The Accidental Cyclist

by Dennis Rink

  Outside the rooster crowed again. “What on earth is that?” Icarus asked.

  Icarus and The Leader lifted the curtain. On a post just beyond their window was a proud red and white cockerel, with puffed-out chest and a bright red comb, announcing to the whole world that it was a beautiful day and it was time that everyone was up.

  “Somebody just throw something at the bloody thing,” the Grey Man shouted from somewhere inside his nest of blankets. Icarus opened the window and The Leader hurled a shoe at the offending bird. The shoe missed the bird but struck the post. The cockerel squawked and looked offended. It tried to fly off, but its clipped wings prevented it from flying more than a few yards. With what appeared to be a disgruntled look at the two young men in the caravan it flapped across to the chicken coop, where it knew that it ruled the roost, and Icarus, The Leader and the Grey Man went back to sleep.

  Icarus woke again about an hour later. He lay still, staring up at the roof of the caravan. It was quite a boring roof, he thought, not at all as interesting as the ceiling of his bedroom. The bedroom ceiling was a Victorian affair made of pressed metal and had swirls and curlicues, and leafs and ferns. Over the years he had lain in bed for hours staring up at the ceiling, losing himself in the patterns, daydreaming of big adventures in a world he would never know. The caravan’s ceiling was just a mottled grey, with patches of mould in the corners for decoration. He tried to discern a pattern in the shapes of the mould, but could not find one. I would rather be lying in my own bedroom, staring up at the ceiling there, Icarus told himself. And then he thought a bit about that assertion and decided that it was not necessarily true. No. The bedroom ceiling was infinitely more interesting and absorbing that the caravan’s, that he could not deny. Even as he lay there, The Leader snoring gently alongside, Icarus could picture every swirl, every curlicue, each leaf and fern of that bedroom ceiling. Clearly he had lived there too long.

  He studied the patterns of the mould above him now, tried to memorise the shapes. He shut his eyes tight and tried to reproduce them in his mind’s eye. He could not. He opened his eyes again. The splodges and splatters were not where he remembered them. For a while longer Icarus just lay there and stared at the ceiling, just as he had stared at the ceiling of his bedroom. But instead of becoming carried away into the pattern itself, Icarus’s mental processes churned away unconsciously, until it dawned on him, in his early morning reverie, that his mouldy, splodgy caravan roof was infinitely more exciting and interesting than his bedroom ceiling, because it was new and unknown.

  Last night, Icarus said to himself, last night is the first night, as far as I can remember, that I did not sleep in my own bed, in my own bedroom, in my mother’s flat.

  He wondered for a while what his mother might have to say about that. But then he realised that it did not matter what she might have to say, he did not care what she might have to say. And the not caring seemed to lift a tremendous weight from his chest.

  Icarus rolled over and quietly climbed out of his sleeping bag. He tiptoed to the door and went outside into the strengthening sunlight. For some time he just stood there, barefoot on the dew-damp grass, drinking in the sights and sounds of the countryside.

  Soon after a hearty porridge-and-toast breakfast Icarus, the Grey Man and The Leader were packed, replenished and mounted, ready to head eastwards, onwards towards Dover and what Icarus believed was the real beginning of their pilgrimage. The Leader groaned as he straddled his saddle. “It’ll get better once you get going,” the Grey Man told him.

  Brother Sam embraced them one by one with his bear hug and the monks waved and cheered as the trio turned down the lane, crossed a small stream and followed the high stone wall that surrounded the abbey. As they emerged from the tunnel of trees The Leader, who was at the front, braked so sharply that Icarus and the Grey Man almost ran into the back of him.

  “What’s up?” Icarus asked.

  “Look,” said The Leader, “a platoon of penguins.”

  Ahead of them, lining one side of the road in front of the stone wall, was a row of nuns, all wearing black habit and white wimple. The Grey Man gave The Leader’s ear a sharp twist, so that for a few moments he forgot his saddlesoreness. The Grey Man leant his bike against the wall and went up to the first nun.

  “Mother Mary Matthew, it’s so good to see you,” he said.

