Two Steps Forward

by Graeme Simsion

  As I came out of Ribadesella, there were no trucks on a deserted trail, and only a white fence between me and the sea. After a short detour away from the coast, the Camino took its final section by the beach, before heading inland along roads and paths surrounded by overhanging trees and dense foliage.

  The following day, I got myself a little lost on what I thought was a short cut. In late morning, I found myself in mist, surrounded by dew-covered spider webs stretching over acres of bushes. I sat for maybe an hour, just taking it in.

  When I parted from Martin in Bilbao I had known I needed more time alone. I had begun to realise how much I’d adapted to Keith’s needs and preferences. Just small stuff: what time we went to bed, which side I slept on, not cooking cauliflower. Allowances and adaptions anyone in a long-term relationship has to make, accumulating over time. But I wasn’t in a relationship anymore. I wanted to know what of myself needed to be reclaimed.

  Maybe because I was consciously thinking about it, I felt the layers I had built up—the part of me that I’d developed to relate to Keith—falling away. A day before Oviedo, I took stock and felt I was near enough. I knew who I was again. Martin would be at the tourist office at 5 p.m. So would I.

  The final day into Oviedo was a long one, or at least I would once have thought it long—twenty miles or more. I barely noticed it. I didn’t have any illusions that my affair to remember would be anything other than a vacation romance, but it would be a kick start for midlife confidence.

  The stage was typical of the Spanish walk in the worst way: long sections of road with no sidewalk and construction works that made it difficult to avoid the traffic. But then the path led into the old city and the twenty-first century was left behind: narrow lanes dwarfed by stone walls, courtyards opening onto churches, cafés where the weather now permitted a sprawl of outdoor seating. I was early, and I figured Martin would have organised a hotel, as he had in St Jean Pied de Port. I bought a coffee and did a sketch of the beggar who had accosted me on the outskirts.

  The tourist office was hard to find—I had underestimated the size of the town or overestimated my navigational skills. Maybe I was unconsciously wanting Martin to get there first.

  He didn’t. It was Paola who was waiting for me. I had almost forgotten that the reason for choosing this date was the Brazilians’ arrival for their next stage.

  We hugged each other, but before I could ask about her three-week break, where her daughter was and whether the others had arrived, she gave me a half-smile and drew back. I’d delivered plenty of bad news in my life and I knew the look. It flashed through my mind that thinking of An Affair to Remember had jinxed Martin. He’d been in an accident. He’d been killed by one of the trucks. Paola must have seen my expression.

  ‘He is sorry,’ she said, ‘but he cannot make it. He asked me to give you this.’

  She handed me a package. I opened it with shaking hands, thinking that at least he wasn’t dead.

  It was the blue dress from the boutique in St Jean Pied de Port, my scallop-shell charm and a note.

  Dear Zoe

  You were right: the Camino has things to teach us and we need solitude to reflect on its lessons. Thank you for the charm. It has brought me this far, and I hope it finds you again and accompanies you safely to Santiago and home. You won’t need it, of course: your resourcefulness is truly astonishing. Thank you for your help with Sarah. We’re not there yet, but you’ve helped me to look at it differently. Or at least realise that I need to.

  I hope you find the peace you are looking for.

  Buen Camino

  Martin

  58

  MARTIN

  I stopped at a hotel a few kilometres out of Oviedo, mentally exhausted from talking to Paola, who had intercepted me as I crossed the main square.

  Zoe had been right: we needed to resolve our present problems before beginning anything new. I’d tried. I’d walked for a week and two hundred kilometres, speaking to no one except to organise food and accommodation. By any reasonable measure, I’d given myself time out to think—about Sarah’s need for parental guidance, the freedom she needed to make her own mistakes, and the complicating factor that was Julia’s and my relationship. This was why people walked. And the result? Nothing. Just despair and anger, some of the latter directed at the self-indulgent waste of time that was the Camino.

