Loves, Loves, Loves, Loves.

By Ethan McLucas

The fractal pressed herself into the kite the whole way on their first tube journey together. The great grey cacophonous mausoleum that wired itself throughout the city seemed, for a moment, to be there just for them.

This was despite all the swarms and swarms of pilgrims of people.

To George, it was like he had just emerged from the caves and was seeing the bright city lights for the first time. But Georgina, she already fit right in, as if existing in London alone was her calling. They had not even arrived and yet she had already found a myriad of places she wanted to take him to. Their current destination was only the first in her long, ever growing list.

They emerged from their mausoleum and like the other pilgrims they trundled up the many steps and many escalators until they broke to the surface. The dead come to life. London was just as noisy above ground as it was below. 

Whenever it spiked, Georgina would shut her eyes. It was almost as if it was overwhelming her but the smile on her face would always say otherwise. 

She was listening. She was feeling it. She was leaning into it.

The fractal marched on ahead, pushing through the crowds. The kite struggled to keep up behind her.

“You have to be a warlord around here! You’ve gotta lead with your chest and walk like you’ve got a mace you're gonna bring down on someone’s head at any moment.”

“That the case?”

“That’s the case on a quiet day.”

They moved through Kensington, for George the destination unknown. When he asked where they were headed, Georgina just told him that her shirt was the clue.

She was wearing an abstract ocean scene.

They were in the heart of a megacity so George just raised an eyebrow.

After almost losing her for the fourth or fifth time, Georgina extended her hand backwards for him to take, which he gladly did.

“Just so I don’t get lost, right?”

He squeezed her hand. She squeezed back. 

“So?” George asked.

“So?”

“London!”

“London.”

“Lon - Don.”

“Old London Town.”

“Londonderry air.”

“London Derriere.”

“My thoughts exactly.”

“I could tell. It’s nice, I promise.”

“You do?”

“Of course.”

“I bet.”

George grimaced and made a spectacle of looking around.

“I don’t think I’ll ever like it.”

“You will. It has its charms.

“George the Londoner - it doesn’t have a ring to it.”

“Would you prefer George of the Jungle?”

George clicked his tongue.

“See I’ve heard that hundreds of times, you’re going to have to do better.”

“Ahh alas, foiled by six year olds, always the way.”

“It is, it is.”

“I think ‘George the Londoner’ sounds nice.”

“Really?”

“Yeah.”

“How.”

“Because it's only a couple letters off ‘Georgina the Londoner’ and that sounds pretty incredible.”

“Does it now?”

Georgina put a proud hand on her chest.

“Dare I say: it sounds utterly, spectacular.”

She spoke with enough passion that the ocean on her shirt could have crashed into waves.

They arrived at a park. Not just a park, as in a flat greenspace but a park as in a gunshot wound in the urban landscape. It was as if at this one point, the city was bleeding trees, bushes, running water and wildlife. They walked into it and were enraptured.

“See, this is the London I like: The little pockets of anything.”

“Like airport restaurants.”

“Like airport restaurants - but actually nice.”

“Come on, this is only part of it.”

Adventurously, she continued to lead the way. A captain of not just her own ship but her own entire empirical naval fleet.

The people in the park moved differently than the rest, there was less need for a mace but Georgine wielded one all the same, following in her stride, George brandished his own fiercely. Here, there were tourists. Here, there were families. Here, there was laughter. 

The fractal pushed her way just as many people as she glided past, going from avalanche to feather at the drop of a hat.

“Almost there! Almost there!”

The two of them arrived at a small pond. It was framed by an optical illusion of bountiful foliage and intricate statuettes as a sinkhole. A hidden eye into the earth. It was circled by people but Georgina found a way through for both him and her. Hand in hand, they both stood gazing, feasting on that eye.

“This is it.”

The turquoise tinted transparent water ebbed lusciously. In it, a brain of beating hearts. Orange and red koi fish swam playfully just under the surface of the water, a whole ecosystem of them existing in this pond. 

An eye with a burning warm iris. A place that screamed and moaned with life.

The fractal pointed at it with sheer purpose.

“This, this is incredible.”

The kite could see its appeal to her. There was a surface level prettiness to it, something that no doubt attracted all the others around it but that was not the thing, he reckoned, that she loved about it.

“This is a shooting star to you, isn’t it?”

She turned to him, almost happier than he had ever seen her.

“That and so much more.”

George looked at the pond once more. He tried following one fish only to lose it and to find it again and to lose it once more. It was kaleidoscopic. He chuckled.

“It’s not bad.”

“Not bad?”

“No, not bad.”

“What’s better than this? What lives up to your highest of standards?”

The kite turned to the fractal.

“You.”

The fractal turned to the kite.

“That’s cheesy, even for you.”

“I see that pond everytime I look at your skin. Something alive, glowing and burning away underneath there.”

She smiled.

“See now that’s a far better way to say it.”

They kissed before turning back to the pond. She lent her head on his shoulder. 

They stood there until satisfied and as if with full stomachs, they turned and slowly made their way out of the park. 

On the way, a little girl walked into Georgina, almost toppling herself over. She was short with blonde hair and a t-shirt covered in koi fish. The girl’s parent came up to them apologising profusely. 

“No worries.” George laughed off. 

Georgina had the smallest of snarls on her face but knelt down anyway to the girl’s height. The girl took a step back, clutching her t-shirt.

“Sorry, miss.”

Georgina took notice.

“You should be more careful where you walk, you could get hurt.”

“I will, miss.”

“I like your t-shirt. Do you like Koi fish?”

The girl nodded excitedly.

“I do, miss. I really, really, really, love, love, love them.”

Georgina bared her teeth.

“I love, love, love, them too.” 

She stood, getting away from the girl but the girl still took a step back away from her. The fractal turned to her parent.

“You’ve got a really wonderful kid. Enjoy the pond.”

She took hold of George’s arm and guided him to walk and guide them away. The girl ran off, her parent following her behind. The kite looked over his shoulder and watched them go, smiling.

But then, spat out from under the fractal’s breath:

“Little snot nosed future roadkill.” 

“Huh?”

He turned to her.

“Nothing. Nothing at all” 

She squeezed his arm. He squeezed back. She made them keep walking, leaving the words behind them like a trail.

Then, they came to the end of the natural wound in and amongst the urban.

“Where to now?”

The fractal looked around, turning as she did so as if momentarily lost. 

“There’s a great ice cream place around here.”

She kept looking, her clarity all fogged up.

“I can look for it on my phone if you give me the name?” He offered.

“No, I’ll find it.”

He took her hand and they were off once more, her mace hungry for blood.

This an extract from a working novel. It is about a person growing into someone they hate, a bildungsroman that descends. The story focuses on George Cavaile as he meets a doppelganger-like figure, who is simultaneously the best and worst person that he ever meets. Together, they burn through life and themselves.