Matthew Twelve: Chapter Three

The day was long.  Double science meaning two hours with the girl from his bus.  PE, meaning humiliation again from the teacher who didn't like quiet boys.  Tutor time with the absent tutor.  The others laughed at how awful he was, but they all knew it wasn't right.  Normally Matthew could laugh along with this, but today, with his mind on the man who had chased him, only found it irritating that Mr Parish didn't care for any of them.  The fact that the PE teacher disliked him so much, today, felt unfair.  Before now he had simply ignored the fact, but now he felt his neck redden with righteous anger.  The girl from the bus, from his science class; the other girl in the shop: they had no right to look at him the way they did.
The bell rang.  They could go.
Normally he ate his lunch alone and he attempted to do so again today, but the seat he had taken a liking to was filled with sixth formers and his other nooks seemed to be occupied too.  Returning to the bench with the sixth formers he decided to wait, standing behind them, waiting for them to leave.
At first he was patient and stood as a statue might while its master chiselled at the chin or the arm, but the longer he waited the redder he became.  He felt the blood pump at his neck; could feel the hot fat swell of blood pushing at the stiff collar, tight around his neck.
He moved a little closer.
After a while he moved closer still, until, had they been his friends, he might have seemed a part of the group.
Gradually the girls stopped talking and looked at him; they tried to carry on with their chatter, but again their attention returned to him.  One of them asked him if he wanted something, but he just stood dumbly, hot, angry and silent.
He spat at them.
He couldn't believe it.  He had spat at them, but it wasn't him.  It wasn't something he would ever do, but he had done it.
They had all shot up; the girl with the spit in her hair screamed and they backed away.
He sat down and ate his mother's unfinished sandwich.

No one came.  The girls left.
After lunch, in registration, a man appeared looking for Mr Parish and, finding him absent, asked for Matthew by name.  He was quickly pointed out and taken away.
In the man's office he was asked if had spat at the girl, but he didn't reply.  The man wasn't surprised he didn't speak, he had been speaking to his teachers about his behaviour today and his PE teacher had reliably informed him that he was out of sorts.  At the mention of her name Matthew tingled.
Reaching for the phone, the man informed him he was calling home: Matthew spoke.
"I'm sorry, Sir."
"Sorry?"
"Yes", he mumbled back.
He spent the rest of the day in a small room alone.  Work from his lessons was sent along and he completed all of it in very little time, however each time the care assistant looked in he held his pen and appeared to puzzle over some problem he had found.  But when the door was closed fast he sat on the table and stared out through the window and wondered how to avoid the man with shabby rags standing near the bus stop.

*

Standing at the gates of the school, a letter for his mother from the care assistant and deputy head in his hand, he watched others step on to coaches, buses and fall into waiting cars.  From his vantage point he could see that his bus was waiting at the usual spot, pupils piling on board.  He could see too the man watching each and every one as they stepped up., until finally he too stepped aboard ushered by the driver impatient to keep to time.  Matthew had decided to take the next bus.
The bus for his village came every hour and so, as the sun grew quieter in the sky, the air became chill.
Matthew wondered what would happen at his stop.  He wondered if the man would be waiting for him, or whether he had given up, or had been chasing him at all.  Whatever the answer he had resolved to either get off at the stop before his, or the one shortly after.  The stop in the village would allow him a shorter walk home, but the one before was longer.  But despite the length of the longer journey, Matthew knew he would have a better chance tramping through the fields and using any number of routes, whereas his other options only gave him one.  If that one route should be blocked by the man then he would be trapped.
A different driver picked Matthew up.  The bus was empty.  The sun was quickly sinking into the horizon's borders, but it was still a clear sky and the light would be enough.
At the stop Matthew was careful to have a good look round before making the final step from the bus to the earth.
Before the bus pulled off, Matthew used it for cover as the wood embraced him.  Thick twigs and branches clattered back together like a saloon door in a Western; Matthew waited for quiet to return before plunging further into the wood.  The wood was thick here and at times, when branches persistently tugged at his jacket, he huffed and became annoyed that he could not have just walked home as normal.  But then he remembered the weathered and dirty look on the man, the filthy beard and torn clothing.
At the wood's end he stood surveying the field.  It was wet from the farmer's hose shooting spurts of water out in great arcing circles.  The sound futtered and sliced through the air.
Timing his dash, Matthew ran through the field rather than around; his jacket was quickly soaked through but he outstripped the rotating hose and walked the last hundred metres of pathway along the hedgerow, climbing up to his house.
A single light was on in his mother's room meaning she hadn't thought to light the hall for him or the driveway.
He used the kitchen door and stuffed his jacket in the washing machine along with his other wet clothing while the dog jumped and licked at his hands; he let it out, though it seemed reluctant to leave him. 
After a warm shower Matthew built the fire up and let the dog back in.  It quickly bolted in through the gap knocking the door open and scraping its sides, turning it growled at the door as Matthew closed and bolted it.
In his dreams he and the dog stood at the water's edge, it seemed like the creek at the foot of the hill, but it was silent.