  As for Zoe: if two months of walking had not been sufficient to forgive herself for Keith’s death, it was going to be a hard nut to crack. She didn’t have answers to my problems, nor I to hers. In the event she had turned up at 5 p.m., it would surely only have been to tell me that. Or to reunite with the Brazilians. We might still catch up in the final fortnight. One for the universe to decide.

  I came down to dinner to find a group of five middle-aged men at a table being addressed—or possibly blessed—by a sixth, a tall bespectacled chap. At the conclusion of his speech he beckoned me over from the other end of the room, where I’d seated myself.

  His name was Felipe: the men were old friends, now scattered over Spain, who walked two weeks of the Camino every year as a sort of male-bonding exercise. One of their number was rostered to drive the van that ferried their gear or anyone carrying an injury. There was much drinking and consumption of good food in addition to the walking and talking. All bar Felipe were married, but it struck me that if I found myself in a hostel with them and the Brazilians I could say goodbye to sleep.

  After dinner one of them came over and we chatted for a while. Marco was an Italian-born haematologist with excellent English. He was a little guy who looked like he’d had his nose broken at some stage, perhaps by a jealous husband. He had paid the price for a wandering eye—three marriages, with kids from two of them and another from an extramarital dalliance—but was philosophical about it and optimistic that his current wife would see him through to old age.

  I was not in the habit of sharing much with other men, even Jonathan, but Marco had been frank about himself, and it was in the spirit of the evening. I told him about my divorce, about Sarah and then, after a digestif, a bit about the situation with Zoe. He had little to offer about the first two, beyond putting them behind me, but pressed me for details on the opportunity, as he saw it, with Zoe. His conclusion was that she was probably looking for someone to take her mind off her problems—and a bit of well-timed persuasion would get her across the line. But I’d never see her again. If that was what I wanted, fine. If not, I should wait until she returned to America and could think about a possible relationship in the context of her family, rather than as part of a transition. That much seemed like good advice.

  59

  ZOE

  CARTOON: A man with a cart walks down the road, throwing up dust clouds behind. His bag of sins is half full and tied up. He is looking back: his expression shows a determination to make the best of what is ahead, mixed with regret for what he is leaving behind. In the foreground, a woman drinks a glass of wine—there are other pilgrims around her but she is oblivious, in her own space.

  STORY: The Camino expands and contracts like a concertina; people move at their own pace, but with rest days and injuries they turn up again in a café or bar, at the gîte or in the bakery. There are hugs exchanged, drinks bought, stories shared. Each time you know that you may see them tomorrow—or never again.

  Buggy Man has come on a long journey, and his eyes have opened to the world around him, but moving forward on the Camino is the same as moving on in life: it can mean leaving things—and people—behind.

  He is a resolute walker, but he now needs strength of a different kind—life’s disappointments have hardened his heart and he must allow it to crack.

  The Camino whispers its magic, and around the next bend are more reunions and new friends—and maybe the answer he seeks.

  I could have been angry at Martin, but it was my pride that was hurt, and that was not his fault. The blue dress made me all the sadder, reawakening my guilt at leaving him back in St Jean Pie
d de Port. I was disappointed that I wouldn’t be walking with him for the next two weeks, and that we would not arrive in Santiago together. I didn’t know why it should matter, but it did. As I was powerless to make it happen, I vowed not to think about it. At least I was back with my old friends the Brazilians, who had reunited after travelling separately for three weeks.

  Paola had taken me to her hostel, where I spent a while in the shower, pulling myself together. When I came out there was a young woman on the bunk bed, plugged into her phone.

  ‘Tina,’ Paola said, nodding in her direction. ‘My daughter. She flew alone from Brazil.’ The girl gave me a brief smile. She was a younger, slimmer version of her mother, with large blue eyes made bigger by the black makeup caked around them. Margarida arrived next, with an extra bag.

  ‘Good shopping in Spain,’ she said. ‘And Italy. Have you seen Bernhard?’

  I hadn’t seen him since France and had thought he was taking the Camino Francés.

