Part 2: The Desecration of Chapel Bank
‘Chicken.’
‘Not – it’s just stupid.’
‘Chicken!’
Jenny held onto the hem of her skirt with both hands and twirled, dancing around the dusty farmyard chanting and goading Johnny, who sat in the shade on an old straw bale that was holding the large swinging barn door open.
He was flummoxed. Jenny had this way of making him feel bad about not doing something, even when he knew it was her just being her usual mischievous self.
‘Well, I’m not doing it and that’s that.’
She stopped herself in mid spin and said:
‘You can have a peek.’
She lifted her skirt so he caught a fleeting glimpse before pulling her hands back down quickly, shutting off the view.
She knew he liked it; she had learned to get her own way with him like that ever since she caught him staring goggled-eyed one day as she sat showing all, albeit accidently, at the village fete. She had felt embarrassed then, but smiled at him before getting up and hence out of her predicament, and saw him grinning back. She had been twelve then and now, two years later, she was still smiling and he was still grinning right on back.
‘I’m still not doing it – you can’t get me like that this time.’
Jenny smiled widely showing her metal brace and half whispered as she turned and skipped towards the dark interior of the barn:
‘I’ll show you more.’
‘It won’t work you know – no way am I doing it.’
But before the words had finished leaving his mouth, he was following her into the cool shade.
A silent moment in a new landscape, she grabbed the moment, twirling like before, but this time had her skirt held high in her hands as she loudly hummed a tune. He just grinned and stared, and lapped up this show for his eyes only.
He very nearly cracked but just managed to hold on, saying confidently:
‘I’m not doing it.’
She stopped and faced him, hands and skirt still held high, coyly smiling and saying softly:
‘Do it and I’ll dance like this with nothing underneath.’
He cracked, exclaiming excitedly:
‘You’re on! – now promise me.’
‘Oh, it’ll be so much fun Johnny – we’ll show them – won’t we?’
‘Yes, and you’ll show me right?’
‘Oh yes Johnny – everything.’
She dropped her hands and twirled some more, humming the same tune which Johnny knew to be her favourite song.
She grabbed his hand and pulled him out into the bright sunlight of the summer’s day. She was gay, happy that they were about to get revenge, some kind of sweet payback against those beastly Slaters down the road by the pumping station. She never thought much about her promise to Johnny, who could now think of nothing else at all.
‘It’s nearly lunch time, we’ll have to be quick.’
She grabbed his hand again, leading him urgently through the open farm gate and down the narrow lane, to where some highwaymen were painting yellow lines on the road right next to the footpath, which led up the mound of Chapel Bank. The men were about to break for lunch. Jenny pulled Johnny into a gap in the hedgerow where they wouldn’t be seen and where they could safely wait until the road was clear. Squatting down, they peered through the twigs and dark shaded foliage at the men packing up and preparing to go. He could feel her breath warm and close and, as she looked him in the eyes, smiling and squeezing his hand, he sensed her daring and excitement at what was about to happen next.
As soon as the car door slammed shut, she was up and through the hedge. Johnny had remained behind, watching her enthusiastically dash and swipe a small pot of yellow highway paint and brush, before running back to his side so fast that the car had barely driven up the road. She was giggling with delight, and without a word, they turned and looked up at the mound with its few scant trees on top and magnificent fields of rape sweeping down to where they stood.
With no time to spare, they hurried up through the warm bright yellow fields, avoiding the footpath so as not to be noticed. After about fifteen minutes, they arrived at the top, sweaty and panting for breath. It was deserted and silent around the old dilapidated tombs and gravestones, which had quietly sat for hundreds of years on this tiny island gently protruding from the endless flat fields and still water of the marsh.
It was too hot for anyone to be out and they both set about the task with speed. Johnny went and kept lookout, scanning the landscape across the rape, down to his father’s farm and village church right next to where the men had broken for lunch. Jenny’s house stood opposite the farm, behind some old, fine looking cedar trees near a large stone house, which sat back from the road near the pumping station. This was where the Slaters lived with their oodles of unused land, pots of money and antique car collection.
Jenny had made a bee line to a large stone, standing more than four feet tall with the name SLATER just showing amongst the crinkly lichen with the date of seventeen hundred and something barely visible below. With spiteful glee, she started painting the stone yellow, trying not to miss a spot; when she was half done, she whispered to Johnny on the lookout.
‘Psst…your turn.’
They changed roles, with Johnny furiously splashing on the paint to finish this daft idea of Jenny’s and to secure his twirling dancing show.
By the time he had finished, his hands were covered in paint. Jenny was standing by his side, marvelling at their magnificent piece of sweet revenge. She made a squealing noise and momentarily tensed her body with excitement and satisfaction. Johnny marvelled too – they had done it and there was no going back now, and he stared at the brilliant luminescence shining like a beacon to the stars amongst the drab stones and dull foliage on the mound.
‘We’ve really done it now.’
‘Oh yes Johnny – I can’t wait. Can’t wait for them to see it – that’ll teach them, won’t it?’
Johnny felt nervous now and just said:
‘We’d better go.’
The pair hurriedly left the top of the mound. By the time they were being bathed in sunshine and losing themselves in the rape, they burst out laughing, splitting their sides and rolling about on the dry hard mud ground. It was a few minutes before they were able to carry on down the hill, both still giggling and talking incessantly about how old Ma Slater would shriek as if she’d seen a ghost the next time she went up the mound.
At the bottom of the hill, where the rape petered out and the field joined the road by the hedge, they both stopped dead in their tracks.
They had forgotten the paint.
‘You used it last.’
‘It was your idea, not mine.’
They bickered for a few moments, blaming each other for leaving the pot and brush behind when the men returned, quickly silencing them both. Jenny looked helplessly at Johnny who took her hand and led them alongside the hedgerow, past the gap in the hedge, and along to where the footpath stile crossed the road near the farm. He speedily led them through the open gate and towards the barn where she pulled her hand free and stopped before going inside.
‘I’m not doing it, I’ve changed my mind.’
‘You promised me.’
‘That was before you left the paint behind.’
‘I didn’t – we both left it behind.’
‘Now there’ll be trouble.’
‘No more than if we had returned the paint.’
‘They’ll know it wasn’t the highwaymen but someone close by.’
‘They won’t know anything – come on Jenny.’
‘No Johnny, it’s not right – I’m not doing it.’
‘That’s not fair.’
‘You didn’t really think I’d do THAT did you?’
‘And you really didn’t think I’d do THAT for nothing do you?’
He pointed up to the mound.
‘Those Slaters have spoiled it for everyone?
?– for you too Johnny.’
He knew she was right, those Slaters had ruined everything for the whole village and he was glad they had done it, but he still wanted his promise.
But before he could say another thing, she had turned and left the farmyard, stomping up the lane, passing the men who were looking around for a missing pot of paint, towards the cedar trees of home.
Johnny felt angry, seething that he had been tricked and was probably now going to get into big trouble, maybe be grounded for the whole summer. He’d noticed that the paint on his hands was very visible and went to the yard tap to rinse and scrub them with the old brush, which they used for cleaning boots. Nothing budged and he knew he was really in trouble now.
He would tell them everything, that it was her idea and she had promised him…but he couldn’t say that, and, no matter how angry he felt he couldn’t stop thinking about her.
Damn her.
Jenny arrived back home and sat in a garden chair next to her mother, who was chopping apples on the outside table for the pies she was making for the village fete, except the fete was not going to be happening this year. Those beastly Slaters had refused the use of their nice ample unused land. They had fallen out with Johnny’s father over the noise of the animals and the smell of the silage, dung and whatever else they could complain about, because Johnny’s father had complained about the roar of their antique cars around the lanes being dangerous and scaring all his livestock.
Damn those Slaters.
Jenny’s mum lived in hope that all these small-minded people would learn to get on and she could sell her pies and cakes to raise money for the church.
