For the eve of St Valentine’s Day, a touching story of youthful romance in an unromantic setting. Jim C Wilson of Gullane is the narrator remembering.
THE STUDENT FLAT
The electric fire’s one bar glowed
dully, half-smothered, its dust skin
of talc holding back the heat. In
a far-distant corner the dark
~
morning was ruffled by the hoarse
scrape of your tinny tranny; you’d
painted its case with flowers. Should
I wake you? Condensation dropped
~
down the black window glass, like cold
tears. The thin curtains couldn’t meet,
didn’t quite fit. You slept, the sheet
wound round your strange nakedness.
~
Cars and buses edged into the dawn.
I saw two sticky coffee mugs,
some underclothes slumped on worn rugs.
An inch of cider still remained,
~
half-accusing. The staleness of the
spreading ashtray clung to the dead
air and my skin. Your single bed
sank in the middle and I ached
~
for you in the pale fireglow in
that old house full of strangers. I
woke you for the new term; your sigh
was a little girl’s. You blinked and
~
were surprised to see me that dawn
in 1968 when rain
made the roofs shine and I had lain
beside you in a night as brief
~
as a smile. The room was filled for
me with wonder as I am now
when I think with surprise at how
you were so prepared to allow
~
me to stay that first October
night and then these fifty years.
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