sun catching at noon in the wild west

SUN CATCHING AT NOON IN THE WILD WEST

Goodbye Mandy.

It was a hot day so instead of bathing in the sea or a shallow part of
a river I knew where there were fewer weeds than elsewhere I sat on a
folded tartan blanket on a hill and waited for the sun to go down so I
could catch it in a washed out old jam jar and carry it around in my
pocket and then maybe give it to a special girl in tight jeans whose
hair was so straight it made you think of waterslides. The jar still
smelt slightly of blackcurrant, which is the flavour the jam had used
to be before I made it into sandwiches.

I guess I was devastated when the jar turned out to be too small to fit
the setting sun inside and all I got was temporarily blinded.

Every time I closed my eyes I saw a sun shaped light reflected on my
eyelids for a long time. It was a significant turning point in my
romancing.

Pretty girl looks at ugly boy: "You know," she never called me darling
or honey, "deciding about our relationship is very like deciding how
many petit pains to buy in the store (19 pence each).

"Insignificant, I mean."

I tell myself that perhaps things would have been different if I had
managed to get that darn sun in the jar. I thought about trying it with
a larger receptacle but the determination seemed to have subsided.
Instead the smiling sun laughed at me everyday when it rose until it
went to bed. Even when I was inside I knew it was whispering about how
silly I'd been.

Sometimes I see her on the street and wonder if I should tell her what
I had tried to do, and how I had waited and waited on that grassy
blanket just so I could put a smile on her face. I know what she would
say though: "Failed again?"

And the tone in her voice would be right and it would be improper to
kiss her on the mouth and run my fingers through her hair. Looking away
from each other seems to be the most mutually acceptable approach to
the awkwardness of not speaking anymore.

Her new boyfriend is handsome and I think he makes her happy. My friend
saw him change his shirt once when he spilt water down it and said his
chest was muscular. Of course, I don't have a muscular chest. The man
with the iron pectorals and the bald chest always gets the fucking
girl.