Matthew Twelve: Chapter Two

On a Saturday morning school became a foreign memory.
Matthew's hand drifted over the belly of the dog laid out before him.  A thin line of hairs stood on end along the ridge of its back, dark against the light.  He dipped a finger forward allowing it to catch and drag over like a distant gust.  His fingers were splayed, almost an inch between the longest and his nails were beautifully clean after scrubbing them with his mother's nail brush every evening.
Underneath his hand the dog breathed on, deeply.  Occasionally its face quivered from a dream, tickling the edges of its mind and spilling onto the sleeping jowls of its face.  Equally, at times, the legs would shake, simulating a final mad dash for some faraway prey.
A shadow passed through the room; a solitary cloud strayed into the sun's sight, lingering longer than it was welcome, before moving into the east.  Returning to the room,  light blanketed every inch in rich, warm light.  Matthew felt the breath of heat return to his outstretched hand, warming the thin skin above bone and blood-invested veins  The corner room was always filled with light this way; it was at the eastern and southern point of the house, with windows giving way to folded views of green fields, or in later seasons, large yellow swathes of rapeseed that spilled up to high bordered hills.
Matthew could sit here, secluded and alone for hours, but now there was the dog.
They had never had a dog before.
The dog's ears twitched at a creak from above; the creak of the floorboard continued as his mother's foot planted its weight down.  Footsteps slowly, quietly, drifted from the landing until reaching the hallway.  The latch raised up on the kitchen door letting in a draught that slipped through the house and woke the dog.
Moving to the window seat Matthew watched her as she disappeared past the wood's edge, down toward the bench again. Taking his list from the night before he slid his empty shoes on and left the house, the dog beside him every step, bouncing and only occasionally looking up at Matthew.
Re-stocking never took very long, he counted out as near he could to the exact change.  The girl at the counter always smiled.  Matthew thought she probably smiled at the time he took to order the coins, by value, in his palm.  Fifties, tens, twenties, pounds and coppers.  The dog barked from outside and the girl's smile receded and she watched Matthew leave hurriedly.
Deciding to detour through the wood, Matthew swung the bag at his side, the dog took off and burst through hedges first ahead of him then emerging behind him, circling in a wild dash.
At the end of the path the house came just in to view and there he stopped, sucking in the wood's air and listening to the branches sway and wave.
The dog barked once and sat at the path's edge, looking back at him, a stern intensity in its eyes.
Matthew smelt smoke and saw a dark puff exhale from the kitchen door.

*

His mother lay on the floor and stank of acrid black smoke.  The frying pan was ruined and cleaning the stove took Matthew longer than he expected.  The walls were dirty now from the stink of oil and choking smoke.  Dragging her clear of the kitchen had been easy, she was feather heavy.  Her chest rose and fell and so Matthew left here there, shutting the door to the hallway while he doused the pan and fanned out the invading pall.

In bed, his mother turned from one side to the other, coughing and occasionally spitting into the bucket Matthew had left beside her.  He had used a sponge to clean her face and now he watched as she moved about.  The sound of the sheets shuffled and a lost bluebottle buzzed at the window, inches from escape through the opening there, but failing to realise.  Gradually this became the only sound in the room as his mother eased her way into sleep.  Matthew brought the sheet up tight to her, caught the fly and tossed it clear into the night air.  Keeping watch on the woods, the dog sat in the garden, listening to shadows, turning once to the sound of Matthew at the window.

All night the dog sat there and in the morning Matthew fed it: cold meat from a can.  Without school to worry about he took paint and brushes and hid the worst of the kitchen's soot under a fresh coat.

All day his mother lay in bed, though this wasn't unusual.  Once the painting was finished he made sandwiches for them both, eating his in the sun outdoors.  Hers remained untouched, which was usual.  And, as always, he covered them in foil for his pack lunch the next day.  The rest of the day he spent keeping watch over her and paranoid a neighbour might call about the smoke, rising like distress signals, the day before.  But no one came.  His mother slept on.  The dog kept its vigil in the garden.

In the evening the fire was built up again and the dog exchanged its sentry post.  Both he and Matthew stayed there like that for a second night.

In the morning Matthew set about his usual routine, tempting his mother out of bed, but she didn't rise and he was forced to leave her there, but before the dog could hop out through the door with him, he twisted and locked it in, though it grumbled and howled.  School was no place for a stray dog.

Matthew reversed the detour he had used at the weekend and pushed on through the wood to the bus stop, though it was a longer route.  The trees stood still today without a breath to move them or bring forth a familiar wave.  Overhead the sky was clear, but it was chill and there was a dampness to the wood's air.

Seeing the open road ahead of him Matthew quickened his pace and saw the bus, on time, fly by.  It would circle at the village's top just in time for him to catch it without wasting time standing silently with the others.  In the distance he heard the dog's howl and turned as if to see the sound breaking through the trees' guard, but saw instead a lone man in shabby ragged clothes running toward him.

