Friday in Summer

Don’t you love that euphemism: ‘problematic’? It explained nothing, and left me with a deep sense of uneasiness.

‘I’ve never had this problem before when I’ve taken my dog for a walk. How come today everything changes? And you still haven’t told me who you are.’ With the stranger’s attention fully on me, I felt safer with one hand on Jasper’s coat, so I stayed close to the ground.

‘Hamish McKenzie. Sports captain at Seaport. At least I was this year.’ He held out his hand to me. ‘Who are you?’ I looked up into his eyes, and started to lift my hand from Jasper’s head.

The Dodger forced his way into the eye contact thing I’d got going with Hamish. ‘Doesn’t matter. Just get us home.’ It seemed to be with regret that Hamish looked back at him, lowering his hand to his side. His face darkened as he looked back at my friend.

Jasper could take care of himself for a bit, I thought. I had so got to be a part of whatever was going on between the two boys. I stood up as Hamish replied: ‘I told you. It’s problematic. You can’t just go back. You have to … go around.’ He said this last piece with that little wiggle of the hand that indicates that the wording used is an approximation of something for which language is inadequate. This was not reassuring.

‘So take us around.’ I said. I was ready to go right now. I wanted to know more about the Seaport sports captain too, but that could wait until I was reunited with my clothes. I walked over towards the section of the hill that Hamish had appeared from, hoping to see some mode of transport at the bottom of the hill, like a truck or a car or a …. Well, it didn’t matter, because there was nothing, just more grass. ‘How did you get here?’

‘I traversed to the bottom of this hill.’ he said. This, no doubt, was in answer to my last question. ‘But I can’t take you back. You have to have a mental image of the place you are going.’ He seemed to be looking at me pointedly. ‘This one will be out of bounds in a short while. We’ll have to go to another gateway. The nearest one is about 10 kilometres up the Valley.’ It didn’t really matter where he pointed because I was not looking. I was starting to get a nasty feeling about this place and the: ‘can’t bring anything through’ business. ‘If we get started now we should make it by Lights Out.’

The Dodger asked the obvious question: ‘Why should we go with you?’

‘Well, Douglass, there are dangers here that you know nothing about. I’d be happy to leave you here, but I don’t know your friend well enough yet to want to place her life in danger.’ He continued to avoid looking at the Dodger. ‘The first step to keeping safe is to get off this hill top before much more time passes. The Clan use this entry point too. And,’ he added as we both opened our mouths, ‘I’ll fill you in on the Clan and where and why as we go, but go we must.’

Jasper was already on his way down the hill. Afterwards I wondered how he knew which way to go, but at that moment I was still aghast at the thought of walking 10 kilometres in bare feet and a borrowed bathrobe. Hamish followed Jasper, and I, without any further thought, followed Hamish. The Dodger hesitated a bit longer, but then he fell into step behind me.

The first part of the walk was completed in relative silence. I didn’t know how I would be able to complete a 10 kilometre walk, but after we had reached the flat, I realised that I was not feeling as physically stretched as I thought I would. The grass underfoot was soft, and the pace Jasper was setting did not strain my limited ability at all. I found I had enough spare energy to take note of the boy walking in front of me. Hamish’s feet were bare, like ours. His size nines were surprisingly white and soft-looking. His clothes consisted of a sad-looking pair of corduroys and a colourless cotton shirt. I caught up to him. ‘So, Captain, if you can’t bring anything with you, where did the clothes come from?’

Hamish looked over his shoulder at me, smiled and answered, ‘I got them from the Village. You like them?’ He chuckled at my grimace. ‘I store mine there when I go back.’ A Village. So there were probably shops here. This was a good sign.

‘Where are we? I mean really. You did say you’d tell us.’ Maybe if he talked he’d slow down. It wasn’t difficult to keep up with him, but it was awkward talking, listening and keeping the pace up. Jasper’s black and whiteness peeped in and out of the long grass ahead of us, and the Dodger was quiet behind me. He wasn’t even breathing fast.

Hamish looked back at where we came from, and then at me. ‘What’s your name?’

‘Janice.’ He waited for a surname, but I still wasn’t sure how much I trusted him.

‘Ok, Janice. If we can make it to the tree line before anybody else arrives, I’ll tell you then.’ His uneasiness when he looked behind me registered more than his words did. I would have looked back too, but, one foot in front of the other was all I was confident of being able to do at the moment. Tree line. I could see trees up ahead. I could get that far. So I nodded, and he turned back to following Jasper.

For a while I did breathing, and trying not to slow the Dodger down and pretending that I was used to walking a distance which had to be farther than from my place to school, for which trip I take a bus, thank you. Almost there I stepped in a small rut. It should have hurt, and I stopped to inspect my probably badly broken ankle. Hamish looked my way, impatient to be moving again. I turned back towards the Dodger for some sympathy, and saw a sudden flash of light on the hilltop.

‘Get down and don’t move.’ shouted Hamish, showing us how. We fell into the cover of the long grass, Hamish’s head close to mine. ‘If we stay still, they may not notice us.’ I looked where he was looking. There had been no-one on the knoll, but now there were at least three, possibly five naked men there. They conferred and then moved off in the opposite direction from us. ‘Clans men.’ Hamish spat out. ‘They’re off to their cache. We’ll have to pick up the pace. They’ll be headed for the cairn once they have clothes and tools.’

With his face close, I noticed Hamish’s top lip was covered in soft reddish stubble, interspersed with tiny beads of perspiration. I raised my eyes to look into his, a startling blue. He looked back. There was a jolt of mutual recognition. A moment passed and we were still lying on the ground looking into each other’s eyes. I felt in desperate need of a non sequitur. ‘Do you know, my foot isn’t sore? And I’ve been walking in bare feet for over an hour, but my feet aren’t even aching.’ Hamish broke eye-contact.

‘Yeah, that’s the Valley. No need for shoes here. And we’ve been walking for fifteen minutes at the most. Let’s go.’

He stood and held out his hand to me. Taking it, I scrambled onto my marvellously restored feet. He squeezed it as he turned to walk beside Jasper. I looked around for the Dodger, who was already standing. Then I pulled my robe closed. He was such a teenage boy. ‘Will you, please look me in the eyes.’ I hissed at him. He smiled, shamefacedly, I choose to think, then we set off at a slow jog to catch up with the other two. Holding my robe closed at chest level at least alleviated some of the discomfort of the increased speed.

Even when we reached the first trees, Hamish and Jasper didn’t stop. ‘We need to get further in. Not too far now and we can rest.’ I was starting to have serious doubts that he was ever going to stop. Funny how my mind was still providing me with behaviour associated with how my body should have been reacting. I really did not feel any physical tiredness. I groaned as we carried on deeper into the forest, until I literally fell over Jasper. Hamish had also stopped. He was leaning against a beech tree, tracing with his finger what appeared to be a sign of the Zodiac cut into the silver bark. ‘Sorry. I should have warned you. We can stop here.’