♣ Scroll 30
There are certain things that I'm always late for, and art openings are one of them. There's something about entering a strange, new world and joining with a new group of people. I need to prepare myself for the deception, and with the art opening crowd it takes some time: short black dress & boots, of course, but accessories are always difficult. As a man, I'm never sure what kind of necklaces I should wear - a choker of boar's fangs or a long string of fake human skulls. But I would certainly wear pearls tonight.
I opened the door of Gallery Panache and immediately was pushed back by a person who was exactly attired like me. I had no idea why but she seemed to be in a hurry to get out of the place. Immediately behind her followed a man who was disguised as a thunder god. He had a big hammer in his right hand and a bolt of lightning in the other, and he was clearly drunk. Somehow I had stumbled into something shaggy when I realized I was following the thunder god. But I was wearing 3-inch-high-heeled boots with pointed toes and felt grateful to have simply remained upright.
Inside the gallery the place seemed to be wrapped in a red fog, blown supposedly from an artwork. I vaguely saw further in the interior just what I had been looking for, and headed towards the hallway leading back to the offices. But as I moved through the gallery, through the red fog, I hit upon a yellow-haired man with a big sack like an inflated balloon. He shouted, looking at my pointed boots, "Who let you in with those on?!" Momentarily set back, I looked down at my feet and staggered, because I had no idea where I'd got them.
The yellow-haired condemned me, "Those are my boots and I want them back." "Impossible," I replied glaring straight at him, as though wearing the pair of boots were of life-and death importance, although I felt like taking off the damn boots as soon as possible. Because I have something more important than putting an idiot in his place, however, I stepped past the man and headed directly for the back hallway. Just down the hallway, second doorway on the right, was standing a customs officer, whose face was somewhat familiar to me.
He tried to stop me, but I forced into the room, where I found what I had come for all along. "I left this in here last week, I said to the customs officer," turning to show him a violin case that looked old and worn-out. I couldn't remember why I had left it there since I always carry it around with me when I'm on the job. The last thing I remember was an airport, where I was to meet a woman on an important job, although I forgot what the job was. I remember she asked me what's inside, and I replied it's just a gift given by my grandpa when I was six.
Photo by James C. Hopkins: Ventspils, Latvia.