Beneath
a clear silence hung in the high blue air of summer two young men slowly walk
across the milewide river’s road bridge and away from the town of their elapsed
morning. The traffic passing them on either side of the central pedestrian
walkway does so noiselessly.
Of
the two, the taller has lemonblond hair, a shaggy string mop of pulled curls
punished and bleached beneath four weeks’ harsh Mediterranean sunlight. He
smokes a cigarette, poorly, and the plastic bag of records he carries flaps
erratic in the breeze.
The
other limps, is the cause of their languorous tread, and his hair is so black
as to suck light out of the immediate sky and reflect nothing.
There
is no sound from their moving lips.
Upon
reaching the other side they lie down on the grassy bevel edging the open
blacktar car-park and await their scheduled collection, both becoming quickly
bored of their initial wish that each car entering either edge of their
periphery be the one familiar.
They
watch various aeroplanes’ silent progress across the sky, each allowed time
enough for the sharp trail of air visible in its wake to become a dusty smear,
slowly fade, and finally evaporate beyond perception.
The
afternoon pulls on and on in its dumbness.
The
blond youth again sits up and puts to his dry mouth another cigarette pulled
from its box, a struck match cupped in his palms until he can taste the heat of
burning tobacco. He looks around and across at the city, then back to the
entrance of the car-park, the weight and texture to the smoke he sucks and
blows belying the actual depth of inhalation.
Recovered
and restless, his friend takes the box of matches over to an empty cardboard
carton littering the tarmac and hunkers down alongside.
Within
seconds, smoke palls thick and grey around his scrawny body; he steps back a
little.
And
now, noise begins.
A
rumbling crescendo hiss as the fire takes solid hold on the box.
With
daylight draining them of colour and drama there is little brilliance to the
flames themselves, but the city buildings across the river lose focus in the
heavy thermal gauze rising from the burning card.
The
noise being produced is of an awesome ferocity, a warfare acoustic running
thresholds without level until a sudden breeze moves the box a yard or two and
the volume begins to die with the fading orange flicker.
Standing
in the returned silence he feels the last smoke pervade his clothes and pass
while his lips form the words he cannot tell his friend:
Skunk:
I don’t think she’s coming.
