She said … He said by Graham Crisp, a glass of sparkling wine

 She said she wanted to go to the cinema, he said he wanted to go to the pub …

 

[they went to the cinema]

 

She said she wanted a big engagement party, he said he wanted just close friends

and family …

 

[they had a big party]

 

She said she wanted their wedding ceremony in Bali, he said he wanted the town registry office …

 

[they had their wedding in Bali]

 

She said she wanted their honeymoon in the Cayman Islands, he said he wanted to go to the Isle of Wight …

 

[they went to the Cayman Islands]

 

She said she wanted a big house in the suburbs, he said he wanted a small cottage in the countryside …

 

[they lived in the suburbs in a big house]

 

She said he should go for promotion, he said he was happy with his current role …

 

[he got promoted]

 

She said she wanted four children two of each, he said he wanted two children one of

each …

 

[they had four children]

 

He said he wanted a divorce …

 

[he got one]

 

She wondered why …

About the author

 

Graham is a retired SME owner. He has written two novels – Nicholas and the sequel Nicholas – The Final Phase. He also volunteers at a local primary school helping children to enjoy reading.

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Moving on by Judith Skilleter, sparkling wine

Phyllis was widowed six months ago. Her husband died after a long illness. When the end came he was ready to go and she was ready for him to go. Not in a selfish sense, but she could see the pain and indignity was putting him in an emotional and physical place from which he could never recover. Her husband was unhappy with what the illness had reduced him to; he felt less than half of the man he used to be. He did not want the world to see him in this state and Phyllis knowing he was a proud man, did not want that either.

Her husband died at home. That was his wish and Phyllis knows that she could not have done more for him – apart from helping him to die which was his wish in the weeks before his death came naturally. They had talked about going to Dignitas in Switzerland for assisted dying but her husband was determined to be at home until the end. And as time went on he was too ill to get to Switzerland anyway.

It is now six long months since his death. All the messy stuff has been sorted and all the bills paid. All the finances and pensions and insurances and banking have been settled to her relief and satisfaction. But why did it have to take so long? All is left is for his ashes to be spread in the garden when the spring planting time comes along. That was his wish, for his ashes to help future life.

And it is about now, when there is nothing to do, nothing to consider that the pain of her loss hits Phyllis. She had been told that after all the administrative work of bereavement is done then the pain will take over – and she didn’t believe it. How could anything be as painful as watching your husband of forty-five years die slowly and painfully. But they were right, the acute loneliness cuts right through and cannot be lessened.

Phyllis is also angry – with both her husband and herself. Their roles within the household had always been shared and now Phyllis is having to consider things that were never before her responsibility. New skills have had to be learned and at a time when her brain seems scrambled. Phyllis can now, albeit reluctantly and slowly, find her way round a computer, she can change a plug and she is driving more. Her husband loved his cars and he loved driving. Phyllis was more than happy to sit next to him and read. What a mistake. Phyllis has over the years as a passenger lost the concentration and confidence that makes a competent driver and getting behind the wheel is a scary process. As for other tasks gardening is now paid for as will be decorating, when she gets round to it.Phyllis resents the fact that she has acquired new responsibilities and  she also is angry with herself that she didn’t take an interest in these before her husband’s death, even before he was ill, even perhaps throughout their long and happy marriage. It might have made a very difficult time less so.

And after six months the support from others has died away. More than once she has been told that she should be getting over it by now. “What a load of bollocks” thinks Phyllis. She has been advised to get out, find company, have fun, take holidays. “Total crap” thinks Phyllis. She has been told “He wouldn’t have wanted you to mourn.” “Perhaps” thinks Phyllis “but he also knew it would be difficult for her and her husband’s advice was the best advice. “Take each day as it comes; don't rush into big decisions and take comfort in what we had for so long. We were very lucky and it will not be easy adjusting to a life alone. Allow yourself to be sad but do not avoid the little bits of happiness that might come along” Her husband had been a very wise man.

But where does all this need to love, need to care for and need to be with go when there is a death.   Does it just hang about and remain unfulfilled until there is space for it once again in her life? There is a horrible feeling of betrayal if something comes along that she enjoys. Staying with the sadness is a permanent link with her husband and she does not want to lose it.

