WORTHING, 1894

 

A cloudburst loomed onto the Worthing seaside, and he puffed curls of blue smoke from his Parascho cigarette to the leaden sky. Snazzy and just arrived from London, jolly like a maypole. He clocked himself hearing his own name, ghostly, from the pier:

"Oscar! Oscar!"

He believed himself seeing Ganimedes conjured up by the scented smoke. The most beautiful effete ever, cup bearer of Gods.A breeze of lust wafted through the green carnation glowing on his lapel.

Though it was not his name that resonated all over the sea, but the wind soughing through a seagull's skeleton.