As Jenny sat there chatting away about mundane things and helping her mother with the preparation, she regretted falling out with Johnny, and tried not to think about her promise which she now felt so confused about.
The trouble came sooner than later. In fact, it was that very same day that an almighty shriek reverberated across the dusky sky, breaking the early evening peace around the village and sending the rooks cawing and flying up from their tree top roosts.
Jenny and Johnny silently understood what had happened, as half the village tore up the mound to find some furious Slaters ranting and raving about devil worship and insult and that there would be hell to pay for this. Both Jenny and Johnny had decided to stay indoors and away from the furore, feigning indifference as people their age could. They later learned that some villagers had laughed at the yellow day-glo, while others were perplexed, the vicar was upset and overall it was an eventful evening, which kept the village gossip fuelled for many months.
However, Johnny’s mother had already seen his yellow paint stained hands and was now in the farmyard, talking to his father who had returned from the fields for the day. She held her hands against her hips, meaning she meant business, but Johnny soon saw his father smile, nod and look up at the mound, shaking his head in total disbelief.
It was only after his father had looked at the Slater stone himself that he came and found Johnny sitting sheepishly in front of the television pretending to be watching some programme.
His father asked if he wanted to drive down to the harbour and watch the boats from the grassy banks opposite the moorings coming in with the rising tide. He’d imagined a long lecture before being grounded for the entire summer and having to apologise and grovel to the Slaters in some public humiliating ceremony. This offer of one of his favourite trips was mind-boggling. He wondered if it was some sort of trap to get him to confess everything, even Jenny’s promise.
His mother joined them on the trip. As soon as they had driven out of the village, his dad said that getting paint on his hands had been a really dumb thing and did that Jenny girl have anything to do with it as she was a bad influence on him. He had better give her a break for a while, let this all settle down a bit, at least until the paint had washed off and he could go out in public again. He then laughed, much to Johnny’s shock, who looked towards his mother sitting beside his father, and she too was smiling. Then all three of them were howling with laughter, with Johnny’s dad exclaiming that he wished he’d thought of it himself.
They ate fish and chips sitting on the grassy bank as the boats returned quietly from the sea with the lapping tide. Watching the fishermen unload their catches on the small commercial dock, Johnny felt a power, some kind of self-sufficiency with what he had done. He knew he would have to keep it secret, knew it was Jenny’s idea, that she had tricked him into it with the irresistible lure of that promise, but he had nevertheless done it, and there was no doubt or going back on that.
He stayed inside the house and around the farmyard for a few days, hiding his hands until the paint had all disappeared, waiting for the heat from the incensed Slaters to cool off a bit. The highwaymen had been grilled about the incident as the paint pot had obviously been found on top of the mound. They had threatened to go on strike and boycott further work around the village, so questions were asked of others and soon the trail went icy cold. The Slaters, who still suspected half the village, were left clueless and without a hunch. Even the police were of no help, saying it was a local issue that was best resolved amongst themselves.
Jenny had not seen Johnny for about a week, not even in passing, and she put him and the entire incident to the back of her mind. There was not going to be a village fete that year and she and her whole family, along with the entire village except for the Slaters, were utterly disappointed. Even the yellow painted stone was of little consolation for her – the fete, which she had been to every summer of her life, was not happening that year. The villagers held a meeting in the hall and it was agreed that one of Johnny’s father’s fields at the far end of the village, where the water meadows started, would be dry enough in high summer to hold the fete next year. There was a big cheer and many of the men went off to the pub to celebrate. She’d seen Johnny across the crowded room but they never spoke; in fact, it was a whole year before they were to speak again.
It was at the fete the following year that they met again. Down the lane, at the end of the village where the lush water meadows began, there was a commotion. A helicopter buzzed overhead as a score of police searched the lanes and rape, their dogs furiously barking somewhere out of sight. Jenny learned that two gem smuggling fishermen, who had stashed their swag at the top of Chapel Bank, were on the run. During this distraction, which took most villagers towards the hedge by the lane at the bottom of the mound where they could easily watch the spectacle, Johnny found himself standing next to her.
‘Do you think they’ve seen Slater yellow yet?’
‘Stop it Johnny.’
‘Fun though, wasn’t it?’
She looked at him carefully; it was the same old Johnny, handsome and full of life and turning into a man.
She smiled and said:
‘Fantastic fun.’
She was older too, and had grown like a young woman does.
He continued:
‘My parents saw my yellow hands.’
‘What happened?’
‘Nothing – my dad thought it was a great laugh.’
‘Oh, he would.’
‘What’s that supposed to mean?’
‘Fickle like you.’
‘Me fickle? Look at you!’
‘Stop it Johnny.’
‘You owe me a promise’
‘Don’t.’
‘We had such fun – you never minded then.’
‘It went too far that day.’
‘Not far enough!’
They both laughed, and Johnny blurted out:
‘If you were my girlfriend would you twirl like before?’
Jenny went ashen.
‘What are you talking about?’
He felt sure now.
‘If we were friends like before, but you were my girlfriend…’
‘I don’t understand.’
But she did understand alright and felt things move inside her. She was suddenly wanting him to
say more, but as she couldn’t twirl just then as she used to, to make him do as she asked, she was stuck.
He couldn’t say it again, so she said it:
‘Twirl and things?’
‘Yes.’
He paused and then finished.
‘Yes, if you were my girlfriend, I mean….do you want to be my girlfriend?’
As the police brought down a handcuffed gem thief to the lane, Johnny and Jenny were kissing somewhere in the hedgerow.
The Seven Million Year Itch
‘Conservation starts with extinction.’
‘That’s a bit late!’
‘Well, maybe conservation starts when extinction looms close.’
‘That’s still a bit too late.’
‘There’s just no money to be made in conservation.’
‘No, it’s all in the destruction.’
‘You’re not wrong there!’
‘Cut the trees down for wood, make way for development and agro industries – unused wilderness is such a useless waste!’
‘And kill off all the wildlife too – kill it if it tastes good, has big teeth, eats your crops or livestock, or is just too darn big.’
‘And hunt what’s left for sport.’
‘It’s got to be small, cute and vegetarian to be safe.’
‘What about rabbits? You told me you like the taste of rabbit.’
‘I did, until you told me they taste of piss!’
‘Guess you must have liked the taste of piss then.’
‘Guess I did. What about all the fish?’
‘Hoover those up – the rarer they get the more money they’re worth.’
‘Blow up the mountains for rocks and minerals. Pump the toxic waste into rivers and out to sea.’
‘Then eat the polluted fish.’
‘And dam up the rivers to destroy an eco system.’
‘Electricity – money to be made there!’
‘What’s left untouched?’
‘Certainly not the air we breathe.’
‘When I was in Phuket I visited the last big unfelled tree, and in Hokkaido I found some of the last magnificent giant trees on an impossible ridge where the chainsaw couldn’t reach.’
‘Do you think we’ll have tree museums one day to remind us what used to be?’
‘Only if they charge an entry fee. What about any indigenous people still lurking in the forests, keeping that entire wilderness to themselves?’
‘Not right – should be rounded up and put into zoos – that way people would pay money to see them.’
‘Good idea – incorporate them into the economy.’
‘What the hell is wrong with us?
‘We’re possessed by a hungry ghost that’s never satisfied.’
‘You think the Earth has feelings?’
‘Maybe. We’re like billions of parasites eating away at its surface.’
‘A skin disease.’
‘Exactly that.’
‘I guess one day the Earth will shed its skin and all that goes with it.’
‘And start again without us?’
‘Well it sure won’t wanna feel that itch again!’
The tree stood alone in the parched landscape without company or any other greenery.
Looking out at this scene from the pleasant shade of the veranda into the vast sea of a rust coloured desert, the woman listened to the two men’s conversation – out of sight by the pool nearby, until a splash put a halt to their witty discourse.
