He stared at me, pupils dilated to the size of ink spots either side of a hideous, bloated bulbous nose. Daring me to hold his gaze. His lips parted in a wide grin revealed a mouth of undulating broken teeth. Wild, unruly and unkempt long hair flared out behind him. He was a throwback to the Neanderthals, right down to the rock clenched in one hand, the stick held menacingly high in the other.
It wasn’t the first time we had met and he had barred my path. But today was different. Before I had ignored him. Now I couldn’t. He just kept staring, and I just kept staring right back. No words passed between us, nothing was said. That was the problem, the cause of the trouble. No words.
He wasn’t going to speak. It was not his way. He just stared, standing there barefoot, eyes unblinking.
Usually we looked at each other for a while, then I would smile and move on. Not today. Today I wasn’t smiling, and he never did. Deadlock. I tried a few words. Nothing. I glanced away trying to think, a way of phrasing what I had in mind to say, but the right words wouldn’t come. That was the problem, my mind was empty. I looked up again and of course he was still there, the rock held firm, the stick pointing in my direction.
I bunched my hands into fists, nails digging into the palms and tried again. A few words sprung to the fore, no gushing torrent as there should have been. A slow sentence dribbled out. Not that it made any difference. I knew it wouldn’t. He was still staring. He knew I was drawn to his ugly physog. He was right. I was staring. This time I knew he was winning.
I knew it couldn’t continue. It made no difference to him, he had all the time in the world and would still be there tomorrow. But I needed to be somewhere else. There were plenty of places I should be in, I wanted to be in, not here staring at him. Relax, I tried to tell myself, just ignore him and look away, take a step back. I closed my eyes and took a deep breath, rubbed the tension out of fingers and hands and slowly exhaled. I opened my eyes and instinctively knew the spell had been broken, that for now he was gone, out of sight and out of my way. And of course that’s when the right words sprung to mind.
Fuck it, don’t you just hate it when you can’t think what to write!
Very metaphorically narrated and disturbingly familiar consternation. The punchline made me go through it again!
Thanks Umashankar. It was written as my ‘homework’ for my local Writing Group which I read out at our meeting last night.
I know exactly how you feel! I’ve been having trouble like that with my latest blog post! It’s an analysis of a particular fantasy novel, and I feel mentally tongue-tied for some reason.
Are you sure this isn’t a bogle? That’s what I thought you were writing about at first! The writer’s-block bogle!
Hi Lorinda. The bogle, you want the bogle. OK, coming soon! Meanwhile this is the little character who sits above my desk and stares at me when I write, or more appropriately when I don’t. I wrote this for my local Writing Group which I read out last night.
Antony, I nominated you for the Very Inspiring Blogger Award. For Information, go to http://termitewriter.blogspot.com/2013/02/ive-received-very-inspiring-blogger.html Participation is not required, of course.
Antony, here is a Liebster Award for you!
Merci, Mes Amis