by Daniel Shand
The pair of us stood at the edge of the clearing and watched them. Most were busy at some kind of work, bustling between tents, holding papers, stopping to have intense conversations with their colleagues. Others sat around in chairs and on tree stumps in the clearing’s middle, playing instruments and whittling.
‘What now?’ asked Mikey, quiet beside me.
‘Just speak to one of them, I suppose. See what the story is.’
I looked around, trying to find a target – someone friendly or dumb looking. They were all intense in a very particular way. Every face I considered carried a stiff-jawed look of hard discomfort and I struggled to catch a likely eye. I was beginning to think Mikey might be right, that we should get out of there, when I saw him. Or rather I saw his hair, bouncing towards us among the crowd. Bright white, recently re-dyed.
It was Isaac.
‘Lads, lads,’ he was shouting, raising his hand above the heads, bounding and waving. We watched him approach till he stood in front of us, out of breath. ‘Well,’ he said. ‘What’re yous saying to it?’
‘Not much,’ I said.
‘But yous came though, eh?’
‘Aye. We did.’
‘Grand,’ he nodded. ‘Grand. Well that’s very good news. The Good News! How’s it going wee Michael?’
‘Fine.’
‘I’m very glad. Ha!’ he exclaimed, baring his teeth in a growl of delight. ‘I cannae believe yous actually came!’
‘Isaac,’ I said. ‘What’s the story here man? What is this?’
He looked round at the clearing. ‘What is this? It’s only the bloody kingdom of heaven, present on this good earth.’
‘Right. But what is it actually?’
‘What is it actually? Well it’s actually a peace camp, a protest camp, for the nukes down the loch. You’ve never heard of it? No? It’s been here for ages man. Banning the bomb and all that.’
I nodded. ‘I thought you said it was a church.’
‘Oh! Right. See, there’s two groups.’ He held up a piece of his robes between two fingers. ‘The ones in robes, that’s my guys. The Church of the Real Presence of the Divine bloody Christ. The others, the hippies and that, they were here first.’
‘Right. So why are yous all jammed into the same bit?’
‘Ehm. Oh. I dunno actually. That’s always how it’s been. Anyway, never mind about all that,’ he said, lunging at Mikey. ‘Come here,’ he said, pulling him in for a hug. He did the same to me and I cried out in pain. When he asked me what the matter was I pulled my collar down to show him.
‘Holy hell,’ he said. ‘Your shoulder’s knackered. What happened there?’
‘Car crash,’ I said. ‘It’s not that bad.’
‘Is it fuck not that bad. Come on, let’s get it sorted.’
He pulled the two of us along, through the clearing and towards the yurts. We passed by crusties painting signs and skinning drums and we passed by churchies huddled in conversation and reading magazines. There was one yurt at the head of the clearing, slightly larger and grander than the rest. Isaac threw the door flap open to reveal a middle aged man, sitting crossed-legged on the floor. He had a vanity mirror set up and he was in the process of carefully combing his oiled hair into a sharp side parting.
His head shot up as the flap opened. ‘Brother Isaac,’ he said, throwing the comb and the mirror away. He had very large, hamsterish cheeks. ‘How can I… Who are these two?’
‘These are some friends I invited along, Michael and Paul. This is Brother Terry,’ he told us. ‘He’s the boss of the church.’
‘Now now Isaac,’ said Brother Terry, standing and smiling. ‘You know we don’t believe in words like ‘boss’ or ‘leader’ here, do we?’
‘No,’ said Isaac. ‘That’s right. We’re an organisation of brother and sisterhood, with power distributed equally and fairly,’ he recited.
‘That we are,’ beamed Brother Terry, taking me and Mikey by the hand and greeting us like a salesman. ‘Good to meet you boys.’
‘Paul’s had an accident,’ said Isaac. ‘Show Brother Terry.’
I pulled off my anorak with great difficulty and rolled up my T-shirt sleeve.
Brother Terry winced. ‘My goodness,’ he said. ‘That’s quite some sprain. Well, you’ve come to the right place. Did Isaac mention I was a doctor in the old world?’
‘I thought you were a paramedic.’
