Bragi: Poetry, Music, Eloquence, Performance Arts (lingobard) wrote in history_dot_com, @ 2012-09-29 16:53:00 |
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Entry tags: | ~bragi, ~idun |
It Never Did Run Smooth [A few months after TAFD] (Tag: Idun)
The skald watched Bragi going over his prose. There was an eager sort of light in the skald's eyes. Bragi did not know the skald's name. He didn't know the tavern's name either. Or the town's for that matter. Bragi never asked. He hadn't asked about any of the last skalds or the last taverns either. He just sat and wrote in any spare moment. He took his meals at the same time every day. He said please and thank you when it was expected to say please and thank you. When someone spoke to him, Bragi listened all the way until they finished a sentence before he politely excused himself. When someone expected him to smile, Bragi turned the corners of his lips upwards. He went to bed as soon as possible, because that was the best time to go to bed, and woke up late, because the writing didn't require him to get up early. He didn't stay at any one place too long. Every place looked rather similar and the differences didn't really matter, but Bragi didn't stay anyway. Bragi did not keep moving because he wanted to go somewhere. He kept moving because he didn't want to be anywhere.
The pieces Bragi worked on contained some of the best prose he had ever written. And in the past three months since he had started traveling, he had written mountains of it. All jam packed with sentiment, beauty, and characters who always died at the very end, because Bragi couldn't think of anything else better to do with them. Occasionally in the evenings, he read a loud. The people who didn't know him, but who called him father when he wasn't there, clapped. They complimented. They asked for help with their own prose. Bragi didn't hear any of it, but he did help.
Together they were starting a movement. They were putting expression into their work so that it didn't have to exist in the regular world. People felt when Bragi read. They didn't have to feel anything when he didn't, because it was all in the paper. They used to play songs in the evenings too, but that had stopped. Their instruments gathered dust. They'd all lost interest in music for some reason. This was good. It gave them more time for other things.
Bragi bit his lip as he scanned the lines in front of him, while the skald waited across from him. They sat in a table near the back. Bragi always took the table near the back. The one with an easy exit in case, he ever felt the slightest tingle of deity, so he could slip out quickly without notice, by stair, window, or back door. The one that required extra navigation if anyone chose to try and speak to him. He didn't have much time for conversation. It didn't really do much for either party anyway. He gave the skald short, constructive, criticism, and the man ran off to begin his revision. The skald had smiled in thanks. Bragi had nodded. He didn't smile back. Then Bragi felt a hand on his arm.
He'd been so engrossed in reading that he hadn't noticed the tingling when it came that time. He felt quite sure that this should horrify him, but the pace of his heart didn't change. He just stared at the hand for a second. Bragi didn't look at the owner's face. He already knew who it was. Bragi knew that hand painfully painfully well. Or well, he used to.
Bragi removed the hand. He didn't make eye contact. “I'm sorry” he said politely, “I don't have time to talk. I'm busy.” He turned to go, when suddenly a detail registered. Bragi turned back. Her dress was completely red. Bragi stared at it for a second. He didn't know what this fact meant. He was sure that he didn't want to. But he still stared at it for a second. He'd never seen her in a red dress before.