Friday 5 October 2012

Rear View Mirror - Friday Flash


The spike heel bit on the pavement, listing to the left which threatened to swipe the foot from under. But settled instead for merely splaying the boot in a wobble. From the distance behind, I couldn't tell if this was due to the spike heel itself having been worn down one of its halves, or the result of the natural sashay that drove the heel into the pavement at such an acute angle. The stutter lent the gait a teetering shimmy though.

The flap of an ankle buckle strap fluttered and reverberated like an ensign with each stride, since it hadn't been fully clamped down beneath its restraining bar. I wondered if it actually made any metallic tinkling sound, but again was not quite close enough to pick it out against the clamour of the noisy street. I increased my own lope in order to narrow the gap between us.

Travelling up the leg now. The nylon wrapping the calves rippled with each movement of the flesh they contained. Yet beneath their sheer sheathing, I could trace the tensing and relaxing wiggle of the calf sinew as the sole of the foot reclaimed contact with the ground. The knot of muscle moved like devoured pray being worked through the body of a snake.

The rep's sinuous give and flow with the elliptical orbit of the ball of muscle, was hamstrung further up the leg. That denier material covering the haunches, did not twitch or ruffle at all. Instead it remained ramrod stock-still, as if spray painted directly on to the skin. No matter the pivot of the hips causing the thighs to sway, the seams of the tights were immaculate vertical lines piloting the eye back down towards the tumult below the knee. Like the bars of a portcullis slamming shut on the bedlam beyond.

I espied the short mini-skirt rucking up with each lift of the leg into a forward step. Exposing the panty-line beneath the dark hue of the tights. An enticing ridge, that teasingly reburied itself beneath the swell of the skirt's fabric on the down-stroke.

Is this perhaps what my own flesh looked like while I'm in motion? Were I to be adorned in women's raiment that is. Or was my twin's mirror image revealed to me, not a reflective replication after all, but one deliberately distorted and carved by the alien clothing? My brother was yet to have the operation to change his body shape, yet nonetheless the legs would not be undergoing any surgical modification. Though how he held his pelvis, may have been subtly altered by the hormones be ingested.

Well may my sibling claim that he was a woman imprisoned within a man's body. Yet I rather feel that this was another instance of him trying to differentiate himself from me and to assert his own being by way of contrast.

But he did make a fine woman, so maybe something untoward had taken place within our shared womb. That the chemicals had wrought about an unintended transformation which my brother was seeking to put right now. Who knows, if we had been lying the other way round in respect of one another, I may have received the concentration of chemicals that bathed and cast him so.

I slowed my pace. There was little point in pursuing him now, in order to capture myself.

8 comments:

Alison Wells said...

Really like the microscopic quality of this and interesting topic, especially since I've just finished reading Middlesex. Like the mirror play as well, especially when ones own self-image tied tightly to another who is to change form.

Aaron said...

I like how this comes back around, starting with him watching the walk of his twin and then coming full circle and ending that way, while he's seemingly lost in thought along the way.

Virginia Moffatt said...

Oh this is so interesting and such an original take on the whole tension of self identity and being a twin...And the way it started I thought he was looking through a car mirror. Excellent.

Brinda said...

This brother's angst and loneliness comes across so well - one of those transforming moments depicted with your usual finesse.

Steve Green said...

Once again you amaze me by taking an everyday action (walking) and turning it into a piece of poetic writing.

I enjoyed the read, and the reveal too. :)

Icy Sedgwick said...

It's funny, there's so many different ways you could have taken this, yet I didn't expect the outcome - but reading it back, it's as if it's the only outcome you could have chosen at all. Masterful.

Cindy Vaskova said...

My God, this is so detailed! It is a slow motion moment in which, speaking for myself,I can get extremely close and observe the action of walking in this very different and challenging way. How insane and brilliant is that?

I was absolutely not expecting the outcome too. Don't think I've actually ever read something like this Marc.. Great stuff.

Deanna Schrayer said...

Yet another masteful work of art Marc. I didn't expect such an outcome either but, as Icy said, it was obviously the only choice.

Love this description: "The knot of muscle moved like devoured pray being worked through the body of a snake."