  “Yes, I suppose it is,” she replied. “I am glad to see you are in good health, Patrick, and finding your way in the world. God speed you on your journey.”

  Icarus looked at The Leader and mouthed Patrick at him, with a big question mark after it.

  The Grey Man meanwhile was moving along the line of nuns, addressing each by name. Sister Mary Mark, Sister Mary Luke, Sister Mary Andrew, and so on. Finally he came to the last nun. She was quite a bit younger than the rest. Icarus recognised her as the nun who had passed him on the hill into town the previous evening. Beneath her wimple she was blushing. As the Grey Man addressed her simply as Sister Susan, she said nothing, but blushed brighter than before, and she pulled from under her habit a small silver package and gave it to him.

  “Why, God bless you, sister,” he said. “And God bless you all, sisters.”

  “He does,” said Mother Mary Matthew sternly. “And let us ask Him to bless you as you go on your way.” And she turned smartly and quickstepped back into the abbey, the sisters following obediently like baby ducks following their mother. Sister Susan was the last to go in, and as she turned, still blushing, to close the large wooden gate, Icarus could have sworn that she gave the Grey Man a big wink with her final wave.

  “What’s in the package?” asked Icarus.

  “Why’ve they all got men’s names?” asked The Leader.

  “Cheese sandwiches,” said the Grey Man.

  The Leader repeated his question, but clearly the Grey Man did not wish to answer any more questions and was already setting a smart pace down the road. Icarus and The Leader groaned as they set of in pursuit.

  It was another hot day as the three pilgrims pedalled through the rolling Kent countryside, snaking their way just south of the North Downs, heading for Dover, where that band of chalk downland would end abruptly in a series of sheer white cliffs. Icarus and his fellow cyclists passed through apple orchards, occasional hop fields, and endless valleys of golden wheat peppered by patches of bright red poppies.

  By late afternoon, when the uphills seemed to be steeper than ever and the downhills too short, the Grey Man turned down a narrow track and into a farmyard. A sign on the gate told them that campers were welcome.

  “Tonight we sleep under the stars,” he announced.

  Icarus and The Leader felt they could have slept right there in the saddle, were it possible. They followed the Grey Man into a field, where they rolled out their sleeping bags in the shade of a sprawling oak tree and lay down. It’s just like the park at home, Icarus mused as he looked up into the branches. He was just drifting off when a strange bleating sound brought him back to the present.

  “What’s that?” he asked, alarmed.

  The sound was coming from the hedge just behind them. The three walked up to the hedge and looked over into the next field, where several ewes and their lambs were grazing.

  “Oh, look,” said The Leader, “pretty little lambs. I’ve never seen a lamb before. Not up close like this.”

  “What about when you had a few slices of one on your plate for Sunday dinner?” the Grey Man asked.

  The Leader looked at him aghast. “You mean this is where roast lamb comes from?”

  “Where else did you think it came from?”

  The Leader stood there and watched a pair of lambs as they played in the field, chasing one another, jumping onto a bale of straw, or the big, fat ram, as if they were playing king of the castle.

  The Leader regarded them for a while, then muttered, more himself than to anyone else: “I suppose I’m never going to be able to eat lamb again. Not without thinking of these cute little thi
ngs.” He turned to the Grey Man and added: “Man, I do wish that you’d never told me that.”

  25. CHEESE SANDWICH SUPPER

  Sleep evaporates from Icarus’s eyes like the morning mists. The Grey Man is not in his sleeping bag. The Leader is still asleep, a slowly pulsing mound on the dewy ground. Icarus sits up, rubs the last mists from his eyes and looks around for the Grey Man. He finds him on the far edge of the fields, staring east, silhouetted by the rising sun. He looks tired. Clearly he has not slept well, and even his shadow is looking older, stooped. Icarus decides it is not time to talk. He lies back and waits for the morning sun to warm the air around him.

