‘And none of this is your burden.’
Wetness on my cheeks, my shoulders shaking. She tipped her head, rubbed my legs, her eyebrows lifted in a parody of pity.
‘I know you want to help them, love, but you can’t. Just like you couldn’t before.’
Tears, now. Real tears, and no option but to surrender to them. I dropped my head and sobbed.
‘So sad, Reggie. It really was. But it wasn’t your fault and neither is any of this, so why don’t you put aside all that sadness, all that guilt, and do what’s right for you for a change. You and that dog of yours.’
She stood up, and sighed. ‘I’m shutting this camp down, Reggie. It’s useless and broken, just like those swabbers.’
I looked up through my tears. ‘And what next? Another camp?’
She shook her head. ‘Nobody’s going anywhere, Reggie.’
‘The gallows,’ I said.
‘There are over a thousand people in this camp,’ she said, ‘and ammunition is somewhat scarce these days.’
She folded her arms. ‘I’m giving you a chance, Reggie. Put all this behind you and move on. You’re a clever man, you always were. I can find you a good job, you’ll be safe, well fed, free. No need for any more tears.’
‘And why me?’ I spluttered. ‘Why don’t you help everyone else too?’
She frowned. A touch of hurt. ‘It’s like I said, Reggie, I’ve always had a soft spot for you. What do you say?’
I had a vision of another life, a world in which I would wake every morning to a day just like the last and lose myself in its simple tasks. I would follow simple codes and rules, ask no questions, move only in the space I had been allotted. I would seek nothing but those twin blisses: solitude and industry. I would turn from the world, leave no imprint, forget the past. Disappear.
‘Well?’ she said.
But I had already tried that once before. If grief has any purpose then it is to bore you so much with the past that you have no option but to turn from it. So I looked away from Hastings’ face and found my dog’s instead.
Hastings went to speak, but before she could the room was suddenly filled with an urgent wail. Lineker was on his feet, hackles raised. His eyes were all over the place, seeking reassurance, orders or both. But Hastings ignored him and clicked her fingers for her husky.
A distant thump shook the floor. Voices echoed in corridors far away.
‘We’re being attacked, aren’t we?’ I said. ‘They’re coming.’
She ignored me and made for the door, calling my 6 foot 5 inch, 100 psi fist-hurler back in.
‘Punish him,’ she said. Then she turned to Lineker. ‘And make him watch.’
She left, slamming the door behind her.
It hurt, but it was not the worst pain I had endured. Not even close.
Story
LINEKER
What makes you choose?
Is it fear or desire? The threat of pain, or the promise of pleasure?
What made him choose her over me?
What made him leave me, again, just to save a child he barely knew?
Was he scared that he would feel shame if he didn’t, or was the joy of her alone enough to propel him?
And what does that say about me?
It says that some lives are worth more than others.
Maybe you don’t make choices at all. Maybe that great mind of yours is nothing but a theatre; a stage on which your decisions are acted out, pre-scripted in advance by reptilian clockwork. All that browbeating, fist-biting, soul-searching – it’s just a game of catch-up. Your life is already written.
If so, then Reg is not to blame; he was always going to leave me on the bank, because humans are worth more than dogs.
Some humans, anyway.
REGINALD
I hit the ground. It was dark and cold.
‘Reg?’
‘David?’
I could see only ripples of light in the darkness, face-shaped splodges moving about.
‘Christ, what did they do?’
I was back in our corner of the cathedral. David helped me down onto the mattress and I felt a small body hit mine.
‘Ow.’
‘Be careful, Aisha,’ said David. ‘Let him sit.’
I blinked and tried to focus on the shadows and blurs.
‘Who’s there?’ I said. ‘Where’s Charlie?’
‘I’m here, Reginald,’ she replied. Her voice was weak and dry. I felt her moving close. ‘We’re all here.’
‘Dana said you were sick.’
‘I’m all right,’ she coughed. ‘I’m glad you’re here.’
A dark mass grew in the left of my vision and David’s face swam into view. I saw his son behind him, craning his neck.
‘You’re safe,’ said David.
One by one, the rest of them appeared.
Dana, Anna, her children, and all the rest.
Dana stepped forward with the medical pack Jag had given her. ‘Sit back, I need to look at that cut on your eye.’
I laid my head against the wall and let her swab the wound.
‘Look left,’ she said.
I did, and saw Anna.
‘Anna,’ I mumbled, remembering the yard. ‘I am so sorry.’
Anna shook her head.
‘It wasn’t your fault, Reg. I knew as soon as I woke up that morning that he was going to do something. He’d had enough.’
‘He was trying to protect you.’
‘He lost control.’ She stroked the brow of her young daughter. Lily was her name. ‘Not that he had much in the first place, the stupid bastard. And now he’s dead.’
She tried a smile.
‘I’m almost done,’ said Dana. ‘There.’
She sat back and gave her handiwork a grim once-over.
‘At least it’s clean. Best I can do.’
‘Thank you,’ I said, the world gradually making more sense.
‘Nada,’ said Dana.
I felt Charlie’s fingers reach for mine. ‘We thought you were dead too,’ she whispered.
