Since I’m too lazy to actually type up an entry right now, here’s something I’ve been working on to be handed in as a folio piece tomorrow. It’s an exercise based off a photo (of my choice) which is then written about. The photo in question can be seen online here.

skinned

*The Führer will always be faithful to us. *

Cracked and broken glass, its edges scalpel-sharp clung to the pewter frame sitting on the mantel. To the left, not quite centered stood a crystal vase, containing three dead tulips. Beyond the vase lay an old revolver on a stand, scattered bullets surrounding it, some spilling onto the floor beneath.

*Friends? Of course we’ll always be friends! *

The grate of the fireplace was dark, black and grey with scattered ashes falling outwards onto the square brown carpet. A wooden box beside the fireplace was almost empty, only a small handful of twigs and splinters littering its floor.

*I’m leaving tomorrow… my commission requires it. *

In an old straight backed chair, Joseph sat on the edge of the carpet, his spine curved into a slouch against the clean, square lines of his seat. An old cushion almost worn away beneath him, the head of the chair above his, he sat staring at the photograph in its shattered frame on the mantelpiece.

*Hey Nine-One-Six! Time for your shower, get moving! *

Joseph shivered, ghosts of voices almost tangible in the surrounding air, looking first at the left, the centre, then the right of the old photograph.

“Hans. Dieter. Joseph,” he murmured. “We were so proud, so happy to be a part of the Führer’s New Germany.”

His arm rested over his lap, sleeveless shirt revealing the numbers still etched into his skin. He saw them as he stared at the figure on the left in the picture. Four, three, seven, two, nine, one, six. Numbers burned into his mind by voices; some harsh, some gloating, some weary with the endless drudgery. But never any compassionate. Not one.

*Care? For you, Joseph? Who would care about a filthy Jew like you? *

“Dieter, Dieter,” Joseph whispered, his eyes never leaving the mantel, “I wish I could have seen the great crane that you talked about so often. I never… I never hated what you were doing, Dieter.” The man in the centre of the photograph seemed to smile, as he always did, holding a bottle in the photograph as in life. The old man smiled back, the golden haze of memory surrounding him, until his eyes slid again to the left, to the man standing beside Dieter, his eyebrows raised.

Joseph’s Adam’s apple moved up and down, as he stared at the picture of the man holding a glass, looking almost amused as if thinking of a joke that he was unwilling to share.

“Hans.”rn

*Two-Nine-One-Six… I know that number… let’s see, Joseph Hërman. Hah. Yes. Hello Joseph. It’s your turn tomorrow. Don’t be late. *

Joseph dragged his eyes away from Hans’ quirky smile, turning from the photograph to the vase sitting beside it. The tulips swayed in the slight draft of his breath as a brief smile traced its way across his face.

“Tulips. Maria loved tulips,” Joseph murmured. “So did Dieter. A tulip for the bride, a tulip for the groom, and a third for the best man.”

Joseph slowly pulled himself to his feet, his hand clutching at the back of his chair as he rose, his arthritic joints creaking softly in the stillness of the room as a grimace formed on his lips. He stepped forward to the mantel and to the vase, and gently lifted out the three tulips, then leaned down to the grate and placed them on the mound of ashes.

Rising, he looked now at the empty vase, and lifted it, seeing again the three letters carved on the base of the crystal, then replaced it on the shelf. A loud chink echoed in the small room as Joseph looked again at the photo, now scarcely ten inches from his eyes.

“Why? Why did you do it, Hans? We were friends, weren’t we?” he murmured, the words drifting up from the halls of memory.

Joseph could see the small lines on Hans’ forehead, the crease lines that would be attenuated by the harsh black and cruel sneer that resonated in Joseph’s memory. Snapping fingers echoed in his mind, as Hans’ smile seemed more secretive, more grim from this distance.

“Was it jealousy? Was it hatred for my family, for my people? Or did you simply enjoy it, Hans?” he asked the photograph, words spoken so often that the answer was etched into his memory.

*You’ll never make it, Joseph. Get away from the fence, or I will shoot you. *

The revolver gleamed next to the pewter-framed photograph, the bullets spilled around its stand carelessly shining in the light in the room. Joseph reached out and traced the butt of the revolver, the leathery grip feeling sensuous beneath his questing fingers. Fingers that ran their tips over two carved letters, tracing them. H. G.

Joseph shrugged and stepped back to his chair, sinking onto the cushion and sliding down the back, until he was almost lounging on the chair’s wooden frame. The bullets on the floor twinkled up at him, not a single one of them ever more than loaded into the revolver, then emptied out again afterwards.

*What? How did… Joseph, don’t do anything foolish. You won’t stay free long, you know they’ll hunt you down and capture you. You know what they’ll do to you. Put the gun down. Joseph… don’t make me tell you again.

Put it down.*

rnBending over in his chair, Joseph picked up one of the bullets from the brown of the carpet and held it, his fingers running along the edges of the casing. His hands cupping the bullet’s dark grey form, he looked again at the photograph. His own face stared out at him, uncomfortable besides Dieter, the naturally photogenic, and then Hans, his small smile reaching outwards. Joseph grimaced, and then hurled the bullet in his hand at the mantel, striking the photograph. He covered his eyes with his hands, tears starting to run down his cheeks, as the bullet clinked softly as it rolled along the wooden floor.

Fin

rnThat is, of course, a draft, but it’s a close to final draft. I’m kinda sorta editing it now. And procrastinating, of course. What else? ^_^

rnAlcata’riel.

-Andiyar