grief encounter

‘Well,’ said my husband as we emerged blinking from the dark cinema into the late afternoon sunshine. ‘It was lovely to get away from work for a couple of hours’. It had been a lovely surprise when my husband had unexpectedly announced an illicit weekday afternoon trip to the pictures, although sadly his secretary Fabio joining us did have the effect that we couldn’t entirely leave my beloved’s trade at the cinema door. It had been a nice way to spend a couple of hours, an old movie, some popcorn, my husband and his secretary sitting just a few rows in front of me. ‘Interesting choice of film’, My husband said to Fabio, ‘The CGI steam trains were terribly unrealistic but I liked the bit where they sneak off to the pictures to watch an overblown romantic flick when they’re in one themselves that we’ve all sneaked off to see’. Fabio smiled. ‘The director’s cut is better’, he told my husband, ‘Trevor Howard leaves the station tea rooms at the end and gets on a space ship instead of the train back to his wife’. ‘Oh, Men!’ I sighed.

Sometimes I've felt as if I were just a made up character as well, living my life in black and white. Although of course, that being the case, the ending must have already been written when in reality most of the time it seemed more as if someone was merely making all this up as they went along. I just hoped I was a character in some great literary work and not in some stupid blog that only seems to get updated once a week lately. ‘I think those were real steam trains darling’, I said, as the famous dramatic climax of Celia Johnson’s hair falling slightly over her eyes resonated in my imagination. ‘It was made in 1945 you know’, I explained. ‘Oh crikey’, said my husband, ‘and it’s still not out on DVD yet dear?’ he laughed. ‘Probably’ I said ‘Not quite the same though.’ I sighed. My husband shrugged. ‘Of course it’s allegorical you know', I said, ‘all this stuff about them not being free to be together because of the social conventions of the time.’ My husband looked puzzled. ‘ Noël Coward being gay and everything’, I elaborated. ‘Noël Coward was gay?’ he queried. ‘Are you quite sure dear?’ It was almost as if he was teasing me but I knew he would never do that. ‘I’m a woman dear’ I began. ‘We girls can tell gay man a mile off you know’, I said. My husband and Fabio exchanged glances so I could see they were keen to get back to work now.

As we walked across the multiplex car park a gust of wind blew up the dust from the ground. ‘Oh, darling!’ I cried. My husband turned round. ‘I think I have some grit in my eye!’ I said, winking vociferously. ‘Oh dear.’ he began, then hesitated ‘Oh, I get it’, he smiled knowingly, ‘Ok, you win dear, I’ll drive’, and he continued on towards the car with Fabio. After a moment I shrugged my shoulders and as I watched to two men walk away across the tarmac, I thought I really should have been writing SITN that afternoon but my agent had been very quiet lately and nobody reads blogs in august anyway. Anyway, I'd detected that some people had found me too critical of the North on occasion, which was unfair because it is grim up north, and what I really needed was for my friend to come up from London and then she could moan about northerners and I could report what she said and I wouldn’t get the blame. Suddenly, my phone rang. It couldn’t be! ‘Air, hellair!’ said the voice, ‘Rilly, is that you darling? Its your old chum from London who really hates it up north speaking’, the voice continued. ‘Coming up to visit you dear, put the kettle on and see you in a few days, what!’. My husband turned around and look back towards me. ‘We’re going to the pub!’ he shouted, so I took off my shoes and sped after after them. As I got into the car I sighed. My friend was on the motorway on her way, my husband was here with me in the car, and yet strangely I couldn't escape the feeling, and I couldn't escape the song in my head, that I was all by myself...