British Summer

A short story

My work shoes pinch the top of my feet as I steadily increase the pressure on the brake. The car rumbles to a snails crawl at the junction on Jellicoe Avenue. I look left then right, left then right. I hesitate to pull out; this is a busy junction. One evening while crossing this road on foot, before I could drive, I saw a car on its back. It had been hit by a lorry. I creep out; shifting my gaze from side to side then push hard on the accelerator, following the road south. It has just gone seven p.m. It is summer. The rolling, heavy clouds have brought with it a premature night, wild and surreal. Curtains glow and porch lights twinkle behind hanging baskets. I turn on my headlights. Even the street lamps have begun to spark; their amber radiance sprinkles upon the pavements. Trees become half illuminated; their spidery arms dip in and out of the light, bobbing with an orange vivacity. My headlights create a small hole in the gloom, a half circle, almost like the skirt of a dress. It illumes the white streaks that arrow past my car, keeping me from drifting out of my lane. The storm tosses a flock of leaves through the air, just in front of me. It explodes, each leaf darting off in different directions. I check my side mirrors and rear view, while moving closer to the windscreen.

A nicotine craving draws me to the sea front. I drive along the road till I see the lifeboat rescue centre which marks the turning into the car park. The car park is empty. I pull up facing the beach and position myself between two bleached lines and strenuously pull on the handbrake. My dilapidated Fiat Seicento is eleven years old and every device is to be commanded with excessive vigour. Although I turn off the engine, the radiator continues to moan with a high pitched whirl.  

I roll a cigarette and light it. I draw deeply but then grit my teeth as I begin to gag. Ten hours of energy drinks, flat Pepsi Max and hastily smoked loose rollies has made my mouth dry and acrid. I lick my lips and then tenderly blow; the smoke plume crashes against my windshield and floods the dashboard. I crack open the window, rowing the ‘tight then loose’ handle that hurts my shoulder and I puff through the gap. Salty spit hits my face and a gust of wind tugs at the cigarette in my mouth, almost plucking it from my lips. I clasp my hand around the stiff handle and expend all my energy winding the window back up. I twist the car key to turn on the battery and then the air fans to circulate the smoke. The smoke seems to disappear once it completes a circuit of the car’s interior, and that’s enough. Tapping ash onto my black work shoes, I turn on the radio. Radio 1 announces their Friday night mega-mix, an electro dub-step compilation, featuring a hidden up and coming music producer. I turn the volume down to a barely audible level and then collapse back into my seat. My head rolls from my shoulders and onto the support. I close my eyes. The position feels alien, as I never rest comfortably against the car seat. I always crouch forward and over the wheel.

Now that I am not at work, the forgotten troubles and anxieties start to take root in my brain. Muscles tense as the priorities in my mind change positions. I need a new job. I need to move back, back with my friends. I place my head against the steering wheel and take another drag on the cigarette. Some tobacco falls from the filter end and into my mouth. My tongue fishes for the sour strands but eventually I swallow. Grimacing, I push my face into the steering wheel.

I’ve graduated, but I am unable to get a job that I want. We are all graduates, yet we cannot find a place to live. What would have been the start of adulthood was now just a pipedream, a ridiculous fantasy that has become more ridiculous with each sobering realisation. Feeling as if a degree had been the ticket to independent progression, our chance to make a mark, to conquer on our own, was the embarrassing naivety of our youth. Now we all live at home, with our parents.  The television doesn’t stay on. Dinner is at five. No shoes upstairs.