She liked these two men, holidaying or taking time out, didn’t know their names yet, but knew she would sleep with one of them – which one she didn’t care, hopefully the best. But that was a nighttime thrill and she left her longing to step down off the veranda into the garden, whose life depended on a constant supply of water delivered by a very slow moving gardener.
Another splash and brief laughter reassured her as she left this artificial paradise and crossed over into rust.
The sky was cloudless and brilliant blue, the air hot and heavy and her slow steps, rhythmic. The sounds now were her breathing and the soft shuffling of sand underfoot, seemingly exaggerated in the silence. She felt self-conscious as the tree came closer and closer.
The heat scorched her bare legs and she was wet from the blazing heat. She welcomed the shade of its thick chewy leaf canopy and the subtle breeze that appeared from nowhere.
Sun bleached animal bones were strewn around and one gave a loud crack as she stepped right on it, making her jump in fright and bump into the hard gnarly bark. The coarse texture grazed her arm and she immediately broke out of the daze the short hot walk had given.
The hotel staff had told her that once a lush forest grew here with many wild animals, some dangerous and some good to eat, but that was a long time ago, before the gun and chainsaw turned it into this beautiful desert.
Now only this strange tree grew, alone and full of life, as if all the missing nature had fled into this one magnificent majestic thing. It was protected of course and the hotel built just to marvel at its beauty.
Something always survives and this was it, a reminder of what was and could be again. But that was just too big a thing to ponder and she turned towards the hotel in the distance, feeling that longing once again.
The Good Liars
‘The trouble with good liars is – they’re just that – good liars!’
Now that made Kay ponder somewhat and there was a short silence between them.
It had been one of those mundane chats about some romantic deceit in a trashy novel they had both read, and before the silence became too long, she left the flat and her flat mate, to amble across the hot, still and empty square to a table outside a cafe, under the shade of an old and faded awning.
Even on a still day like this, the square’s impressive palm fronds somehow managed to catch a subtle breeze and sway a little, as if to say: we are the only midday life here. And they were right; every living thing had retreated into deep cool recesses and were nowhere to be seen, except for Kay and a reluctant waiter who had shown himself only for her brief and usual order.
Her habit had been the same every day for nearly a month now; a couple of hours of quiet solitude in a still and empty square, where she could write productively in peace.
Well, that had been the plan at least, but, as she looked out across the bright square to where her flat sat a couple of storeys above the stone facade of an old bank, lost in deep shadow, she knew it wasn’t working at all; in fact, it was pretty much a disaster. Sure, she had a story, a good story. It was all there, no problem with that – it would probably sell, well-done old girl and all that nonsense that had once flattered, but now seemed such boring rubbish.
Fuck it – novel number three by numbers by a predictable boring formula; yes, what boredom it had become. Where was the excitement she first felt putting pen to paper. How old fashioned is that – pen to paper and not finger to touch screen.
She slammed her pencil hard down on the table, the brief thud momentarily cutting through the stillness of the day before it fell onto the stone slabs below, rolling to a stop a few feet away.
With her writing tool lying slightly out of reach, and now feeling quite lazy from the midday heat, Kay stretched out both legs to try to roll it back towards the table with her feet. She tried several times before succeeding and then bent down to snatch the pencil up.
Impatient, she quickly sat back up catching her head on the edge of the heavy wooden table. She cursed, and slammed the pencil back down hard again. It remained motionless as she breathed in hard, feeling the angry pounding of her heart.
This wasn’t like her, getting angry and having a total hissy fit. What had she been thinking? Being a writer was like having an illness, some affliction whose demon drove her on and on. She was fuming and alone in a baking hot square, in a country whose language she could barely understand, let alone speak.
This was now hurting and any more pencil to paper would be certa
in torment.
It had to stop no matter what – she had lost and that was simply that.
She hurried back to the flat and slammed the door shut behind her. The cool shadows of the hallway were a welcome relief after the burning heat of her frustrations on the other side of the deserted square.
‘That was quick!’
Kay let rip, told her story in a flood of tears and fury before collapsing on the sofa.
Her flat mate was silent, looking at the manuscript that had been banged down onto the table and then at Kay who was now sobbing uncontrollably, her head hidden by her hands.
He hadn’t known about her woes; they just shared a long summer let together – he merely hanging out and being lazy, while she seemed focused and intent.
He tried not to laugh, but a snort came out, and a glance between her sobs caught his obvious smile.
‘You bastard!’
She was up and out, again slamming the door shut behind her, leaving him with the empty echoes of her fury.
He felt a little bad, but not too much, after all, he hardly knew this woman except by reputation, and what a high reputation it was – she was a name you sometimes read in the paper.
He looked down and lightly touched the manuscript.
Kay had called a friend for some consolation, and now sat on a bench under the shade of a large poplar tree, overlooking the town’s lazy river shimmering in the afternoon sun at the edge of town, feeling a little better. Her friend had suggested coming straight home, but perhaps she would do some sightseeing first, relax a little before she had to face her friends, agent and publisher and disappoint the lot, let alone herself.
Not blaming her flat mate for his insensitive laughter, she knew she would somehow have to make up for her rude remark; after all, he had always given her space and had never asked a personal question.
It took some time for Kay to wind down and just be able to sit and be in this tranquil spot she had accidently found whilst pounding the streets to find some reprieve. Only when her angst had gone, did she dare risk going back to town to face the flat.
It was late afternoon, and she hugged the long cool shadows opposite the sunny side of the narrow cobbled streets until she reached the busy square, now bustling with shoppers.
Kay closed the front door gently. Only the soft click of the latch told of her return, but her flat mate hadn’t noticed as he was on his knees and totally engrossed in the manuscript, which was now spread right across the living room floor.
Stopping dead in her tracks, she viewed him scribbling notes and re-arranging a page or two.
‘What the hell do you think you’re doing? That’s my private stuff!’
Taken slightly aback, he looked up.
‘I didn’t see you there.’
Kay immediately started to pick up the papers, trying to put them back in order while staring right at him, hissing:
‘Well?’
‘I can do it for you – it’s a great story, just missing some, um…’
‘Excitement you mean.’
She quickened her efforts to put it all back into the proper order once again.
‘Yes, but not just that, all of it needs working on – it needs to go to hell…’
She stopped dead and looked right at him, wanting to hear more.
‘…and stay there.’
She just stared in horror at his smiling face. What was he saying? She couldn’t do that – it was so outside her experience, and besides, it would be far too horrible and sordid for a girl like her. But he was right, and she knew it too – that’s exactly what it needed.
As shock and some kind of realisation gripped her, she quickly sat down on the sofa as the blood began to drain from her head.
She awoke to the rude awakening of a glass of water being thrown over her head and face. She gasped, dizzily stood up and walked shakily to her bedroom where she shut the door and turned the lock before getting into bed, soaking wet and fully clothed.
It was evening when she woke, feeling parched, hungry and rather weak. She showered, changed and was back in the living room where the same shocking sight greeted her once again. However, this time, the manuscript was spread everywhere, even on the chairs and sofa, as her flat mate worked on his secret plan.
Kay feigned indifference, merely asking:
‘Shall we eat?’
They walked in silence across the evening glow of the square and along dark narrow streets to where the river met the sea. They sat together outside an old wooden ramshackle restaurant, which had once seen better days. It was a good spot to eat, as the sea breeze eased the humidity of the long hot August night.
The tide was out and the river mostly mud, with only a narrow channel in the middle flowing out to sea. The silhouettes of a few small boats lay along its grassy banks.
As there was no beach here, just rocks and a wild sea that never slept, even on the stillest of days it was free from tourists and the incessant hum of cars. With the sound of pounding waves echoing her own heart, Kay tried to ponder her next move.
They had eaten here together once before, although she didn’t really like to keep his company that much; he was on a long break, getting drunk and sometimes staying out all night, not that that was a concern for her, as she had had to focus and work towards her goal. But that was gone and out to sea, and now she needed him or at the very least to hear him out.