Phyllis’ grown-up children are aware of how their mother is dealing with the death of their dad. They have ideas to help and have suggested that she stays with them more often. Phyllis tried this once or twice but each time she left early to return home where her memories were. They have suggested a holiday, a holiday with them all together to celebrate their dad, but Phyllis wasn’t keen. “No thank you, I am fine at home at the moment” was her reply to the invitation.

The family know that their mother is not being awkward – it is just that the time is not right, yet. It is a difficult time for all of them.

About the author

 

Judith Skilleter is new to writing fiction after a long career in social work and teaching. Her first children's novel The April Rebellion, has recently been published. Judith is a Geordie, who settled in East Yorkshire 45 years ago and is married with four grandchildren. 

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The Magician and the Jinn

by Mason Bushell

sparkling wine

“You’re supposed to be Archie the Illusionist. Lately, you’ve become Archie the boring idiot.” Jodie the stage manager stood hands on hips. Her lips pursed with annoyance. Archie looked up at her from his seat on a magic box. He flipped an ace of diamonds over his fingers, waved his hand and made it vanish. 

“I’m doing the best I can.” Archie let out a sigh and cursed as his deck of cards fell from his hand, scattering across the floor. “They used to love my act.” 

“Well, get a new act or get out of my theatre.” Jodie stomped off leaving the magician a sagging figure behind the curtains. Surrounded by his magic props, he felt like a failure. He picked up a limp wand and slammed it into his magic hat, it was then footsteps sounded a visitor.

“Hey, magic-man. What’s a matter with you?”  

“Hallo, Charlie. I’m done for mate. Nobody likes me anymore.” Archie looked aloft to the brown eyes of the near seven-foot-tall stagehand. He’d come to sweep the stage and was leaning on his broom. 

“Aw, well, I like you, Archie,” he said.

“Thanks, mate. What I need right now is a miracle.” Archie stood and began loading his tricks into his metamorphosis box. 

“Here, my father Doug said this coin could bring me good luck. He said it taught him diplomacy and now his warehouse is stronger than ever. Maybe, it might help with your fortunes too.” Charlie handed over a large silver coin bearing the image of a horned demon surrounded in flames. 

“This is no coin, it’s a talisman.”

“Whatever, can you do a trick with it?” Charlie began pulling on a rope drawing the curtains aside and revealing the stage and empty seating. 

“Maybe, can I borrow this.”

“Keep it, mate.”

“Thanks.” Archie picked up the hat and walked from the backstage area to his dressing-room.  A small space with white walls, no window, a clothes rail and a mirror back desk to prepare at. Sitting down he tossed his top hat on the rack, then read the incantation before typing it into his phone to search for the coin. Around him, the room grew hot and orange. The top hat fell to the floor, dispensing the wand, and somebody groaned in pain. 

“Cor, bloody hell. What happened,” said a booming voice from the direction of the hat on the floor. Archie’s eyes widened as he cautiously lifted the hat. He revealed a five-inches tall muscular man. He looked to have been carved from granite and was naked save from black leather shorts, and black sunglasses in his flame-red hair. 

“Who – er – what are you?” 

“Ahh, I suppose you think it’s funny summoning into a bloody hat.” The Jinn stood rubbing his backside while looking up to Archie in his magician’s cape. “You tall, insensitive git.”

“Sorry, I didn’t even know I could summon you.” Archie felt stunned by the little man. 

“Oh, you’re one of those?” The Jinn picked up the limp wand, snapped his fingers and turned it into a stick of rock candy. 

“One of what?” Archie watched him chewing on the enormous candy with interest. 

“A wizard wannabe. A fake in a cape, an illusionist with sparks instead of spells. Bet you can’t even disappear a coin, properly.” 

“Oh really.” Archie took up the talisman, holding it between finger and thumb. With a flourish, he vanished it. “There see.” 

“Huh, it's up your sleeve.” 

“No, its naaaah!” Archie shot toward the ceiling and found himself hanging upside down in mid-air. The Jinn made hand gestures. “Agh, I’m not a bloody ragdoll, put me down.” Archie felt himself shaking about until the talisman dropped from his sleeve to the floor.  

“See.” The Jinn snapped his fingers. Archie fell onto his chair and thundered to floor with a crash. The Jinn folded his arms with a smug look.

“That was unnecessary,” he complained.

