This year, V-Day was his enemy. He knew for a fact that Avebury would get clogged with romantic fools and sickeningly sweet couples after breakfast. If he wanted any decent photos, he’d have to do as he had instructed his students, wake up at some ungodly hour, and be ready to shoot at the infamous “butt-crack of dawn.”
“I AM SO TERRIBLY SORRY, sir, but we’re full.” The woman at the front desk looked truly very sorry, especially this late in the evening. “It’s the Valentine’s Day weekend, don’t you know? I’m afraid it shall be quite difficult to find a place nearby.” She leaned over and patted his shoulder in a display of maternal care, a gesture in keeping with her casual clothes and no-nonsense, steel-gray hair. “Let me give you our Wi-Fi pass code. Would you like to enjoy the pub and order a nice dinner? You’re lucky the kitchen’s still open. You can check your phone as you wait and see if there’s a place nearby you could stay the night.” She leaned in, and whispered “I’ll make some calls for you as soon as the front desk quiets down.”
“Thank you so much.” Ariel knew his words failed to sum the extent of his gratitude. Still feeling a bit shocked by his navigational mishaps and the lack of prospects for lodging, he nodded, turned, and moved into the pub room like an automaton. He selected a seat by the window and took in the ancient dark wood, modern warm lighting, and the cozy fireplace across the room.
He would’ve enjoyed the hell out of this establishment if he only had a place to stay, but this driving adventure of his came with unexpected complications. Still, he’d manage.
It wasn’t even too cold outside.
Ariel wondered what would be worse, sleeping in the car, or trying to drive these crazy roads after dark. With his luck, he’d make a right turn into the wrong lane and head-butt another car, much like the crazy sheep he had seen waging a battle of dominance not too far from here.
His beer arrived. As he waited for his steak-and-ale pie, he put on his glasses and opened a browser on his phone. With a strong hot spot signal, he’d assess his options and study the maps and hotel websites without burning through his data allowance.
“FUCKING V-DAY.” ARIEL crawled out of his car several hours later and unfolded his poor, abused body. Sleeping in the car wasn’t sleeping rough, exactly, but he wasn’t in college anymore and his muscles and joints weren’t thrilled about being stuck in such an enclosed space for long.
Even though the seat was pushed all the way back.
Even though it was reclined as far as it would go.
He was having a driving adventure alright, all alone in the middle of the English countryside. Once he had eaten his dinner and finished his beer, and once the beer wore off and he had topped it with coffee, he had resolved to drive on. This time, he wrote down the turns on paper just in case he lost signal again. He was going to drive to Bath, hell or high water.
He had stopped not due to getting lost, but because his GPS routed him to a tangle of narrow, local roads which he had spent half the night unraveling. He was just bloody tired of slowing down and having to aim his emergency flashlight at those tiny country lane signs. Half the time, he had to turn around and backtrack to make it to the proper turn, but since the roads were empty after midnight, making a sketchy K-turn with his little economy car on a narrow road wasn’t as dicey as it would’ve been with the big cross-over he drove back in Atlanta.
And now he was parked by the road in what looked like an official parking place, safe and snug, knowing exactly where he was and wishing he had thought to bring a tent and a sleeping bag.
His phone, which now had reception again, told him he was in the middle of the Avebury stone circles, which happened to be the biggest henge in England. Or the oldest one. Or... or something. He just plain forgot all the exalted details, but he’d look them up again later.
Ariel was surprised how warm it was for a February night. Sleeping in the car got cold, sure, but that’s what these little walks up and down the road were for. Few minutes, and he didn’t even need gloves anymore.
His mind was alive with vivid imagery of ancient people who no longer lived here. Neolithic technologies were clever in their simplicity, and this cleverness had resulted in a population which had enough food for their settlement to afford a whole construction workforce. How many men did it take to carve the raised plateau with an embankment of a chalk hill to surround it? How many man-hours had it taken to carve the stones by hand, to transport them, to build the stone circles, and to scrape the hill free of vegetation? The website mentioned they had used antlers as scraping tools to keep the ditch and bank bright white.
The effort just boggled the mind.
The hill’s white chalk must’ve gleamed from afar, proclaiming the wealth of its people.
And the tomb! He had read about the tomb to the right of the road and could barely wait till morning to go and visit the oldest longbarrow around. It was on top of a hill which now held dormant fields, but its sod had once been stripped as well, making the chalk bedrock white and visible, a fitting abode for the bones of the ancestors who watched over their descendants from their place of honor.
Or that was one of the theories, one that his ex would’ve never appreciated.
He tried to shut his eyes one more time as a fine drizzle settled in.
BY FOUR O’CLOCK IN the morning, Wade was dressed and had a pot of tea brewing. Aunt Rose’s touch was still all over the kitchen with its irritating pink wallpaper and flouncy window dressings. As much as Wade had loved his aunt and had appreciated the cottage during her life, now the color scheme grated, and was something that he resolved to do without. As he was making a picnic lunch of egg sandwiches and apples, and as he waited for his tea to brew, he started a mental wish list.
