Reed
First published in 'In Darkness Eternal' 1996
Reed decided to go to a different pub, the one that meant him using the footpaths across fields and between the darkening trees. It was close on sunset and bright orange clouds littered the skyline. He wondered what it would be like returning by the same route with just the moon - hopefully - and with the creatures of darkness having come out to play.
He laughed to himself, as he tried to imitate a concert bugle.
He hoped none of the creatures would come out early, before he reached the pub. Perhaps, it wouldn't matter so much on the way back.
Shaking himself free of his own imagination, he passed a man and a boy with a large Alsatian dog. They ignored Reed, obviously rushing to reach home in time for high tea... or was it that they too feared night's possible produce?
"Time, gentlemen, please," Reed muttered to himself. He had only been this way before at lunch time, so the brooding atmosphere took him by surprise. People's moods are nothing to do with factors inside themselves, he mused, rather they are due to the external factors of the environment. Waking up is far different from falling asleep, but both are bleary-eyed. He heard the distant echoey shouts of boys playing their last game of football. Late September was a peculiar time of the year; neither Summer nor Autumn. The unseasonable warmth belied the insidious undercurrents. The countryside's clandestine preparation for the cold made him shiver.
Then, he saw her. A white flowing lady passed across his path. She could not be a ghost, since he did not believe in them, but he recognized that she was the nearest you can get to being one. Like a forgotten piece of music, until you heard it again.
He shrugged, failing to grasp his own thoughts.
"Hey, nice evening". He turned, startled, as if he hadn't said it. But he had, unaccountably.
The lady swivelled on her heels, the face tantalizingly familiar. She reminded Reed of his own mother, from the photographs he had seen of her before he was born. But not quite. It was her older sister ... or younger. He was confused as to breakpoints and temporal medians.
This random encounter with the white lady, like all unacknowledged coincidences, could only be seen with suspicion. Sign of the times. Reed was no careless rapist nor, even, a man prone to foolhardy flirtation. What could he expect but another cold shoulder to make him cry at night in his lonely bed?
"Yes, it's a lovely evening for the time of year." Her voice was lilting, breathy, almost too musical for real words. The smile she granted him was more than he could ever have hoped to deserve.
"It's a shame people stay at home staring at television on evenings like this." He tentatively approached her, as he spoke.
"Yes, there's more in mother nature than in anything else." She picked a sprig from a nearby outgrowth, smelling it deeply. A large aeroplane droned like a long held note on a pipe organ, reminding him from where he'd come: civilization and all its accoutrements. He couldn't see it, as it must be flying below the treeline. Hearing such aeroplanes usually increased the sense of loneliness. Because, perhaps, there was no way he could talk to the passengers.
"Where do you live?" he asked, surrendering any pretense of continuing towards the pub. They were merely a body's width apart.
"Amongst those houses." She pointed to some distant rooftops Reed had never previously noticed.
"Where's that? It must be part of Chipstead."
"No, Woodmansterne."
He tried to get the customary geography straight in his mind, readjusting contours as he went. The encroaching darkness had altered all the angles.
"There's a house converted into a musical instrument shop..." Her words were tongued somewhere inside her neck. No other way to describe it.
"Yes, I know... it's got a sign outside saying that they mend instruments." He did somehow recall it but, on that occasion, he had gone by road in a car. His daughter's clarinet had been severely damaged by leaving it on a chair where someone was bound to sit. Against the odds, the shop had healed it. He had been very annoyed at the expense.
"I live in its top flat. I come out when they test the instruments... to get some peace," she said.
Reed could not believe he was participating in this conversation. He reconsidered his views on ghosts. "Would you like to walk on with me to the Woodman pub?" There, he'd said it. This would bring things to a head.
"Yes, if you like."
She linked her wide white sleeve into the loop of his arm. It's like carrying nothing, he thought. But, often, those of the opposite sex did not lean nor even touch with the threaded arm - it was merely a sign of togetherness. Reed was shy, but she did not appear capable of believing in the existence of shyness. He felt, gradually, confident. It was all too easy. He could not credit his luck. This was no surprise, since luck as well as ghosts were tantamount to fiction. Life was full of pitfalls. Confusions as to averages and optima...
The darkness fell in one swoop, and there was no moon to count on. They trod upon what he took to be one of many footpaths.
The boys' football match was moving into the distance, teams continuing to play even as they progressed towards homes and beds.
Eventually, the raucous sounds of instruments being tuned took over, at first quiet, then more insistent. Members of a different team, an orchestra, he thought, roaming the woods to seek a conductor. He laughed for the second time that evening.
With a free arm, she pulled his head to hers, mouth at first thirsting for mouth.
"Blow, pretty one, blow!" she crooned, more to herself than to him.
Reed felt his chest shrink, expelling the air, as he felt himself urged to tussle with her bosom, seeking the organ stops beneath the dress. Her piping filled his ears in anticipation; a wild shrieking aria of terror, as her toothy mouth sank to his neck.
So, I'm a flute not a clarinet? His fear was finally allowed full spate, confusing his mind as to what he really felt. He caught the distant sound of large creatures droning and baying, despite her shrill double-tonguing upon the bubbling slit in his neck and, finally, he heard nothing.
At least, it proved that she wasn't a ghost.
No comments:
No trackbacks:
