tale of twilight

...a tale of the unseen, imagined from a provocative photo by Francesca Woodman (1958-1981) and exclusivly written for Magpie Tales...

'There was that one time'.
'One time what'?
'The way she...well..you know, she has the blackest hair, almond black eyes, high check bones, so slender!, the fairest milk-bottle-on-the-porch white skin'.
'Oh. The white glistening cream in di-rect sunlight'?
'Yesssss...Rising. Not for the faint of heart'.
'I bet he rose'.
'Anyway...as he tells it, there was that night he came home, the only dim light from a pink taper she held, shadows wavering - really eerie like an old movie. She was wearing a fluttering white dressing gown hour-glassing to her bare feet, the white against the long black hair making her ghost-like'.
'Like a spirit from above'?
'Or below'. He laughed. 'Said she mumbled incantations the whole time and she was still incanting as he turned on the football game and was belching his second brew'.
The listener's peeled banana broke off. A scrawny dog behind their sticky wooden bench came around and swallowed it whole, sniffed the man's shoe, received a hard kick and curse, then scampered away. They were silent. Their bus had arrived, remained for the allotted time, pulled away with a jerk, they remained on the bench oblivious, wondering later where the hell is the bus goddammit!, the sweaty bus driver's muffled cursing behind the tinted window petrifying those along for the ride, clutching their worldly possessions closer, black diesel smoke rising into the overcast afternoon, the street smelling of hot choking black tar. One looked at his shoes, the other at the accident lawyers clever phone number on the back of the bus going the wrong way. One scooted closer and nudged the other with a sharp thin elbow.
'Another time, if you can believe it, she was cradling this sea shell resembling a huge...'.
'You know', he scratched his chin, 'maybe he loved the way she welcomed him home'?