The edge of real

I give what I know to be a sweet smile.

Please
He drags the sugar away from his body. I sweeten myself further. When he arrives, so to
does my desire, like a crow to it's nest, and I am stunned with it's harsh call. here must be
others, drinking tea with him, in other meridians. When he goes my desire must fly, lest I
lie in decay wishing for death until his long awaited return, only to see the ghost of !ity
!ass his eyes.
"ut here he is and his own brilliant smile breaks me in two again. he cold wind of sea
cliffs returns and sets a holocaust on my doubt, and once again I am in the sunset of s!ring.
he faint aroma of bloom enters every faculty. #riving u! the highway with him, windows
rolled down. Immersed in a moment. Would that I could make today a moment like those.
$o, your letter said you were engaged then%
How it stings when he lays his smirk in the !itch of his voice. I can only nod once, like a
nun, then drink my communion to the world. I see myself crucified in the cu!& a frightened
reflection. His insight courses through me. How we give ourselves away' (nd why% What
do we leave ourselves with% We only give u! what we ho!e to regain. "ut comfort is
anathema to ecstasy, and !assion runs from routine. his kind of destiny damns us, not to
fire, but a te!id end. I wish I had his courage.
His bravery is thoughtless. He takes to the sea of life like a fearless sailor. )othing could
anchor him, he wouldn't be coerced or im!ressed. While I flounder in the waves, he steers,
and charts his direction, and I am to scared to call for rescue for I fear his destination. $o
he'll steer around me. (gain.
He stirs his coffee im!atiently. I need to slow this down, there is only the two of us. his
table, these chairs. When we are together it is only us. I live in the !leasure of memories
when we loved. I thought I knew love, but then he knew me. $omething ine*!licable
ha!!ened when I saw him first. ( stirring in my soul. ( kin beyond flesh. +ife became
easy. I had learnt who I was. Had I forgotten all that now%
His hands are full of heat. I reach out and hold them.
I've missed you, you've been gone so long.
( year, I wasn't sure if you still thought about me.
Wild. his man that sent a brand into my heart a year ago. +eaving. I will always go. I can
never stay. hose words I will never forget. I only forget him to salvage some remnant of
my !unished soul, stretched to breaking, left desolate. He should know how he ruins. How
he breaks me. How could I be so easily ensnared by this hunter of lust. I can only s,uee-e
his hands tighter.
#id you think about me%
.f course, he says. "ut when... in the bed of some Italian beauty, or a /reek goddess% I
wonder who is waiting for him to return. I recall waking with the thought of him in tangled
sheets, before my desire flew.
0ou should have come with me
$alt crusted on his tongue. 1y old wound is s!lit o!en and it waits eagerly.
I did ask you
rue anguish starts within the dee!est !art of you. "eyond flesh and blood, beneath even
the soul. It slithers u! through all that you are like a ser!ent, rending a!art both s!irit and
body until it has gorged itself. When the anguish is done it s!its you out again. "ut you are
changed, !arts of you are gone, never to return.
)obody knows me like him. How I wish he could take me from choice. ear me from this
!lace. "ut my reasons satisfy him. He is weak like that. He won't fight for me. He will take
flight again. We are destined for division. 2elief surges through my frame. I can't be
e*!ected to do his work. .rder screams at the image of my form bathed in his chaos. What
can I do but stay. his I will make my last goodbye. 1y hands return to my tea.
$o where are you going now%
He mentions a !lace, but it doesn't ring in the memory of my mind. It doesn't matter where
he goes. he !laces he goes are meaningless to me. I try to invent a cure, but the truth, ah
the truth, it strikes me like a cane. I see it swinging every time I imagine his intervention. It
smashes dreams like a thunderbolt.
he moments !ass in still motion.
( single solitary tear forces its way from his eye. It moves down onto his cheekbone then
down over his 3aw before disa!!earing. It is gone then, not to be re!laced. He stares into
his now em!ty cu!. I can only close my mouth as if I was the sole witness to a violent
murder, unable to s!eak or move out of fear.
I smile within myself at that second of realisation. I am battered and wounded, and here he
is ill. 4nable to do what we both desire. iny flakes of memory return to com!lete a long
abandoned !u--le. he man is tra!!ed in his own !rison. His conce!tion of what he thinks
life should be tethers him, and I 3ust the same. .nly by cutting the cord can we begin to
breathe. +ife wont start until we do.
I will be the one.
