Still Life with Bacteria continued
A woman's voice, a short cackle of nervous laughter following the gravitas of her statement. Alias turns his head to see her step out of the cobalt shadows of a crumbling stone archway.
'Is God on your side?' She asked as she approached the bench. 'That weird gown makes you look like a religious nut. God looks after them that loves Him, but if you ain't a believer, what you can believe is that you won't get outa here alive. Bad goes down in here after dark. You want some gum?'
Alias shook his head, noting with regret that his sense of humour had deserted him since he had come amongst them.
'How about a fuck?' The woman said. 'If you're too old to get it up, you can feel me up for half the price of a fuck.'
I created this as a still life, and a still life it shall remain. Alias fixes the woman's gaze. A mule, a bacteria-carrying mule, ideal for his purposes.
'Did you know that there are two kinds of bacteria?' He said, lifting the hem of his gown to his waist and spreading his legs. 'Good bacteria, and bad bacteria.'
The woman spat out a blob of pink chewing gum, genuflected and dropped to her knees. In the fading daylight, Alias looked out across the lake. A swan, its plumage soiled by the filthy water, negotiated smouldering tyres, a shopping cart and other flotsam before it disappeared beneath the petrified branches of a weeping willow festooned with scaps of plastic sheeting.
Holding her head forcibly in place long after he ejaculated, Alias gazed at the first stars glittering in the crepuscule.
When he capitulated to her struggling she staggered to her feet, cursing between wiping an indignant pout with the frayed cuff of her coat.
'I swallowed.' She said, her voice choked with indignation. 'Normally I spit. You want some gum?'
Alias took the stick of chewing gum she proffered.
'Thanks.' He said softly. 'I'll save it for later.'
§
For the ascetic that Alias was, the beach hut was a romantic place to shelter in. About thirty feet by thirty feet, it was built on a wooden A frame constructed at the foot of voluptuous golden dunes in whose arid and shifting curves sea grass, gorse, purple thistle and oak bushes struggled to survive.
Weatherbeaten by winds and saline air to the colour of ashes, the outside walls had been fashioned from overlapping pine planks hewn with an axe. The entire structure had buckled over the years due to the natural subsidence of the shifting dunes, giving it an off-kilter, cartoon sketch appearance.
A covered porch ran the width of the building, and either side of the door tattered curtains flapped in the breeze in two small windows like square eyes blinking at the solemn majesty of the ocean. A crooked and soot-blackened chimney pipe sprouted out through the tarpaper clad roof, and on the south side of the hut, a rusty rain barrel sat at a jaunty angle atop cinder bricks. The spartan interior featured an uneven wooden floor with a dark cherry patina and stains like Rohrsach mishaps, patchy whitewashed walls, an antique cast iron wood-fueled stove and a small north facing skylight.
During his absence, the hut had begun to look even more dilapidated than it did before. He began by patching the tarpaper roof before going inside to sweep cobwebs from the rafters, dust from the floor and firing up the old stove. Whilst stacking firewood beside the house he saw a brace of woodpigeons foraging in the dunes. Fetching a rifle from the wall inside, he shot one in the neck. Supper would be a hearty pigeon and wild mushroom stew.
Feeling the need to cleanse his body, he stripped naked as he walked to the ramshackle wooden jetty at the sea's edge and plunged into the icy breakers, scrubbing away the terrestrial dirt in the turbulent surf with clumps of fragrant seaweed.
By nightfall all was in order and the stew was simmering on the stove. He stoked the fire, lit candles, poured a generous cup of wine and sat on the porch, contemplating the rhythmic to and fro of the moonlit waves beneath a fathomless sky peppered with incandescent stars. Alias was no different from other artists: his creations imitated nature, and this place had been his inspiration for Stasis.
After supper he lit a lantern, slung his satchel over his shoulder and clambered over the shifting dunes to the keyhole. Holding the telescope against the tiny aperture, he focused on the area he was looking for. Stasis. He took the stick of gum from his satchel and chewed on it. When the gum was moist and malleable, he held it between thumb and index finger and spread it over the keyhole.
END