by Frank Almond
“Er, and so to Lord Byron,” I said. “Byron was a Romantic from the quiff of his mullet to the polish on the toes of his riding boots…um, did you know he had a club foot?”
* * *
In the wee small hours, long after we had progressed to the wine, we retired to the cushioned lounge area and were lying about listening to Tree’s collection of jazz records, and rolling joints. I had totally corrupted the two androids from Corrective Measures. The power of free expression of the self is staggering. In ’60s America, psychologists introduced the concept of the freeing the inner self to the initiates of a convent, within six months over half the sisters had broken their vows and left the institution, and the rest were practising a sort of lesbian version of free worship. It’s true!
“…I like the Parker—it’s freer—don’t you agree, Stevie?”
“Jody, you don’t know what you’re talking about—how can you sit there and say that?” argued John.
“All I’m saying,” said Jody, “is that Bix’s syncopation is more accessible and the Bird’s technique is a natural extension of that. Stephen, tell this creep what I mean for pity’s sake!”
“The Bird flies, man,” I said. I jumped up, stuck my thumb in my mouth, and played the imaginary sax stops up and down my chest with my other hand. “He floats, he flits!” I skipped around the cabin. “He blow that horn like he’s grown a new tongue, cats—it don’t just sing—it makes lurve!”
Jody laughed and clapped her hands. John shook his head and poured himself another glass of red wine.
“You the man!” he said.
“Sit down, you buffoon!” hollered Jody, finally.
“Who you calling a buffoon, girl?” I laughed, throwing myself back down on the bench seat with her.
“I’m going to bed,” said Emma, who had been sitting at the dining table. She padded past us in her bare feet. We heard her slam her cabin door and all fell about laughing.
“So,” said Jody, playing with my hair, “the French existentialists, led by Sartre, were not only saying we had free will, but that we have too much?”
“Too much choice,” I nodded, topping up my glass and Jody’s with more wine. “We don’t know what to do with it all. We walk into a supermarket, we don’t even know what breakfast cereal we want to snap, crackle or pop. That post-industrialism-consumerism complex—that whole Freud-Bernhays thing—has spawned a new religion—shopping! The will has been set free! We can be and do and buy whatever we want! We’re all so free it’s like being in a cage of freedom!”
“I like that image,” said John. “Cage of freedom. Oxymoron. Bravo, mon ami.”
“But we still have Rome,” sighed Jody. “We still have original sin and we still have guilt. We are still repressed by that medieval rack inside our heads—those old philosophers, like Aquinas, still tell us it’s all preordained. The bastards!”
“Well, not Aquinas—he, er, sort of believed in free choice,” I corrected.
“Sorry. I meant that whole Spanish Inquisition—Reformation-Counter-Reformation chain thing—it’s still pulling us, spinning our souls on the wheel of St Catherine! Whipping us to the Cross!” cried Jody, with scary passion. “We’ll never be free! God isn’t dead in our heads, man!” She burst into tears and threw herself against me and pounded me with her fists. “I just want to be who I want to be—I just want to be me! I have to be free! Oh, Steve—set me free!”
I held her head in my arms and stroked her hair. “Shh, shh—I’ve got you, babe…”
* * *
At dawn my students and I were sitting cross-legged up on deck, meditating and composing freeform poems.
“…rain drops Venn diagrams on the still lake,” offered John.
“…the peeled lips of their swastikas speak of rage rage rage!” hissed Jody.
I was worried about Jody.
“…but they also spoke of love love love,” I added, “uh, because love is all you need.”
John opened his eyes and nodded at me. “Cool, man,” he said dreamily.
“…there is nothing you can do that cannot be done,” I went on, “nowhere you can be where you are not supposed to be—it’s easy…”
It seemed to be working.
Jody said, “…all you need is someone else to live in hell with…”
“…there is no one you cannot be if you really want to be somebody—it’s easy…” said John, getting the hang of it.
