Month: January 2015

The Paris Catch 22

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Published in The Sunday Times She waits for the waiter to pull her chair out, sits down as he pushes it in. She pulls her tight black leather dress down, her Hollywood legs still well exposed, and struggles to tuck one ankle behind the other. Four inch red heels are difficult to manage. Even for Mary Louise Parker. I’m watching her every move, covertly and calmly, despite being so close to someone so famous. I’m not used to this… Mary brushes her black hair behind an ear, showing me her cheek as she sits to the side. Her skin is as pale as the Parisian sky this October. The star of the series Weeds, she’d be a much better choice for a Tim Burton film. A rival to Bonham Carter. Parker’s posse swoon around her, knocking my chair as they pull out their own. At her table is one friend, one PA, one film assistant. Three women and Mary. Mary is sitting on top of my boyfriend. Basically. Seated with his back to her, at our table at this popular bistro in St …

The Hunter’s Last Days

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Last night I sat next to my grandfather on a bench in his garden while he told me of the ways he planned to kill himself. He said that the pain some days gets too much to bear and he imagines how to end it all. My grandfather is a hunter. His outside shed is filled with guns, bullets, gunpowder and other paraphernalia. In the locked safe are about five rifles and two shotguns. If memory serves me. When I was a child, growing up, he’d show me how to put together a bullet in that shed. A little after-school project. He sat over his tools like an artist over a water painting, lamps arched over his hands to illuminate the small casing and fine, fatal powder. I can’t remember much of what he told me. If I tried to construct my own bullet today in that same shed I’d fall short. I’d create something closer to a birthday cake sparkler. But my grandfather, he was a weapons expert. Is. His guns have been with …