She viewed the stars brilliantly shining over-head and looked out towards the dark horizon, where lights of passing ships clearly showed against the night, and asked:
‘Why?’
‘Because I can,’ was the dry reply.
She agreed that he could do a review, not an edit, some sort of revision of the text, and then perhaps she would see what she could do with what was left.
But she never did a thing, just did as she had planned – went sightseeing and started to relax. She even spent nights away in different towns with real beaches, where she could sunbathe and take a dip.
To hell with the book – she didn’t want to know right now.
And he did the lot. What fun he had. They barely spoke, and he even insisted she hand over her laptop to get it done.
As August disappeared and the deadline loomed close, she came and found him in a bar drinking alone, looking pale and washed out from all the late nights working on the text. He saw her slim, nut brown, with little care for a thing called book.
Yes, he was done and it was ready to read.
It took her three days to get through it, absorb it, until she understood what he had really done.
It was early morning and, as she lay in bed turning over the finished book in her head, she shot up and walked naked into his bedroom, demanding that he change the lot.
He woke and looked at her naked body, brown all over except for where her bikini had stopped the sun.
Suddenly realising what she was doing and what he now saw, she gasped and grabbed his bed sheet, pulling it hard to wrap around her modesty. When she saw him naked, morning stiff and waking up, she ran back to her own room dropping the sheet midway in her flight.
There was no time left – just show them back home what he had done, or walk away for good.
Stuck between the devil and the deep blue sea she let out a scream, and kicked her feet and legs wildly on the bed. On hearing her, he laughed aloud, threw on some clothes and headed for the kitchen. He needed coffee to soothe his drinking head.
The smell of coffee soon lured her out and they met in the living room. She had pulled on a dress and nothing more.
‘It’s disgusting – I would never write such filth!’
‘You didn’t! Anyway I think it’s rather good myself.’
‘What will they think of me?’
He just shrugged.
‘Who cares – it’s all made up anyway.’
He clearly saw her dilemma as she screamed:
‘You’re abhorrent!’
She was about to storm out of t
he flat, was at the front door, as he loudly shouted back:
‘It’s exactly what the public wants.’
She knew that he was right; he had given it that and much more – too much in fact, and no matter how she deplored what he had written, it was affecting her right there and then; aroused and wet and aching for sex she turned back and stopped in front of him. He had sensed it before she blurted out:
‘Fuck me like you wrote.’
He pushed her back into the bedroom and she flopped onto the bed and pulled her legs right up showing him her wet and aching everything, but he didn’t want it like that, and rolled her over, plunging deep inside her. She moaned, didn’t want to, hated him, but wanted that kind of sex right now. He whispered that he liked her shaved; it reminded him of a little girl. Stuck somewhere between the devil and another devil, between loving the moment and an absolute disgust for him and herself, she tried to pull away from him, but he had her by the hair and was now painfully twisting one of her arms as she felt him push up against her other hole. She shouted no and tightened against penetration but she was too physically weak to stop his twisted urge. His excitement was too much and he shot his load over her tightly squeezed sex. He groaned and flopped allowing her to escape his weakening grip.
Looking at the monster lying on the bed that was half smiling at her, she let rip:
‘You lied to me – it wasn’t some fantasy – it was you on all fours with your head down some filthy public lavatory at midnight being banged by another completely twisted stranger – wasn’t it?’
He said nothing.
‘Wasn’t it?’
‘So what?’
‘Get out and don’t come back, or I’ll tell the police what you just tried to do.’
She grabbed her bag and ran out of the flat without her shoes, knowing exactly what she had to do.
At the clinic across the square, she was a sticky mess, but the doctor was sympathetic, reassured her it would all be fine, offered to call the police, but she didn’t want that. All she wanted was the morning after pill and a post exposure prophylactic to be rid of any monster disease. Six weeks of feeling rough was a small price to pay, but a big hit on her credit card. The doctor said it was lucky that she came straight away. Lucky! She wasn’t lucky, only stupid. What had come over her? Something so dirty all locked up inside her just waiting to burst forth.
He escorted her back to the flat and entered while she stood in the square below. The monster had gone, had even left his keys, and she went inside and locked the door.
She had the finished book and would use it – tell them it was all hers and pretend she was that sort. If it made a hit, she would have the cash to walk away, be free to do exactly as she pleased. No way could she ‘write’ another one.
But what of him? He had written all that damned stuff that people want to read – not her. To hell with him.
Kay packed up what she needed, stuffed the altered manuscript into a plastic bag, having checked she had the lot on her laptop, and left the flat for good. Dropping off the keys at the letting agent, she forwent her deposit and headed to the river mouth.
At the river mouth there was always a smouldering fire; a kind of rubbish tip the fishermen used to burn anything they didn’t need. The smells of burning nylon rope and nets was taken by the off shore wind, and soon the smell of burning paper joined this lot. Page by page she fed the flames until nothing remained except black ash.
It was done and she could lie and lie…that’s what the world wanted from her, a story so vile that they would be up in arms, tell her she was a monster, shouldn’t be allowed – but they wouldn’t and couldn’t put it down.
Star Man
A beautiful, cold crisp and clear starry night.
A man is fishing (FM) from the shingle beach, the high tide rollers gently crashing and sucking back like a living thing.
In the starlight, a stranger (ST) approaches, feet crunching on the mottled blanket of stones.
ST: Nice evening for it.
FM: A perfect one.
(glances of camaraderie)
ST: Caught anything yet?
FM: Not yet – but they’ll come, always do.
ST: Surf looks good, what ya after?
FM: Stars, always stars of course.
ST: Yeah, on a night like this they’re magnificent. (looks up at the night sky)
FM: Bright and full of mystery – do you ever wonder what they really are?
ST: Err… what kind of fish you after?
FM: No fish here at night, only stars, millions of ’em.
ST: No fish uh? Just passing the… err…time of night, like me then? (smiles)
FM: And what a good place for that! (turns and looks at the stranger) No rod?’
ST: No fish, no rod!
FM: Stars, I catch stars.
ST: Up there? (points up) Maybe in our dreams, but you’re fishing the sea.
FM: I catch stars in this black and endless sea – wishing stars I call them.
ST: So no fish (slightly irate), just stars in there (points to the dark sea) – is that what you’re saying?
FM: Stars at night, fish in day, but fish ain’t no use to me.
ST: Why not?
FM: I’m a star man.
ST: A star man eh…? (shuffles nervously)
FM: It’s my job, see – to catch a star now and then – catch a wish, catch a dream.
ST: Whatever.
FM: Forever.
ST: Nice talking to you star man…(starts to leave).
FM: I’ve got one, strong, out there in the breaking surf.
(he points, and they both look out – the rod bends and the line goes tight and starts to sing)
FM: See it jump? Wow, it’s a good one alright!
ST: That’s no star, that’s a big, mean looking jumping fish.
(large fish leaps out of the surf – fighting the fish, the fisherman moves into the sea a little and the stranger follows)
ST: Anyway, if the stars are all up there, how can they be in here? (Points up and then down to the sea)
FM: They only come out at night, rise up – look at the horizon – you know a shooting star ain’t no different from this jumping fish, just that stars can’t swim, just like fish can’t twinkle in the night sky, they have to change you know, and anyway not all fish become stars at night, too damned many of them – it would be permanent daytime! (laughs)
ST: Whatever, it sure is a nice fish though. Here it comes! Wow, look at it sparkle!
FM: Star, it’s a star – not a fish.
ST: Star fish you mean.
FM: You trying to be funny? Guess it is funny (laughs) – make a wish, quick, quick, you’ve got your chance now.
ST: Wish – what wish?
FM: How should I know, but be careful, don’t wish for too much, last guy wished for peace and crashed on the way home – he got his peace alright.
ST: You’re a nut.
FM: Wish! Wish!
