Writers Block Exercise

No matter how hard he tried Tom could not seem to make himself concentrate on the words of the men around him. He knew they were talking, could hear their words and he even nodded in appropriate places. He roused himself just enough to make a noncommittal grunt or a comment of, ‘a gentleman would know the difference,’ before sliding back into blank apathy. It was startling to Tom that though this could well be the very last time he saw any of these people again, he could not make himself care for anything they said. It made him question what sort of man he was that he did not care to know the last words Reverend Phillips spoke even though the man had been a fixture in his life since he was placed in his cradle. Could he recall his cousin, Simian’s anecdote of that recent scuffle between two gentlemen in the Hyde Park area of London. Tom felt removed from himself and the people around him, the very room he was in. He saw the whites of the men’s cuffs and heard the rustle of the ladies skirts as they brushed against one another and yet Tom felt as if he were imagining them. He noted absently that the piano in the corner was far too large for this room and the walls had too much pink in them.

The parlour where the farewell soiree was being held, in his honour of course, was stifling. He caught snatches of conversation from the people all around him. The parlour of his childhood home was small and made the crowd in it look large. It always seemed fortuitous to Tom that his mother and father should have a small parlour so as not to make it so overwhelmingly obvious that their son had a very small number of friends. Most of the people there were his father’s friends, middle aged merchants and prosperous business men who traded in the east. Tom said very little as the men spoke at him or over him because that was his nature and as such it unnerved people. He was not a gregarious fellow, he was not fun loving and talkative. He was a silent and perhaps unsettling presence in the corner of a room, without meaning to he made people feel watched. Tom felt his eyes cross as he stared at the lace doily on his mother’s mahogany table, he rubbed his eyes with his forefinger and thumb and tried to make his brain work itself out of the stupor that all the benign chatter had caused.

“When do you sail, Tom m’boy?” Jeremiah Coxwell asked for the third time since he arrived, there was an awkward pause before Tom realised he was needed to speak.
“Forgive me, Mister Coxwell,” Tom saved himself politely, “I was quite in my own head for a moment. I sail from Portsmouth at six tomorrow morning.”
“six, you say!” Coxwell cries and Tom wants to whimper childishly with the need to be away from these people. “Six. Taking it over to Spain I suppose?”
“Yes, Sir. We go to Madrid and then on to the devil,” Tom said the last part quite light heartedly, thinking he was talking to at least three ex-servicemen. Tom may as well have thrown his full wine glass in widow Chamberlain’s ninety-year old face for the reaction he received. His mother gasped and she along with the gaggle of ladies and their daughters pressed their hands over their stuttering hearts or their open mouths. Then men averted their eyes and cleared their throats.

“I should hope that you are less careless with your life than you are with your words, Tom,” his father’s low, unamused voice, so familiar to Tom because of it constant stain of disapproval, drifts over to Tom from his left but Tom does not look to him.
“A stupid, foolish joke,” Tom presses his hand over his heart and bows to the women in the corner, even bestows a smile upon Rachel who he never smiles at. “Careless words are nothing but bluster and bravado from someone who is trying to impress gentleman who have already distinguished themselves in battle. Forgive me gentlemen - and ladies.”

Sufficiently mollified by his flattery the talk began to spread in a low hum once more about the room, Tom excused himself so he could slide up to his cousin, Simian, and his friend Charles.
“Quite a fly in the ointment, you Tom,” Charles’ toneless voice is belied by the look in his eye, hiding his smile in his wineglass.
“Well, where do they think I am going?” Tom muttered gruffly, eyeing his father warily, the man was edging closer, “to shoot rabbits in fields? I have been trying to convince my mother that no matter how good a shot I am the frogs are likely to shoot back.”
Simian chuckled heartily and Charles’ smile broadened as they were wont to do when Tom began to complain. Hearing me complain, Tom thought, they love it because they know it’s true. Moody and melancholy as I am, I am honest, Tom decided he liked that about himself. Simian was a coffeehouse fop who drank too much brandy but was lovable and funny and adored by all of the fairer sex. Charles was a studious young man who was sought after by all young woman and admired greatly by their fathers. Tom could not see a place for himself amongst the people in this room, amongst his friends and society, even amongst his family. Honesty was not a desired commodity, Tom decided, no matter what Reverend Phillips might say. It wasn’t welcome in polite society and neither was the longing that Tom had in him, it made him solitary and hard to endear to.
“I wish I were going with you, old boy,” Charles said, “even if it is just to see you roughing it like some gypsy and taking orders from a jumped up Captain.”
Tom quirked his lips, it was the nearest he ever got to a real smile.
“I’m sure we will be out there with you soon, Tom,” Simian grimaced, as if he dreaded the thought but didn’t truly believe it would ever come to pass, “the King always needs more soldiers, God love him.”

