clouded his senses. The clinking pennies in the slot machines cried out. A figure stood in his line of vision, a dark silhouette which blocked out a colourful shard of light from a nearby fair-ride. A bearded, rugged man approached the boy and his father. A set of hungry, pained eyes darted in their direction, an intense flash of emerald. The figure was hunched over, wrapped in a tawny coat which was frayed and patched at the edges. His jaw was disjointed and his teeth were rotten and stained a foul yellow. He came closer with his palms wide open in search of money.The father held his child tightly by the hand, and his son could sense an unusual tension in his father’s quick movements as they weaved through the crowds between the ushering stalls. The crooked figure followed amidst the louring shadows. As the boy pushed his way through the dazzling world of activity, he thought how insignificant he was, entering the lives of anonymous people for a split second, a hazy glimpse of a face, and then leaving that moment behind forever. Forever was a long time. You could never reach the end. It just keeps ticking on and on. He shivered.The boy pressed forward. Always forward. The father led his son to shelter from the pursuing beggar, behind a humming fair-ride. Shouts and screams echoed in the cold, crisp air. Litter and plastic debris lay scattered and strewn across the ground. The bearded beggar began to approach once again. His eyes were now bloodshot, transfixed on a glinting aurous timepiece wrapped around the father’s wrist. A shock of danger and insecurity rang through the boy’s body. He gripped his father’s hand but it was clenched; his cadaverous knuckles were a pallid white.The boy looked into his father’s piercing cerulean eyes and his gelid expression revealed something unknown to him. Instinct told him to run.The boy stared blindly at his father, who stood trapped in a frozen state.The child ran. He escaped the enclosing crowds and the din began to die behind him. He wanted to run and carry on running, forever,
17 52
Made with FlippingBook - Online magazine maker