“All you need is love—la-la-la-la-la! Keep it up!” I sang, conducting them with one hand, while I lifted myself up with my other.
“All you need is love—la-la-la-la-la!” we all chorused.
“Now,” I said, backing away, towards the hatchway, “keep adding verses and don’t stop, till I get back.”
I swung down the last few wooden rungs of the hatch stairs into the main cabin, pleased with myself, and found Emma lounging full length on the sofa bench, reading a paperback and sipping coffee.
“Hallelujah! Give me black coffee!” I cried, clapping my hands and rubbing them together.
We could just hear John and Jody singing their improvised version of “All You Need is Love” right over our heads.
“In the pot,” said Emma, without taking her nose out of her book.
I poured myself a coffee and went over to join her on the bench. She was forced to move her feet slightly to make room for me, and tutted.
“Well, aren’t you going to say anything?” I said.
“Morning, Sloane.”
“No, I meant about that,” I said, pointing my finger up at the ceiling.
“You mean, The Temple of the Seventh Day Sloanites? Yeah—tell them not to chant so loud, I’m trying to become one with this book.”
“Emma, last night they were going to crack open our heads like eggs—now they’re singing hippie anthems and making up avant garde poetry. I’ve converted them!”
“Yes, but into what?” she said. “I think I liked them better when they were psychopaths.”
“Well, I think I did a pretty good job,” I said, a bit miffed. “What you reading?”
She flashed the cover in my face and carried on reading.
“Hm, Lucky Jim,” I said. “Isn’t that supposed to be funny?”
“It’s hilarious,” she said, without lifting her eyes off the page.
“Then why aren’t you laughing?” I said.
“I’m laughing in my mind. Now, leave me alone—go and sacrifice a goat or something.”
I was not put off—I had just converted two aggressive automata into peace-loving poets—I was on a roll.
“What first attracted you to me, Em?”
“Your silence.”
Undeterred, I said, “I wonder what love is.” I clutched my coffee cup to my heart. “They say love grows and it can die, but it can’t be organic, can it? ’Cos the lover still lives on. Is it merely a bio-chemical reaction? I ask myself. Or just an instinctive animal urge, over which we have no control, no say in the matter? Can this be all there is to love? I think not. I think love is like a faith, a faith in the one you love.”
Emma heaved a huge sigh and turned the page.
“I have faith in you, Em. A faith that cannot be shaken or broken. I will never give up my faith in you. Because I love you.”
“The baby is not yours, Stephen—it’s Matt’s,” she said, without interrupting her reading.
I drank the rest of my coffee in one, got up, walked stiffly out to the galley, and smashed the mug in the sink. I charged back in.
“Matthew bloody Turner! How could you sleep with that shithead—that bird-brained, fish-faced, ass-licking, little shite of a pratt? How could you?”
“I thought he was your mate,” she said, finally looking up from her bloody book and smiling sweetly at me.
“Mate? Mate? I hate the little tosser! I hate him! I hate everything about the slimy, two-faced bastard! You slept with Matthew Turner? I hope you showered all the slime off afterwards! Do you realise you’re carryin
g the seed of Matthew Turner? Men like Matthew Turner shouldn’t be allowed to breed—they should be castrated at birth! That’s a point—when’s the little shit’s birthday? I could fast forward to the day he was spawned and go round to the maternity unit and do it myself!”
“But you told me you wanted good old Matt to be your best man,” said Emma. “Oh, my mate, Matt will do it—Matt’s so cool—Matt this, Matt that. Do you really want him making his speech in a squeaky voice?”
“This is all one big joke to you, isn’t it?” I yelled.
“Do you still love me now?” she smiled.
“No—I do-bloody-well-not! You two-timing, little tart! I hate you! I hate you—I hate women!”
“Well,” said Emma, “so much for your unshakable, unbreakable faith. That was short and sweet. He’s declared a fatwa on me and all my kind.” She returned to her paperback and calmly read on.
