Time Stood Still

His voice was a clear indicator that something was terribly wrong.

Whether it was the slight tremble in his tone or his restlessness in shifting his weight, she could not decide. He kept on talking, hastily, spitting out words quicker than his heartbeat. He was loud, but she did not understand a word that fell from his lips. It was the language, perhaps, that made her body stiffen and a lump form in her throat.

He was talking too fast, and she could not fathom why.He knew she was here; he knew she was going to be here. And never before, in their two years of friendship, did his lips move so quickly. With a forced laugh, though no one else could know that it was unnaturally coming from his belly, he ran his fingers through his hair and paused. He was looking right at her.

For a minute, time stood still.

It was as if no one else was there, his eyes never tore away from her. Her eyes never tore away from him. He stumbled on his words, muttering a quick apology and offering his signature warm smile before straightening the paper in front of him. Fixing his microphone, although it was perfectly in place before, he glanced up.

After his short pause, he spoke softly and slowly, making sure that she could comprehend everything he was saying. But she did not want to know how grateful he was that everyone had attended the event. She did not care that he felt honored to be invited as a guest speaker. She wanted to know what he had said.

So when he came down from the podium, she asked him.

“Minor mishaps with my initial script, a bit too long, a lot of unnecessary information that I had to skim through-“

“But what did you say?” Her words, still vaguely unfamiliar to the new tone of the language, were clear to him.

“I told you, it was the original script, just rushed through.” He tried to reassure her, but her eyebrows stayed furrowed. He sighed heavily and gave her shoulder a soft pat.

He walked away from her to shake hands with someone she did not know. The man leaned over his shoulder to whisper something, making the both of them smile and nod. Just as the man opened his mouth, he started talking.

“May I introduce you to Alaiza?” He gestured for her to come over. She shook hands with the man, despite the initial shocked expression and pursed lips that were quickly disposed of when she came to them.

“Hello, Alaiza.” The man said calmly. He made an apology and excused himself, claiming to greet someone who had just arrived.

“Is it because I am Arabic?” She finally asked him. He wanted to reassure her, she could see it, but she did not let him. “Because I am a Muslim, that is why you gave a different speech.”

“Alaiza-“

“And someone told you to change this speech. You did not talk about friendship, or unity, or acceptance! You said what they told you to say!” Her voice trembled, tears brimming in her eyes as her face grew hot.

“Be quiet, people are staring.” He stepped closer to her, whisper-shouting.

“Let them stare, let them hear us. I do not care. I am a proud Muslim, and you are a coward.”


Katya Tjahaja

August

Thanks to those who are soldiering on with stories - hopefully some of our other contributors are still reading, thinking and scribbling.  For August, the Artistic Director has offered this inspiring idea:  Time stood still. I hope this gets the creative juices flowing for the next 31 days.

Stories to rosemary.mcbryde@gmail.com by 31 August. Happy writing!

The push and the pull

The canvas captures three shadowy figures on the back seat of a car. Big, middle sized and small, they are seen as though the front seat passenger has just turned her head to – what? Issue a reprimand? Check if they are asleep yet? In the distance, through the back window, two sets of taillights recede while the hint of headlights beyond the straight illuminates a stand of pines and the corrugations of a farm shed.

One girl offers a direct gaze, the smallest of the three. She’s off centre, edging away from the child on the left who leans in, her hand stretching forward to the unseen front seat passenger. To the right, the oldest is in half profile, her forehead resting against the glass as she stares out into the darkness.

Shona steps back to view the canvas. It’s almost there but not quite. Not quite right. It’s still just a memory of the familiar nighttime ride home from their grandparents’ town, hemmed between Fiona’s wriggling and squishing, and broody Bron, whose stabbing right elbow would catch her in the ribs accompanied by a low, hissed “Move over!”

Shona drops the brush into water and walks to the kitchen. She drains the teapot into her cup and steps outside. The hens dust bath in the vegetable patch in late afternoon sun which has turned the bay to sequins. A tui calls to its mate in the swamp gums.

When Fraser left her, the noise in town was unbearable. Without the masking barrier of his music playing in the next room, the neighbour’s steady stereo bassline was relentless. She missed the doors opening and closing downstairs, the rattle of kitchen preparations and the waft of spices, humming in the shower along the hall and the discarded running shoes. Overnight, there was only other people’s dogs, children, lawnmowers, music.

The cottage felt like a homecoming from the first viewing and she consented to sell the family home without hesitation.

Fiona was horrified. “What will you do all the way out there? What if something happens? All by yourself… it’s just a knee jerk reaction. You’re upset – why not wait a few more months…”

“He always was a prick. I never liked him,” Bron jabbed. “Move on. Make a fresh start.”

A cool breeze rattles the flax leaves. Shona wraps her paint stained shirt more tightly around her body, and returns to the warmth of the house. She throws another log on the wood burner and takes the brush from the jar, wiping it on her shirt.

She knows what it needs now – a puzzle, a premonition. She loads the brush to gift her younger self the hint of a smile.


