Time Slip

A small, manky flat in London.

A woman is shouting at her boyfriend.

Girlfriend, “You kill yourself over drawings in those damn sketchbooks. You spend more time with those sketchbooks than with me. You live hand to mouth. You’ve got a buyer that’ll buy the whole lot for £20,000! Sell them! What is wrong with you? They’re just drawings. You can always draw more. I’m trying to help you. When are you going to live in the real world?!”

“TALK TO ME!” “Why won’t you fight back?!”

Love says quietly, “I’m not good with words. I love you.”

Girlfriend, “Coward. I can’t be bothered with you anymore.”

Months later at a pub in the East End, London…

Love, “Ever feel like you belong sometime else?”

Loves Friend, “Huh?”

Love, “Like you were born in the wrong time? Or the wrong place?”

Loves Friend, “You’re going on about nothing. You’re just depressed because you got dumped. I already told you, she isn’t worth it. Anyone that’ll dump you in a text isn’t worth anything.”

Love protectively put his hand on his sketchbook. “I thought everything was going well.” “She seemed so good. I thought she was the “one”.”

Loves Friend, “Yea. The “one”, huh? She cheated on you with a guy she met online and then lied about it. Then she demanded that you sell your sketchbooks. You forgave her, gave her another chance and then she ghosted you. You gave her everything and she didn’t think it was enough. She showed you who she really is. She’s a bint. A plug-ugly, slag inside. Sorry, mate. But she’s rubbish. You got £20,000. You can go anywhere and do anything. PhssH… Move on.”

Love, “It’s not really about her.”

Loves Friend, “What, then?”

Love, “Sigh…” “I have dreams. I keep thinking things in my life will turn out better. And here I am…again.”

Loves Friend, “Yea. Well, we all had dreams and thought that at one time. Then reality breaks in and pisses on everything. You’re thinking too much. You’re a dreamer.” He throws back the last of his beer. “Hhhh, I gotta go, mate. See ya.”

The old clock on the wall chimed 30 minutes after the hour. Love walks up to the bar with his empty beer glasses and quietly sets them down. He reaches into his jacket to tip the barmaid.

Barmaid, “You don’t need to tip me. You always pay too much, love.”

Love, “Sigh…”

Barmaid, “You okay, love? Inspiration running low?”

Love, “It’s always lonely. Don’t know why.” As he looks down at his short nailed, smudged, ink crusty fingers.

Barmaid, “Ah, be glad you’ve found what you love. Most people don’t have the bollocks. They just follow. Do what they’re told. So they pack it in, drink and pretend they’re happy. Honesty is brave. I serve beer and clean up after people day and night. I give them the illusion they’re being cared for, but it ain’t really nothing. Most of ‘em is the same. They want to escape. So they get buzzed for a short while and then leave. Tomorrow, after they break off from their crap jobs, they’ll be back for more.” “But you ain’t like ‘em. You don’t come ‘ere to escape.” The Barmaid looks down at Love’s little, black sketchbook. She pats the sketchbook and whispers, “You know love, you have everything you need.”

Love, “Thanks.”

Love walked out of the pub and into the passageway. He’d been down this passageway countless times. It looked like all the rest of the passageways in the East End labyrinth. Built on ancient roads and layered over and over with every generation. Updated, but basically the same path. That night, the passageway looked dark, dangerous, rough. The sort of honest, dripping, filthy place people that play the game don’t go down. Love walked down the passageway. A motion sensor light popped on. A lightning-like flash. And Love was gone. ∞