Tram ScribblesspacedmonkeyOctober 27 2012, 15:13:46 UTC
Largely because my notebook is getting full of scribbly bits...
"Have you broken your hand?"
"Have you developed x-ray vision now?"
"I should decline to know what that is, but no, I don't believe so. he plonks himself next to me on the tram and nods towards my right hand. "However, it is bruising as I look at it and quite swollen. Did the good doctor look at it?"
"I only really noticed it last night, so, no. I'm sure it's fine."
"No you're not."
"Okay, well, it has no option other than fine. I can't afford a broken hand."
The early tram seems to be a favourite of his at the moment while I am tired enough to sleep through my stop.
"Person, look up. You took your normal seat while the two men that alternately sit opposite you looked at their seat and walked away."
"Not odd behaviour. The floor opposite is covered in blood."
"So you conclude that the blood troubled two men in a way that doesn't concern you?"
"If I conclude that it was my presence that made them break from their routine what I am the constant and the blood is a new variable then I'd be in a huge spiral and I'm not. Blood upsets people." I look up. "I'm sure I upset people too, " I conceed, "but today I'm just sitting and scribbling so it's all fine."
Re: Tram ScribbleswraithwitchOctober 27 2012, 15:29:57 UTC
*laughs* the first and the last are my favourites =) I love 'Do the charge per broken bone?' and also just picturing his look and tone for 'there's a tiny tree in the stairwell' heehee =)
Re: Tram ScribbleswraithwitchOctober 27 2012, 15:43:36 UTC
Vincent stood at the end of the bed, one arm across the brass rail, watching me as I sat huddled, sullen and insane amidst the duvet. “You’re always at war. What enemy is so-”
“Everything,” I interrupted. “I’ll fight everything.”
His eyes showed understanding. Not the glassy, superficial comprehension most people exhibit; but actual understanding, true and utterly unselfconscious. He sat on the bed, still looking at me as if I was a colour scheme that needed to be put right. “But you don’t want to fight. If you did, you’d be better at it.” His hands hovered, almost touching my arm, fingers close to the mauve, red and ocher burn that hadn’t quite healed. “All those wounds... you want to be saved.” He looked at me, eyes sharp but blurring to confusion beneath a furrowed brow. “What do you need saving from?”
“I don’t know. Myself probably,” I commented with a queasy smile.
“You should go to your family. Theo is very good to me - he is like the bedrock of the earth when above ground all has turned to a tempest.”
“I can’t talk to my brother, I’m meant to be making his wedding ring.”
He looked at the lump of silver, plucked it up, rolled it in his palm and put it down again. Whilst he managed not to frown, he offered no words of reassurance or encouragement either.
I didn’t need his criticism to know it was an awful piece. “Yeah, and that’s why I can’t talk to him,” I snarled.
He shrugged, and how a shrug could seem so bloody French I don’t know especially since he’s Dutch. “Then absinthe, wine and prostitutes.”
“This isn’t Paris in the Belle Epoch, this is Sussex.”
He shrugged again, a smaller movement as if ridding his coat of raindrops.
It was unfair to force him to come up with answers to my issues but he was there and so would bear the brunt of my hopeless frustration. “What do you do when it’s all so fucking awful and you’re sick of it all and want to cry or bleed but you’ve done that too many times before and even your art has deserted you and-”
“Stay at Saint-Paul-de Mausole,” he said simply. Then: “You should talk to him. Your man.”
I gave him an anguished look. “Yes, because you always tell the ones you love everything no matter the cost.”
He frowned. “Truth cannot-”
“So you always wrote to Theo, did you? When you were going mad and drinking turpentine you always wrote to Theo, never crossed anything out, always sent the letters you started, never scrunched them up for kindling because what you wanted to say made no sense?”
His head bowed reluctantly.
“Thought so,” I commented nastily. My venom left me hollow. “Maybe I should go to hospital. Then at least I’d know I’d reached the floor of the abyss.”