ST: I wish! I wish! I wish!
FM: Hey! That’s three!
ST: So what? You’re totally freaking me out!
FM: Here it is!
(the fish swims around the shallows right by the two men’s feet leaving a swirl of white surf and green sparkling fluorescence in its wake)
ST: I wish I could have some of whatever it is you’ve had – because I just don’t get you and all your crazy talk!
FM: Aaah a good wish.
ST: The fish is off, gone – why didn’t you land it?
FM: Land it? What use would that be – you’ve heard of meteorites right? Best leave it as a fish star
ST: You mean star fish.
FM: No I don’t.
ST: Who do you think you are – God?
FM: The star man of course.
ST: And I suppose you become a fish at daybreak?
FM: Don’t be daft, I just disappear and turn up some place else with my fishing rod and line – catch a wish, sometimes tw
o – you were really lucky tonight, that was one hell of a fish to wish on – you’ll see – it’s done now. Won’t get two like that in a night.
(reels the line out of the water)
ST: Fish must have swallowed the hook. (examining the dangling line)
FM: There weren’t no hook or bait, but I do use a weight to cast into the surf.
ST: So how did you hook it? (looking perplexed)
FM: I’m a star man. Well, I guess I’ll be seeing around you then, show you a few tricks sometime.
ST: Sure, whatever.
(the two men part and we follow the stranger across the shingle to his car. He looks troubled as he glances back at the empty beach, fading stars and the coming dawn)
(the following night we see the stranger on a different beach with a rod and line ready for casting, looking up and then out to sea, not exactly sure of what to do – he is soon joined by the star man)
ST: Did I really wish upon a star?
Down Hill Racer
It looks good on You Tube, and great to watch for real.
But you try doing it for real, without fantasy to cosset and protect your vulnerabilities. It will bash you, throw you, crack you, and if you are lucky enough to still be in one piece at the end of it all, you can go back up and do it all again.
So, what is this thing, I hear you say?
Nothing less than downhill mountain biking. Not the gentle Sunday afternoon in the woods type but the hard-core steep downhill one, with jumps and obstacles like rocks and tree roots on tight twisty-turny tracks, at a speed where one miscalculation ends in broken bones and titanium plates.
So why would you do it? And why would I do it?
Firstly – I like to turn fantasy into reality. Otherwise, it just remains fantasy. For me, something is either real or unreal, useful or useless. So there’s no point in fantasy, unless it becomes real. That’s just how I see it.
I liked downhill biking – it’s a lot of fun, but I had yet to experience the hard-core version. I was definitely up for it.
Secondly – now, this will take some time to explain, so bear with me as I take a little detour before we climb up the hill and reach the top; whereafter, it is all too easy to go downhill, let go of the brakes and begin the helter-skelter descent to the bottom once again…
It was the end of a wet and cloudy summer in southern Holland. I had been seeing clients, the life coaching and energy work kind of thing. That’s what I do. All had been going well, nothing special to report. However, a guy, whom I will just call Black Gloom, came to the house interested in coaching. He was tall and good looking – had the features, eyes and hair of James Dean. He looked great – like a classic film star. He suggested that we go and walk in a beautiful heathland spot full of lakes and wildlife. Great, I thought, the perfect spot to walk and talk.
How wrong I was.
It was a fair drive out of the city, along the busy highways.
I had no idea where I was. I had not paid much attention, only to Black Gloom’s increasing tales of woe. This did not bode well, but I tried to keep a positive outlook.
After a lot of small, single track, pot-holed roads we parked the car and started walking – he talking and me just listening. We stopped by a lake whose waters were a sinister murky brown from the local peat soil. I sat on a bench and gazed across the tranquil water to some rushes on the other side. Above us, dark and gloomy clouds suggested rain.
Then it began – a non-stop rant and barrage of life’s unfairness and misfortunes. This happens from time to time, a verbal vomit, an explosion of pent up feelings, but never like this. It went on and on, an articulated sermon of doom and gloom. I couldn’t get a word in edgeways, tried to be polite, tried to bring things to a halt and back to ground, but no, it was useless and the tirade continued, only breaking as he struck a match to smoke his endless cigarettes.
Now, this is not what I do! I’m not a therapist, a sounding board for childhood catastrophes. Perhaps therapists deal with the echoes of ghosts, but not me. I deal with what is staring you in the face right here and now.
And staring me in the face was Black Gloom.
This was tricky, he appeared semi-psychotic and I was trapped. He could easily leave me stranded if I pissed him off, and walking back to the city did not appeal. I had to play it cool.
Damn this, I was in a tight spot and kind of helpless, as if I had been tricked and hijacked to be at his mercy.
He took me up on the idea of moving when I got up from the bench and started to walk. Around the lake, he had said – eight kilometers later, we reached the car, wet through from drizzle. However, as I was now in the car, it seemed progress towards getting me back.
Black Gloom then suggested a ‘session’ at his home around the corner. What exactly had I just endured if not a ‘session’? Anyway, I agreed – keep is smooth, keep it happy. After about fifteen minutes, we arrived at a large suburban house. He then suddenly proclaimed that he was too tired to continue and shouted across the garden fence to his neighbour, demanding to be fed. It transpired that dinner was to be served sooner rather than later, so I found myself being raced back to the city. The barrage continued, but this time I tried not to listen or look at the road in front of me, where everything was coming towards us at incredible speed.
It had been six exhausting hours and I wasn’t even paid – raising that as an issue would have meant prolonging the torture. I just cut my losses. (Interestingly, he proceeded to call me every day after that, until I left to go back to the UK a few weeks later. I didn’t answer once.)
That evening I walked along the city canal. The moon was full and the water clear and shallow, full of plants and an abundance of fish. Pike lay just under the surface above the weeds, still and serene. Then I saw one of those out of the blue and out of this world sights – a very large Koi carp, orange, white and black, just meandering through the water, slowly going back and forth. A few years before, I had put about forty goldfish from an over-crowded garden pond into this canal and now I stood wondering if this was one of them. It was far too big to be bothered by a pike.
Fortunately, a moonlit Koi carp is quite an antidote for an afternoon spent with Black Gloom.
A few days later, I had another strange encounter, but this time, instead of Black Gloom, it was Wide-Eyed and Frantic. Another session of non-stop talking, but instead of woe, it was of how wonderful life is and how God is great. She was flying high on the non-stop wonder train. That’s all fine, but it went on and on, again I hardly said a word – I couldn’t get started, there were no spaces to say anything. Ironically, just like Black Gloom, she looked great – pretty and vibrant, in fact, I could say fantastic.
Never judge a book by its cover. Old and corny I know – but oh, how true it is.
What I hadn’t known at the time was that she and the friend I was staying with had arranged an afternoon out to follow the session. Now this was tricky. The session had ended, thank god, and now I was faced with the tricky predicament of going out with her. Did I really want to go out with a client? So far, it had not been on a Black Gloom scale, and I foolishly thought that it might be fun. I agreed to go along.
Never mix business with pleasure.
We went for a country drive to a café in the woods. I sat in the back of the car to avoid the conversation, which went on unabated in the front. At least a café in a wood would provide great scenery, and with other people around, I could avoid direct verbal bombardment. However, things never quite work out how you think they will – my friend and Wide-Eyed and Frantic, fell into a full-blown argument, half in English and half in Dutch. I didn’t get the gist, didn’t want to, but there I was in the middle of this affray. We soon left and the bitching continued on the way home. To make matters worse, we took a wrong turn and ended up on a motorway going in the wrong direction. That was cause for a blame war. I tried to sleep amongst the furore. It didn’t work. Later, the two of them parted on very bad terms.
&nb
sp; Black Gloom and Wide-Eyed and Frantic were different flavours of the same thing – people who talk incessantly with little heed for the sensibilities of those in front of them. It doesn’t matter whether they are riding high or in a black hole – they are essentially the same.
