Tracing a separate path between streams and puddles on the undulating concrete she passes in front of me, head down, water bouncing off the shiny gumdrop-green raincoat she wears. It suits her: It suits her scent: not the scent of perfume, or of shampoo, or washing powder, or even a body scent, but something more intangible and unexpected, like icing sugar or sherbet. Airy, aura-like, this scent was so distinctive that it would linger after she had left, like paper leaves fallen from a breeze-blown tree. If she fell, I might catch her, rather than poring over the lines on fallen paper leaves, but, inexplicably too tense, I never touched her, fearing always her delicacy, as if she were made of dust and dreams suspended on a wire skeleton.

(more…)

It’s a boring Sunday. Rain beats against my windscreen, my bonnet, my roof, like a thousand fingers drumming a monotonous, impatient rhythm against the glass and the metal. The clouds it falls from have cast a twilight over the whole day, but I think now it finally must be dusk, because the streetlights have switched themselves on and are casting an orange glaze over the dark blue tarmac, under the dark blue sky.

(more…)

Lightly rain fell, collecting in droplets on the leaves, blurring the eyes of men walking their dogs, of women jogging across concrete. Josh watched, stared unfocused, contemplated considered, and felt the rain slowly soak into his hair. It hadn’t been raining long. It hadn’t been long since Arietta had sat and stood and hugged him and left. She’d left and he was still sat there. She’d left this time, but he had left her, and he was leaving again.

“Can we meet this week?”

“I’m busy, why?”

“I’m going away. It’ll be a long time until I see you again.”

(more…)