‘Please … please …’
I shook my hand, clenched my fist, closed my eyes and …
The space I had grabbed was empty. She had already turned and was running down the street. With some relief I followed her. I called Lineker but he seemed deaf to my voice, intent instead on standing his ground. As the truck reached the junction the girl ducked into a side street and I jumped in beside her. We lay shaking against the wall.
A door opened and slammed. Lineker’s bark fell to an undulating growl and boots crunched in the dirt. Then the growl was cut short, followed by silence. There were a few scuffles, sharp thuds and yelps, another door slamming and more footsteps ending in two smart heel scrapes. Whoever it was said a single word I could not make out – sharp and direct, female – and then there was a series of quick thwacks, each one punctuated by a man’s cry.
I edged to the corner and looked round. To my surprise, Lineker was sitting with his eyes turned up to a tall, raven-haired woman in the unmistakable Purple uniform of the BU. I tried to get a closer look. There was something about her I could not place. She was wearing an extremely large amount of make-up: pitch-black mascara, dull blusher and brutally red lipstick, but beneath it all … a face I swore I knew. She appeared to be quite high up in rank, so perhaps I had seen her on the television, or in those propaganda rags they had handed out. Something told me otherwise, though.
In one hand she carried a cane. At her side was another dog. A man limped away from her.
She said another word that caused Lineker to cock his head. Then she bent down at her hips and ruffled him on the head. The girl made a noise and I held a finger to my lips. She blinked in understanding.
I looked back and saw that the woman had returned to the truck. The door slammed, the engine roared and they rolled away down the main road.
When it was quiet, I jumped up and ran for Lineker.
‘Lineker!’ I shouted. I found him next to the wall, licking his paw. When he saw me he gave a kind of shocked snuffle. His fangs were red with his own blood. ‘What did they do to you, eh?’
I gave his ribs a once-over. He flinched a little, but there did not appear to be any breaks. Eventually he stood up and plodded around for a bit, then found my side and leaned against my shin. He was trembling.
I turned and saw the girl standing behind me, holding the cuffs of her coat in her fists. She walked over and stood close, looking down at her feet. She was shaking too.
Decision swayed beneath me.
I am not a hero. Altruism does not exist. There are the things a man wants to do and there are the things he must do, and the things he must do must be done because if he does not then the consequences linger. That is really all there is to altruism: the avoidance of bad feeling.
There I stood on that empty, rubble-strewn street with an injured dog at my side and a lost, mute girl before me, my shadow drawn thin by the midwinter sun, and my being torn between the want and the must.
It was unfair, but I had no choice.
‘I shall take you as far as the river, young lady,’ I said. ‘But I am not crossing it. After that, you are on your own.’
PART 2
Her
LINEKER
Well, that was weird.
Proper. Fucking. Weird.
One minute I feel like I’m me, doing my job and giving those Purple twats what for, hackles up, snout out, teeth bared and full of righteous indignation – I tell you, there’s nothing like a bit of righteous indignation to get your hackles up; they were after the girl, I knew they were, and I just couldn’t let that happen – and the next, I’m … I’m …
I don’t know what I am.
That cunt came out, I remember that. Him with the long arms and shiny, dumb face who smelled of sour lamb and shaving foam – he came out first and suddenly all that righteous indignation turned to pure rage. I was still in control, I knew what I was doing, and there was no way I was letting him past me. He wasn’t going to get the girl, no matter how much he towered over me or eclipsed the sun with that thick head of his, or cocked it to the side as he raised back his shiny black boot with a childlike thrill on his face as though this was going to be fun, this was, to …
To kick me. Yes, Lambchops got one in first, all right? He gave me a lazy thump in the ribs, but so what? Maybe I’m a little rusty – it’s not as if I’ve had a lot of combat experience recently – but I would have got him back. All I needed was a second or two to get my head together, shake off the shock and jump back in the fray. I would have been ready for action, ready to pounce on him, ready to tear him to pieces. I would have fucking had him, I would.
