Title: A NIGHT IN YELLOW BIRD BAR
FOUR
Amy flicked at her Ronson smartly, the bright flame engulfing the tip of another cigarette. She stood the lighter upright as she began to explain herself to Joey. Amy’s smoky exhalation seemed to hang motionless in the air. It was an insoluble liquid pouring into a bath of hot water. This white liquid spilled over her bloody lips as she spoke. Joey was determined to ignore her. Whatever treacherous sea Caitlin had drowned in, Joey could navigate. She knew she was strong and Caits would be safe too, so long as she didn’t concentrate on anything this woman had to say.
Amy had somehow allowed the flame of her lighter continue to live. It was flickering, dancing, caught by a soft breeze, even in the airless confines of the Yellow Bird. This gasp of fresh air captivated Joey. If only she trace it’s source. She would somehow ride it out of this booth. She could escape to her friend, and spirit her away from this beguiling woman and her smoke-filled cavern. Instead of Amy’s voice, she followed the fixing and waning of the light. It seemed to inhale and exhale in rhythm with her own breath. It was so pretty.
Opposite her, Amy lightly breathed out another stream of smoke, this time directly over the flame. It threatened to die for a moment. Joey felt fear that she would lose it forever.
“Just relax, Jo. You won’t lose the flame. If you keep looking at it, you won’t lose it ...”
Stop talking! Why does no-one stop her smoking in here? Why can’t I stop her?
“You can stop me any time you want. If that’s what you really want, Joey ...”
Joey ignored her, working up the energy to leave. As she stared, the flame receded down into a tunnel of fume from Amy’s cigarettes. She was running as fast as she could to catch it in her hands. But the fog was dark and thick and she struggled to move.
“Don’t worry about the smoke, my dear. Just keep looking at the flame, and all that dark will just melt away. Just let it melt away and keep looking ...”
Joey kept looking at the pretty flame. She imagined the smoke Amy exhaled kept endlessly. It was all around them both. The smoke turned into white arms in Joey’s mind. Fingers of vapour crept around the edges of her vision. The wreath of smoke began to tangle itself around her arms, like the ghosts of vine creepers. They bound her arms to the table. It was the vines that held her now. She couldn’t move because of the vines. It wasn’t Amy making her stay put. The vines were holding her and the vines felt so good she could never break free. They caressed her neck and her shoulders. She swayed with their touch. Fingers of rich smoke slipped down beneath the table and knotted themselves around her legs. Their tips penetrated the fabric of her clothes and tickled the lace of her knickers. It was the vines making her juice further, turning that lace into a sopping mess. It wasn’t her. It wasn’t Amy. Amy couldn’t make her wet.
An animal made purely of smoke spilled from Amy’s lips and grew infinite tentacles. These limbs grew and stretched thinner and thinner into more fingers to hold Jo on place and explore her every crevice. It was alive and behaved as it pleased. Joey pretended she was powerless to prevent it leaping through the air and wrapping around her head. The body of this creature began spinning. It transformed into swirling black and white streaks, and it was turning ever faster. No, she realised, it was the booth itself that was spinning. It was taking the seats and the table and the empty glasses and herself along with it. She was twirling over and over with it all as the creature hugged her body tightly. But it was okay. She could break the back of this beast if she wanted. All she had to do was keep looking at that undying flame. If she kept looking it would never die and she wouldn’t lose herself in the spinning booth, or give in to the smoke monster and she could stay safe and keep melting into comfort of her leather seat.
These strange thoughts grasped Joey for a second before she pulled her eyes up. Amy was still talking. It was just that Jo couldn’t hear her words any more. Her claret lips were moving, but no sounds emerged. The booth was deathly quiet, the smoke encasing the two women in their own world of silence.
The bar, and then the walls around them, faded into darkness. Then the buildings of the city itself disappeared. The Earth dropped away altogether. There was nothing left but the booth and Joey and Amy and her lips dripping blood onto the table. The blood was shining black against the flame. They were alone together and safe in the booth as it spun slowly through space. Joey had melted into the leather and the spinning would stop soon. So long as she kept listening to the words she couldn’t hear and staring at her pretty flame.
Jo became aware of a sound. The flame from the lighter seemed to be hissing, as though it was allowing gas to escape. Could Amy hear it too? Her heart leapt as the hiss grew to a roar. It plateaued loud and insistent as though a great length of wood burned in a furnace. She stared with a feeling of remote dread. Something spoke danger to her. The sound filled her ears. The flame itself was growing. Joey decided instead that it was all okay. The flame radiated heat and pleasure and she wanted to feel that pleasure grow. She allowed herself to pretend it was about to engulf her. A burning forest to lose herself in.
She looked back at Amy’s lips. Still she spoke, but all Joey could hear was the tremendous bellow of the fire. But it was okay. She knew that the fire would make her feel so much better. She relaxed. She followed those lips, trying to hear the words despite the rending noise. The words she couldn’t hear seemed very important now. Those lips were moving so slowly.
The flames licked at her toes and kept rising. The pleasure she felt increased. Up her calves and thighs the heat filled her. Her most private place burst into flames, yet still it rose, fuelled by the oxygen of her lust. The whirl swept over her breasts and up her neck. She was an incandescent being of pure white heat and love. And just as she was about to be devoured whole and forever, the beautiful blaze burst from her scalp and dissipated like the crackling whispers of a dying campfire. It faded and she slowly dimmed back into human form.
The vines of the smoke beast were now slowly receding, untangling themselves from where they had lain. Recoiling from her wrists and slipping back from her shoulders. The fingers that had wriggled their way around her thighs drew back, departing mournfully from her soaked knickers.
Another couple of seconds ticked over. Amy’s voice was as clear as ever, it was never missing. She stubbed out her cigarette. The Ronson was dormant before her and always had been.
“You can go visit your friend now, Jo. She’s been waiting for you all this time. Do whatever you feel you must, I can’t stop you. Nor do I want to. Just bring me back a present when you return.”
Wonderful! The last minute had dragged like an age for Joey. She gladly tore herself out of the booth and shook off all those fantastical images that had flashed through her mind. All she had to do now was find Caitlin, and they could leave together. This awful woman could stay here with her awful cigarettes and awful blue cocktails. Screw her and her “presents”.