Love and Fallout (9 page)

The trees smelled rich and damp as I walked. A chain of rusting chime bells hung from a low branch, tinkling when I rippled my index finger through them, and in the canopy a bird clapped its wings. As I moved further in, the loamy darkness became welcoming and quiet. Quiet-ish. I stopped still, listening to a faint, what was it – yes, a gnawing sound. There it was again. Could it be a squirrel? I crept towards the noise, eager for my chance to engage with nature, to appreciate the fact that I was out of that office, out of Stevenage and free. I edged closer, careful not to disturb whatever tiny animal might be at work, and as I peered from behind a tree the source revealed itself: there, with her back to me, someone was sitting in an empty bath, reading a book and crunching steadily on a carrot. A branch cracked under my foot and the figure turned.

‘Hello there.' It was Rori, hatless, her curls bobbing free. ‘Survived your first night?'

‘More or less.' It felt odd to disturb someone in the bath, even if they were fully clothed.

‘I imagine the welcome committee woke you?'

‘What happened?'

‘Drunks from Newbury who've nothing better to do. They wanted to piss in Barbel's tent.'

‘Piss in it?'

‘They're usually content to hurl abuse or rubbish, but occasionally they'll become more adventurous, try to impress each other by overturning our tents or stealing our belongings.'

‘Sounds horrible.'

Rori shrugged and took another bite of her carrot. The bath had an old-fashioned roll top, with two exposed pipes where it had once been plumbed into a wall. Bricks propped it up at the back, but in the front its original claw feet survived.

‘What are you reading?'

She flipped the cover as if to remind herself, ‘
An Introduction to Feminist Thought.
Something Angela lent me.'

‘Any good?'

‘Oh, it's all right. I've reached a chapter which discusses de Beauvoir's idea of immanence, you know the closed realm of the woman which keeps her passive and static, as opposed to the male state of transcendence. But Simone wouldn't think that if she were here, would she?' Rori leaned back and considered the twiggy sky. ‘Then I started pondering that old existentialist idea that freedom is a burden and causes anxiety.' I nodded as if I knew this idea well and was regularly thinking about it. ‘But we're compelled to be here, I mean at this camp, so the burden has lifted. Which is itself liberating.' She turned her head to me and raised a finely arched brow in a gesture which meant
What do you think?

I nodded in a way I hoped looked ruminative.

‘But the anguish always manifests somehow I expect,' she added, taking another chomp on the carrot. She was right. The idea of being urinated on while you slept was enough to anguish anyone.

‘D'you have any books with you?' She'd obviously read de Beauvoir so I mentioned Germaine Greer.

‘Oh,' she seemed disappointed, ‘nothing else?'

‘Well… not exactly…'

She leaned forwards, ‘You're blushing!'

‘I, um, borrowed it.' Shamed on my first day.

‘What is it?'

‘
The Wives of Sunset Strip
,' I said from my hot face.

‘Ha! Thank God, something fun.' Rori sighed, laying the book down. ‘Anyway, that's a classic feminist text.'

‘Is it?'

‘Of course, it's all about righting the status quo for subservient women in a male-dominated materialist culture.'

‘Really?'

‘Absolutely. And there's a good dollop of sex in it too,' she said, repositioning her leg. ‘Who doesn't want to read about sex?' Her boot now rested on a tap freckled with rust. ‘You and I are going to get on famously,' she declared. I felt my heart lift.

‘So, do you actually have baths in there?' I asked, shifting my weight onto my other leg because there was nowhere to sit apart from the edge of the bath.

‘Used to in the summer, with some effort. We dragged it behind the trees for the sake of privacy, then we'd shallow fill it and there you are, bathing en plein air.' She trailed a hand over the side. I imagined a cloth-capped ladies' maid pouring jugs of water over her back. ‘Now I use it to read. Always read best in the bath. See,' she said indicating the corner of a tartan blanket, ‘takes the chill off.'

Car seats, Welsh dressers, baths.

She gave the carrot a last bite and considered me. ‘You look a little lost.'

I shrugged and did my best stiff upper lip smile.

‘Come on,' she said, tossing away the green stump and climbing out. ‘I'll give you the tour.'

The
drizzle
had cleared leaving a white sky. I followed as we left the trees and headed back into the camp, which Rori said was about half an acre in size.

‘We're lucky to have space – at some of the other gates the women are sandwiched between the fence and the road. I love the gorse, don't you?' she said, not waiting for an answer. ‘I slept in a caravan at Main gate when I first visited, but then the owner wanted to move, so I came here. But a bender's perfectly cosy. Amazing how one adapts.'

My trainers made sucking noises as we crossed through the worst mud. I'd have to return to my Doc Martens before long, blister or no blister.

By far the best-looking of the feeble tents and shelters was a cloth tepee.

‘That's Jean's wigwam. She's been here almost from the start, her husband was here too before it went women only.'

It was the sort of structure befitting a chief elder. ‘Is she in charge?'

Rori laughed. ‘No one's in charge. It doesn't work like that. But,' she considered, ‘I suppose Jeany is rather the matriarch. She used to be a headmistress at an eminent girls' school.'

I reminded myself to smile if we passed anyone, the way I had on my first day at work, but apart from the two women at the fire drinking tea, there was no one around. Not until we encountered the humped figure of a woman stooping over a black bin liner.

‘Morning Di. This is Tessa.'

The woman retrieved a crisp packet from the ground and deposited it in her sack like a peaceable Womble. It was the woman I'd met at the roadside, the one with the placard. Now aware that conversation wasn't her thing, I returned her smile without trying to engage her in chit-chat.

‘Di's a Diamond,' declared Rori as we continued the tour. ‘But she doesn't say an awful lot.'

