Turn into something beautiful

She violently put down the novel she was reading and after the thud make by the hardback copy of Welsh’s “Trainspotting” she stood up glancing across the room. Frank looked up from his portable game console in a puzzled way only to meet Jillian’s almond shaped hazel eyes.

“Somethin’ wrong, Jill?” the shy sounds got to the other end of the room and the reply slipped out from her lips as she was making up a plausible excuse “It’s that wuddayacallit?” she spoke as she crawled back into the vintage armchair shifting her feet up under her and adjusting them with her left hand ”That state when you get annoyed by meaningless things” Her eyes followed the path of light up to the ceiling where the incandescent light bulb forced her to frown and close her eyes seeing cream and lilac floating circles behind her eyelids. “It’s love, infatuation, the perfect setting for vulnerability” she savagely concluded as if she was reading it out of a book. Frank compassionately smiled and put down his jet black console which made a last bleeping sound before automatically turning off. She was still facing up with her eyes shut but all the muscles in her face were serenely relaxed and gave away a hint of a smile.

In an effort to surprise her, Frank tiptoed behind her and, within a second, lifted her up from her place and carried her around the room. “You crazy? Gosh, you scared me to death, kid” she laughed till she started hiccupping and after dropping her on the sofa, Frank rushed to the kitchen to get her a glass of water. When he got back Jillian was trying to stop breathing for a few seconds – an old trick she knew that was supposed to make her hiccups go away. It didn’t work, but the water did. “Okay, so now that you’re not dying anymore, you’ll tell me everything that bothers you, we have plenty of time before Mona gets here” he said holding her cold arm “you need to get it of your chest, maybe we can help” he smiled. He always had this wonderful smile that just made your day. “and besides, we guys also like to chat and gossip from time to time”

Jill almost felt like crying, her heartbeats were getting so fast and loud she feared they would become audible. She slipped her arm out of his hand almost shivering when their fingers stroke against one another. “You’re a terrific friend, y’know, you don’t have to do this” she babbled as she watched him lit two cigarettes and giving her one. She stared at the long, skeletal thing, dragged and then put her hand out to get the ashtray closer to them. “It’s this guy I’ve known for a while and I just realized I like him. No. Not like, love, I don’t know, I feel so stupid. I mean, how do I know it’s love? It’s just…umm…” she got up and stopped in front of the book shelf. Taking out the dictionary she returned flipping pages rapidly. “Lemme see, L..La, later, lead, left, license, loutish, lovable, love. Here it is! Love” Jillian silently read the entry while Frank was trying to get a glimpse of what exactly was she reading. “I feel for him the following: I feel attracted to him, I cherish him, I adore him, I’m fond of him, I long for him, I am infatuated with him” she proudly recited. “The trouble is that I know he notices me, but he doesn’t just notice me as a girl, but as a friend. Sure, that’s important, but it’s not all that I want.” She paused to sip some more water. Frank nodded “Yeah, I get your point, but I’m sure you could just talk to the guy and maybe he’d want to go out with you. I mean, just look at yourself: you’re pretty, smart, witty, a lot of people like you, you don’t get to crazy over stuff, and you read a lot of cool stuff. Y’know, if I were a girl, I’d hope to be just like you…maybe without the name, I’d call myself Miriam or Phoebe, instead” she giggled and stubbed out her cigarette. Maybe it wasn’t going to be so painful after all, maybe she was overreacting. Maybe this was his way of showing her he knew what everything was about, but tried to bait her into talking.

“What’s he like? Your mysterious anonymous future-lover.” Frank’s remark made her eyes flicker with confusion “future lover”. She lit two more cigarettes and handed him one. “Well, he’s a sweet guy, he notices stuff, he remembers birthdays, calls when you’re sick. He’s the athletic type, really sporty and he looks good, too. He doesn’t read that much, interested in mathematics, spent one year writing horrible poetry and had a band, but that didn’t work out either. He’s slightly older than I am, a bit taller and really fit.” She dragged on her cigarette and almost choked as Frank enviously added “He sounds like a hell of a nice guy, I hope it works out for you, but tell me, how does this in-fa-tua-tion of yours act, what do you do differently? How is it affecting you?”