‘I’m sorry,’ I said. ‘I should never have signed up for the work. They lied to me.’
‘It’s not your fault.’ She kissed my swollen cheek and rested her head on my shoulder, shivering. ‘It’s not your fault.’
As the noise of conflict dwindled and the night fell back to its usual hiss and murmur, I lay my head against the wall. I did not even consider sleep. There was no telling what those distant shots and explosions meant for us or how much time we had left. For all I knew we did not even have the night. Aisha was still buried in my side, and if she knew anything at all about what was going on then she had already made the same choice as me, which was to endeavour to spend whatever hours we had left wisely.
For her that meant comfort and dream.
For me …
I felt beneath the mattress, finding the stub of pencil and my book still there where I had left them. At least, I thought, I might finally finish my story.
LINEKER
I did not enjoy watching him being punished. I felt every blow and winced at every cry. And when he stopped protesting and his head just lolled there, taking the punches, the impact of that brute’s fists seemed to match the rhythm of my heart – thump, thump, thump – and the room disintegrated until all I could see was his purple face, swollen and bleeding.
His face.
In his face I still see love and all the bright memories of a life before; grass I could lose myself in, blue skies swarming with birds and endless sun-filled days. But he abandoned me twice; I don’t know what kind of love that is.
In Her face I see security, predictability, purpose, stability. No surprises, apart from the sharp sting of the stick.
I don’t know how much longer I can keep dwelling on this. My thoughts used to be bright, like sunlight through river water flickering with the shapes of birds above. But now that river’s murky and those birds – they’re circling low, and I can see their wings are shad
owed with the black feathers of carrion. They’re coming for me; I can feel them.
REGINALD
I read the words of my unfinished story, feeling like they belonged to somebody else. I could barely remember writing those neat and hopeful opening paragraphs describing the changes in the seasons of Karafall, or the scrawled and scratched-out verses detailing the Great Battle of the Schrugian Hills, or the love story up in the lakes, where the General finally finds the lost dwelling of his uncle, and he and The Duchess sleep beneath the light of their dying second sun. For the life of me I did not know what I had been trying to write about. It all seemed alien and jumbled, like cargo washed up on a shore.
And then I realised: of course, I had been trying to write about me. My grief. That is why I could not finish it, because grief has no ending, happy or otherwise.
I let the book drop to the mattress. It was hopeless. But as my gloom threatened to engulf me, I became aware of a presence. I looked up and saw a pale face in the moonlight. It was Aisha.
‘What are you writing?’ she said.
I held my breath. Her voice again. Those words – bright stars, diamonds, lighthouse sweeps from an unseen shore – they cut through the silence, the darkness, my despair. I fumbled for my book.
‘Is it a diary?’ she went on.
‘No,’ I whispered. I spoke carefully, in case my words might somehow damage hers and force her back into silence. ‘It is a book. A story.’
‘What kind of story?’ she said. Her eyes did not leave mine.
‘It’s complicated.’
‘What is it about?’
‘Hard to explain.’
She paused, thinking. ‘It should be a good story,’ she said at last. ‘All stories should be good.’
‘I don’t, it’s …’
‘You should tell us the story.’ Then she sat down, crossed her legs, and looked up patiently.
I glanced around. There was movement up and down the pillar as people sat up, awake, and to my surprise more faces had appeared at the door to our pillar, lit by their makeshift candles.
Charlie crept to my side, shivering.
‘She’s right, Reginald,’ she said, with half a smile on her face. It’s not like any of us can sleep anyway, and it might help the children.’
‘But I can’t,’ I said. ‘It’s not finished.’
‘Then tell us what you got,’ said Dana. She looked around as the others made space on the mattresses for those at the doorway, until I found I was before a small audience of flickering, expectant faces, young and old. With a smirk, she added: ‘Just, make it good, like the girl said.’
I looked down at Aisha, waiting with her chin on her hands. It seemed I had no choice.
So, in the dead of night, breath clouding in the bitter air, I began.
‘Once upon a time, there was a kingdom called Karafall, and in the springtime the valley floor was awash with honey blossom …’
LINEKER
I think it’s simple. You do have a choice: you follow either the certainty of fear or the fantasy of love.
Reg has already made his choice, and as I lie here in my cage, bruised, shivering and listening to a hundred other dogs whimpering through the night, I know I’ve made my choice too.
Today I fucked up. But I will do better next time.
REGINALD
I told them my story. It was not the one I had been writing, but it was the one I should have been. I made it as hopeful and exciting as I could. The Duchess – once tragic – was now an unstoppable optimist. It was no longer her jewels she was searching for but (of course, it had to be) her son who had been taken from her during a raid. She roamed the kingdom she had once ruled as boldly as when she had ruled it, never once giving up hope, and spreading that hope as widely as she could as she neared her goal.
I tried to tell a good story.
I pushed all sadness aside and hers with it. I even gave her a dog as a companion, because what better gift is there to give someone who has lost their life? And when, at the end, she finally found her son upon that sun-drenched hillside, I drew on every painful memory I had of my daughter and I squeezed every ounce of joy I could from them to explain how it felt to have your child run into your arms.