“The sky has no roof nor the abyss a floor,” he said softly. “God made both infinite.”
“Yeah well I can’t fucking cope with infinite depression and infinite I’m-for-shit, so there had better bloody be a floor to this mess.” I had no idea if any of that had made sense and didn’t care. “I think I need to break.”
He gave me a sideways look.
“Everything’s fraying, cracking - it has been forever. I want to rip the whole lot out and start again. Raze it all and begin again instead of spending all my time trying to sand down and fill the cracks.”
“You want to be saved.”
“I want to be destroyed,” I corrected.
“No - to be destroyed is oblivion. You don’t want peace. You want all the pieces to be whole again. It’s not the wound you need but the-” He waved at the scab on my arm. “The healing.”
I pulled a face. “Cuts are clean and burns don’t hurt; getting the fuckers to heal, that’s an entirely different matter - they hurt and itch and are ugly and I hate them.”
He shook his head, a stilted twist from one side to the other. “That’s not what you hate.”
“Really?” I challenged. “What is it then?”
He didn’t blink, irises as vast and blue as the Caribbean sea. “You hate that the wound heals, but it does not heal you. Like a splinter you can’t find to pull out.”
I shivered. Being cold when the room is at 20 degrees along with being catatonicly tired or twitching is always bad news and shows my brain has or is in the process of capsizing.
He reached over and pulled back a corner of the duvet. “I’ll wake you if he calls.”
I noticed the charcoal and paper that had appeared from a pocket but didn’t comment.
Re: Tram ScribbleswraithwitchOctober 27 2012, 15:59:44 UTC
Vincent, when not crazy or absorbed in painting, really is somewhat lovely.
And there may well be all those things in Sussex - or at least Grinstead - but I have no idea where and can't very well ring up a taxi to drive me to the nearest bordello/absinthe-den =)
"Have you broken your hand?"
"Have you developed x-ray vision now?"
"I should decline to know what that is, but no, I don't believe so. he plonks himself next to me on the tram and nods towards my right hand. "However, it is bruising as I look at it and quite swollen. Did the good doctor look at it?"
"I only really noticed it last night, so, no. I'm sure it's fine."
"No you're not."
"Okay, well, it has no option other than fine. I can't afford a broken hand."
"Do they charge you per broken bone?"
"Work wise."
"And I'm the mad man?"
"I think we're fairly clear on that."
============================================================
"Observe your behaviour."
"Too early!"
The early tram seems to be a favourite of his at the moment while I am tired enough to sleep through my stop.
"Person, look up. You took your normal seat while the two men that alternately sit opposite you looked at their seat and walked away."
"Not odd behaviour. The floor opposite is covered in blood."
"So you conclude that the blood troubled two men in a way that doesn't concern you?"
"If I conclude that it was my presence that made them break from their routine what I am the constant and the blood is a new variable then I'd be in a huge spiral and I'm not. Blood upsets people." I look up. "I'm sure I upset people too, " I conceed, "but today I'm just sitting and scribbling so it's all fine."
============================================================
"There is a tiny tree in the stairwell."
"It's a Bonsai."
"Bon sigh?"
"A tiny tree."
"Why do we have a tiny tree? Does it grow tiny fruit?"
"It was a gift from K. Raven's K. And no, it doesn't grow tiny fruit. At least I don't think it does although how cool would that be?"
"Focus!"
"Sorry."
"Why is it tiny?"
"Magic."
"You mean you don't know."
"Yep. Are you staying on the floor because I need to go to work."
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I love 'Do the charge per broken bone?' and also just picturing his look and tone for 'there's a tiny tree in the stairwell' heehee =)
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“Everything,” I interrupted. “I’ll fight everything.”
