Corinne

Cheers as he left the concrete plain. The badge of his rank pressed undoubtedly on his breast pocket. Number A32 printed on the side of his favourite fighter jet, along with the words "Only the Bravest Win". Grey-blue paint. And as he sits in the drivers seat, one hand lingers idly along the curve of teh wheel, like a hand placed on a womans waist. Driving the truck, the word "DUTY" plastered on the face of the sergeant, in black bold IMPACT letters. Now slipping his hand into the gun case and pulling out the heavy instrument with tense arms, alipping a didget infront of the trigger, and 'BANG BANG BANG' he joked feeling the minute hairs on his face bristle with excitement, smiling like Mit Romney on a dishwasher advert. He fired the gun at the target, he felt released. Shameless. Oh Corinne.

And that was why, 6 months later, he left the concrete plain, the badge of rank unstitched from his breast pocket. Number A32 never to be seen. "Only the Bravest Win", he was sure he'd been brave, he renamed it bitterly. The too obsequeous. Off to the prison in the back. Every night while inmates bickered, he slid his weathered hand down the metal leg of his bony bed, imagining it was Corinne. Every pore of his being prickled, and his inner organs wailed. The prison food was okay, but he felt starved. Prison break in the library, "I'LL FUCKING KILL YOU" "What's your gun called again mate?" shoving him. "Corinne". "YOU should get YERSELF a BIRD!". Laughter, including his own. The name only an echo of what she was. Trgger pressed down tightly, a deep breath.

***

Corinne was the name of his aunt. She was tall, thin, with bony elbows. Deep Picasso eyes, charchoal cheekbones. Her house might as well have been some council flat turned shanty town. His mother dropped him round there between the ages of 9 and 16. Everytime she would make him sit on her withering sofa and she'd sit on the opposite and tell him about GUNS. Take his hand and tell him about guns. Her hair was dyed reddish-brown, she wasn't that old. And everytime he was dropped there he would notice something new. The AK-47 was invented by... her eye lashes were short, and one day they appeared wet after a trip to the kettle. Her moods were strange, up and down, and her voice would wrasp with smokers vocal cords. She sat next to him and the heavy, musty scent of her fag perfume lingered against his neck. One slim arm behind his 16 year-old waist. "Look at me boy" she looked at him, Picasso's muse Corinne, the corinne scent.