The CuisinArt

Hello all, here’s the latest submission from Dylan. Enjoy…

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Quimson’s exotic stories of romance were always a source of great entertainment. He was raised on the classic tales of love. The plays, the poems. The films, novels, and songs. And his life, he liked to think, was a reflection of those mediums.

Versed in all forms, he was able to summon up lines from the great poets, it would seem, without any sort of mental pause. Where others found themselves adrift in a sea of thoughts and feelings they could not explain, Quimson’s speech came across as both effortless and precise. His words came out, not as though he had thought of them, but as if they had sought out his mouth specifically. Like the pipes in his throat were the most divine gateway to speech an utterance could hope for, and so it was there they flocked.

He believed in, and could understand nothing but, great passion.

Among all the attributes he carried, people would first take note of how stout a boy he was, with attire consisting mainly of sweaters and an earflap hat, in which he could be seen regardless of season or setting.

After school, atop an overturned chicken crate, Quimson would spin stories of love’s triumph to a mass of his classmates. Children, held suspended from their televisions and radios by one boy’s histrionic telling of a summer courting, or of two lovers rend by society or wartimes. Stories where hardship is endured and characters discover strength through love. Sometimes the love was reckless, sometimes it was mad, but always it was pure.

Often the children had questions. Often the children were not children at all but young adults much older than Quimson himself.

He would address their concerns calmly and warmly, settling their worries by citing Cummings, Shakespeare, Frost, and Dickinson when appropriate.

But despite all the times he had helped the public deal with the woes of the heart, they would always return with new dilemmas and, frequently, new loves altogether. As much as Quimson tried to mirror his life with the romance in his books and plays, his peers seemed to live a carefree existence filled with shallow, frivolous coquetries.

Quimson was not like them. His heart was devoted to Monique - a girl he spent an all too short spring in the company of many years ago. Their initial paths crossed during a year which, to lovelorn Quimson, isn’t remembered by a number but by the event – “The Spring of Monique.” A daughter of friends who would imbibe with Quimson’s parents, Monique was a thin-armed girl, sleek and slender, who would squat in mud for long stretches of time, as was the tendency at the age. During these play dates arranged by their parents, Quimson was captivated fully and found his eyes lingering on her so long he’d forget his mouth altogether, letting it droop toward his chest. But his Monique showed no signs of noticing.

At the close of the spring, as school let out, Monique was whisked away from Quimson. Her father had been offered a new job and so the family of three moved. To where, Quimson did not know.

For that summer, and all the seasons since, Quimson writhed over her absence. Although brief, he declared his time with Monique to be the buds of a romance destined to follow him throughout the rest of his existence. Once a month he would compose a letter to her, opening it with “Dearest Monique” and then stating his continuing adoration for her before the eventual close - “Truly yours…”

Knowing no address, he would rely on the wings of pigeons, or the waves of a nearby creek to deliver the message to her hands.

Quimson composed the letters as he did all his writings, by candlelight, in cursive, using a feather and ink. For school, sometimes professors would make a dire request for type, in which case Quimson had an old typewriter. It was a gift from his grandmother. A number of the keys had the tendency of sticking, but Quimson strongly believed in believing and modern day “advancements,” he felt, alienated people of this duty. Everything was too easy for everyone and true work, he believed, true passion, true love, was a rare sight nowadays.

This thought had been forming in his mind for some time but it invaded his home in the summer of his thirteenth year, before he was to enter the eighth grade. He was in his room when from down the stairs, through his wall, the voices of his parents found the canal of his ear.

He was working diligently on a paper of little importance, lit by a skinny wax candle, feather tip in hand, when he heard the bitter bellow of the word “divorce.” It had sought him out. It found him, as many other words had, and Quimson began to think – the world may very well be heading in the wrong direction.

He felt then, more then ever, the frustration of everyone around him not taking love seriously.

Quimson was able to rely on the satisfaction of knowing his life was based on a larger, a more grand idea of romance. If his life were to be viewed by a writer, there would be the saga of Monique - two young lovers, separated in their youth. Quimson knew that he would go about his life always thinking of her, and she would go about hers thinking of him, then many years down the road they would reunite under unlikely circumstances with a passionate embrace.

But not yet.