ITRITE TTIE I'AY UP by Dtek Lucas
*
Well w?rat's it all ahout then? It's about uritlng (a foot) and clinibing (a rnuntain)
At
Ttre Sare Time
*
Written in inlc largely to the sound of 'North of the River Thames' an LP by [nrh Sl.ttdic'ate
Thanks
Silas
to
for getting it
going
and
Michette
for keeping it
going
and me
for typing it all
out
*
c in a circle
95
{
{
t.
CHAPTER
1
I landed with a bump. I was catching my breath when a voice, part Gaelic, part garlic, tapped me on the shoulder. "f've just arrived, lny friend! Could you show me the l,ray up this hill?" "f 've only just got down herer" f panted, ,'f 'm too tired to go anywh- oh! Hi Jacklrr "No, no, just a favour." It l'ras Jack, from Chapter 19, back to remind himself how this began. 'Looking a bit worse for wear,r I thought. "Howrs life in the later chapters?" f asked "Oh, you ]c:row..." He grinned a bit, like a see-saw. "Yourre looking a bit worse for wearr" he said. "But that's OK, there's Chapter 10 up ahead." "Chapter 10? Not sure if f recall that one." I paused for the resL of the sentence. ',Is it worth checking out?" "Oh yâ‚Źs, " said Jack. We stood gazing up at the mountain. "L]trmn-r" f almost said. "Oh yes indeed," he nodded, "ADd you could show me the v:ay up this hill while you're at it!" And so I did! Which is just as well, otherwise this would be a very short book indeed. CHAPTER 2
"A11 cl-imbs are longr" f said. ,,They bring your head to make sure your feet aren't being left behind, and wishing they had been so you'd have an excuse to stop.,' "What are your feet doing now?" came Jack's voice from behind me. f glanced down. down
"They're holding out a white flag and sacrificing
another poor sole in the hope of gaining eternal rest.,' He laughed. "See? You weren,t even looking at them in the first place! Feet are 1ike chairs-" "No they're not ! ', "-ey go unused for Loo long. " "What was that?" "ff they go unused for too long."
"0h.
" A seagull shot by. "But chairs stay
sr-: -_
,
T
said. "Unless you move them about until they're in a ce-":er position. " "But then they're still t eyr sti11,', f said. "Yes, but that's afterwardsr" he said, breathing rapidly, "not beforehand." THE lEff-Io -ruqlff f,EiDtrtg pfi,f,lER
LeJ"re
?LEA5E EAD
lund We came to a flattened rock and sat ilphew t I
down.
"That was hardly a fewr" said Jack, pulling oui pipe. "Ttrat was a whole bunch. "
:-rs
What a view!
CHAPTER TI{REE
"Between there and there," he said, indicating a vaque blur of distant trees and a cloud above them (that looked like a sink fuIl of suds; if it liras a smal1 sink; or if they were huge bubbles), "is about as far as from there to here." f took a closer look. "Trees are like crowdsr" f said, "a11 huddled together, waiting for something to happen."
"We1lr orle crowd. " "Could be a crowd ()f crowds. . . " "Which is stil1 the one crowd. " "How big is two crowds?" I mused. "Too big for comfort. Better to have one big one t::ar to have two of- anything. Too divisive." "We1l there are two of usr" f said, "and if I r==:.'-, here, you'd be halfway to nowhere by now, matey! f -:--e Guided Tour Mountain Ranger! And if this is 'divi.l-,-=' f 'm Frank U. Verymuch!" ,
"Pleased to meet your Frank, your g:uidance is only recollection of what's coming up
exceeded by your sketchy
i1 later chapters; but two people is a completely different...kettle...,' A seagTull flew by as Jack carefully traced its path with his outstretched pipe. "That cloud looks like a huge spongy grey blob,', he muttered. f looked back to the sink and suds. The bubbles had burst, and the sink had tipped a bit. With a nose on top"A spongy grey blob?" I said, ',That's art, that is!" "Did T say spongy grey blob?', We stared more as we spoke less, then wheels were jolLed again. He turned round. "My mind must be wandering. Letrs wander up the hill some more." t'Hill?t' f scanned the rock faces for signs of hillness. "More of a mountain." "Hills are smaller to climb. " "Yes, but, I'm the Guided Tour Mountain Ranger, so f say it's a mountain." "Ttrs the same distance, whatever you call it,. Let's
90. "
We picked our way up, through fern-furnished leg-rooms between rocks and- we11, more rocks- using each other's progress and glances to spur oursel_ves orrr until we reached a more accomodating path; one thaL gave our arms
a rest.
CHAPTER FOUR
"Jack? "
Where was he now? f'11 tel1 you (f,ve read ahead a bit)- he was lying face flat out peering into a crack in the storyline. I picked up a small st,one. "f think we,re nearly in Chapter 4r,, came a muffled
voice.
rrJt's here already where f'm standing!" I threw the sma1l stone. It bounced awts1lr one...two, three...four...five... (',Bit of a volatile area, this,,, said Jack)...and l_ost the bounce count at 14. Or so.
Hrfirml.
"What are you looking
at?" f asked. in the storyline. could be dangerous. could be a red herring. Hard to te11." He stood up, sweating "A crack
profoundly.
lying on your stomach?" can't see it otherwise." "But how did you krov where to look?" "Oh, um.." He dusted off his elbows. "f bent dolun to see what this was, and, uh, fell over a bit." "Well-, better than falling over a lot," l said, and had a 1ook. ft was the burst remain of a yellov balloon. How "Why were you
"You
odd.
And we walked out of Chapter 4 talking of numbers, populatiorrsr rndpsr graffiti, and seagu11s. CHAPTER FIVE
"What are you doing?" We'd walked time out of our router pdssed parcels of loosely-sealed ideas, trodden on each other's feet and presumed pebblesr sâ‚Źâ‚Źo an unstartled rabbit- and a startled one- and are now sat feeling the sunset brew its last cup of sky-warm tea. rrlfrar?rr I looked up. fhen across. "WhaL are you doing?" "Oh, writing. "
"Writing what?" "A11 this. " "Yourl1 rrliss half of it if you've got your eyes stuck on a pen. " "That'll be half of it, then. You do the other half and we'l1 exchange views at the end." ItDonrt forget to write that downr /cu might forgetl" "'Forgot to write down not to forgeL to write down that f shouldn't forget to exchange views at the end'," I said. "Now f definitely won't forget!" "Forget what?"
We laughed, some bushes.
like passing trains. Later on we slept with CHAPTER SIX
Ttre next morning, a not,ice was found pinned to this
page:
PAPER NO
C,OOD
AS A BLANKET
"Want some soup?" Jack was crouched over a i::= ard behind some smoke.
"What flavour "Hot. "
is it?"
"Definitely ! "
And that was the nicest soup ever! Just thought f'd mention that. Sometimes you just never J'o:ot'1, you know? Ttren when you do lmow, your wellr you take a can Of Soup and a box of metches when you go up a mountain! f'd said this to him, about the soupr and he said "We11, a blind man would be g1-ad to see it." I think it was the smoke getting in his €f€sr he didn't seem too enthusiastic. Later on that day I made the soup" ' ,,I'trhat shall we do nexb?" f asked Jack, cautiously turning a netLle aside with my sleeve. werd walked a long way, and I ]crew we were both getting hungry' ,,Next Can'L wait ! " he said. "T,et's dO SOmething now, like eat! " "Eat what, though?" "T'here's a whole feast of nettle soupr right here!" "You eat nettles?" out, lots "oh dY€, boil rem up and it takes the sting fistful of grabbed a hurriedly He protein that." anr or
nettlesr dod howled like a crumpled pack of dogs. "You really are the limit over which there is no edge!" I laughed. "You get stung in Chapter 7, and learn nothing
!"
"We haven't even reached Chapter 7!" "Wellr |€s and rlor I mean, I don't get a chance to write about all this until we're in Chapter 9..." "Well why didn't you stop me before I got stung in Chapter 7, then maybe my hand wouldn't hurt so much now!" "T didn't have the chance." He sat slurping at his fingers and re-inventing semaphore to include animal speech patterns. "So, what shall we do next?" I asked. "Ir11 use my feet!" he spat. "Ttlen eat nettle soup!" "First take a look at that rabbit,r,' I said. He and the rabbit stared at each other for a while- Cne of them thought the other was a long way off. Ttre other one tnoulht, 'Rabbits don't have fing"ti, do they?' * seagTull
walked by. "What sha1l we do now?"
I said.
"f'm doing this DOW7" he breathed, resting his hand on some air. "That rabbit is like a statue... (he stared)...of a rabbit... (he shifted down onto a rock)...pretending to be a statue...of a rabbit,..." fhis went on for a while, his voice drifting into a monotonei several other rabbits came to r+atch. Veanwhile, f looked around, found some water in a reasonably clear puddle, and got a fire going. I was loo}<ing for a big stick to trash some nettles with when Jack leapt up, grinning. "Aye, let's do some stompin'!" And
to the chant of rabbits' hind leg:s
(magnified)
We danced through the netties and laid them aside Boiled up some water (unprivatised) Burnt a few fingers, with smoke in our eyes
But eating lJ-as worth it, it felt like a prize And a lesson in patience. Pure DIYI CHAPTER 7
I was looking at the st,ructure of a leaf in one hand and a feather in the other, trying to calculate -rhetherqiven shallow roots, thin trunks, enough leaves and a strong upward wind- trees had the capacity to fly, r+hen Jack started singing"Ever since my baby left meeeeee!"*- which ended in a shriek as he rushed his fingers to his mouth. "Urne11!" he inhaled between ]cnuckles. f wondered if he was on solids yet. "A nettle!" he yelled, "and it hurts!" "We1l that's a relief," f said, "f thought you were gonna sing the whole bloody song!" We carried on. The rocks were thinning out now, the slope becoming more horizon than vertigo. Greenery scenery.
