when three worlds collide

a short story on who we become across different mediums

Slyvia

It’s a crisp, sun-dappled morning in Pari. The season? One might guess late March… perhaps early April. A dusting of pink and white cherry blossoms lie delicately on the cobblestoned boulevard, confirming that the threshold of spring has decisively arrived.

Slyvia rises early, like always, from a night of undisturbed rest; despite indulging in perhaps one too many glasses of Bollinger with her husband the previous evening – who treated her to dinner at Restaurant Guy Savoy, and who never fails to keep her glass topped up. The good stuff never has (and apparently never will) given her a headache.

She finds a solemn bliss in the unhurried life. Not to say she doesn’t miss it – the chapters brimming with ceaseless thrill – spontaneous adventure always within arms reach. But in this chapter, which her daughter graciously named ‘maman’s long afternoon of living’, it’s the slow moving mornings out on the sun speckled terrace; the first softly invigorating sip of coffee; the contemplative, eternity long conversations shared with her husband – where they speak in the language of reminiscence – in the tongue of nostalgia.

Yet this morning belongs to a gift… from her daughter.

Her wise yet withered eyes drift knowingly towards the coffee table – where she keeps artefacts that gather the day’s pauses. It breathes like a vessel of stillness, each tactile page promising a moment of weighty absorption. It’s patient on her age-softened body, which takes a few moments longer than it once did to carry itself from place to place. Still, it lies with unflinching composure upon the honeyed oak. She traces her hand across the hard-back cover, the words Arts & Culture embossed into the page – a sensuous texture that ripples through her map-like fingers.

It’s time to disappear for an hour… or two.

Josephine

“I swear to god Katy, nothing can come between that girl and her phone. I’ve tried, really, I have. No phone in the bedroom, app limits, total confiscation… you name it! But she always finds a way around. Always coming up with an excuse. And then she goes on this whole rant about what a terrible mother I am and how– oh crap, gotta go, I’m at my hair appointment. Catch up later, okay?”

Josephine barrels from the stream of drug stores, charity shops, estate agents and fast food fronts into the thick, heat infused air – almost losing her footing in the process.

Her heart drops several inches towards her stomach as she catches herself, non-chalantly scanning the room to confirm that nobody saw her nearly become an object of quiet ridicule.

Great. Beads of sweat were already tempting to make an appearance on her forehead, and the fact that just about every means of electricity is being utilised in this airless – bordering on dangerously overcrowded room – is just not helping the situation.

Thank god David is free. She does not want to risk one of those inexperienced junior girls screwing things up, especially with the PTA ball this Saturday.

She collapses into the salon chair – her glutes still positively tender from yesterday’s ‘bums and tums’ class.

“I’ll be just one second, my love”, David chimes whilst tapping her shoulder.

The latest copy of Heat hangs lazily on the side table; the edges of the flimsy, glossed pages threatening to make their way to the hair-strand infected floor. She grabs the magazine – one headline in particular seducing her interest:

“THE FINAL STRAW ‘WE HAVE TO GET BROOKLYN AWAY FROM NICOLA’”

Well she is totally submerged in the Posh versus Peltz drama.

“Don’t mind if I do” she thinks to herself.

She begins rustling through the thin-walled contents–

“What page is it…paaaage– Ooh”

–but hastily becomes distracted by another headline:

“WE LOST 6 ST DANCING IN THE KITCHEN”

I mean, she is really starting to hate Wednesday morning ‘bums and tums’, and Susan is just the biggest bore, constantly going on about–

–her mind swiftly returns to Posh.

Didn’t she order a t-shirt online from Victoria Beckham just last week? It was a moment of weakness – £95 (for a t-shirt) – but – I mean – she couldn’t resist. Katy was just saying how her husband bought her the most gorgeous tailored jacket from VB and she was getting major fomo. She swears it should have been delivered by now…

In a quiet wince she squats up a few inches to retrieve her phone, which is tightly pressed into the back pocket of her Primark spandex skinny jeans. Needs must for her waistline these days, which just isn’t as forgiving as it once was.

The screen lights up with a notification from her daughter. A link to an Instagram Reel.

“For goodness sake” she thinks.

“Not more evidence that she’s been wasting her life away on fricking Instagram”

Sadie

Sadie remains anchored in inertia these days.

