Nicola Barker - Darkmans

‘The barn in Oxford.’

‘Ah. I see …’ she suddenly caught on. ‘And was there much damage done?’

‘Oh yes,’ Fleet nodded, enthusiastically, ‘because he locked all the beggars inside. He wanted to burn them alive, but mostly they just got suffocated in the smoke.’

The woman blinked.

‘Oh dear,’ she finally responded. ‘Well that wasn’t very nice of John, was it?’

Fleet shrugged. ‘Served them right,’ he opined, manfully.

‘Gracious me,’ she exclaimed, ‘but what about all their poor families? What about their mummies and their daddies? Wouldn’t they have been upset?’

‘No,’ Fleet seemed unmoved by her argument. ‘It was good,’ he insisted, ‘because that’s when John knew. ’

‘Knew what, exactly?’

‘That he needed to abandon the sheltered world of academe ,’ Fleet pronounced, almost as if by rote, ‘and pursue his fortunes in the real world.’

The woman looked over at Elen, quite amazed. ‘They won’t half come out with things at that age, eh?’ she laughed.

‘He’s terrible,’ Elen tried to smile back, ‘I just can’t take him anywhere.’ ‘I don’t want to go anywhere,’ Fleet muttered, suddenly reverting back to his sullen self, ‘I want to go home .’

‘Right… Good! ’ Elen almost sang, pointing towards the exit like an actor, glibly improvising stage directions in an amateur panto. ‘Let’s go and see this fabulous tractor thingummy, shall we?’

‘We might’ve had a slim chance of catching the damn thing,’ Dory spluttered, ‘if you’d’ve just broken into a slow trot .’

‘A slow trot ?’ Elen’s breathing was still jerky and irregular from the intense bout of exertion she’d just undergone. ‘We sprinted the last hundred metres, Dory. I literally had to drag Fleet along behind me. Didn’t you hear him screaming?’

‘I turned around at one point,’ Dory scoffed, ‘and you were collecting flowers from the roadside…’

‘Flowers?!’ She seemed stunned. ‘Are you serious? It’s the middle of winter. How could I possibly be collecting flowers? He dropped his glove , for heaven’s sake. We went back to grab it.’

‘Oh. Right.’

He had the good grace to look slightly shame-faced.

‘We should’ve come in the car,’ she upbraided him (still deeply insulted by the ‘flowers’ comment). ‘It was just too far on foot.’

‘It’s not even half a mile , Elen…’

Dory continued to fight his corner.

‘Fleet’s only five years old , Dory.’

‘Five years ?!’ Dory exclaimed. ‘I could walk for entire days when I was five years old. I once walked seventeen kilometres when I was about five. Barefoot. By the time I arrived home the soles of my feet were completely black with dirt and dried blood. It took literally weeks before the stain wore off.’

‘Well that’s hardly the kind of conduct I’d advocate for a young child,’ Elen rebuked him, quite horrified.

‘Whyever not?’ Dory casually waved her reservations aside. ‘I absolutely thrived on it, as I recall.’

She looked away, with a grimace.

‘What’s your problem?’ he asked.

‘I don’t have one,’ she answered, ‘I just wish we’d driven, that’s all.’ ‘I do believe,’ he murmured silkily, ‘that you’ve already made that point.’

As he spoke Elen noticed — from the corner of her eye — a man and a woman about two tables along shooting them furtive, slightly disapproving glances. Dory also noticed. He leaned back in his seat, cleared his throat, then calmly inspected the brand-new time-table which he’d just picked up from the ticket office for the Romney, Hythe and Dymchurch Railway (‘Thirteen and a half miles of mainland railway in miniature…’).

Elen unfastened her hair and shook it out. Fleet, meanwhile, was crouching under the table, quietly humming a sweet — almost inaudible — little tune while strumming away, dreamily, on his upper lip.

They were waiting for their lunch at The Light Railway Cafe. The cafe’s fish and chips (according to the station guide) were apparently much vaunted in the local area.

Dory placed down the new time-table. He peered over at the nosy couple. They were silently consuming their meal, but still maintaining a steady interest.

‘Fleet,’ he murmured (concerned that his son’s unconventional behaviour might be the real source of their fascination), ‘please come out now.’

Fleet didn’t budge.

‘At least it hasn’t started raining yet,’ Elen sighed, staring out of the window towards the huge nuclear power plant which — from this particular angle — completely dominated the sky-line.

‘So there won’t be another train for the best part of an hour…’ Dory inspected the new time-table again, pretending not to be concerned by his son’s total lack of compliance.

‘To be perfectly honest,’ Elen confided, pouring Fleet’s apple Fanta from the can into a glass, ‘I don’t think a long train ride is really what today needs.’

‘How d’you mean?’

Dory looked surprised.

‘Well Fleet doesn’t like trains, does he? They upset him. Remember Victoria?’

‘Victoria?’ Dory scowled. Then the penny dropped. Victoria. God… Yes .

‘I wouldn’t even mind,’ Elen continued (obviously minding very much), ‘but it took about twenty minutes to persuade him into the car , and I only managed that by agreeing to bring the dog.’

Dory didn’t comment. He picked up the time-table again.

‘We’re meant to be trying to relax , aren’t we?’ Elen persisted (but with an edge of timidity in her voice). ‘As a family, I mean?’

‘Relax? On a day out?’ Dory seemed quite astonished by the suggestion. ‘Surely if you want to relax you simply stay at home and do nothing? This is a trip , Elen. On a trip you’re active — vigorous. You experiment. You explore . You try and expand your child’s horizons…’

‘That’s all very laudable ,’ Elen conceded, ‘but I think it might be a mistake to try and run before we can walk…’

‘Fleet?’ Dory leaned back in his chair (ignoring her last comment). ‘Mummy’s just poured you your Fanta. You’d better come out and drink it.’

Silence

‘Fleet,’ he repeated, ‘come out now, please, and have your Fanta.’

Silence

‘Fleet…’

‘Dory…’ she interrupted him, quietly.

‘Fleet…’

‘ Dory! ’ she almost shouted. He stared across at her, startled.

‘I’m sure he’ll come out when he’s good and ready,’ she murmured.

‘But he can’t just sit under the table, Elen,’ Dory struggled to keep his voice at an angry whisper. ‘Next you’ll be advocating giving him his meal down there.’

‘Let’s just…’

She smiled and gently cradled her coffee cup in her hands…(‘Let it go’, or ‘Try and behave like two civilised adults’, or even, ‘Enjoy the moment’, this gesture seemed to say).

Dory grimaced. He straightened up. His nostrils flared. Elen tipped her head forward to cover her face with her hair.

‘You’re still upset with me, aren’t you,’ he suddenly rounded on her, ‘for giving that lifeboatman our telephone number?’

‘What?’ She seemed taken aback. ‘ Upset? No. No . You’ve got it all wrong …’

‘Have I?’

‘ Yes …It’s just…I just…’ she drew a deep breath, then glanced over towards the couple two tables along, ‘I simply wasn’t expecting…’