Not 'Heartbreak Flotel ' , ----:= but. the first line of 'When My Baby left Milton Kelmes" by the -\< Eifties' one hit wonder woman, April May June.
'April May June'r" said Jack. than "Better 'Ju1y Aug"ust September'r" f said. read an with her once. Apparently she was interview "f born three months prematurely." "What, in April instead of July?" I laughed. "Good I' "Funny name,
career
move !
He smiled. "Nor January. ft was just a stage name. She could've cornered Lhe charts every summer if she hadn't begun by warbling on about Milton Ke1mes..." "And babies." "Babies?"
"Well, calling someone 'baby' implies underdevelopment I said. calling them 'Milton Kelmesr." like "Much "Probably why her 'baby' left in the first place." "Aye, better out of it," nodded Jack. "Ever been there?" I asked. "Flfim..they say itrs not built on a 1ey1ine."
and anonymity,"
"More ,'Once
nettles. .. "
bitten, twice shy...I
I'SHEEPS I "
CHAPTER 8
It doesn't say much for human nature that such passive creatures as sheep, who will take all day over a meal, reserve so much instant escape energ'y Lo create as much distance as possible arr:ay from we two-legged beasts. They'd have to eat without sleep to have enouEh energy bo maintain such velocity, though; so these had moved onto the side of a mountain. "We weren't built for slopesr" I panted, as we reached a smooth grass incline. Ttre nearest sheep was gazing mid-graze at our uninvited state of late arrival. Further away in nineteen directions were the rest of the family. "I wonder whose sheep these are?" I said. "Do you?" said Jack, "Why?" "We1lr" f said, slight,ly surprised, "sheep are usually owned, and these are all over the p1ace, so it's one smart shepherd who lmows where to f ind them all. " "ff this is all of them, you could apply for the job; fancy being the boss of this lot?" As he spoke, the nearest sheep bounced up and off to her nearest neighbour, who joined her to gaze back that extra distance.
"No," I said, "but T hope they're safe." "Safer than we are."
"Still, f'd like to meet that shepherd." Jack grabbed my arm. "He won't be anywhere near his sheep if he's a good one." "Why not?"
"l"Iutual co-operation. He lets them do what they like, and they stay on the hill. They won't run too far from here, I reckon." ilUnless hers too close?" "Unless hets too much of a boss." CHAPTER 9
ttDick. " t'Jack.tt
"Short for 'Richard', isn,t it?" "Hm, like'Jackr is short for'Jotlrr' . " He chuckled. "Almost." We sat down and took our boots off to air our feet. To breathe at both ends is guite a luxury, as long as the ends donrt meet. toes meet nose it's ten to one And overwhelmed- what had begmn As exercise will soon dispel Into a clash of smeller and smell
When
"Why do people shorten their names, then?" f wondered aloud, leaning back and watching miniscule dots career
across my eyeballs. rrliihat?rt I looked across. Jack was his armpits, and finding it difficult. "Names, why shorten them."
"Easier to reremlcer?"
trying not to sniff
"Hnrn. " ft seemed that words were the only thing keeping us awake. "Rumpelstiltskin. " "Now that is a memorable narme, " said Jack. "And not a short one, by a long chalk!" ,rHa I ,, snOrted Jack, "Rumple ! Hey, RUmpie ! " And, in a high pitched whimper, "Oh rlor all my friends call me
'RumPt r "
,,oh, Jack it in!" r said. "You Dickhead!" We were quiet for a while.
"Steamrollerr " said Jack. T grunted. "Md?"
"That l/as like a steamroller." He coughed, thinking aloud in the space thus created. "Loud and rolling along...and when it stopped, everything went f1at. Something like that. Sha1l we carry on?" 'rIn a minute." We left about two minutes later. CHAPTER 10
Two minutes and
iifteen
seconds
later
we reached Chapter
10! T'd been keen to get here sinc.e,fack had hinted at its potential in Chapter 1. Ttrat seemed ages ago, but here it was: the double figures had lined up a one and a zero, everything and nothing. I was determined to discover the Everything side! "oK, Jack, rftrat do we get in Chapter 10, then?" "Anything could happen!" He was striding ahead of me. "f thought you said it was worth checking out?" I shouted. I think he said something about hotels. f paced
to his side. "In a hurry?" he said. "Who, me? Yourre the one all in a rush!" f replied, trying to catch his eye. He was carrying a fixed view of a flat edge up ahead. " It's gett,ing dark r " he said.
up
the sound of a stadium fu1l of hissing teeth. mix in a monotone barbershop guartet using blunt Gradually Then the volume, dim the liqht to ful1 increase razors. moon, and check out the chaos theory at full speed... "f don't remember this being here!" I shouted above Lhe fmagine
r+ind.
"You may have blocked out some parts, but yourll find it's all there! Your head's like a book! You just got to find the righL page! Awhaaay! What're you doin'?" "ft's not bloody safe! And this is no time to go pontificating on the nature of reality! Wtrat are we going to DO?" Ttre reality was strung in front of us in the form of a rope that linked the cliff edge we'd reached with its egually vast and very black booming twin several leaps of the imagination away. these were not close twins; they
towered and shouted at each other, a boom box amplifying the river that hurtled far below us, engulfing the debris of disintegration as it vore the cliffs deeper and further apart. Jack had been looking aboutr ds scared of all this nightmare scenery as a lenrning, and had crawled right, to the edqe. He got up. "There's a ladder going down! Tt looks safe! Wel1r as safe as it gets..." We stood there and looked. At the rope, a thin wavering curve going downr+ind. At the ladder, disappearing from view unless we chose to get on it to look. Neither of us wanted to choose firstr so wâ&#x201A;Ź talked about it a few yards back, in the small shelter of a slightly bigger rock. We stared at the moon for a bit, then at the grass by our lorees, with occasional stones that traced ropes and ladders on a more bearable scale"We've got to go over on the rope, f think," said Jackf agreed. "Even if we make it down the ladderr " f said, "we'11 never get across that river." It r+ras still another ten minutes before we lrot up. Then we saw it. Lying against the rock was a piece of wood, nails and advice:
But, at the edge again, we both ]a:ew how to climb ladders, and how it. feels having nothing under your feet. "Who goes first?" shouted Jack. "I dontt, uh, whatever!" "You go first ! " "Right.!" f didn't move. "Alphabetical order ! " I stared at him. "Whatr" f said, "ds in'f'goes
ru'r
?I
before
IT
*>;
-21,
"Aye!" he laughed, "sounds about right!" Then paused.
It was the rapid pause that comes after all rapid decisions, and the point where the decision faltersr so before f could further resist the idea of going down first, or Jack could invert his reasoning and avoid going down 1ast, f swung my legs over the edge, feeling for rungs with my feet. The noise was incredible! I could hardly hear Jack as he ye1led down to me: "And remember!" "What? ! "
"Whatever you [hJhat?'r
do, don't look up!"
you'll just "See you at the
see my ass in your face! bottom! " I started the long descent down. Every step was enough of a pattern to keep me going, not enough to let me go any faster. A large recess, lasting several rungs in height and an arm or two either
"Or
side of the ladder wide, provided
a
temporary resting point. We didn't use it. This was something you only did once, so you did it all in one go. ft was a long way down.
A11 the most, successful soap operas have a pub as a central meeting place. A11 manner of subjects and emotions can be raised along with degrees of intoxication, soeial barriers can be crossed with a flick of a cigarette lighterr drrd you can film a whole six months'worth of scenes in one week without the risk of having unseasonal weather messing up the
'rea1 life'
ang1e.
In the lounge bar of 'The Missinq Rungi,
two camerawomen* and a director were busy adjusting beer mats, reading the bottom of glasses, and thinking up anagrams.
"Bedroom," said Julie, dt that indeterminate age between youth and menopause that carries a 'donrt ask, warning, "makes'boredom' . " "Speak for yourself," guipped Harry, who had asked her once (and then repeatedly for the next Lhree years) and liked quipping between shiftsr "You should go out more." "Go drive a tractor," replied Julie, who was trying to get the hang of this guipping thing. "Shut. Up." They shared a sigh of mutual tolerance, somewhat frayed. Clement Weather Gutteridge was on a lifelong crusade to counterbalance any idea that he might want to live up to his name. His parents had both died during a trip to India,** and his friends called him 'Hippy Guts'. Once. "fs that an anagram, Clamny?" chirped Harry. "Yeah, it's an anagram of 'unemployed', sponge face, which is what we'll all be if this carries on. Are you absolutely sure yourve not got the scripts?" "Not me, I had a check up last veek! "
"And stop quipping!" They lapsed into silence.