Brother Terry’s smile never faltered. ‘There’s not much difference between the two, not these days anyway. All the exams are basically the same – it’s just who you know. Come inside, let’s have a look at you.’
I ducked into his yurt and kneeled in front of him. He looked me over, opening my mouth with his hand and peering inside, staring directly into my pupil. He got me to take my T-shirt off and he manoeuvred my arm around in his socket.
‘Fuck,’ I hissed.
‘Bad pain,’ he told me, ‘comes from a bad mind.’ Then with no warning at all he gripped me by the neck and upper arm and jerked my shoulder back into position.
It was lightning. It was an eclipse.
I fell backwards from the pain and lay on the floor of the yurt. I heard Mikey shout out.
‘Clear your mind of badness,’ advised Brother Terry. ‘It’ll help with the physical pain. Physical pain is an illusion, did you know that? The brain tells the shoulder to be sore but the shoulder itself isn’t really sore.’
I wanted to tell Brother Terry that maybe I should break his nose and then see whether or not the pain felt like an illusion or not, but I couldn’t. I sprawled on the ground and sighed and winced and felt my blood as it was forced through the screaming joint.
‘Ach, come on. You’re right as rain, son,’ said Brother Terry, hauling me to my feet by my good arm. ‘I’d want to watch out for those ligaments though. Once a shoulders been dislocated as bad as that for a few hours the ligaments are essentially knackered.’
Isaac and Mikey stood in the door of the yurt, watching me.
‘All better?’ asked Isaac.
‘I wouldn’t say that,’ I told him.
‘Are these two sticking around like long term?’ asked Brother Terry, flicking his index finger between Mikey and me.
‘Well,’ I sighed. ‘Long termish, maybe.’
‘You’ll need to let my dad give them the once over if that’s the case, Isaac,’ said Brother Terry, shooing us away. ‘You know the rules.’
Isaac led us back through the camp. We passed one woman, crouched on the ground, practising some kind of basic metalwork, hammering a sheet of steel into a flower shape. We passed a group of robed figures praying in a circle, on their knees. We passed a man laid back in a waxed beanbag, enjoying a gigantic joint. Everyone nodded at Isaac as we went and bongos were being played somewhere, unseen.
‘Who are we going to meet?’ asked Mikey, bamboozled by everything going on around him. ‘Your boss’s dad, was it?’
‘Aye,’ said Isaac. ‘Brother Terry’s dad set up the camp back in the 70s or something. He’s dead old now, pretty scary actually. So he set it up ‘cause he was totally cheesed off with all the war and nuclears and that and Brother Terry and his sister get brought up here. She’s in charge of the protestors now. Well, no, I’m not supposed to say that about her either.’
I started to wonder what kind of soap opera this was, families and all that.
‘So they don’t get on?’ I said.
‘Brother Terry gets on with everyone,’ said Isaac, solemnly. ‘That’s one of his prime attributes. But you can tell Beth’s pissed off with the whole thing. You’ll meet her, soon enough.’
We were nearing the side of the clearing cluttered with wacky tents. Again, one of the dwellings on this side was more elaborate than the rest. There was a muscular woman in a camp chair outside, a pile of papers on her crossed legs and a mobile between her ear and shoulder.
‘Sister Beth,’ said Isaac.
She glanced up. ‘Don’t call me that.’
&nb
sp; ‘Sorry. Beth.’
‘What can I do for you?’ she asked.
‘Brother Terry said I should introduce my friends to Brother Angus. They’re sticking around for a bit.’
She took the phone away from her neck and rubbed her nose in frustration. ‘He’s not your brother, Isaac. He’s our dad. You don’t have to call him that, he’s not part of your thing.’
‘All right,’ said Isaac. ‘Sorry. Can we go in?’
‘Probably not, actually. He’s having a bad day today. Couldn’t they come back tomorrow or something, when he’s feeling better?’
‘It’s just…’ said Isaac. ‘I mean, Brother Terry did say for us to come.’
Beth sprang out of her camp chair, the papers spilling to the ground. ‘I tell you what,’ she said. ‘You lot just do whatever it is you want to do, Isaac. How does that sound?’
Isaac watched her storm away, thin-lipped. ‘That’s a shame,’ he said, ushering us inside. ‘A proper shame.’