The following day, I took another walk along the canal to look for the Koi. It was late afternoon and the sun had broken through the clouds at last. The water was still and brilliantly clear. Three rather large, jet-black friends had joined the Koi. They all swam together, meandering across the weeds. Occasionally they would stop with their backs and fins out of the water enjoying the sunshine for a moment before swimming off again.
I don’t imagine Koi having much psychological drama in their lives…but you never know a Koi, eh!
The calm and languid nature of Koi carp helped me make the situation later that night funny, rather than another trying time.
Right across the canal, in the industrial wastelands of Eindhoven city centre, is the city scrap and recycling yard. Between this and the canal is a ‘house’, not a normal house but a house belonging to an artist who opens his ramshackle space full of found objects, bric-a-brac and scrap yard inventions every Friday night.
It becomes a bar – well, not really a bar, but more a place where social dysfunction can flourish and be played out without hindrance every a Friday night. The working week is over, no chance of staying sober – have that in mind as you enter a long room, completely glazed on one side, looking out and over the city scrapyard. It’s full of mad objects, tables and chairs from the yard over the fence and a counter dispensing drinks. You don’t have to pay upfront for your drinks, there’s kind of an unspoken tab, which you negotiate at the end of the night, if you can still walk and talk that is. Upstairs is an open terrace with a fine view of the city dump. It was near impossible to get a seat on the terrace – it was coveted ground.
You can order pizza in this bar. The catch being that you need to make it yourself. There’s a ticket system and when it magically transpires that is it your turn, you do it yourself from the ingredients provided, which were plentiful I have to say. A stoned hippy cooked the pizzas in a homemade wood burning oven.
There’s also a small garden and a cat.
Sounds quite eccentric and fairly pleasant so far – right?
However (of course there was always going to be a ‘however’); the bar’s clients were the type who chain smoke strong reefers, drink beer by the gallon all night and most probably enjoy the effects of scrap yard waste! Now, I don’t smoke weed at all, don’t care if others do, but before long, this place was a smoky weed gas chamber and I needed to get out. The place was crazy; rock music blared, everyone was laughing and screaming – totally shit-faced, people could no longer talk properly, and the pizza production line had ground to a halt. I saw a young guy trying to make one, even I started to laugh – he was making an effort, all the right moves but his brain and body no longer worked well enough to flatten the dough and lay on it a few ready chopped vegetables and grated cheese. The pizza cooking man sat in front of his fire, grinning like a Cheshire cat with bloodshot eyes, doing nothing.
I tried to settle my bill. That was tricky, conversation was hard – it wasn’t even late, so who knows how things were settled later on. It cost me four Euros and I left. The music slowly faded as I followed the canal back home.
So maybe you are getting the picture a little – two very tricky customers in the space of two days, both of whom would talk and suck the very life out of you given half the chance. Along with this, I had had a multitude of hiking and coaching clients, some of whom had the idea that hiking begins with getting out of bed at midday and going for a cappuccino and leisurely brunch! I kid you not.
All this adds up, until downhill racing just seems like a damn good idea; the freedom of letting go of the brakes…
That took me to Italy. The high and steep hills around Lake Garda make fantastic biking trails. I have a good friend there, an enthusiastic and slightly obsessed off-road biker. He had already snapped his pelvis in two on a mountain trail, but this hadn’t dampened his high-octane drive for adventure. He had had one of those dumb accidents that should never have happened. His front wheel touched the back wheel of his friend’s bike. He was wearing shoes that clip into the pedal, and the speed of his fall was much too fast for him to get his feet free to deflect and cushion his fall. He fell hard, with his pelvis taking the full brunt. It took a very long time before he was back in the saddle.
Having recovered, he was still a demon on the bike and as fit as anyone could possibly be. Now I am fit, but not that fit. I have a slow engine; it doesn’t get tired easily, is good in the cold and uses minimal fuel. Let us say that I am a tractor whist my friend is a formula one racing car.
I could get up the hills okay, only having to push it once on an eight hundred meter, thirty-eight percent gradient hill climb. My friend almost raced to the top. But what goes up must come down.
I was on one of those mad descents where I had to negotiate ridiculously steep tiny forest paths, full of loose rocks, small drops and tree roots. I can’t say I was quick, but I did okay.
Previously, I had tried the clip-in shoes but had slipped and fallen several times on loose rock during harsh but slow uphill climbs, ending up on my side with my feet still clipped in the pedals. No harm done, but I soon had the spanner out to change the pedals from clip-in back to normal.
I exited the woods and turned onto a small concrete road full of dry gravel and small stones. My front wheel slipped away and my reaction was to squeeze hard on the front brake. Next thing I knew, I was snowballing and bouncing down the hill. Fortunately, tractors don’t break very easily – just a scraped knee and leg, banged hand and slightly twisted ankle where my foot had braced my fall. I wasn’t wearing those clip-in-shoes, thank goodness! Fortunately, the bike was okay, and together we continued downhill. However, for the next few days I improved on the uphill but remained slow and very cautious on the downhill.
I like my body!
Later, my friend took me on an official mountain bike racetrack. The downhills were so steep and treacherous that, even going slowly, I could hardly believe it was possible to finish a race without an accident or a hospital visit.
If you ever watch professional downhill racing, the type with extreme jumps, you may notice something: almost everybody is well under twenty-five. Not sure you can ride after that with a twisted body and a few kilos of titanium.
And the moral of this little story…?
Going uphill is hard, you may break a cog or two or often never make it to the top, and, if you are one of the few that does, then what? Stay there and view the world from your castle? Maybe it’s time for some fun, an adventure. Go on, let go of the brakes, pick up speed, the faster you go the more fun you can have, but the chances are you’ll hit a rock and become a broken wreck forever.
It’s so very easy to go downhill. You really don’t have to do a thing, just let it all go and life will do the rest.
So before you go turning fantasy into reality, make sure you can handle it, ‘coz whatever it may be – it’s gonna hurt!
A Different Kind of Beer
London in the late ’70s was a pretty run down city. It was the financial hub of Europe and an epicentre for music, art, theatre and ideas, but none of that was reflected in anything you saw on the streets or in the buildings. Only the years of neglect showed.
This wasn’t decadence, this was decay, and the rot had set in.
Take Covent Garden for example, now full of designer shops, overpriced apartments, expensive bars and hip nightlife. Tom remembered whole streets empty, tattered and neglected just a few blocks from the Royal Opera House. So neglected and devoid of care that it was possible to squat there and not be out of place. When his Basque friend Sebastian threw a brick through the grand window of a Spanish bank late one night, no one seemed to blink an eye.
Such was life back then.
&nbs
p; Even Notting Hill, now the domain of media, film and pop stars living in their central London rich kid haven, was half derelict – grand Victorian and Georgian houses falling down, squatted, empty and on the verge of ruin. There were streets you didn’t want to walk down because your colour wasn’t right and dark alleyways full of graffiti with bad people doing bad things to themselves and others.
The docklands, now expensive glass and concrete, had vast derelict spaces, crumbling warehouses, old cranes and burnt out cars. There were people who needed money fast and the crime that goes with that.
Those days are long gone, replaced with modern things designed by those who want to keep urban decay far away.
Berlin 2014.
Its modern centre with grand buildings, good design and an urban park full of trees, ponds and monuments pays homage to important things. This is the Berlin you see in films and adverts. Between this and the old East with its dull grey flats cut through by large main roads – the kind of place that drives a person to despair – lies an area a little like London in the 1970’s. Berlin’s not so miserable or neglected, but there was something in the old factories, the endless train lines with their empty depots and a nightlife that was still sleazy enough not to give a damn that took Tom back to the grey but exciting times of London.
It won’t last long of course; soon the old becomes the new and this gloomy urban landscape, will be gone for good.