  We are on the third day of our travels, and as we get nearer to the coast, the Grey Man becomes quieter, almost morose. Icarus and The Leader, although tired, are becoming accustomed to the long days in the saddle. Along the way they observe more, enjoy it more, while the Grey Man seems to become more and more withdrawn.

  Today the ride seems to be almost all downhill. Our travellers don’t seem inclined to conversation. It’s not that they are already tired of their pilgrimage or of each other’s company, but maybe they sense that some big decision lies ahead, some dilemma. They ride in single-file close formation – a mini-peloton winding its way Doverwards, where part one of the pilgrimage will come to an end and there will be a parting of ways.

  Mid-afternoon, and without consulting his map, the Grey Man leads them along a lane away from the main road. They toil up a long hill until the lane peters out and they find themselves on flat, rolling grassland. Salt is in the air. And the grass comes to an abrupt end, the ground falls away sharply into the dark green sea below, flecked with flashes of white.

  “Wow,” says Icarus, “the sea.” For it is indeed the sea, and indeed the first time that he has seen the sea. He drops his bike and leans over the cliff’s edge, ignoring a moment of vertigo to peer down the chalky chasm, until a wave of nausea draws him back. It is the first time one of them has spoken for some miles.

  They determine to spend their last night together on this cliff top – although not too near the edge. Tomorrow they will have but a few miles to cycle to reach Dover, and the ferry to France – for Icarus and the Grey Man – and the train back to London for The Leader.

  Icarus is clearly excited by the prospect. The Leader, in contrast, appears to have been struck by the same malady that afflicts the Grey Man: silence. Icarus is so enraptured by his first sight of the sea – even if it is only the English Channel – and by the prospect of travelling to France in the morning that it takes some time for him to notice his companions’ complaint. And so they settle down to another silent meal, and an early night.

  The trio have set up camp less than an hour’s ride from Dover, which they can sense in the distance. They are on a treeless cliff top and they can smell the sea below them, feel the freshness of the breeze. They know that they have reached the end of England – a critical point in their pilgrimage. They roll out their sleeping bags and lie down, munching the last of the cheese sandwiches from the tinfoil package that the pretty nun gave the Grey Man yesterday morning. It is their last supper together.

  “You never told us about the cheese sandwiches,” says Icarus.

  The Grey Man looks at him with tired eyes. He shuts them for a time, and just as Icarus decides that he must have fallen asleep, the Grey Man begins talking, slowly, eyes still closed, as if only half awake.

  “I told you that I had a breakdown and walked out of my job.” Icarus nods. The Leader says nothing, but is listening.

  “Well, there is so much more to the story. And over these past couple of days it’s all been coming back to me, more and more. When I first walked out, I slept rough in London for a few weeks. It was the worst time of my life. I hated it. But I couldn’t escape it. My depression fed on itself, and I just sank deeper and deeper. I lost all my self-respect. I didn’t wash or shave for weeks. I scrounged for food from bins, or from the back of restaurants, eating other people’s leftovers. I slept in the doorways of shops, covered in cardboard to keep me warm at night.

  “Then one day I was outside a takeaway restaurant in The Strand. I was digging through a waste bin looking for scraps to eat. I looked up and I saw this chap looking at me. I didn’t recognise him at first – he was filthy, unshaven, thin as a rake. Only when I moved did I realise that I was looking at my own reflection. I knew then that I couldn’t get any lower. I had sunk so deep into this hole, and now I had to start digging my way out. I decided to go home.”

  The Grey Man pauses, thinks about what he is saying, what he is about to say. “I walked home, to my house in southeast London, my shoes falling off my feet. It was along the route that we cycled a few days ago. By the time I got there it was dark. The house was empty, and next to the gate there was a SOLD sign. I had known the neighbours well – we used to socialise together, our children played with each other, we were on all the local committees together. I went to their front door and rang the bell. The wife shrieked when she saw me and ran inside and called her husband. When he came out he was carrying a cricket bat. Clearly he did not recognise me, and he told me to leave or he would call the police.

  “I wanted to say to him, Don’t you recognise me? I know your golf handicap. I know about the affair that you had with your secretary. I even know your kids’ middle names. But I said nothing. I was, well, not really embarrassed, but ashamed.

