Ali Smith - Autumn

They’d come to a bench at the side of the river; both the fields were far behind them. It was the first time Elisabeth had ever crossed the fields without it seeming like it took a long time.

What’s the available choice? Elisabeth said.

Can be anything, Daniel said.

Like truth or lies? That kind of choice?

A bit oppositional, but yes, if you choose, Daniel said.

Can I choose between war and peace? Elisabeth said.

(There was war on the news every day. There were sieges, pictures of bags that had bodies in them. Elisabeth had looked up in the dictionary the word massacre to check what it literally meant. It meant to kill a lot of people with especial violence and cruelty.)

Lucky for you, you’ve got some choice in the matter, Daniel said.

I choose war, Elisabeth said.

Sure you want war? Daniel said.

Is sure you want war the first line of the story? Elisabeth said.

It can be, Daniel said. If that’s what you choose.

Who are the characters? Elisabeth said.

You make one up and I’ll make one up, Daniel said.

A man with a gun, Elisabeth said.

Okay, Daniel said. And I choose a person who’s come in disguise as a tree.

A what? Elisabeth said. No way. You’re supposed to say something like another man with another gun.

Why am I? Daniel said.

Because it’s war, Elisabeth said.

I have some input into this story too, and I choose a person who’s wearing a tree costume, Daniel said.

Why? Elisabeth said.

Ingenuity, Daniel said.

Ingenuity won’t win your character this game, Elisabeth said. My character’s got a gun.

That’s not all you’ve got and it’s not your only responsibility here, Daniel said. You’ve also got a person with the ability to resemble a tree.

Bullets are faster and stronger than tree costumes and will rip through and obliterate tree costumes, Elisabeth said.

Is that the kind of world you’re going to make up? Daniel said.

There is no point in making up a world, Elisabeth said, when there’s already a real world. There’s just the world, and there’s the truth about the world.

You mean, there’s the truth, and there’s the made-up version of it that we get told about the world, Daniel said.

No. The world exists. Stories are made up, Elisabeth said.

But no less true for that, Daniel said.

That’s ultra-crazy talk, Elisabeth said.

And whoever makes up the story makes up the world, Daniel said. So always try to welcome people into the home of your story. That’s my suggestion.

How does making things up welcome people? Elisabeth said.

What I’m suggesting, Daniel said, is, if you’re telling a story, always give your characters the same benefit of the doubt you’d welcome when it comes to yourself.

Like being on benefits? Like unemployment benefit? Elisabeth said.

The necessary benefit of the doubt, Daniel said. And always give them a choice — even those characters like a person with nothing but a tree costume between him or her and a man with a gun. By which I mean characters who seem to have no choice at all. Always give them a home.

Why should I? Elisabeth said. You didn’t give Goldilocks a home.

Did I stop her for one moment from going into that house with her spraypaint can? Daniel said.

That’s because you couldn’t, Elisabeth said, because it was already a part of the story that that’s what she does every time the story’s told — she goes into the bears’ house. She has to. Otherwise there’s no story. Is there? Except the part with the spraypaint can. The bit just made up by you.

Is my spraypaint can any more made up than the rest of the story? Daniel said.

Yes, Elisabeth said.

Then she thought about it.

Oh! she said. I mean, no.

And if I’m the storyteller I can tell it any way I like, Daniel said. So, it follows. If you are –

So how do we ever know what’s true? Elisabeth said.

Now you’re talking, Daniel said.

And what if, right, Elisabeth said, what if Goldilocks was doing what she was doing because she had no choice? What if she was like seriously upset that the porridge was too hot, and that’s what made her go ultra-crazy with the spraypaint can? What if cold porridge always made her feel really upset about something in her past? What if something that had happened in her life had been really terrible and the porridge reminded her of it, and that’s why she was so upset that she broke the chair and unmade all the beds?

Or what if she was just a vandal? Daniel said, who went into places and defaced them for no reason other than that’s what I, the person in charge of the story, have decided that all Goldilockses are like?

I personally shall be giving her the benefits of the doubt, Elisabeth said.

Now you’re ready, Daniel said.

Ready for what? Elisabeth said.

Ready to bagatelle it as it is, Daniel said.

Time-lapse of a million billion flowers opening their heads,of a million billion flowers bowing, closing their heads again, of a million billion new flowers opening instead, of a million billion buds becoming leaves then the leaves falling off and rotting into earth, of a million billion twigs splitting into a million billion brand new buds.

Elisabeth, sitting in Daniel’s room in The Maltings Care Providers plc just short of twenty years later, doesn’t remember anything of that day or that walk or the dialogue described in that last section. But here, preserved, is the story Daniel actually told, rescued whole from the place in human brain cell storage which keeps intact but filed away the dimensionality of everything we ever experience (including the milder air that March evening, the smell of the new season in the air, the traffic noise in the distance and everything else her senses and her cognition comprehended of the time, the place, her presence in both).

There’s no way I can be bothered to think up a story with the tree costume thing in it, Elisabeth said. Because nobody in their right minds could make that story any good.

Is this a challenge to my right mind? Daniel said.

Indubitably, Elisabeth said.

Well then, Daniel said. My right mind will meet your challenge.

Sure you want war? the person dressed as a tree said.

The person dressed as a tree was standing with its branches up in the air like someone with his or her hands up. A man with a gun was pointing the gun at the person dressed as a tree.

Are you threatening me? the man with the gun said.

No, the person dressed as a tree said. You’re the one with the gun.

I’m a peaceable person, the man with the gun said. I don’t want trouble. That’s why I carry this gun. And it’s not like I have anything against people like you generally.

What do you mean, people like me? the person dressed as a tree said.

What I said. People dressed in stupid pantomime tree costumes, the man with the gun said.

But why? the person dressed as a tree said.

Think what it’d be like if everyone started wearing tree costumes, the man with the gun said. It’d be like living in a wood. And we don’t live in a wood. This town’s been a town since long before I was born. If it was good enough for my parents, and my grandparents and my great grandparents.

What about your own costume? the person dressed as a tree said.

(The man with the gun was wearing jeans, a T-shirt and a baseball cap.)

This isn’t a costume, the man said. These are my clothes.

Well, these are my clothes. But I’m not calling your clothes stupid, the person dressed as a tree said.

Yeah, because you wouldn’t dare, the man with the gun said.

He waved his gun.

And anyway, yours are stupid clothes, he said. Normal people don’t go around wearing tree costumes. At least, they don’t round here. God knows what they do in other cities and towns, well, that’s up to them. But if you got your way you’d be dressing our kids up as trees, dressing our women up as trees. It’s got to be nipped in the bud.