Lipogrammatics - WIP
An odd and disparaging cloud had put David in a low funk. Standing at an Ibis booking station, door-card in hand, this world-worn warrior of forty had had all a man could stand. But what had David had? What in his status quo was proving so difficult to stomach? Such thoughts brought on confusion, making narrowing circular paths in his tiring mind, rabid hounds trying to catch tails that always, always got away. Stop it, David thinks, I’m happy, am I not? A loving woman indoors, two sons, a spacious flat, rich in comforts, and a job I can do practically unconsciously. So why, on work trips (a thankful rarity) should I always find my mind full of such gloomy notions? Why can I not account for this disparity that has torn at my soul for so long?
Looking down at his card, David flicks it up and down. His mug, bouncing back at him, was sliding up and down too, as if bobbing in a roughly pitching in a tidal flow of a vast aquatic body. Am I drowning? If so, in what? Down first, and again, and a third and final dip. Now what?
A lady in uniform was staring at him. “Sir?”
“Hm?” David starts, is brought with rapidity from his own musings.
“Would you want an assistant for your bags, sir?”
“No, I can carry my own bags.” David says, but adds a cordial “thank you,” so as not to insult.
Room two-oh-six. Room two-oh-six. David usually stays in a ground-floor room, but this was a bank holiday, and room two-oh-six was his only option. His card slips into its slot and a tiny dull brown bulb lights up. Within, a lock pulls back, and David’s door swings forward.
David is struck by an odour of soap and cloth, a room too tidy, too _______ for his comfort.
Stuck on his door is a card with markings that show at what point his room has a maid visit. David hangs a “do not disturb” sign and shuts his door, slumping slightly at his own arrival.
First on his list is a bath. His trip was hot and shot through with frustration, so a long soak would do him good.
As David pulls a wad from its wall-mount a scrap in a dissimilar stock spins floorwards. David stoops down and lifts it up. An array of words is spilt across it, but at first David cannot follow what it says. Two stanzas, in a tight scrawl. A short composition on an ailing plant, hiding a nasty flavour in which David finds not a jot of joy.
It runs thus:
A Sick Bloom
Oh bloom, thou art sick
An indistinct worm
Has flown through night’s dark
In a howling storm
And sought out thy cot
Of crimson thrill
And with its dark occult lust
Will, oh bloom, thou kill.
William Black
On its back is a big dark spot that chills David to his marrow. As David runs through both stanzas a troubling familiarity occurs to him. This work is known to him.
...
A ladybird with a trio of dots on its back is busy making its way across a fading curtain that hangs from his room’s only window, transfixing David as it crawls. It hits a wall of fabric and stops so that it can work out a satisfactory way of ______. David waits for it to start moving again, as if inspiration might flow from its continuing path, in similar way to that of a mythical Scottish arachnid. But no, it fails to push on, and David thinks for a short instant that it is in fact his companion that is looking to him for inspiration, both now caught in a void of lost ambition. David finally snaps his curtain, causing a ladybird to vanish.
...
...
His two o’clock.
Why work a bank holiday any way? Rocks in his skull, it was a singular possibility.
David blacks out. On coming to, a long dark shadow informs him of lost hours.
A logistical study into obstructions to productivity arising during construction of modular buildings.
What apparition, this?
I thrust my fists against both posts
But still insist I saw two ghosts.
David would always talk in polysyllabics if drunk. It was thought of as proof, if you didn’t know him, that drink couldn’t touch him, and proof if you did that it had!
History is irrational.
Which flips and flaps its way into his loo bowl.
It was as if his provision of tools was not satisfactory on its own.
Waking up in a chilling bath “call if you don’t wish to snuff it.” Or some such similar