“Next time don’t lie. You know I hate phoney magic people. I caught a witch out, once, she flew off the handle and hurled her cauldron at me.” The Jinn vanished and reappeared looking in the mirror. 

“Then there was the wizard who couldn’t do magic. He asked me how to deal with an angry druid that was bothering him.” 

“Did you help him?” 

“Sure, I told him to deal with him very carefully.” The Jinn grinned at his reflection. “So, now what do you want me to do?” 

“I’m a complete failure.” Archie took a matchbox, revealed it to be full. Shut it, then opened it again, this time it was empty. “Nobody loves my tricks anymore.” 

“No wonder, Merlin was doing better tricks than that a thousand years ago. Every dinner time that wizard would magically glue a knife into the margarine block, he’d call it excali-butter. Only worthy diners could use the butter after that. The king was never amused. That bloody sword was his best trick.” 

“What about me. What can you do to help me?” Archie looked hopeful.

It was curtain time, the next evening. 

“Ladies and Gentleman, I give you Archie the Illusionist,” announced Jodie with a hopeful look at the stage. The curtains opened and the audience applauded but Archie wasn’t there.  His usual illusions were in place, but the stage was devoid of life. 

“Boo, we want magic.” 

“Yeah, Daddy said, there was magic here.” A little girl jumped to her feet her face contorted, close to tears. 

“You want magic, girl.” The voice had come from the ether, right by her side. “This is magic ladies and gentlemen.” A fire erupted on centre stage, it burned into a boiling column. The crowd gasped as it exploded in a puff of smoke revealing the magician dressed in a white suit. “Sorry for the delay, I caught my trousers on fire during testing,” he said leaving everybody laughing. 

Spinning on the spot, he vanished and reappeared wearing all green. 

“Now.” he looked about the audience. “You sir come and join me.” 

“Me?” a man in his forties rose.

“Yes, you’ll do. I can borrow him, can’t I, madam?” 

“He’s my husband, do what you like with him. Just make sure he’s back to do the washing up,” she replied, getting a dirty look from her man.

“Thank you, madam.” Archie guided the man into the spotlight on stage. He raised a hand producing a deck of cards from thin air, before fanning them out. “Pick one, and show the audience.” The man did as he was told. “Good, put it back in the deck.” 

“So, you manipulated the deck to make my card easier to find, did you?” 

“Oh, we have a smart arse in the house ladies and gentleman.” Archie never blinked, he raised the deck and watched it erupt into flames. “You sir, chose the Jack of Diamonds.” the audience applauded. 

“No, I did not.” The man folded his arms. Archie held out a hand and conjured a large wand. Throwing high he caused it to become a large shawl. He spun it around the man covering his body. Then in a poof of smoke, the shawl and the man’s trousers were gone. He was stood wearing huge white boxer shorts emblazoned with the Jack of Diamonds. 

“A man’s boxer shorts never a lie. Ladies and gentleman.” Archie bowed to his applause. 

“Huh, nice, trick.” The man folded his arms. “Can I sit now?” 

“One second.” Archie took a tall cardboard box and lowered it over the man. Next, he took a sword and proceeded to slice the box into sections, getting lower and lower. The audience gasped for the man had vanished. Archie walked to his empty seat and laid a black cloak over it. With a flourish he flicked it skyward, revealing the man in his seat. The audience burst into fresh applause.  

Archie did trick after trick until his time was done. Exhausted but smiling from ear to ear, he walked off stage. Jodie stood applauding him. 

“You were amazing. Archie the Illusionist can do great magic, after all,” she said.

“I wouldn’t bet on it.” Archie snapped his fingers, engulfing himself in fire. It extinguished a second later revealing the Jinn hovering in mid-air. Jodie flinched back in shock. “Don’t panic woman, I’m not here to hurt you. That useless twit, Archie. Couldn’t do a thing I told him to. He’s been sitting on his arse in the dressing-room all night.” 

“Figures. I’m going to fire him, right now.”

“Wait. It’s you stressing him out that’s causing the problem. He can’t focus and do anything right for fear of getting fired.” The Jinn saw the manager preparing to speak and held up a hand. “Don’t open your mouth, just listen. Archie can do what I did, but only if you let him, only if you encourage him.”

