Perspective

As a kid I used to run away a lot. The most common place I would have been found, had anyone tried to look, would have been the park. I had a tree there that I’d sometimes spend the day in. In that way that boys do, I’d pee from the top of it and jump down and scare little kids from time-to-time. No I never peed on any of them.
I’d often spend hours just laying there in the tallest branches thinking about life. Soon my thoughts would drift to all the happy kids below and how unhappy I was. The thoughts used to make me cry, so I was glad no one could see me.
Later on my thoughts turned to the kid’s mums and how from that vantage you could look right down their tops. I’d watch their ample boobs wobble about in their low cut tops.
Its strange how your perspective can change with age, and how much difference puberty makes. More than anything it gave me something to distract myself with, and boy was I distracted!

Behind

My ex-girlfriend had a rather large bum, which I fell in love with almost instantly. We used to walk from school to her house and I’d sometimes walk slower to get a better view of her rear. Sometimes she’d look back and I’d grin at her and raise my eyebrows cheekily. Most of the time however she just kept looking forward while I took my fill of bottom-gazing, until I’d catch up to her side again and we continued hand-in-hand to her home.
After some time however it became clear that we couldn’t stay together. I had to go to university and so I chose to leave her behind.

Pavlova

On the evening of the dinner party my Father was always demoted to little more than a fixture. He was reduced to a useless mass that took up space in the living room with the rest of the inefficient males. It would be a good few years until I joined their ranks, till then my games took on a new dimension. I used to play at being a spy. I’d hide in the same places, but report my observations into the freckle on the wrist of my right arm.
I’d be forgotten about while my Sister and Brothers were sent to bed. I’d be left to observe the drunken stumbling of the adults around me. After a few close calls I’d realise that it no longer mattered if they saw me or not. If my Father saw me walking about he’d mention bed, take another sip of red wine and then carry on talking to his friends.
If I went into the dining room to grab a bite to eat, my Mother would put down her glass of white wine and call me to her. She’d place a hand below my chin and lift my head, then use the other to crush me to her waist. She held me in a way that with one swift twist she could have easily have broken my neck. She’d then turn to her friends and carry on talking. Her grip would loosen. Eventually I’d be allowed to wander off with a large piece of homemade Pavlova.

Aspirations

Piya and Conner were the beginning of caring for me.
We didn’t have aspirations. We didn’t care if we were compensating for families that didn’t care for us. We were just three kids looking for something to belong to. Closer than friends. Closer than siblings, because for all we knew we had stronger loyalties. Our brothers stabbed us in the backs as soon as they could reach. Our sisters clawed our faces at a crossed-word. Home was a battleground that we avoided, daily, for as long as we could. Ours was a world of distraction. We didn’t care for anything but each other. We were more than a family. We were part of one another.

House

When I got here, when I off the train, walked the long walk to the front door, when I turned the key and stepped in, my heart faltered and the beast wriggled in delight. I felt like I was opening the box of the world’s ills. If I had a choice I’d shut the lid and leave it here forever. Home is so sad, is what Larkin said ‘shaped to the comfort of the last to go’ well in this case, it isn’t. Its shifted furniture; moved in new televisions and hi-fi’s; the doors open differently; some doors are locked; my room is nothing more than a music studio. I feel like weeping for that now disbanded ‘joyful shot at how things ought to be’. Gone is the home, this is the house.
I’ve tried to think of where home is. Where my heart is, or longs for. I love Bath, but it isn’t a home. This is a world of sorrows and I’m a wandering kid without the wanderlust to enjoy it. How do they know how I feel? These people who tell me that it’ll be ok. If they did; they wouldn’t lie to me, they’d understand that the longer I stay here, the less ‘here’ I am, the more ‘elsewhere’ the more ‘anywhere’ I become. There is only so much absence you can handle, before you start to fade physically.