There was a vast pile of cushions and pillows piled on the floor of the tent, propping up a tiny, wizened man. He had a large oxygen tank under his arm, a tube connecting it up with the mask over his mouth and nose. There was a paperback in his spiderish hands, which he lowered as we entered.
‘Afternoon Brother Angus,’ said Isaac, bowing.
The old man frowned at Isaac for a long time, then he put the book down on his chest and fiddled with the mask. He was no larger than a ten-year-old boy. ‘Eh?’ he wheezed.
Isaac hesitated. ‘I was just saying hello, Angus.’
‘Aye. Hello,’ said the old man, and then, ‘Who’re you?’
‘I’m Brother Isaac. I’m part of your son’s church,’ said Isaac, his voice low.
‘Terry? Terry’s what? His purse?’
‘No,’ said Isaac. ‘His church. You know?’
‘It all goes over my head,’ wheezed the old man, directing his words at Mikey and startling him.
‘I just wanted to introduce you to a few mates of mine,’ explained Isaac. ‘See if they’re OK to stay at the camp.’
‘Aye,’ said Angus. ‘That’s right. The camp. I invented it, did you know that?’ he asked, again of Mikey. ‘Something about… Christ, I don’t know. It was a good cause though, you understand.’
‘OK,’ said Mikey.
The old man’s eyes were milky but still full of crackling energy. ‘Let me get you a bowl of stew,’ he said, making moves to hoist himself out of his pillow pile.
Isaac rushed forward, calming the old man but also restraining him. ‘That’s all right, Brother Angus. You just rest yourself.’
‘Aye. Rest. That’s what I was saying. A good rest never did anyone any harm, did it Terry?’ This was once again directed at Mikey.
‘Nope,’ said Mikey, shaking his head.
Isaac forced the mask onto the old man’s face, waving for us to back out of the tent.
12
We set off into the hills, away from the camp. Isaac was excited about what he had to show us next – a small waterfall and plunge pool, hidden in the rocks far above the tents.
‘This was where Brother Terry baptised me,’ he said, pointing into the pool. ‘A quick dunk under the water and I came out clean. Other folk get it done down in the loch. Doesn’t matter though, eh? Water’s water. Yous fancy going in?’
I declined but Mikey and Isaac stripped off and jumped from the overhanging boulder into the pool. I sat on the side and rolled myself a fag, watching them.
‘Christ,’ Mikey cried. ‘It’s freezing!’
‘It’s good for you,’ said Isaac. ‘Opens up the veins.’
I sat, smoking and enjoying the scenery. You could see across the treetops to the water of the vast loch beyond. Some kind of naval ship was coasting along, full of turrets and sticky out bits, an evil looking thing. I began to grow distracted, feeling myself shift around in time. I was in the woods, in the woods here and the woods before. The long ago day. Me and Mikey throwing bricks at a tree. Ticking off from the school and getting told off by the mums in the swing park. Someone else was there with us too. A little girl, one of the ones from the park before. I asked her why she wasn’t at school and she told us she was ill. Why wasn’t she at the swing park then? Because she’d fallen out with her mum. And then Mikey told her she should come with us. We had something to show her.
We walked with the little girl beside us. Mikey asking her what school she goes to, whether she likes it or not. She tells us it’s fine. Mikey says he bets she’s a little swot. A little brown-noser. No, she tells us. She’s not.
I try to give him the eye, to tell him this is getting silly, we should take her back to the swing park. He ignores me. Keeps going, keeps asking her all these questions, mostly about the school. I can tell it’s because of how he was embarrassed by Mr MacPherson, his teacher. He’s taking all of it out on the wee lassie.
She asks us where we’re going and he tells her not to be so nosy. That we’ve got something amazing to show her, haven’t we Paul? Aye, I say. That’s right. She trusts me, I think. Whatever Mikey ended up doing, what I did was as bad, or worse. Because she trusted me.
I don’t know if he has a plan as he leads us forward, onwards, into the heart of the wood. It feels like his anger is the one in charge. This poor wee lassie. She only has moments of life left. She’s so delicate that she flickers in my memory, somewhere between real and not. Mikey tells us to hurry up, that he wants to show us something. Something amazing.