The Sun. It remains at the centre of the solar system, whilst all the other planets circle it in a quiet repetition.

Sadie isn’t like the Sun. Sadie is the Sun – constantly in a state of rotation; yet watching life happen around her. Never to her. Never for her.

Self-loathing, some may call it. But Sadie is physically shackled to the centre of her own mind, which is only comparable to an internal captivity of suffering.

In fleeting moments of reflectiveness she contemplates what happened.

What happened to the happy little girl who would squeal with joy at school trips, at pressing the zebra crossing button, at the jingle of the ice cream van in the distance, at a can coca cola, at the smell of fresh crayons, at opening her lunchbox to find mum packed a Snickers bar.

Now she can barely bring herself to eat anything – nevermind experience joy from it.

But perhaps contemplating ‘what happened?’ is the wrong question.

Maybe it’s a matter of ‘when happened?’

On her 13th Birthday she was finally allowed it. Those were the rules. “Only when it’s officially legal”, mum insisted.

It felt unfair, all her friends were allowed it at 12. It was like being in the playground, but being forced to stand in the centre while all your friends play around you. The most isolating feeling in the world, at the time.

Now she’d do anything to turn back time. To 12. To the lack of.

to days when it wasn’t the first thing she checked in the morning and the last thing she checked at night to days when she didn’t constantly feel restless and overstimulated and compelled to check check check check check check to the days when her mind was free of posts of classmates holidaying in dubai wearing bikinis pouting duck-facing mewing with breasts photoshopped to be three sizes bigger and waists two sizes smaller to the days unburdened by a fragmented stream of what I eat in a day try this diet for 7 days and lose 7 pounds pictures of freya natalia and sophie (her three primary school best friends who always insisted that four was a crowd) travelling in vietnam kim kardashian’s latest mirror selfie molly mae’s Look Fantastic campaign romanticise my evening with me but its an #ad to buy these sleepy gummies and you’ll fall asleep in seconds–

–to fall asleep.

To fall asleep without a cold, luminous glow leaching into her eye-sockets that pays no responsibility for the state they will be in 13 hours later – glassy and gnawingly achey.

Ultimately dimmed by the light.

The time. 11:56am. Just four more minutes. Tomorrow – the nocturnal sleep schedule and all – will be different.

Tomorrow she’ll make a change.

She lightly presses her scroll-weary thumb into the heat-saturated screen. She flicks, landing on a Reel – it’s an advert by her favourite designer brand.

A mere 20 seconds later, and a mild spark of inspiration ignites from within. Her mind wanders to her grandmother – who modelled for the brand in the 70s.

She sends the Reel – an advert for Arts & Culture Magazine Vol.1 – to her mother.

“the perfect bday gift for grand-mère sylvie, no?!”

As she presses send, a wave of relief – contempt – washes over her. Something she’d not felt in so long that it almost felt unfamiliar. A tender heaviness lulls her eyelids; but just before transcending into slumber, an old memory returns.

A dream.

Seven year old Sadie’s dream.

Sadie’s dream.

Fashion school.

A glimmer of excitement returns. She reaches for her notepad and jots down two words. Two words that appear unremarkable. But two words that will catalyse quite the remarkable future for Sadie.

Sadie Martin.

Aged 35.

Artistic director.

For Chanel.

‘research fashion courses’ she scribbles.

Perhaps tomorrow really will be different.

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The Inspiration behind this story

This story was inspired by an ongoing debate regarding ‘the death of print media’ in the fashion world.

There’s no denying that with the rise of digital – print media just isn’t the same as it once was.

Yet that doesn’t mean it’s disappearing – in fact, quite the opposite.

Print is being reborn.

Reborn in the shape of cultural artefacts. Reborn in the shape of heritage objects. Reborn in the shape of sentimentally heart-felt gifts.

With this story, I intended not only to showcase the rebirth of print, but also the symbiotic relationship between print and digital – whereby they benefit from each others’ very nature.

However, it goes without saying that the recent Meta and Google scandal got me thinking about the dangers of digital media, and I felt it essential to highlight this – bringing to light how when used incorrectly – social media can be life threatening.

But if the ending of my story is anything to go by, it could also be true that when used correctly, the media can indeed be life changing.

Thank you for reading (it means everything!)

Olivia