But then She came out. She and that husky bitch of Hers.
I already knew She was there. Not consciously, but on some level. I couldn’t see Her because the windows of the truck were blacked out, and I couldn’t hear Her because the only sound in my ears was that of my own blood raging and the mumbles of that imbecile as he waited for my next move. But I knew She was there. Somewhere beneath all the fury of that moment, beneath the red mist and tang of blood there was this other scent, like fresh snow in a place with no people, colossal pines and icicles dripping in low sun. And there was something else too, something deeper, more pungent and familiar. It ran beneath everything like a deep river, and it had done since we’d first seen that truck three days ago. It was calling me.
As I regrouped, I suddenly felt my hackles fall and my tail go limp, as if some great power had swept all the anger from my guts and carried it away on a polar wind. Feelings and thoughts disintegrated, and I drifted with them, but the sound of a sharp slap brought me back from my stupor. I looked up and I saw Her.
She was beating him. Wordlessly, She was clobbering my adversary around the head with a single gloved hand, not in a fist, but straight out like a blade. He cowered and yelped as She delivered his punishment.
Her blows were measured and well timed, each one landing with the same force as the last. I counted them – seven, eight, nine – and my eyes drifted to the source of that other, deeper scent: the husky bitch sitting patiently by her side. She was the first dog I’d seen in three years.
Our eyes locked – mine still trembling as the fury left my body; hers unwavering, a brilliant, treacherous blue. Her coat was a landscape of blacks and browns and whites, like tundra sweeping down two lean flanks into a coiled tail and four slender legs with full, white paws. Her ears were folded in soft points towards me, and her snout was marbled black with freckles. She lowered it an inch and I saw something in her, a ripple that seemed to say, Well, hello.
The lady, her mistress – She – was finishing up, arriving at the twelfth blow with a neat thwack against the nose of Lambchops who, by now, was whimpering and for whom I was starting to feel a kind of disgusted pity. She stepped away, placed Her hands on Her hips and said a single word: truck, and what do you know? Off to the truck he scampered, leaving Her, the Husky and me alone.
She removed Her cap and brushed it off, revealing a glistening black sweep of hair. Her skin was arctic white and Her lips were painted a fierce orchid red. She smiled. Two green eyes gazed down upon me, squeezing out whatever remnants of fury still quivered within my gut.
Fucking weird, I thought in some far-off region of my mind.
Her chest rose and fell with each breath, a single strand of loose hair undulated in the breeze, and Her head slowly tilted. I got lost in the rhythm of it all, calm and empty as a shell. I blinked, feeling my own breathing match Hers and drinking in that scent as if it was an elixir, filling every cell in my body with its memory. And once again my eyes wandered to the bitch who, with the slightest inclination of the head, said, It’s all right, just go with it.
It was magic. Not the kind with flashes, lights or tricks, but the kind that makes you feel what’s underneath everything. It was The Howl, that’s what it was; a direct mainline hit from The Howl. For a second I forgot that I was me.
I try to do my best by Reg. I try to do what he
asks me: to come when he calls, to stay when he wants and to sit when he asks me. But it takes concentration and I don’t always get it right. Sometimes I get distracted.
But this, this thing She was doing, there was no getting distracted from that. This was the distraction. So when She filled Her lungs, raised Her chin and said, ‘Sit’, that’s exactly what I did.
She looked between the husky and me.
‘Veronica seems to like you,’ She said. ‘How unusual.’
I don’t know what would have happened if that radio hadn’t crackled. When the truck’s engine started and the plonker driving it shouted something at Her, the moment just buzzed away and I was back, standing in the rubble without Reg – albeit now looking at a pretty tasty-looking husky who, if I’m not very much mistaken, had the hots for old Lineker too. Before I knew it She had replaced her cap and returned to the truck, with the bitch hopping in behind her, and the doors had slammed and they were away down the road in a cloud of dust.
