Auden Wow

They have not met before. But when they clink their glasses in Cecile’s Bar at two-thirty in the afternoon they know that they will for a while be connected, and for a shorter while will give hope to one another. Before stepping down from their bar stools she will tell him about her marriage that didn’t get past the first year, and the kid she only sees once in a blue moon and who lives with his mother. She will tell him about her own mother who she doesn’t even visit now. She will tell him how she plans to get back to acting school.

He will tell her of some people he knows who are actors, or at least were.

“Don’t mind if I do,” she will say when he asks if she would care for another. “That’s most chivalrous of you.”

He will after a couple of hours tell her that he writes poetry but that the world isn’t ready for it yet. And while on the subject he will tell her that he loves Auden, and she will say, “Auden, wow.”

It is Cecile’s daughter behind the bar, and as they go out into the rain she will say, “Bye folks, have fun.”

They will that evening and through the night come together three times in her unmade bed, and they will eat toast and drink tea in the morning. And they will over the time of his stay share their disappointments, and curse the people who have led them to spending Thursday afternoons in Cecile’s. And they will look forward to better things, maybe with each other. For five days they will only leave the apartment to bring in sandwiches, doughnuts and drink from the mini-mart below.

After she has told him some more, he will tell her that he will kill her husband if he ever sees him on account of what he did to her. “Really,” she will say. “You would do that for me?”

“Yes, I would do that for you. Of course I would.”

“Wow, that’s something,” she will say. “I wouldn’t want to see you in prison on my account though.’”

And she will lay her head on his shoulder.

“Lay your sleeping head my love,” he will say. “Human on my faithless arm.”

“What?”

“Auden.”

“You want a beer?”

“Why not?”

“You familiar with Auden?” he will ask when she comes back up from the mini-mart.

“Who?”

“Auden, who I mentioned in Cecile’s.”

“How do you mean, familiar with?”

“Okay, like?”

“Not sure,” she will say. “I don’t think so.”

“Where’s he live anyway, this husband of yours?”

“Ex-husband. And don’t know, don’t care. Who the hell’s Auden anyway?”

“Nobody,” he will say. “Come back to bed, I’m hard.”

“I don’t feel like it.”

Next time he goes into Cecile’s, Cecile’s daughter will say, “Hello stranger, what happened to your lady friend?”

“Just pour me a cold one,” he will say. “And get me a cheese roll, no pickle.”

“Aren’t we forgetting something?” Cecile’s daughter will say.

“Please,” he will say. “A beer and a cheese roll no pickle – please.”

“That’s better. What was she called, anyway?”

“Ward, I think. Said her name was Ward. Didn’t get the second name.”

Ed says: I am a  writer of as yet not – and maybe never – published novels and shorter fiction. I live in the north-east of England, within the range of the bells of Durham Cathedral.