When you kiss me, heaven sighs

[weighted_reality]

There's live music in the bar tonight, a torch singer of decent talent and no renown, accompanied by a baby grand. It draws Arthur there, one hand thumbing the totem in his pocket and the other wrapped around a glass of whiskey. There's a sketchpad on the table, mostly filled with drawings of buildings, none of them particularly imaginative, each tower restricted to a specific architectural movement. There's very little variation in the doodles of an educated and orderly hand, more meditative exercise than art piece.

Halfway through his whiskey, the girl at the piano encourages her small audience to take to the dance floor if they so choose, an invitation Arthur declines. He lacks motivation and a dance partner to boot and so sees little point. Instead he returns to his sketches, turning his attention to the corners of the bar and the brave few who've stood to dance. What grace he captures in still architecture he doesn't possess in the drawings of people and organic forms.

He's about to stand and order another drink when the piano plinks out a few hauntingly familiar notes and the woman at the microphone croons out words he knows well, "Des yeux qui font baisser les miens...un rire qui se perd sur sa bouche..." 

Arthur can't help humming along. He's always loved Edith Piaf.