Bloom

Bloom

Bloom may have seen seventy-eight summers but in her day she was a swinging hippy cracker… No, she never could play a single comely note on anything of musical hue, but boy could she sing… Soft and lilting or with a roar fit to tame a rampaging lion.

True to be told how nowadays the wardrobe mirror reflected the lie that her once voluptuous shapely curves had corroded to reflect an allure more to contrast with Maris Piper potatoes by the sack, than the gregarious delight of womanhood of her youth... But hey-ho for such historical vanity.

Whilst in such positive mind, Bloom happily recounted how Randy had always been the pick of the bunch… Up there on stage with mic in hand, or his Glastonbury curls chafing his agile fingers as they caressed and teased the guitar strings, creating such musical magic as to make all eager ears dance, or reduce the strongest of eyes to tears.

Bloom could still recall that strange surge of excitement as his welcoming hand reached down to take hers that first time… Bodily lifted onto the stage she stood red faced yet proud to be found standing so close and willing beside him...

The music rose to surprise the audience with her voice, so magical as to raise the roof, whilst Randy’s eager eyes lapped up this vision of gayly abandoned loveliness who open up in him the possibilities of what might yet become his just desserts.

Randy and Bloom!.. Not a partnership name that would ever make the papers… Yet when enlivened by half a bottle of Jack Daniels, the happy twosome giggled their way to the registry office and legally entwined themselves into their future.

Poor Randy wasn’t old when the cigarettes took his lungs, chemo took his hair, then depression finally sealed his fate…

This was not only the sad end of one life, but also the demolition of what had been two people’s dreams.

Bloom never sang again… After all, what was the point?.. Without Randy by her side, music could no longer hold the magic.

The satin liner they gently laid her head upon was cool and in some ways soothing.

No longer having need for the support of medication and pain killers, even the soft twist of the screws to seal her lid came and went as a welcome finality of her passing.

Time thereafter had no meaning…

Until a strange warmth slowly ebbed into her now ice-cold body…

Was it a feeling? A sensation? Or maybe a sound that coursed through her unfettered soul?… It was a voice… And one she had known well… And singing one of her favourite songs of old…

“All we had between us was a secret…” It started from a distance then slowly grew closer.

“Kept for just us two for just, just now.” Then came Randy’s smiling face, his features back to when he was younger, his hair grown back into a thick mop of gold that cascaded over his shoulders, just as it had on that night.

Bloom felt herself start to laugh with joy as she reached for his outstretched hand to pull her up into his world, her gay floral hippy dress and shapely curves back to her finest hour…

Clinging tight to one another, the chorus of their old duet began to flow into what may well be their eternity.

“Traffic Light Lady turn your eyes… I’m the green and red surprise… Traffic Light Lady turn your eyes on me.”

And then they kissed.