And we follow him.
I shook my head and I noticed that Mikey and Isaac had swum over to the far side of the plunge pool and were treading water close together. They were talking but were too far off for me to hear. Their heads were turned away and all I could see was their arms moving and splashing in the water.
‘Hey,’ I shouted. ‘Mikey. Time to get out now.’
He swum himself round to face me. ‘Already?’
‘Aye. That’s enough swimming.’
Later on there was a big dinner. We had vegetarian sausages cooked in foil on the fire and oily mashed potatoes. Isaac wasn’t around, having been taken away by Brother Terry on official business. We sat on a log among the munching crowd. There was a hippie girl on my right, wearing rainbow pyjamas, and a bald-headed church member on Mikey’s left.
‘Couldn’t we have some proper bangers?’ asked Baldy over the top of Mikey. ‘This veggie nonsense is so dry.’
Rainbow Pants tutted. ‘If you don’t like it then don’t eat it.’
‘It’s not like I’ve got much choice. Mind when that farmer dropped off a lovely side of lamb but yous lot said we had to throw it away.’
‘It was disgusting,’ moaned Rainbow Pants. ‘All the blood and whatever in the plastic bag. Eugh.’
‘That was good lamb, said Baldy, waving his fork at the fire. ‘High quality.’
‘I don’t care what quality it was. If you want to murder animals, then do it on your side of the camp. This,’ she said, gesturing to the middle of the camp, ‘is meant to be a safe place. And that means safe for everyone.’
‘What do you mean safe? It is safe, isn’t it?’
‘Safe means safe for everyone to express themselves without being stifled.’
‘How is a nice bit of lamb stifling anyone?’
‘I’m not going to discuss this with you.’
Baldy speared one of his sausages on his fork. He held it up and gave Mikey and me a the-things-I-put-up-with look before biting into it. Leaning over us, he said to Rainbow Pants. ‘Who are this pair then?’
Rainbow Pants checked us out, scowling. ‘How should I know?’
‘What are you then?’ Baldy asked us. ‘Are you us or them?’
‘We’re mates of Isaac’s,’ said Mikey.
‘Ah,’ laughed Baldy. ‘Nice one. Another few for the Church.’
‘You’re welcome to them,’ muttered Rainbow Pants.
‘I wouldn’t say that,’ I told Baldy. ‘We’re not paid-up members or any
thing. We’re just here for a visit.’
‘Oh,’ said Baldy. ‘Fine. Be like that.’
‘A fine example of Churchly goodness there,’ said Rainbow Pants.
‘Are you coming along tonight at least?’ asked Baldy.
‘Aye,’ I said, not knowing what he meant. ‘We’ll be there.’
‘Oh Jesus,’ said Rainbow Pants, rolling her eyes. ‘Not another one.’
‘We’re perfectly entitled to perform our ceremonies are we not? Freedom of religion and all that. Brother Angus said so.’
Mikey pushed the chopped up sausages and mash around on his plate, uncomfortable with the argument going on over his head.
‘Oh Brother Angus,’ scoffed Rainbow Pants. ‘He’s so ancient he’d agree to anything. And it’s only because Terry’s his son.’
‘I thought this was meant to be a safe place,’ said Baldy, standing up and revealing his true height, which must have been pushing seven foot. He threw his paper plate into the fire and sulked off to the Church’s side of camp.
‘We’re meant to recycle those,’ Rainbow Pants sighed.
She introduced herself as Mairead and offered a many-ringed hand to shake.
‘Pleased to meet you,’ she said to each of us. ‘Sorry about him. That lot are so fucking sensitive.’
‘What’re they all about?’ I asked, leaning in, the fire’s heat touching my cheek. ‘Isaac’s told us a bit about it but not what they actually do.’
‘It’s all bollocks mate,’ Mairead said. ‘It’s just nonsense that Terry made up to make himself feel better. Angus kicked him out years ago – this is before my time mind – for being a waste of space. Then he comes back years later with these followers and his mumbo jumbo religion.’
All around the fire were similar clusters of people, sitting on logs, enjoying their food. Everything smelled of the spice of wood smoke, even the food in my mouth.