The Cabin on the Hill (working title)

James opened the drivers side door, stepped out into a shallow puddle in the car park, which had been dug up by tree roots and walked towards the bar with the same nervous half swagger he always wore. It wasn’t cold, but it wasn’t hot either, it was one of those  in between nights in the early spring. James was thinking about the little cabin on the hill again. It was maybe twenty meters he had to walk to the big double doors, and that was just enough time to picture it.

It wasn’t a big property, maybe five acres all up, but there were no fences, no boundaries of any kind, and there were no people. 

It was just him and his cabin.

The walls were mostly made of cladding he would mill himself on a clapped out old ban saw he would steal from a high school workshop, and he would have a large decked balcony with potted plants and a hanging egg chair overlooking the small lake at the bottom edges of the clearing before his property merged seamlessly into the woods. Inside he would keep it very simple, a cabin must always be minimalist.

He thought about the time he would spend there, thinking through all the things that troubled him, all the things which made him happy, reading all the books he never had the time to read, learning how to paint and grow vegetables, watching the full moon rising as the sun sets and to stay out all night to follow its decent back into the dawn.

There are multiple dimensions to any daydream, some are mysterious, others are scary, and the woods past the lake fascinated and scared James. 

They were thick and over grown in an almost identical way, the shrubs merged with the ferns which filled all the spaces right up to the trees, which hung their vines right down to the ground like tendrils. There were thin, dirt paths he had walked which lead to no where, there were paths which lead back onto other paths that lead to no where, and then there were paths which lead to hidden places only people who know where they are know how to find them. It was not the thought of being lost in the woods that frightened him, it made him excited at times to be lost in the woods, it was the thought of being alone out there.

The cabin was different though. He loved being alone in his cabin, it was a temple of coffee drinking, cigarette smoking ritual. In his cabin on the hill he was the lord of his universe, and master of his will. There was nothing in the cabin which could escape him; for he had built it a thousand times with his own hands.

The tension between fear and security, between the woods and the cabin gave rise to another tension in James, and that was figuring out how to keep it his own without being alone; it all came back to the source. Back to human contact and that deep immersion in the web of interconnected nodes which was his city life, his actuality. 

The source as he called it was the antithesis of the cabin, it was bustling organized chaos, it was the rat race, the ever present knowledge that in order to exist you must participate in a system and a way of life you don't choose, James loved the way he resented the source so much that sometimes it was the resentment itself which kept him stimulated. In many ways the source was his muse and the cabin was his finished product. At the source he was free to romanticise his cabin on the hill without the fear of the woods because in its own way the city was its own serpentine labyrinth of no-where-roads, and in any city there are places you can find only by knowing how to get there; except it was full of people. It wasn’t that James didn’t like people, he just didn’t like many people, and not many people liked him back. That was the way it was, and that was ok with him.

And so as he crossed the threshold into the bar with his self conscious attempt at not being self conscious, he looked at the floor, the old floor boards were soaked in half a century of spilt beer. He looked at the bar, its granite top was sheened over in a half assed way with cheap cleaning products by disinterested bar staff. He ordered his beer from the same concerned looking bar maid who never said anything, just gave it to him with a sort of hesitant guilt; and he found himself standing next to a woman, at least five years younger than him. James said something about the taste of his beer, how he thought it was dull and soapy. It was the only conversation starter he could think of.

“You know what else is dull and soapy?” She said “You are.”

He could have almost bet a hundred bucks she would say something like that, but she kept talking.

“Cmon man lighten up it was just a joke, the beer here is crap, I’m just waiting for some friends, are you drinking alone?”

“Not anymore I guess.”

The girl looked at James in a way he’d only ever seen three or four other girls look at him before. He almost couldn’t believe it at first but it was one of those unmistakable non deliberate gestures.

“Haha well I can’t stay long we’re meeting here but we’re going to Dirty Larry’s after, we’re getting an Uber together, but I was early.” She said.

“That’s cool, I’m just in for the one and I’m off home.”

“Oh so do you come here often then?”

“Haha yeah this is pretty much my regular I guess, probably come here once a day.” He tried to joke.

She looked at him, “What so you’re an alcoholic?”

“What? No! Nothing like that, I just enjoy a pint after work.”

“Jeez you’re a jumpy guy Larry, I’m f*****g with you man.”

She pushed him playfully on the chair.

“My names not Larry its actually..”

She interrupted him

“Ok Not Larry, my names not Penny but it’s a decent working title don’t you think? Anyway see those girls over there, they’re my friends so I gotta go.”

She got up and tried to skull her beer before putting it down on the bar “God that’s awful, take it easy Not Larry”

He looked after her for a second as she walked away. “So what is your name?”

“Well it’s not Penny.” She turned around and smiled over her shoulder and then kept walking.

James had never really understood what the expression ‘s**t eating grin’ meant till he found him self wearing one as he looked at his beer. The bar maid smiled at him from across the bar as she was polishing glasses. He always thought that bar staff had a sort of omniscient knowledge. He looked up above the bar and up past his pint, he had forgotten why he even started drinking there in the first place, it was the contrasting lights in the long bar which he liked the most, the dull red light shone up against the silver s shaped spirit shelves which made the bottles look sacred, the music was always just right and as he looked around everybody was happy. He looked back down at his beer glass and it was nearly empty, the bar maid came over.

“Would you like another one James?”

“No thanks Hannah, ones enough for tonight.”

She almost looked proud as she picked up the glass and took it to the dish washer.