Leftovers from my last job. What had that been? Jesus! What the hell was it? My last job! I had had to leave in a rush the day before yesterday, two days before yesterday, or was it three? Through no fault of my own it might be said, given one’s temper can be frayed, frayed and these gaffers, managers and foremen. Farms may be factories, but I aint no fucking chicken.
Who cares.
I drapt the jeans and stepped to the edge, dipped in the right side toes. Freezing cold water. I submerged a foot. This foot, old pal of mine, I submerged it, seeing the hairs on my lower leg rise in protest. Old pal or not this gnarled extremity required the cold water treatment. I forced the foot down onto a flat rock amid the pebbly bottom then stepped in the other. The water rose to that knuckly bone beneath the knee. Cold, yes; freezing? I do not know except there was little feeling in these lower limbs of mine and the feet could have been cut and leaking blood, for all I knew, piranha too, plentiful in the land of Angles. These feet were numb and deadly white in colour. Too cold for comfort this water. I returned to the grassy bank, pulled on the jeans and sat, using the docken leaves on my feet, pressing the sap into them. I stretched out on the grass. I am a vegetable. Sap or blood. The sun had been hidden by a cloud of many layers but the last of these evaporated. I watched the sun revealed. The heat from it was quite amazing. I got an erection immediately in a most natural manner. The vegetable aspect of one’s body. I sat up. This was no time for erections. Yet it maintained itself in spite of certain mental efforts. ‘Think of churches.’ Who gave such advice? Unless I dreamt it.
Guzzy, is there a word ‘guzzy’?
When I wakened
Thus had I dozed.
Was the heat greater now? Yes. Past midday too, and the sweat on my body! I slid down to the water’s edge and onto my hunkers, resting there. I submerged my hands, my arms, ohhhh breathe in breathe in. I could sluice the water up under my oxters, over my shoulders, onto my chest, I cleansed my face and neck. My eyes closed; my eyes had closed. I was crouched there and motionless I was motionless I must have been motionless, but then gazing at the water, the lady’s reflection, my eyes no longer closed. She was sitting on the other side of the stream, close by clumps of ferns, this lady. The bank rose higher here and the line of the stream slanted strangely that almost she lay out of my field of vision and may have assumed I did not see her. A stately and majestic country home or castle was located in the immediate vicinity. ’Twas her abode. ’Twas my conviction, wearing a summer dress of a kind favoured by all, having two little thin straps across the shoulders, Oh my Lady. Those straps may be thin but but for them the dress would collapse onto the ground, falling or crumpling in a heap at her feet and these feet might step out of such a garment. She was sitting with her knees raised, her elbows resting upon them, hands cupping her chin. And I did see her, truly I did and now of course pretending that I had not and again dropped my jeans, dipped both feet into the water until touching the pebbles, then I rose, pushing myself up from the bank. The water was cold and necessarily so, creeping over my knees, but not so cold as before; I stared into the water, concentrating on this, and waded a third of the way across. It was a little deeper now and I might have swam. Instead I returned to my own side and stepped out onto the grass maintaining the pretence that I was alone, leaving my jeans where they were and lying stretched out on my original place halfway up the grass slope, shielding my eyes from the sharp ray of sun. She perhaps would have thought my eyes closed but they were not and I could see her clearly enough, this beautiful beautiful lady, of indeterminate age. My legs had dried but the chopper was rigid and it would not go down and I thought to cover it with my T-shirt, yet seeing her shift position, her legs now outstretched and her hands underneath her thighs. I shifted my own position, laying my arms alongside the length of my body, closing my eyelids. I was waiting, I waited. A rustling movement, as of her rising and entering the stream, lifting her dress clear of the water, carefully stepping her way across, focused on the water alone as though in ignorance of me, then approaching from the stream, passing where my jeans were lying. She lowered herself down to kneel on the grass oh so carefully, lifting her dress that it flopped to cover her legs entirely, her hands lightly on my ankles, rustling the hairs over my knees and upwards to where the hair stopped on my upper thighs and they moved to each other, her hands, meeting together round my chopper, gently, but increasing the pressure until I had to flex strongly to withstand the firmness of her grip. When she released it imprints of her hands would remain on the skin. I stopped flexing. A mild draught, the wafting of her dress; she had risen and was standing, or had moved, kneeling closer to me. I needed to look at her, needed to see her, and if she had arisen her knees would have crisscross marks from the grass. Had she settled back, sitting on her heels? Perhaps I think perhaps, the unzip of her dress, it falling from her onto my feet, and her hands returned to my legs, moving upwards again but where they had come together previously they now parted, off from my body and onto the grass on either side of me, her wrists set firmly against the sides of my chest. She lowered her body until the top of my chopper touched the insides of her thighs, she moving forwards again until her face rested against my cheek, her tongue touching my lips, now her hands propping herself, manoeuvring herself, enclosing me, taking the weight of her body on her hands and moving slowly upwards, and down and now I thrusted and thrusted again but then was able to stop. Neither of us moved for several moments and when eventually we did we did together. I had raised my arms and placed them round her. We were moving together, we were. I marvelled at this. On it went and I knew I was smiling a true and honest smile. There are many types of smile and this was one such, there by the stream, my bag of possessions, thoughts of food.
(TZEKOVITZ
WAS ANOTHER)
Mind you, I said, some writers can write a story about any damn thing in the world. Choose an object and tell me what that object is, I shall write you a story about it, I shall hand you that story as a finished piece by tomorrow morning. This is what they tell ye. Tzekovitz was one such writer and John Harvey was another. You too, I said. Dan . . . ?
Dan.
Dan Driscoll?
That’s right son.
Dan Driscoll; how could I have forgotten? I was chairing this Writers’ Group. Dan was wee and skinny and who knows what age; deaf when necessary, wore a bunnet and specs with thick round lenses. National Health specs they used to call them, granny specs. The auld bugger sat to my left side with his chair pushed back. He could see me clearly but I could not see him without shifting my own chair. What a tactic!
Dan had no interest in what I described as the practicalities, none at all. He did not disrespect them, just had no interest in them. Nevertheless he listened politely when I was advocating precision, exactitude and the miracles of meticulousnessnous, such that draft after draft after draft should be produced toward that end. He waited to ensure that I was finished talking then handed me two stories he had written earlier that same day.
The other people in the group smiled and watched for my reaction. They accepted Dan as a phenomenon and appeared to equate it with his North Bringlish origins. But how seriously should he be taken was the key question. Very seriously. Somebody who could write this number of stories? How else should he be taken but seriously?
Dan had been privy to some exciting military events and incidents during his lifetime, had survived serious wars and violent interventions, been stationed in some of the more devilish outposts of Empire. When Britain was not at war with other business rivals, and Dan was not in the army, he generally was unemployed, along with the usual countless millions. I dont know if he wore a poppy every November. He maybe had one pinned in the dark interior of his bunnet. During one bout of unemployment the Bringlish Government had him interned in a work camp in the Renfrewshire area. His family fended for themselves while he was locked up. The politics of this seemed not to bother him but he was watching me when he let slip the information. I said, Where did it happen?
I had a feeling ye would
