The Reverend John Dee had always dreamt of Salisbury Cathedral, striding across the green gazing up at the tall spire, pointing to a heaven he didn’t believe in. It was the beautiful setting that appealed to the vicar; he pictured himself as a new deacon cycling by the water meadows, smiling at other cyclists and walkers, enjoying a drink in the pub by the mill. Dining in the evening with fellow clergy interested in history and nature.
Instead, John Dee found himself in a bleak town in sole charge of Saint Justin’s parish church, a church under threat of being deconsecrated, its few remaining parishioners left to the ministrations of visiting lay clergy. But St. Justin’s was also an historic Saxon church which experts, who didn’t actually attend church themselves, felt should remain dedicated to Christian worship. No other clergy wanted to take it on and no other parish wanted John Dee. He only agreed because of his love of history and nature. The church was surrounded by a large graveyard, accidentally rewilded. Next to the grounds of the church was a nature reserve of a few acres, fields and a copse protected for eternity from the encroaching ugly town by a trust endowed by a local of great standing centuries ago.
As John Dee stood leaning on the churchyard wall in the autumn sunshine, listening to the robin’s sweet song, he took some pleasure in his new little kingdom. But there was a difficult side to his new calling, the bishop expected him to revive the congregation and inspire locals to attend services and put money in the collection. He could rustle up a few stirring sermons on the internet, but how to get locals there in the first place, especially as he didn’t particularly like people.
He decided to turn his attention to the letter that had arrived that day. A team from the university in a neighbouring more interesting town, had been given permission to do a small test archaeological dig just the other side of the wall. They were hoping to find traces of a Roman Villa. The robin would be happy with a supply of juicy worms, but John did not want his peaceful sanctuary disturbed. Then he recalled a bizarre conversation with his oldest parishioner.
She told him this very field was the resting place of evil, where the wicked were buried in unconsecrated ground after being executed or struck down with nasty illnesses they deserved. John had been amused and tried to suggest modern thinking would no doubt consider they had been harshly treated for stealing a loaf of bread or having mental health issues. But the old lady had no truck with modern thinking and warned him that field must not be disturbed for fear of releasing evil.
John Dee was struck with a new idea. Halloween would soon be upon them and he would somehow spread rumours that the dig might come upon skeletons not Roman tiled floors. After all, it was traditional for those not worthy to enter the Kingdom of God to be buried on the other side of the wall. Before interest could wane he would hold a service on All Hallows’ Eve to pardon those poor souls and welcome them back into the family of the church; an excellent alternative to all the commercial rubbish and greed at Halloween. The bishop should approve.
I should have been in the theatre with my husband watching that new comedy drama. Instead I was trapped in a drama that was not funny.
‘Madam, you are not registered with any sector in this bunker. Which bunker are you registered at?’
How had a trip to the Ladies at a Wetherspoon pub turned into a dystopian nightmare? I must have opened the wrong door…
‘Please tell me where I am and who you are, then I will tell you who I am.’
I was now in a strangely lit smaller room with half a dozen men and women all in the same uniform, all glaring at me.
‘Name and date of birth Madam.’
‘Lauren Smith, 8th February, 1983.’
There was a sharp intake of breath and mutterings.
‘You are just making things difficult for yourself, please show us you ID and current status.’
Shakily I opened my handbag and fumbled for my driver’s licence.
‘Very funny, what do you call this piece of historic plastic?’
Suddenly a woman pushed past the others to stand close to me.
‘It’s her, it must be, the prophecy…’
‘Billings, you are on duty, this is not the time for your ridiculous fantasies, have you taken your medication today?’
‘Please Sir, just let me talk to her, I mean look at what she’s wearing… Lauren, it’s okay, we don’t mean any harm, we’re just not used to strangers turning up here. What is the date today?’
‘Tuesday 18th April.’
‘…and the year?’
‘2023 of course.’
‘It is her Sir, come to take us back to change things.’
‘For God’s sake Billings, the dawn of the 22nd century and you still believe in time travel and benevolent forces coming to save us.’
Some of my questions were being answered, but not the answers I wanted. Best case scenario I was being tricked and filmed for some ridiculous reality television show, but who would have arranged such a thing? Jay did not have the imagination and all he wanted was a romantic night away with me while his sister looked after the kids. And if this was real… the children. How would Jay explain to them I had gone missing, the last person to see me, they always suspect the husbands…’
‘Lauren, are you feeling okay, come with me to the calm zone and have a drink, you’re in shock.’
Mutterings among the others got louder and scarier.
‘She’s in trouble, not shock. Obviously a spy… or a total nut case.’
Despite my terror I wondered how politically incorrect language had survived.
‘Billings, you are dismissed from duty, report to headquarters in the morning.’
I was about to lose my only hope.
‘No, please, I am not a spy and I do not have mental health issues, just let Billings show me the way I came in so I can leave.’
‘No one leaves the bunker till the all clear.’
A green light flashed on the wall.
‘All clear’ said Billings triumphantly ‘permission to escort the prisoner to the custody suite while you supervise the security checks.’
‘Ten minutes then report back to me.’
My new friend ushered me out of the room and into a dark corridor. Was she a friend or was worse to come?
‘I have to get back, my husband will be wondering where on earth I am.’
‘You are not how I always imagined, but then the prophecy says only a few will recognise her and to think it is me you have chosen to be your disciple.’
‘But I am just an ordinary person who hasn’t a clue what’s going on.’
‘But you will, that’s what the writings say and it’s my privilege to help you. Once I take you outside you will understand.’
‘Yes, outside, lets go before your boss changes his mind.’
