an aphasic moment
(by dim aldebaran)
:i
I.
Artemis had intended it to be an affair in only the most professional sense of the word—
—but then, intentions rarely have anything to do with the end result.
When words were said and the deal was done, he stands and smiles and somehow—somehow—he shakes her hand.
As she walks out the door, he can only think: the smooth way her hand slid into his and how he touched the silk of her skin and grasped it and for a moment, for a time, it was as if she was his, even as her hand slid out again and curled into a crisp wave of farewell—
He blinks.
II.
He had no reason ever to see her again, he realizes over a breakfast of toast and tea.
…to never feel that hand, slipping into his, slipping in and clasping with a gentle firmness, slipping in and slipping out of his life…
He sets down his Darjeeling and considers:
She was a businesswoman, a mere representative of a company he would never deal with again.
—the steam rises from the tea—
There had been nothing special about her: moderate intelligence, a handsome face, and perhaps that gift of a perfect smile.
—it curls into twisted, tortured shapes—
The meeting had been a ten minute affair, with nothing of any real importance to either party on the table.
—spinning a lattice of mad dreams before his eyes—
There had been no emotion, nothing, until the end, until that smile and that hand and the way she walked away from him as if she didn't care.
—rising, rising desperately into the air, twining and spiraling in on itself—
And after, after! The ghost of her, the thought, the curve of her neck and the sweep of her waist, and even now he can see her, smiling that knowing smile and reaching out her hand…
—coupling fervently, empty thoughts and only that heat, only that memory of heat—
Abruptly, he stands. The door slams shut.
—and evanescing to nothing in a cold, cold world—
He didn't even know her name.
III.
He settles down at the piano.
His breath curls in the cold morning air, and for a moment he wonders what it would be like, to simply stop that unsteady rhythm that is life and end it with a couplet out of rhyme.
—and, slowly, he begins to play.
He plays of a world where logic is only implicated, he plays of a time where thought is for sinners and sins are for thinkers, he plays of a land where that high lattice has fallen and there is only ever that which you build yourself, he plays of a world, a world, a high world where maybe he wasn't Artemis and maybe he could be free of the chains he had fallen in love with and maybe he couldn't have to simply continue to continue to pretend—
The song is Träumerei, a Schumann.
—and not even the memory can stop his shame.
He does not slam down on the keys in his anger. That would be… childish.
IV.
In his bed, he slowly draws his pen over a notebook, tracing the outlines of mad dreams, each more grandiose and absurd than the last. Mere anarchy is not enough for him anymore, mere anarchy had never been enough…
He closes his eyes, breathing in the stale air of a prison, breathing and breathing and breathing since breathing is all anyone can ever do—
When he opens his eyes, the words are still there.
…and all he can do is breathe…
i:
Nothing good ever comes of crushes, except for very bad, simplistic writing. Apologies, but every once in a while it's just nice to have things out there, even if people don't simply don't care.
It's Mozzie's birthday today, so I suppose this is for him, if that means anything for a dedication. So, bon anniversaire and all that jazz.