First
The Hour Glass by Hilary Spiers, aged 56, from Stamford, Lincolnshire
His hand feels warm; tiny grains of sand grind between their palms. “Look,” he
says, gesturing along the beach, “sand dunes. They've been here for ever.”
For ever, she thinks, marvelling. “They change shape and re-form every day
with the sea,” he says, “but they'll never disappear. They keep us safe.” He
squeezes her hand tight. “Come on, pumpkin, time we got back. Mummy'll be
getting anxious.”
She's anxious too. The looks across the sunflower-patterned cloth on the
veranda table, the too-tight hugs, the silences. She fills the air with
chatter, nonsense, questions, pushes books under their noses, climbs on to
laps that feel cold despite the sun. Her chubby fingers trace unfamiliar
lines beside mouths and eyes. Sometimes, distracted, they flick her hand
away; sometimes they seize it and press it to their lips. When they do that,
she snatches her hand back.
Later, in the strange bedroom, she hears their voices through the thin walls,
spikes of anger breaking through the whispers. Someone is crying, muffled
noises smothered by a pillow or a shoulder. Slipping from her bed, she
creeps into the corridor and stands outside their door: the noises cease.
Minutes pass. She pads back to her room.
The next morning, their faces are gaunt, their smiles painted on. “One last
walk along the dunes,” he says. Her mother turns away, fumbling for a
tissue.
He strides ahead of her, oblivious to her little legs pumping to keep up.
“Wait for me!” she cries, but he's too far ahead. Wind whips the words away.
He stops on the shoreline, eyes fixed on the horizon. She tugs at his
flapping shirt.
“Lie down, Daddy,” she cries and desperately shovels sand over him. To keep
him safe. To keep him there. Panicking as the grains slip through her little
fingers.
Second
Anniversary by Jo Stone, aged 57, from Doncaster, South Yorkshire
They visited the caves on the first day of their honeymoon. Glowing with love
and sunshine, they waited at the mouth of the largest cavern.
She clutched his arm in fear as they were led down, away from the daylight.
Eventually they reached a calcified river and stood in silence as the guide
explained how it had been formed.
Sixty years ago. What difference would sixty years have made to that scene?
Nothing visible. A little frill on the edge of a ripple perhaps.
He remembered that truncated cataract, the colour of cream and coffee,
cascading down, all its force and energy frozen. Only the shape of a river
remained.
The shape of love remains. The habits of love.
“Come along, sweetheart, let me wash your face.”
He coaxes her into a nightdress. “Hush now, time to sleep.”
She lies beside him, and pats him gently, seeking reassurance that she is not
alone in the darkness. For a while he sleeps, but wakes in an instant. The
space beside him is empty.
He levers himself upright, shuffles to the stairlift and glides smoothly down
to the kitchen. It is just light enough to see that she has set out two
cereal bowls.
“I'm making breakfast,” she says. “Why is it so dark?”
She pours the cornflakes, and goes on pouring, on and on, a stalagmite of
cornflakes, flowing over the edge of the bowl and skittering across the
table until the packet is empty. She looks bewildered.
“Never mind, my darling,” he says, as he begins to pick them up. Handfuls at
first, then one by one until the sun rises.
Six o'clock. The carer will be here in an hour. Carer. One who cares. Well he
has been a carer for sixty years.
“Happy Anniversary darling.”
Third
Amore Eterno by Christopher James, aged 27, from Bayswater, West London
Young lovers in Italy scratch their names into padlocks and chain them to
bridges and piers, twenty feet above the eternal sea. School children Biro
hearts with arrows into the tops of school desks. Woodland couples carve
their initials into solid oak.
I climbed over the side of Archway Bridge one night and in six foot letters
spray painted on its side “I WILL FOREVER LOVE PATRICIA LISBOA”. It took me
an hour and a half, and used up a whole can of paint. I dropped the empty
over the side and left. Every morning Patricia would drive beneath it on her
journey to work and know that somebody loved her.
Later that night a man jumped from the bridge. His body was found not long
after two, next to the can of spray paint. It was assumed, first by the
police and then by the media and the people, that he'd painted the message
himself and then fallen, or jumped, to forever love from the other side.
A journalist tracked down Patricia, my Patricia, and asked for her story. They
told her she was the only Patricia Lisboa in London. She said she didn't
even know the man, had no idea why he did what he did. The paper said
“LISBOA REJECTS LOVER”.
Patricia got a lot of hassle and abuse after that; from the papers, from the
man's family, from people who didn't know her but were enraged by the way
she casually drove this man to kill himself. She moved away, and I don't
know where she is any more. I still love her. But, you know, I don't go
around shouting about it.
Runner-up
Love Hurts by Jennifer Sutton, aged 42, from Esher, Surrey
I love you he said as his fist drove into my face. I know you do, I answered
as I slumped in the chair, the taste of blood sharp, metallic in my throat.
His eyes, dove grey in repose, receptacles that could channel such warm
affection in the daylight hours, sparked slate chips as his hand took a hank
of hair and pulled my head back so that my pale neck was laid bare, tendons
screaming.
I stifled a cry, past experience telling me that sound antagonised, his not
wanting verbal confirmation of my pain.
Do you love me? Tell me you love me, he spoke low and soft - if I closed my
eyes and let go of the searing pain, I could recall the days when his words
cast warm shadows; soothing, pacifying.
Now, my head cradled in his arms, his chest solid against my ear, the frenetic
thump of his heart reverberating through my body, the essence of me that he
couldn't reach relaxed into memories that cut a billowing swathe through the
reality of now.
I love you spilled from me as he swung me up and around and his fist caught my
stomach. His smile belied the scorn in his eyes as tears sprang forward and
I fell to my knees, his hand still curled lovingly in my hair, whilst his
fingers, as if with a life of their own and searching for some way back,
gently stroked the silken strands.
As I waited for his next move, he broke away, letting me drop forward on to
the carpet as he walked to the door and out, carelessly flinging it shut, no
lock or key necessary.
See you soon he whispered as my hands reached out yearningly for my man, my
lover, my life.
Runner-up
Mr Bean by Phil Doran, aged 44, from Cambridge
He was always at the dogs, her old man. Head like a kidney bean. Unsoaked,
hard and shiny. He drank Scotch and milk. And smoked cigarillos. He had a
gold tooth. The only break in the purpleness of his face.
It was Thursday. He was drinking alone, punting his wages away down the dogs
again.
We went for a walk on Blackheath. Sat with her in the snug at the pub we found
together. She had a map with her. She needed it. She was always getting
lost. Not being a South Londoner. I was her fancy feller. Her slap &
tickler. Her Thursday night man. She was my once a week bit on the side.
Can't really say when it got more serious. When her old man caught us at it,
I suppose.
He'd got back from the dogs early that night. Done all his dough in by half
eight. It was freezin' and rainin' and so we'd slipped into her parlour for
a warm and a cuddle before going down the boozer for a couple of brown &
bitters. But we didn't make it; we dozed off in front of the fire. I'd been
working lates. He came home early.
His face had never been more purple.
