Hampshire - View Magazines

Inn
‘Please, my wife is with child and we have nowhere to sleep.’
‘Yes, yes, come in, come in!’ I can feel Miss Garwood’s glare
singe the hair on the back of my head. There is a very long silence.
One of the angels starts to pick her nose. The shepherds are
throwing sheep at each other and a king starts to unwrap his box of
myrrh to reveal the cornflakes packet beneath. Only Mary remains
sedately calm through the crisis, sitting on the back of her donkey,
hands hugging the cushion pushed up underneath her dress.
The play clearly disintegrating, Miss Garwood enters stage left
and tries to get things back on track. I am led firmly off to wait in
the wings, where I stay for the rest of the performance. I stand there
and watch him… the boy who is Joseph, and even then I can
almost sense the future. Even then, at the age of six years old, I
guess that I will always be the one who is watching, watching him
throughout our school years, watching him through wide eyes as he
walks around with the prettiest girl in the class, watching him and
knowing that he will never notice me.
‘I have spent the last 15 minutes with a finely
detailed memory of a boy who does not know
I even figured in his life’
The sign now tells me that the train I need is due in two
minutes. I almost wish it were going to be late. I am enjoying this
trip down memory lane.
The train pulls into the station and I have to pass him in order
to reach the platform. I steel myself, breathing in courage and cold
air, both of which sting the back of my nostrils. I venture a smile.
Nothing. Blank face, marble expression.
My heart falls for a moment as I clamber aboard but then I
laugh it off. Twenty-five years have passed and I am no longer the
child looking on. I have a career, a husband, a daughter. The train is
almost empty. I find two vacant seats, sit down by the window and
pile my bags in the place next to me. I have spent the last 15
minutes with a finely detailed memory of a boy who does not know
I even figured in his life. Sad. Buts it is just the past and there are
more important things. I am suddenly aware of a voice and I look
up with surprise to see Joseph.
‘Is anyone sitting…?’ he stops for a moment then tries again. ‘Is
there any room at the inn?’ A twinkle of mischief plays at the corner
of his lips. My eyes meet his and I am almost tempted to move aside
my bags, pleased that during ten years of school I did not go entirely
unnoticed. I put out my hand to do just that but something stops
me. The train is moving forwards. Nobody wants to go back in the
wrong direction.
‘I’m sorry, no, there isn’t,’ I say, with growing confidence. ‘Not
any more.’ I smile as he shrugs and walks away.
Time has moved on, the train is picking up speed, charging
ahead into the future. V
View readers who would like to see their own work published in
the magazine are invited to submit a short story of no more than
1,500 words that refers to Wiltshire or Hampshire. Work should
be previously unpublished and should be sent to:
editor@viewmagazines.co.uk. Work submitted by post must be
accompanied by a stamped addressed envelope.
join�er�y | 'join re
e-
|
noun
the wooden components of a
building, such as stairs, doors,
windows and conservatories,viewed
collectively.
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The Fairground,Weyhill, Andover, Hampshire SP11 0ST
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