Hush Music

The finest strain of tea, and the finest of company, and there was I — me —, lashed between uneducated, crawling thoughts, each making an unwise break for my mouth, and chewing, as one does, on a December tart, whilst that unspecified companion of mine, clad boldly in red halves, echoed my jaw's joyous rhythm, only with a decidedly more mundane treat (and beat, while I'm at it), and, I suspected, a more workaday approach. As you will have no doubt gathered by now, this is a situation I often find myself in, but its bottoms are still, teasingly, never quite got at, despite my very sensible reach, and the only way I can inch myself closer (centremetres sound too ugly, you see) is by picking and clawing, sparing nothing in the process. So be it that I may never fully repay your patient eyes!

"It's a mystery to me," he decided, employing the least of his vocabulary.
"Oh, I know," I said. "Oh, I do!"
"You do! I know — I'm glad."
"I do! I am."
"Oh I'm sorry, what of you? I failed to ask. All this of me — unhealthy! What of you?" (This is all to the best of my recollection, mind.)
"Me? Oh, you know — you do. I rummage, I find, I get attached. And the prefix un ruins my fun. That's life, they say; yes — mine especially. There's the early heavens and the late hells, but limbo's the worst. Concrete, even the vilest, has the cool comfort of conformation as its plus; limbo has none such. Limbo is hell masquerading as two possibilities. It shows a skylight to safety and hands you a spade. Do I even mind, though? Somewhat, yes. When someone goes rueful walkabout, later citing a specious fuse, I lose kilos, and demand, quietly, a straightforward sentence. I'd much prefer a felled axe to swinging ligaments. I know, I know, I know — like a Disney lemming to a cliff, someone went off me. Yes, I went off, all right: first, like a rocket; last, like milk. What is it exactly? A smashing surface and an ugly depth? Temporarily interesting virtues? A role and nothing more? Heaven forbid great features. Curse these well-formed boobs."
"Oh, you're a woman this time?" chimed in Ben, helpfully.
"Ya-huh. Innovative spin, no?"
"Lesbian?"
"Of course — I hail from Northcote."
"Coward."
"Wilde."
"Tell me, Miss, is this she to whom you refer (or so I infer) of the earth or of the air?"
"Of the nothing."