Limbo

The Importance of Being Patient

The taste of the last drink was still in her mouth: the lingering tang of lemon still on the back of her tongue. She stays by the bar, fingers ghosting over the thin layer of settled dust. Her fingerprints don't disturb it, despite the patterns she tries to draw. They've all left now. Cobwebs weave and hang and haunt the corners of the bar: once bustling with people it now lies so very still.

The cobwebs consume her, over time. Wrapped around her like a cocoon, she's now muted to the world. The world outside sounded muffled and drowned out, like she's still underwater. Drops of cold water drip on to the bar she rests against in a rhythmic motion.

Gentle notes play on a piano drift through the empty space, dancing through the lone-gone crowd and swirling around her. In her mind, or what remains of it, it sounds like heaven's music. But heaven and its gates wouldn't want her now.

It was never enough. She always had to be there; staying and swaying to the pianist's song, wishing that it was her that he sang about. She wanted to be his muse, his songstress. But it was never enough.

The days she spent haunting that bar are ironic now. Now, now, she spends her days haunting the bar, haunting him.

"I was never enough," she mumbles, her lips numb and heavy and not red and plump with blood. No heat courses through her. No matter how many times she bangs her fists against the bar's splintered wooden top, she doesn't feel it. No matter how loudly she tries to scream at the man at the piano, he never hears her. She's trapped. She's stuck. There's no way of moving forward or back.

She needs to know why. Why is she here? Why isn't she still on the railway of the Tube, watching lights get brighter and people scream louder? Why is she here, with him, wishing for her wish all over again?

She stalks forward, away from the bar and away from the glass that's rim is still smudged with ruby red lipstick. Flickering images of people still dancing get in her way. They wisp away with a flick of her wrist.

I was never enough, she mumbles but the words stick in her throat, I wasn't, she wasn't. What could be enough for you?

Slouched at the piano, he moves. It's the most movement she's seen out of him. His fingers always tap away at keys, music swirling through the empty space. It's nothing like he used to play. Those days are behind them all, now.

He straightens slightly. He looks around.

He looks straight at her.