Glistening bodies surge back and forth, back and forth. Flailing arms reach into the air and sway back and forth overhead in imperfect unison, only to dissappear again one by one, leaving only a sea of bobbing heads.
The noise is animal, defening. The smell, to the uninitiated, is worse. Sweat and cigarette smoke, spirits and the hint of sex, the acrid-sweet smell of weed smoke and the inimitable stench of spilt beer over it all. There are people everywhere, at the long bar packed three or four deep and shouting over the noise; girls with hard and unfriendly eyes slouch on sofas in the half-light, choosing which boys they will tease and abandon at the touch of a hand. Skinny boys in tight trousers with artfully ruffled hair wear thier fathers' braces over too-expensive "vintage" shirts, and try not to stare at the girls.
There is a girl in a patterned 1940s tea dress, standing in matching teal green court shoes. Her face, her hair, are both perfectly made up so that her features have become beautifully, fantastically, doll-like. She holds a plastic pint glass in a hand which sports bitten, unlovely nails.
The doll in the tea dress is being eyed by a man - a tall boy - wearing out-of-place baggy denim jeans and a skinny-fitting band t-sjirt. He has enough weed in his pocket to get him stoned and more than stoned, and in the other pocket, a wallet that contains twenty pounds, a bank card, his fake i.d., stating his age as nineteen, and two condoms given to him by a mate on his sixteenth birthday last year. A flash of the lights illuminates the acne hiding under his thin stubble, stubble he hasn't shaved for three weeks to achieve. His friend - the same giver of prophylactics - weaves through the crowds bearing bottles of the cheapest beer available. They drink, and watch the girls, trying to look older, less innocent and more experienced. The girls ignore them.
On the dancefloor, girls dance in groups, flinging thier arms around, stamping, on the edge of the greater mass, watching the boys they like through thier lashes, studiously not looking at them with more than a glance. Towards the center, towards the stage, the girls become tougher, less distinguishable from the boys as the gender line is blurred by sweat, smoke and seething bodies.
Showing posts with label prose. Show all posts
Showing posts with label prose. Show all posts
Membrane Cytoscaffolds
Row upon row of heads, tier upon tier of bodies. Shuffling noises, the undercurrent of two hundred asynchronous breaths being drawn and released. Someone coughs, another sneezes then blows thier nose, while another sniffs inelegantly, hoping nobody noticed.
There is no silence, but instead a noisy sort of quiet as two hundred pairs of ears strain to hear the narration of what two hundred pairs of eyes follow on the projection board in front of them. The clatter of pens being put down and picked up, searched for in pencil cases and dropped on the floor. Pens clicked, tapped, chewed in concentration and as the chewer drifts into daydream before shaking thier head and returning to the present. Eliptocyctosis, splemomegaly, anaemia; long words hang in the air with almost tangible crushing weight. Two hundred brains bend themselves around an endless parade of facts and tidbits of knowledge, gawp at the image of a grossely over-distended spleen and sigh over complex diagrams of molecules arranged in a complex network.
Heads begin to loll as the lecture continues, concentration wavers and every now and again a muttered conversatin can be heard.
When the lecture ends, there will be a clattering of feet, as bodies rush to stand. Voices will raise suddenly as chatter errupts among friends anxious to continue conversations halted by the neccessity of learning. Bags will clater as pens, cases, pads and folders are slung in carelessly or wedged in; noise will conquor silence to reign once again.
But for now, quiet rules. Shuffling bodies, subdued movement, interrupted by the rattle of pen and the rustle of paper.
Dedicated to the interminable droning of Protein Pete
There is no silence, but instead a noisy sort of quiet as two hundred pairs of ears strain to hear the narration of what two hundred pairs of eyes follow on the projection board in front of them. The clatter of pens being put down and picked up, searched for in pencil cases and dropped on the floor. Pens clicked, tapped, chewed in concentration and as the chewer drifts into daydream before shaking thier head and returning to the present. Eliptocyctosis, splemomegaly, anaemia; long words hang in the air with almost tangible crushing weight. Two hundred brains bend themselves around an endless parade of facts and tidbits of knowledge, gawp at the image of a grossely over-distended spleen and sigh over complex diagrams of molecules arranged in a complex network.
Heads begin to loll as the lecture continues, concentration wavers and every now and again a muttered conversatin can be heard.
When the lecture ends, there will be a clattering of feet, as bodies rush to stand. Voices will raise suddenly as chatter errupts among friends anxious to continue conversations halted by the neccessity of learning. Bags will clater as pens, cases, pads and folders are slung in carelessly or wedged in; noise will conquor silence to reign once again.
