GRAZES

GRAZES

         Much later, in bed, she told me how scared she was. She held me closer, looked at my chest, held my forearms and told me in a voice that spoke of vulnerability. I kissed her forehead, and looked up at the ceiling as I said it was OK. We didn’t look at each other. Moments like these are too fragile for eye contact; the meeting of such raw emotion with what was such a small incident can make you betray a tearful giggle, or worse - a dismissal, a shrug followed by a cold silence, and then either a lonely night or a false imitation of intimacy.

         I had known all along, of course. Her touch on my coat had been that little bit more firm, urgent even, and I’d noticed her breath catch with something more than pity. Looking back now I can see more – a finality in her step, perhaps, the occasional break in her voice after it happened.

         In truth, in cold hard fact, it was just a bird. We hit it just 10 minutes out of the park, a soft thud against the bonnet, barely a tangible resistance. She stopped the car. We stepped out. It was a robin; dead of course, its shock of red compensating for the lack of blood, betraying a vitality that mocked its lifeless state. Even in death it was beautiful. I took off my gloves and felt it with my bare hands. Every touch - the fading warmth, the downy feathers, the twiglike bones – was an echo, a trace of what had once been truth. I looked at her and saw fear, not in her eyes but in her mouth, in the corners of her lips. I said nothing.

         We could not bury it in the earth. Nor could we throw it away, nor leave it in a tree in imitation of life. The problem became huge as the creature became cold in my hands. When we finally placed it on frosted leaves at the base of a hazel tree, I said something about fertilising new life, maybe even some crap about a natural cycle, and she said; “Let’s go home.” We both knew though, when we carried it from the road, and laid it out of view so we could not see it from the car, what neither of us would say. Neither of us would talk of decomposing, of flesh becoming food, of red turning to grey. She sped away shaken, and in my mind I let the robin grow and grow.

         Because, of course, it was not ‘just a bird’, not in any way that mattered. That wintry day we had braved the elements, travelled outside the city, breathed in views, held each other in the chill, ate under a fierce Winter sun, kissed in a dusky silhouette, made love and made promises. What this was was something grotesque, a scar on a perfect memory. This was an ugly omen wrapped in something beautiful, malicious ink advancing over fragile paper. In our minds the bird became metaphor, so we held each other tighter, and grew fearful.

* * * * * * * * * *

         We returned in the Spring, tentative but with renewed hope. We climbed up paths of rock in our newly-waxed boots, feeling dewy moss underfoot. We smiled, and held hands, and moved higher to see the city we were not in anymore. The sun warmed our skin as we shed coats and basked in the purity of the air.

         She fell on a stone too small to be called an obstacle. I saw her fall away like a rag doll, her face a picture of dismay, she had rarely looked more beautiful. A sliver of flint broke her fall and tenderly rent open her hand. She gasped at the fresh wound, biting her lip and holding back tears. I saw her as if from a mile away, flailing for her helplessly, and read in her face the fear I suddenly realised had been lodged in my gut all this time: that this was the season’s robin, this pulse and this growing blazon of red; that this would taint this place – no worse, taint us – and all chance of one perfect memory, this small good thing we tried so hard to nurture, would be left to decompose in the earth.

         Against instinct, I did not speak. Whatever was in my throat was hard, and sharp, and unable to heal. So I knelt in the gravel, and took her palm like a broken fortune-teller. I kissed her hand, pressed my lips to the tear and absorbed the angry pulse, shivering at the thought of the life being carried through her. She smiled, and when she put her other hand on my shoulder it felt heavy and hot. She said, “Thank you.”
“I love every part of you that hurts,” I said. She laughed.
“You got that from a film.”
“Yes.”
Droplets of her blood coated the stone. She looked down and shivered.
“Let’s go,” she said.

         At the top we sat, and watched the city’s constellation of lights succumb to tired owners, the sun long since faded. I held her and felt her heart like a butterfly, she pulled me closer and leant against my shoulder. Our bodies were aching, tired from exertion, rebelling against the uncomfortable, unforgiving stone of our resting place. But this time there was no danger, no tainting of perfection, just one more sensation that enveloped us as we watched the city where a multitude of unknown lovers slept. I could feel the air between us, tense and fleeting.

         Moments like this are too fragile for eye contact, but I gazed at her. She looked round at me, understanding, and in her eyes were all the lights of the city.
         We said nothing.