“Fine, teach him and I’ll help.” Jodie sighed and headed toward the dressing room with the Jinn at her shoulder. 

“Good girl. That saves me having to do, what I normally do to bullies,” he said.

“Really, what's that?”

“I burn their pants off.” The Jinn gave a broad grin and disappeared into the dressing room.

Links to previous episodes 

 https://cafelitcreativecafe.blogspot.com/2019/07/the-heart-shaped-carving-in-old-oak-tree.html

https://cafelitcreativecafe.blogspot.com/2019/08/talia-and-jinn.html
https://cafelitcreativecafe.blogspot.com/2019/08/talia-and-jinn-2.html
https://cafelitcreativecafe.blogspot.com/2019/09/the-jinn-and-dog.html
https://cafelitcreativecafe.blogspot.com/2019/11/the-governor-and-jinn.html

The Dancer

by Norbert Kovacs

sparkling wine 

Sally had been a professional dancer for twenty years so knew the dance repertoire. She had performed those by famous choreographers many times in many spaces and now delivered them without flaw. She no longer read the reviews that said she was a masterful dancer since she had been told it many times. She did not regret passing on them, either. Sally had become disaffected with dancing since she was middle aged and even showed it through in her graying, curly hair and crease-ridden face. Her dark-brown eyes, once bright, drooped for the same reason. When she danced, she did so precisely, making it appear she had planned her every step. Her quicker, shorter dances sometimes looked mechanical. If she made missteps in rehearsal, she did it because she wished not to dwell on an arrangement she knew already. To vary what she performed, Sally reworked dances that she had done into new pieces. She spliced together the formal steps of ballet with the fast motions of modern; she used pieces of popular and folk though she felt these last not her style. Her fellow dancers who respected Sally’s experience sometimes performed these dances with her. These novel experiments did not coalesce well, Sally found. The audience clapped for them, the reviews gave some lukewarm praise but not the emphatic kind Sally had received earlier. She was disappointed by it. In coming to rehearsals, she no longer looked at the scuffed studio floor that she danced over the day. She watched instead younger dancers re-create the steps and gestures that she knew. She thought lately she might quit dancing but did not imagine what else she might do. She did not feel cut out to teach.

Sally was brooding over a work she was to rehearse when she read in the paper that a dancer would be performing at a long shuttered theatre in town. She knew that several famous artists had performed at this theatre while it had operated. She recalled a famous actress had been there to perform Shakespeare; a soprano, a program of arias; and a respected pianist, a concerto with ensemble. The theatre had held a reputation for these performances. However, the venue’s usual fare, much less than these, was not enough to continue drawing the crowds and the place had closed several years ago. Sally found it strange a performer should choose to appear there now when many other spaces were available in the city. When she asked her artist friends, they said they had not heard of the dancer who would perform in the shuttered place. Sally, left wondering who the dancer was, decided to go see her perform.

The night for the dance Sally walked the sidewalk from her apartment to the old theatre. She felt guilty as she saw the lazy motion that her legs made as she turned at the street corners. She had the habit to walk so and it had embarrassed her more than once. Couldn’t I walk straight just once: I have the control on stage, she thought as she hurried along. She arrived before the old brick theatre fronted by Ionic columns. The local paper had bragged that the place had "an apt, classic splendor for the fine performances given inside.” She took the long flight of stone steps to the door, no longer veering to the side as she went, bought her ticket, and entered the auditorium where many people had gathered. She could tell several were established figures of the town by their well-cut clothes and suits. She recognized a historian who had written of the theatre in a city history. Near the wall sat a drama teacher who lead a respected studio. Sally took her seat at mid-floor, draped her blazer over its back, and unwound her scarf. Once she settled, the last comers took their seats. The lights over the audience dimmed and the black curtain rose exposing the stage.