Tom did another one of his lip quirks but stayed silent, for it was happening. What had not happened with his mother and father nor the rest of the people in the room. Right now, Tom thought, was what I will remember when I am on the battlefield. I am not even there and I can feel it changing me already, I can feel the distance between myself and the people in this room but I will remember this. When he thought of home he would see Simian’s fingers, pale and slender, curled lazily around the stem of the wine glass. He would see the candlelight playing over the surface of the claret as Simian swilled it while he spoke. Tom would remember vividly how strong Charles smelt of mint and how there was a spot of ink just to the right of his fingernail on his middle finger. Their hands, Tom would remember their hands because he could not now look them in the eyes.

~~~~~~~~~~~


As the evening drew to a close there was a casually orchestrated agreement that now it was time to be gone, the carriages were called and horses saddled. Tom was clasping hands with a boring man who traded in sugar and thanking him for coming. He drifted away much to Tom’s relief and then a hand fell on his shoulder, Charles grinned at him.
“I’m going to help saddle up Maurice,” he said cheerfully, “he is pulling our carriage tonight and he is quite a devil to all except for me and my stable hand.”
“Alright.”
“I’ve left Rachel in the parlour with your mother, go and keep her company will you or your mother will try and marry her off to one of your relations.”

Charles chortled as he moved past Tom into the yard, Tom’s visage darkened at the request and he dawdled restlessly at the doorstep, nearly wringing his hands, he expelled an oath on a breath before going back to the parlour. Tom opened the door and his heart stopped dead in his chest, Rachel was there, in the parlour and his mother was not. There was no chance of backing out of the room, Rachel had heard the door open and turned to see him walk into the room. They stared at one another and he sardonic dark eyebrow began to rise as she appraised him at the threshold. Reminding himself that he was master in this house after his father, he closed the door behind him and stepped further to the room. The silence was awful and hurting, Rachel smoothed her hands down the front of her pale dress, Tom watched committed her hands to memory as they washed over the satin material, looking tanned against the fabric.
As if the oppressive silence was too much Rachel quite literally sprang from her seat and began to pace. Tom watched the bottom of her dress sway, the hem snagged on a pewter bird that looked like it was part of a brooch that had fell onto the rug. He saw the barest hint of her heels as she took steps away from him. He let his eyes drift higher and he saw her dark hair, not curled like most young ladies of fashion but straight and limp, forced into a style by her exasperated maid. Her slender neck sloped away into shoulders that were covered by her gown. It was elegant, like a swan Tom thought, sturdy like a tulip.

“Thomas?”
Tom blinked, she was the only one that ever called him by his full name and by the way she was saying it Tom believed she had been attempting to get his attention for a while.
“Forgive me – “
“You were in your head again?”

Tom nodded, suddenly feeling wary of her, feeling like a hen that had noticed a fox circling the barnyard wall. Rachel gave him a forced smile she opened her mouth and closed it, Tom felt his stomach tighten with dread and anticipation. The world seemed to have gone quiet as if it too were holding its breath. Rachel turned to him so he saw her in a halo of candlelight, her back to the windows while darkness pressed against the panes. She was the light right then, darkness did not touch her, light bloomed from her, radiant and lovely.

“Thomas,” she said softly, “if I were not me. And you were not you. And our lives were not what they are – “
“Rachel,” Tom warned.
“Would we have been together?”

The breath was released then. Tom felt his limbs loosen in a strange, unpleasant way but his chest, that seized horribly, paining him in a way he had never felt before. This was the real reason for his departure. This beautiful creature was his torment. Tom chose to say nothing as the world returned to normal, noises of the night and of the departing people sailed leisurely through the door. Tom felt annoyance at the intrusion of the noise, it made the people seem close and made Tom and Rachel too easy to be stumbled upon and if they did surely they would know. For Tom could not imagine facing the world after this without it showing in every fibre of his being what he was feeling.

Tom chose to stay silent and simply watched her with solemn, dark eyes that had always reminded Rachel of coffee and kindness.
“Forgive me,” she said swiftly, plastering her famous false smile on her not-quite-pretty face, “a foolish girl’s idle chatter.”
Rachel moved because she had to, propelled by a need to exercise her body so as to not think about the hurt she was feeling. She walked to the door and it was like some sadistic witch was pushing a thin needle through her heart as she passed by Tom on her way to the door.