  “I stood there for a few moments, and he made as if he was going to come after me with the cricket bat. So I said to him that I had done some work for his neighbours, some gardening, and that I had left some tools there and wanted to collect them. And I added that I hadn’t been paid yet. He seemed to feel sorry for me all of a sudden. He said that something had happened to the people next door, they had fallen on hard times and had to move away. I asked him where and when they had gone and he said they had left only two days before. Gone to the Kent coast. Somewhere like Deal, he thought.

  “Then he pulled out his wallet and gave me a fiver and said: I hope this will help you. And then he shut the door. For a while I stood outside, wondering why I felt ashamed. And I realised it was because I had been like him. The old me would also have chased away someone who looked like I did. The old me would have shown no compassion.”

  The Grey Man stops, as if too regain his breath before assaulting the next climb of his odyssey. Icarus and The Leader say nothing. The Grey Man lies there, looking up at the sky as if addressing the gathering dusk.

  “That night I slept on the doorstep of the house that I had bought and paid for myself. I couldn’t even break in and sleep inside. Shows how conscious I had been about security, protecting what was mine.

  “The next morning I set out to walk to the Kent coast, to find wherever my family had gone. My wife’s family had come from Sandwich originally, so the neighbour was probably right about where she had gone. So I walked for three days, the last two with absolutely nothing to eat or drink. I reached the town where we spent our first night. I was falling down by then, hardly able to stand. I stopped outside the supermarket – everyone just passed me by, as if I wasn’t even there. All these affluent people with bags full of shopping and fat children munching fistfuls of sweets. And I leant against the railings, not able to move any more. I thought that I would die right there, and no one would even notice.

  “I’d shut my eyes for a while, then a squeak woke me. It was a nun, and she was parking her bicycle against the railings. She bent down and gave me a bottle of water, then unwrapped a foil parcel – inside it was a cheese sandwich.”

  Icarus notices that the Grey Man’s eyes are moist. He wants to do something, but doesn’t know what. He lies there, and waits for the story to continue. The nun helped the Grey Man up and took him to the monastery. The monks cared for him there and when he had regained his strength he began to do odd jobs around the place to earn his keep.

  One day he found a rusty old bicycle in a shed at the monastery. It was an old delivery boy�
��s bike, heavy and chunky, with a huge basket at the front and no apparent brakes. “I took it down the lane where I thought no one would see me. I’d never ridden a bike before, you see. Well, I fell off more times than I thought possible. I just didn’t seem able to keep the thing upright and going in a straight line. It had a mind of its own.

  “I was just about to chuck it all in when Sister Susan – she’s the one who found me – cycled along and saw me under a heap of bicycle. Well, when she eventually stopped laughing she said that she would teach me to ride the bike. And she did.

  “After that we used to go for rides all over the countryside. She would sneak out from the abbey and we would meet up, and we’d ride all day long. Eventually the Mother Superior found out where Sister Susan was going. She told the brothers at the monastery to send me packing. It was either me or Sister Susan. So I decided it was time to move on. Sister Susan had helped me to rediscover my self worth. She told me that if she could get me back on the road to good, her life’s work would have been done. And it was done.

  “I suppose I was a little bit in love with her. But how can you be in love with a nun? I mean, you can’t make a pass at her, can you? And I’m sure that she felt the same way too. So for her good and for mine I decided to move on, and I went back to London and became a cycle courier.”

  His story ended, the Grey Man lapses back into his sullen silence. It is dusk as they crawl into their sleeping bags and, one by one, they drift off to sleep under the wide open sky.

  26. A PARTING OF WAYS

  Icarus awakens with a start, startled by a sharp cry. He looks in the direction of the cliff. The cry comes from a seagull that is arguing with its mate. Icarus watches as the awkward, ungainly birds wheel and turn, furiously flapping in the updraft of the cliff face to gain altitude in their eternal search for food. I never saw a seagull in the magic carpet, Icarus thinks. No, they are too ugly, too ungainly for such a place.