The scene was the stage’s original linoleum floor and bare, back walls. The floor had been swept clean but not polished, so that it had an old worn appearance. The single prop to be seen was a pale, green oblong of hard plastic standing waist high at stage center. A plain white light diffused over the scene. There came hurried string music from the speakers above the stage and a woman sped into view. She was a young, lean figure, shorter than most dancers whom Sally knew. She had black hair, face of a cream color, and dark eyes. Her chest was small and rounded, her arms and legs angular at the joints. Her tight midsection tapered at the waist , fit from long practice at dance. She wore a dark blue body suit cut at the elbow and the ankle that outlined her form well. The dancer halted at stage front, her arms bent tensely at her sides, her hands open, the fingers pointed down.  At a start in the music, she turned and bolted toward the back of the stage. She leapt as the violin music broke and landed facing the stage back.  She ran again with arching steps toward stage left, leaped again, her legs kicking in the air and landed quietly before the wall. Sally thought it a strange way to open a dance. She asked herself why, for one, the dancer did not look toward the audience. As Sally watched, the dancer moved by more short bolts and leaps around the stage, her face turned always from the crowd.

A wilting, sad line of horns and oboes transformed the music. The dancer strode by long, graceful steps in a diagonal across the stage, then back. She moved in figure eights, each time stopping farther from the stage’s corners. Her motion was tight, never straying from the shape of the eight. On her third figure, she slowed, rolling her torso before she turned and for a first time faced the audience. She crossed the stage, curling midway, returned to front left, and circled herself in a loop. Sally found the turns out of place with the woman's former flow of movement; it was as if her dance was falling apart when it only had started. Sally's confusion grew as the young artist slowly confined her motion to the stage front. The dancer turned in small loops, crossing her own steps. These steps shortened until she circled once before the oblong. Her motion had became extremely tight. Sally thought it a difficult, over-controlled sequence to maintain. At last, the young woman drew her arms to her chest, bowed her head, and held still.

The oboes and horns in the music fell quiet and the sound of flutes began cautious and low. The dancer opened and unbent her left arm, the wrist catching the white light from overhead. She curved her limb and let it sink, slow and snakelike toward her tight stomach. Her arm moved with a lazy, idle languor that she studied with interest. To Sally it seemed the dancer had forgotten her earlier movement; the young woman hardly moved, absorbed as she became in her self-study. The dancer next arched the left side of her body, her shoulder suddenly slumping. A sinuous clarinet started in the music above the flutes and the woman swept her left leg low over the floor. She made it go long, close to the linoleum. Sally considered the cautious, reflective way the woman maneuvered, more as if she demonstrated a motion rather than dance in any sense.  

As the flutes performed lazy measures, the dancer arched  and curved her leg with the knee into a sharp peak, and drew it to her side.  As the dancer repeated the move, Sally wondered what the young woman aimed for doing it. She watched the dancer bend and unbend her arms a second time. The woman curved them like an S, all while following this motion curiously with her eyes, as if with surprise. The motion seemed strange, unrehearsed. Finally, she jostled and loosened each arm, dropping them. She had relaxed from her early stiffness.

A high-pitched violin and a piercing oboe took over the music. The dancer rippled from her left shoulder to the right, then down her arm and back across her body. She sent wave motions across her legs, arching and twisting the limbs. Sally smiled helplessly. She enjoyed these new, complex moves ; they made her think of a usual dance, though she knew this was no usual one. The dancer next sent twists from her leg across her torso. She gyrated her waist, and curved her arms as she studied the moves, flowing and bending. Her legs rose and descended. It’s like she is moving freely for the first time and not according to a formula, Sally thought. As Sally watched, the dancer combined motions, curved arm and leg at the same time, bent and unbent her torso.

The dancer looked intently at the audience whenever she now shifted her body. Her expression seemed to ask something as Sally came to feel. She felt the question behind the look, whatever it was, more insistent each time. Sally puzzled why the dancer should want to ask anything and followed the performance seeking an answer. In one part of the dance, the young artist shifted to a side and promptly raised her eyes to the audience. Sally had a strange idea of a sudden that the dancer  was asking a question of her rather than anyone else. It seemed bizarre to think; the dancer could have been studying anyone just as well.  However, Sally realized she very well might be right. The dancer's line of sight crossed through her; she could have been looking only at her. But what then had the dancer meant to ask? Sally had no answer as the young woman stepped elsewhere.