But for now, quiet rules. Shuffling bodies, subdued movement, interrupted by the rattle of pen and the rustle of paper.
Dedicated to the interminable droning of Protein Pete
On Being Ill
My head is pounding. Pounding, throbbing, bursting, pounding. Little men have squashed cotton wool in place of the menisici between my brain and skull and it’s too tight. The granny trolley being wheeled down the street outside might as well be gunfire, it seems so loud. My teeth seem to rattle in my mouth and the vice around my skull tightens another notch and I can hear the blood pounding through my veins and arteries.
My throat tightens. A wave of nausea rises up my oesophagus and stops before it reaches my throat, and my empty stomach contracts and relaxes. I take a deep breath. The next wave comes, so quick as to be a spasm, wrenching me forward and despite this I know I will not be sick. I try to breathe, too shallow and my breathing rate increases. I heave again over the still-empty bowl on my knees. Suck air into my lungs. Heave and suck, heave, heave, suck, heave, suck desperately as spots begin to appear before my eyes. Finally, I vomit, and can breathe a little easier before the next wave comes.
I’ve been vomiting for what seems like a lifetime. There is nothing to vomit. There was nothing to begin with, now I am vomiting bile. It burns my throat, already raw, burns my oesophagous, exhausted from constant movement. The pain in my stomach is worse, breathing is obscured by pain and I can barely think. I am hyperventilating, aware of this but unable to stop myself, unable to talk, to vocalise the pain that twists my intestines and knots my body.
Morphine flows into my vein through the needle in my arm. It stings, everything stings. The light. Movement. The texture of the hospital gown and the gentle touch of the nurse. Morphine acts quickly. I am aware of another drug, to stop the nausea, but dimly. I pass my glasses to my mother, who hovers anxiously. I cannot see and I drift in and out of awareness now I no longer have pain to pin me to consciousness.
I am being hooked up to a drip. The nurse tells me its saline and I nod, not really understanding. I drift back to sleep. My head twinges, ever so slightly, and though to remind me that it is only the drugs between me and the pain. I’m awake. The drip is two-thirds empty and my head is starting to hurt.
The drip is gone. I am wobbly, spaceially aware but unable to do anything about it as I reel slightly. I am home. More painkillers and more tablets to stop the nausea. I sleep, curled in bed and glad of the pillows and the duvet. I wake regularly, and in the early hours I take more pills.
The pain. It’s back. Pounding pain as the vice around my skull is tightened. Knots in my stomach tighten and undo despite the painkillers and it is all I can do to lie there, hoping not to go to hospital.
My throat tightens. A wave of nausea rises up my oesophagus and stops before it reaches my throat, and my empty stomach contracts and relaxes. I take a deep breath. The next wave comes, so quick as to be a spasm, wrenching me forward and despite this I know I will not be sick. I try to breathe, too shallow and my breathing rate increases. I heave again over the still-empty bowl on my knees. Suck air into my lungs. Heave and suck, heave, heave, suck, heave, suck desperately as spots begin to appear before my eyes. Finally, I vomit, and can breathe a little easier before the next wave comes.
I’ve been vomiting for what seems like a lifetime. There is nothing to vomit. There was nothing to begin with, now I am vomiting bile. It burns my throat, already raw, burns my oesophagous, exhausted from constant movement. The pain in my stomach is worse, breathing is obscured by pain and I can barely think. I am hyperventilating, aware of this but unable to stop myself, unable to talk, to vocalise the pain that twists my intestines and knots my body.
Morphine flows into my vein through the needle in my arm. It stings, everything stings. The light. Movement. The texture of the hospital gown and the gentle touch of the nurse. Morphine acts quickly. I am aware of another drug, to stop the nausea, but dimly. I pass my glasses to my mother, who hovers anxiously. I cannot see and I drift in and out of awareness now I no longer have pain to pin me to consciousness.
I am being hooked up to a drip. The nurse tells me its saline and I nod, not really understanding. I drift back to sleep. My head twinges, ever so slightly, and though to remind me that it is only the drugs between me and the pain. I’m awake. The drip is two-thirds empty and my head is starting to hurt.
The drip is gone. I am wobbly, spaceially aware but unable to do anything about it as I reel slightly. I am home. More painkillers and more tablets to stop the nausea. I sleep, curled in bed and glad of the pillows and the duvet. I wake regularly, and in the early hours I take more pills.
The pain. It’s back. Pounding pain as the vice around my skull is tightened. Knots in my stomach tighten and undo despite the painkillers and it is all I can do to lie there, hoping not to go to hospital.
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