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It’s the middle of the afternoon. The sun is shining. The sky is clear. There are few clouds. While I catch my breath I survey the truly wonderful panorama around me, slowly turning on the spot as I scan the distant horizons, amazed at just how far I can see.
London seems so far away from me now. My life and experiences so incongruous to the peace and tranquillity that’s up here.
It’s mind blowing to think that regardless of whatever world I occupy, this scenery would be the same: humans, like ants, scurry around at the base of the mountains, but up here, time passes so slowly that its passing is almost unnoticed, except for the obvious seasons of the year.
Here there are no clues as to what is happening elsewhere in the world. No clues as to what year it is. Or what world it is.
If a Highlander were to suddenly walk up to me and inform me he was in the year 1665, apart from the clothes he might wear, there would be nothing to indicate the contrary.
Up here, above the valleys, far from any other visible sign of humanity, time is invisible.
There is no stress induced from the rotating hands of a clock, or the audible tick-tock from a clock as they mark the passing of our lives. There are no newspapers. No radio. Nothing.
Just me. The sun. The wind. The grass. And these glorious views!
I sit myself down on the edge of a steep slope and retrieve the lunch I packed for myself this morning…what’s left of it. I pour myself tea from my flask. I eat. I drink.
And I am content.
More content and more relaxed than I have been for many years.
At least nine.
My meal completed - the sandwiches, an apple, an oat bar – I lie back on the grass and stare up at the blue of the sky above. Soon my eyelids grow heavy, they close, and I sleep.
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When I wake, twenty minutes has passed. Or so my watch tells me.
I sit up, reach for my flask, and pour myself another cup of tea.
I love it here!
I know that I should soon be heading back, but the temptation to just STAY…for ever….is immense. Once, many years ago, I was at the top of another mountain, and I got talking to another walker. We were sharing our thoughts on how beautiful the view was from the summit there, where we were both standing. I remarked that I thought the view from the peak was perhaps the best I had ever seen. The man I was talking with agreed. He then proceeded to tell me that several years before another walker had come to the summit, and thought it was so beautiful she had decided not to leave. Ever. She had simply sat down and enjoyed the views. The last of the other walkers who had visited that mountain that day later reported that when they left the summit, she was just sitting there. Contentedly. Happy. A smile on her face.
They had discovered her body the next morning. Still sitting. Still smiling. Happy.
I’ve often thought of that tale. I don’t know if it’s true or an urban legend, but I’ve always found it fascinating and wondered what would happen, in a world where we all strive to find the place where we can be most happy, if you found it? And if you did, why would you leave it?
As I sit here now, I almost feel like that woman on the top of her mountain. I am content. Relaxed. Happy.
I know I’m going to leave. I know I’m not going to stay. But it is tempting.
If I did stay, some people may perhaps think that I was mad. But surely staying here would be a much safer option than flying back to London, the centre of the world’s worst ever pandemic, where according to last night’s news, one in fifteen people have been exposed to the virus, and the death rate for anyone infected is seven percent.
It’s a sobering thought. Here I am safe. Surrounded by peace, and beauty, and nature. And yet, tomorrow, I will voluntarily be flying back to the epicentre of death.
Am I crazy?
Chapter Twenty Five
.
When I eventually drag myself away from the sanctuary I found at the top of the world, its already quite late, nearly four o’clock. I’m tempted to stay up here for longer, but I know it will take me several hours to get down, and probably an hour back to the cottage from the river. The Professor will be waiting for me. We still have much to talk about before I leave tomorrow, and as I start to make my way off the hill, I begin to worry that I may be rushing it. Perhaps it would be wiser to stay a little longer before I head back down to the madness in London.
I make my way down the path slowly and carefully. The last thing I need to do now is to twist or break an ankle, and I find myself having to concentrate hard on my footing. After an initial steep descent, the gradient eases off, and I find the going easier.
My mind starts to think about tomorrow, and to build a plan of what I’m going to do when I get back to London. More than once I stop to catch my breath and look around me. It’s…it’s all so beautiful.
Stress free.
Clean.
Safe.
It’s hard to believe that beyond the mouth to this valley is a world where death and dying are commonplace, and every breath carries with it the risk of infection.
Just now, probably everyone in London would give anything to be here, and I am leaving it all behind and going back?
But every time I question the sanity behind it, a picture of Sarah pops into my mind, followed swiftly by thoughts of my son. MY SON!
What does he look like now? When he talks, what does he sound like?
What’s he like as a person?
What are his interests? What does he want to be when he grows up?
Is he sporty or a geek?
When’s his birthday?
What should I buy him as a birthday present?
Does he like football? If so, what’s his favourite team?
I find the questions that pop into my mind about Kenneth both exciting and frustrating. Frustrating because I don’t know the answers, but exciting because I will hopefully soon meet him, get to know him, and then find out all the answers for myself.
I have a son! A SON!
I still find it difficult to believe.
