by Neha Yazmin
Chapter 9. Cured
She’s sitting on the step,
staring back at me.
Wonder why she does,
wonder what she sees.
Nothing but the lies.
Nothing but the cries.
There’s nothing in her eyes except for me.
The silence was broken. And the second verse was ready.
I don‘t really quite see,
what I’m meant to find.
But something in me says,
there’s something in her mind,
That I need to know,
have to comprehend.
Wonder what she’ll see
if I want to be her friend.
Nothing but the lies.
Nothing but the cries.
There’s nothing in her mind except for me.
It had started with a question: Why is she just staring? He hadn’t cared at first; he was used to peoples’ stares. But there was something about the smartly dressed girl that he couldn’t ignore, couldn’t hate.
That was strange because he loathed being gawked at.
The girl’s brown eyes were a little interesting, he supposed. Such an unusual shape. When her eyes narrowed in the strong winds, they curved into a horizontal S shape.
He thought she had very sad eyes. That’s when he wondered what made her sad. Why she kept staring. Why she wasn’t behaving like the girl she seemed to be. Sensible. Smart. Cautious.
As the questions swirled around in his head, they took on a life of their own and music began to accompany them. And everything else flowed easily thereafter.
Though this song wasn’t like his other work––ready-made and whole when they came to him––it hadn’t taken long to develop into the finished article. It was about a complete stranger, so of course it needed a little push.
The melody, the tune, the whole song, resounded in his head. Soft guitar. Sweet piano. He heard himself singing it. It was nice. Easy. Different to the darker feel of his usual material, but those songs came from the darkness in his heart. This song was from a brighter place. An innocent girl on the bridge.
He took out his phone from his jacket pocket to write down the song––he couldn’t record it; he had an audience. The one person who could never hear this song.
When he came to saving the file, he didn’t know what to call it.
Most of his songs had recurring lines or words, so the title was obvious. With songs where there was no obvious title, like this one, he left them untitled until the right name came to him. But this song needed a title.
Needed it now.
He quickly dismissed the idea of naming it ‘The Girl from The Bridge’. Too obvious. Not quite his style. ‘The Girl from The Bridge’ does have a nice ring to it… She’d essentially be known as that if he never found out her name. Her name… Of course, this song had to be named after its protagonist.
Discreetly, he observed the girl. It would be a little creepy if he asked what her name was and got up and left. Yet, it might look like he wanted to befriend her, chat her up, even, if he took a more tactful route. And that was the last thing on his mind. He never chat anyone up.
He didn’t chat, full-stop.
For the time being, he saved the song as ‘Untitled’.
Then it sunk in––he finally had a song. He’d been making pit-stops at the needle sculpture on his lunch breaks, and on his way home from work, everyday these last few weeks, but it had done no good. Just looking at the needle usually elicited enough wonder in him to draw his instinct out into the open.
In the end, it wasn’t the sculpture that unclogged his songwriter’s block. It was the girl that came to visit it.
Her lunch hour was probably two to three pm, and it was ten to three now. She’d leave and he’d never know her name…
I could just make it up. He could try the internet. Get creative. But he wanted her name. She’d have a nice name, to go with the nice face. Wait. He thought she had a nice face? Therefore, he’d noticed it?
Yes, he had. How odd.
Weirder still, he hadn’t even considered blocking her out.
Then the girl stood up; Jamie froze as she strode off.
Mukti didn’t know what she’d expected of the boy she wouldn’t forget for a long time. If ever. When she saw the shocked expression on his face as she stood up, a sense of anticipation had swelled up inside. She was surprised by the disappointment in the back of her mind as she realised he had no intention of approaching her.
Crossing the bridge at a much slower pace than she could afford––she had ten minutes to return to the office and freshen up––she kept thinking about his face.
A face she’d never see again.
A strange numbing sensation passed through her when she got to the mid-point of the bridge. She stopped in her tracks. The anaesthetising feeling had spread from her left shoulder where something, a finger, had tapped her from behind.
“Excuse me,” said a slightly breathless male voice in a mildly posh London accent.
Knowing for certain it was him, she turned around.
She wanted to sound cool but “Yes?” was all she managed. And it was a whisper, her mouth dry. It was because she was looking at his face. He was so close.
As were his striking eyes.
Two shiny blue-topaz gemstones sparkled before her. Flecks of varying shades of crystal-blue spread like sunrays from his pupils, like hundreds of tiny facets of a diamond, twinkling in different directions. Deep and vivid. Shiny and piercing.
Blue diamonds.
They weren’t peaceful. Not like the waters around tropical islands that they resembled in colour, but rippling from some storm at sea.
Mukti’s heart raced. Her breath came out irregularly.
She had to look away from his face; there was more of him to take in. Tall and lanky, his posture was awkward, looking down at her with a pained expression on his face, a dilemma in his eyes. He scratched his head quickly with all four fingers.
His white T-shirt wasn’t tight-fitted so she couldn’t see the contours of his torso, yet it was clear he was lean but not too thin. Dropping her eyes lower, she saw that he was wearing black skinny-jeans, new and expensive around his thin legs.
When her eyes reached his brown shoes, the beautiful boy spoke.
“I was wondering if it would be possible to ask you your name.”
He sounded polite, formal, though his eyes were on the ground.
He had an amazing intensity about him.
If he were an actor, he’d have such presence on screen.
If he was singing in a massive concert hall, he’d own the stage.
If he were a model, the camera would love him.
“I’m Mukti.” After two seconds, she tacked on “hi”.
The breathtaking face before her looked startled. “What does it mean?” He finally met her gaze, demanding an answer.
“It means freedom in Bengali.”
She’d said this line many times in her life, never more than in the last couple of weeks in her new job.
He chuckled under his breath. “Thank you.”
Then he turned and hurried off in the direction he’d come, leaving Mukti confused and disoriented.
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Want to continue reading? Please visit the Chasing Pavements book page on Neha’s blog for more details:
https://nehayazmin.blogspot.co.uk/p/chasing-pavements.html