Present Tense
By f.i.walker
- 522 reads
He picked up the card from the browser unit and stared at the image.
Of all the nauseating anniversary cards with their soppy messages, this
particular one and its picture of a bouquet of peach coloured roses,
had sparked off a memory process that hurtled him back in time to one
particular special day.
He remembered how he had looked into her eyes as she had taken her
place by his side in the registry office. He remembered too how amazed
he had been that so many people could have crammed in to such a tiny
room. Then he remembered how he had told himself that he would never
forget how happy he felt at that moment, even should he live to be a
hundred. He blinked, reviewing the image for confirmation. Yes! Quite
definitely! A bouquet of peach roses in her hand and yet another on the
side of her broad brimmed hat.
He was going yet further back now. Back through time in his mind's eye.
Not too far though, for theirs had been a short engagement. Less than
twelve months, in fact - and they said it would never last! He couldn't
remember anyone ever having said these silly words though he could
think of many who had thought them. Their unconvincing, two-faced
expressions had been transparent enough to convey to him what they were
really thinking inside. He smiled in the knowledge that the last
twenty-odd years had proved them all quite hopelessly wrong.
Like a video, the images ran behind his eyes as he relived those, the
most precious moments of his life. The smile broadened as he recalled
how they had met; they had dated; they saw no one else and then gave
themselves unconditionally to each other for eternity.
He had been as predatory as any young man. Live life and party; love
them and leave them. These had been his mottoes. That, however, was
before being hit by a charging rhino; a runaway train; Cupid's
arrow.... Heaven knows what it was but whatever it was, it was for real
and there had been no way in this whole wide world of avoiding it. He
had known that. She had known that. They'd both known each other had
known that. Instantly.
The word 'Love' seemed so inadequate somehow. After all he had used the
expression before. Frequently. Only on those occasions it had been 'as
a means to an end'. Well, didn't everyone? But this time around it was
somehow different. This was for real. This was true. This was how it
was supposed to be. He wondered if every married couple in the world
loved with the same overwhelming passion, then dismissed the idea as
quite ridiculous. For surely, if they did then the world might be a
much nicer place in which to live.
They tumble into a hippie indoor market that reeks of jasmine and
patchouli oils, no doubt in a vain attempt to disguise the aroma of
some other less than legal substance. The midnight blue walls are
adorned by kaftans, Afghans, gaudily embroidered wall-hangings and
psychedelic record sleeves. Dim lighting and an understated soft rock
soundtrack complete the backdrop of laid-back ambience.
"Sweeping cobwebs from the edges of my mind,
Had to get away to see what we could find.
Hope the days that lie ahead bring us back to where they've led.
Listen not to what's been said to you.........." *
Totally immersed in his own world of second-hand and rare American
imported vinyl, he heads straight for the record racks on the far wall
and immediately begins to flick through the dog-eared sleeves,
discordantly humming the lyric to himself in his own distorted
interpretation of harmony.
"Take the train from Casablanca going south
Blowing smoke rings from the corners of my mouth.
Colored cottons hang in the air, charming cobras
In the square, striped djellabas we can wear at home.
Let me hear you now - ...." *
Still humming, he turns and sees her again as the recording goes into
its familiar refrain and the express heads off, bound as ever for
Marrakesh. He rediscovers her and reproaches himself for having been so
self-centred as to have shut her out for all of five minutes. It had
only been five minutes but now he realises that he had been without her
all that time and to him it was an age. Five minutes lost
forever.
But she too is lost in her own world - a world of cheap costume
jewellery beyond the cheesecloths and loon pants. As he rejoins her she
is staring wistfully into a glass-topped display case at a small, thin,
silver ring. He coos an apology in her ear, plants a kiss on her
slender neck and snakes an arm back to its rightful place around her
waist, bringing a thumb to rest in a belt loop on her Lee
Coopers.
"I've always loved these," she breathes.