“I think I hear Charles calling me,” she lied, hearing a note of hysteria in her voice, she held back her tears of shame.
“It would have been our seventh anniversary this year.”

Tom watched Rachel’s back go ramrod straight and she became uncommonly still, perhaps the world had slowed down for Rachel. Tom was experiencing the opposite, the world was alive with sound. The sound of Rachel, her quick, light breathing catching only once on a sob, the line of her neck consumed him as he never allowed himself to be consumed before. He let himself look at her, he let himself love her for this one and only time. Then after this no more.

“It would have been in November,” Tom continued, “it should have been in April, I wanted a Spring wedding because I did not want to wait but you insisted people would talk so we married in November. Snow was everywhere, absolutely freezing, it was. Reverend Phillips was presiding, of course because my mother would have had both of our heads if it had been any other way and we knew it. But we didn’t care. I was waiting for you in the church and it was so cold that frost had formed on the pews and people frightened to sit down in case they got stuck.”

A strange sound came from Rachel, a straggled sound that could have been a laugh coupled with a full nose. Tom continued with the life he should have been living if, as Rachel aid, they were not who they were. Rachel turned to face him, her eyes full of tears but they were not shed, they were held ripe on her lower lashes, looking magnificently bright. Her tears could be seen in Spain Tom thought, his voice softer now that his fantasy was almost becoming real.

“I was wearing my best and by my best I mean whatever you told me to wear because I haven’t the patience for fashion. And I wait for you at the altar. And you come in. On the arm of your father and I turn to face you and there is a sea of faces watching me, all around me but you are all I see. You look beautiful and you stop my heart when you stare back at me. I tell you I love you as I take your hand and you say it back and squeeze my fingers. When we return from the church people mutter behind our backs because for a wedding gift I give you a wooden door, my mother is scandalised but when you see it you laugh and so do I because we have a secret. We call it our wedding door and you spend weeks painting it and it is still the door to our bed chamber even now. ‘
“We travel to France where we buy paint and Italy where we buy glass and then we come home. And we live, Rachel, God how we live! We have three children, you always said only two but our little one came as a surprise to us. But she is loved just as well.”

“She?” Rachel gasps.

“Oh yes. Our first is a girl. Her name is Florence and she is the most precious thing I have ever seen. I know I will have trouble with her when she is older because her first word was ‘No’. She loves to learn, I sit with her on my knee while you paint and watch us and I tell her of long ago kings and Gods of foreign lands. She is just shy of six years. Her brother is James but we all call him Jem, he is quiet and thoughtful and kind like his mother. He is sturdy and strong even for his age and he isn’t afraid of the world at all and it scares you to bits. Then Mabel comes last, our surprise. She will be the one that we worry for because she dreams too much but Jem and Florence dote on her like nothing else. James has a pet squirrel and Mabel tries to adopt the ducks that roam the yard. We watch them playing from our window that is thrown open in the summer and all you hear is laughing in the garden and all I see is you, settled in your chair so the light just touches you and you paint whenever you feel like it. And I … I can walk up beside you and brush your hair from your face, touch your cheek with my fingers and watch you smile while I do it because you know I love you and always have. You have to but call and I am at your side even after all the years.”

Tom stops talking because to relive anymore of his fantasy would surely shred what little soul he has left. Rachel is crying openly now, the crystal tears have spilt from her lashes and cut a path down her cheek.
“Oh Rachel, what a life we would have had.”

“Indeed.”

They stare at each other for another long moment and Tom feels the familiar dread again of not knowing what is about to happen. He also feels besides the dread and the emptiness that comes from spewing forth all that has been in you for so long, a small feeling of joy. Bittersweet yes but still joy that he can say, as he goes off to fight in a war he doesn’t care about, that he loves and is loved in return. Even if it cannot be expressed or shown because of who they are and how their lives are meant to be.
“Thank you, Thomas,” Rachel whispers and swipes under her eyes before turning to leave, she opens the door but instead of walking through it she leans on it, pressing her cheek to the cooling wood.

“I even know what I painted on the door,” she says softly.

“So do I.”

“Goodbye Thomas.”

"Goodbye love."

Rachel shuts the door and Thomas collects himself, he begins the arduous journey of stitching himself back together with tight, gnarled knots never to be untied again.