2 Bad Dates

The gulls’ nest has slowly descended along the roof’s valley from spring, when it was at the ridge, slowly, almost glacial, a prickly brown glacier. A few heavy rainstorms might take it off there completely, but after a cold spring killed the chicks, one doubts the parents will return, thinking the nook cursed. Do animals believe in curses? Seafaring birds must believe in curses, it is something they learn from the water.
When I arrived home from our first date, the cat greeted me noisily. She scolded me, too – for it was five hours past her dinnertime – and harassed my ankles until I spooned a pouch into her bowl. Afterwards, she sat on the dining table and watched as I ate an orange. The peel was tremendous, soft as marshmallow; it came easily from the flesh and perfumed the plate from where it lay, still slightly curved.

When I arrived home from the second date, the cat greeted me with nonchalance, although one could hardly describe it as a greeting, weaving through my ankles to sit in the communal corridor and preen herself. When I said—‘Oi, come on, indoors.’ She rolled and stretched herself, all her bones light like a bird’s; she clawed tightly over my shoulder, both of us pulling the other closer.
On the doormat, I put the bottle of wine down and an all-day breakfast sandwich I bought at the shop next to the train station. White bread clings to the sausages; the egg defined only by its outline; tomato ketchup sixty-nine’ing butter; bacon ripples; and on the front BRITISH PORK, in bold letters as if it were the Good News we had, every kid with a television set, been waiting for.

The Prosciutto di Parma was aged eighteen months and summer had turned. Over my mother’s shoulder was the hometown and although I no longer had any affection or connexion with it, those streets & shopfronts had power to move me. We had forgone breakfast, so the booze – a prosecco and a cyder – would hit a little harder. The food was delicious, one of those meals you sink into your gut and it flowers until every tremulous limb you keep off the table is electric.
Once my cutlery was together, I walked through the town, as the cool wind that came along the High St penetrated me and all my extremities, such as my fingers & hair. Caution! I thought, do not bump into old acquaintances, but there were none and I was as disappointed as I was comfortable. There was the bookshop I bought my curriculum from: Flaubert, Ibsen, Miller. An entire town hidden in the memories I made over two decades ago.

When the weather turns, they tie a weight to the pulley and it keeps their front door closed against the cold. At first: blank. And then, in an Australian accent—‘Remind me of your name again.’ Always my surname; my father might be pleased our surname is in print. Europeans into Australia ignored culture so they could focus on coffee. By the fifth day, the baristas remember me. I walk to the office beneath the overhang of the meat market.
They were in London for a bit and after they had bred, they would likely move out to the sticks. They were, quite truthfully, lovely people and, amongst the smoke, I have met none like them. He was a bearded Jesus-type and she some hippie devilish brunette with eyes deep enough to bends in. She got pregnant and they invited me to their new years’ eve party – although I was in love – and asked me to turn my amp down. Their firstborn turns ten this year.

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