It’s awful nippy here, inside and out, even though this is only mid-fall. Shut tight in front of me is the glass door, which I can’t hardly open, on account of being tired, and a bit wobbly on my feet. Even so I can hear a sound, a muffled sound from the other side, out there on the balcony. From this angle I can spot him, kinda: at least his outline, bent over the desk, and the slant of the shoulders.
And I can’t barely see a face, but somehow I can tell it’s a familiar voice out there, saying, like, Here is one thing I hope she knows: she deserves better.
Which makes me shiver, even in my coat. The man, he’s tapping his fingers tensely on the edge of the record player, pressing one key, then another, which brings up the voice saying, louder now, She deserves better, and again, deserves better, then, better.
That voice, it’s Ben’s voice—but them fingers, they’re the old man’s fingers. The instant he hits Pause is when my doubts go away, and like, I know who it is.
So I don’t even need him to turn around, and I don’t even want to ask him, like, Where was you, ‘cause I don’t want to hear no lies, and no long stories either, and above all, I tell him in my heart, I don’t want to admit how lonely I am here, in this place, which isn’t my home, Lenny, without you.
★ Love reading? Treat yourself to a family saga ★
The complete series:
"Uvi Poznansky's, "My Own Voice," is a creative, gripping and deeply moving tale of a young girl coming of age in unfathomable emotional circumstances."
- Bill Cronin, Author
No comments:
Post a Comment