The customer lay on his front, head and back covered in sharp little needles. He breathed through the hole, the acupuncturist said goodbye. Listening to muzak from the Himalayans, he flexed the mind to Slow Motion. How many times had he played that song? The weightless key changes, basic beats and lulling chorus of it's counting, counting, counting mesmerised him. Something so elemental, so cleanly imagined, yet impenetrable, beyond specific meaning. A distant thought, babble language lost in harmony. An arch, a fall, stridency rising to the surface, overtaken by splintered submergence into repetition.
The patient lay on his back. A blond medical student smiled and inspected his stomach. Her legs were strained from hockey injury. Amongst the palpitations and percussion he could hear Scheherazade. Through clouds, a rainy shoreline, a building imprint of architecture, a frightened moan, as if the hand gently reached into the heart, throb of memory, shriek of dissonance. 'Now I'm going to check how you move,' she said with a wink. Tiptoes, heel to toe, then one foot in front of the other he walked out of the room.