But today, Tom felt the old London in Berlin. There were no real punks of course, no ideas of revolution, no squats by the thousand, no Baader-Meinhof on the run and in the shadows, no communists and certainly no Basque separatists. That was London way back then, a safe house for radical ideas. This was Berlin now, modern, hip and tediously correct; however, it still somehow clung onto something dark, unruly and disheveled, refusing to be named or tamed – it was there alright, not much of it, but he could sense it in the air, in the pavements and in the concrete itself. The ghosts of Berlin’s dark past still linger in its shadows.
As he walked down Emserstrasse from the sunken garden of Korner Park, where he liked to sit on a summer’s night, towards the old West Berlin airport at Templehof, passing new bars and restaurants, he knew what was about to come. Once across Hermannstrasse, the decay was not hidden or disguised – it was on display with hideous pride. Smashed bottles and endless throw-outs littered the streets; dirty old clothes, bric-a-brac and broken furniture, useful only to the desperate, were scattered about between neon brothels and drinking parlours, some of which you couldn’t even call bars – just someone’s front room spilling out onto the open street.
Tom wasn’t fooled by any of it, he saw no glamour, and everything this place was, was in the dog shit, supernatural amounts, like a museum collection, piled up around the trees, which were numerous. German was a second language here as swarthy macho men and headscarf women, herded kids from one block to the next in this very other Berlin world. You see a few young with-it things, maybe poor, but more likely living the bohemian life – what fun this is!
Tom watched the floor, dodging what dogs had done and do, and, outside his apartment block, he held his hand over his nose and mouth. The ground floor flat had open windows covered with chicken wire to stop the hundred rescue cats from jumping out. Through the front door and along the public corridor, stands the rescue cats’ front door with another flat opposite; there the stench was at its strongest, in summer, unbearable. Tom thought about that other flat – they must love the smell of a hundred cats or have no sense of smell at all, have heavily discounted rent or just be generally desperate and grateful to have a place called cat pee home.
Up the stairs, away from the dirty street and cat smell hell below, another front door was home.
The girl was sitting in the kitchen as always, legs pulled up on the comfy armchair and indulging in her usual evening habit – getting stoned and puffing away at a small and strong smelling reefer, getting on with whatever she usually got on with – nothing much he suspected.
The washing machine whirred, spun, stopped and whirred again as she just stared at the drum of colours after giving him a courteous grin.
Damn Berlin, it had woken up the London in him – living on the edge, living hand to mouth – different times but simple times. How did it ever get so complicated? Modern life was a string of passwords and endless technology that never gave him any time, space or empty days where nothing could possibly happen. The worst thing was – it all felt perfectly normal to be crammed full and planning the next day or moment.
Maybe she had the right idea.
‘Give me some of that.’
She looked puzzled and somewhat taken aback, before slowly stretching her arm out in front for him to take the smouldering incendiary from her feeble grip. He drew the smoke into his lungs, instantly coughing and dribbling saliva down his shirt.
She laughed and pulled a handkerchief from her sweater pocket. Still coughing, he caught her throw and mopped up the drool. He too was laughing now and, between splutters, took another drag.
He eyed her sitting there in that chair in that usual way of hers. She looked sexy – did she always look that good? He felt the sudden urge to pin her down and bang her hard right there and then.
Instead, he pulled on the reefer once again to distract himself.
What was she thinking now – the same thing? God, how was he to know? Was he getting stoned?
He coughed and she beamed a smile, as if to say this smoking thing somehow brought them close, but he knew that was all bullshit. He recalled the dope smoking at Art College many years ago, and all the useless talk and false feelings it aroused; for when it passed it was like it never happened – just the smoke of delusion. He could now feel it coming on strong.
He sensed the room was getting smaller, or was it getting bigger? The annoying whir stopped, allowing the shouts and traffic noise to filter in from down below. Then the machine spun again, reverberating, making him tingle, filling him up to an explosive point, until it stopped and he could hear the traffic once again, so close it was in the room.
This feeling of unreality, which was a kind of reality of course, started feeling good.
Then endless thoughts started pouring through and overloading his mind. He shut his eyes and saw vivid colours moving in kaleidoscope.
He tried to stop it, knowing it was near impossible to do so, but also knowing that all he was experiencing was nothing more than a toxin rushing through his blood and brain.
He plonked himself down on a wooden chair.
Somehow, he managed to cut the babble from his mind and listen to the magic sounds around. He could smell the girl but had lost the urge to do whatever it was he thought he might like to do to her, and sat for what seemed like an age.
‘You ok?’
‘What? Yes.’
Was she worried? Was that really his voice answering?
It was nice to have all his tensions wash away. He could get used to this.
He tried to stand, only managing it with some focus and by holding onto the kitchen counter. He was wobbly and woozy.
God, they call it dope for good reason.
The whir now irritated him – it was far too loud and rude, and the girl was far too real, still in the same position and grinning like a fairground doll, rolling another joint.
Where was the other one? Had he smoked it all and stubbed it out in the ashtray?
‘Did I smoke it all?’
His voice was too loud and seemed to echo. It made him laugh and she laughed too, not giving him an answer, and he knew this was how it was and would always be – stoned is stoned, no matter where, when or how you do it. This was as good as it would ever get.
I’m drunk he thought; a different drunk, but drunk I am for sure.
How was he going to get to the bedroom – it seemed miles away and full of obstacles to negotiate.
Ignoring the girl, he stumbled and fumbled his way out of kitchen through the open door into
the dimly lit hallway. Not daring to turn around and see the brightly lit reality of the girl and the sounds of her still rolling a joint, he lunged left and into safety.
It was dark. Silhouettes and strange shapes that he could not recognise lay like a maze in his path.
Tom stood still, caught between the world of a smoking girl where nothing but confusion lay and the black door of his bedroom where he would be alone with all this mad stuff running through his brain.
He could hear his heart pound and the sound of blood rushing through his ears. He didn’t dare plonk himself down in this no-man’s land of a dark hallway. Yes, it was safe between those two awful realities, but what if she came and asked him if he was all right, touched him – wanted something, anything..?
Tom suddenly found himself on the floor, melting away into the floorboards, the warm wood pressing against his cheek. Had he fallen?
‘What happened?’
She was touching him, talking to him, seemed concerned. Was he damaged somehow? He could not talk, only managing to mumble something even he didn’t understand.
Oh my god – no, please go away…
She was the last thing he wanted to deal with.
While she was talking and trying to get him up, he lunged forwards towards the black door and knocked it open. On all fours now, he herded his clumsy body inside and spun around to catch sight of her shocked face, bemused and full of night shadows and ghostly glare, transfixed and staring right at him.
She was the devil – he was sure of that, and Tom used his foot to slam the door shut tight.
Christ…what happened just then.
He heard her shuffle back to the kitchen, and then nothing. Only the hum of the Berlin traffic told him he was not in hell.
But it felt like hell.
The only solution lay somewhere above him, amongst the sombre and melancholic shadows of the room. The safety of his bed urgently pulled him up. He flopped fully clothed on the duvet, struggling with it for a while, turning and pulling at it until he was hidden from whatever it was he was hiding from.
Safety.
Just switch it all off now please…
He heard himself breathing, loud, fast and very shallow. Deep breaths were needed and he obeyed this inner command whilst feeling and hearing the thudding of his heart that shook the bed. Can they hear it down below?
There was nothing more until the morning light and early birds had him waking up. Strangely, he felt normal. Did that really happen?
Tom lay looking out of the window at the autumn leaves on the high trees, still and catching the first rays of sunshine.
A different world; so peaceful that he didn’t get up, just drifted between sleep and a waking blankness where all his thoughts were gone.
Bliss.
Sometime passed like this. He could have stayed like that forever had it not been for a noise. Not any noise, but the noise of her doing the things she always did before she left for work.
Damn. Tom shot up. Dizzy, he fell back on the bed.
God, I’m drunk…no I’m not…I’m…like hung-over without pain or any discomfort.
