Dispossession (14 page)

Which is, of course, promptly etched to nothing by acid
reality, the next time I consider Luke.

o0o

Of his own kindness, then, or else prodded by some power or
principality of indeterminate intent, a man who had been seemingly catching up
on the sports results two benches down—though I thought in honesty he’d just
been absorbing sunlight as I was, practising photosynthesis for the next
life—stood up, walked over and offered me his paper.

“Looks like you’re settled for the day there, son,”—he was
American, of course; catch a Brit being so offhandedly open-handed with a
stranger—“you might as well have the benefit of this, if you want it.”

As cover, he meant, as he’d been using it himself. Perhaps
he meant as more literal cover, perhaps he was saying
get your head down, put this over your face and have a
snooze
, if Americans talk about snoozing. Whatever, I took the paper
with as good a smile as I could manage through my all-too-British startlement
and a stammer of thanks, too late; he was five metres down the path already and
didn’t bother to look around to acknowledge it, only made a vague gesture with
one hand to suggest that he had heard, but that his offer was too commonplace
to merit even a token gratitude.

Well, now I really didn’t have to move. Only a tabloid, but
it could still take me an hour to read; and maybe some subconscious process
would have made a decision for me by the time I reached the back-page cartoon,
maybe I’d have figured out what to do or where to go...

I read the headline, a 40-point
SLEAZE SENSATION ROCKS CABINET
, then checked out
the pictures on the front page: politicos scuttling down Downing St, gazing at
their crabwise-shuffling feet to avoid catching the eye of the camera; and
then, boxed off from that story, the picture of a great tree falling. And
beside it a lesser headline, triple-stacked:
COLBURNE
VALLEY PROTESTORS: ‘WE’LL BE BACK!’

Which was the gift, the sending, the forefinger of fate—or
angel or devil, whatever, if it wasn’t sheer coincidence or chance—nudging me
when I seemed not to be quite on track.

o0o

What did I know from Colburne Valley? Fuck nothing except
the one thing, I didn’t even know where it was; but that didn’t matter. I didn’t
have to go there. It was a trigger, that was all, gifted or sent or whatever,
and it fired me like a slow bullet—a dumdum blond, call me, soft head and
all—from the tunnel of my depression as if it were the barrel of a long gun. No
great speed, but a deal of distance.

Except of course that this bullet had to provide its own
propellant. I was up on my feet already and moving as best I could, heading for
town again as fast as my aching legs would carry me; but that was neither fast
nor far, and nowhere near enough. And my Volvo was God alone knew where, but
nowhere near me; and its substitute the MR2 must be a write-off, even if I had
any sense of its possession, which I didn’t; and there wasn’t any way to get
where I was going, other than by car. Well, there was, but not for me. A
succession of buses I guess I could have managed, if I could only get money for
the fares, but not the climb after. This current walking was almost too much,
and this was downhill all the way.

Like so much else
, I thought,
smirking, loving the pun,
like my life,
suddenly...
But that wasn’t true, or not necessarily true. At least I
had a target now, something to shoot at; and that brought its own focus by
definition, I wasn’t careering blindly any more.

More puns threatening there, more disturbing to me. If a man
is a composite of his parts there were fundamentally two things that defined
me, my career and Carol, and both of those were seemingly gone now.

So don’t think about it now. One foot in front of the
other, think about that, it’s getting harder...

Which it was. I was sweating and breathing fast, driving
against my body’s reluctance and clamping my mind against its tendency to spin.
Never mind my job or my love life, I focused by necessity on my feet.

Step by step, and all too aware of each one of them, I made
my way into the city centre. Found where I was aiming for, stepped up from the
street, pushed the glass door open; and even as I was walking in I was thinking
this was maybe not such a bright idea.

I needed a car; I’d come to a car-hire company, first I
could think of. So far so good.