As I got my bearings and the world fully returned, Reg was next to me on his knees, checking me over and looking all worried – bless his fat-packed heart – and the girl was there too, stroking my head and making me feel like the bravest dog on Earth.
But not the last, clearly. Like I said: fucking weird.
But none of that matters now! Forget it, done, in the past, weird bit definitely but time to move on. And moving on we most fucking well are, because it looks as though we’re going on a little adventure! Reg – the man I love and trust more than anything in the world – the girl, of whom I’m growing fonder and fonder by the hour, and little old me, we’re heading – wait for it – north! North towards all those wonderful buildings where my dream birds land, the impossible places I visit when I fall into a nap at my window.
Reg has packed supplies, so I can tell that this is one serious fucking walkies. It’s a fresh new day, all wintry and bright, and the world is ours alone. The sights, the sounds, the smells … I can’t wait for them, and apart from the strange memory of that moment, the scent of Her still lingering in my hairy nostrils and the dull ache in my side from that twat’s boot, I haven’t felt this good in ages. I feel hopeful and alive. I feel free.
The Gift of Not Caring
REGINALD HARDY’S JOURNAL
10TH DECEMBER 2021
So there is this duchess, you see. Only you should understand that she is not really a duchess, more of a princess or a queen. It is rather complicated to explain because it all happens in a different time and an imaginary place. But she is called The Duchess. That is her name.
The story takes place in a mighty kingdom called Karafall, and The Duchess has just led her people bravely in a ten-year war against a horde of fierce warriors from across the sea called The Skellt Droves. But now the war is over and Karafall lies defeated, so The Duchess must flee from her mountaintop tower, abandoning her crown and all her riches for the greedy Skellt to plunder.
She walks among her people, but without her fine clothes and jewels nobody believes who she is. She stands in a market square declaring her title and imploring her people to follow her once again, but they jeer and throw rotten fruit at her as if she is a lunatic. The more she insists, the less people believe her and the more fruit they throw. And then this beggar arrives …
Twenty years I have been writing this story and I still cannot get to the end of it. I have written it so many times in so many ways, but each time, just when I think I am going to crack it, I hit this wall.
I get stuck, and I cannot move on.
How can I save The Duchess, and what will she do when she is saved?
I would not normally have been thinking about my book during daylight; I save my writing for the morning and the evening. But today I needed a distraction.
She is small and still a little weak from her time in the stairwell – when you refused to help her, Reginald; yes, thank you for the reminder – so we were moving rather more slowly than I would have liked. Lineker ran ahead and she walked behind, scurrying every now and again to keep up. She does not complain, though. In fact, she does not say a word, just keeps her head down and follows. So I suppose that is a blessing of sorts.
My plan was to head for Vauxhall Bridge, taking Peckham High Road (well within my map) until Denmark Hill, then north-west up Camberwell New Road (a little outside the boundaries) until we hit the water (which is completely off the page). The whole route was just under five miles which, at the pace we had been keeping, would have taken us about three hours. I had a map for her with a route marked upon it, and a small bag with food and water for her journey. After Vauxhall I would send her on her way and be back in Peckham in time for tea.
The problem with my little scheme was that I had not ventured north of Peckham High Road for the best part of three years, and so I had no idea what was there.
The cold mist clung to everything as we made our way along the middle of the road. Three-storey shopfronts lined the street on either side: curry houses, barbershops, cafés and bookies all with their windows either shuttered, boarded up or smashed in like everywhere else. Every surface – every wall, lamp post, phone box and door – was plastered with posters and flyers from top to bottom, each layer bearing evidence of its era like the rings of a tree trunk. Poking through at the bottom were advertisements for events – music festivals, concerts, plays and comedy nights. The names of the acts and celebrities seemed so distant it was as if they came from a book or a film, a different story that no longer belonged in reality. I can barely remember the sounds that used to blare from radios and sizzle from headphones.
