Dale visited Flossmans sporadically to see or pick up his girlfriend. She worked in the lingerie department. It exuded erotic and dark flavours and charms – spiced sandalwood, chicory and sweet chrism brightened by infusions of pomegranate and rose petal.
Why Dale stopped talking to Genevieve and lost interest in her and her mother he would never recall. He broke his leg coming off old Salzerac, his father’s harness horse and missed the end of term and graduation. At the end of the holidays he was sent to board at a mediocre private Agnostic school in the city while the rest of his friends and class remained in the township and attended the local comprehensive.
By the end of winter the saddler’s son had in fact made the soap factory girl fall in love with him. He abandoned the school playground at midday recess and occasionally skipped class to see her on her lunch break, or when she was working a split shift.
She started working at the soap factory when it opened in autumn. He walked her home through the butterscotch and peanut brittle leaves. He was the son of a saddler. It seemed right to Dale when he told her he would make her fall in love with him.
Many people deride pity. Like an allergy it incites discomfort and queesiness from any number of causes – often its a case of inflated pride and insecurities. To these people I say, ‘Damn you – Damn you all the way to the Pity Monster!’
The following Monday Josphine wrote a review of Finn’s birthday movie night in the double-sheeted weekly newspaper Lieb had just launched. It was titled Amateur Perfectionist Projectionist.
Duston and Russell grew frustrated and tired missing or letting lizards slip through their fingers. They deliberately flattened their hands and began indiscriminately smacking the walls. They squashed one accidentally and were satisfied. Then Duston pinned a straw lizard against a hot brick.
The plane soared upward like a ballistic Phoenix until it was a splinter in the sun and everyone squinted and turned away. They missed it curl around. Then it swooped down to a choir of hoops and screams that lifted and fell when it appeared gravity would smite its cavalier defiance.
Gonzalos swims in the light sleep of morning. He dances in his dreams to a bolero of unrequited love Rosita is humming. She had started singing boleros the day before, with her head drooped over the starboard aft, her gaze lost in the shimmering water like she was singing to the ocean itself.