His eyes showed understanding. Not the glassy, superficial comprehension most people exhibit; but actual understanding, true and utterly unselfconscious. He sat on the bed, still looking at me as if I was a colour scheme that needed to be put right. “But you don’t want to fight. If you did, you’d be better at it.” His hands hovered, almost touching my arm, fingers close to the mauve, red and ocher burn that hadn’t quite healed. “All those wounds... you want to be saved.” He looked at me, eyes sharp but blurring to confusion beneath a furrowed brow. “What do you need saving from?”
“I don’t know. Myself probably,” I commented with a queasy smile.
“You should go to your family. Theo is very good to me - he is like the bedrock of the earth when above ground all has turned to a tempest.”
“I can’t talk to my brother, I’m meant to be making his wedding ring.”
He looked at the lump of silver, plucked it up, rolled it in his palm and put it down again. Whilst he managed not to frown, he offered no words of reassurance or encouragement either.
I didn’t need his criticism to know it was an awful piece. “Yeah, and that’s why I can’t talk to him,” I snarled.
He shrugged, and how a shrug could seem so bloody French I don’t know especially since he’s Dutch. “Then absinthe, wine and prostitutes.”
“This isn’t Paris in the Belle Epoch, this is Sussex.”
He shrugged again, a smaller movement as if ridding his coat of raindrops.
It was unfair to force him to come up with answers to my issues but he was there and so would bear the brunt of my hopeless frustration. “What do you do when it’s all so fucking awful and you’re sick of it all and want to cry or bleed but you’ve done that too many times before and even your art has deserted you and-”
“Stay at Saint-Paul-de Mausole,” he said simply. Then: “You should talk to him. Your man.”
I gave him an anguished look. “Yes, because you always tell the ones you love everything no matter the cost.”
He frowned. “Truth cannot-”
“So you always wrote to Theo, did you? When you were going mad and drinking turpentine you always wrote to Theo, never crossed anything out, always sent the letters you started, never scrunched them up for kindling because what you wanted to say made no sense?”
His head bowed reluctantly.
“Thought so,” I commented nastily. My venom left me hollow. “Maybe I should go to hospital. Then at least I’d know I’d reached the floor of the abyss.”
“The sky has no roof nor the abyss a floor,” he said softly. “God made both infinite.”
“Yeah well I can’t fucking cope with infinite depression and infinite I’m-for-shit, so there had better bloody be a floor to this mess.” I had no idea if any of that had made sense and didn’t care. “I think I need to break.”
He gave me a sideways look.
“Everything’s fraying, cracking - it has been forever. I want to rip the whole lot out and start again. Raze it all and begin again instead of spending all my time trying to sand down and fill the cracks.”
“You want to be saved.”
“I want to be destroyed,” I corrected.
“No - to be destroyed is oblivion. You don’t want peace. You want all the pieces to be whole again. It’s not the wound you need but the-” He waved at the scab on my arm. “The healing.”
I pulled a face. “Cuts are clean and burns don’t hurt; getting the fuckers to heal, that’s an entirely different matter - they hurt and itch and are ugly and I hate them.”
He shook his head, a stilted twist from one side to the other. “That’s not what you hate.”
“Really?” I challenged. “What is it then?”
He didn’t blink, irises as vast and blue as the Caribbean sea. “You hate that the wound heals, but it does not heal you. Like a splinter you can’t find to pull out.”
I shivered. Being cold when the room is at 20 degrees along with being catatonicly tired or twitching is always bad news and shows my brain has or is in the process of capsizing.
He reached over and pulled back a corner of the duvet. “I’ll wake you if he calls.”
I noticed the charcoal and paper that had appeared from a pocket but didn’t comment.
Reply
Plus, I'm fairly sure there are absinthe, wine and prostitutes in Sussex, although that might just be East Grinstead.
Reply
And there may well be all those things in Sussex - or at least Grinstead - but I have no idea where and can't very well ring up a taxi to drive me to the nearest bordello/absinthe-den =)
Reply
He really is. Same as himself, although I might not say that out loud.
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