On top of these were election campaign posters. Primary yellows, reds and blues, each with a happy, caring face advertising the candidates’ charm and suitability for the job. And nestled among these, in lesser number, were the purple sheets. There were no faces on these, just Union Jacks adorned with words like ‘change’ and ‘unite’.
The next layer was overwhelmingly taken over by something called THE MANIFESTO. These had been scratched, defiled and muddled with handwritten notes, most of which appealed for help finding family members. Others were scrawled with times and places or stamped with a small emblem: an open palm and a star.
The second-to-last layer was made up of single sheets with the heading ‘POSITIVE STEPS FOR A POSITIVE FUTURE’. Underneath was a list: ‘Study your neighbour’, ‘Respect your curfew’, ‘Encourage vetting’, that kind of thing, and over them all were stuck red squares emblazoned with the starred palm. These were either torn, scratched, smeared with spit, or graffitied with suggestions of activities the supporters of this symbol might like to engage in with their mothers, or fathers, or certain animals. The insults were set off with the occasional swastika for good measure.
I glanced over this little history lesson, affording it the same interest I had done when it unfolded in the first place. Caring, you see, that is what it comes down to. The quality of your peace upon this godless rock is, I believe, a function of how much you decide to care. Caring leads to nothing but disappointment, confusion and pain.
Not caring, however, does not mean not watching. I was fully aware of the seismic shifts that were occurring in the political landscape back when the glue on these flyers was still wet. I saw how people reacted. I remember once getting stuck in traffic on the Old Kent Road. I was waiting next to a bus full to the brim with passengers all facing down as they swiped screens, turned pages, and shook their heads. Nothing unusual about that, I thought. But then, two panes of glass and three feet of smog-filled air away I saw a man in his thirties. He looked like he’d done all right for himself, had a pricey-looking suit and watch (I immediately marked him as a handshaker). Suddenly, he dropped his phone on his lap and turned his face up to the sky, contorted in a bizarre and sudden spasm of anguish. He stared into the sun with mournful eyes and a drooping mouth; looking for all the world like a stained-glass saint beholding the crucifixion. Then, ever so slowly, as if pulled there by some unseen force of despair,
his gaze trickled down the grubby window towards me.
And do you know what he did? He started bawling, that’s what he did. He cried his eyes out at me. I hardly knew where to look, so I kept my eyes front and willed the truck ahead to move. To my relief, it eventually did, and I used the space to swap lanes and whirl away home.
‘It’s the end of the world,’ a young mother in East Dulwich lamented another time. I was fixing a socket in her kitchen as she leaned against the sink, cigarette trembling in her hand. She sucked and puffed at it like a child pretending, avoiding all the smoke. ‘Don’t you think?’
I tightened the screws on her socket and told her that the end of the world was not something I knew much about, being an electrician.
‘I’m being emotional, sorry,’ she twittered, extinguishing the cigarette under the tap, ‘but that’s what I think. It’s the end, I can feel it.’
I had finished so I packed my tools and stood to leave. She bit her nails and shot me nervous glances as her children’s tablet computers beeped and bubbled from the back room. Without quite knowing why, I found myself speaking again.
‘The world ends every day, madam, and it always has done,’ I said. ‘Inside every third set of eyes you will find a little apocalypse raging. You don’t need bombs for that.’
She had stopped fidgeting and I had run out of words. We faced each other in a silence that went on far longer than was comfortable.
‘My apologies,’ I said at last, but her expression changed as I turned to leave. With a single glance in the direction of her distracted offspring, she flopped her shoulders in surrender and sprang into my path, arms outstretched and mouth agape. I barely had time to snatch my laminate sheet before she was upon me.
‘Madam, please!’ I announced, holding it up like a flaming cross in the face of the devil himself. She froze as I shook it at her. ‘Please! Control yourself!’
The Last Dog on Earth Page 10