A
massive roaring wet one, as the river thundered past. "Puny dole mer" said Julie, suddenly. Clement and Harry looked up. "Anagram! Of 'unemployâ&#x201A;Źd'r" she beamed. "The point is," said Clernentr eazing around the otherwise uniformly empty bar, "is where is everybodl, else? " "We11, the drinks are free." Harry leaned over the bar and poured himself another pint of nameless beer, which is what they se1l in soap opera pubs. "Anyone else?" "Yes! Good idea! T\+o coffees, and no ice!"
One
of which was.a
man.
** They'd been run over on their way
to the airPort.
The trio as one turned to face two almost complete strangers, standing in puddles of river. One closed the door behind him. The other was peering into a rucksack, muttering. TLrey walked to the bar. "Where's the others?" asked Julie"Others? There's just us," said one, in a Scottish accent tinged with a throat deficienry that comes from being scared to death by great heights and short-range negat,ive weather conditions. ;Who put a pub here?" said the other, in a non-Scottish pair of glasses tinged with short-range negative weather residue.
got the scripts?" snapped Clement. "Not me, I had a check up last weekr" said Harry, more to himself than anyone else, but at this point t'he one in the glasses pulled out a notebook and wrote it down. 'Good one!' he thought. "Ah good! Let's have it here!" said Clement, grabbing the notebook. Waving away any protests with a hardened finger, he @an to read. After half a while- and a small one at that- he looked up at the ceiling and started singing "Oh here we go again, oh here we go again, did someone say we had been here before?", which none of the others had heard before or since it had won a primaevally structured inter-border song contest once. Or twice. "Quick, get the camera!" grinned Harry. "Shut it!" ClemenL abruptly ditched his choral mode and slanrned the notebook onto the table in a way that very slightly altered the atomic gravity of both. (efthough the effects were minimal. However, this is a bookr not film, and as such can bask in the limitless imagery of the reader's mind, and avoid the horrendous costs of creating life-1ike atoms to appease and appeal to the selective tastes of both cinema goers and microbiologists "Have you
Et
amongst us).
"You call this a script?" yel1ed Clement. "Tttis is another pile of rlet's-go-up-the-mountain' hippy crackpotsmoking type of self-searching thing! You want to set this in a pub? Couldn't you come up with anything more pub-like, like arguments, noise, local gossip, cheery pints being drunk, fruit machines flashing somer.rhere
and a few more people?"
"Alright, Clarmy, give it a break, you got it, all wrongr it's not a scriptr" said Julie, picking up Lhe discarded notebook and handing it back to"What's your name?" she asked. "Dick. Ttris is Jack. " "I guess you're not from head officâ&#x201A;Źr then." "No, just canre down the ladderr" said Dick, wiping his glasses on a beer mat. "fs there a lr-ay over that river?" 'rso you haven't, got, the scripts, " said Clementr to the tab1e. Jack had been ambling around the empty pub, trying to fill it. wow he sat on the edge of the bar, not swinging his legs to the silent jukebox. "Pass me that notebook, " he said, and flicked through it. His eyebrows read down the last couple of pages. "So this is a TV soap thing you're making? With no
people, no script,, and halfway to helI between two cliffs? ! " 'tltrs got atmospherer" growled Clement, "and the actors are on their way." He frowned. "Probably." "Actually," said Harryr loot<ing up from his glass, "f think we've been sent up the wrong ravine." "WelI you had the maps!" shouted Clement, "And the scripts!" Harry grinned. "And don't say that again! And if this is the wrong ravine, who in the name of Shirley Maclaine built this pub in it? ! " CUT
TO: Dick and
Julie
D- Shirley Maclaine? J- Hers got a picture of her in his wallet. D- Name rings a bell. J- Actress. American. D- She in soap operas? J- No, too well lniown. D- You'd get better ratings, though. J- She's too e>rpensive. D- Oh. J- You start with a bunch of unknowns, you see, and as the ratings increase they become household names, then you can afford to meet
their
demands
for
D- The price of fame?
J-
Yeah. You have
more money.
to sell reality to afford it.
D- But, it's not reality, just a representation
of it!
]N ON BAR MIRROR, SHOI^ITNG HARRY HOLDING CAMERA CUf T0: Clement So just, in case you C- ...in every ravine! happen Lo go rup the wrong ravine' there's the relief of getting a pint of- f mean what is this stuff? And stop cutting in on me when f'm halfwaY into a senCII'I TO: Dick and Julie D- ...takes all the negative aspects of 1ife, puts them all in one area amongst less than thirty people and says 'this is real life'! ZOOM
If leel real life had a ratio of one romance to half a murder, two-thirds of a tragic accident, one stolen car, two or three fights and a complete absence of music, we'd all be lying on couches, gibbering!
PAN BACK TO REVEAL .]ACK
JK- Sounds 1i]<e watching TV! PAN FURTHER BACK TO REVEAL CLEMENT
It gives people what they want! ft gives me a headache. J- What is it that people want, then, Clement? C- Thrills and comfort combined, that's whaL! JK_ Sounds like having sex! D_ But without getting too involved, eh, Cl-ement? T\lrn on, tune in and drop off! Not tonight dear, I had a soap opera earlier on! J- Maybe the population crisis could be sterrned C_
JK_
by compulsory viewing! C- Harry! Will you turn that thing off? JK- Keep it going Harcy, it could be a decent episode in the can.... \-- Keep your nose out of this!
ZOOM
IN ON JACK'S NOSE D- This is your soap opera, ClemenL! Shouting without content! U- We need the scri-pts! And turn that river down!
ft carried on like this for the length of several trailers; Jack and f 1eft, before getting hooked into the series.
There was a choice of which way to go.The ladder was probably going to be faster, but it only Ied to the rope. Walking up the ravine could only lead to a surprise or a shock, but either seemed preferable.
For a few moments, at least. Knowing it would be dangerous was no preparation for the surge of adrenalin and fear that pounded wittr the river. "Give me nettles anytime!" f shouted, stressing each word as if to combat t-re sonic apoealypse around us. It was like trying to catch snowflakes. Or cornflakes. For all the urgency of maintaining my balance on the path of wet rocks at the edge of certain death, 1 found myself thinking of showers of
cornflakes, and wondering if they could cause lacerations if they fe1l fast enough. "Cereal killers!,' I cried, and nearly fell in the river. Jack had vanished when I looked up, and for three split seconds f felt the panic of universal solitude. But then he emerged from the cliff face, beckoning hurriedly. He'd found a small cave. Inside it the reflected sound of the river hel-d less danger and direction, and gradually became a background sound to our mutually silent mixture of tiredness and olryqenated relief. We sat just inside the entrance and gazed through its jagged outline at the moonlit cliff facing us. After a series of untraceable thoughts we arrived back at the present; one of us shifted a foot, then we both
talking at once. "Cold!" f said, as Jack uttered something egually obvious. We got up and felt along the damp waIls for a few yards in the pitch black. I lit, a match, but it went out before we could gauge any distances. fhis further back was out of the wind, so we sat down again. "Never did get any coffeâ&#x201A;Źr,' f said. "That's the least of it," said Jack, "We haven,t got across this riverr either. " "ft can't go on forever. f mean, all rivers start somewhere," f said, not wanting to think too hard along this line of thought, knowing that the last half hour or so had seemed as close to forever as half an hour can began
get.
"Jtrll get a lot easier in the daylight," said Jack. fn the darlmess our voices had to take on the extra weights of normally visible body lanq-uage and facial e:<pression. At this point he sounded complacent.
"If you ask me it'l1 be a Iot harder in the daylight," I said. "What !?" exclaimed Jack. moonlit "Wellr /ou ]<now how danqerous that little stro1I rras? Wait 'ti1 you see it in fulI 3D colour!" "Then it'll be easier to deal with, you daft nelly!" 'rNonono!" I said, inwardly chuckling at the instant lack of image conjured up by the word 'ne11y', "The amount of danger-induced panic is directly related to that danger's visibility; the more you see, the worse the level of panic and the greater the chance of- falling into the river! You can't be scared of something you cantt see! " you hear that?" came Jack's urgent whisper. "Did rrlrlhat?" I strained all my eyes and ears. "That scraping sound." I'Just the river," I said, but kept listening. Suddenly the river was a cover for all sorts of other noises, and the darlcress had different shades, and how big was this hole we were in? "'You can't be scared of something you can't see"'7 mimicked
Jack, "You daft nelly!,' f said, glad of the darlcress
"You- yeah, yeah, OK, OK,"
to hide my embarrassed relief , ,'trrcint taken. " "Rightr" said Jack, "wer11 just sleep on it,
what happens."
and
see
"Sor" f said, a few dots later, "who or what, exactly, is Nel1yr and are all Nellies daft, or are they on a sliding scale of Nel1y lntelligence?" "A Nel1y is a Je1ly on its Belly watching Telly, " muttered Jack. "I'm asleepr" he added. "A sleep is a heap of creeping sheepr', I ventured, "too tired to leap across the fence between random speech and making sense.rl
Dots filled the holes of wet silence and dried tongues...there's three of them. I dreamt I was writingor possibly vice-versa- until it felt hours later. Dim lighL told me my eyes were open. CHAPTER 11
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CTIAPTER ]
1
Ttre morning sun cast its golden rays across the dew-lined daffodil fields, to the sound of scuffling padded feet and stretching wings as nature's nocturnes
settled
down and the
"What's the opposite of nocturnal?" I asked. "flrere isr.,t one," said Jack, picking his teeth. awakabillies non-nocturnes. day. pleasant no doubt very daysurfers set about their However, we were stuck in a cave at, the bottom of a long H"ay up. At least we were in a new chapter. "Hohr do you lanow it's a new chapter?" asked Jack. "f got tired of Chapter 10, it was nothing buL chaos." "I didn't see you writing Chapter 10, when did you do that?" "Last night," I said, stretching things. "1 couldn't sleep. " "How could you see?" "f couldn't! I just sort of felt along the paper," f grinned. "Bet it's a right mess!" he chuckled. "Let's have a look?" I pulled out my notebook and handed it to him. He shifted idly amongst the creased sheets, grunting and occasionally squirming. "'Sounds like having sex'-! Good grief, what kind of conversations were we having in that pub?" "f forget..." f said. "Quantity ones." "Well that's soap operas for you." He flicked on a page or two (or in your case iL could by now be any number of pages, depending on book size)(ttris tactic is called involving the reader, and if that's not involvational enough there's a phone call for you three doors dom on the left or up on the right depending which way you face run and mind that milk float as you work it out or it'll away with the spoons- get the drift? OK, keep it fed and watered and f I 11 get back to the cave situation plot development scene).
