We laughed aloud and,

with the sound, shook

the water from the sky.

Creativity

Issue Two Spring 2010

Photos Art and Words by Cardiff Students

Editor

Oliver Franklin

Co-Editor/

Head of Design

Paul Stollery

Assistant

Sub-editor

Megan King

Cover Art

Front: Nat Hills ‘Carousel’ Back: Sam Smith

Proof Readers

Tom Rouse Daniella GrahamDamian FantatoTomos ClarkeMiranda AttyGreg ReesLucy MorganLizzie Blockley

Welcome to the second ever issue of Creativity magazine. In case you missed the first one,

here’s the premise: we’re all about showing off new and exciting creative talent. What you will see on the following pages is the

best writing, art and photography that the students of

Cardiff have to offer – now in glorious glossy.

This issue, our artists venture from the chilling (Tom

Edwards’ brilliant short story ‘Fallout’), to the beauti-ful (particularly our gorgeous centre-fold, Nat Hills’

Red Passion’), to the awe-inspiring (Jonny Wrate’s

photo ‘Wild’).

As always, we would like to thank everyone that sub-mitted work for consideration. The response to the

last issue was unbelievable, and whittling the choices

down to these select few was an almost impossible task – although it must be said, a very enjoyable one.

A big thanks must also go to Emma Jones and her

team at Cardiff Student’s Union for sourcing the fi-nances to bring you this lovely new glossy magazine and enabling us to give our talented photographers

and artists the outlet they deserve.

If you would like to submit work for the next issue,

or talk to any of the contributors about their work,

please email us at creativity@gairrhydd.com

Hello.

‘Black Man’David Baines

3

Left: ‘Full Moon Party’Below: ‘5:43 Sunrise’Rishi Shonpal

4

Beneath Perseus

Hannah Caddick

One August night, when the sun was just setting, you told me

there would be a meteorite shower.

I couldn’t wait; my eyes fixed wide on yours with excitement. We drove out into the country as the light rapidly

faded, leaving the hazy orange city-sky behind us. You

told me about your job as I drank in the cool night air.

We parked the car on a verge and walked through the long grass-

es ready for harvest. Their bulky heads heavy with corn looked

blue in the dimming light. As we shook out the blanket and laid

it on the ground, dust shimmering round us, you told me about

your family.

The ground was hard, baked from endless days of hot summer

sun. We wriggled beneath the darkening sky and you asked about

my family. Finally comfortable on the cracked earth, I told you

about my father and you listened silently. The night was still.

Your face was fading in the darkness, but I could still see your

eyes, unfaltering blue, sparkling as we laughed about how we

became friends. All the while I didn’t notice clouds sweeping

over the pale stars.

We talked about past lovers, companionship, intimacy, loss and

love. We talked about desire. The air felt suddenly cold and I

turned onto my side, closer to your warmth. The wind fondly

ruffling the corn, we shared our dreams and our secrets. You leaned closer to my ear and lowered your voice, as though suspi-

cious of the whispering grasses.

Looking for a shooting star, I felt a splash on my cheek as I

turned my face to the sky for the first time. It was empty and full of cloud, fat and ready to burst. We laughed aloud and, with the

sound, shook the water from the sky.

We ran through the corn, the noise of our laughter and the rain

deafening. Peals of thunder shook the ground and you took my

hand in yours. You stopped and turned to me, and through the

storm shouted something I couldn’t hear.

From the warm dry shelter of the car we watched the rain pass

over, like huge grey curtains pulled back to reveal a burning sun-

rise. We had stayed up all night and not seen a single meteor

blaze through the sky. But as you kissed me and told me you

loved me, I fell for you, aflame. Two stars collide.

We laughed

aloud and,

w ith the

sound, sho ok

the water from

the sky.

5

My heart whistles in the tin kettle over the fire but they do not seem to hear it. They pour over me, star-ing into my glassy eyes, searching for a trace of the man who disman-tled me. I lie on my crime-scene bed and try to cry, but my insides

are turned to ice.