A quick, bright oboe and violin announced the next lines of the music. The dancer struck a full body pose at stage left, her back arched, her arms high, studying the spot she had departed a moment earlier. A pride entered her dark eyes, as if she reflected on a great feat she had achieved.  Letting go the form, the dancer hooked by quick steps to mid-stage. She halted before the large oblong and raised her arms as if startled just as several violins sounded a dark, ominous bar from the speakers. The sound worried Sally and she froze in her seat as the performer did on stage. However, the young dancer relaxed and leaned against the green oblong, arching her leg in the air behind her. She seemed she was engaging the object, which she appeared unable to earlier.  The dancer brought her entire body onto the block, balling her form, and rolled onto her side. Her motions, mimicking those she had done earlier, came now at the ready. By a small effort, the dancer raised her torso and snaked up her body. She arched her arm upward, following it with her eyes. Sally realized the woman was building up her performance. She was drawing on the motions of earlier, of curling her arms, bending her legs, to master the oblong space. She figured it neatly, in fact. A flute sounded light, easy, and flowing. The dancer rolled again on the oblong, curling a leg, then an arm. She looked at the audience, her eyes on Sally. The same question came from her as earlier and Sally recognized that she was being asked to respond. She looked on, fixed by the idea. The dancer rolled again and raised her head. She bounced up, stood on the pale oblong, and faced the ceiling.

The music became all violins, high in pitch, quick in tempo. The dancer stepped from the oblong by eager steps, hooked by the wall of the stage and leapt with it at her back. The vigorous move sent a jolt into Sally where she sat in the audience. The dancer turned her leg, arched her arms, jutted forward her knee. In this leap and those that followed, Sally felt the young woman had brought the program completely around from the beginning. Everything in her movement showed energy and a sense of command, even a feeling of success. The dancer circled the stage, then bound to its front. Excited violins, horns, and trumpets rose in harmony within the music. The mood infected Sally, lifting her. The dancer raised her arms high, her legs stretched. Then she arched arm, leg, torso. Her body rolled. She faced the audience. She faced Sally. She splayed open her arms and rolled her head. She let her shoulders flow loosely. A heavy drum beat sounded from the music speakers and the dancer halted. The music finished and there was silence. The dance had ended and the theatre’s black curtain fell.

When the theatergoers rose to leave, Sally saw the confusion in their faces. She watched a suited man turn to his sequined wife and ask, “What was all of that?” An elderly man and two aged women exchanged puzzled faces; the more simple looking woman of the two said, “Could you make anything of her?” The dance had mystified them and few seemed to accept, let alone have liked, the performance. Perhaps, Sally thought, an art critic, if he were among them, would write a poor review, contrasting the dance to the long idolized appearances by the actress and the pianist in the theatre long ago. Sally appreciated why they might reject it. She herself liked the established and the standard: it was her repertoire. However, she felt she understood the basic meaning of this night’s dance unlike the rest of the theatergoers. It was that the young dancer had seen the old forms of dance and decided she must create a new one for herself. Sally felt this stated the point exactly. The stark dance had played at boundaries, experimented with motions, and combined and re-combined them in a new light for the sake of doing it. And in doing so, Sally felt, the young woman had rejuvenated the space of the old theatre. She had given a performance equal to the actress and the pianist, if not more in her daring. Sally sat reflecting happily on the idea that this could be so as the befuddled theatergoers trailed out of the building. At last, she gathered her blazer and scarf in the silence of the empty theatre and left.

Sally found the stone flight of steps to the street outside empty, the last person having departed the theatre long before. As she thought of the night’s dance, she recalled her own performance that she long had accepted as polished and perfected. She felt now she might try to change it. She would make her dance new again, as the performance tonight had been. Going down the first steps, Sally saw her legs wander to the side with the off movement she had made walking to the theatre. She slowed and watched her feet make two, then three of the steps. She liked the motion for the first time. She thought it had its own kind of grace, one she had overlooked in her self-chastisement. She took a few more strides right. She held still and treaded back. She took a few paces down again, watching herself carefully; without turning, she shuffled back up the steps. She lifted her foot to make a new advance. But an idea struck her.  She raised her leg and arched it down to the stone. She descended a short way and curved in her path. She saw her legs cross neatly before each other.

Sally reached the broad sidewalk, circled in a small loop, and bowed a leg over the concrete. An old man in a costly blazer, advancing along the sidewalk, stopped a short distance away and stared at Sally. His puzzled face pleaded the question why Sally was acting so on that deserted street on a cold night. Sally looked back at the old man but, rather than speak a word, she curved her leg and took a bounding step to the side. Her dance was the answer to the old man and, as she thought of it, the question the young dancer had asked.