"What's this about a dandelion frenzy quadrant?"
asked.
he
"Oh, that shouldn't be there Yâ&#x201A;Źtr" I mr:rnbled. I grabbed the notebook back and shoved it into my bag. Jack raised his eyebrows and stood upr shaking his head.
"Not enough sunlight," hâ&#x201A;Ź said, probably to himself. He walked into the cdvâ&#x201A;Źr which overnight had stretched out and now lay losing its shadows, and disappeared into a wall; "HEY HEY HEY!" came back from it, in largre letters. Inside a thin crack to the ceiling up the cave wall on
the left r+as his extended arm. "In here! We've got some steps!" The daylight vanished with the riverberation as total dar]<ness returned to lead us up by our echoes. Curving upl'rards with our hesitant, bewildered feet, we gradually seemed to be a spiral ascended on what at first staircase. Ttren it continued to seem l-il<e that, as our progress grappled along concaves and arcs. We became di.zzy as we circled faster, the steps becoming more sharply defined and easier to deal with. Especially in the dark. I had Vincent Price leading me up with a leering beckoning finger; I had the river rising up from behind us, filling the cave and woe-betiding all over usi I had huge, separate feet working together by instinctive feel, encouraging each other to go ahead; f had Jackrs
erratic staccato ahead of me. "This is weirdr" I said. Clonk. "It gets weirder, toor" said Jack. "1 just hit my head on a- hold on-" There was a quick noise. "I think werre blocked off." Then a thump, and an echo with distance. "Sounds like wood!" f hissed. "I think it,'s a door." Jack's voice dropped a notch.
"Shh. "
heard the footsteps a split second before the voice, and both nearly fe1l over. "Somebody there, yBS, We
somebody there." woman's voice; it
It
was a
sounded
underused. fhe door made the sound of a yawning
frog as we regained
our
balance, and the face that launched a thousand bats poked a candle out at us. "Have some light." Then the door elosed in our blinking faces!
" f sguawked. Her muffled voice came back. "Just a question before-" "Who are you, ladY?" snaPPed Jack. "I'm Sarah, and T'm going to ask you a question before-" "Can we-?" began Jack; but her voice was sharper noll. "-before you can interrupt me again!" We were quiet. "OK, now then, why are you going uP?" We looked at each other for clues. I shrugged. "Only way to go?" I said; Jack stared at me. "Only way out of that caver" he muttered; then, turning towards the door, "Itrs the only way to go, out of that "Hang on!
cave ! "
There rras a snort. The door pulled back, revealing short, slightly benL old woman in a blanket, holding
a a
candle. Behind her were more steps. "On you go, thenr" she said. Something stopped us from asking further guestions. She shuffled off into a side shadow. I'We are meeting some
very odd people in this ravine ! " I said. "Did you ]crow she was there?" "How should f lsrow that? Yourre writing the damn thing ! " "You came down from Chapter 19r" T said, "I just wondered , you might have met her on the way..." "We11, she didn't remind me of anyone f've met before," he said, slowly. "f came down a different way." He stopped walking. "Irve never come across this ravine at all, actually. I mean, considering the size of it...you'd think it would stick out a mile." We carried on up, glad of the candle between us. "If it stuck out a miler" I said, "it would be a mountain." Shuffler clunk; f shunted some thoughts ]-ying ahead of me as we trudged up. "Tmagine living herer " I said.
"Use up a lot of candles," said Jack. "It was real-ly odd, meeting her." "hlhat was that question?" "Why are we going up, she said. Perhaps she likes it down there, and wanted some company. Wonder what she
eats?" "FiSh?" said Jack. Shuffle, clunk; "No, tco fast." "Chapter 10 was a real sidetrack off the mountain. " "And you're supposed to be showing me the way up!" he laughed.
'
r said, "why are we going up?" "sor" tr etts leave questions like that for the hr:ndredth t' rnonkey to answer, dh, we have another door. . . There was a handle on this onâ&#x201A;Źr but it didn't helP much. We knocked. rrl,ilhor s there?" Ttre very first
'lcnock lcrock' joke occurred on April Fool's nay, 1666. Due to the general state of t'he ci-ty of lcndon (rutt of disease-carrying ratsr and no plastic fast food containers l-ying around for them to choke on), people were in the habit of demanding visitors' full names, in case a disease-carrying stranger should enter their homes. on this particularly hot day, Charlie the Baker was inter:rupted during his mid-day bath by the sound of rapid )orockings at both his front and back doors. Making his way to the front door, he shouted 'Who's there?'. 'April!' came the voice of an out-of-work clolrm, in search of a party she could juggte her rats at. the 'April who?r, shouted Charlie, wondering what allyelled point voice a conunotion was out back. At which 'Your roof's on fire!'. 'April the Fool!' replied April the Fool, and Charlie laughed. 'Kids!' he said. Then he and most of Iondon burnt down. "fs that you, Sarah?" f said. T'he door opened. ft was. "f thought it might be you." She was holding her blanket this time, and looked less wintry. "Why are you
going up?"
"ft's the only way to go, we've already done thisr " "That was last time, why are you going up now?" Her eyes seemed to defocus, to the roof as it sloPed awaY rumbled Jack.
behind our heads. "Same reasonr" f said. "Think of another one," she sighed. It was suddenly as if she was very used to asking this question. "Werre going up because we're sick of all the madness down therâ&#x201A;Źr" 1 said. "Would you like a cup of tea?" she said.
yes!" we peal-ed. "So would f," she said. She motioned us through into what looked like a continuanee of the stairw-ay, and in fact was. And again she turned into a side cavity, behind "Oh
the door, and this time we thought of following; but the narrouness and absence of footfalls came a big second to the srnall but definite feeling of security induced by our
spiral route. "These stairs are spinning me out ! " said Jack. "I almost imagined a cup of tea just then!" "Did yours have sugar in it?" I asked, spoons appearing in the candle smoke. "ft had whisky in it." "fn tea?" "Aye, no sugar, no milk, just strong black tea with a shot of whisky in it." Ttrat's a very night-time drink, I thoughtr dnd felt like one of the Seven Dw-arves. "Norrr sugar and milkr,' I said, "is what you need in tga. "No, it's what you need in tear" said Jack. 'tAnyw'dlr if we had all we wanted, we wouldn't be in this place. Oh! That was quick!" We'd reached a third door. This time the handle worked, and as the door opened a be1l turned in its sleep. tt
"Teatime ! "
Sarah, beaming off a few wrinkles, stood a few feet away, with a cup in one hand, a saucer in the other, and steaming tea beckoning from both. There was a guick succession of glances. "Cup?" said Jack. "Saucer?" I replied.
ItJtrs tea, you idiots! One each before it gets cold!" She smiled. "f've only got this one cup, the cat uses the other one." The saucer was on my side. "Any port in a storm in a teacup," f said, and took an undertentative sJ-urp.
trOol
tt
this-?" began Jack. "fs rrJtrs got whisky in it. And sugar. And milkr" said Sarah. "f hope it's to your satisfactionr" she added, with a hint of sarcasm. "Thanks a lotr um, Sarahr" said Jack. "So who are you two? Travellers? Explorers? Or just lost?"
in a soap opera!" I said. 'We came into that ravine." t'Jtrs got a pub in it!" exclaimed Jack. "Tttere were these people in there, it was-" He shook his head. "We stayed in that cave." He paused. "We almost ended up
down
l 1
"Yes." Sarah turned away. "A lot of people go down that ladder. I put a sigrn up there warning them not to, it's a waste of time and energy." "Are we getting near the top of these stairs?" 1 asked. "That reminds me, " she said, "Why are you going up?" "Again?" I looked at Jack. "Your turn." "Ttlere was no tea down there, especially with whisky in
it!"
I
I \
i
He grinned. "You didn''t lctow
there was anything up here, l-et alone a cup of tea. No, not good enough." She folded her arms, "To get lo the top and back to the mountain, then, " he scowled.