A man with kind eyes lightly fin-gers the wounds in my chest that

cannot heal.

“Who did this to you?” he mur-murs.

I want to answer him and all the others that are rallying to my cause, spying on my tragedy. But my lips are drawn taunt with the effort it took not to scream: I had not wanted to give him the satis-

faction of my suffering.

Beneath his sharp fingers I flaked away in fleshy chunks. With swar-thy eyes he methodically plucked the light from my own until the

world was a perpetual twilight.

Somewhere in my emptying skull there are the hills I grew up in and the lovers I had in France who fed me oysters and called me Marie. My memories slip through my fin-gers like liquid before they can clot

in the palms of my hands.

My heart stops hissing in the ket-tle. Finally, I am done.

-Mary Ann Kelly, 1863-1888, final victim of Jack the Ripper.

No. 5Megan King

6

Folding your shirts I feel the small, hard rounds of buttons that, count-less times, I have pushed undone – and done up too. Just last night I pressed them past the stitched edg-es of gaps in the stiff cuffs when you could not do it yourself. I told you less haste, more speed and took my time, breathing in your damp aftershave. I turn the fabric in my hands now and when you are not looking touch the collar to

my nose and inhale.

I draw a black dotted line along your chest in permanent marker, take big, shiny crunch snap, crunch snap scissors and cut you open. I make little holes in you, along one side, and, on the other, stitch on

black buttons, black as my eyes.

And then I put you on and breathe you.

Buttons Hannah Caddick

7

‘Street Dancer’ Lizzie Foggitt

Welcome to Paradise Chris Griffiths

8

It was his bid for life, ironically, that precipitated his

downfall. His body well and truly on earth, his head

well and truly in the clouds, he stomped on the

accelerator and propelled the car one hundred

and thirty miles-per-hour down the hot strip of

tarmac. The sun glistened across the windscreen. He

bellowed in exhilaration as the dust from the barren

orange land washed through his hair. This was it. This

was certainty. This was life.

But where there was life, death was shortly behind.

The distance narrowed between the vehicle and the

object of his desire – the rainbow. He was now directly

under it. Surely he was going to catch it this time. And

then, conveniently, clandestinely, it suddenly gave a

flickering shift. It was moving, fading away from him.

“No!” he screamed, and threw the wheel carelessly

to make a sharp turn. Only, it was too sharp: the car

jack-knifed, flipped and flung through the air to de-

struction. As he lay there dying, Connor Figure caught

sight of the rainbow, elusive, untouchable. He spat

blood and laughed.

The End

* * *

I woke up this morning face down in desert sand, after

what felt like a very long sleep. The car was utterly

demolished, components spread out by the clumsy

hands of detonation. Forced to walk for God only

knows how many miles back to civilisation, I probed

my memory. Nothing. I don’t recall why the hell I’m

out this far or what happened. And that was only the

beginning. I got back to town around midday. Over the

horizon hung a banner of hot orange as if the world

was catching fire - it wasn’t a natural aesthetic, but artificial, contrived.

My suspicion was later proven right – the world was

alternating on behalf of my presence, my anomaly.

The land was uneasy, breathless trees were perform-ing these staccato dances, their leaves flashing from bruised red right through to May green. And then sud-denly, in their budding prime, the trees decide to drop

like poles straight into the ground. It’s growth in re-verse. It’s a world of unnatural colours. It is fake.

Chasing RainbowsA.T.P. Mathias

9

* * *

I am a ghost.

That’s right, a ghost. I tried to talk to people, to engage.

They looked straight through me – the kind of igno-

rance that would simply be impossible to feign. I went

berserk. I screamed as their scripted speech filled my

ears. And they didn’t sense a fucking thing. I went to

my house and found a funeral card with my picture

and name on it dated a year back on the mantelpiece.

I’d died in a car crash. And then it all made sense.

