Rose Leopard Read Online Free Page B

wrapping, imagining all that warmth and taste, those succulent juices coating my lips … ’
    â€˜You’re verging on crassness, you know that?’
    â€˜Kaz, the line between crass and titillating is finer than gossamer thread, and I walk that line. So — undergarments?’
    â€˜Horrid word — sounds like you should hold them at arm’s length and drop them in a bucket of Domestos.’
    â€˜Briefs?’
    â€˜What my Year 9 Phys.Ed. teacher said — and I have too many bad memories of sweaty briefs.’
    By the time we had decided that undies was an okay-word, if a bit Westie, her nutty mother had returned and my hands were safely together in the still-moving warmth of my own lap.
    * *
    So, words fascinate me. Story-telling fascinates me. I think it was Calvino who identified a saturation of other stories around the story, the idea that, as we move through the spaces and times of our lives, everything we do and touch and feel is part of a story, which in turn is part of another story, and another again. I like the idea that stories are so powerful, so defining — and I’d like to write a story about stories, but I can’t seem to. Not yet. Not until I’m ready, says Stu, whatever the hell that means.
    â€˜Vince,’ he told me over coffee, ‘you’re a good writer — but at the moment you’re also a lousy story-teller.’
    â€˜Ignore him,’ said Kaz breezily. ‘Write what you feel, not what he wants you to feel. If you can’t write crash-bang every-page-a-breathless-climax — then don’t. Write about love and smells and being alive. Good writing usually feels more comfortable than orgasmic. ’
    â€˜No more napalm in the morning?’
    â€˜Whatever. The point is — write from the inside, not the outside. We can all see the outside and appraise it mercilessly, but the inside? That’s much harder. That’s where we need help. We need stories for the inside.’
    I had more coffee with Stu, mentioned the inside, outside and crash-bang.
    â€˜Claptrap,’ he grinned. ‘And most unlike Kaz. Fuzzy and idealistic but a market no-go zone. Definitely.’
    â€˜You’ve got better advice?’
    â€˜Yeah,’ he said, stirring a flat white pensively. ‘Join a writers’ group. Get some feedback, walk the walk, talk the talk.’
    I woke Kaz up at five o’clock in the morning. The early sun had cast some feeble rays but it was so cold that even the birds were silent.
    â€˜Geriatrics and failed Arts students,’ she told me, ‘go to writers’ groups. Oh, and lesbians who think that being lesbian is enough to get them published. And they all sit around blinking and saying ‘Yeeeeessss’ periodically and scribbling notes about ‘point of view’ and trying to look meaningful and listening to each other’s weekly assignments, and it’s always tawdry stuff like — write a poem which links the words perspicacious and genitalia, or write your Personal Action Plan for the next ten years. Yawn yawn. You’d hate it, Vince.’
    I agreed.
    Although I have always written things, I’m not sure when I made the transition from person-who-writes-for-a-hobby to actual writer. Probably the first time I filled in a Tax Return and didn’t have a discernible occupation or income.
    â€˜What do I put here?’ I asked the accountant.
    He peered at the form. Number 2a instructed: Write your occupation .
    â€˜Your occupation,’ he said evenly.
    I must have looked blank because he placed his pen carefully on a blotter, sighed quietly and said, ‘Your job, Mr Daley.’
    â€˜I don’t have a job,’ I told him earnestly.
    He nodded and I could see what he was thinking: No job, eh? No hope, good-for-nothing. Can this loser pay my bill?
    â€˜My wife works,’ I said. Then, suddenly inspired, ‘She’s the CEO of a Saudi oil