His back was slightly hunched, but not to the extent that a stranger would notice. His lip jutted forward, like an animal edging towards a precipice. He used his voice instrumentally. His clothes were generic. People would not remember him after a fleeting meeting, he was not regarded as a charismatic man. He was born in Gateshead, England, although his name was Schultz.

He entered the hotel with minimal fuss, neutrally. Schultz did everything with the air of a man who wished to leave no trace after him, unaware that he was being pursued and plans were in place to put an end to his existence. The youth at the reception desk, looked out of place, exceedingly handsome but in an androgynous way. It was very difficult to read the youth. He was all function. 'I have a reservation'' the youth opened his mouth to respond as the chandelier fell. The impact was fatal. A noteworthy end to a monotone man.

It is probably nothing to ruminate over,
Regardless,
Leave me to do so
There is no other way
Afraid to leave definite things unsaid,

Our hands are not interlinked
Nor should they become so,
In spite of contrary glimpses,
This is not our journey to make,
Leave me to regurgitate what probably isn't,
This afternoon,

I do not ache for what is left behind,
Not anymore at least
Sometimes I wish I had more places to go,
I have cast more shadows than I ought to,
Listlessly trying to find any other way to be.

He spent numerous days in his pyjamas. If he recalled correctly and sometimes he didn't, he hadn't left the house; at least physically for 3 days. His skin seemed to weigh on him like a polyester suit. He had a constant itch and feeling of being enclosed, obsessing over people had never really known or liked. They seemed to live so effortlessly. Their social media posts and photographs projecting a warmth and a coherence that he felt unable to match in his own life. He wanted to leave no trace, live a blameless existence. He had many plans but no intention to execute any of them. She lived a noisy life in the attic above him. His day was filled with her footsteps and musical choices. He viewed her positively although their contact was functional in a practical sense; upbeat energy in otherwise gray days. It was a surprise when she invited him for a cup of tea. "It is weird that we live under the same roof but are otherwise strangers". There was no time to be surprised as the car skidded out of control and hit them, he tried briefly to grasp her hand, one last reflex. Although he lived an extensive life in his thoughts: he didn't have time to think a final thought.

They could barely relate to each other. Unpolished as is the human
way when observed dispassionately, but like humans they tried to
seem certain. Thinking they could carry out their plans, manipulate
and get their own way. Their eye contact had become forced and
staged; their smiles of acknowledgement were masking
estrangement. When the woman choked on the hard part of a
tomato; they were forced into immediate action; one of them applied
the Heimlich manoeuvre while the other called the emergency
services. We do not have to get on to compliment each other
perfectly

He did something in the shipyards, but I was too young to know what. Those times, in any event, had long passed. His hair was white and he had spectacles with thick rims, that is much of his appearance as I recall. It was hard to imagine the time in which he had worked; things around there were beginning to accelerate, melting into air and the past was exactly that; should he come back now he would recognise very little.

I learned much later that he sometimes visited the Chinese takeaway to talk about communism; he believed in an equally high standard of living for all, not death camps and suppression of the individual. If one man has a nice suit, all men must have a nice suit. His presence was not a political one for me, I was a child, he was someone who we visited. He greeted me on me and my brother's visits with a smile and a jig; "Not bad for 85 year old'' he'd say. He made us ice cream floats, slipping the ice cream out of those individual paper packets that ice cream used to sometimes come in. He was a vital man, there was something to him that made him exciting to be around. Although he had been educated to a low level by contemporary norms he was well read and informed, I came to learn in later years. He never had a child, that I learned too.     What does that do to a person to be childless? What does that do to a person to have a child? Time passes and things happen regardless. I think he died in the same week as my grandma, but I could be mistaken. The exact details of one's life sometimes become muddled. An enigmatic figure in a bigger picture. Forgotten by many.

I slept wonderfully,
expunged of all sins
actual and imagined,
under a checkered quilt,
I dreamed of an Adonis and forgetting,
His clothing perfectly accentuated
his classically perfect physique,
I don't know what to make of that,
that has  been happening so much lately,
Who do you confide in, when there is just jittery energy?
My body is calling for something but I have not yet formulated an answer,
I have made a deity out of caffeine lately,
and my nails are so far in the distant past,
they bumped into my great granda on Bedford terrace.
People ask me if I'll move back to my land of birth,
But I have never really left.

Sometimes his attention seemed to split apart. His consciousness seemed to visit different dimensions simultaneously. He felt like, at times, he was living inside a kaleidoscope. Although he often lacked the means to describe his lived experience to others. When he tripped over the old Dutch woman; her hair disordered and her body cramped up like a day old hot dog, he experienced his head hitting the last step of the escalator, but his mind was also elsewhere compiling a shopping list. His thoughts were still something briefly as his body became nothing. His eulogy mentioned his numerous professional accolades, but nothing of his trivial end.