While we walked, she explained that the fence around the base stretched for nine miles and women were camped at the different access gates.

‘How many women are here?'

‘At Amber? About eight campers at the moment, but we get a few visitors.'

Eight?
Was that all? Rori registered my confusion. ‘There are more at Main gate and the other women distribute themselves according to their leanings. Numbers are up in the summer. Are you a lesbian?'

‘What?'

My reaction obviously amused her. ‘Don't look so shocked,' she said, pushing a curl out of her eye. ‘Women gravitate to whichever gate they're most comfortable, whether they're musicians, or Christians or they want to live with women of the same sexuality. Every gate has a different personality.'

‘What's this one?'

‘We're non-partisan,' she said firmly. ‘All welcome.'

I felt lucky to have stumbled here first. We'd reached the edge of the clearing and were at the road. The fence ran as far as we could see, with a soldier standing at a gate in the wire.

‘Is he an American?'

‘British. You don't see much of the Yanks. Wait,' she pointed, as if spotting a rare bird, ‘there's one. I've seen him before actually.' A tracksuited figure stopped at the gate. He looked tall even from our distance, and must have been at least six foot six. ‘Day off, I suppose,' said Rori as he threw his arms into two wide circles, warming down after his run, before disappearing inside the base. She checked her watch, ‘Time for Elevenses.'

I followed her back to the central muddle of the camp, to what she called the kitchen – two trestle tables sheltered by bamboo rods coved with a tarpaulin, which also protected the Welsh dresser, and a tall fridge, lacy with rust. The tables were stacked with tins.

‘Bread's in here,' she said, lifting the lid from a large bale which housed a plastic bag and within that, another containing sliced loaves. ‘In here for spreads,' she added, opening an oversized biscuit barrel. Tacked to the tarpaulin and decorated with browning ferns, a sign read, ‘Please don't take more than you need,' and a smiling cartoon face indicated a non-dictatorial spirit. The jam was home-made, not the sort you found in the supermarket, but gooseberry, damson, greengage. ‘We're lucky with donations,' said Rori. Another collection of plastic bins was marked with makeshift labels: pulses, muesli, veg, tins (various), herbs. Another container full of silver cans said simply ‘Lucky Dip'.

‘Labels came off,' explained Rori. ‘Tea and coffee over there. Water's in that jug. The mains supply is down the road. There's only one standpipe,' she said, scraping a curl of cold margarine for her bread. ‘We have to keep those containers full. No rota, just go if you see they're running low. Sometimes Jean takes the van, but it's close enough to walk.'

‘Right.' I could carry water at least.

Not sure what I was looking for, I opened the fridge idly and took an immediate step back. Its insides were stuffed with paper bundles, tied with the same pink ribbon we used at Hirshman & Luck, or banded together and stacked in rocky piles which threatened to spill free at the slightest provocation. A manual typewriter sat on the bottom shelf.

‘That's the office,' said Rori, ‘for campaign letters and leaflets. We've a separate box with letters from the council, fines, that kind of thing. Jean looks after it.'

I nodded and shut the door carefully.

‘How do they get here, the letters?'
There were no front doors.

‘Mail is passed on from Main gate.'

‘What are you girls up to?' An older woman in a pair of army boots dropped a clutch of shopping bags onto the duckboard floor.

‘Your ears must be burning,' said Rori.

‘Not taking my name in vain are you?' The woman had a silver bob, and underneath her jumper the collars of her candy-striped blouse were sticking up Lady Diana-style.

‘Quite the opposite. Tessa, this is Jean,' said Rori, licking jam from her knife.

‘How d'you do?' She spoke with the voice of a newsreader. I remembered what Rori had said and imagined Jean in her previous life, on a stage before an assembly of girls, handing out lacrosse awards and leading the school in Jerusalem.

‘I was just showing Tessa the office.'

‘Administration, it's a necessary evil I'm afraid,' said Jean as she unpacked. ‘I tell you, it was bedlam in Newbury. The number of people trying to get their trolleys around Sainsbury's. Madness. That's the last time I'm doing a shop on a Saturday morning.'

‘Didn't anyone help?'

‘Sam came along for the ride,' said Jean. ‘Oh, by the way,' she turned to Rori, ‘we've been given a heap of stamps and envelopes, so we'll make a push on those leaflets. Send them in bundles for the networks to distribute.'

‘Good stuff,' said Rori, taking a bite of bread. I'd spread my own slice with gooseberry jam, wiping the knife on my jeans first.

Sam appeared through the tarpaulin with more shopping, her Mohican wilted by the weather.

‘All right, girls,' she said, dumping the bags.

‘How's tricks?' said Rori, poking about to see what she'd got.

‘Same shit, different day,' replied Sam. ‘I was telling Jean, it's time she did another blackberry crumble.'

Rori explained that Jean had devised a way of making an earth oven by digging a hole under the fire pit.

‘Don't suppose you managed to find any lemon curd?'

Jean apologised, saying she'd completely forgotten, and Rori said not to worry, it was a filthy habit anyway and she'd been trying to kick it. We discussed preserves for a couple of minutes before Jean raised the subject of a blockade meeting.

‘We need everyone for this one,' she said removing a small jar from her pocket. ‘Fish paste. Don't tell the others,' she whispered, ‘nothing's sacred in this place. Want a little taste?'

‘Oh yes,' said Rori, looking genuinely excited.

‘How about you, Tessa?' she asked, offering the tip of a knife for me to dip into the paste.

‘Yes please.' I'd just swallowed a mouthful of gooseberry jam, but it seemed rude to refuse, even though I wasn't a fan, Dad spread fish paste in his sandwiches for work. Jean held the jar back for a moment.

‘Fish paste is for women who earn it. Will you be coming to the meeting?'