I'm A Festival. I'm A Parade.

We’re lying on the bed with the window open. The breeze sucks the curtain out of the room, billows it like a sail into the world outside.

His arm is wooden beneath my neck, but when he speaks he moves his hand, twitches his fingers, and I feel his muscles contract and slacken underneath me.

Our clothes are from another decade. We laughed at first, trying on outfits of the dead, their garish colours at odds with our complexions. But it soon exhausted us, the being other people, the being ironic. And so we lay down on top of the sheets. But we’re still not ourselves.

His eyes are hidden behind dark glasses, huge. Reflected in them I am a mass of gold and green. I’m a festival. I’m a parade.

We breathe soft under the weight of the clothes. He is layers of red and blue and brown. He is three shirts deep, strangled by a tie that’s bigger than all our dreams put together.

His body is unrecognisable. I press my hands against where his chest should be. All I can feel are buttons, shiny and smooth beneath my fingers.

I undo them one by one.


***

(I'm writing tiny stories/snapshots inspired by songs, either taking the title or a line or two. The stories don't really have anything to do with the songs, but maybe they'll evoke the same feelings, or maybe they won't. I'm making a tiny book of each story. Just one book per story. If you would like this one, leave a Yes in the comments or email me at ejlannie [at] gmail [dot] com with your address.)