"Try smiling when you say it, and no doubt it'll be a quicker, happier staircase all round!" She smiled, and pu1led a candle out from the front of her coat. "Right, then- oh! Your names! I forgot to ask, how rude of me!" We
introduced ourselves.
"Dick," said I. "Jockr " said Jack.
tea Dickie and Jock, the mouse ran up the clock!" she sdrrgr and left by the now entirely predictable gap next to the door. I was staring at'rrJockr? Since when have you been 'Jock' all of a "Whislqr
sudden? ! "
.l
I
\b
"Ah, yes, aha! There you have it, Holmes, f am revealed!" He leant back and lit the new candle, bringing his stubbled grin into fresh Iight, squinting. "My name is Jock. But it turned into 'Jack' one day, and it EucX." f waited. "1 put an'A' inside the rorrrr he said, with half a 1augh. "It vas cheaper than a tattoo." We started walking. "But not as permanentr " I said. "f mean, to everyone else yourre 'Jack', then to Sarah you revert to rJockt...tt this much. He paused, about "It was like meeting my grandmothefr" hâ&#x201A;Ź said, "cups of tea and candles, and that- formal introduction styl-e." "fn the face of strangeness we all lose our self images
a bit," I said. "We don't lose them, we just forget them." "Hard to forget your name, though." "J didnrtl't "You did! You forgot you were Jack, under pressure you dropped the A out of its circle and reverted to childhood ! "
,,you,ve got it, all this upward physical. momentum is causing gr;dual mental regression!" he said' his words picXing rp pac.. "Another fer+ spirals and I'11 be back in Lhe *omU,- a.rd then you'll have to carry both candfss, and anyw-ay you're just jealous 'cos I've got room for an A in my name and you haven't!" "Just call me tDackrr then!" ''DUCK !'' Then T hit my head on the roof' "T said 'Dac]<'!" tDuc]<!t"
said
"f We'd not noticed the stairs becoming gradually more compressed- perhaps Lhey hadn't been- but now we had to hunch over and semi-crawl as we reached the fourth door' ft
opened. C}IAPTER 12
on inr" said Sarah, "We've been expecting you"' I stopped rubbing my head and started shaxing it, b1inl<ing in the sudden burst of light,. Along the line of Sarah's outstretched hand we saw a row of fifteen seated stenographers tapping out messages coming in on their headphones. What was once no doubt a rather standard cave had been fitted out in late twentieth century pastelina plating and imitation Graveldt carpet. The room was lit as most rooms are and most caves aren't. "What did she put in that tea?" whispered Jack' Sarah was rooxing a lot younger. she bustled us into the room with the efficiency of an odd Situation Dealer, which was what she had written on her lapel badge' "We've got an odd situation developxnent scenario," she said. "Firstly, someone has left an lrrelevance lying about, and we had to get the guys in to help clear it up." She motioned towards the line of fixed heads and slaccato fingers. "They don't come cheap, either, this is going to cost a few extra pages before it's sorted out' ind they don't grow on-". She stopped herself, and stared at us. "And I had to get someone in to look after the "Come
cat.
tt
"This is nuts," I said. "What happened to the " "A11 in good timer" she said. "First we ha'/e to get this worked out."
staircase?
exactly is the probtem, lady?" said Jack. "Cal1 me Sarah, Jock. " "CaIl me Jack, Sarah." She looked confused. "What
"ftrs
a
short story." "OK- Jack," she said, "the problem concerns a certain
Dandelion Frenzy quadrantr
first heard of in Chapter 10."
"11, I think you'll findr" f said. "It came loose." "Ioose endings are bad enough! But loose beqinnings are bad practiee!" "Ttlere's no need to shoutr" f said. "Md what happened to the old lady get-up?" "It got up and left." She relaxed a little. "Everything seems older in candlelight." "So rstrat is all this?" asked Jack, staring at a grated cheese plant in the corner.
"This is,
apparentlyr
the
Plot
Development,
Corporation's finest team of researchers; they're finding out what a Dandelion Frenzy Quadrant is." "What are the headphones for?" f asked. "Ttrey're linked up to the next paragraph." She grabbed it from the nearest stenographer, whose naJne was Brian.* Dandelion Frenzy Quadrant
ar
crazy
for rapid dandelion growth Any space cont,aining floating dandelion seeds in excess of fifty per sq.ft. Original title for 'Gone With the Wind' Meeting place for the Lost Balloon Tracers of fdaho Area
"Well Lhere's a few choicesr" said Sarah. She checked the other fourteen sheets of notes she'd collected. "Al-1
the samer" she murmured. "Who are the Lost, Balloon Tracers of ldaho?" asked Jack. She shrugged. 'rwe have to pick one of these options to insert into the plot as soon as possible," she said, "Whatrs it to
be?"
still is.
"I thought this lot were supposed to be doing Lhe plot developmentr" f said, "let them work it out. Vierve got a mountain to get back up to! Where's the way out?" ',HoId on,', said Jack, turning to Sarah and tapping his forehead, "you said this dandelion thing was the first odd situation, did you not?', She smiled. I'Tl'latrs right. But r,re can't do much about the other one, as it's already happened, and it's a biggie. f don't, think we could've stopped it, probably one of those predestined events. Oh dearr" she said, seeing our bewilderment, ,,Jrm not being too cl.ear, am r? rt's that ravine and river you just got out of, it never used to be there at all
!
"
"f }olew it wasn,t there when f came downr', said Jack, "it must have been recently." "Tt1at's the odd thing abouL this," said Sarah, "it seems to have been there a long time, long enough for too many people to have gone down that ladder, and- shall we talk about this over a cup of tea?" CHAPTER 13
We were sat in Sarah's cErvâ&#x201A;Źrlr wondering which of us had the cat's cup. The cat-sitter, a young girl with long hair in a ribbon, had put the cat back, cleared uo a pot of spilt, paint, apologised and left. "f rneanr" continued Sarah, ,,that's why I had that rope put there. f suppose it's too dangerous...everyone heads down the ladder an1rwa]r as if that was the only other choice. T'ttere are plenty of ways to go up a mountainl But put two choices in front of people, and they tend not to look for a third or fourth. I got to asking them why they were going up, as f did with you; and do you lcrow, nobody seems to have griven it any thought!" "We11, it seemed so obviousr" f said, "up is up, and positive, and down, wel1, down is dowwvlwwwn, isn,t it?" Power of the word? This one indeed Cuts mightier than the sword! you need A shot of Upness mighty fast When Mr. Down comes storming past!
He pulls instead of pushing He has less pleasant chords He scares you from further enquiry He redefines 'towards' When he exhales, we start to gasp Undo the clasp and raise the sword
Yet the pen is mightier- there again, fhe word is mightier than the pen!
"Md we had to get ouL of that raviner" said Jack. "Yet you st,ill, go, down!" laughed Sarah, standing up. "Everyone says 'I,et's go up this mountainr, then half of them go headlong down that ladder as if they had no choice ! "
"It di.dn't seem like we had much choice at the timer" I said, ruefully. "What about the other half?" asked Jack. "We11, I haven't met them. When f say rhalf ', f 'm being optimistic." She sighed. "What is it about human nature that makes people forget their intentions so quickly?" ttltrs not human naturer " f said, "just nature, especially the sort that scares you into giving undivided attention to the idea of staying alive." She folded her arms. "But you stil1 went downr" she said.
"ft was, at the time, the only way forw-ardr" T said. "Even if it wasn't upr it was some sort of progress." "We had to keep going," said Jack. "Talking of
which...
"
"Yes, of course." She pulled open a door. "Here we are...it"s not my proper ladder," she grinned, "it's my step-1-adder." Giggling, she set it up in the centre of the room, underneath a trap door. Just then, one of the stenographers poked his head around the cavery entrance. "You haven't seen a yel1ow balloon on your travels, have you?" "Did it have a piece of string tied to it?" asked Jack. ttYgs !tt
"No, we haven't.t' "Oh. Sorry to bother you." He 1eft. "We11, we1lr" said Sarah. He came back in.
"Oh yes! We just traced the ravine back to a crack in the storyline, somewhere in the Chapter 4 area, sonre kind of local chaos theory expansion, time distortion, the whole works, itrs n-" "C,ood!" clapped Sarah, "Keep working at it, T'11 be in in a minute." "Yes, er, we're just having a meeting actuallyr ah-" "Meeting2"
"Yup. Sort of a guy thing. Business. You could say the balloon's gone upr uhr we need to talk it over, interface our options, },,h:tow, shouldn't take long..." He left again. Sarah winced. "strange bunch." She turned back to us. "OK, up there is a mountain to climb! Keep it, y']<now, up! " We thanked her, and climbed up the ladder and through the trap door, dislodging a layer of dirt. rrohttr f called back down, "What about the dandelion frenzy quadrant?" "Oh f think they've got that covered...'bye!" CHAPTER 14
"Jaek? " Where was he now?
fr1I tell you (f've read back a bit)lying face flat out peering into a crack in the storyline. f picked up a srnall stone. "T think we're nearty in Chapter 4- hang on!" He stood up, looking panicked. I put the stone in my pocket. "What are you looking at?" I asked. "That crack in the storyl-ine, it's the point where that ravine goL created! Something happened, right here in
he was
Chapter 4! " f looked up. "But
this is
14!"
