I remember an ungainly building, around six floors high. Long-closed metal shutters and black railings and stairs where there shouldn’t be any. The sky flashed grey around the edges and the facades were the rusty-brown of ancient tube stations.
Those shutters though; much taller than they needed to be. They loomed over the queue and you got the sense you were slipping inside through a crack in the walls.
And even though the queue was just a queue – and even though the faces changed every time I went – the nerves always felt the same.
I remember finding him alone. He wore a grey three-piece suit that seemed to have been sculpted around him. The cut threatened, sharing more of his muscles than all that fabric should.
He was standing at the end of a long table, looking at a head-shot of a fresh-faced man. He was leering, the barest trace of movement on his face. He then strode towards the doctor’s theatre, back rod-straight and movement at three-quarter speed.
His smile scared me most. It only hit me once, and I thought he’d stab me next.
I remember she wore all the sadness in the room. That and very black hair, ruby lips, and eyeliner heavy enough to sink a fleet. She fixes drinks and polishes glasses and does it while staring somewhere in the middle distance at a memory I haven’t seen.
Later one man will come in, bowl her off her feet and leave her in tears. Another will come in full of threats and tension. She’ll survive them both three times before curtain down.
As I sit watching she fixes me a lemonade that turns blood red before I take a sip.
I remember a short man, rumpled, round glasses and an exact moustache.
As I enter his shop he catches my eye, asks the other audience members to leave, and shows me a script that describes catching my eye and asking the other audience members to leave and showing me this script. It describes the room behind the shop, and the place he sits me down, and then describes me turning the page to read a speech–
-and as I do that his hand slams the script closed and I don’t remember most of what he said. I can remember the smell of mint on his breath, and his final words to me; "Don’t get trapped in someone else’s dream!"
I remember the first time I saw a character and knew what would happen next. I watched a woman in a blue dress reach in to the water, to pull sharp scissors from it. I wanted to scream. I wanted to stop being an audience member – for just a second – and just tell her that I know what’s going to happen and that she can leave the scissors in the water and walk away now and only now.
Instead I turn, and let other people follow her.
I remember the leopard-print dress and bloody lipstick. And I remember the actress with the black hair and another with a red bob, and how both of them looked past the mask and into your eyes. The same look from different people playing one role, months apart.
I remember the first time, when she pulled me close and left lipstick on my collar, and the final time, when she told me a story in whispers and stopped me watching something terrible going on behind my back. I heard screaming.
October 2014 | November 2014 | December 2014
Temple Studios | January 2015 | February 2015
March 2015 | April 2015 | May 2015
June 2016 | July 2016 | August 2016