Stunted breath and tears ensued… what the fuck was

happening?

In that moment I heard this patter – like rainfall,

only harsher, more punched, like keyboard chatter. I

glanced out of the window to find it was raining phras-

es. Hundreds of little strips of size twelve, Times New

Roman were falling from above. I went outside, picked

up one of the black strips and read the words:

Warning Stop Now!

* * *

“I’m Alex Mathias, the original writer of this story. I

thought this was being hacked so I’m here after my

typed warnings didn’t stop you.” The man pointed to

himself. “I am an advocate, an avatar if you will of the

real Alex Mathias, who is typing his entry alongside

your independent, self-creating one. You no longer

exist to these characters; this is a sequel without you

buddy. Can’t you see that your presence here is fuck-

ing up my story? You’re not meant to be here.”

Just some character in a book? This Mathias guy has

really got some gall.

“And how do I know you’re telling the truth?”

He slowly unbuttoned his flowing black coat. Where a

body should have been, there instead resided a churn-

ing mass of thousands of typed words, describing his

every word and action. Well if that doesn’t confirm

you’re from a book I don’t know what will.

I’ll admit I got a little shaken, a little scared, so I started

pleading to something beyond the sky. I explained to

him my predicament. I still don’t think he believes I’m

not some hacker. I inhale upon my cigarette and juggle

the smoke in my mouth. I didn’t want him to know

that underneath this façade I was falling to pieces like

the rest of the world.

“So what will you say when you meet the writer of

your life?” He bolted as soon as the question left my

mouth, the little coward.

I’m living in the interlude, the no man’s land of cre-

ation. He must be lying. I need to escape.

* * *

What does one do when they are faced with the fact

that their existence is based on the capricious whims

of some author? You’ll chase rainbows Connor; if you

can prove they’re real then anything can be… it’s what

you’ve always done said these thick black letters that

fell from the vacant sky. There stands a rainbow off in

the rim of the glassy sky. It looks tangible, the bands of

looped light simply glistening and coruscating, proud,

fruitful. I’m laughing. Is it real if it was written? Is it

Mathias’ thought or my memory? I can’t concern my-

self with the philosophy; I just have to keep driving.

I speed down the black strip of a familiar looking des-

ert. My legs are beginning to vanish from the waist

down. The sky is melting down off its canvas like le-

thargic ice cream. He must be shutting down this doc-

ument. What a strange sensation it is to say that. Just

as my arms start fizzing into clear nothingness, I take

out a pad and paper and balance it precariously on the

steering wheel.

Connor Figure, cigarette in his mouth and sand in his

hair, sped down the black desert asphalt scene…

My sight is going. The world is waning, clouds popping

like lemonade bubbles, life dissolving like dreams on

awakening, the writers’ neglect or the characters’ pro-

found realisation. I can just see the rainbow, I’m right

alongside it – I’m going to catch it. It suddenly moves,

eschews me playfully.

He saw the rainbow, plummeted toward it as it glis-

tened remaining absolutely still…

I swerved violently and lost control; the car jack-knifed

and spun through the air. The pen and paper still in

my hand, I lay dying, my body fleeting, evanescent. I

saw the rainbow sailing away. Life defeats me.

And yet, I spit blood and laugh. My words can create

a reality and my spirit will not be bound in hollow

bondage. I can escape… I can escape…

Trying to find certainty and assurance in existence is like trying to find the end of the rainbow. But Connor Figure caught it, and as the rainbow was real, so life

was real. And such a thing could never vanish.

The End

‘Under My Umbrella’ and ‘Contact’ Sarah Pritchard

10

Top: ‘Under my umberella’ Bottom: ‘Contact’ Sarah Pritchard

Mirror mirror on the wall, I see ashes in you.

My flesh on fire as my entity is melting

and my breaths are but a few,

while my life support is pending.

My flesh on fire as my entity is melting,

yet you stuff me in a vial

while my life support is pending

with a scarred and twisted smile.

