by Anna Burns
So in the next second femme would take action. In the current second she turned to hero for he was stirring once more. First thing she noticed was that there was a new look about him. Fleeting - there one moment, gone the next, then back again. It was a look of ease perhaps, of something being easier about him. It seemed his features had ceased to be static, implacable, impenetrable and certainly it had been forever since femme had witnessed that. ‘See that?’ she said aloud. ‘Did you see that? Definitely there was emotion in it.’ Hero laughed and, ‘Hero,’ femme responded softly, leaning over to brush strands of hair from his face.
He had opened his eyes and though he’d laughed, he wondered what he and femme were doing in his kitchen. ‘It wonders me, femme,’ he said, ‘what has occurred?’ He wasn’t urgently though, awaiting a response. Instead he turned his thoughts to how long it had been since he’d slept, for he had slept, though he could recall little of it. It had seemed a restful sleep, and also that he’d given up nothing for it. This brought on a glad and quiet astonishment. And the peacefulness of the moment - that brought on a glad astonishment too. In just one second, when he should get his breath, he’d ask femme if she was all right, if he could get her something, do something for her - especially after those heavy revelations regarding Great Aunt laid upon her, given that all she’d thought was going to happen that day was lunch. He struggled up then, to lean against the kitchen unit beside her which was when he noticed his condiments - also his alcohol, his pots and pans, his knives and femme’s sewing equipment. Also when he saw his stitched wound - then his graphs. ‘About those graphs, femme,’ he thought he’d explain in just one second, but then he didn’t know what he’d say about them, how to explain them, especially the past tense of them. He’d say something, but just not right now. Right now he’d sit and look out his window. He meant the kitchen window, which was tiny, a little bit open, and directly in front. Femme too, was gazing out this window and from their quiet position on the floor they could just about make out the top of Great Aunt’s skyscraper in the distance. There was a coffin-shaped cloud hanging over it and by now the day had turned to dusk. Not really dusk. It was the blue-hour, the era of endarkenment. In the air, however, was the delicious smell of life. Possibly real, possibly delusional, came the fragrance of newly cut grass, of freshly turned damp earth, of honeysuckle at the end of summertime - things that might make a person happy, especially unexpectedly happy, and which cost little, bar the willingness, and the gratefulness, to open up and breathe.