Our conversations start at 4 a.m. (Adult: Romance)
Posted: August 29th, 2011, 7:18 am
Arthur can’t describe what it means to be in love. It seems absurd, somehow, to put it into words; he can’t channel sentiment into poetry. What does spring to his mind when people say love are odd fragments: long fingers draped across a green bedspread, brown hair curling around white fingers, green eyes laughing.
He thinks in colors.
*********
They meet when they’re seventeen, on opposite sides of a debate competition in a wide hall of expectant faces. Emery speaks and gesticulates with supreme confidence about the pen being mightier than the mouse, besting him, until Arthur goes in for the kill: case of a six year old who escaped from her kidnappers using a laptop. It’s not very relevant (it only shows the wonders of technology, not the superiority of the technology over the written word) but Arthur hopes that the case is moving and impactful enough that the judges won’t notice. Indeed, they don’t; by the time Arthur is done with reciting how Lila was handed back to her weeping parents, there’s a hushed silence in the hall and people are dabbing their eyes.
Emery flounders. There’s no way to make a hard hitting rebuttal to this that won’t make her seem heartless and cruel; she stumbles through a weak response. It falls flat, feeble, and Arthur allows himself to feel a twinge of sympathy before reminding himself that he’s in this to win.
He’s been told that a lot. You’re in this to win, Arthur. His father had first said it to him a rainy Saturday evening when he’d dragged a bored fifteen year old Arthur to play poker with his uncles. Arthur remembers the shuffle of the cards, the gleam in his dad’s eye. Arthur had won that game, and many more after that, and almost been driven to hit his head against the wall by the amount of times his father would use poker as a metaphor. ‘Life is the game, son. You’re not here to play. You’re here to win.’ Yes, Dad. If you could stop spouting movie lines, I’d play poker with you more often.
At the end of the debate a beaming judge pronounces Arthur and his team the brightest youngsters she’s seen in a while, and wishes the others ‘better luck’ next time. Arthur’s lips quirk up at the corners when he sees Emery huff in annoyance across the hall. She’s seated, legs crossed, on a lone chair a little apart from her team, looking down at her lap, and Arthur watches her. He notices the tendrils of black hair escaping from a hastily made bun, the green eyes flecked with grey. Long lashes rimming her cheek like a Japanese fan, one foot tapping the floor in a staccato rhythm, and suddenly he wants to know her.
It’s not difficult. Arthur hunts up someone who has her number, someone who belongs to their mutual network of seventeen year olds killing time in the same neighborhood. He isn’t nervous until the call goes to voicemail and he hears her answering phone message.
‘Leave a message.’ Curt. The beep sounds, and his mouth goes dry. What the hell does he say? But there’s a reason Arthur’s on the debate team. He thinks quickly.
‘Hey, have I reached Emery? I just wanted to say you kind of look like a Bond girl. Call me back, okay?’
He hangs up.
On reflection, he concludes it was probably his father’s influence that got him on the team.
***********
Hey guys, please let me know what you think. Stupid? Good? Terrible? Would you want to read more about Arthur and Emery? Even a line will do. Constructive criticism is welcomed. You have no idea what a difference it makes to a writer to get feedback.
He thinks in colors.
*********
They meet when they’re seventeen, on opposite sides of a debate competition in a wide hall of expectant faces. Emery speaks and gesticulates with supreme confidence about the pen being mightier than the mouse, besting him, until Arthur goes in for the kill: case of a six year old who escaped from her kidnappers using a laptop. It’s not very relevant (it only shows the wonders of technology, not the superiority of the technology over the written word) but Arthur hopes that the case is moving and impactful enough that the judges won’t notice. Indeed, they don’t; by the time Arthur is done with reciting how Lila was handed back to her weeping parents, there’s a hushed silence in the hall and people are dabbing their eyes.
Emery flounders. There’s no way to make a hard hitting rebuttal to this that won’t make her seem heartless and cruel; she stumbles through a weak response. It falls flat, feeble, and Arthur allows himself to feel a twinge of sympathy before reminding himself that he’s in this to win.
He’s been told that a lot. You’re in this to win, Arthur. His father had first said it to him a rainy Saturday evening when he’d dragged a bored fifteen year old Arthur to play poker with his uncles. Arthur remembers the shuffle of the cards, the gleam in his dad’s eye. Arthur had won that game, and many more after that, and almost been driven to hit his head against the wall by the amount of times his father would use poker as a metaphor. ‘Life is the game, son. You’re not here to play. You’re here to win.’ Yes, Dad. If you could stop spouting movie lines, I’d play poker with you more often.
At the end of the debate a beaming judge pronounces Arthur and his team the brightest youngsters she’s seen in a while, and wishes the others ‘better luck’ next time. Arthur’s lips quirk up at the corners when he sees Emery huff in annoyance across the hall. She’s seated, legs crossed, on a lone chair a little apart from her team, looking down at her lap, and Arthur watches her. He notices the tendrils of black hair escaping from a hastily made bun, the green eyes flecked with grey. Long lashes rimming her cheek like a Japanese fan, one foot tapping the floor in a staccato rhythm, and suddenly he wants to know her.
It’s not difficult. Arthur hunts up someone who has her number, someone who belongs to their mutual network of seventeen year olds killing time in the same neighborhood. He isn’t nervous until the call goes to voicemail and he hears her answering phone message.
‘Leave a message.’ Curt. The beep sounds, and his mouth goes dry. What the hell does he say? But there’s a reason Arthur’s on the debate team. He thinks quickly.
‘Hey, have I reached Emery? I just wanted to say you kind of look like a Bond girl. Call me back, okay?’
He hangs up.
On reflection, he concludes it was probably his father’s influence that got him on the team.
***********
Hey guys, please let me know what you think. Stupid? Good? Terrible? Would you want to read more about Arthur and Emery? Even a line will do. Constructive criticism is welcomed. You have no idea what a difference it makes to a writer to get feedback.