The Blink That Killed the Eye by Anthony Anaxagorou

Author:Anthony Anaxagorou
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Jacaranda Books Art Music Ltd

Cowboy

There were nights when her mother would stand by her bedroom door just to watch her. She was of course supposed to be asleep, but when a mother has to work late it grants the child an opportunity to take advantage of the big night and its inviting solitude.

We could see her dolls meticulously aligned in the corner of her room opposite the window where the curtains were always kept widely drawn. Blonde dolls, more female than male with pinkish skin and coarse hair placed up by the skirting. Each one’s frame resembling the other with its factory set of small rounded breasts, protruding bottom and flat beach-like stomach. All favourably ranked in order of popularity and beauty, while being made to purposefully appear as if they were forever holding hands. As the line fell into the shadows, we could see the dolls which bore the forsaken marks, scars and blemishes of those old and least preferred, buried in the room’s sunless corner where they remained forgotten by everyone except time.

With the plastic of their skin and bones she had created the perfect panoply of a family life she knew must exist, however this wasn’t what worried her mother. Rather it was the sight of seeing her young daughter play tirelessly with one particular plastic figure. He, like the others, had pinkish skin, cinematic blue eyes, blond hair, and a broad hexagonal chest with thick muscular legs. He wore a white and blue cowboy hat with a gun lodged brazenly in the holster around his waist. His grin dictating to the rest of his facial features what they should always be doing. Her mother tried hard to remember who brought the toy for her. Maybe her father had, one of the few gifts he ever surprised her with. On this particular night she interrupted the young girl’s play by what we assume was her asking why she wasn’t in bed, and why she was up so late playing with her dolls and cowboy. Here, one might expect a young daughter to grow mildly effervescent at hearing the voice of a mother she hadn’t seen all day. Not her. Instead she aloofly reeled the figure into her pyjama pocket, remarking with the candour of the young, that she really wished she could be a cowboy.

As the years developed we know her mother was forced to change jobs several times, although no substantial reason was ever given as to why, which could have helped to appease the growing tensions between them. She kept few friends, her repose finding itself in the introverted hours she would spend drawing alone. Most of her illustrations consisted of white unicorns, bright hot-air balloons and tropical fish. Things indigenous to one’s imagination, the massless air or tepid oceanic shallows.

Her best friend’s name was Holly. We know that from the summer days they spent skipping and playing in the front garden until being called in for tea. Their mothers met one year at a school committee meeting where they were brought into a conversation about property development and the benefits of gentrification.

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