This page hosted by Get your own Free Homepage

Iodine.

     Susan sat alone at her writing desk and pondered
exactly how one might reply to a letter from an ex-lover. This
first breach of silence in five years had come as something of
a surprise,  for the split could hardly have been called
amicable. The letter had nestled stealthily amongst the bills
and clothing catalogue fliers on her doormat. It's bite had
numbed her to the heart, and now she sat at her desk,
wondering about how she could reply.
     A book of essays by Monangue sat on top of a pile of
books that she  had' to read. Near the bottom sulked a book
by D. H. Lawrence, who she hated. Instant coffee granules lay
scattered across the green leather of the writing surface. She
stared, lacklustre, at the paper under her palm which bore only
the date and her address. Four years ago she would have
known what to write. Four years ago she was sure of their
love. But now that the assured cockiness of youth had passed
she was beginning to doubt the certainties which she had
attributed to herself. She didn't have brown eyes, but neither
were her eyes blue. Nor did she love, but she might care. She
didn't hate the past.
     Susan had lived for the last five years, since the break
up, in a bungalow by a nature reserve. There was a road at the
front of the building, on which deer could be seen at night. In
the morning, occasionally, a car would be left abandoned on
the grass verge, it's bonnet crumpled and it's engine written-off.
 A deer can do a lot of damage when a car hits it at high
speed. One morning shortly after she had moved in she'd
gazed sleepily out of her window to find a stag standing in the
front garden. These days however there seemed to be more
cars, and less deer.
     She doodled on the back of a till receipt and turned the
key in the top drawer. Pulling it open revealed her emergency
supply of chocolate  whole nut' bars. The nuts were her
begrudging nod towards healthy eating. In the drawer beneath
lay a hand mirror which she knew would reveal very little
change from five years previous. Her brown hair was maybe
a little shorter, now only covering the tips of her ears. Behind
the new fashion frames were still the same cold blue eyes. Her
ears had healed, and she now wore longer earrings to
celebrate this. But, all in all her appearance had changed more
drastically by expression than time. She was becoming cynical.
The doorbell rang and she answered it hastily.
     "Good morning, love." said the Parcel-Force delivery
man, "Could you sign for this please."
     She signed the carbon paper and was given the pink
slip and a small square parcel wrapped up in brown paper and
cardboard. It was the golf ball embossing set that she had
ordered from an  innovations' catalogue for her father. It
seemed rather pointless and she started to cry.
     It seemed strange that communication could be
severed so irrevocably. That someone who she'd shared some
of the most intimate and special moments of her life might
disappear from it suddenly and without explanation. Placing
the golf ball stamping machine to one side she doodled on the
writing paper. The radio was tuned to Classic FM.
     "That was a request for Mandy, from Robin, who
loves you very much." said the DJ and Susan smiled.
     They had really loved each other, she was sure of that.
Her first relationship, after years of poking and groping
around in basements. Maybe if her parents had known more
about the poking and groping they wouldn't had objected so
much. Maybe. She brushed the coffee granules aside and
screwed the doodled paper into a ball. Then taking a fresh
sheet of paper she wrote the date and address once more and
put a CD on the hi-fi.
     "I let you love me,  til I was a failure,
Your beauty, on my bruise, like iodine."
     "You were very beautiful then," she thought
nostalgically to herself, "very beautiful of face. Clearness of
thought. Not always beautiful thought, but clear thought
nonetheless."
     She sighed and picked up her pen. With her free hand
she opened the drawer and peered at her face in the mirror.
     "What did you ever see in me?" she questioned aloud,
then, startled by her own voice she got up and walked into the
kitchen. Experimentally lifting up the kettle she found that it
was full and switched it on. As the water hissed she lifted up
the plastic lid and watched the bubbles rise in a swirling foam
to the surface. She turned away from the vapour and the heat
and knocked the coffee jar onto the tiled floor. It bounced and
the plastic lid split. She shook her head and walked back into
the study.
     She had been told, ever since primary school that she
overreacted to things and lived life in an am-dram manner. She
shook her head and reread the letter. Her mind wandered
briefly to their first time together in her parents double bed.
She scraped the granules into a little pile and brushed them,
with the letter into a paper bin.
     There was a pain beneath her ribs, which felt like
melting ice. She knew what to write and flexed her fingers.
The pen circled over the paper a couple of times before she
bent her head over the desk. The tips of her fringe almost
touched the leather, then she began to write.

                                             Stoneythorne Cottage,
                                             Landdown forest,
                                              Nr. Bewdley,
                                               WORCS,
                                            DY13  7JD
12th August 1996

Dear Louise,
     I'm sorry to hear that you are unwell. . .

©1998 Mark Sexton