Prose
It was during the warm-up exercises at his Tai Chi class that he first noticed it. He had shaken his leg out from the toes, ankle, calf, knee and hip, closed his eyes holding a phantom ball between his hands before his dan te en, meditated while feeling his spine rise like a golden thread lifted from the top of his head to the heavens while rooting through his bubbling wells, breathing deeply through his nose long and thin, through his mouth long and slow, all the while soothed by Siobhan's instructive guidance. And then as he opened his eyes, returned gently to the room, he patted himself down, like a policeman conducting a body-search, and felt two damp patches under his arms, the threads of his shirt stained green, almost black, with sweat.
It was a gym, you were expected to sweat in a gym. But Siobahn taught them to listen to their bodies, and this was only the warm up. He worked through the lesson, went home and bathed. He thought nothing more of it.
The next day in his classroom, light slanting through the shutters, it was 8.05, an hour before class. The Fall were playing on the CD player, separate piles of photocopies tiled the desk before him. The chairs had been lifted off the surface of the tables and placed under the desks. He breathed deeply and caught his own smell. He couldn't be sure it came from him. Placing a fingertip to his shirt he felt dampness. Fabric soaked with liquid over time.
As a child he could not get enough of cotton. His yellow pyjamas, thin as flame, the tag at the inside thigh of a polyester dog. He couldn't keep things out of his mouth. He sometimes sucked his school shirt until the dust and dirt from the surface was all tasted and only a a wetted texture remained, like chewed gum. He soon lost interest and the shirt dropped back down, a ripple gathered inexplicably at his collar, a drool spot dark and asymmetrical like a bad butterfly painting.
He sucked his thumb continuously and then had braces fitted. He painted a transparent solution onto his nails but he only came to endure the taste. Rather than take its slow, sour spreading into his mouth as a reminder, he saw it as something to be savoured. At university, after his braces were removed he started sucking his thumb again to keep his hand from his crotch, to avoid the anonymous knock through the dormitory walls.
Looking back, he couldn't keep his hands out the cookie jar. Half-starved, he ignored the consequences, rifled among the carriers accumulated at the back of the cupboard and, finding nothing, reached for the Lion bar allocated for tomorrow's breaktime.
He peered beneath his arm and inhaled. A whiff brought him up short.
He got up and went to find a newsagent that stocked deodorant.
That evening as he pressed his weight onto his left arm he was left with a dull ache in his bicep, a ball of undispersed pain in his shoulder that would not disperse along the arm even by taking pressure off it. He lay back, breathing deeply, and could not find a comfortable place to rest his limb. It seemed dislocated, separate from his body, yet it was unresolved, unstraightened out. It hung wrong, even when lying down. He could not sleep. It was 2 am. He he got up and watched the Open University. It was a long couple of hours. The fall of the Berlin Wall, Hiroshima and Aushwitz from 'A Day in History', then a programme on recycling and Terry Hall recovering from illness in the country. He went back to bed exhausted.
The next day was the penultimate day of this German group of students. That night he accompanied them to watch Tamburlaine at the Bristol Theatre. There was no fire curtain. A series of gowns and robes hung from hooks at the back of the stage. 'Coathooks weren't invented until the Eighteenth century' said Piers, the principal, sat next to him. 'That's a bad start'. He projected his voice like he was speaking from the royal box.
Afterwards, he walked to the station with the students, marked some papers on the train, and waved them off as they left the train at Bath. He walked home from his station and arrived home at 12.30. He felt something close to despair at the display of the clock radio.
It was during the warm-up exercises at his Tai Chi class that he first noticed it. He had shaken his leg out from the toes, ankle, calf, knee and hip, closed his eyes holding a phantom ball between his hands before his dan te en, meditated while feeling his spine rise like a golden thread lifted from the top of his head to the heavens while rooting through his bubbling wells, breathing deeply through his nose long and thin, through his mouth long and slow, all the while soothed by Siobhan's instructive guidance. And then as he opened his eyes, returned gently to the room, he patted himself down, like a policeman conducting a body-search, and felt two damp patches under his arms, the threads of his shirt stained green, almost black, with sweat.
It was a gym, you were expected to sweat in a gym. But Siobahn taught them to listen to their bodies, and this was only the warm up. He worked through the lesson, went home and bathed. He thought nothing more of it.
The next day in his classroom, light slanting through the shutters, it was 8.05, an hour before class. The Fall were playing on the CD player, separate piles of photocopies tiled the desk before him. The chairs had been lifted off the surface of the tables and placed under the desks. He breathed deeply and caught his own smell. He couldn't be sure it came from him. Placing a fingertip to his shirt he felt dampness. Fabric soaked with liquid over time.
As a child he could not get enough of cotton. His yellow pyjamas, thin as flame, the tag at the inside thigh of a polyester dog. He couldn't keep things out of his mouth. He sometimes sucked his school shirt until the dust and dirt from the surface was all tasted and only a a wetted texture remained, like chewed gum. He soon lost interest and the shirt dropped back down, a ripple gathered inexplicably at his collar, a drool spot dark and asymmetrical like a bad butterfly painting.
He sucked his thumb continuously and then had braces fitted. He painted a transparent solution onto his nails but he only came to endure the taste. Rather than take its slow, sour spreading into his mouth as a reminder, he saw it as something to be savoured. At university, after his braces were removed he started sucking his thumb again to keep his hand from his crotch, to avoid the anonymous knock through the dormitory walls.
Looking back, he couldn't keep his hands out the cookie jar. Half-starved, he ignored the consequences, rifled among the carriers accumulated at the back of the cupboard and, finding nothing, reached for the Lion bar allocated for tomorrow's breaktime.
He peered beneath his arm and inhaled. A whiff brought him up short.
He got up and went to find a newsagent that stocked deodorant.
That evening as he pressed his weight onto his left arm he was left with a dull ache in his bicep, a ball of undispersed pain in his shoulder that would not disperse along the arm even by taking pressure off it. He lay back, breathing deeply, and could not find a comfortable place to rest his limb. It seemed dislocated, separate from his body, yet it was unresolved, unstraightened out. It hung wrong, even when lying down. He could not sleep. It was 2 am. He he got up and watched the Open University. It was a long couple of hours. The fall of the Berlin Wall, Hiroshima and Aushwitz from 'A Day in History', then a programme on recycling and Terry Hall recovering from illness in the country. He went back to bed exhausted.
The next day was the penultimate day of this German group of students. That night he accompanied them to watch Tamburlaine at the Bristol Theatre. There was no fire curtain. A series of gowns and robes hung from hooks at the back of the stage. 'Coathooks weren't invented until the Eighteenth century' said Piers, the principal, sat next to him. 'That's a bad start'. He projected his voice like he was speaking from the royal box.
Afterwards, he walked to the station with the students, marked some papers on the train, and waved them off as they left the train at Bath. He walked home from his station and arrived home at 12.30. He felt something close to despair at the display of the clock radio.
posted by Matt at 6:07 PM
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