Yet you stuff me in a vial

-with its toxic quintessence-

with a scarred and crazy smile

forever more haunting my essence.

With its toxic quintessence

in mirrors and in people’s eyes;

forever more haunting my essence,

their looks as eerie as wolves’ cries.

In mirrors and in people’s eyes,

when they look at me with vanity

their looks as eerie as wolves’ cries

and this encrusts me with insanity.

When they look at me with vanity

it makes me hate me to the bone

and this encrusts me with insanity

which is by now my comfort zone.

It makes me hate me to the bone,

all that purposeless and fake attention

which is by now my comfort zone

and challenges my soul’s retention.

All that purposeless and fake attention

has puzzled me whether it’s true,

a mirror never lies, dictates convention;

mirror mirror on the wall, I see ashes in you.

Mirrors

Sergio Hadjivasilis

12

13

Left: ‘No Rescue’ right: ‘Untitled 2’ Philip Newbould

‘The Tree’Jake Yorath

14

When only the moon rages outside my window,

and the room is filled with soundless dark,

I feel my heart thud in my chest and know

that one day this will end, this drumbeat cease

after a sudden blast, or a slow decline.

Wiping sweat from my brow, twisting, turning, toiling,

steeped in memories, I gaze at Adriana,

tell her our first kiss should be to the song,

Pretty Green Eyes. ‘But we have brown eyes,’ she says.

Caroline smiles as snow begins to fall,

before her taxi arrives, before she leaves me.

Now, I’m with Will, ignorant and happy,

staggering under this same moon, not knowing

he’ll find a girl, have kids, and forget that I

was once his friend. Sometimes, without reason,

I fear I won’t wake. Better to fall asleep,

distracted by memories, even bittersweet ones,

than watch the future threaten all night, wide-eyed.

FacesDarren Freebury Jones

15

‘Lips’Natalie Hills

FalloutTom Edwards

twentysixthofaprilninetee

neightysixonetwentythreeam

thirtymegatonscaesium137

strontium90 fourhundred

timesmorepower fulthanhiroshimafiftysixconfirmed

directdeathsfortysevenworkers

ninechildren fourthousand

estimatedcan cerdeathsthreehun

dredandsixtysixt housandresettled

‘The Declaration’ Jonny Wrate18

One night I heard a noise. I looked out the window. He saw me.

“Close the window and go back to sleep,” he said, “There’s a fire at the reactor. I’ll be back soon.”

When he died, they dressed him up in formal wear, with his service cap. They couldn’t get shoes on him because his feet had swollen up. They buried him barefoot. My love.

– Lyudmilla Ignatenko, wife of fireman Vasily Ignatenko

The flames after the explosion in Reactor Four gave the sky a bright raspberry glow. The air smelt metallic and tasted sour. Clickclickclickclickclick: Geiger counters chirped like a plague of locusts. Fire trucks and mili-tary vehicles trundled towards the scene, crushing fall-en pine cones and chunks of hot graphite under their wheels. Vasily’s skin felt hot. He sat in the back seat of the truck trying to concentrate on Sergey’s briefing, but all he could think about was the heat: an itchy, dry burn that clung to him all over. He scratched the palm of his left hand and swallowed, trying to get rid of the

taste at the back of his throat.

Later, as Vasily lay dying in a poisoned hospital, work-ers built a concrete structure around the burning re-actor to reduce further contamination. It was hastily constructed and inherently unstable. They named it the Sarcophagus. It was too late. The fallout had already floated high into the atmosphere. It moved in the wind and fell like grey snowflakes in twenty six countries. Green forests turned blood red. Children in Belarus de-veloped incurable tumors. Babies in Turkey were born

without brains.