Matthew Twelve: Chapter One

Every household is different,  every household has its quirks.  When one child is invited to another's, for the very first time, there will even be a new smell in the air.  It may be a kitchen smell, it may be a garden smell or the smell of washing damp on a radiator or dry in the tumble.  One household may in fact be a flat: five rooms, four, three, two.  Some children may not even invite anyone back.  It may not be the size of their home or indeed the smell, it may be that when their door is at last opened to a stranger, that stranger will see the truth beyond the doorway's frame and that truth may not be a pleasant one to see reflected in another's eyes.

The toast popped away from the filament and was quickly spread with margarine, halved and laid on the plate.  Leaving it on the table he took the coffee cup and stood at the stair's bottom.  The bedroom door was ever so slightly ajar.  The window panes, set in the wall and keeping track with the steps, allowed in a finger of light that lit up wisps of steam rising towards the door.  Matthew returned to the kitchen leaving the mug at the toast's side and left via the kitchen door.  This door he left ajar, ever so slightly.  Moving the empty plant pot at the kitchen window's heel, he stepped up to the dirty glass.  Carefully he tipped the pot over and used it to gain a better view, balancing on one foot then the next.  The edge of the terracotta pot crunched and crumbed slightly as his weight shifted about, but he held his gaze steady on the kitchen table and the empty chair there.

The light flicked from the hall as something passed by and in to the kitchen stepped Matthew's mother, a light robe with sprawling vines spread this way and that covered her.

Matthew watched as she slowly sipped then nibbled and bit by bit finished the toast.  A smile rose then as she drew herself up and stepped towards the door left ajar.  He sat back on the pot.  Smiled.  Heard the creak of the garden chair and caught the scent of the coffee.  It was the sun that had drawn her out and now she sat there, bathed in it, coffee resting at the table's edge.

Creeping in through the front door he readied himself for school, made the beds, making sure to firmly tuck in both sides of her duvet and open the window, left out a fresh towel and, as an experiment for today, took an empty mug from the rack, dropped a spoonful of coffee in, filled the kettle and went to school.

Today would be a good day, he could feel it.  The lessons today were all favourites, though he didn't especially like the science teacher or the girl he sat beside.  On the bus he sat alone, as was his custom.  The girl he sat next to in science took the same bus and he saw her look at him then smile at a friend.  The friend looked too.  He shifted on his seat and looked out at the fields passing by, seeing his reflection, the dark rim around his eyes and the smudge around his neck.

*

The door was open wide when Matthew came home.  He could see that the post had come: all the usual.  He picked it up and screwed up the junk, taking it straight to the fire basket.  The only remaining letter in his hand was from the doctor.  He opened it, read it and resealed it before the gum dried out, leaving it at the side table in the sitting room.

The back door in the kitchen was still open.  The coffee cup from the morning was still there and the empty cup with its spoonful of instant was untouched.  He moved through the house quietly, searching.  Every room was empty, upstairs and down.

Certain now that she wasn't at home he left and went into the woods.  Around his house a thin spread of woodland touched the edges before giving way to fields rolling down to the water's edge and a short rocky beach.  The rocks here were dark with seaweed and the ground made a wet crushing sound under his deft tread.  But it was empty and so he began to circle back to the house along a path that shadowed a thick hedgerow.

She was sat at the bench, her body facing the water but her eyes somewhere else.  Matthew watched her.  Watched her silently.

In the evening he ate his dinner alone and afterwards made a list: butter, bread, oil.  He wrote down everything that needed replacing, conscious of one thing missing.  Upstairs he heard a board creak as his mother shifted her weight in bed.  Matthew knew it meant she was dreaming tonight.  Normally there wouldn't be the slightest movement after getting her into bed.  She would lie there statuesque and he would watch to see that she carried on breathing in and out, in and out.

A bark came from outside.  Matthew put his pencil down to listen.  The bark was from outside the house, not the woods or the path.  He heard it again and an accompanying scratch at the door.  Flicking on the porch light, Matthew opened the door.  A dog sat squarely at his feet forcing him to step back and has soon as he did it hopped in and settled down in the sitting room before the empty fireplace.  Outside, a gust shivered through the air and the trees stirred up waving as Matthew closed the door.

The dog lay unmoving, curled in upon itself, refusing to rise and recognise him and so he sat in the armchair opposite watching the dog.  All the time the dog stared back and the two blinked at each other in the darkening light; with the drop of the sun a cold cursed through the house and Matthew was forced to lay a fire down. He took the balled up junk mail and made a bed of paper and kindling before building the fire up with larger logs and lighting the touchpaper.  The cold retreated and he sat closely as the kindling cracked and spat and burnt up the edges of the wood and everything settled into place.  The dog now moved and shifted and finally turned to lay its head on Matthew's knee.  He wanted to jump back, but he equally wanted to stay like that all night.

He dreamt that night of himself standing at the water's edge, the dog standing by his side.