  ‘He is coming to join me—all of us,’ said Margarida. She showed me a series of messages on her phone.

  He arrived in time for dinner, along with Renata and Fabiana. There was a path from León on the Camino Francés to Oviedo—one hundred kilometres on the Camino del San Salvador. He brought plenty of stories from the most famous pilgrim trail. One couple had skipped the flat section to take a plane to the Grand Prix; a Korean guy navigated by choosing a walker each day and following two paces behind, stopping when they stopped and refusing to pass; a priest had performed an impromptu marriage ceremony for two pilgrims to allow them to consummate their relationship without guilt.

  ‘Irish, Australians and Kiwis—New Zealanders,’ he said. Looking at me, he added, ‘And Americans.’

  Bernhard had met Todd, whose discarded possessions had saved me in the Pyrenees.

  ‘Todd has rocks in his head. He follows the shortest route on the map. Because of this, he is always on the highway, which is bad for the feet.’ Tina was hanging off every word and Bernhard was playing to it.

  His summary of the Camino Francés was: ‘Too many walkers, too much commerce.’ I figured he meant: too much competition, not enough handouts.

  He added, ‘And flat. Flat and boring. Perfect for Buggy Man.’

  ‘Where is Martin?’ asked Renata.

  Paola answered for me. ‘He came through this morning. He is moving on.’

  Fabiana was subdued. She had spent the time out at a religious retreat and seemed to have recovered some of her piety. She’d have a tough time keeping a hold of it with Margarida around.

  So began the last leg of my Camino: two weeks and a bit more than a hundred and twenty miles. What had once seemed impossible to contemplate now seemed not worth worrying about. The coastal section of the walk had been lonely and, as if to mirror my emotional turmoil, the beauty of the ocean and the countryside had been slammed up hard against concrete and progress.

  Now I was on the Primitivo, the most ancient Camino, where at times my feet would tread on the original stones of a path pilgrims had taken for a thousand years. I started feeling both humble and strong, in the company of good people. Even Bernhard.

  The next day he slept in and Renata left early. Fabiana was deep in conversation with Paola, which left me with Tina and Margarida.

  ‘Have you done any other walks?’ I asked Tina.

  ‘No. I’m doing this thing only for my mother.’

  ‘Why do you think she wants you to walk the Camino?’

  ‘My father died on it.’

  That was a conversation stopper. Margarida was the one to break the silence. ‘I think for her, it is a walk about love.’

  Tina didn’t look like she wanted to think about her parents being in love.

  Margarida persisted. ‘It is a very romantic story.’

  If you like romances with unhappy endings. I wondered about Paola’s need to walk and re-walk.

  By the end of the day, I was walking alone and headed for the albergue in Grado. The Brazilians had a hotel, and I had arranged to meet them for massages and dinner. We were joined there by another walking group completing their first day, six Spanish men in their forties and fifties. Two spoke good English—the tall, serious Felipe, and Marco, who had those dark good looks and bedroom eyes that give Latino men their reputation.

  The next day, I met Marco on the trail.

  ‘Why this Camino and not the traditional one?’ I asked him in Spanish.

  ‘The Camino Francés? Too many Americans.’ He grinned. ‘And we have walked the Camino Francés already. Over three years.’

  ‘I think you can blame Hollywood for the American takeover,’ I said. ‘Apparently there’s a movie.’

  Marco laughed. ‘I have seen this movie. It makes a big mistake.’

  He didn’t elaborate until that evening, when he and his friends insisted on buying drinks for the Brazilians and me.

  ‘Look,’ said Marco. ‘Watch this and tell me if it seems like it is true.’

  We gathered around his phone screen to watch a scene from The Way, somewhere in the middle of the movie. I recognised Martin Sheen from Apocalypse Now: he was having his pack stolen by a Roma boy and giving chase. I was about to call out the racism and the fact that I’d never felt at risk of losing anything to anyone, beyond human error in St Jean Pied de Port. But Paola got in first, laughing. ‘He is running. Running. Who can run after a day walking the Camino?’