After the walls of the hospitals had been scraped down and the bodies had been cremated, the govern-ment set up a series of four exclusion zones, concen-tric circles like Dante’s rings of Hell, centred on the smouldering heart of Reactor Four. The centremost Zone of Alienation, chetvevta zona to the locals, is still a strictly protected no-man’s-land. Even today, only the remaining liquidators – workers employed to decommission the Chernobyl plant – are permit-ted to enter, and they must work three days on, four days off to reduce the risk of contamination. They sweat in hazmat suits and take cigarette breaks in lead-lined, one-man huts. Open coffins standing on end.>>

‘The Declaration’ Jonny Wrate 19

>>The short, elderly woman stood defiant in her door-way, knotty grey hair tucked under an old baseball cap.

Her son had known Vasily from fire station number

38. She gripped the shawl around her shoulders with

a slender, weathered hand. Her frown was stern, im-movable. This is my home. My home. I will not leave.

Who are you to tell me I must leave? You think you

can scare me with your guns and your tanks? No, no,

it is you who must leave. Let me be. This is my home,

my home. She slammed the door shut and moved

to the window. They were leaving. In the distance,

the ancient pine forest sighed as it blushed death.

The Ferris wheel in the centre of Pripyat Amusement

Park has never turned. The town, originally built to

house employees and scientists from the plant, was

evacuated before the park had a chance to open. The

wheel still stands, rusting, occasionally groaning in the

wind. No children ever shrieked in excitement at the

view from the top, no couple ever shared their first kiss

there. A heavy silence hums in the convention centre,

where hardy shrubs, hardly alive, cling to concrete.

A wolf shelters in the lobby of an apartment block.

In summer, white light glints off the broken glass, ly-ing where it fell. In winter, blizzards scream through

empty schools.

They call them the samosely, a Ukrainian slang term

which, roughly translated, means ‘self-settlers’. The

samosely are a small group, now made up of fewer

than four hundred individuals, who still live inside

the dangerously irradiated Zone. Some are elderly res-idents who refused to leave. Some are vagabonds or

drifters, squatters with no families and no real homes.

They fish, grow vegetables and hunt in the woods.

Some of them say they will never leave, that the Zone

is safe, that the Zone is where they belong. Some will

not speak, or, like Vasily, cannot.

i am the steam void that caused the first explosion i

am the az-5 button that should not have been pressed

i am the white hot rubble i am the wind which spread

the dust i am the ferris wheel that never turns i am

vasily burning inside out i am lyudmilla who couldnt

touch him on his death bed i am the baby born with-out a brain i am the black fungus growing on the walls

of the sarcophagus i am the clock stopped dead at one

twenty three i am the generation defiled by fallout

scattered like snow

20

‘The Rut’ Hugo Creeth 21

Pretty plumes of pink brush feathered fringe against the crag,

Indescribable light that heralds with calm grace the writer’s defeat.

Smudging strata stretching a bruised grey beneath the pink,

Grades purple blue and darker down towards the silver sea.

It’s so quiet: the silent announcement of greatness,

The stern landscape of sky beyond the fretting thoughts.

Bundles of self-importance trip and trample tiny lives,

A quibbling neurosis wasting hours crossing wires.

Empty bubbles burn through brains and the stagnant dust of dreams,

To finally leak in squawking words and self defeating schemes.

All to the changing cinema that arches overhead,

Us ants in agitation will leave the gods for dead.

St Lucia Sky & MountainsDavid Spittle

‘Wild’ Jonny Wrate

22

23

Stuffed Children

‘Black

and Whites’

Jonny Falkus

S. Manley Hadley

24

Maria Putsch became, whilst pregnant, paranoid about her child dy-ing. Every time she heard mention of cot death, car accidents, leukaemia or terrorism, she shuddered with a fear of her un-born child perishing before he or she finishing growing. And

so, rather than attempt to assuage these fears by talking to anybody about them, or even perusing child mortality statistics, she instead

began to research taxidermy.