She clutched the cigarette almost snapping it in half and looked over at him through the silvery hazy curtain of smoke. It was the big moment and she had to make sure it was going to be worthwhile. “He gives me butterflies, about 14 of them. I’ve named them all: Flora, Nina and so on. He makes me feel I’m not good enough and makes me wanna try harder. He makes me take detours just so I could get to spot him around. He makes me feel I can rewrite the lyrics he wrote and make them have a meaning. I talk to him inside of my mind and I imagine he is watching me. Whenever he smiles over I feel pretty. Every time when I go to bed I close my eyes and open them in the dark imagining he was on the other side of the bed and I could turn around and watch him sleep. He is that person I think of before sleeping and he is the one that makes me think that all the other times I’ve fallen in love nothing was so intense. He is my fuel, he gets me to wake up early just by the thought that we would see each other.” She stopped, breathed in and pushed her cigarette in the ashtray. “That’s impressive” Frank had the courage to break the silence “I see no reason why you shouldn’t tell him. I don’t know if any girl ever felt like this about me and you made me curious like hell. You really need to show me who this lucky guy is.”

The doorbell rang, Jillian shrugged her shoulders “Mona, she’s early, I’d better go get it” Frank said in one quick breath. As he was preparing to get up she caught hold of his sleeve and made him stop and turn around and look at her. All she could do was murmur with her eyes filled with tears “It’s you, the mysterious and the anonymous you…”He got up to open the door and let Mona in. It seemed awkward to see her so happy and didn’t even listen to what she said, he just noticed 3 pieces of paper – the tickets for the movie they were going to. She walked into the lobby and gave a hug to Jill who had her coat on and was ready to go. Mona turned to Frank and told him to go fetch something warm and meet them in the car parked in the driveway. Frank closed the door behind them and went to get his cigarettes, the lighter and also picked up Jillian’s glass. He walked to the kitchen and washed the glass but then he dropped it and it shattered on the floor, breaking into 14 pieces. “Nina, Flora…” he whispered blankly.

L.I.

Monet.

When you wake up confused and feel that you are betraying the duvet by slipping from under it there’s not much that could indicate something will happen.

I’m finally dressed and have zipped my wind-proof jacket up to under my nose. The icy air will refresh me, but it won’t harm me. Walking down the two twelve-step staircases, I check my pockets. It was Wednesday, that Wednesday.

I walk across to the newsagent’s and take a glimpse at the tastefully coloured army of cigarette packs and then some of today’s papers under a scratched plastic cover.

I am there. One question away from it. I ask for the newspaper I want and press my red fingers against the note I’ve just placed on the counter. I get the paper containing all the possible things in the world that could go wrong and on top lays the album. White letters elegantly read “Monet” on a gentle splash of blue. I get my change and walk away. I turn it around and on the back cover of my hardback copy is the list of the painters that will have albums published on. Monet’s impressionist work in contained in number 5, the remaining thirteen are mainly ‘the usual’ – Picasso, Van Gogh. The final album in the series brings along the bold and subtle touch of Dutch artistic world by Rembrandt.

But it’s all about water lilies, umbrellas and words like “Giverny” flowing out of your mouth easily, bringing along a scent of spring and sun. The frozen rays struck the pavement revealing deep shades of gray and dirt. Sunrise – impression. Nothing can go wrong now as I slip the book inside while waiting at a traffic light.

writing on the subject “the best thing that happened today” (in 10 minutes, in class) for my english writing class.

Red sky at night, rocker’s delight.