When I was done, the children were asleep, and after a few moments of stillness the adults retreated quietly to their mattresses with smiles and nods. Charlie kissed my cheek tenderly before settling down next to Aisha, and as the room organised itself into its various shapes of sleep, I stared up at the dim, yellow lanterns high above, thinking: Every moment is a new world waiting to begin and be better than the last, and as the idea drifted up with the restless whispers and I slowly surrendered to sleep, I found myself believing it.
Shapes
LINEKER
I’m awake. Head up, eyes open, mind skittering in the shadows. It’s been a while since I’ve been like this.
I’m back in the flat. I can see the outline of the kitchen worktop, a moonlit rhombus on the tiles, the toaster, kettle, coffee machine yet to switch on, the sofa, door frame, pictures …
I feel a soft blanket beneath my belly and the dip of a chair’s cushion. The room is warm and I hear the snores of a man I know from the room next door.
The smell – that’s what woke me. The bone bag abandoned on the moor, stronger than ever, pungent, making my eyes water. I have a strange feeling about it, as if it has been finally opened and those crows and ravens with their beady black eyes are pecking at whatever’s inside. I want to chase off those ragged scavengers, I want to tear their filthy beaks out of it, these unworthy retches picking through Reg’s memories.
Reg’s memories. I realise now that’s what they are. The ghosts he carries with him.
My belly tightens and suddenly that blanket doesn’t feel so soft. It’s hard and cold. Concrete. And that toaster; it’s just a box of syringes. That kettle is a water canteen. The pictures are fire drills, the tiles are the walls of the medical unit, the moonlight is the skewed outline of a single thin window high in the breeze-block walls. The snore is of the ragged Vizsla in the cage beside me.
The bars of my cage close in, crushing me. But they don’t crush me nearly as much as the lingering smell of Reg’s memories, or the fact that I’ll never know what they are. I’ll never understand them, like I’ll never understand him.
But a thought occurs to me; a thought that has no earthly business occurring in the middle of the night to a cold, caged, wounded animal.
Is this what love is?
Is love being able to accept someone, even when you know that you can never hope to truly understand them?
And is it that you let them accept you back, with all your flaws laid out for them to puzzle over, as you do yourself?
Is love just the sharing of riddles?
But it’s too late. No more questions. The machines are on and with a whir and a click the long room is illuminated in stark white light, showing me the world in all its harsh reality.
The dogs are awake. Howling, barking, snapping. It’s early.
REGINALD
I was dragged from sleep by scuffles and grunts. Then the sound of choking forced my eyes open and I turned to see David’s face in mine.
‘What’s happening?’ I croaked, my swollen face protesting at the action of speech.
‘Jag,’ he breathed. ‘Jag is dead.’
His body was alive with nerves, and his eyes – already twin moons – seemed to be straining to escape their red-rimmed sockets.
‘I killed him.’
‘What?’
I sat up, fully alert. It was early and only the occasional sound of a guard’s footstep broke the hush.
‘How?’
David stood and faced the far wall, where Dana was crouching over something.
‘He was trying to … he was making a nuisance of himself with Dana. It woke me up. His back was turned and he didn’t see me and I just … I just jumped. I wasn’t thinking and I leaped on him and he wasn’t r
eady … Christ …’
I stood. My battered body howled with the effort. Dana was checking Jag’s pulse.
‘I had my arm around his neck and I pulled it tight and, and, before I knew it …’
David’s face shone with exhilaration. ‘He dropped. I killed him.’
Dana turned. ‘Yup, he’s definitely dead.’
The three of us looked at each other in silence.
‘Well I’ll be a Dutchman,’ I said at last.
‘What do we do?’ said Dana.
‘If they find him, they’ll kill us,’ said David.
‘We’re dead anyway,’ I said.
‘What do you mean?’
‘I mean …’ I hesitated. ‘I mean they intend to execute us.’
There was a pause but no sign of surprise.
‘How do you know?’ said Dana flatly.
‘Is it not obvious? They haven’t been building those bloody great gallows outside for nothing.’ My blood was up and I began to pace. ‘We have to get out of here.’
‘But how?’ said David. ‘There’s no way out. Even if we get to the yard there’s no way we can get over the fence. We’ll be dead before we clear the steps.’
‘Wait,’ I said. ‘The corridor where I was kept, there was a door at the end of it.’
‘Locked?’ said David.
‘No. It was a fire escape.’
‘Did you see what was outside? Was there another fence?’
I remembered the guard with the buzz cut smoking, the shiver as he gave me that look, and what I could have sworn was a wink. Then the brief flash of grey beyond.
‘There was no fence. Just a few dead trees and empty streets.’
‘How do we get there?’
‘There’s a door in the eastern aisle that takes you down some steps.’
‘Guards?’
‘One on the door. But … blast – it’s locked.’
‘These might help.’
We looked over at Dana. She had shouldered Jag’s gun and was holding up a set of keys.
‘Found them on fuckwad’s belt. So, are we going to do this?’
The Last Dog on Earth Page 30