"Same place, just, ten chapters older, don't you recognise iL?" f looked around. "But there's no scenery!" "Exactly! ft's the onJ-y chapter with no scenery in it!
Let's carefully geL to the next one, and don't displace anything ! "
CHAPTER 15
Daylight ! People moan, uOh, the sun's gone in," but sti1l wear sunglasses when it's out. It's a see-sawi.ng double standard when it comes to sunlight, and one that clouds particularly resent as they pass through the rays above. Being simultaneously referred to as Nimbus, Cumulus and other such antiquated* names (and there being a quantlty
of weather forecasters on the planet, this can be conrnonplace) often leads to strrcntaneous thunderstorms, isolated showersr â&#x201A;Źtc.** So it just goes to show that if you put dorvn the weather, it'll put down on you. Weather. You like it, or not. Weather. It likes you, or not. Right nohr we are in the glorious rays as they pour through the curious eloud, the brash breeze is waking up my face, the nyaghk! "You say something?"
"Flies! All over the place!"
"Those are gnatsr" said Jack.
"f missed the labelling session." T walked over to where Jack was sat on a rock, rubbing his kr:lees. "They still f1y in your face, whatever you call them. " He smiled. "I can hear them all now, rfhose clumsy lumps, always taking up all the room!'. We're like mobile mountains to them...if they couldn't fly in our faces they'd have to cli-mb up them...our hair would be full of fLy flags! Be glad they stay in the air and arenrt the settling do'wn types !" I looked at the gnat tangos taking place. "Ttrey just f1y around each otherr" f said. "You'd think they'd qet tired out. " * F-theIatln I Jusi l@ked it up, ln latln, ytllct is Frerch for 'the tin. uhtch reans I dldn,t, (1@k tt. up) reans
**
FEople rtlo blarE reaLher foreasters for ruining Ltpi trclldays are mtlrely justifled. there are sm forecasters Hho call clads ,Câ&#x201A;Źrald:, ,Marjorie', ,Sareor', and so 7.* m, but they can't geU ttE Jobs. those who do get Lhe jobs becffi gawL, pale creatures utD haren,t had a drent hollday in ysrs.
"Too light for gravity to make any difference: flying around each other is just like sitting in a waiting room, really. .. " "Run that one over ;ny head again?" "fn rapid timer of course. I mean, they only live for a c-ouple of days; imagine a lifetime that lasts two days, everything has to happen that's going to happenr so it
has to happen at a speed we can't detect."
"Where did the waiting room fit
into all this?" I
asked, feeling a bit giddy. "ff you sped up all the ins and outs of different people in a waiting room over a l-ifetime of seventy years to fit into two days, you'd have a gnat's view of lifelots of short lives flying about in a small space." We were on the edge of some trees, dt around mid-day. The instant coolness as we slid into the brown shadows gave them a feel of old furniture in a shed. The smell was of brushes gathering dust in a eupboard; leaves had long left any life behind as they bristled at our feet. The trees held their air so tight it couldn,t move; an occasional hurried bird was the only relief from the }motted silence. Soon the sun was a distant bulb above usr and the receding view was beginning to look small and flat, like a postcard. We were following a line that shoel-aced between trees when we came across an o1d boot. I picked it up. "Funny how you never find the other onâ&#x201A;Źr I' said Jack. f gtrunLed. "You la:ow; you only ever find the one of them, it's one of those odd things." "Almost as odd as finding a note inside it, " f said, unfolding a dry browned sheet, of paper.
rr I said, "This must mean that the boot that's always found first is still about here somewhere!,' But it trasn't. After stopping that long, r,re were totally 1ost, as opposed to trusting some instinct or even just following each other's noses, so T swung the boot round a few times and 1et go: 'twe I 11 qo that way ! " It bounced of f the nearest tree. So we went that r+-ay! rr
I,
I
ti
4-5W.<
CHAPTERS
16 +
17
The thin trees thinned, the sun turned up the volume of daylit activity,and here we were on the edge of a 1ake. To our right the trees were dwarfed by a series of vast stone towers, that had melted into each other like candles. From there to our left the lake was surrounded by green slopes, nudging for space and sharing shadows. Spilt stone fractures piled up at viewpoints on the slow journey down. It was an awesome sightr so we awed a while, the tiredness of our feet awoken to the attention demanded by exbreme slow motion. A swan flew past. ,'That was no swanr', said Jack, "That was a seagiull."
"Seag-u1ls are all flaps and screechesr" I said. "That was definitely a swan." "No need to get, in a pickle about it," he muttered. "f 'm not in a pickleT f 'm just saying! Seagulls don't have long necks!" "But swans fty in twos and threesr" said Jack, counting out five fingers into the air, "and that was one seagull, and it was too far away to see necksr dndr we1l, there you go. " Ttlen we stopped flapping and screeching, and did considerably good impressions of sl/ans. The ricochet of a sunlit, day The echo-co of the H2O The thrill instilled by all things sti11 As less goes rushing and more lets go
"You are spa.ced out!" said Jack, as we sat- wel1, here we are, sitting!- by this vast vista of rrariety of food has become a central point of concern for the fridge
health and saliwa sguad homing in on the digestive traction engine steam pudding "You're right," f said, blinkingr "too much walking and not enough food.'r We were sat on a pile of ambivalent rocks (too large to eat all in one go, and too smal1 to really fill you up) after the afternoon's steady ascent on a staggered series of paths through the trees and along the green slopes. It had what been what fit people call 'a good climb'. We had 1itt1e breath left to call it anything.
"Way above it nowl, I said. We stared down at the water. "We should have taken more time over it, " said Jack, "savoured the waIk.,' "f don't see why savouring always has to be such a slow processr" f said. "Walking provides a longer flavour to savour when you,ve got where you,re going, anyway. Constantly stopping would've meant less time up here." "But why stop now instead of ten minutes ago?" 'rIt seemed a good idea? If it had been ten minutes ago, you'd have said the same Lhing," f said, flatly. "f did say 'let's stop for a bit' quite a few times, you lcrow." f turned to face him. "We did stop. " "Only long enough to 1et the tea out!" "Which is why I presumed you didn't want to stay any longer ! " "Why didn't you want to stay any longer?" "Ttre view's better up here, out of the trees." I nodded towards the lake. "Well if we moved up therer" he 1rcinted, "it'11 be even better, and f can get off these rocks.,' "So now you don't vant to stay longrer than it takes to
recycle tea "We just
!
"
" he said, qetting up, "and now f tr)ee. " "Again? We only had two cups of tea!" have,
"with whisky in it rrSO?[
need to
! ,'
"ft sends adrenalin to the bladder!" "It does not!" "ft does too, and then we'll head up there where it's a bit sheltered and grassfr and eat something." "Yes!" I yelIed, ttIIll bring the spoons!" 'tJrll ring for a chair or two!" He stood up and put his fist to his ear. "Hello? Yes, f'd like a table for two chairs and a large plate of lake, please." He looked at his feet. "Ahr I see. No matter....sorry?" He looked up again. "You do have matter? OK thenr we'l-l have some of that. Could you put sorâ&#x201A;Ź lake over it? ft's been rather a dry day. See you in ten minutes." He flung some air over his shoulder and turned to me with a grin. "well they've certainly gone up in the world since last time! We were lucky to get a seat!"
"They answered the phone pretty sharpishr" f said, "ft doesn't sound like theyrre very busy at all!" "Can't have the phone making a lot of noise and disturbing the customers," he beamed. ('And whislqr,' I thought). "Anyhow, we're OK, there's a free space with a good view, and we've got matter with lake for tea." f smiled. "furd what exactly is 'matter with lake'?" "Nothing matter with lake," he intoned with a mock frown, "Lake oK. we stay here, we eat rocks, we get too heavy to move. We go there, lre eat-"-he paused slightly-"and we stop walking." f laughed. "Ring back for a couchr" f said, nudging him onwards, "so you can 1ie on it." "Tt all beganr" he said, "at the age of Birmingham..." "What did?', "The M6. t' We paced at a
lit, a fire.
rate of interest to a sheltered spot,
and
"Have you got any matches left?" f asked, reading the empty box. The average contents should've been 43 matches. This seemed rather a precise figiure; wouldn't they have had to count them to be sure the average hadn't gone up or down a bit? And surely the average amount in a box of matches oceurs when about half of them have been used up...but they'd never fit 86 matches into this little box.."Have you got any matches left!'/" "No, " said Jack, "f just rubbed two boy scouts together, what do you think?,' With the fire going, and the sun going down, we got a meal going. A11 guite
hectic, really!
A seagiull stopped nearby, at a rock pool fed from a solitary spring that disappeared into the ground as unannounced as it had arrived, some three feet and a guench-bench later. It provided Jack with an essent,ial ingredient for a panful of porridge. rOats cuisine' he called it. "Nicer" I said, and tried to mean it. Porridge is an acquired taste. This stuff had acguired the taste of seagnrll d*9, if youlve never had the savoury orperience of seagull dung, then the analogy is rather wasted, but f can assure you it's like eating old yognrrt cartonsr dDd if you've never- wel1r /ou get the picture, and it's not the Mona Lisa. Tf Da Vinci had used this porridge instead of paint, Mona Lisa would,ve looked like it tasted. But, like cement, it was fil_ling.