A dishwasher would be nice, especially if he ever had to clean up after guests. So would a set of dishes he wouldn’t cry over if they got broken by a careless hand. As to the new colors - sorry, auntie Rose - the cottage wasn’t called the White Rose Cottage just because of the thriving climbing roses in the small garden out back. The House of York stood prominent in the interior decorations, of course – but it seemed as though aunt Rose’s focus had been more on the flower in general.
He’d whitewash this place, and restore the wood, and... and he would be running behind schedule in five minutes if he kept wool-gathering!
Wade downed his cup of tea, filled the thermos with the rest, and stashed his lunch into his backpack. He then stole his way out the door as though he didn’t want aunt Rose’s ghost to wake up in that big, musty bedroom on the first floor.
Once he was in the car and wiped his hands dry on his jeans, he peered through the drizzle and wondered whether he’d get rained out just like the previous weekend, or whether the weather would settle down and he’d get his much-coveted fog.
CHAPTER 4
Two hours of fitful dozing brought Ariel into the utter darkness that heralds the break of a new day. He yawned, checked the time, and peered out the rental car’s window.
He didn’t hear any rain - good.
Ariel switched his car lights on. The windshield was wet, but he didn’t see splashes of large droplets. The head beams faded into a milky-white haze, and Ariel decided he was being treated to some genuine English fog.
Regardless of the hour and of the weather, he wasn’t willing to endure the car seat any longer. He grabbed his water bottle and a packet of paper handkerchiefs, a box of shortbread for later, and headed out.
He had the paths memorized from his navigation app.
Down the path, then up the dirt road that shot to the top of the hill.
He peered through the hazy darkness. The trimmed hedge to his left side snagged his arm every so often, which kept him going straight.
He wondered whether he’d recognize the place where he was supposed to turn right. It was up the hill, after all. It shouldn’t be hard to miss, not even on this foggy night.
Something cold and hard bumped his chest.
Ariel stumbled, then re
ached out carefully. Whatever this was, it was inanimate - and it had not been apparent from the map. Not even on the satellite view.
Rounded metal tubing made a half-circle around him, and as Ariel felt his way in the dark, he felt the smooth wet metal give way to wood and wire to the right.
Same thing to the left.
A fence, then. And this was some kind of a gate, one which was impossible to push or pull open, and one where he didn’t feel an obvious latch.
Some kind of a local version of a cattle gate? Maybe. But if this was a cattle gate, logic dictated that there was cattle on the other side. Ariel was a creature of the civilized cities, and as much as he yearned for adventure, being gored by a bull wasn’t on his bucket list.
Hesitantly, Ariel turned around and made his way back to the road and to where he had parked. He was, after all, in the middle of the stone circles. Surely he could avoid cattle in the middle of a neolithic artifact? The place was a protected site and tourist-friendly to boot. He had no misgivings in settling down in the middle of the Avebury stone circle and do his morning yoga and meditation. He stopped by the car, then set out on a slightly different adventure.
After all, he was here all alone.
THE VISITOR’S PARKING lot was empty, something that pleased Wade as its gravel crunched under his tires. He displayed the National Trust member’s permit on the dash, grabbed his equipment bag, and gently closed the car door.
No need to make a racket on such a peaceful night.
The fog tended to distort sound, either carry it or muffle it, and he resolved to be as silent as possible. Being here alone might mean seeing a wild animal. The best photo ops revealed themselves only to those photographers who knew how to keep silent and still.
He walked on the damp grass just to keep the crunch of fine gravel of the path from breaking the peace. The earth never quite closed at this latitude, and Wade inhaled with greed, searching for any sign of life. Soon there would be new grass growth, green punctuated with bright spring bulbs and veiled with the white clouds of blossoms from the trees.
Even now, Avebury had its own sense of beauty. Bare of leaves, a row of trees stood dormant and stark, like sentinels on a path that used to be the Great Road of the ancestors.
Leading through the henge and around it.
As always, Wade wondered whether the annual showing of the bones of the Dead Ancestors had been a protective measure, or whether wielding them had been intended as a threat that would keep the residents on their best behavior some four thousand years ago. Nobody but the nutty sorts believed in such things these days, and the nutty sorts were safely tucked in their beds.
Wade was alone, and as he pulled out his camera and checked its settings, he relished his privacy.
The stones disappeared into the fog in a classic gradation of grays, showing the kind of typical atmospheric regressions photographers live for and painters try to capture in vain.
He shot a few frames, then moved onto the old oak tree. Then crossed the street to a place where the large henge’s stones stood arranged in gently curving arcs, and where he knew the fog would obscure the buildings that still tended to show through the branches beyond.
He didn’t want the period buildings with their thatched roofs – not
now. Today his heart hearkened to an earlier time, a time when just grass and trees and improbable, cottage-sized monoliths stood witness to the presence of humans.
Few more frames, few more angles.
He turned - and he stilled. A scream froze on his lips as a wraith drifted through the mists within the smaller circle of stones.
It had the shape of a man, a bare-headed man draped in a long cloak who floated along the ground without taking any steps. Lolling fog tongues covered his legs from the ground to mid-thigh.
Wade came to his senses, aimed his camera, and started shooting even though he wasn’t sure whether the otherworldly being would ever show in something as mundane as a photograph.