As I make my way off the hill it becomes very clear to me that my main priority when I get to London is to meet Kenneth. I miss Sarah, and I ache for her, both physically and emotionally…I just want to hold her in my arms, cuddle her, kiss her… but strangely, I realise that she is now no longer the priority.
Kenneth is.
I need to meet him.
As soon as possible.
Of course, there is the question of logistics.
How am I going to find him, meet him, talk to him?
When I get to London, where will I stay?
I realise that I am going to need a new phone. A laptop. A contract with a telephone company. And some way of getting around London, if there is no transport.
My thoughts switch to my mum. I need to visit her grave. And her house.
Perhaps I can stay there if it’s still habitable.
And then I think of Jane, and the mystery of why she needs to see me so urgently? What’s that all about? What is the mysterious package that she has to give me?
Eventually I come to the bottom of the mountain and the ground levels off. I find myself walking across open land across the valley floor towards the river where I stopped off before.
Suddenly I hear a cry, and I look up.
A large bird of prey, a Golden Eagle, swoops overhead. It’s close, very close, and for a moment I stand there as I watch it swoop around several times in a circle above me.
As I watch, an intense feeling of déjà vu overcomes me, which quickly changes to a memory…a memory of me standing in another field in another world with Keira and Nicole, my hands resting on their shoulders, as we all stood looking up at another Golden Eagle, spotted during a camping holiday to Fort William, a couple of years ago…no, or is that nine years ago?
As the eagle soars away, rising higher and higher and soon disappearing from view, I am left wit
h an intense feeling of longing for my daughters. It hits me like a physical pain in my chest, and for a moment I struggle to breathe.
I fall to my knees and lean forward, tears now quickly flowing and all the euphoria and joy of the day swept away.
I am left feeling empty. Hollow. And a traitor.
I think of my girls all the time. I miss them terribly. But now I realise just how much I have been suppressing my longing for them. At the beginning, when I first crossed over from one world to another, I struggled with my separation from them, and trying to understand what was happening to me. But as I realised the truth, or what I think is the truth, I began to understand that I have no control over what is happening to me. I am like a piece of flotsam wood bobbing around on the eddies of time, unable to control my direction or speed of movement. The only way I learned to survive was to bury my emotions, to hide my feelings from myself…but sometimes, when I let my guard down, my Pandora’s Box is opened and the truth comes out.
I miss my daughters. They are growing up without me. In my dreams I reach out to touch them, to draw them to me and to hold them in my arms, but when I wake in the morning they are always gone.
I worry that I have abandoned them. In the excitement of learning of my son, I have thought more about him than them. And now they are calling to me across space and time and sending eagles to remind me they are still there.
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When I finally make it back to the cottage, the Professor is waiting outside in the garden.
He has set up a table and chairs, and laid on a banquet for us to eat alfresco in the warmth of the summer’s evening. A fire pit is full of logs waiting to be set alight, and two rugs and cushions are spread on the ground beside it. On top of the table is a full bottle of whisky, and beside it, a small bucket with ice and several bottles of beer.
“Ah, James, my boy, you’re just in time! Everything is ready.”
“What’s the special occasion?” I ask, collapsing into one of the seats and immediately reaching for one of the cold beers.
“Our last dinner before you head back into the lions’ den. And my last chance to talk with my favourite pupil and another human being for goodness knows how long. Living up here in the mountains is amazing, but I fear it might get lonely again, once you’ve gone.”
“I’m sorry, but I don’t really have much choice but to leave. I don’t know if I have any control at all over what happens to me any more… I am ‘but a piece of flotsam on the eddies of time itself’…but whatever I am meant to be achieving in this world won’t be achieved up here. London is calling, and I have to go back.”
The Professor nods.
“I fear I agree with you, James my boy.” He raised a glass of whisky to me, and toasts my future. I say thank you, and toast his longevity and continued rejuvenation, but caution him not to get too young, lest he has to go back to school and wear short trousers.
We eat. We drink. We enjoy each other’s company.
It’s a warm evening. The stars are out.
And as we both sit back in our chairs and start to get quite hammered, a bright shooting star passes overhead.
“Ahh…. A good omen! Quickly, make a wish!” the Professor urges me. But he is too late. I have already made it.
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The next morning I wake early and quickly pack the few possessions I have. The Professor and I are both sitting outside drinking coffee after breakfast when we hear the pulsating thunder of Sergeant Dave Porter’s taxi emerge over the ridge of mountains to our south.
Breaking all the rules, I hug the Professor. It was a moment of pandemic insanity, but also a finger in the sky to the virus. “Fuck it.”
The Professor doesn’t object. In fact, after I pull back, his voice is rather hoarse, and he has to cough to clear his throat.
I don’t know who benefited most from the spontaneous moment of human contact. I instantly thought it was me, but as we said verbal goodbyes and I walk away from Professor Kasparek towards the helicopter, I realise I was perhaps being rather selfish.