Jeez. It was hard to walk. Wobbly and slightly floppy, he left the room.
The hall was light and no longer full of menace. Pausing before the kitchen, he tried to make and memorise a speech, an apology of sorts for his behaviour last night, but he could not remember much, let alone the feeling.
Had it been as bad as he now imagined?
Before he could say a word she burst out laughing, sitting there as she had done when this mess all started. It was a cup in her hand now, not a joint, and the tea slightly spilled over and down her pants. She didn’t care, she had seen what she had expected to see and it filled her with joy. He knew it too.
He was a shocking mess, clothes all crumpled, hair unkempt, and that look of washed out drama in his face.
‘Don’t say a word – it’s always like that the first time.’
She had cut him dead but as it was not the first time, he kept quiet, let her have the moment, for it gave him the perfect excuse to connect with her. After all, she still looked good.
Damn that stuff. Tom laughed too, and hoped that one joint would be enough.
A Camel’s Tale
Raj was an unfortunate camel. I had tried to like him, be a friend, but under the circumstances, it was all rather hopeless. These days, being a camel in Rajasthan is to be born into a life of hard work and slavery; no camels roam free anymore to wander the gentle dusty dunes. A camel has to pull a cart, loaded, and more than likely overloaded, with people and chattle or bricks, sand and rocks; or dance in some cruel camel circus act; or more lucratively, be used to move tourists around the desert so they can witness its beauty before it evaporates into the modern world.
This good money earner for Indian business men requires complete submission, unconditional surrender, from the camels; of course, they are not born losers, it requires regular beatings, shackles and a rope threaded through the soft sensitive tissue of their noses, so authentic camel men can yank them anyway they choose by inflicting great pain. Then there is the whip, in case the camel forgets who the boss really is and has ideas other than a harsh life of enforced slavery.
If you don’t care about camels then they are a great way to experience the Great Thar Desert. I didn’t know much about camels and, wanting to see the diverse wildlife that the Great Thar offers, went into its beautiful lonely reaches with my girlfriend. Unfortunately, we needed camels and some camel men.
Every night under a vast twinkling sky I made chapatis in the burning coals of camel dung; an art the camel men patiently taught me. Desert nights were freezing, below zero, and any attempt to sleep under the stars was soon abandoned for the tent, where all night we would hear the gentle breeze and soft scratching of fine sand blowing on the flysheet.
I did not make a good camel commander and Raj would regularly stop at a bush or acacia tree to munch contentedly away, whilst the others ambled towards the horizon, leaving me to have an awkward discussion, which I knew was being ignored. I could get Raj to sit down and stand up, but due to my soft camel commander nature, could not get him to move forwards or backwards one inch, no matter how I reasoned. A camel man would soon return, shout aggressively, and whack Raj with a wooden club, wound with metal at its tip, on the neck or head and almost yank his nose clean off to get him moving again.
The blue bulls, Indian gazelles, black bucks, silver desert foxes and huge flocks of ugly vultures kept my interest, delayed my distaste for this camel cruelty for about a week or so.
The vast, still beauty of the Great Thar sets a style; a slow and tranquil pace, where every sound, every quiver and every breath is magnified, almost measured by an enormous silence; and reflecting such, people live a seemingly languid life. However, the Great Thar has a tacit cruelty, in metaphor and in fact, sands soaked in blood, well hidden and disguised from any passerby. Don’t be fooled by this poetry, dazzle of its mesmerising light, slow swagger of some beauty’s swinging hips, for the vultures wait as the culture stifles those within, beats those who disobey, shuns those without, and keeps those outside from coming in…
If you are born to the Great Thar, it will never let you go, and, if you’re not, it will never give up its mystery.
Are you getting the picture? I rode Raj and got the picture.
Now Raj had a buddy called Rosie, a proud upstanding kind of camel, overflowing with oomph and verve, and one who really liked the girls. Nasty scars and deep gouges etched his strong body, where the camel men had clubbed and beaten him in their frenzied attempts to secure compliance and a Rajasthani set of morals; I’m glad to say that this savage re-education was a dismal failure.
One day as Rosie ambled along the endless track he became increasingly frustrated, wanted every female glimpsed or smelt; he would gurgle, salivate, dislodge his soft palette and hang the pink flesh out and down his neck for all to wonder and behold. Not a problem for some folk, after al
l it is something all men – real and fit – feel, like, and want to do; however, the camel men hated this display of open sexuality, perhaps it told them of their own true nature, made them feel uncomfortable. Surely they were not like this – they were men, not men like camels, camel men, oh my god what do I mean?
Meanwhile, as Rosie showed off and strutted his stuff, a storm brewed inside these tacit camel men; stony faces, muffled murmurs, the usual quiet before the first crack of thunder and lightning flash as the heavens open and all falls down.
Campsite fixed and Rosie won’t play ball, takes offence at being yanked and pushed around, and rears up and tears around. No big deal, so I thought – letting off steam – give him space and he’ll calm down. No way; the camel men jumped into action, pulled and pulled at the string through his nose, brought him down to his knees and clubbed him half to death with the metal tipped beating club; his head was clubbed, blood flowed as the club was whacked at full force – we’d be dead that’s for sure. Then the club was forced down Rosie’s throat and the metal ripped soft flesh…
After some shouting on my part, I managed to stop this insane cruelty. After all, they still needed me to pay them. I guess money was my club to bring these dogs back to heal.
So, beware of trips to lonely places with lonely thoughts of lovely things – it may force you to commit murder without regrets, well, only the regret of all that dull police stuff and hassle that ensues.
Ten Gallon Reef
‘Bail!’
The desperate cry was almost drowned out by the driving wind and powerful surf that crashed and spilled over the jagged reef and stacks sitting no more than one hundred yards out from the dark, imposing cliffs.
With the wind behind them, it would only take another large swell or two for the small boat to smash up against the reef, before being dragged into the back pull of a retreating wave and pushed up once again, until just shards and splinters remained and the two men were lost forever to the hard blue below.
One man bailed furiously with a small bucket as the other pulled hard on the oars into the back pull, before the swell could push them closer towards the frothy violence of the reef that lined the entire west side of the island.
It was a hopeless task delaying the inevitable, as they inched closer to the pounding white waves breaking over the black barrier, now no more than ten yards ahead.
The boat was swamped and the bailing too slow and inadequate, as the next lashing of white water sunk the boat deeper and dangerously close to the top rim of the boat.
The boat, heavy from flood, slowed, allowing time for the oarsman to push away against the reef and into the pull of a retreating wave; it gave some grace before the next wave threw them forward once again onto some submerged rocks in front of the stacks. They bottomed out and breeched. Seconds later, another wave ripped them off and tossed them behind the jagged rocks into the swirling eddies behind the reef and under the cliffs.
Around and around they went as one bailed and the other kept pushing off the cliff or reef with the oars. For some time this cycle continued, and, though exhausted, they kept up this tedious task into the twilight, where the only hues were steel grey and eerie white. Fulmars dropped off their perches, chuckling and swooping, indifferent to the two men weakening in their fight to save themselves.
It was a little after dusk when the wind dropped and the swells abated somewhat, allowing the men to sit and shiver as they drifted between reef and cliff.
They started rowing at first light, the sea now calm, its fury spent, and the reef passive in the welcome light of morning.
It was a mere mile and a half to their inlet mooring where the others were waiting, their drawn faces relieved to see the two return, full of questions as no one had really expected them back after such a violent blow.
‘Was fishing the stacks when it came.’
‘What stacks.’
‘I don’t know – those where we got swamped.’
‘Ten Gallon or more came with each wave, we was nearly done – spent the night against the cliff.’
They all drifted off, leaving only an old man to ponder the empty stillness of the sea.
A boy approached.
‘Where they been all night?’
There was a pause, and then the answer came with a certainty as he pointed north.
‘Ten Gallon Reef – don’t you ever be going there now.’
Big Ted