For a period of about four or five months, Maria Putsch spent her eve-nings reading leaflets, adverts, textbooks and watching documenta-ries on stuffing, embalming and generally on what would be involved if she had a dead child on her hands and wanted to preserve it. The image of a stuffed toddler at the top of her stairs did not strike her as morbid, did not make her scared – she felt, for quite a while, that if she had a child which could not make it to adulthood, she would al-

low it to continue existence as an ornament.

She looked up prices, and even made genuine enquiries – under a pseudonym – regarding having a child stuffed. Legitimate taxidermy businesses either laughed her away or, on realising her seriousness,

asked her – not always politely – to never contact them again.

She eventually asked her friend, Danielle Coup, if her thoughts were normal. They were in a small cafe neither had been to before and Danielle, thirty-six, had produced a child already so would under-

stand how a pregnant woman thinks. She said, after a short pause,

‘That’s weird, Maria. Really weird.’

And somehow, having had someone say that to her directly, the myr-iad stuffed children Maria had imagined her house containing began to disappear. The plaintive toddler staring down the stairs: gone. The teenage boy preserved having his first shave: gone. The five-year-old girl displayed at a picnic with her dolls in the garden (there were special waterproofing treatments available): gone. The ten year old holding a child’s bicycle in the garage: gone. The adolescent forever crying after her first break up: gone. Maria’s imagined house of dead children evaporated, and was replaced by guilt at ever thinking such a thing. And then she became scared – no longer certain her child was going to die, Maria realised that he or she would be a living creature she would probably have responsibilities and attachments towards

until she died.

She began to cry. Danielle looked confused and asked the waiter for the bill.

Stuffed Children

‘Black

and Whites’

Jonny Falkus

S. Manley Hadley

25

‘Lassie’ David Baines

The rasping stone tongue of the playground -gravel-studded flesh and blood-raked skin.

Every tree a splinter shop, every flower a cup of bees.

Bones snap like carrots, knees peel like gold stars,

toffee-teeth chip and nails bend, acute angles.

Hair ripped from scalps, burns from the Far East,

And if all else fails, a kick in the nuts.

The wail of a fallen comrade,

But we’re drowning in thickly invisible mud.

Still the sun shines ripely, a birthday balloon,

and the air is sweet and clear as juice.

Then, the brass voice calls us back to the dust,

and broken, we return from Break.

BreakSophie Dutton

My God, how this winter drags its feet! Just when we all began to think it was over, to emerge from our protective layers, it drew another breath and spat another round of snow upon our heads. The plants that had begun to peer up from the earth perished overnight. You see their crumpled bodies lying just beneath the snow. The birds are desperate now- a blue tit searches in vain for food and for his partner in my garden but he is too late. She too lies crumpled beneath the snow.

I wish I could hibernate. These lengthy nights and biting frosts reveal my very worst. I am a monster in the cold. No thoughts for anybody but myself, no thoughts beyond my chapped fingers and wind burnt cheeks. In the summer I can be lovely, and kind. I long to pick a flower and give it to a passing stranger. To lounge about in the park and throw a ball for a dog. Or read a book sat on a bench: a gorgeous com-

bination of the public and the private.

How I wish I could hibernate until the sun comes out again.

Will you sing me to sleep?

Wake me when the first daffodil shows its pretty face.

My God, how this summer stays and stays. My hands, my lips are parched. The earth is parched. We’re all longing for a drink, a good long soak of rain. Saturate me, saturate my flaking skin! The flowers gave up long ago. They lie along the soil, their open grave. The stream that ran along the gar-den hedge dried up weeks ago. Now it is not even a dribble. A young sparrow lands hopefully on the bank, but there is nothing but cracked mud and wizened worms. Sun-shriv-elled reeds. A mouse dead for thirst. The sparrow flies away

again, parched, parched.

