Velvet true p2 of 2
First posted December 23rd, 2020
Translated 2023
Velvet true p2 of 2
A bit of text. Big beautiful eyes, he writes meanwhile thinking the girl has fish eyes. A comfortable body, he writes to another, sighing. This one, despite her generous big pocket and insistence in meeting will be left behind. Too much fat in her veins for sure. Nothing unhealthy for the diet in that gorgeous being residing in his green house. “If she can’t stay healthy at least, no thanks”.
He gets up from his desk. Stretches his legs. He has had to learn that God forsaken alphabet[1]The one of the double consonants that sometimes are read like a «d» and sometimes are read as they are. The one of the bloody noun counters to count long objects or bottles! He has faked his voice with software. Stolen profile photos in IG and even researched the yellow dust. His bony wrists swim like a little fish in a big fish bowl, inside the red sweat sleeves. No more texts today. He goes to the fridge. Milk and protein shakes. Perhaps some ham and chicken but any vegetables. There’s ramen in the left corner of the second shelf of the kitchen. He frequently posts that he eats it.
Gardening gloves, long sleeves. He patiently fills a flower pot. He remembers the first time he saw it, in the bathroom as a white ghost. A reminder that things were not ok with el… she. She would suddenly say she was going to the movies with friends but would come back with dilated pupils and a swelling in happy sighs neck.
— Where are the car keys?
— They’re still there, how could I know where?
Small razor sharp quarrels. Besides, he remembers her with the lover… To be true, he only remembers the banging of the bed on the wall. That angry was him. After that… he had to get rid of the bed. It was a sticky mix of blood and fabric and spongy brain matter. He felt like trashing the orchid. Instead, he took her flesh out as butchers do with pigs. He cut himself on the finger five times but he did it. He diced the meat and ground it in the food processor. He got a kind of porridge. He took out the orchid from its painted porcelain with bark filling and submerged the roots in the mix. The plant grew, changed colour. He made pieces of the guy too. However, he was composted for the lawn. Fortunately the neighbours, whom had already complained about the smell, were on holiday. The first thing he did when they arrived was to go and greet Mistress Ilse and gave her a small bag of compost for her roses.
Mistress Ilse reluctantly took it, until the rose bushes were about to bend because of the number of blooms. She wanted to know the secret and bugged him long enough for the secret to be leaked halfway: bones and blood. The woman made such a face! As if she had crashed against death himself. Carlos explained you can get blood in the county abattoir. The only requirement is to be attentive and enroll in the waiting list. The bones could be the ones from the stew or chicken bones. She only had to reduce them to dust by drying them a long time and grinding them afterwards. She looked at him with distrust and asked about Se…she.
He confessed, avoidant smile and teary eyed, broken voice and nervous hands; that she had taken her suitcase and left with her lover. The hay blond hair falling lifeless on his nape. Mistress Ilse couldn’t help looking at him with pity. The woman have left cause this gray dull vermin was unable of fulfilling her wishes. She thanked him the explanation and made her mission to feed him every weekend. The guy was a wire frame layered in latex.
Sooner, he was taking a red petals orchid seedling to her. The little sprout had adapted with delight to its new diet. Charmed about owning something as singular and showing off worthy, Mistress Ilse called Vale, the «little parakeet». Mistress Valentina came and coveted the white porcelain tea cups, the new hand sewn curtains, the new chal and… the red flowers on the coffee table whilst she rejected the dessert. Greedy, she asked for the seller.
Ms. Ilse, who pitied the “poor boy”, explained it was her neighbour, a young man without any ambition… Immediately, that’s next day and without her friend to know, Ms. Valentina was ringing next door. A year later, Carlos knew enough about lonely women and how to scam them. There was no piece left from Valentina when she threatened him to share profits.
[1] I remind you, this is pure fiction. Despite the character’s frustration being true to my own experiences with Japanese kanas and Korean hangul, his frustration belongs to him and only to him. The same way his opinion is, his opinion. I’m still learning Japanese and Korean (not very seriously since I use the green owl) because, no matter how much I complain, I like learning languages.