Swallows - Larry Stylinson

Chapter 2

Louis woke the next morning, having dreamt he'd walked through a garden of stone statues, each one possessing all the intricacies of human stature, carved by some masterful artist who could make stone look soft, frozen in movement.
He rose then, and checked the watch splayed on his bedside table, it read 8:34, around the time he'd seen the boy on the balcony last morning. Covers pulled hurriedly off him, Louis scurried to the bathroom and splashed water on his face, looking up to the mirror then, fingers running through sideswept caramel hair. Not bothering to fix a tea or make his bed, he closed his door quietly and hurried to the motel stairs, painfully aware that his mother might have heard him in the next room. He furrowed his brow at the thought, unsure of why he cared if she heard him heading to sit at the pool.

Before even settling on a pool chair, he scanned the balconies above him, this time with intent, but he found them empty. He bit his lip then, looking down, slightly crestfallen. Shaking his head, only then did he stop to wonder what he had expected, why he craved catch a glimpse of that silhouette. He sat, rather defeated, on the edge of a chair, feeling like a voyeur whose subject had found him out. Thinking back, the figure he had seen seemed to weave in and out of last nights dreams, questioning for a moment wether he had seen it at all, and why the image was stagnant, branded in his mind

                                         • • •
The motel looked out over a small beach town, Tenby, which he and his mother visited each summer in the last two weeks of August. Dusk had settled that evening, Louis and his mother were packing up their blankets and umbrellas, having spent the day under the beach sun.
"So how do you like having on your own room this time around" she peered at him through sunglasses,
"It's fun, yeah, thanks mom" he muttered.
She smiled, grabbing the ends of a blanket   and folding them neatly together.
"Alright, take this and I'll take the umbrella" she handed him the blanket and slipped on her flip flops.
"Mmk". He was glad to be leaving before dark set in, uncomfortable at the thought of the bleach blonde teens, tan and lean who had bonfires each night, howling and laughing loud enough for Louis to hear them from his motel
. He was painfully aware that a group of them had gradually accumulated about 10 feet away from him and his mom, unmistakeable teenage giggles and exchanges of "bro" and "dude" ringing out. He'd refused to glance in their direction, worried he'd make awkward eye contact with a buffed guy or long-tressed girl, but allowed his eyes to wonder curiously as he and his mom packed up. The scene was a typical one, too-tanned bodies played out over beach chairs, bud lights in hand. His eyes focused on the curls of a boy leaning his elbows in the sand, head rolled back behind his shoulders. A girl chatted away beside him but his eyes were set not on her, instead just past her, out onto the darkening water. There was a familiarity in the way his limbs curved on the blanket, silver ringed fingers for one hand softly fingering the sand, the other held a beer slightly swaying, wrist bent. Some of the other boys stood up, zipping wetsuits up to their necks
"Yo Harry, you coming"
The fingers ceased swirling the sand, and a deep, resounding voice rang out
"Yeah I'm coming"
The sudden movement brought heat to Louis' cheeks, and he looked down, pretending to re-fold the blanket in hand. His peripheral vision caught the figure rising to his feet in a slow, solid movement before glancing over his shoulder in Louis' direction.