L (and Things Come Apart) Read online

  And so on.

  Henry pours himself wine, declines to comment with a slow nod, which says they can all go to hell and if the subject of the piece in question jumped from anywhere it was because the agony of enduring both their prejudice and speculation was probably too much to bear.

  Henry moves his eyes upwards to the ceiling fan circling above. There were times on hot days when the fan spun like propeller blades that he feared or wished for the sequence of events which might unfold should it ever dislodge. Imagines sitting beneath the fan as it breaks free from the ceiling and what his last sight might be before dying. Maybe it would be a book he was reading, a pale tablecloth, speckled with blood. He imagines the others, sitting beneath the same whirling blades as they carried on idly with themselves about this piece or that piece of art. Maybe they wouldn’t die, as he imagines he would. They would just be scarred, be marked. Would he sit idle as they panicked less at their need for immediate help than at the horror of the possibility that their face mirrored the severed faces across from them? Music begins to fill the room. Master ventriloquist, Henry watches their mouths move but hears only what he wants to. All but one of the guests at the table make scandalous jokes about the vagrants, vandals and lowlifes in the city, and all but one make complaints about the ineptitude of the city to properly manage the migration habits of these people, as their intrusion into the finer suburbs on the outskirts of the city was sure to drive down property value.

  “Henry, he’s talking to you.”

  “I’m sorry,” answers Henry. “Could you repeat?”

  “You need to find the man who sells you coffee and have him shot,” suggests another guest. His wife and her guests laugh. Henry responds with a smile. He raises his glass, smiles and empties it.

  A record skips beneath the needle, the twin scratch of a heartbeat over and over. She had arrived after him, a sailor, wet hair with ropes of wet mascara anchored to her cheeks. She had watched Henry’s every move from a perch high above the city. Between her fingers she spins an empty wine glass by its stem.

  None but one recognized Henry for what he truly was. With her eyes she tells him to come to her. It takes time for him to recognize her, but when he does his chest tightens. He places both hands on the table, slowly stretching the tablecloth, disrupting plates and settings. These are the images, which occupy Henry as his mind passes through the seasons. An iris. The black holes at the centre of the eye where all matter takes shape yet no matter exists. A single wrinkle. A damp leaf pressed against a windowpane. Henry rises from his chair and lifts himself on to the table and with apprehensive limbs, makes his way over to her where he will climb deep into her eyes to sleep for thousands of years. He grips the neck of the bottle for balance as he brings his foot on to the table. He knocks over a glass, spilling wine into the cloth.

  “Is it that hard to pour wine, Henry?”

  Acknowledgements

  Special Thanks to Sacha Jackson, Nic Boshart, Robbie MacGregor, Megan Fildes, Jenner-Brooke Berger, Chloe Vice and Michelle Sterling. To Gail Scott, and the late Rob Allen. As always, to closest friends, and dearest family.

  Biography

  Ian Orti was born in Kingston, Ontario. He is the author of The Olive and the Dawn (Snare Books) and his work has appeared in journals and anthologies in Canada. He also writes a music column for Matrix Magazine. He isn’t really based anywhere at all, but spends his time between eastern and western Canada and the Northern and Southern hemisphere.

  Invisible Publishing is committed to working with writers who might not ordinarily be published and distributed commercially. We work exclusively with emerging and under-published authors to produce entertaining, affordable books.

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  Text copyright © Ian Orti, 2010

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form, by any method, without the prior written consent of the publisher.

  Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication

  Orti, Ian, 1976-

  L : (and things come apart) / by Ian Orti.

  ISBN 9781926743103

  Based on Print ISBN 9781926743059

  I. Title.

  PS8629.R84L2 2010 C813’.6 C2010-901603-3

  EPUB created by Carolyn McNeillie and Nic Boshart

  Print Version Cover & Interior designed by Megan Fildes

  Print Version Typeset in Laurentian and Slate by Megan Fildes

  With thanks to type designer Rod McDonald

  Invisible Publishing

  Halifax & Toronto

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