Seemingly every year in our country sometime in August the weather changes dramatically and we get a window onto wintertime; a week or more of really nautical weather flapping and soaking us. But it doesn’t take; although the trees samba in the wind the leaves aren’t ready to swoon and more often than not it is followed by a warm Indian summer in September.
But when this inclemency is eventually blown away some of the silliness of summer goes with it and we appreciate any remaining sunshine in earnest. We ignore the start of autumn; the equinox and the incipient winter is forgotten or put to the back of our minds as we talk and walk about in shirtsleeves.
Perhaps this ‘winter-glimpse’ in August is the real start of winter - the vanguard - and though we love the sun some of us are refreshed by this. Some see something romantic in the fisherman’s weather, and relish seeing the clouds bolt across the sky.
Emilia was one of these people who liked the cooler weather. The predictability of rain in England was comforting. She had started jogging this summer and she loved running through the damp air, the mizzle invigorating her as she went. She was three months experienced and had graduated from jogging to running. Having found her rhythm she could skim along fairly quickly. Ignoring everything around her and the men looking, some sheepishly sidelong, some unashamedly, at the sway of her breasts.
Running had also aided her adaptation to contact lenses. She’d previously resisted her mother’s urges to switch from spectacles but as she now had a practical reason for doing so she had made the change easily.
She listed this in the benefits of running as she ran, focussing her mind on why she was doing it whenever she felt like stopping. This benefit went hand in hand with another; that she had argued a lot less with her mother since starting running; her frustration was stamped into the pavement rather than spat out in cattish comments. Indeed the air between them was as peaceful as at any time since the death of her father.
As you would expect, this traumatic event, the result of a gnawingly typical gnawing cancer, had far-reaching effects. Emilia’s was a sea of grief and after the tidal wave of sorrow that begot it, it continued to break in waves, as unremitting as the tide, and dominating her fledgling adulthood.
Her mother realised that it was since her husband’s death that Emilia had (probably subconsciously) decided to spend little time worrying about her appearance. Most of her decisions were made, like the switch from glasses to contacts, on the basis of pragmatism. Yes she still was attracted to certain colours or patterns but she cared little as to whether or not they glorified her appearance. Her mother knew she couldn’t explain this in these terms to her daughter, (though she had tried to get Emilia’s older brother to say something). Instead she simply chided her about ‘going about unnoticed’ which simply irritated Emilia.
In simple terms Emilia was petite with bobbed dark hair, and spent most of the time in her glasses. Her fringe fell down straight, tucking itself behind the frames. And as she spent most of her life looking through glass and hair she had a permanent look of mild curiosity.
Unbeknownst to Emilia, not only were there fewer arguments because she was less angry after a run but also because her mother had understood the running as Emilia taking an interest in her looks and reflected a wish to ‘tone up.’
This was wrong. In fact Emilia had started running as some sort of homage to her father who had been a keen runner, and also perhaps as an acknowledgement that she needed to control her grief. She was twenty and because of four years of blind sorrow had arrived at this age unsure of where her life was going.
The running then, was a constant tribute to her father while also allowing thoughts of him to be slightly separated. She had begun the task of restructuring her life. She thought about her dad and she thought about what she could and should do with her life. She had sleep-walked through the rest of her schooling and after earlier promise had done well but unspectacularly so. Since then she had a variety of jobs but none stuck, her sadness had given her a daydreaming aggressiveness that many of her colleagues had not taken to.
On her stereo, onto to which she’d emptied all the music off of the family computer she found herself listening to soft-rock, though she wouldn’t admit this to her few friends; she’d claim to be listening to something edgier. A lot of it was to her dad’s taste, which was one reason for listening to it. But also because it seemed to fit; the pedestrian emoting seemed to suit the pedestrian weather in this pedestrian summer.
She had just started a second job working in a pub; she was now keen to save as much money as possible. She wasn’t sure which direction she wished her life to take but wanted to be able to afford it when she made a decision.
