Fiction logo

August

The carmine sun

By Rosy C. HowardPublished 3 years ago 3 min read
1
An afternoon- by Rosy C. Howard

August

The carmine sun

In an exceptionally beautiful summer afternoon just driving her way back home, August always took that route, the old carmine barn route. She loved the combination of the carmine color with the deep green windows and doors. An old traditional barn, but well kept. It seems to be used as a home office as well. The windows were dressed with curtains and lights twinkling through. That barn has always been full of life and the happiest place she has ever seen. That Sunday the sun shining just behind the barn gave it a wonderful golden contour. The front of the barn provides cooling and comforting shade sheltering the children playing with their toys under the manicured plants and flowering bushes. The adults were having a gathering around a bonfire and the smell of smoke, cedar wood and cinnamon was filling the air.

The rest of the surrounding neighborhood was mid-century, suburban where one can imagine each member having the same possessions from a shopping list for a good living.

That afternoon was so beautiful even the buildings a few seconds down the road couldn’t escape that enchanting embrace.

August spotted the cemetery and even it was beautiful under that light. So she decided to stop and take a better look at it. The cemetery’s early brutalist architecture of about three stories high heavily straddled a front portico with a façade better fitting for a neo classical building. The sun was casting a golden contour at the sharp lines of the building’s wide and large presence.

August walked through the half open gate and stayed there about four feet from the gate admiring the building. A man wearing a long brown trench coat was just then leaning on the left corner of the portico smoking a cigarette. They noticed each other and she wondered who the man could be. She continued looking at the build toward the right side, then the center where the main entrance was placed, to the left again where the man was. He was no longer there.

The air was still. The birds were inquisitive or nowhere to be seen. The notes uncelebrated but just there. Suddenly the wind blew long and lukewarm carrying some leaves with no sound. Her cheerful curiosity had turned into a quiet observance and a patient wait. Waiting for what, she didn’t even know. She didn’t even know why she was there. She brought happiness with her time and light as a warm candle, but there was no one there to receive it.

The sun’s golden contouring light has turned steel gray sharpening the brutalist edges. By this time the sun was blasting through the back windows of the building, scorching through to the front door glass, obfuscating her view. The sun worked there daily like clockwork insistently, but no time keeper.

The building looked empty, the lights perhaps off, dust, silence. The emptiness of unnecessary functions, the silence to rest, the questions asked, unasked or missed. The reception of no one. The bucolic pathways, the trees shading for peace, the empty benches, one of them with a bouquet of flowers poetically left. Intentionally, unintentionally, doubtably, confusedly.

August felt chills; she was accompanied only by the smell of her perfume, a classic that reminded her of the smell of embalming fluid, cloying around her like neutrons around a nucleus, or the noisy flies that had started orbiting her. The shadows of the afternoon dimmed darker and she was still pinned there, four feet from inside of the gate. Her heart started to race and it was time to go.

No days to come, no words to say, just an eternal Sunday.

Short Story
1

About the Creator

Rosy C. Howard

Art │Design │Illustration

Rosy Design Studio

RosyDesignStudio.com

https://www.ebay.com/str/rosydesignstudio

Poetry + Visual Arts

Reader insights

Be the first to share your insights about this piece.

How does it work?

Add your insights

Comments

There are no comments for this story

Be the first to respond and start the conversation.

Sign in to comment

    Find us on social media

    Miscellaneous links

    • Explore
    • Contact
    • Privacy Policy
    • Terms of Use
    • Support

    © 2024 Creatd, Inc. All Rights Reserved.