Broken moment

But, then it was interrupted. Sasha's phone rang, it was her father. She glanced at Elise and got to her feet, taking her wine she walked quickly back along the pier and went up steps towards the cottage. Elise looked at her own small hands with their oval nails and then at the water and the boats. The corellas and lorikeets started to settle. The light got yellower and yellower. Elise waited there, but Sasha didn't come back.

Dreamtime horse

But, to Sasha the conversation was all promises. They had spoken mildly about the idea of moving to Elise's grandfather's waterside shack - to discover what it was they could do without the financial grief of rent. They would hire themselves out as cleaners - tie their hair up in scarves and pour buckets of bleach on expensive bathrooms. They would stay awake all night composing stories and songs. They would breathe the fresh air from the sea and their creative lives would flow from there. They would become famous - because all it took was enough passion and enough time and it would all happen from there. At least, that's how it felt for a while to Sasha, who was old enough to know that Elise's dreams were just that. And she drove off into the rain thinking of an old song she once used to sing. Something about hitching a ride on a dreamtime horse - was it? Or was that just her memory, playing tricks?