voices under the bed
There were voices under the bed. Only at night, but every night. Every night he put his head on the pillow and the voices rose up; at first a low hum, a hollow rhythm, then growing, lifting, insisting, and annotating the darkness with their serious talk. He did not know the language, with its corrugated glottal stops and throaty rolling consonants; a bit like Arabic, he thought.
Or was it the sound of burning he heard? Sometimes he thought this too, and then he imagined the bedroom to be full of smoke, which he breathed deeply in until he slept, although it gave him hot and acrid dreams.
The voices spoke with great urgency at times. They banged doors in the top of his head. Wake up! they might have been shouting. Sometimes he thought he was hearing his own language; words popped out like Necker cubes pushing through themselves, but it was too fast for him to hold the sounds. Then the voices would sink suggestively into honey songs, and he would relax again.
He believed that the voices belonged to the bed, which he had bought in a fire sale. He thought that the bed was telling its secrets: stories of love, childbirth and blood, and all the other things that happen in bed. He believed this and so he felt it a wonderful miracle that the bed belonged to him and spoke to him, and it made him humble.
His wife, on the other hand, never heard a thing. As soon as her head hit the pillow, she was asleep.
benchic said,
January 9, 2009 at 2:32 pm
You really are remarkably good at conjuring these small impressions of symbolic realism. I’m very, very pleased I came across you and your blog – my mind would not be quite the same were it not for your words and way of writing.
thebeardedlady said,
January 9, 2009 at 6:44 pm
Thank you very much indeed. A big part of the reason that I write is in the hope that it connects me with other minds in precisely this abstract, but very meaningful, way.
Rob said,
January 18, 2009 at 5:29 pm
Love this.
thebeardedlady said,
January 18, 2009 at 6:32 pm
Thanks Rob. Appreciate it.
Ladonna said,
January 24, 2009 at 4:18 am
Hi, my husband said the difference between British and American writing is you can take the most ordinary thing and make it wonderful. Great story. You are so talented. Since your previous submission is more graphic I won’t read it, but congrtulations on your short story that might win an award. I really enjoyed that one. Let me know how you do. Take care. I hope you had a wonderful New Year.
thebeardedlady said,
January 25, 2009 at 12:15 pm
Thanks Ladonna. Happy New Year to you too
ISA - FLASH blog said,
February 3, 2009 at 6:44 pm
Beardedlady,
You are invited to a Flsh Blog event at 9pm tonaight. Wordy will be blogging on Norman Mailer.
The idea is to develop an independent bloggers platform for all of us by rotating a flash blog from site to site, with different people writing the blogs.
Would you like to pop in.
Best wishes,
Ishouldapologise – ISA – Phil Hall
thebeardedlady said,
February 5, 2009 at 9:13 am
Hey,
Sorry I missed this – I would have come along.
Will check out the next one.
Cheers x
Annie Paul said,
February 16, 2009 at 12:41 am
aren’t you going to write again BL? or rather when will you write again?
thebeardedlady said,
February 16, 2009 at 10:47 am
I am, I am, I promise! Have been concentrating on a couple of longer stories and haven’t written any flash for a while. But I will – soon!
Thanks for asking
mand said,
February 18, 2009 at 7:37 pm
Missing you…
Annie Paul got there before me with the elbow-jog. ;0)
thebeardedlady said,
February 24, 2009 at 12:24 pm
Eek! I’m going to try to get something new up here today…………….