Sharp-faced, square footed and chest-forward. Thin-rimmed glasses that twinkle as he eyes notes then the audience then back.
He moves a lot. Behind the lectern, beside the lectern, rocking on his feet and gesturing – mostly palm-up. And he knows that; periodically he checks himself, sets square on, folds his hands tightly.
That’s all just emphasis. What’s distracting is his watch. Chunky, bold, a little loose; it slides from under his shirt cuffs and presses against his wrist. Too big by far.
Pink-faced, chewing his nails – well, actually, more than just chewing them... mushing his fingertips into his lips and teeth, drumming on the bridge of his nose and boiling all of his fidgeting into his right hand – leaning into the right arm of the chair and pushing as far from the man beside him as the space allows.
His right arm is drawn across his chest, his left across his lap. His eyes scan the room repeatedly for a way out, but he’s exposed at the front and has nowhere to go. He’s stuck watching a speech and can’t do anything about it.
Blonde hair tied up and back, black jeans, a baggy top with a paint-spatter speckle that looks somewhere between an artist’s dust-sheet and a starfield… you know, I get lost in fabrics like these. Some days I start joining dots in my eyes and making constellations of nonsense. I find loops and circuits and my gaze gets tired reading the scatters of white. The worst is when you can see the fabric’s pattern looping – it’s legible, but effectively meaningless still. I don’t do that today.
He’s by the radiator, curled up as close as he can get, sucking up heat in an otherwise chilly kitchen and napping off a lamb supper. A few minutes earlier he’d been dozily staring at the rest of us at the dinner table. Before that, getting groggy on attention.
His paws overhang the chair seat a little drift towards the radiator. The heat wakes him up. He gets to his feet and winds him tail around them, wide-eyed and interested. He lets his chin be tickled.
Over the counter I can see him only from the shoulders up. Heavy black shirt, neat hair shaved close at the sides and slicked back. Looks like a wave. Greasy too. He runs his hand through it every time the espresso machine runs hot – a little reflex.
His eyes are locked wide and his pupils are tiny. Dark smudges underneath, like the marks of some sooty elf who must have woken him up by pressing its thumbs out and down from the bridge of his nose. Or he’s just super-tired. There goes his hand again.
Revision. Except, no; she’s much too calm. Cramming pages of something though, measured and steady. A large pot of posh tea on the go and a heap of documentation spread on the table in front of her. Case history? Pinching her brow in concentration.
The papers are a mess of charts and prose but they don’t have much academic cruft. The type is tiny. She’s sitting too far back for it, and I can only imagine she has contacts in.
He leans back into the moquette, looking at his friend’s phone but not with much enthusiasm; he makes his friend work for the attention.
He’s wearing a black suit – probably his first – with smart black shoes and a white shirt topped with a navy collar. His beard’s close, but also quite new; there’s as much just-grown fluff as there is trimmed hair around the puppy-fat traces. He rounds the ensemble off with a hat, this black felt number that comes off a little more Bugsy Malone than he probably imagines it does.
So, he has quite a small head. And he’s a tall man. He reminds me of the sewing pins hanging on the inside of my Gran’s needle box, but he’s a person and he’s walking. Wrapped in a long wool overcoat, tartan, that billows out in the chest where he doesn’t quite fill it.
His spectacles appear to be made of pins too. They’re thin, wiry and brittle, balancing on his face and touching just a few millimetres of skin.
Evenly cropped black hair and beard. Rigid denim jacket, dyed black, collar popped. Rumpled from storage and – given the weather – probably out and about a little too early. A response to yesterday’s sunshine instead of this morning’s forecast.
He’s eating a teriyaki dish, bending to the chopsticks in case the sushi rice tumbles away. Beside the meal is his phone. As he chews he taps at it gingerly with his right index finger.
Hair tied back, face flush with tube heat. Pink running shoes, grey leggings, puffy green overcoat, white and grey wooly scarf. A chunky and ornate engagement ring. Small silver earrings in gnarled shapes. Her bag is a tote made of thick blue canvas, worn and faded with use.
She reads an iPad with wide eyes and an open face. It’s a smaller model, sheathed in red rubber. It’s dulling at the edges, turning a grubby shade where her hands hold it. Along the top it’s picking up the tote’s dye.
Pale. A taste for purple. It’s the dominant colour in her wool coat, backpack, and scarf, as well as a top note in her hair dye. She’s rounded off with browns.
Her bag bulges around a pair of heels, and on her feet she’s wearing chunky commuter trainers – black Nikes with a turquoise trim. They go with the outfit and also don’t; they’re obviously not supposed to be there, but the colours line up somehow and they don’t look as dissonant as they might.
She handles her phone with her fingers splayed, tapping it with her index and making the others dainty.
A larger man, extremely pale, grey t-shirt and well-washed boot-cut jeans. Around his neck the strap of a blue messenger bag, and at his feet a black Umbro holdall packed tight and heavy. Orange in-ear buds and an orange cable trickle down into the metallic orange nano tucked just inside his bag.
He’s angry or tired. Red skin flushes around his neck and fists and his eyes are screwed tight. When he fumbles with his iPod his lips purse, and the lids of his eyes crack open in a scowl.
Black leather-like jacket, black handbag, red jumper, black jeans, mouth agape. Striding through the carriage to reach a string of empty seats and snag a Metro while she’s at it.
Harried. Concern creasing her face, brow knotted up and shoulders high. Seated, she sort of hangs over the pages. Not really taking them in. Witnessing print.
She breathes through her lips, jutting her jaw forwards a bit, working it a little, looping and circling her bottom teeth around her top.
Eyes closed, face resting. The rocking carriage seems gentle on him, a little moment of peace at the start of the afternoon. The metal whistles and shrieks, but it doesn’t stir him.
He’s awake though. Hands clasped over a small paunch. He has grey tracksuit trousers on, a black running sweater and a black gillet. A chunky digital watch. His beard is short and grey, as is his hair.
Beside him, a crumpled M&S bag with lunch and some odds and ends.
Blue jeans, black walking coat, navy backpack. A white wool scarf that billows up and out from her throat to swamp her chin and neck – one of those endless hankies magicians conjure from their sleeves.
Her fingers sit just inside her her cuffs, rubbing for warmth and occasionally pinching to keep her from drifting off. Her eyes wince as the train pitches and squeaks, fracturing the warm of the afternoon sun on the window.
October 2014 | November 2014 | December 2014
Temple Studios | January 2015 | February 2015
March 2015 | April 2015 | May 2015
June 2016 | July 2016 | August 2016