“You should have told me all this before—I’ve made a right dickhead of myself chasing round after you. The Duck was right, there’s plenty more where you came from, Gummer!”
Emma turned another page.
“And another thing—I never trusted you—oh no, I knew there was something going on between you and that slimy creep Turner. I knew it. I knew you two were at it!”
“Well, you were wrong then, because I made it all up.”
“Hey?”
“The baby is yours and I have never had an affair with Matthew Turner,” said Emma, looking up at me with her head tilted to one side, eyebrows arched.
“What? You expect me to fall for a line like that?” I laughed.
“No, I couldn’t care less what you think,” she shrugged. And went back to her book.
“You made it up?”
“If you say so, Stephen.” She read on.
“Why?”
“I wanted to test that unshakable, unbreakable faith you had in me. I have to admit it was much stronger than I imagined—it lasted all of three seconds longer than I thought it would,” she said. “I’m flattered—not.”
“That’s not fair. Come on, Em—you—you said the worst thing you could possibly say to a guy,” I said. “All right, you put me to the test and I took the bait and—”
“You failed miserably.”
“I admit I fell for it. If it had been anyone other than Matt Turner—”
“What difference would it have made who I’d shagged?”
“Well, Matt’s my best mate.”
“Your best mate? A minute ago you were going to jump in your time machine and de-bollock him at birth!”
“Yeah, but that was just a normal male reaction.”
“Sloane, there is nothing normal about you.”
“Emma, it’s in our genes, love—we’re programmed to react that way—haven’t you heard of the harem-castration syndrome? It’s been around since the dawn of time. Guys want to mate with as many females as possible and try to stop the rest of the lads in the tribe getting a look-in. It’s all perfectly normal and healthy,” I said. “That’s why I was behaving a bit off with you. I didn’t mean it. I didn’t mean it, darling. Love? You didn’t think I meant it, did you? All that stuff…”
“Don’t simper, Stephen.”
A voice called down from the hatch. “Hey, man, like, is everything okay down there?” It was John. “We thought we heard someone screaming.”
“The coffee was a bit hot!” I shouted up. “Go back to your meditation!”
“Uh, cool. Uh, actually, Steve, Jody, and I thought we’d go and find ourselves now, if that’s all right with you.”
“Find yourselves?” I said. “Where?”
“Wherever it’s at, man,” said John.
“It could be within us or without us,” said Jody.
“Yeah, like far out or all in the mind,” said John.
“What do you think, Steve?” said Jody. “Can we make it?”
“Well, I don’t know, it’s a wild and wacky world out there, you guys.”
“Yeah, but, um, you know, er, if we can kinda like tune in, man,” said John. “We just might stand a chance, don’t you agree?”
“Go for it, man.”
“Hey, wow—like love and peace, man!” cried John.
“We knew you’d understand, man,” said Jody. “So long, Steve, love and peace, man. You, too, Emma.”
“Yeah, love and peace,” I said.
“Just do it,” said Emma.
We heard them tramping up the gangplank and chattering excitedly as they left on the voyage of self-discovery we call life. Yeah, it was kind of funny hearing them express themselves like that, but kind of touching, too.
“You know, in my own way, I think I really helped those kids,” I said.
“Steve, don’t kid yourself,” said Emma. “You turned them into Sloane clones—their lives are going to be hell.”
I thought about that. “You may just have a point there. I’ll go and call them back.”
“Oh, leave them alone!”
“Yeah, you’re right. Em, can’t we stop all this fussing and fighting now? Can’t we be friends again?”
“I am your friend, Stephen,” she smiled. “But I love Travis.”
“But you can’t mean that, love,” I said. “It’s so—so irrational—we’re expecting a baby together. We still have issues here.”
“I love Travis De Quipp. End of story.”
“Look, will you please just try something for me a minute?” I looked round for a pen and paper. I found a desk diary and a biro on a shelf. I tore out a note page from the back and handed it to her. “Here, take this pen and paper and try to focus in on your subconscious feelings for Travis.”
