Button's Map

The ocean came toward him and lapped at his legs, soaking his cheap shoes and socks. Six inches of worn and weary corduroy were a deep, wet blue. The icy kiss shook his nerves and his heart skipped a beat, as if double-checking reality. Am I really here, doing this? The crabs were hidden under cover. The mackerel-coloured sky taunted the hungry gulls, as the cold, wet, wind tossed them about. The firmament and strand harmonised in their bleakness.

Button was a suicide veteran. A greybeard of despair. Whatever random forces held this planet together had conspired to keep him here. And so he'd continued to exist in spite of the esophageal ulcers, the bloody coughing fits and countless hours spent doubled over in misery. "Lord won't take me and the devil don't want me," he'd tell the few townies that took note of him enough to enquire to his health. "Sure, we want you, old-timer," the better ones would reply.

Button extracted the crumpled paper from his coat pocket and held it between grimy fingers. It was yellowed with age, forty-years worth, but it had stuck out the years about as well as Button. As he unfolded it, his old heart skipped again and the wind snatched his breath away. Unfettered grains of sands bounced around, some settling between the deep creases of his face, others collected in his beard. Figures from the past danced through his mind, all dead, yet still alive for brief snatches of seconds and in skipped heartbeats. He remembered standing alone at the edge of the dancehall, watching her and him, the dapper, dark haired lothario, and her in her elegance. The atmosphere was joyful and the air was full of hope. Arms rounded waists, the laughter scattered all around and elsewhere drinks were consumed amid the smoke and the sweat. He remembered it because that was the first time his heart was crushed.

The wind bullied and blustered, sending detritus running for cover, and it stung Button back to reality. His eyes watered, but not with sorrow. He felt the tide at his feet, and another, less tangible tide beginning to bear down upon his old bones. In his hands was an unfinished drawing - the sketch lines were still visible and only the first few dabs of colour were apparent. Button held it before his eyes, then gazed up and down the beach, out at the rocking waves and the tumultuous sky. It hadn't changed much. The tide tossed some driftwood ashore like a pet presenting a gift to its master.

Button remembered the hard wood of those church pews. He remembered the chance meeting, her face, the realisation that the same thing that could tear apart could also heal and unite. Maybe you could only gain hold of that thing you so desired when you'd abandoned all hope of attaining it? He remembered the vows, her heavy, hooded eyes, the sense of fate, and later the jazz - Duke Ellington in particular - and the dancing. He could recall every one of her finished watercolours. Screeching sax and trumpets somehow formed a insanely melodious rhythm. And then... then she was just dead. And Button remembered the final time his heart was crushed.

Taken sick, he was told, as though these things just happen. There wasn't a pirate on the high seas capable of such a cruel trick. So he put her in the ground and didn't know what to do with himself and eventually just abandoned life, and death abandoned him.

Button frowned at the charcoal lines. He located the hilly, green dune close to the rocky area to the east. Those rocks were lightly sketched. The queer shape, the tidepool, and the imposing mountains in the distance were all outlined. Then there was that figure - was it a figure? Was it a stray mark of charcoal? Was it nothing at all? Button walked towards it over the soft sand and suckling sea. He found the point - x marks the spot in his own search for treasure.

The ocean came toward him and lapped at his legs, knee high now, and he squinted his old eyes in a mad sort of hope. He was struck with a fit of coughing which continued for some time, until eventually he coughed no more. A peace settled on his lungs, and no longer did the caustic seepage scald his old gullet. She appeared on the horizon, looking away to the west, scanning the horizon. The she saw him, and he saw her - at the altar, at the kitchen table, at the easel, at the swing dances and at the foot of the bed, smiling. He remembered the one unfinished painting, and how he held it in his hands. He was wet and old, a bag of miserable old bones, but by God he knew what he saw. He stuffed the paper in his shirt pocket and waded toward her. Duke Ellington and his band started to play Royal Garden Blues. The sun began to fight its way through the mourning sky and the crabs and critters scuttled along the beachfront. Seagulls stabbed at the water, cried out, blew ashore, and Button slid quietly underneath.

Four Snails and a Slug

Four snails and a slug are crawling along the garden wall. The slug sits wedged between the brickwork and the concrete ground. Above him, the four snails are dotted horizontally on the wall. Three of them are positioned above and to the left of the slug, and a monster sits to his right. I wonder whether there's a deadly game of cat and mouse being played out. Played out at a terrifically slow speed. Is the gang of snails going to converge on Mr. Slug and nibble him to death? Perhaps he had his way with Biggie Snail's snail wife, and Biggie called in his snail goons to give Mr. Slug what for. He's a character, Mr. Slug; in fact I can tell he doesn't like formalities. I'm giving him a name. Chuck. I'm rooting for Chuck. Always root for the underdog.

The sun glares down at the scene and is relentless. The birds are nowhere to be seen. I'm on the rum. Dark rum. Cheap, but not the cheapest rum in the store. There was one less expensive brand which was probably pretty rough. It's dark and thick and the way it burns feels good and familiar, like nostalgia and those long gone feelings for somebody, at a certain time, in a certain place. It's a good buzz tinged with regret.

The 'garden' is six foot by six and is mostly concrete with a couple of rectangles of bad, unkempt grass. It's a cheap place to rent though, and these sunny days are good for getting cooked in. The sauce always helps.

After a brief standoff - lasting several minutes - our hero is up and mobile and is about to put into action his escape plan. Underneath the cruel sun I'm urging him to get to cover. Lord knows there's enough weeds in amongst the scrubby grass. Not even a shirt on his back, let alone a shell, poor sod. He's a soldier of fortune. A loose cannon. Unbeholden to the square community, the homeowners who curl themselves up inside their hovels, shaking with fear and paranoia and an unidentified sense of impotent anger, Chuck is different. Sure, they call him a bum. He lives the free life, a zigzag wanderer who has seen the stars and the moon and who vows to blaze a silvery trail to get there someday soon.

He begins to squirm and squish his way toward the greenery. He has a tough row to furrow, old Chuck. The drawbacks to his freedom are obvious. On a daily basis, he weaves his way across footpaths and roads, playing russian roulette with feet and tires and vindictive little children. Last thing he needs is the wrath of a jealous snail husband. The mollusc community probably has its own standards. A hierarchy. Homeowners, such as Biggie and his pals, nearer the top, and no doubt the likes of Chuck are treated with contempt. Outsider. Freak. Even most of the female slugs probably look upon him with disdain, while shacking up with lifeless, shell-bearing blobs. "Because security is a very attractive quality in a gastropod." What they don't realise is that Chuck is an artist, goddamnit! A creator! And he's a lover, not a fighter, and it's his joie de vivre that gets him into scrapes like the current garden wall fiasco.

Chuck has moved a full inch now, an inch nearer green, dewy freedom. Great minds think alike. One of the snails is gesticulating wildly with this feelers - instructing his colleagues to head Chuck off at the pass. Forget it Biggie - you and your goon squad have lost. He's flying now, almost into the grass. Victory! I'll drink to that. I take a slug.

The next day I awake at 5.30am. The pillow is wrapped around my head. I'm crumpled under damp cover and dare not move. Through silent suffering the stillness is perfect. Outside, I hear the sound of the crows, dropping tightly wound up shells onto concrete from the rooftops in preparation for their breakfast. I close my eyes, smile slightly and suffer.