U
With the sudden alteration of what men had to become in wartime, no one considered what women thought or how they would adjust to the change.
For dinner Gerry dispatched a squash chicken and pink rooster with the aplomb of men who kill often, who have experience and have reconciled the matter with their maker.
He is a disavowed prototype, integrated to his surroundings. He doesn’t hesitate. He feels no sin.
A convalescence of solipsistic wandering men conflicted and confused about their context in the new world meet women here. They are tasked with breaking this veneer like men once did, to connect.
In these alcoves of alders spuming with discomfort and resentment Gerry and his men huddle around the dancing dice licked by firelight – unable to accept dice are aleatory and indifferent.
It cannot repair their status, charter or build a new place for them in a reordered world.
Dice dance to their own tune.
Skulduggery rules.
The men do not see life is theirs again to mould on their own.
They are subservient to a higher fate.
Their solitude begrudges companionship.
Definition:
Nes’vi-o’sous adj [nés’vi-ō’sₔs]
1. One who adroitly states the obvious.
2. Fatigue or displacement belonging to an interbellum.
Nes’vi-o’sous-ly adv.