We stared down at the 1ake, its movement almost infinitesimal, yet magnetic. After a while of hearing stomachs fill their pockets, we refl-ected aloud on the past couple of days. The ravine, nettles, rabbits, the pub, the cave, Sarah, that boot! seagrulls, swans and the long climb. With its colourful peopLe, and their voices still ringing in our heads, the nremories of the pub and TV crew took up a 1ot of debate and amusement between us"ft seemsr rlowr even more unreal than when we were therer" said Jack. "Yet it's such a strong memorlr" I said. "That|s because it stands out amongst a lot of realexperience and activity as totally unreal. And
essentialiy worthl€ssr, he added. It was the tethered end of twilight when I pulled out
my notebook and wrote
this:
fn a few years, when television has been replaced by virtual reality body-coms and skin will have turned grey from the gradual avoidance of daylightr some corporate consumer intel-ligence unit will re-market television as 'Actual Reality'. With this novelty advertised on the VR discs- 'With Actual Reality You Are Free! Free to Put the Kettle On, Answer the Telefon, Sit or Lie in Any Position, and! You Can Watch it With Somebody Else!- it will gradually outsell and outdate VR, and TV will return to dominate attention. But as skin regains colour and daylight loses its glare in a shower of outside shades, it, too will gradually be replaced, by actual reality. Without the capitals.
"I guess you have to go down to come up again," I said. Jack looked over. "What goes up must come down." "Approximately a difference therer but f couldn't guess what it is." "I s€€rrt said Jack, shaking his head; so f guessed anlrway.
"It's the same amount of difference as there is between you saying that and shaking your head at the same time, " I said. "No, that's a contradictory difference, the up and dorrn one is directional and less inunediate."
"There,S no difference at d11," I said, after a guick glance round, "between the alnounts of difference in contradictory and directional differences, I mean, a
contradiction creates two directions, and opposite directions create a contradiction. " "f s€€rrr said Jack, shaking his head, then rapidly nodding it, "except the pictures are getting rather fuzzy here! Perhaps the irmnediacy is the source of differencei a shake of the head is a much more momentary and real thing, whereas all these ups and dovns are abstractions, not baseC in time." "Wellr" f said, "f reckon the ups and downs are just as real, and the contradictory lcehaviour of a Scottish lunati-c just as abstract, as each other!" "But there's still that difference in time taken, that momentaril€ssr or lack of it." "How long is a moment?" T mused. "How long is a piece of string?" he added. "As long as it takes..." "As long as I'm around to see it..." "As long as you don't te1l anybody..." "About 23 yards." "Or a long wait at the bus stopr" f shrugged. It made little difference. f r,ras bored. most stimulating the Boredom can strike in environments, f mean, there we were, watching streaks of moonlight dispersing across the lake like epileptic caterpillars, and all we could talk about was, weIl, not a lot! Abstractions, linguistics, logic, the stuff of feeling stuffed and yet sti11 hungry. "More porridge?" asked Jack.
"I'm boredr" f said. "Well don't come crying to and there's no food left."
"Chips?" "How can you get bored?" he
me
when the chips are
down
said, ri1ed. "I jusL looked into an empty space and there it wasn't," I said, getting up. "Where are you going?" "Nowhere. We just got here." "Aye, only justr too! Feel lucl<y we're not in a cave!" "Probably just tired," f said, feeling stupid. "Boredom is your brain's way of telling you the body wants to go to sleep, or do something different."
"Oh
the body's OK, it's the brain that needs a restr" f
said, stretching. "Anyw-ay,
what's wronq with my porridge?"
I grinned. "It has the essence of uniguenessr" I said, pointing upwards, "combined with the sustenance of a thousand light meals; it could single-handedly remove internal warts and has the potential to gain a cult following; whole new branches of culinary science-" "Shut up! " "Can f have the recipe?" trDontt patronise me!" "You are the most unpatronisable person I've ever met, and I mean that from the heart of my bottomr" I said, avoiding most of a small shower of stones. We threw a few more stones and insults, stopped when it got too dark, and fe1l asleep by the fire, completel-y. CHAPTER 18
"f had a rea11y weird dream last nightr" said Jack. "Write me a letter about itr" I groaned, picking at my teeth. "f was a really small kid, and this naked nurse with huge breasts was smacking me with a Bible! Weird, eh?" He beamed. Oh dear oh dear.
"Actua11y, Jack- have you read any Freud?" "No. My good?" ',Iht, we11, he wrote a lot of stuff about dreams and what they mean, and if I remember rightly, letrs see..."
f shuffled my legs together. "Ttle sma1l kid has an element of everyday necessities about it, the nurse- hm, a naked nurse- a mixture of blue and green in that-" "Green?"
"Apparently, yes, green means nakedr" I said, sucking my gums. "Andr" I continued, "the largeness of the
i la indicator, size a plenty-of-it-in-abundance, the smacking denotes-" "Plenty of what?" "Unn[n...the everyday necessiLies, T orpect; the smacking denotes a strong taste or smell; and the Bible,
Uieasts, that's
that's either fear, control, or complex! "
good
old religious guilt
"Like he1I it is ! " "We11, thank heaven for that, eh? But it just goes to show, all those underlying meaninqs." "So, " said Jael<, "what did you dream about?" "Me? Oh it was whacl<y! There were these huge piles of clothesr sorted into different colours, loads of them'
and we have to wear all the clothes in the pile of our choice, I got the green pile...everyone wanted the blue pi1e, 'cause it was the nearest, I mean, we're talking huge in real terms of massive bigness here ("Get on with it," said Jack) but there's no socks! So no-one wants to go first rcause all our feet really stinx and we a1l ]gtow it... "
"Then what happened?" "That's it." I shrugged. "ft seems to me, Watsonr" he said, pulling on his chin, "that we have here a classic case of dormant psychosexual womb-climbing exacerbated by repressed exhibitionism and pseudo-rel igious self-oppression ! ', "hlhere on earth did you get that from?" "f read it in a bookr" he smiled. 'roh well there you go!" I said. "Now, if you'd heard it from a bloke down the pub the other night-" I paused for effect. There Hasn't any. "Yes?" prompted Jack.
mean, you could say that sort of "WeIl...f psycho-jargon about anything! That's how psychiatrists get paid more thanl sdfr workers on oi1 rigs." "For doing much the same thing," said Jack. "What, drilling for oil?,' "FIrl7" he nodded. "Drilling for That Which Lies Beneath the Surface...then refining the crude to fuel the thought trains with costly standards of living with what yourre
like. " Jaek was in fuII flow, my teeth were bugging me. Something flew past. "...soon as it gets labelled and packagâ&#x201A;Źdr" he looked up, "it gets taken for granted, it qets more expensive, and before you know it whole societies are struggling to remember life without it." "What, oil?" "Oi1, psyehoanalysis, television, the whole western world routine that worships the weekend and- ha!- would rather trust the words of a book than a bloke down the pub the other night."
it;
f
was more avake now. "That's a c1ich6, and you lcrow how reliable is the bloke with no name? Who probably
got his idea from a book in the first place." "Or TVr " said Jack. We were both standing now, unaware of the evolutionary link between clothing and tower blocks. "O.r7" he continued, "aDy other of the variety of artificial information sources that have detracted from, if not completel-y nul-lified, the art of conversation and the importance of people as carriers of ideas and truth." "Truth!" f shook my head. "There are only ideas; truth can occur if enough people agree on the same idea, but it
vanishes when another one comes along!" "That's not truer" said Jack. "No, it's an idear " f said. "e.E.D.'l "Piffle! Truth is the basis for a bunch of ideas, that may clash on the surface, but stem from the same sourcei
ideas arenrt the basis for anything except distorted representations of the truth. Ttre ideas keep cJ_ashing because this world is so geared to the physical and material. Everyone wastes their time comparing and fighting over differences that basically woutdn't exist but for the social pressure to conform to hierarchies based on ok/nership and control .,, He paused. I leapt in. "Exactly an example of what f'm saying; any truth in the idea that a society functions best in controlled layers is blown ard.ay by the idea that everyone can and should funct.ion equally, sor you end up with two ideas, and to say one is true but the other isn't wipes ouL the notion of truth being a universal, er, thing. And as for ideas coming from truth instead of the other way round, T'd agree, except that meansthat everyone who had an idea would recognise where it came from, would then ]arow what truth is, and would therefore guit argruing about it, and everything else.tl "Wellr" said Jack, "f reckon there was a lot more understanding of it when the ideas it produced didn,t get distorted for profit and social engineering." We started walking again. ft seemed a good idea. "Did you lcrow that a litre of bottled water costs more than a litre of petrol?" f asked. "fs that right?" said Jack, his eyes up ahead. "No, it's not right at all. But it's true""
CHAPTER 19
"f went down to the sea with this lassie oncer" said Jack, pulling out his pipe for the second time in as many mentions. I mention it again here, because for the first time he was actually smoking something in it, instead of waving it about like a weatherman. We were on the edge of saying goodbye to the huge view of the lake in its green basket, and in the tinre to $noke a pipe Elwdlr we'd be saying a t,imid hel1o to a return to being positioned at the bottom of a height, rather than here at the top of a view... Sometimes descriptions cannot quite make it through the view and into words. f mean, come orlr 'green basket'? Some of you will recall the notorious trial where Sir Les Eesmoore, the discoverer of the evolutionary link between clothing and tower bl-ocks, had described the 3000-storey Yonk Theatre as a 'large ice-cream', was subsequently found guilty of abstactivism*r drrd had his poetic licence removed, shredded and served up with his hat for breakfast... L. FUNCTION REPORT ,/ P3 At thr'ee fifteen second intenrals during his meal the prisoner was heard to recite the followinq:'Tf you say '1'11 eat my hat' don't keep it on your head until hats taste like bananas f'11 wear a cake instead.' EESMOORE,
t brd Crln mtu tl, tu hE. tuD in
lntrdld tutry !b llE o( !b Gnt Blg ftiry, b dt th rlltq I.nd6 rrrtr. Fr6 tu htn!.