I long for the cooling breeze of autumn to burst into the sti-fling air and liberate us all. Breathe life into my languorous limbs, and sooth my sunburnt face. We scuttle from one shady spot to the next, soldiers seeking camouflage. The sun is now our enemy. We are bloated with it, glutted on it. Our bellies swell from the heat that stops us running, walking, moving, thinking. Caked on sweat on caked dust. Come, au-tumn rains, and wash us clean. Come drag a cloud across this

blistering orb.

Will you wipe my brow?

Fan me, cool me, until the first apple hangs heavy on the bough.

The Long Year

Emma Hillier

28

‘Chilli’Chris Griffiths

29

On just an ordinary day, a Saturday, laughter rang through his ears and a smile ran across his face. His father stood at the kitchen counter making his famous home-made bread. He wasn’t a fantastic cook, but his bread was unbeatable. It was just one of the things that made his father wonder-ful. His mother was cleaning the living room and singing her favourite songs of the past decades. The coal fire crackled and the warmth blushed the cheeks of everyone inside. He crept up to the counter, his eyes hovering above the surface, and breathed in the soothing dough smell. His father kneaded the smooth clump with his strong fists, pushing in more air pockets. “Go on son, you have a go,” his father smiled at him. Stepping back to allow his son to take his place, his fa-ther’s dog tags clanged against his chest. The cuts of crisp silver always shone in the sunlight, dis-playing his bravery in the rage of the last World War. For now they remained protected under his shirt. He smiled, thrilled to take part in one of his father’s achievements, and concentrated so as

not to mess up his father’s work.

He smiles. Then he opens his eyes.

Upon the vast hills above his hometown, the strong wind beats against his face. It is cold and all he wants to do is go back. Go back home, back to then. But the boy stands there, huddling into his long coat, his uncle looming at his side. The boy, no more than eleven, has to be brave like a grown man. For a second he looks at the moun-tains that rise exceptionally over the hills, then quickly looks back down to the soft earth at his

feet.

“Come on now, Rich,” his uncle presses his hand firmly onto his shoulder.

If he hadn’t had his arms crossed around the steel box that he’d sworn to protect, he probably would have crumbled to the earth, felt his body crack and fall to tiny pieces, some so small they would be like dust. Rich takes a deep breath; his eyes sting with the prospect of tears and his heart

30

Bethan J. V. Evans

Forced Forward

We laughed aloud and, w ith the

sound, sho ok the water from

the sky.

31

beats so loud he can almost hear the vibration

of the two slices of metal, inscribed with his fa-

ther’s name and unit number, which now hang

around his neck.

He sees his father standing before him, looking

deep into his eyes, hands casually in his pockets,

with a gentle smile on his face. Rich secures his

grasp on the box, its cold hard exterior sinking

sorrow into his body. This is where they have to

part. Up on the hills streaked with heather, in

front of the grand mountains that guard the sky,

they have to say goodbye. His father’s favourite

spot. The sun was lowering its light on the world

and streaked the sky with lilac. The rocky tops

were illuminated, revealing their magnificence to

the world. A worthy audience for his father.

“It’s time we said goodbye Rich.” His uncle looks

back towards their town, like he couldn’t even

see his own brother.

“But I don’t want to.”

“Come on, Rich. You need to be the man of the

house now.”

That thought makes him want to run straight to

his father to be swept up in his arms. His uncle

turns around to face him. He has a look of serious-

ness about him but now that he is so close Rich

can see his bloodshot eyes shining with tears. He

carefully loosens the grip of Rich’s arms so that

the steel box is held in front of them. They hold it

together while a tear trickles down Rich’s cheek.

His uncle lifts the lid, and with his hands firmly

grasping Rich’s at the sides of the box, he makes

a sharp upwards motion so that the contents fly

into the air and are caught on a gust of wind.

Rich looks at the box. Empty. He looks back to his

side. His father is gone.

Through his glazed eyes he sees the million

speckles of dust, which retained a sparkle in the

evening light, fly up higher and higher in the sky,

making their way to the great mountains.

‘Rodin’s Kiss’ Lauren Housego

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AUTUMN

2010

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