“My subconscious feelings for Travis?” she said, pulling a pained expression. “What do you mean?”
“It can mean anything you want it to mean—I just want to prove to you how irrational our emotions can be. This is classic market research, trust me,” I said.
“Anything?”
“Whatever comes into your head when you think of Travis,” I nodded. “Don’t think about it—just let your pen flow over the paper.”
She drew a long cigar-shape and passed it to me.
“What’s that supposed to be?” I said.
“You tell me,” she said, sucking the pen.
“Well, let me see, it could be a, um, it looks like a, um, what the hell is it?” I said. “It looks a bit phallic.” I ripped it up. “You did that on bloody purpose!” I said.
“Got a bigger piece of paper?” she smirked, and went back to her book.
I stormed off up the stairs. Just as I got to the hatchway, a big black Norton motorbike, with two people astride it, zipped up in leathers, wearing goggles and black helmets—one big, one small—drove onto the quayside, mounted the end of the gangplank, and bounced down onto the deck. The tall driver switched the roaring engine off and the little one jumped off the back and lifted her goggles up.
“Steve!” she cried, running to throw her arms around my neck and kiss me. “Oh, I missed you.”
“Emily, Emily,” I smiled. “How did it go?”
Tree dismounted. “Don’t ask,” he said.
“They blew up Daddy’s farm!” cried Emily excitedly.
“Oh, no. What happened?” I said. “Come below—I’ll put the kettle on.”
“They blew up everything—even the wood shed!” said Emily. “They even blew up the car! They would have blown us up if Daddy hadn’t remembered his old Norton—they locked us up in the barn with it, and Daddy got it going and we smashed through the door like James Bond! Then we rode over to Taunton and bought all this biker gear—isn’t it just the coolest?”
“Yes, yes—you must tell us all about it,” I said. I turned her round and faced her down the steps. “Later.”
I stood aside to let Tree go next and patted him on the back.
By the time I got down to the cabin, Tree and Emily had removed their helmets, unzipped their leathers and were lounging on the bench seat
s. Emma was already putting the coffee on, so I sat down at the dining table. Then Emily stood up and gave me a little fashion show on the pretence of following Emma out into the galley. I heard her chattering away, telling Emma all about their narrow escape in Somerset.
“So what happened?” I asked Tree.
“They were waiting for us,” he sighed. “Either they got very lucky or someone tipped them off.”
“Tipped them off? How? I mean—who?”
“Wish I knew.”
“We’ve had a couple of visitors here, too,” I said.
“Here?” He looked around. “Where?”
“Don’t worry—they’ve gone—I got rid of them,” I said.
“When was this? You didn’t tell them where we were, I hope?” said Tree.
I shook my head. “No way, man. I just persuaded them to get a life. And they left.”
“Just like that?”
“Just like that,” I said. “Mind you, it took me all night to talk them round.”
“I think I need to ask you a question,” said Tree sternly.
“Yeah, I understand. Go ahead,” I said.
“What did you borrow off me at Knebworth?”
“A Tibetan hat,” I said.
Tree smiled and reached out his hand. I stretched over mine and gave him five.
“They must be tracking us somehow,” said Tree. “The net’s closing. You might have seen two off, but they’ll be back as sure as eggs is eggs. We’d best leave as soon as we can.”
“Yeah, tempus fugit. Did you manage to save the drawings?” I said.
He put his hand inside his leathers and pulled out a bundle of papers, and tossed them on the coffee table.
“Nice one!” I said.
I slid off my seat and picked them up, and began leafing through them. They were mostly interiors—sketchily drawn scenes of men and women sitting around in what looked like an ancient dungeon—there were a few others of inmates exercising, but they were all enclosed by walls. I was disappointed. And then I found two, right down the bottom, that were exactly what I had been hoping to find—they showed the view from a cell window—one looking towards a distant coastline, which seemed to curve around like a horseshoe, and the other from a completely different viewpoint.