Claire-Louise Bennett - Pond - Stories

Incredible, really. Or so it seemed to me as I went by and heard the thing play out. Further along there were those very small raindrops, droplets I suppose, which attach themselves with resolute but nonetheless ebullient regularity among the fronds of a beautiful type of delicate grass, appearing, for all the world, like a squandered chandelier dashing headlong down the hillside. I soon came to stand by one of the gates for a while, one I ordinarily pass by in fact — most times there’s a wind blowing up here and regardless of its cardinal direction it invariably travels through the gate in such a way as to make a sound out if it. The same sound always. A sound I don’t mind hearing incidentally, while passing by, but which would, I’m sure, induce a kind of peripheral insanity if attended to in stationary fashion for very long. Still, despite the gate being uncommonly mute, I would not describe the time I allotted to spend there as being altogether peaceful.

I’m used to vehicles coming up this way. That is something I am used to. And sometimes — though less often — they go down the way, and I’m used to that too. In either case I step into the long grass; out of the way. At such times, he, without fail, will put a hand up to the driver, whereas I never do — I don’t know why and I do know why. I’m just the same, actually, when I’m on my own, but perhaps the reason why I don’t put my hand up then is in any case quite different. Perhaps it would feel sneaky to do a thing without him that I do not do with him.

I don’t know, and I don’t believe unravelling these minor foibles is a relevant pursuit just now — the point is, no car came by. Not one, not in either direction. A car passing by me is something I am accustomed to: a young man passing by me on this road, on the other hand, is something I am not at all accustomed to. So it was that while I stood at the gate there came up the road not the thing I am accustomed to but its opposite, a young man, on foot, his head in a hood. An apparition quite without precedence — I saw him and I almost didn’t believe my own eyes. I saw him, the young man, and it was an alarming thing. A most alarming thing that set my blood and organs into crashing disarray until I was soon drained of all former purpose, as slender as that was. Yet for all that it did not feel as if the alarm I was experiencing had originated from me — it was rather as if I were implementing the feeling for the purpose of some sort of nebulous external design. No, it didn’t quite belong to me, and in fact it didn’t quite belong to the situation either— as the young man came closer the disquieting sensation did not surge, as one would expect, but remained constant. As such I could only infer that the pervasive unrest I was undergoing was probably not attributable to the young man’s sudden and unprecedented presence entirely.

I angled my elbows upon the gate’s top railing so that my hands tilted back behind my ears and my fingers slid up into my hair, and I committed every strand and sinew to this position despite not being quite able to inhabit it fully. Initially I thought such a posture might signal an impenetrable insularity — to the point of rendering me invisible perhaps — a somewhat far-fetched aspiration that was emphatically curtailed by the terrible recognition that actually I in fact appeared as defenceless and available for the taking as an ostracised vole. Unable to withstand or accommodate the panic that was the same but more exacting I found myself attempting to wrong-foot it with the speculation that perhaps the worst thing that could happen right now might not be quite as diabolical and frenzied as the thought of it jaggedly decreed. If it — that — were to happen right now, would it be so awful, I thought. Would it really be such an upheaval — such a defiling affront? Perhaps on the contrary it might actually seem fairly recreational, like the way dogs are, and not in the least bit vile. I looked as far into the distance as I could and after a moment of blank thought it occurred to me that I would very likely wet myself. That was a certainty, more or less, and it troubled me actually. The likelihood that I’d wet myself — not after, but during — troubled me. I surmised it would be unavoidable, really, because, for one thing, of all the rainwater that entwined in a lithe stream along the side of the road, which surely I would not be able to take my eyes off, and, for another thing — though it’s true I drank very little water before leaving the house earlier, I had in fact consumed a considerable quantity of ginger tea throughout the afternoon — consequently my bladder was already very susceptible.

What do you care, I thought, if you urinate on him during? Wouldn’t it serve him right? I did not dwell upon the question long because the fact of the matter was that the possibility of urinating on him bothered me very much, and I did not, just then, wish to confront the reason why. As his proximity to me increased I became aware of myself from the young man’s perspective — my shabby sealskin boots, the cerise snowflake pattern around the top of my thick Norwegian socks, the thin lace trim along the hem of my nightdress. My damp unbrushed hair. Nothing happened of course. I stood at a gate and a young man passed by. That was all.

Then the cows went all queer on me. When I arrived at the gate, which was in fact a good while before I’d seen the young man, the cows scarpered off pronto to the left side of the field, down a kind of gradient — a reaction which, in itself, wasn’t very remarkable so I accorded it no significance and mention it now only in order to clarify the herd’s temperament and position so that the subsequent development, convoluted as it is, may be better appreciated. I didn’t mind in the least that the cows took exception to my approach and found myself likening them to a shoal of fish on account of the way they each stared out at me from just one side of their head as they ran by. In fact, if anything, I rather approved of their taking up a more distant location since it meant my attention was free to overlook them. However, this pleasant reprieve did not last long. Soon after the young man had passed by me, and my hands had dropped down from behind my ears, the cows drew in close to one another and all looked up at me with the very same expression. I wondered what exactly they could see and did not move. Time passed, right up against me, and then the cows reeled forward ever so slightly — all of them still regarding me with that same expression.

The cows stopped and continued several times over and always in the same rhythm, and even though, as they got nearer, I felt increasingly aberrant, I managed, actually, to defend my position at the gate. In all this time they did not take their eyes away from me, and so unwavering was this confluence of looking that I went on wondering what exactly it was they could see. Once they got fairly close they became less unified— some were genuinely wary, while others dumbly followed suit, and at least one was acquiring that lurching confidence which menial and unexamined curiosity brings out in certain members of any species. I must admit that all this had me feeling fundamentally perturbed in a way I could not describe or even classify. Did they know something? Could they see something? Were they waiting for something? What did they want, exactly? Despite my inadequate comprehension of the situation and the absurd tension that upheld it, it was somehow clear to me that something was going on and I continued to stand where I was and remained there until the one cow reached across the gate with her nostrils and eventually released a long sultry breath across the backs of both my hands — at which point I couldn’t see that there was anything left to do. The situation, whatever it was, seemed at an end and so I stepped back from the gate, not quite ceremoniously, but with what I felt to be due consideration. Once I found myself to be very much back within the parallel parameters of the narrow road I shook my hair out a little and carried on up the hill.