So here I was walking into this nice smart expensive
polished shopfront, asking to hire one of their nice smart expensive polished
vehicles; and me with my face all scabby and unshaven today, the skin still
puffy and yellow from fading bruises and the sweat of effort like a sheen
across my brow, moving strangely because it was getting harder and harder to
drag the weight of my bones against the deep weariness and the deeper hurt,
looking in short like I’d been living the life that Carol had recommended to
me. Thank God the boozers weren’t open, or I’d have had the smell of beer
hanging over me like a garnish, just to make the unlikely impossible. Even
without that, I still must look like a street-stricken wino in borrowed finery,
because the clothes on my back might be clean but they all too clearly didn’t
fit well enough to be my own.

Too late to check now, though, too late to back away. The
clerk behind the counter was already watching me with interest; and I might
have lost everything that defined me to myself but it seemed that I still had
some pride, unless it was sheer bloody stubbornness instead.

Whichever, I walked boldly in where no man of my description
had walked before...

Walked? Shuffled, more like. Waddled, maybe. My legs wouldn’t
stride, and my bare feet in those deck shoes conformed to someone else’s
bunions were already beginning to blister. If I wanted to walk without
wincing—which I did, most definitely—then I had to go flat-footed and with
care, leaning at curious angles to shift my weight.

All in all I was a procession in my own right, and something
of a sad one. I watched the clerk struggle with a smirk that would rise despite
his training, and felt a flush of anger in response.

Good. Use it. Apologetic would be the worst thing, just
now...

I leaned a little on the counter when at last I got there,
glad of its good support after that long stretch on my feet, and this last
couple of metres over carpet seemingly the longest; and fixed the clerk with my
best version of a steely stare, and said, “I’d like to hire a car. Please.”

“Yes, sir,” swallowing his smile, but I thought maybe
reserving a little pleasure for later, for when he turned me down. In fact, I
thought I saw his nostrils flare as he set a form on the counter between us,
and was doubly glad I hadn’t had the chance of a drink. “Any particular type?”

“Doesn’t matter. Nothing too small,” I amended quickly,
thinking that I might need to stretch out and sleep in it. “I’m going across
country. Just me, no baggage or anything, but I’m not comfortable driving a
little car.”

And I was talking too much already, explaining where I didn’t
need to, starting to plead almost. I bit down hard on my too-eager tongue, and
was silent.

“Have you got your driver’s licence with you, sir?”

Thank God, I had: one old habit not apparently broken in the
recent upheavals. It was in the back of my purse, where I always kept it; and
while I had the purse out, stained and strangely-smelling as it was, I thought
I might as well produce my Access card as well, to add a little verisimilitude.
I may look rough just now, but at least I’m
creditworthy...

So I fished, and my fingers found plastic just where they
ought to; but when I eased it out it wasn’t my Access card at all. Wrong
colour.

Gold
colour.

American Express it was, when I looked more closely. And
yes, definitely gold. Which required more disposable income and considerably
more creditworthiness than I’d ever mustered yet; but there was my name
embossed into the plastic, and there was my signature on the back when I turned
it over to check, and I supposed that I should be getting used to this, but oh,
it was hard.

When I looked up, the clerk was frowning as he watched me,
and I could read his thoughts as clear as if they’d been written in mud baked
under a hot sun:
that surprised you, didn’t it,
sir? Whose pocket did you lift the purse from, then, didn’t they look like a
gold-carder?

But he didn’t say anything yet, he must be saving it for
later. He took the licence out of its plastic holder and checked it minutely,
probably wishing they’d introduced photographs already so that he could prove
immediately that it wasn’t mine; then he grunted—in frustration, I thought, at
finding no convictions, no penalty points—and asked if I’d ever had an
accident.

I lied, of course. What was I going to say:
yes, I’m fresh out of hospital, discharged myself early
after I totalled my car last week, but I can’t remember a thing about it
?
No, I lied in my teeth and just hoped not to have another smash, because surely
the insurance wouldn’t cover me after I’d signed my name to a false
declaration.

Another grunt, and I wasn’t at all sure that he’d believed
me; but I suppose he didn’t have any right of interrogation, he just had to
take my dishonest word for it. So we filled in some of the form, and then he
ran the card—
my
card?—through the machine
for authorisation, and I knew, I just knew he was expecting the little screen
to flash a warning at him,
Card Stolen! Alert
Police!