I stand u! and the scene of the coffee sho! whirls around me, !eo!le talking, arguing,
drinking and eating. ( glass smashes in the kitchen. he rain outside s!atters the window
and I feel the chill as more !eo!le enter to esca!e the cold outside. He is looking at me
now, staring, waiting.
I take his cold hand in mine.
(nd we go.
5*egesis
his story is about a woman and her lover, and the heroine's attem!ts to choose which way
down the crossroad she will go. hey find themselves together after a long !eriod a!art and
the heroine, who the story is narrated through, try's to resolve her old feelings and her
obvious attachment to the man. I have written the short story in a kind of !oetic !rose, and
focused on the narrators thoughts in a stream of conciousness. I did this to try to trans!ort
the reader out of the world and into the heroine's mind. I deliberately did not describe her
surroundings or her senses outside of her interactions with her lover.
1y !lan was to build the fantasy world described in the readings. "y kee!ing the reader in
the mind of the heroine I ho!ed to disru!t the reader's !erce!tion of a knowable world that
might su!!ly a secure sense of self6identity71c8racken 9::; !.<:=. In some res!ects I
wanted to mimic the re!resentation of fantasy found in ancient /reece where nothing
matters e*ce!t the !assion of two young lovers the absence of any setting re!resents the
free -one 71c8racken 9::; !.<<=. he closing !aragra!h brings the reader back to
reality. It also brings my characters back to reality, and breaks the heroine from the safety
of society. his is com!arable to the use of womb archety!es found in contem!orary
romance 71c8racken 9::; !.<;=. 1y heroine ends the story reborn back into the world,
her senses restored, she no longer needs the safety of the de!endant !osition in their
relationshi!.
(n element of this romance story that is characteristic of the romance genre is that we have
two star crossed lovers. he man and the woman both want to be together but something
7in this case not entirely clear to the characters= is kee!ing them a!art. he narrator's
struggle to solve this issue !rovides the dramatic tension for the story. 7/iuffre >?9@ !.A= In
sim!le terms the story is structured around the ob3ect of desire& the narrators wish for a
working relationshi!, and the difficulty of satisfying that desire& the emotional and cultural
baggage that !revents the main character from leaving with him 71c8racken 9::; !.<;=.
he baggage I have mentioned is !redominantly the woman's !osition in the world. $ociety
desires that she nest, which is something her lover refuses to do. $he can't maintain the
se*ual relationshi! with him because of her own need for a secure relationshi!, 5ven
though she dislikes the role society has given her, she allows herself to be tra!!ed by it.
his fits with the formula of romance fiction 1c8racken describes 79::; !.;:=. he reader
will notice that the heroine has settled with a man in order to satisfy the desires of her own
culture, rather than do what is re,uired to make her ha!!y, and this will highlight the
damage done to the feminine !osition. I structured this as outlined in 1c8racken 79::;
!.:B=.
In this short format I was ho!efully able to chart an element of the character's !ersonal
transformation. hroughout the tale the heroine alludes to her earlier e*!eriences and tries,
weakly, to recreate this again. However the heroine's regret for not going with her lover,
and her resentment that her lover will not com!el her to make that lea!, kee!s this
!articular meeting confusing and stressful for her. Her identity is not fi*ed, and as in other
formula romance she tries to make sense of her situation as she transitions into a new self
identity.
he re!resentation of gender roles within formula romance was also an im!ortant !art of
the story. feminine and masculine !ositions define each other in the formula
romance71c8racken 9::; !.;<= (s I said above regarding the womb archety!e, the
heroine is in a !osition of ,uasi6comfort as the de!endant female. Her situation is entirely
decided by her lover. $he re,uires that he stay there with her or somehow drags her off
with him. his is the ty!ical view of the feminine as subordinate71c8racken 9::; !.;C=
to the masculine in the social order. However it is this social order that is causing her
!roblem.
2omantic narratives are as much about a man finding his !lace in a feminine world as a
woman finding her !lace in a feminine world.71c8racken 9::; !.;<= his is evident
when the social order is !olarised and the heroine realises that the man hasn't the emotional
!ower to change the circumstance. Her ado!tion of the decisive role effectively castrates
the male character and em!owers the heroine, there by destabilising the social order. his
is a transgression of historical romance conventions and gives the story a contem!orary
close.
25D525)85$
1c8racken, $cott. Po!ular romance in Pulp: Reading Popular Fiction , 9::; , <B69?9
/iuffre, +i-, 8+ @A? /enre Writing, Lecture 5: Romance, >?9@, 1ac,uarie 4niversity,
$ydney.