  The following morning, I walked for a while with Marco before he stopped at a bar to wait for his companions. I figured he’d show up in the evening, but for now I enjoyed the contrast: I was no longer lonely in my own company.

  The hills to Pola de Allande never let up, yet the countryside was beautiful, reminiscent of France in parts, and the weather was warmer. I wanted to take in every scene and experience, so that I could recreate it in my mind later. The urge to paint was stronger than it had been in years. The landscape was full of vibrant colours and I could imagine putting them on paper—I pictured the brushstrokes and longed for my paints. But I was also dreaming up cartoons of the Spanish Six.

  I was still working hard at night—not just drawing but doing massages for the Brazilians again. As soon as the Spanish Six learned that I did massages, Marco lined up. Of the five men walking he seemed to be the fittest, and I had a sense that it was more about an excuse to chat than sore feet. Perhaps more than chat.

  In Pola de Allande, after looking at me a little too intently during his foot massage, he positioned himself next to me at dinner. I thought of Camille’s comments on Spanish lovers. Margarida winked at me several times.

  ‘Good man,’ she whispered in my ear at one stage. ‘Very cute butt.’

  This was the sort of conversation my daughters had. I couldn’t help but smile—and he did have a cute butt.

  That night I had an email from Stephanie at the Chronicle. She loved Buggy Man. I hadn’t intended to draw Martin again, nor include myself in a cartoon. Not that Stephanie knew.

  You manage to put so much into your pictures, she said. Will the concertina bring them back together?

  I was certain the answer was no. If Martin and I met again, it would have to be because one of us had a change of heart and chased the other, and we had gotten past that. Martin had made his intentions clear enough with the return of the scallop shell. I had his bank-account details: as soon as the Chronicle paid me I would return his money. And that would be the end.

  60

  MARTIN

  Coming into Castroverde, just five solid days from my destination and no further advanced on resolving the situation with Sarah, I had an extraordinary encounter. Walking out of town in the opposite direction was a man pulling a cart, albeit a more primitive one than mine. It looked to be the same model as the one that Maarten had carried into Cluny one life-changing morning, nine months earlier. As we approached each other, I realised it was the model Maarten had pulled out of Cluny, with its improved wheels. He was still pulling it.

  It
was only a minute before we reached each other. He recognised me and we threw our arms around each other, British and Dutch reserve notwithstanding. He had lost weight, but the trolley had survived. He confirmed that our repair had held. The ENSAM team back in Cluny would be chuffed: I took a bunch of photos for them and my blog.

  Since I had last seen him, Maarten had reached Santiago via the Camino Francés (three months), then made a return trip on the Camino del Norte, stopping at the French border because of the cold weather (a bit over three months), followed by a return trip to Lisbon on the Camino Portugués (three months).

  ‘Bloody hell—when are you going home?’

  ‘When I am too old to walk. Then I go straight to the care home. I sold my house and now I can stay in the pensiones sometimes and eat well. And no communication with my relatives or the Dutch government.’

  He had not seen Zoe: I presumed she was still behind me.

  I persuaded Maarten to return the half-kilometre to town and stay with me. It was like running into an old friend and we had stories of the road to share. The invitation turned out to be one of the poorer decisions of my life.

  At the hostel, he examined my cart and took it for a test run. ‘If you manufacture it, perhaps I will be your first customer,’ he said. ‘It is definitely superior.’

  ‘Not really.’ The German accent was unmistakable. Bernhard had appeared, apparently from the hostel behind us. Paola had warned me we might see him again. Whatever the Camino had taught him, it was not humility. ‘I see you have made a parking brake, as I suggested,’ he added.

  ‘Nice to see you,’ I said. ‘Maarten, Bernhard. Bernhard, Maarten. Despite neither being an engineer nor having pulled a cart all over Europe, Bernhard knows more about carts than either of us.’