But obviously it didn’t, and neither did it have any
problems with the amount it was going to cost me to hire an Orion for a week.
The disappointment on his face was manifest, he couldn’t hide it. There was
nothing left for him now except to challenge my signature when I produced it;
and he tried his best to do that, he spent a long time scrutinising it against
the card, but in the end he had to give way.

Which in some respects was as much assurance to me as to
him. If he who was trained and practised and trying so hard couldn’t spot
enough difference between two signatures to pick one as a forgery, then likely
neither one was. Which meant that I really had signed that card and I really
was gold Amex material suddenly; and it might all be mystery bordering on
magic, but it was one more confirmation that I wasn’t being conned here, I wasn’t
being set up. Whatever had changed in my life, I’d effected those changes
myself; and what I could do once, I could work out now why I’d done it.

Sure I could, no sweat. None at all.

o0o

I took the keys that the clerk so reluctantly gave me, and
walked out of there feeling surprisingly grateful. Every business had the right
to turn down custom; his manager couldn’t possibly have blamed him, the way I
looked and acted, however solid my
bona fides
might appear. But he hadn’t let prejudice rule him; he’d done his checks, I’d
passed, he hired me a car. However much against his better judgement, he was
letting me drive away in the company’s property, and yes, I was properly
grateful.

Next question, could I actually do it? Could I drive, was I
in any condition?

Answer, yes and no. No, I wasn’t in any condition; but yes,
I could drive despite that. Slowly, but I always drove slowly anyway, except
apparently when flying MR2s off tight corners; uncomfortably, but I’d expected
that; safely, so long as I stopped often to rest. I had to concentrate
fiercely, the old days were gone when driving was easy and natural; and I
couldn’t concentrate for more than twenty minutes at a time, half an hour at
the most. Any longer than that and my vision started to blur, I couldn’t move
my eyes left to right without a sharp pain inside my skull, my hands started to
shake on the wheel and my legs ached cruelly just from working the pedals.

So I established a routine, designed to save me the
insurance money I wouldn’t get if I drove off the road from exhaustion.
Designed to save also my life, perhaps, and others’ lives with it. I watched
the milometer religiously, and took a ten-minute break every ten miles, tilting
the seat as far back as it would go, just lying still with my eyes closed and
trying to relax, neither to think nor anticipate.

At thirty miles I started looking for a tea shop, and found
one open in a village five miles further on. Same again after another thirty,
more or less; though by then I was into the rugged, rolling moorland that was
prelude to the Lakes, and close enough not to want to stop. Made myself do it,
though, for the pleasure of a good hot cup of tea on a dry throat—could be the
last, was very likely to be the last for some time now—and the good sense of
it, not to break a habit that was working, that had brought me most of the way
across the country without a dent or a scare.

I was hungry: hungry enough to slaver at the scones and the
coffee cake, with barely enough cash in my purse to pay for an individual pot
of tea. But hunger was good, it was helping: keeping my mind sharp and giving a
physical focus to my body, so that I thought less about everything else that
was wrong with me, all the damage I was carrying.

Back in the car again, another twenty miles and now this was
known country, and that helped too. I wasn’t following a route-map in my head
any more, signs and numbers; I was spotting landmarks, turning left just after
the ruined barn and then looking for another unexpected left, hidden back of a
twisted tree that had exploded into leaf since my last visit here, to hide the
track even better.

Picking clues from landscape, clues from memory—and
rejoicing that I could still do that, that some things in this
grotesquely-altered world were still as I remembered them, as I had left them
last—and always, always heading up.

o0o

Came a time, came a place where the track went up no
further, where it petered into wheel-ruts and nothing amid the sheep tracks.
There must be an ongoing right of way to the top, but it seemed that even
Wainwright had never found it. So far as I knew this particular route featured
in none of the guidebooks and was marked on no tourist trail. Even the farmers
seldom came this way after their sheep any more; the deep tracks of Land Rover
tyres in mud were breaking down year on year as winters passed and they were
not remade, as they crumbled through the droughts of summer and before the
roots of tough grasses.