-
At work Emilia is sitting outside the back of the pub talking to one of her male colleagues, he is smoking. She isn’t, but is taking a break with him. They had helped themselves to glasses of lemonade from the tap and are perched on the barrels that, along with empty gas canisters are awaiting collection by the brewery. This area has been half hidden by a wooden trellis with some desultory shrubs leaning affectedly on its base. It is a pretty wooden structure but within the tarmacadam ground is split where dandelions wrest through, it looks like one of those patches of land that are resolutely not meant to be looked at.
This is their first shift together and they are getting to know one another, dealing in the banal questions about their lives away from work. Her colleague is called Simon. At first he had that familiar tightness in his chest and a higher vocal range because he was talking to an attractive female but in the course of the conversation this has eased a little. He still has a blank whenever he has to think of a topic. He is five years older than her, and though he is trying not to, cannot help but offer advice on her life.
‘I respect your decision not to go “travelling”’
He said, coating the verb with derision.
'I hate that fucking word. Just say you are going on holiday. People talk about finding themselves. It’s daft. You’re just as likely to find yourself nipping to the twenty-four garage to buy fags as you are suffering culture shock on some beach in Thailand.’
‘Yeah…’
She says, deciding not to tell him yet why she hasn’t been away and that she will happily go if she wants to when she has the money. Simon, in an effort to stop pontificating, asks Emilia about her other job.
‘Where else did you say you worked?
‘In The Museum’
She said referring to the local Victorian museum in their suburb on the outskirts of South London. Everybody who had grown up in the locality referred to it simply as ‘The Museum’ Simon had been puzzled by this when he’d first moved down here, arriving from the north of England, but now understood it.
‘Oh yeah? That sounds alright.’
‘So far yeah, but everybody there has been so nice that every time you meet someone new you think; is he going to be that fucking guy?’
‘What fucking guy?’
‘You know, the arsehole, the jobsworth, the one that you check on the rota to see if he is working at the same time as you.’
‘Well, have you met him yet? Does it have to be a him?’
‘Not yet, and no, it could be a women but I was working with this weird guy yesterday; listen to this.’
She explained to Simon how she worked in the museum’s shop which had the big wooden, glass-panelled doors that you’d expect of a Victorian institution. Lighter and better oiled than every visitor expected, the doors swung back and forth throughout the day and as they did so the rubber seals would kiss repeatedly, filling her days with a puckering sound. Her colleague there, the ‘weird guy’ had observed: ‘Those doors sound like they are kissing.’
Emilia turned to Simon;
‘That’s what he said; do you think he’s flirting?’
‘I dunno; I’m not sure I even know how to flirt.’
‘Ha. Come on, you must do.’
‘Well maybe but I don’t think so.’
I don’t, otherwise I’d flirt with you, he thought, a little nauseous with desire. And he fucking hated ‘that fucking guy’ at that moment, he exhaled smoke deliberately and looked at her; she talked so easily she seemed oblivious. He couldn’t read her windblown conversations as a nervousness she thought was obvious. Despite not really wanting to know he asked the question;
‘Well do you want him to be flirting with you?’
‘No.’
‘Right’
Relief released throughout him. ‘In that case let’s not talk about him.’
‘Right’ she said smiling and he became aware how happy he felt. Their grinning was broken by her,
‘Did you go to university?’
‘I started a Fine Art degree... but I left; I realised it wasn’t what I wanted to do. I was spending money by the bucket load and not getting anything done… Or anything I really believed in. I was more interesting in other things, I was making a film. I’m still trying to do things now, when I’m not working here, or anywhere else.’
‘Will you go back; you can do film degrees can’t you?’
‘Yeah maybe… I’m not sure I’m still into film that much… I’ve got things I want to accomplish first.’
He had a list of these things taped to the wall above his bed. This list was constantly changing as items were added and items erased. He had had to re-write it at least a dozen times in the last three years, each time printing from a master copy on his PC. This list encompassed projects; photography, art, writing. Things he wanted to buy; ‘leather jacket’ was the last thing added in this category. And more ephemeral things, the most non-tangible being a list of mixes of music he wanted to make. The fourth thing on the list between ‘photograph windows’ and ‘regular self-portraits’ was ‘get girlfriend.’