!ld? or
( Dfor. !b crcr Btq ftiry, E Eny Fl.ntr Erc blB rslld lht th. anfrr! b tu ot. $ lby ffidd up th lmtntnq anmr. and pL th tn -tErtd Blg fttry. tun p bd !o Or-l W.m up ud e&r 1or! o! Ws.tim! ln order -tb h Et m._ol tb.mr. rhy M tn.Ek. tu cMt Alg frl.E r;E ofltctauy rm r. 'h hl.nr,. br6citvt.r! ,6tnt of M Retum,, @ld !Iq!n tx nriil f,1n.,, b rh .nmrr otry ot *r. *omr.t., try I!_!l_Y='r! tb cut dlrnlld Etq rra, rnJ "na TL Erâ&#x201A;Ź md!. hr."nam o* pttnr, E slch tn th dc, dc. *c.) "il"i"i "
...and some of you wonrt. It'll be the green baskeL of Wednesday afternoon shopping instead, or will have flowers drooping over its edge on a hot pier; and it would be a lot easier to 1et you picture your or.,n scenei but to avoid Sir T-es' uneasy fate (he u"as lorighted for inventing a banana-flavoured hatr but Later stoned to death by a gang of fringe milliner activists), here it is in a poem. Almost. Here are the slopes
At
that
shed
random onto winding paths
their
stones
That on three sides a lake enclose That waits...until a draught Of wind creates a ripple, and Across the slopes the hiss vibrates As water turns the rocks to sand
"This is why people travel in pairsr" f said. "What is?" "ltnowing someone else has seen the same things. " "T'hat is one hel1 of a postcard you're writing!,' We
circle
round horizons
Md pass on what werve found Some said they heard the mountain roar And others, not a sound
f'd almost found the shade of ThaL could be written down f'd almost found the sound of
green waves
That could be read aloud
to reciprocate fhe feelings to the things that make Us feel so srna11 and they so great Will disappear as we relate Ourselves to all of It The struggle
"So, teIl me about this coastal caper!" f said, as settled down with his pipe. rrIIl1?
he
rr
"You said you went dovn
to the
sea
with a lassie
once.rl
"Oh aye, it was wonderful! The openness, the unity, the feeling of being totally linked up, the excitement-" "Yeah, r love the sear" I said. "Eh? Oh no, that was me and her!" He drel'r again on his pipe. 'rTtre passion, the intensity, the mental and elemental fusion of liquid and so1id..." r chuckled. "So who was this wild and wonderful woman?" He looked at me. "What? f'm talking about the sea!" "Oh! Right." f Looked right, wary of Chapter 20. "We11, probabJ-yr" he added, and passed me his Pipe, grinning. ,'ft was a 1ot of fun." "Yes, f remember the postcard."
"What postcard?,'
"Exactly.
"
"Ahr they're too srna1l. Better to wait 'ti1 you get back. " He looked round. "You got something wrong with your teeth?" trOh,rt T said, feeling for gaps and edges with my finger, "No. Just a routine check up for any porridge left over. f thought I might have it stuffed and mounted. "
"Yourve been messing about with your teeth all day." "Nnnn, they're all therer" r glurked. And then r+e had a long detailed exchange of dental horror stories, in rm:ch the same style as people rambling on about last night's 'weird' dreams, teeth and dreams being two areas of eomplete disinterest to anyone other than the person involved, whilst retaining enough potential interest to
spark off all and sundry once the subject has been brought up. Ttrerefore, just as James Bond never goes to the toilet, this book wilt be omitt,ing references to teeth and dreams. From now on. Ahem. Then it was time to move on. We sat, thinking it would be rrice to sLay a bit longer, and absorbed guietly. Silence is the absence of listening guiet is a noise far away Peace is a place in slow motion Where humans just geL in the way We've all got, a place that we go to And respect it enough not to stay C}{AFrIER 20
whoa. dannit
CHAPTER 20
It had been easy to imagine we'd made it to the top of the mountain, looking around and down into Chapter 19, but no. Not guite. TLre path 1ed us into a second ravine. This tinre the cliff to the right had crumbled its outer defences under the sheer visual weight of its opposite,s vertical strength, leaving a mountain range in miniature for us to clamber over. "ft could be worser" said Jack, as we surveyed the heights and u-aited for an easy route to present itself. "ft could be better thoughr" I said. "Ah, don't be such a defeatist!" rrJ 'm not ! It, could be better ! f mean, it's not a problem, jusb a bunch of rocks blocking a casual strol1, and it beats wobbling alongside a torrential river at
night-" "Exactly!" cried Jack, "ft could be worse!" "But it's not! Now who's being defeatist?" One of the greatest human inconsistencies is that of taking previous experience, calling it liorowledge, and applying it to the unlc:own. After enough time spent operating in this fashion, humans become incapable of let.ting go of their rlcrowledge' in order to let their instincts take control of unl<rrorvn situations, and lose the endless range of opportunities to increase their orperience, due to hesitation, prevarication and pride. There we lrere, waiting, lazed out by smooth slopes and more watered down than invigorated by the distance of the lake, when a rabbit shot pastr paused for a secondr dnd bounced right up and away across the boulders before us. Fo11ow that rabbit! "so thi.s is it." "Ttris is it."
rabbit had gone was anyone's guess. Beyond the adrenalin leaps over the gaps and the crooked jumps between unequal heights of stone- much like the way a sma11 child discovers what a piano sounds like- w-as a gap beyond leaping, where adrenalin became awe, a height frorn which no jump could repeat itself. On either side the tower rocks housed us in, and we could go no further. Where the
Below dwarfed above,
yet this
new sense
of finality held
the taunt of failure. "What a viewr " whispered Jack. "You should lcrowr" I said. He looked at me. "Howt s that?" "This is where we last met- isn't it?" 'rwe last met at the bottom of this...mountain. "
smited.
"But you'd just, "So had you.,, "f had things
come down from
He
here, right?"
to do."
"What, like turn round and come straight back up again?" he laughed. "Actuallyr" I said, after a long-distance gaze that couldn't put the view down, "I don't remember beinq here
before. . . " t'Jtrs
an aberration that comes with such a massive " said Jack, "the bigger it is the less detailed it gets, until it becomes a sensation of distance, rather than a solid picture for the menory to hanq on its wa11." "I don't think f'd have forgotten this distance. You can see all the way down!" "And all the vay up again!" "Almost. " f stared up at the impassive weight of unscalable heights on either side. "f just don't reca11 this feeling of- reaching the end,' there must be a path view,
somewhere. " ,vltly?,r
"'eause we've not reached the top!" "You real1y are on edge," chuckled Jack. "Iook, rememlcer back there, above that lake, how it felt really ron top of the worldr?,' "Yes, but-" "Wasn't it the best place to be?" "But there's stilI further to go!" "But we just did go further. And this is what 'further' looks like; the view is wider and deeper, but it's not as comfortable, because in any other direction we're closed in by rocksr drrd we haven't got the ehoice of where to go next anymore. Once you can't go any further..." "You have to go back." A seagull drifted past. "Or grow
wings. "
"Or stay.
"
wel1r we did stay, for ages- but, we1l, you just don't. Everywhere"has its natural longevityr dild we merely sit down with it for a whil-e. You can be part of where you gto, but you can't be all of it,. We crabbed back over the rocks, and looked out over the lake again. It was like a favourite meal waiting to be But.-
eaten. CHAPTER 19
,'You seâ&#x201A;Źrrr said Jack, "sometimes you any further."
don't need to
go
"Yesr" f smiled, "but you wouldnrt lalow that unless you'd done it." We were guiet for a while, long enough for another seagull- to swish past. "Another seagrull!" exclaimed Jack. "What are they all doing up here?" "Probably wondering the same about us! Anyw-ay, it's a good place to be." "But it's nowhere near the sear /'know? "Perhaps
they're
slqrgulLs ! "
"Are you still rrriting those trrcstcards?" Jack vatching, ticf ticr ti_ck. "Ho1d on, nearly finished. Then ve can go.''
was
IGO?,r
"Back dovn. "
catch up. " Jack stayed behind fot a while. He said he prefers to go dorcn by himself, and come up with someone else' As I started lualkinqr it @an to make sense. 'lJ t 11
!'Hâ&#x201A;Ź}rr Jack?'r ItDonrt ask! tt 'rOK! See you there!" "Hang on! What was the guestion?" he called. 'rlr11 send it on a postcard!" I left him with a smil-e on his face, and headed off doi+n the mountain' But that's
another story.