David Mathew - O My Days

Bailey, this is the third attempt I’ve made at this letter. The other two I destroyed, though I’ve kept the occasional phrase in for good luck. If you think these words are harsh and they’re uncomfortable to sit through—fuck me again! You should have been witness to the first two drafts. Make the piss in your bladder go cold, mate. And I’m not self-ignorant either. I’ve become a fresh master at reflective mores. It’s entirely possible I’m simply showing off to get back at you. I admit that. Possible and frankly speaking likely. Realistic. A realistic assessment of current prevailing trends, as someone wise once said to me. He’s gone now—dead and gone, or as good as, as far’s I’m concerned. His name was Ostrich. I have stopped keeping track of my days, not on his advice exactly but following in his footsteps. It’s easier that way. To sum up? My emotions are like horses in a race—a long race. Frustrated Little Nipper takes the lead, but here comes Curiosity Kills the Cat; pulling up fast is Eyeblinding Rage—and the dark horse, Unexpectation. You are truly the jockey on my Unexpectation. I don’t know what you’ll do next.

Thanking you for returning my money is all but bar the warmest I can be.

Better late than never, I suppose—

Billy

There’s a certain maniac grace as we put the horses through their paces, their hooves kicking up scatterings of black, then purple, then light grey sand. As swiftly as night descends in the desert, the daylight rears its head; the sand turns a buttery yellow and then white. It’s now that I puzzle—clinging on for dear life—whether we’re still in real time or not. Are things speeding up? Can the desert have lost patience with darkness so quickly? Has it run out of that cold void? With no better tactic than rough-and-ready sadism at my disposal, I heel the horse’s flanks until it’s on a parallel line with Dott’s own vehicle. There is dust in the air; it enters my mouth as I shout my throat dry and sore.

What do you mean, Dott?

It was enough, Billy! What I did in the prison: it was enough!

Enough for what?

To spur us on, Billy! Can’t you feel it? Time’s behind us! Time’s pushing us towards the roses and the Amnesia Trees! Can you imagine these horses going this fast twelve hours ago?

No!

It’s shoving us in the right direction, Alfreth! Hold tighter! It’s going to be like riding a wave! Do you surf? Dott shouts.

No! I repeat.

Well, it’s never too late to learn a new skill, Billy!

What I feel is pressure—pressure on my back—and in the way the horse is leaning forward, I’m certain the animal can feel it too, on its rump. Dott’s ploy seems to be working. Though it’s hard to believe I’m here, I can’t doubt the evidence of my own eyes, ears and taste, can I? The evil Dott’s done—the savagery, the senseless disregard for life—this has been his harvest. He’s sold it all for a trip back into his past, to get older; but a bonus has materialised, in the shape of a helping hand from time itself—to get us to the right spot, unerring in our direction, fleet of foot and blank of mind. A journey that should take a week on horseback takes no more than a further fourteen hours, I reckon—fourteen hours of Dellacotte time, which in itself is not the same as time on road. How many days have we travelled in old money? No more than two by the standards of the desert, but out of dream time?—out of dead time? How long have these horses’ hearts pounded on their final tour of duty?

O my days! I whisper when it comes in sight.

But that’s as close as we’re getting on horseback. Without warning, the animals spook and nag; the halts they draw to are so extreme that Dott is tossed forward, over his animal’s head; he executes a perfect ten somersault and even lands on his feet—until the hours of riding remind him he hasn’t been using his legs to stand up for a while. His thighs weaken. He wobbles, holds both hands out to hold on to something to stop himself falling—there’s nothing to catch—and momentum sends him flying forwards. He ends up a blob of black garments. My own dismount is not much more glorious. I slide and twist off the horse’s right side; pull a muscle in the small of my back. I swear the air indigo. I punch the horse’s neck; the legs rear up but the animal isn’t spoiling for a rumble. The horse runs away, back in the direction we’ve come from, closely hunted by Dott’s own pony. And then, Dott and I—we’re alone in the world. I can’t think of anything sensible to say. The only thing that might work is a blunt streak of irony I seem to have caught from my co-traveller, like a rash.

You need to get yourself a gardener, I say, half under my breath.

Isn’t it stunning? he asks, walking closer.

Well, stunning ain’t the word I’d use; but there is no doubting the shock value of what’s there before our eyes. What have I actually expected? True it is, no signs of life should be here at all; but I’ve anticipated something more glamorous than this approximately twenty metre-wide patch of overgrown grass, among which curl spiky ropes of rose stalks; a handful of trees no taller than I am have sprouted randomly here and there. To be frank, it’s a mess. If Mumsy sees the communal gardens behind the flat get to this state, she goes bugshit, blood; she’s on the phone complaining to the Estates Committee every other day until the scruffy shit’s sorted.

Not exactly the Garden of Eden, I say to Dott.

I never said it was the Garden of Eden, Billy-Boy, Dott replies, stepping on to the grass and taking a deep breath.

Is it my imagination? As I follow Dott onto the oasis, I can smell something—something more than the rare scents of vegetation. Dott’s occasion does not last long; the moment passes. He even goes so far as to snap his fingers, as if to wake himself from a reverie; all of a sudden he’s business again, striding further into the oasis, his head snapping from left to right. What’s he looking for? The original rose, I assume. The air is thicker as soon as I join Dott on the grass. To adjust to the shift in pressure, it takes my lungs a few seconds of heavy toil. When Dott calls to me to keep up I can’t shout what I want to, which is simply a declaration that I can’t breathe. It’s as though I’ve been running through rain. All the same, I chase Dott. As far as vegetation is concerned, there’s not much to slow me down; actually, it’s easier than trudging through sand. He is sitting, facing one of the gnarled trees; a string of sharp vines is attempting its ascent. A single white rose—unhealthy-looking—is at the end of the stalk.

This is it, he says.

I can’t help but be disenchanted. I come from that? I ask.

Quickly, Billy!

What do you want me to do?

Come closer. Sit down with me.

I do as he asks. Cross-legged, he first and then I lean forward, embracing the tree like a conservationist, and with it the barbs of the rose’s stalk. One of them pricks the skin on my right shoulder; blood weeps out. This is stupid, I’m telling myself—but I can sense whatever’s been following us, now getting closer. It’s tracked us down. It’s followed us from the carnage in the prison, through the membrane, to the desert ( Am I dead now? I ask myself for the umpteenth time), and it’s besieging the oasis of grass and stunted flora. I don’t need to look back over my shoulder to see there is no more a vista of sand dunes. The oasis, surrounded by a caul of smoke, is mist and streaks of blood flying through the curtain like lightning crackling. I’m scared, I’ll admit it. Every month—every minute, every second—of fear I’ve endured, they come back to me now in one solid and breath-taking deposit. Doesn’t matter what the temperature is like out in the desert: suddenly I’m sweating like a mule, but I’m freezing cold. We should have drunk something before this; I feel light-headed and nauseous. A glance to my right shows me Dott has closed his eyes. His lips move silently—a prayer or a mantra—and the only sound I hear is that of our hearts, both pounding as loudly, it seems, as the headbanging on the cell walls by Dott’s victims, back in the nick. I try to concentrate. I try to join Dott’s inner world, allowing my thoughts to slide any way he wants to take them. But he appears to have no interest in what I’m thinking. Does he even really need me at all? I want to ask him. At the same time I don’t want to spoil his fugue. It will come when it comes, I tell myself—a blind faith that wobbles like a plate spun on the top of a pole. I can’t let my faith fall down to crash apart.