And here we are again in the turning, ticking, moving, roving, itching, scratching, licking, biting, beating, thumping turning of the world. And it turns, yes. In a full circle before falling off the pin it is sat on, sharp and shiny and malevolent to the core. It takes you by the hand and it leads you to that little rose garden, closer to the bay and that white cottage than you would have at first thought. When the door opens you must be careful not to scream and scare the inhabitants who are always sitting there in the front room whispering and talking and cawing and nattering and screeching into the glass of the windows. They are easily frightened.
So are you, I remember from the days we would run barefoot in the fields and not care about the worms between our toes. You found a dead bird one day, half eaten and rotten but you still called it beautiful or I thought you called it beautiful. What I imagine seems so real that it might be true if I tell you enough so I tell you every day, I make sure I repeat it word for word and talk as fast as possible so you can't miss anything. Like now I'm talking and talking and talking and you're there listening, you're always there listening, listening at the door, at the wall, at the floor, at the cupboard and at that sick little hole at the sink. You put it there to remind me not to get ill or I'll be like the plug-hole all silver and filled with such small rips that a mouse might have made them but they are perfect, perfectly round. It's almost like an art.
You liked art, you always liked art, you were always arting around in the garden beneath the ferns. It's not the same as the rose garden and it's not at all near the sea. You liked it by the sea, didn't you? I always liked it by the sea and the sand and the smell of the salt in your hair and on your fingers after you picked up all of the shells you could see and put them in the bucket.
Then you stood on them. You crushed the shells and the bucket and it makes me feel like you're glaring at me. You were always glaring at me, you're still glaring at me even though I am in this bed feeling oh so sickly, you still glare. You look at me with those eyes and they tell me it is my fault. Mine. That you glare at me so when I have done nothing but count the tiles on the ceiling and pretended that those shells weren't in splinters. But you're always here, aren't you? Always glaring and looking a gaping at me. Gawping at me.
Why are you always looking at me?