"How much is it," he asks the vendor. The hippie squints into the case
through the smoky haze that spirals heavenward from a dubious
roll-up.
"Twenty."
"Pounds?" he barks in disbelief.
Hippie stifles a laugh, thinking, "For twenty quid pal, you could have
the flamin' case!".
"Pence! Twenty pence," he controls himself, recognising the imminence
of a sale.
Two shiny coins exchange hands as does the insignificant ring, dwarfed
further now in the vastness of a small paper bag. You know the type.
Like you might expect to find in a schoolboy's pocket stuffed full with
dolly mixtures or the like. He tucks the 'dolly mixture' bag into the
small inset pocket of his Wranglers and follows her out onto the
street.
Mind's eye now on fast forward. Later the same day. A summer's evening
and our happy couple crouch in the back garden picking strawberries for
dessert. His hand reaches out for a large, succulent, red berry. She
strives for the same fruit. Both miss. He clutches her hand, steadying
her as the berry yet dangles tantalisingly on its stalk. His stare
bores deeply through her eyes and beyond, penetrating her very soul. A
bag falls from his pocket. Flashback within flashback. He rediscovers.
He kneels.
"Will you marry me?" He can hear the words but cannot believe that he
is the one saying them? They look at each other. Talk without speaking.
At the end of an age she mouths a reply, though he has long since heard
her answer. Did this 'being in love' make you psychic?
"Yes!"
He takes the twenty-pence ring from the bag and places it on a long,
slim, anxious finger. They stand. They embrace. The bowl rolls over
spilling the fruit on the ground. They laugh uncontrollably and as
children might, blame each other for having been the one who kicked
it.
It had been all of three weeks but eventually they are engaged.
**************
"Excuse me, sir! Would you like to buy that card?"
Suddenly he snapped back to the present, realised that he had been
daydreaming in the middle of the card shop and then checked his watch
nervously to see just how long he had been gone. Five minutes! Five
minutes lost forever!
"How much is it?" he asked.
"One pound, ninety-five, sir"
He fumbled deep in the lining of his pocket and removed what he
believed to be two pound coins. He turned them over several times in
the palm of his hand, blinking at them incredulously. Two ten pence
pieces! With great solemnity they are returned to his pocket.
"Eh... no! Not to-day, thank you," he said and with a painted smile
handed over the card to the assistant who appeared somewhat bemused by
him as he promptly left the shop.
"Pay day tomorrow!" he told himself. "Another trip to the bank this
month and we'll be in the red! I'll get her card tomorrow! Tomorrow!
Without fail!"
He quickly pressed on further up the street, trying as he might to
relegate these recollections from his mind. Just then a hand-scrawled
notice in a travel agent's window caught his eye, forcing a
double-take. It read :
"Morocco - 14 nights including trips to Casablanca and Marrakesh" But
by the time his eyes had absorbed the asking price he had reawakened to
reality and with a heavy heart resumed his somewhat more mundane
sojourn back towards the office.
"She'd hate all that sand, anyway!" he consoled himself. "Camels! Great
horrible, smelly brutes! And they spit!"
He might well have succeeded to convince himself and been able to go
back to work that afternoon, wiping away such foolish fancies from his
mind had he not come to one particular shop, the sight of which stopped
him in his tracks quite abruptly.
For there in the window sat punnet upon punnet of freshly picked,
bright red, strawberries glistening at him temptingly, calling out his
name - and hers - and demanding to be bought!
Realising that he could suffer the mental torture not a second longer,
he eventually succumbed, dashing off in the direction of the nearest
cash dispenser with a small piece of plastic held tightly in his grasp
and the close harmonies of that old hippie anthem ringing loudly in his
head.
"I've been saving all my money just to take you there,
I smell the garden in your hair........" *
*********
* MARRAKESH EXPRESS (Graham Nash)
from "Crosby Stills and Nash" (1969) Atlantic Records 588189
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