The Art of Remaining - By Amina Mariyam

Written By: Amina Mariyam

Category: Short story

Competition: Global Poetry and Creative Writing Competition 2026

In the evocative short story "The Art of Remaining," Amina Mariyam invites readers on an introspective journey through the themes of memory and identity. This piece, submitted as part of the Global Poetry and Creative Writing Competition 2026, combines the allure of travel with the enigmatic nature of human connections. Conjuring images of jazz-filled nights and snowy European landscapes, the story immerses us in a world where the past intertwines with the present in unexpected ways.

About the Work

"The Art of Remaining" is a narrative woven with rich imagery and emotional depth. Amina Mariyam explores the fragile nature of human memory and the impact of forgotten pasts on personal identity. The story's mood is both melancholic and hopeful, as it delves into the protagonist's encounters and the poignant realization of lost memories. The use of music as a backdrop adds a lyrical quality, enhancing the reflective and tender atmosphere.

The art of remaining

Original Submission by Amina Mariyam

THE ART OF REMAINING

BY AMINA MARIYAM

I recommend you read this story while listening to the following playlist !

WICKED GAME

CHRIS ISAAK

PAGE 1/2

LA VIE EN ROSE

LOUIS ARMSTRONG

PAGE 2/3

NO ORDINARY LOVE

SADE

PAGE 3/4

EYES WITHOUT A FACE

BILLY IDOL

PAGE 4/5

Jazz was playing. The winter snow is rustling. Arms around waists and hands on shoulders. It was a typical December in Calabria but oh how people romanticise these times. Never in my years of travelling have I seen people drunk on so much joy and thirst for life.

I look to my left for no apparent reason only to play eye tag with a man in a pink tie, on it written in beautiful bright cursive, the tulip man. I give him a wry smile and walk to the door, My silk gown clinging to my skin and hair flowing in the winter cold. It was snowing and yes, I was freezing but the heat of sadness that pinged at me kept me plenty warm.

After I reached my apartment, I met Louanne, my landlord. Louanne was, as people described it, old but with a young heart. She had listened to my travels in awe and admiration. We nodded at each other since it was too late and no one greeted each other at this oddly early hour.

I left my month's rent on a tea table, carved on it out of wood, were probably some renaissance people. I left out the backdoor, in nothing but a fur coat and the silk dress I had on. The winter air rumbled louder, as if it came from my own soul that longed for my mother. My mother who’s probably travelling as well. After I reached the train station, I booked a train to France. Not because someone is waiting for me, holding a mug in hand and a hopeful face, but because I hope someone is . As I enter the train, I see the tulip man from the jazz bar. I give him the same wry smile, I like to let people keep me as a distant memory rather than a fond one.

After I got settled in, I put on my sleeping mask and as I hoped to drift off to memory lane, I heard a coarse voice. “God, how many bears did they have to kill for a coat this furry?”, the tulip man chuckled slightly as if mocking me and the bears that died for my coat. “How many tulips did you pluck?” “Not a lot, but I’ll pluck a whole garden of them for you” how charming, I thought. I gesture to the seat opposite me, and he gladly sits. Through his trench coat, I could see a peak of cyan, on it, written, the tulip man. I give out a chuckle and point at his tie, “How many of those do you own?” he gives me a genuine smile “One for every tulip i plucked” I give him a nod.

“So, what's your reason to be alive?” he asks genuinely. I smile and put down my tea. I tell him about my travels and my mother and the pact. “So what was this pact, stranger?” I chuckle and ask him his name as a way to dodge the question. “I don't tell my name to strangers” he said with pride “Ok, we’ll remain strangers”

I look out the window, Calabria has now become a tiny yellow dot behind us. He looks out the window too, and remarks about Christmas being near. “I’m not really festive," I say, in reply to his question about my Christmas plans. “You should spend it with me in Cape town, Jillian.” I looked at him in awe, who was this stranger to know of the name my mother pondered upon for 9 months. “How do you know my name?” I asked, honestly kind of shocked. The wind replaced the silence that stayed after the question, rustling his hair and destroying mine. “Your suitcase” he replied, pointing at my maroon leather suitcase, on it engraved Jillian Forrest. As I stared at his tie again “t u l i p m a n” i read out quietly. That was the last bit of our conversation before I drifted to sleep with my head against the window, the wind being my mask.

I woke to see an empty seat opposite me. As I poked at my breakfast, I was drowning myself in hatred for being a fond memory for the tulip man.

As we pulled into the train station in Colmar, I was hit with sudden yearning for my mother. She loved colmar. On my walk to the hotel, I let my mind drift into memories of her and how she told me to travel and enjoy the present and sometimes visit the past, but never the future, because the future makes us ponder and wait for our moment. After I reached my room, I called room service to send a pen and paper to room 317.

