Sunday March 22nd, 2015

The exercise:

Write about: the suspension.

This afternoon I finally got my hands on that new (to me) camera that I mentioned a while back. I'm going to take some time to try it out and see how I like it, but I'm pretty sure I'll end up buying it. I'll try to share at least a few results of my test run with you guys.

I think I'll start with a visit to the apricot blossoms tomorrow morning, if the weather agrees. Without Max, this time.

He's hogged enough of the spotlight for now, thank you very much.

Mine:

The college's chemistry laboratory was quiet, it being a Saturday night in July. All of the usual suspects were off on summer vacation, and those students and teachers stuck doing school work during the hottest months of the year were out partying, or recovering from partying. Most of them, at least.

I was there, amongst the beakers and test tubes and mystery substances. And it was no party. I just wanted to check in on a few experiments I was conducting... off the record, so to speak.

Approaching the work station furthest from both the door and the windows, I took one final look around before taking the small silver key out of my pocket. Into the lock on the cabinet it went and a quick twist later I was in.

My breath grew rapid, despite my best efforts to remain calm, as I pulled away the cloth which covered the three glass beakers I had come to visit. The one on the left contained a clear red liquid, the middle a pale green liquid, and on the right...

"Perfect." The smile on my lips had a life of its own, springing to life without my permission or even awareness. I almost reached out to touch the beaker holding the blue liquid but I managed to control myself. Just in time, most likely.

For the liquid was no longer alone inside its prison. No, there were now three black balls of something suspended in the blue. As I crouched there watching, one of them clearly grew larger.

"Perfect," I breathed again. Then I returned the cloth, locked the cabinet, and hurried back to the hallway. Still empty, luckily for me. Without a backward glance I moved for the exit, for the outdoors, for my car, for the safety that only a few hundred miles of road could provide.

5 comments:

Greg said...

So you won't be letting Max take any pictures with the new-to-you camera then? ;-) I can imagine it's a little easier to manage photography by yourself, as there's places that are better reached by one person than two for the right angle, and Max is perhaps a little young still to not get easily distracted. I will look forward to seeing the pictures though.
Hmm, so now I'm all kinds of curious, including as to whether the pale red and pale green jars are failures or supporting material or... something else altogether. And what happens when the black spheres reach the right size, and why hundreds of miles away is the safe place to be. So many questions!
I do like the way you build the background though so that all those questions are natural and insistent, and I've got a pretty good idea of what the lab looks like too :)

The suspension
The eighteen stone gentleman in opera cloak and bone-white mask had left the seat next to Agnes, presumably to complain to the management of the theatre about the two ladies, and had not returned before the opera started. Three people had so far tried to sit next to Betty, but after getting tangled up in her knitting, falling over her handbag (the size of a carpet bag and filled with all kinds of oddly sharp geegaws) and getting perturbed by what they described as "a strong smell of cat. On heat. Madam." they had all left again. Betty was sucking peppermints with enthusiasm, and Agnes was cruching popcorn while they both stared avidly at the stage below. There a portly man with a bad wig was gesturing grandly and singing loudly about drainpipes, and how he intended to flee the bedroom of his wife's sister by climbing athletically down it.
"Not much hope of that then," said Agnes ruminatively. She belched.
"Is popcorn supposed to crunch that much?" asked Betty. On stage, the portly man edged closer to the drainpipe, while on the other side of a free-standing door a woman in a house-dress started banging theatrically on it.
"I think maybe they put too much salt in," said Agnes. "But I've always liked salt."
"You've got that salt-lick in your kitchen," said Betty nodding. "Oh look, they've got him in a harness, see!" She pointed at the stage, accidentally throwing a peppermint as well. It bounced off the back of several people's heads before falling off the edge of the balcony. On stage, the baritone was indeed being hoisted up, with an audible creaking of rope, to assist him in fleeing down the drainpipe.
Then he stopped, suspended in midair, turning very, very slowly in the air currents of the opera house.
"He's stuck," said Agnes. "Not surprising really, though. Drainpipes are tricky things."
"I think this bit's called the Suspension," said Betty, paging through the programme. I saw it in here somewhere, he must be Disbelief. That always gets suspended at the opera.
"What, 'cos he's a fat bloke trying to get athletically down a drainpipe?" Agnes snorted.
"No, 'cos they all singing in Ukrainian," said Betty. "That's not a language for opera in anyone's book!"

morganna said...

Mmm
A wonderful
Yummy yet
Ordinary condiment.

Greg said...

That's not only a very neat acrostic, but a very nice take on the prompt, Morganna!

morganna said...

Thank you, Greg!

Marc said...

Greg - I've told him that if I'm happy with this one then (at some point) he can have my old one. Not sure he totally understood :P

Hmm, I will consider answering a few of those questions for you at some point :)

So pleased you gave us some more time with these two! Such enjoyable back and forth between them, with some great details on what's going on around them.

Morganna - I'm with Greg, well done!