It must have been six months ago when someone posed the following problem: how do 25.000 rockers take a shower all in the same time and in the same place? The answer? Well, that’s easy: they go to a Metallica concert on a rainy day. It seems that less than a month ago the riddle changed to: how do you get 4000 rockers to jump around in a freezing sludgy pool? The answer? Oh, it’s obvious…

After experiencing a Madonna concert in the last days of August, Izvor Park in Central Bucharest “disappeared”, being replaced by a dry desolated area which constantly released hazy clouds of dust. The real problem was that the location was set as a venue for the Tuborg Green Fest, just a week ahead. But this issue was mostly ignored and the first two days of gigs registered massive attendances, even though this meant you had to breath in a lot of dust. Having set the scorching heat as the culprit, people wished for a cooler, moister weather. Not many gave it a second thought to realize what damp weather or even rain could lead to.

The third day, which was also the closing day, answered their prayer by washing down the whole city. The bone dry ground slowly took in the water it needed and then the excess leveled up. Due to the wavy ground that seemed to have always been caved in a lagoon of sticky mud started to form. The temperature assured its gelid state.

The weather influenced many people’s decision whether to go or to stay indoors. It goes without saying that I wasn’t going to think again. Some friends and I set a meeting point at seven o’clock so that we could get there on time for a drink and then find a place somewhere as near to the stage as possible so that we could both hear and see everything without having our view blocked. We arrived there at half past seven delighted to see that there were less than 50 people around the stage, but horrified at the thought that we would have to move around through all that mess. It was really slippery and people trying to get from one point to another appeared to be swaying. The crowd started to build up and judging from their looks nobody came to see the band before Vita de Vie, whose act should’ve ended by the time we got in the stage area so that the place could be cleared out and Vita have their props and instruments set. For no apparent reason they continued playing and the audience was chanting Vita de Vie’s name in a strong, yet shivering voice. It continued until they’ve decided they were no longer wanted and have exceeded the time given for their performance.

The stage was quickly cleared and instruments were taken in, other instruments were taken out and tested. Microphones, lights, sound checks. My friends and I witnessed everything neatly lined up in the first row. The downpour was falling unnoticed, the audience  - mostly teenagers dressed in colours that appeared to be dark from all the rain water they’ve absorbed – was getting more and more excited as they saw a big Fenomental poster being raised in its place in the back and getting sneak peeks of the group’s members.

The concert everybody was anxiously waiting for started with a delay of thirty minutes and was over in an hour. Vita de Vie’s lead singer knew what we were going through staying out in this almost arctic weather and thanked us often and even joked by giving us advice of how to manage our illness if we caught a cold. It even seemed that the lyrics were plotting everything, because you could see him point at the sky every time the word “rain” was mentioned in the songs and, believe me, that was for more than just once or twice. The crowd was more than just ecstatic and they were singing along to Vita de Vie’s most popular songs such as Praf de Stele, Zale de matase, Beat mort, Varza, Sunetul mai tare, Liber, Totata. Thousands of hands were permanently touching the sky either clapping or showing the world-renowned “rock on” sign with the green Tuborg Fest bracelet glowing. The lights were always changing from a bloodlike scarlet to fresh greens, deep violets and shades of blue. The raindrops became visible in the light that altered the silent, black horizon. The light was also colorizing all the monochrome locks of hair that were soaked up in rainwater and heavily stuck to our cheeks and foreheads.

They sounded so much better live than in recordings because there wasn’t that queasy and annoying artificial background buzzing and all the other sounds that were added as later edits were missing – they only offered a cheap, disappointing feeling. The sound system was a bit too loud in the front where we were but that was so just to cover the whole area. There was also a problem with one of the guitars, but they managed to fix it.

After one hour of amazing music their performance ended, leaving the crowd with so many moments they’ll never forget and probably a couple of days to spend in bed coughing and shivering. Of course, everybody started the chanting routine once again demanding to have the band back on stage for a few more minutes of additional performance. Probably because of the delay and the harsh weather they were told not to return for the encore so that moment was slightly disappointing, but fully understandable. After all we got what we came for and even more than that. The compact crowd was breaking down into small groups that were either heading home or somewhere dry crawling through the sludgy mud.

And the answer to my riddle? Vita de Vie’s gig at this year’s Tuborg Green Fest.

Lavinia PETRESCU – 10 A.
September, 29th.