In the letter I only wrote 7 words, I miss you Veronica, I'm in colmar. I kissed the letter, leaving behind my light pink lipstick that I bought from a lady in Copenhagen at a little white store with checkered floors. I remember because she told me how my eyes had a fiery flame, enough to light up the whole street.

As I stepped out of my hotel room, I found myself bumping into the tulip man. “Fancy seeing you here” I chuckled. He dusted whatever piece of me I left behind on his maroon sweater and said “Small town Jillian”. We went our separate ways after that, me to the post office to give my mother a letter, and him home, to his mother. That basically summed up our lives.

It was lunch time already by the time I got back to the hotel, the walk back was quite comforting. I settled into the little couch, not bothering to take off my coat. I let the happiness, the sadness and everything else a soul can feel, sink in. As I laid there for 25 minutes, I realized the past 28 years had been a quiet settling mist and now the rainstorm will begin. It was then I heard a knock. “Open the door please Jillian” I could recognize that voice anywhere, “Sienne, Sienne my darla” we embraced each other and as I had my face snuggled in her neck, I got a whiff of tulips. Tulip man . “Sienne, i met a friend” Only she knew what that was code for. “Whats the namee?” she asked in that playish manner of hers “Tulip man” I replied honestly “Jazz club?” she asked though knowing my answer already.

We got ready to pearls by sade. She smeared her red lipstick, casted in its gold casing and I let my blonde hair fall. We slipped into our dresses and as I looked at my best friend, I realized yet again how beautiful women can be, her yellow sundress and her beautiful brown locks cut just above her shoulders and that genuine smile she wore every time she saw me. My silk pants and shirt were no competition to her beauty and scent of tulips that always seemed to hover over her now.

We left the hotel room by 8 and then played detective to find the tulip mans’. Turns out he was staying 4 rooms over. We knocked and kneeled so that he wouldn't spot us through the peephole and when he opened the door, he looked calm and composed and so full of enigma that it took me by surprise. He stepped out in linen head to toe, curls falling freely. I smiled as Sienne asked him to join us to go to the jazz club. “Sure, let me grab my wallet” he said with his eyes teared up and a smile forming on his face.

He carefully suggested taking a car there, glancing at Sienne, as if asking for permission. She nodded slowly and asked “Will you be alright with that Jillian?”. As I thought about it, I remembered not having ridden in a car for a very long time, I was surprised by this sudden revelation of understanding . “Yeah sure, it's been a long time since I’ve been in one”. The tulip man hailed down a yellow maserati and we all got in, with me in the middle.

The leather seats started sticking to my bare shoulders, although it was the middle of winter. I looked out the window, a short moment after taking in the views rushing out of my peripheral vision as if the mountains were trying to escape me, I threw up. Sienne was holding my hair as my body slumped over the car. “Jere, Jere do something” I hear in a blur. The voice most definitely belonged to Sienne.

I woke up in strong arms. Sienne had sat down with me on her lap outside the bar. I wake up to the tulip man giving me an apologizing look. I stare back confused. “What, What happened?” I ask in a daze. “You passed out, Jere will get you water in a bit okay? Hang in there” Sienne was so very comforting, I thought. I gave her a wry smile and glanced at the tulip man, who now had a name, Jere. Proper French.

We got into the jazz bar which was packed and had sade playing at the perfect volume. My silk shirt clung to my skin as me and Sienne were dancing at the hip, her sundress moving in the perfect ways and her hair all messy from the car ride. Jere was by the bar, sipping on some fancy drink that looked much too fancy for his linen set and messy curls. “He loves you, you know” she whispered as she winked at me, I gave her one of my charming chuckles in reply. As I thought more about it, I wanted to talk to him, march up to the bar and confront his awaiting confession. Be his present, most definitely his past and hope to be his future. “I’m gonna go talk to him” I tell Sienne as she gives me her smile in return.

“That drink's a bit too fancy for you, Jere” I said as I adjusted myself to sit on the high top bar stool. He was staring out the window behind the bar. The sun was still setting, the sky was painted different shades of orange, blue and black. Mountains stretched, and yellow lights were dotted. The window looked like an exquisite scenic painting.

“You truly most genuinely don't remember me, Jillian?” he said tired.I looked at him for a while, trying to find the joke hidden somewhere in his tired expression. “Should I?” I asked, laughing a little, hoping he would laugh with me. He didn't. He looked down at his drink and ran his thumb along the rim of the glass, the way people do when they have too much to say and nowhere to put it. “We were supposed to grow old together, Jillian.” The music continued behind us, Sade singing about love as if she knew something the rest of us didn't. I looked at him, then at the window, then back at him. “I'm sorry,” I whispered, though I wasn't sure what I was apologising for.