I lift my head and stare out; past the screen, past the pavement, past the mounds of stones and onto the sea. If it wasn’t for the Isle of Wight, then it would seem as though the waves rolled downwards from the sky, plummeting and colliding in a wall of murky fury. If it wasn’t for the sparkling star light that lines the horizon, with yellow and red fireflies that march in unison, then I would be staring into a dark abyss, the end of the world. The tumbling black clouds meet the turbulent waves in a dark symmetry that encapsulates the world in front of me. Swirling giants crash; shadowy titans ride ferociously upon the heavy gale, and then strike the ocean. The blows reverberate towards the coast, galloping with a hungry ambition. Each dark cavalry charges with a tenacious bloodlust that drives them towards the drowning shoreline. I follow the water’s edge, trying to gauge the crash of another large wave, when something sneaks upon my vision, causing me to start.

Without any street lights or other cars, only the moonlight gives clues to the figure’s presence. I move my face towards the window but my breath fogs up the glass. I rub with my sleeve, scrubbing at the condensation and passata sauce that blotches my uniform smears the screen. I spit on the window and scrub feverishly. It is coming closer. I stare out again and focus my eyes. A hunched form, with many legs and a metallic gleam shows through the grubby windscreen, scuttling sluggishly along the pavement. The peculiar form seems natural in this outlandish terrain. The moonlight gives the shape a white outline and I start to see the tip of a cap and shoulders with a scarf. Eventually, staggering in slow jostles of movement, a long grey duffle coat and hood moves into the orange beam from my headlights. I look in front of the shaking figure and see that it is using a zimmer frame. Judging by the flat cap, pin stripe trousers and weathered coat; I presume it is a man, an old man. He moves without rhythm; seeming to strangely lumber short distances then stop, then start again. The wind howls and a huge gust pounds the figure, relentlessly beating upon the old man. The duffle coat flaps franticly, the buttons looking ready to pop. The old man lowers his head and places a gloved hand upon his hood and cap. He doesn’t fall back. He stays still, unmoving, gripping on to his zimmer frame with his other hand. His trousers press around his legs, showing their thinness as well as revealing his shaking ankles, their bony protrusions highlighted with his white socks. The wind dies down and there is a break in the assault. He continues, picking up his zimmer frame and continuing his awkward march. The frame rolls on its four legs; back legs then front. One leg is slightly bent. I continue to gawp in disbelief. It was crazy to be out in this kind of weather, especially at the beach.

 The wind takes charge once again and rams the man with tremendous velocity. Again, like stone, the man bares the barrage and holds tight to his zimmer frame. He is now right in front of my car, right between the headlights. His eyes. They are old, and faded. But they are frozen, never straying from the ocean. Open, even with the glare from my headlights and from the biting power of the wind. Transfixed, his head is always slightly turned to the sea. He shields his face from the aggressive storm but his eyes are never covered, always looking from under his hand. On the zimmer frame, held fast to the front, is a plastic sheet. In bold letters it displays:

 

NATIONAL FRONT

ENGLISH DEFENCE LEAGUE

NO TO THE EU

 

Around this, clinging to the frame with duct tape and string, are plastic poppies, pink tassels that whip the air and mini Union Jacks that fly manically. I have no idea how these cheap and tacky objects have survived the storm and are still attached to the silver structure. If it wasn’t for the frame, I think the old man would just take off into the sky. There is always one hand on the zimmer frame. I watch him stumble through my headlight beam. As he continues, I keep my eyes on his metallic support. It moves like a mechanical lion and its silver pillars beat the concrete floor with complete assertion, never slipping or bending. The old man reaches the edge of my headlight beam and as he continues down the pavement the moonlight slowly leaves his form; the white light fades like a skeleton disappearing back into the darkness. I take another drag from my cigarette and stub it out in the ash tray. I roll another cigarette. 

Author's Note

Just your honest opinion guys

Reviews

[Allyson Wolfe]

I like this a lot. Is there more you could expand it too? Possibly using this segment as a chapter? I love your use of descriptions, and especially the line "It moves like a mechanical lion and its silver pillars.." It just calls to me. Wonderful work! :)

[CousinLymon]

Thanks, appreciated. It was really just a writing exercise for myself. I had an image of the old man and I wanted to stick him in a short story moment; I don't really know what I would do with him.