He thought about this list but decided against telling Emilia about it, instead he simply crushed his cigarette beneath his foot;
‘We better get back to work.’
-
Later that afternoon during their flickering conversations, Simon walking down from his station in the top bar into the bottom bar, to her station. He walked down with a piece of paper in his hand. How do you pronounce this, he asked her. Writing ‘Brakhage’ on an answer sheet left over from quiz night.
‘Like breakage.’
‘Yeah brack-age, not brack-har-gay. It’s a bloke’s name. Stan Brakhage. He did a film called Anticipation if the Night.’
‘Cool title.’ She said nodding her head. ‘Why do you want to know? I mean why are you not sure?’
‘I was having an argument with my flatmate about it… We argue all the time. I don’t know why I live with him.’
‘What do you argue about?
‘Everything really: He’s become a bit of a cock since he started going out with his new girlfriend. He’s even started to dress differently. He wears these long coats and classic sunglasses like an American teenager about to go postal on his class mates.’
She laughs appreciatively so he continues, opens up a little.
‘The last time, I know this sounds ridiculous, but the last time we argued was about the band Belle & Sebastian. He says it is wet nonsense, has no edge. I reckon that a band who write songs that your nan can dance to as well as you at a wedding or somewhere like that, and also be ‘modern’ whatever that means. Well, they're a rarity and have a place… Do you know what I mean? Wanting everything to be edgy is ridiculous.’
‘I know what you mean.’ she said, thinking of the music she listened to while running. ‘Does your Nan really dance to Belle & Sebastian? How long have you known him?’
‘Nah, but I can imagine her doing so… Err, five-odd years, we met at uni, he stayed on when I left. He said that we weren’t supposed to be doing anything we believed in at that stage; maybe he was right.’
‘Anyway we kept in touch and now he’s finished and moved to London; because that’s where the art is, you know. I moved in with him because I was living with these wankers before and he is a good friend, just irritating recently.’
‘Actually I’m meeting them tonight; do you want to come along? You can offer moral support if we get into an argument.’
Though she didn’t hesitate, not really, his words to her seem to hang in the air, repeating like an echo, until,
‘Yeah okay.’
His head was pounding as he had asked her, asking her out in effect.
‘Now I’m anticipating the night.’ He said and walked to the toilet, inwardly cringing at this clumsiness, this is how I flirt he thought. God. For her part Emilia simply smiled, which confused him further and made him wonder whether she picked up on what he’d said.
Forgetting about their inner nerves, Simon and Emilia spend the rest of their shift idly chatting, probing at one another's interests, Simon trying to be as amusing as possible, Emilia trying to be as amused as possible. Simon talked about Stewart and Amanda preparing Emilia for any caustic reception. Their shift ended at four and after leaving Emilia at the bus stop, having arranged to meet again at eight, Simon headed toward home. He walked whenever he could, finding relief to be outside, travelling at his own volition in London, a city in which movement is often stifled and shunting.
He was buoyed more than he could credit by Emilia's agreeing to meet him. He
walked with a grin and a bounce, enjoying the unseasonably breeze, he browsed
every shop window he passed.
As Simon wanders home in a state of beatification, he sends a message to his flatmate Stewart, who has just had sex with his new girlfriend Amanda. Stewart was smug and recumbent as Amanda pulled a towel around herself in readiness for a shower. She was taller than Stewart and looked down on him: Now whilst standing over him, but also whenever they talk, and in life in general.
‘I just got a text from Simon. He’s bringing some girl from work to the pub.’
‘Really? I bet she’s some crazy artist goth or some ultra-mild film geek.’
Amanda emphasised this statement by letting it hang in the air as she swaggered into the bathroom.
She’s cold and a bit scary thought Stewart but he revelled in the fact that she had chosen him. He thought her uncompromising rudeness evidence of a discriminating nature and integrity, and the fact that she had chosen to go out with him meant he was special. He lay there basking in self-satisfaction, feeling the semen crispen on the soft hairs on his gut.
-
A couple of miles away Emilia is setting off on a run, the coolness still hanging in the air, hoping to exercise some of her nerves before meeting Simon later.
