andy cannon
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Everything posted by andy cannon
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### Chapter twenty Christopher met Marco that evening in a cafe on the promenade. The western sky still held the last pale gold of sunset, though the sea below remained dark, its long swells folding steadily against the rocks. Fishing boats drifted gently at their moorings, their mast lights beginning to appear one by one across the bay. Marco leaned upon the rail, watching the water. He turned as Christopher approached. "You've been to see Vale." It was a statement. Chr
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That is my hope for all my scribblings!
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It's easy to do, especially when you are sharing so much high-quality content of your own!
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I know what you mean. I dredged up some thorny issues around civic responsibility and theology in my story about Medici-era Florence, but I am cleaning out a neglected part of my mental/emotional attic with this one.
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--- A few nights later, Christopher slept little. A brief storm had passed before dawn, leaving only the steady drip of rainwater from the gutters outside his flat and the distant wash of the tide against the harbour wall. Pale morning light crept slowly across the bedroom ceiling. Marco still slept beside him. Christopher lay awake watching him, the wayward dark curl that lay against his forehead, the way his mouth parted slightly in sleep. For the first time since the dream
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I have arrived at the conclusion that I may have focused on the wrong character in this story. While Christopher has the flashier, cinematic flashbacks and recovered memories, Marco actually has a more compelling arc... periods of happiness followed by intense grief, filling time between his beloved's appearances, not knowing if a reincarnation dies young before it is time to go look for him. He knows that Christopher will reappear in Penmere, but he can't wait there for him since it would be impossible to explain why the fisherman he has known all his life looks the same when Christopher is 27 as he did 20 years earlier. How did Marco learn that bitter lesson?
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### Chapter Eighteen Christopher woke before the alarm. For several seconds he lay still, staring at the ceiling while the events of the previous night returned in no particular order: the storm, the candles, Marco's hand in his, the kiss. He closed his eyes. For months he had imagined that if he ever crossed that particular line, everything afterwards would feel different. The world would tilt. Some hidden mechanism would begin turning. The sea might rise. The Tor might call
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Exactly! There had to be some reason they suffered through nineteen centuries of painful separations.
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Plenty more Sturm und Drang to come, but a respite is welcome!
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Christopher stood for a long time after the last memory faded. Rain had begun again. It drifted across the harbour in a fine grey veil, softening the lights reflected upon the water until every colour seemed uncertain. The fishing boats rose and fell gently against their moorings, ropes creaking with the tide. He ought to have gone home. Instead he found himself walking without direction through streets he had known since childhood. Nothing looked quite the same. The caf
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Christopher will ask a variation of that question in a couple of chapters. I'm just running behind your observations a bit.
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That is addressed to a certain extent in the next chapter. An interesting parallel story would follow Marco in all that time between when he finds Christopher again.
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Christopher expected the memories would come as they had before. One life. One death. A single thread unravelled slowly enough for him to follow. Instead they began arriving without warning, colliding with the present so violently that he no longer knew where one existence ended and another began. It started three days after his conversation with Marco. He was standing in the queue at the bakery before work when the woman ahead of him asked for a cottage loaf. The words struc
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After more suffering, a resolution will peak through the clouds.
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I had forgotten about the Maugham version! I was thinking about the novel by John O'Hara, Both are great achievements.
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Christopher found Marco where the harbour gave way to the old cliff path. The morning had broken clear after several days of rain, sunlight across the water in broken ribbons of silver, while the tide crept steadily back towards the harbour wall. A pair of fishermen were repairing lobster pots farther along the quay, their voices carrying faintly on the wind. Marco stood alone beside the rail overlooking the sea, a mug of coffee in one hand, looking as though he had scarcely slept. Chr
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Vale's role in this becomes clearer over the coming chapters. As far as a ritual to release them from this cycle, as with many actions, the doing is easier than the undoing, i.e., a reputation can be destroyed in seconds but can't be restored in decades.
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A magnificent story by a master of the craft!
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What makes you believe that could protect him? The icy fingers of Fate reach everywhere!
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Chapter Fourteen It was Christopher's birthday, though the fact had seemed strangely unimportant when he woke that morning. By mid-morning, however, the whole of Penmere appeared to have gathered along the promenade to watch the tide. The sea had withdrawn farther than anyone could remember, exposing dark shelves of rock, weed-slick channels and stretches of ancient stone usually hidden beneath the water. People stood in clusters along the railings, pointing and murmuring, while children we
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For several moments neither of them spoke. The wind moved across the harbour, carrying the smell of salt and seaweed from the dark water below. Somewhere farther along the promenade, a gull cried out. The sound seemed strangely distant. Christopher stood with his hands shoved into his coat pockets, watching Marco hesitate. That, more than anything else, had become intolerable. Every answer led to another question. Every explanation dissolved into implication and half-finished warnings. "No.
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That word "convincing" is rather ominous, LOL! I believe a gauntlet has been tossed.
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That's good! I am finding it tough to address a somewhat complicated plot from the point of view of a character who is largely in the dark without leaving the reader in a similarly confused state or revealing too much too early.
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The memory followed him everywhere. Christopher tried, at first, to explain it away. A concussion, perhaps. Shock. A panic attack brought on by stress and too little sleep. The mind was capable of extraordinary distortions. He knew that much. There were books full of documented cases. False memories. Dissociative episodes. The brain filling gaps with stories it found easier to bear. The explanation sounded sensible each morning, but by evening it felt absurd. Every time he closed his eyes h
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Christopher spent most of Wednesday attempting to concentrate on work. The approaching birthday lingered stubbornly at the edge of his thoughts. Ordinarily he paid little attention to it. Twenty-eighth birthdays carried no particular significance. They arrived and departed much like any other day. This one felt different, from the tidal event through the records stretching back through centuries to Adrien Vale's fear. The coincidence sat uneasily in his mind no matter how oft
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