Rosemary McBryde

Puttin' on the Ritz

Anthony takes the AirTrain from the Hotel to Howard Beach Station where he transfers to the A Train, then the L Train, then the 123 Uptown to Broadway. From the station it is still a long walk on hard concrete through thick crowds of grim humans to reach ‘Harry’s Shoes’.

     Have you seen the well-to-do
     Up on Lennox Avenue
     On that famous thoroughfare
     With their noses in the air?

There are too many people, too many buildings, too many miles of canyon-like road to negotiate.

Anthony mutters to himself, ‘My awa is Oruarangi, my maunga is Pukeiti …’

He weaves his way through the crowds.

     That’s where each and every Lulu Belle goes
     Every Thursday evening with her swell beaus
     Rubbin’ elbows …

It is almost impossible not to rub elbows.

At ‘West Side Stationers’ – 2620 Broadway (corner of West 99th Street) – Anthony buys a note book and pen, green with little stags’ heads on it.

He sits in ‘Starbucks’:

‘Everything is water. I slip and slide and get stuck in sodden earth. It is a grove. The silence is defined by the constant, irregular drip of water from high branches and the gurgle of the tide on the rocks. There are the footprints of ducks in the mud and, as the light fades, frogs chorus. On the fence – the decomposing body of a pukeko.’


Barnaby McBryde

Rats

It was time he moved out, moved on, generally got his life reconstituted. New job, new house, new relationship – certainly an end of this current madness.

The one good thing about working in a laboratory where they tortured animals without end – and as far as one’s psychic and spiritual well-being there had to be some significant compensation – was that in the lunchroom he could sometimes talk to the scientists, the psychologists, the experimental ecologists about their ideas.

It had long been known that, given access to a lever that dispensed cocaine, laboratory rats would push that lever without cease and snort coke until they died a seemingly miserable death. It was an irresistible addiction.

It took an imaginative scientist to wonder if that was really inevitable. What is the life of a laboratory rat in general? – a small, sterile cage; no elbow room; loneliness; a lack of social interaction and family ties; endless sameness; endless lack of conformity with his or her own nature. And more – one scientist had constructed cages that measured the pressure that the rats’ feet applied to the floor. That was for use in experiments to measure how much pain the rats could endure but it revealed a coincidental fact – when a human walked into the room the rats started walking on tiptoe.

The imaginative scientist built what she called a ‘rat park’ – soil, plants, sunlight, dark, tunnels, space, nooks, unconstrained social interaction, freedom … and then, the cocaine lever. The rats tried it once and then got on with their lives. It was time to move on.


Dhiraja

Elbow Room

I just need time alone, away.

He told me these exact words on the 20th of August last year. When I asked him where he was planning to go, he clicked his tongue against the roof of his mouth in dismay. The rest of the drive back to mine was silent after that, excluding the radio in his car that blared out a steady beat, pounding in my ear.

When I looked at him that day, he was different. Unrecognizable from a distance, with a haunting darkness and looming melancholy over his face. His eyes never lit up, and a frown stained his face eternally. I was upset, disappointed, in rage with what he had become.

But I didn’t say anything to him.

“Hey,” he called out as I shut the car door. “I’m going to be alright, I just need some time.”

I didn’t say anything to this. I couldn’t. One look into his mellow eyes and I thought he was going to leave and never return, and I was ready to forget him. I didn’t want to see him ever again. After a year, I had my fair share of tears and anger and disappointment, I was done with constantly being physically sick and tired of worrying.

So when he arrived back at my front door on the 21st of August this year I screamed. Whether it was purely from joy or panic, I am still unsure. I was ready to yell at him and ask where he’s been, slap him and hug him. I didn’t dare answer the front door or climb down the stairs.

“He’s back!” My mother flung my bedroom door open, overzealously, expecting me to be excited. When I turned down her offer of seeing him again, she gave a pitiful smile and proceeded downstairs with pursed lips.

He came back the next day, and the next, until it was late September. After weeks of attempting, my mother forced me to see him. She told me I could just greet him and decide whether or not to say anything else. I agreed and made my way downstairs.

I thought I was going to yell at him and interrogate him mercilessly, until I actually saw him.

How he looked from the stairs, playing with his car keys and humming, made me smile the slightest bit. I wanted to cry and laugh, run up to him and literally jump for joy. Seeing his face made me realize how his freckles had multiplied and the gleam in his eyes had emerged once more. Displaying his pearly white teeth, he opened his arms, timidly, and waited for me to go up to him and embrace him.

In a few hours, we found ourselves inside his car headed for a frozen yogurt store.

“I told you I’d be alright,” he clicked his tongue. “I just needed some time.”

“And a hell lot of elbow room,” I smirked his way. He laughed, throwing his head back.


Katya Tjahaja

July

It's heartening to receive stories every month from our loyal band of writers - and others send an apology or a promise to write soon.  Spread the word, as more writers are welcome any time.  This month, as the days are short and we spend too much time inside, see what you can do with "Elbow room".
Stories of 300 - 500 words (or so) to rosemary.mcbryde@gmail.com.  Happy writing!