Without human contact, humans can’t survive too long.
A hug is a hug.
And the Professor needed it just as much as me.
As he wishes me the best of luck, and says the words “James, my boy,” that one final time…for now… I realise how much I’m going to miss him. Since I arrived in this world from my own, he has been my only true friend.
As the helicopter rises high into the sky and turns south towards London, I watch him get smaller and smaller until the valley swallows him up and he is gone.
It was a short visit, a moment spent in a haven of peace and tranquillity which I will never forget, and I which will treasure for all time. Wherever and whenever that time is.
Chapter Twenty Six
What next?
The Sergeant smiles at me as he welcomes me back aboard the helicopter.
“I didn’t expect to see you back so soon,” he remarks. "There’re probably about ten million people in London desperate to escape to a paradise like this, and you want to go back? With all due respect, sir, I know what I’d be doing if the shoe was on the other foot.”
His observation doesn’t help. There’s a little voice at the back of my mind shouting exactly the same thing.
“I wish I could stay,” I reply. “But I can’t. I really have no choice but to go back to London and meet some people. Although first I have to find them…And I think I’m going to need some help from you, or your colleagues?”
I spend the next five minutes with the Sergeant running through a list of things I’m probably going to need when I get back to London in addition to the SP the Home Secretary has already promised me. Luckily, in an amazing display of generosity the Professor has given me a credit card, with his PIN number, and suggested I should use it to buy anything I needed. Anything. That would be great, if any of the shops were open. But they’re not.
So, I ask for help from the Home Secretary, handing over the list to the Sergeant and asking if he can help with anything that’s written on it? Things like a laptop and more clothes. And food.
The Sergeant smiles when he sees the list of food, probably reacting to the childish request for chocolate.
“I don’t know if you’ve been told yet,” the Sergeant says, “but the Professor has requested access for you to the special government accommodation allocated to Blue Pass holders near Whitehall. The request was granted, and we’ll be taking you there today. If you hand in this list to the concierge at the front desk, he’ll arrange all of this for you, courtesy of the Government. As for the laptop and clothes, I need to make a few calls now, and hopefully you’ll get them later today.”
After the Sergeant pours a coffee for me and hands me a fresh newspaper from London, he makes his excuses and disappears upfront to the cockpit.
I settle back and scan the paper.
There’s some more talk of a vaccine being developed, but the article stresses that it’s unlikely to be anytime soon. Scientists are considering a new approach to vaccine development, which actually doesn’t ever use any live virus in any inoculation. In effect the idea is to develop something that prevents any of the symptoms of a disease from developing, although letting the infection still enter the body. In other words, you get infected, but you don’t get ill. As I read about the concept, it occurs to me that it’s actually more of a treatment, than a vaccine. It’s an interesting approach, but one which, I suspect, will never catch on or work.
Another article catches my eye. It’s basic premise is that whereas in 1918 there was the Spanish Flu pandemic that came and went in three distinct waves before it died out, there is a growing concern that what the world is experiencing today is not actually multiple waves of the disease, but still the emerging phase of the first wave. The article suggests that with most societies going into a lock-in but never for long-enough to let the virus die out completely by starving it to death of victims to infect,
each time a national lock-in ends and a population emerges from their homes, the virus simply immediately starts to infect again. In other words, lock-in only puts the current wave on hold, but it carries on as soon as lock-in is lifted. Until the virus is left to run its course through the population, and then fade away naturally, then all society is doing is simply prolonging the inevitable.
The article finishes by expressing another, more scary concern: namely, that whilst everyone is in lock-in, and because we are unnaturally allowing the wave of virus infection to last so long by forcibly dampening down the curve of infections and deaths, that during this time we are giving the virus an ideal breeding environment to mutate and evolve. In other words, instead of having one wave of virus infection at a time, each due to a dominant virus candidate, that each are now experiencing a single wave with multiple virus mutations, each with a possibility to infect in a different way. In other words, we may soon have not one, but multiple pandemics all running concurrently. On and on. Until one day we accept the inevitable, and simply let the virus rip through society. Killing millions. Perhaps billions. Who knows.
“Bloody hell!” I mutter under my breath and cast the paper aside onto the seat beside me.
“I’ve only been here for a matter of days, and already I’m sick of it. How on earth has everyone managed to live like this for so long?” I ask myself.
Shaking my head, I shuffle along the seat and snuggle up in a corner against the bulkhead.
It’s warm, cosy, and the constant vibration of the flight soon works its magic on me and I fall asleep.
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I sleep like a log. I wake only when shaken roughly by the shoulder by the Sergeant as we pass over the edge of London.
“We’ll be there in ten minutes. I thought you might want to see London again as we pass over it. I’ve got used to it now, but it’s still quite incredible. Only a few people have ever got to see what a completely deserted city looks like from the air. You’re one of them.”
Am I Dead? Page 16