THE WALK FROM THE CAR had warmed Ariel up as much as the old woolen blanket he had borrowed from his corporate apartment, which he now wore draped over his shoulders.
And he was alone. In a henge. In a place many revered as one of ancient power. The tranquil vibe of the place drew him into a smooth gait of his yoga moving meditation. He rolled off his heel and onto the toes of the foot with knees bent, still slowly moving his body forward as his other foot caught up and did the same thing.
Over, and over, and over, step after a carefully controlled step. Had his yoga teacher seen him now, he would’ve approved.
Smooth. This place had coaxed him to relax enough so that each step flowed into another, languid and even, almost as though he were floating on a cloud of energy.
Ariel moved with his breath, letting air whoosh in and out in a way that left him energized and made up for his lack of sleep.
Dawn broke, but just barely. The light of day hesitated, hiding behind all this fog while the stones loomed solid in the dark, swallowing light rather than reflecting it.
The road that bisected Avebury was as silent as death, and Ariel had not seen a single man-made light anywhere. Had it not been for the clouds overhead, he was sure he’d have seen magnificent stars.
Heaven above, Earth below.
If he was alone and unobserved, surely it wouldn’t hurt him to continue with his morning yoga routine? He chose a monolith with a distinct, top-heavy shape. Its base would be a repository of the things he couldn’t afford to lose. Then he scanned the horizon around him and located the brightest shade of gray in the sky. That was, most likely, the east.
He grinned. He was going to do something even better than taking a dip in the forbidden pool of the Roman bath house in Bath.
He zipped his keys and wallet into his jacket pocket and shed it at the base of the stone. The sweater went next, then the button-down shirt. Misty, cold air caressed his skin with a soft breeze, but he didn’t shiver.
He felt refreshed, rejuvenated.
Nothing like a bit of naked yoga to reboot this disaster of a road trip.
CHAPTER 5
Click, click... Wade paused and zoomed at the ethereal warrior in his cloak. Did he -
Wade cursed under his breath.
The man - it seemed to be a real man after all - let the cloak slip off his shoulders and spread it on the ground. Then he faced east, pressed his hands together in a greeting, and bowed his head.
Torn, Wade couldn’t quite look away from the entirely nude man who stood in the middle of the ancient henge. He was perfectly poised, as though not a single thing could go wrong in his day and not caring that the wisps of fog that swirled around him did little to preserve his modesty.
One with the ancient monoliths, one with the land.
Yet he looked as though he were floating in the sky.
Wade snapped shot after shot as the unknown wraith - for that’s how Wade chose to think of him - flowed from one yoga pose to another. He might never be able to use any of those images, but his inner artist couldn’t possibly pass up the opportunity.
He’d keep the photos to himself if need be.
When again would he find a naked man standing on his head in the middle of an utterly abandoned henge?
The light shifted as the sun rose, and its pallid beams caressed the stranger’s skin, highlighting the play of toned muscle underneath. The fog glowed as though from within, but the sun was that way, and if Wade wanted to catch its ascent and its scintillating effect just so, he needed a new angle.
He walked more to the left, took a few shots of the wraith’s new pose, and reconsidered. No, he needed to be behind him, shooting into the sun before it burned all the fog away. He wondered how the man didn’t freeze.
Satisfied, Wade assumed the perfect position.
The man turned toward him just as he clicked.
“What the fuck?” Bewildered and scared, the peaceful yogi morphed into an irate warrior of old.
Stunned, Wade stood his
ground, snapping away as the angry, naked stranger ran at him with murder in his eyes.
Just as the sun hit him from behind just so.
Click.
Wade came to just before the guy grabbed for his camera. He evaded to the side. “Sorry,” he said, feeling contrite. “I thought you were a ghost!”
The man stopped, breathing hard, and turned to face him. “What the fuck!” It’s as though he was at loss of words. His English was distinctly American. Then he recovered somewhat, and shivered as the cold morning finally caught up with him. “And I thought you were one of those stones! I was having a perfect spiritual experience until you had to show up with your stupid camera!”
Wade couldn’t resist a smile. “Isn’t that odd. I was having a perfectly brilliant religious experience taking those photos. I’m sorry if I didn’t ask first. I didn’t know whether you were real, or some ancient apparition. But here, I’ll erase them if you wish.” He started scrolling through the images on his memory card. “It would be a shame, though. You should have a look! You don’t get lighting like this very often, and your face isn’t recognizable in any but the few last ones.”
THE GUY OFFERED TO erase the photos. Taking them without permission was a shit thing to do, but then again... Ariel had been caught doing naked yoga in public. In a foreign country, too. He panicked for a second, thinking of what might have happened had somebody else had come by. He might’ve gotten arrested.
A stiff breeze reminded him that he was standing there buck naked and barefoot. His foot squished in something cold and soft. He looked down at the dark smudge. “What’s this?”
“Sheep eat the verge here,” Wade said, not quite managing to bite back a smile. “And what comes in must come out, don’t you know? I hope you were doing your yoga on that cloak?”
Escaping Cupid (International Affairs) Page 2