He reached into his coat and pulled out a small photograph, worn at the corners and folded slightly down the middle. It was of a woman in yellow jean shorts and the United Kingdom flag wrapped around her, laughing with her head thrown back, a man beside her, wearing a yellow stripped tie, holding the biggest bouquet of tulips, bigger than both of them combined. I recognised the distinctive shorts before I recognised the woman. It was mine. The woman was me. I took the photograph with trembling fingers, staring at the man beside me, at the familiar curls and the ridiculous tie. On the back, in handwriting that looked strangely like my own, were the words, for my favourite human, my fondest memory and memories. I turned it over twice, as if the picture might change if I looked at it long enough. “Jillian,” he said quietly, “I'm Jere. I'm your husband.”

Husband. The word sat between us like poison. I looked at his hands, at the small silver ring on his finger, then down at my own bare hand. There was a faint pale line where something had once rested. I rubbed it with my thumb. “What happened to me?” I asked. He took a breath, and for the first time I saw how exhausted he was. He told me about the car accident, about the months I spent recovering, and about the memories that never came back. He told me about the guilt he felt about forcing a hurting woman to remember her husband. So he let me travel. He followed from a distance when he could, never wanting to become another obligation I had to carry. The ties, the tulips, the lucky guesses. They were all little pieces of a life I had once called mine.

I wanted to cry, but my eyes stayed stubbornly dry. Instead, I laughed, a small broken sound that made him smile despite himself. “You could have picked a less embarrassing tie,” I told him. He laughed then, properly, and something in my chest loosened. I didn't suddenly remember our wedding or the mornings we must have spent together, and I couldn't promise him that I would wake up tomorrow and know his favourite song. But I knew that I wanted to hear the stories. I wanted to know the man in the photograph, even if I had to meet him all over again.

“The pact, you promised me your mother you’d marry by 30” he looked at me for a split second “We got married by 22, Jillian”. I looked at him, really looked at him, at my husband. “So, this car accident must have been that bad. I don't remember being in one, but I trust you because I remember being in a hospital, lying in a daze, with no memories except for little bits and pieces of my life. At the time, my mother had told me that I had fainted and broken my arm, nothing too serious, nothing that required me to worry about the future. She had ushered me into travelling, telling me to see the world and enjoy my life while I still had the chance. I remember how she smiled when she spoke about all the places I would visit, as though the world were a book waiting for me to turn its pages. She never made me feel like I was missing something, and perhaps that was her way of protecting me. I suppose she knew something I didn't, something she wasn't ready to tell me. And now, sitting across from you, I wonder how much of my life has been hidden from me.”. “I was waiting for my wife in the hospital room adjacent to yours” he replied, smiling wryly.

Sienne came over a little later, a drink in her hand and her eyes shining. She sat beside us without asking questions, placing her hand over mine as though she had been waiting years to do so. Outside, the snow had begun to settle over Colmar, covering the streets in a quiet white blanket. Jere took off his pink tie and placed it on the table between us. “One for every tulip I plucked,” he said softly. I picked it up and tied it around my wrist, badly, because I had never been particularly good at knots. “Then I suppose you'll have to pluck another garden,” I replied.

That night, I wrote another letter to my mother. I told her about the snow, Sienne, the jazz, and a man who claimed to be my husband. I didn't tell her I remembered him, because I didn't. I told her I was willing to try. Then I folded the paper and left it beside the photograph, room 317 glowing quietly in the lamplight. Perhaps my mother had been right about the future. Perhaps it was never meant to be waited for. Perhaps it was meant to arrive, unannounced, wearing a ridiculous pink tie.

I still don't remember falling in love with Jere. But when he held out his hand, I took it. And for the first time in twenty-eight years, I didn't feel the need to leave.

About the Competition

The Global Poetry and Creative Writing Competition 2026 by Hashtag Kalakar is an esteemed platform celebrating literary talent from around the world. It provides writers with an opportunity to showcase their unique voices and creative visions. Participants engage with a global audience, sharing stories, poems, and essays that resonate with readers and inspire thoughtful dialogue.

Thank you, Amina Mariyam, for your captivating submission, "The Art of Remaining," to the Global Poetry and Creative Writing Competition 2026. Your exploration of memory, identity, and the beauty of human connections offers readers a profound experience. We appreciate your contribution and look forward to witnessing more of your literary artistry.

About Hashtag Kalakar

Hashtag Kalakar is a creative platform dedicated to providing artists, writers, singers and other creative talents with opportunities to showcase their work and reach wider audiences through competitions, features and creative initiatives.