A door, a door with chinks of light, she pulled a lever and it opened; but not onto a busy London street at twilight.
I closed my eyes against the brightness, a wonderful scent came to me, fresh air, air even fresher than during the Covid lockdown. The ground felt soft underfoot. I opened my eyes. I was surrounded by green; fields and trees as far as I could see. If I had time travelled I was surely in the past, unless I had died.
‘Is this real, it’s wonderful, where are we?’
‘In North London ward, April 18th 2099.’
‘But it can’t be. If we are really in the future it means the planet was saved.’
I ran through the luxuriant grass like a child, hugged a tree.
‘Wait Lauren, it’s not safe, you must stay with me till you understand.’
‘Do you know how I can get back to 2023?’
‘No, you need to tell us how to get back so we can change things.’
‘But how and why, it’s beautiful, nature has reclaimed part of the city, how much is like this?’
‘All of it.’
‘Impossible, all of London?’
‘All of the world.’
‘How wonderful.’
‘Wonderful for the world and other creatures, but not for humans. It started in your time, most of you didn’t realise. I thought you would know all this as the wise woman who knew the past and the future.’
I was beginning to wonder if Billings should have taken her medication.
‘You don’t get it do you? I expect you have a lot to learn before you can help us. You turned everything off, no more polluting power stations and vehicles, no more exploiting the earth and the oceans. It didn’t happen overnight, but you weren’t prepared. People couldn’t get to work and many jobs ceased to exist. Food couldn’t get to shops, then food wasn’t being grown or caught. Only the ‘organics’ as they were called managed to support themselves, but they weren’t so smug if they got ill and realised hospitals could not function without power and medicine could not be manufactured.’
I couldn’t believe what she was saying, but wanted to defend my times.
‘But we all learned to live off the land eventually?’
‘The minority who were left in safe pockets.’
‘But you still have wars, the bunkers…’
‘No war, not on any scale. The bunkers are where we live most of the time. The outside is dangerous, most people did not know how to hunt, or at least hunt without being killed first. Farm animals left to their own devices turned out to be better than us at survival and provided good food for the carnivores to thrive.’
‘But if you could you go back how would you change things?’
‘That is for you to explain. You are a scientist as well as a seer…’
I was a teaching assistant in primary school, I didn’t even do A Level science or maths and certainly knew nothing about time travel. I clung to the tree with its spring leaves budding, it felt so solid and alive and real. I looked up at a host of birds calling and singing. Was this paradise? Suddenly all the birds took off from the branches in terror. I looked down to see a large creature slinking through the long grass. Billings’ voice and the sirens seemed faint as I heard my heart thumping.
Rats seem to be everywhere lately, but don’t worry about another great plague.
Last week Pete Springer was inspired by one of my archive blogs to write about his teaching days with class pets – rats. His post was headed by a picture of a most adorable rat which reminded me of TV star Roland Rat; the only rat to join a sinking ship, credited with saving TVam breakfast television in the 1980’s.
One of my children did have a pet rat in his class, I did hold it once and it was very cute; after all, rats are just big mice and I had pet mice in my junior school years. My friend and I bought two mice from Aldershot market, plus a little book on mice and assured our parents they were both male. Of course they weren’t. Luckily my father loved woodwork; the designer shed/greenhouse he had built himself was soon filled with cages and bags of hay and oats. We ended up with forty mice, some of them pregnant, I will draw a veil over what happened to them next.
By strange coincidence, just before Pete posted his blog, I heard from my friend 300 miles away ( too far away to be of any assistance ) that her young dog had found a rats’ nest in the garden. As a busy carer for her elderly mother the last thing she wanted to find on the staircase was a blind, hairless, mewling baby rat being tenderly licked by the dog. ( Handy hint, this is one of the many reasons why it is not a good idea to let dogs lick your face. )
Thankful that this could not happen to us as we don’t have a dog I was soon to get my come uppance. Since we finally got around to having the outside light in the back garden fixed it comes on quite often, usually to reveal a fox; the fox suspected of chewing up my garden shoes. Late one night ( at a time when only bloggers and foxes are awake ) the light came on and there was Mr. Fox playing with something furry, and it didn’t look like a slipper.
In the morning there was a dead rat on the back lawn. Obviously the fox has better things to eat. Feeling like a frontierswoman I trekked the few yards to the bottom of the garden and got the spade out. Throw him over the fence? No, we have nice neighbours. Put him in my compost bin? No, never put meat in your garden compost. The council food waste bin that you can put meat in? No it’s got our house number on. I gave him a woodland burial, relieved that I managed to scoop him off the grass with the spade. Two mornings later a second dead rat appeared. Perhaps the foxes are doing us a favour with rat control.
The ‘woodland garden’ is the corner where the compost bins and insect hotels hide; a tangle of apple tree, holly and ivy and sapling nursery. Cyberspouse suggested the piles of branches preserved for hedgehogs and insects are also luxury living for rats. I have never seen a hedgehog in our garden despite the plentiful supply of slugs for them to eat.
While we sign petitions to save hedgehogs and are reminded to mind the gap, leave holes in our fences for hedgehogs to travel, no one suggests we worry about the survival of rats. When does wildlife become a pest? Why are we not urged to protect rats’ environment and put food out for them?
Penny is one of my local writer friends and we have both been going to the same writers’ group forever. Penny amuses, entertains and makes us think. She can say in a few words what most of us take thousands of words to say. ‘The Lesson’ reminds me of a folk ballad.
THE LESSON
I must believe that he, my son, was good
He never lied, nor spoke a bawdy word.
He’d sit against a tree in yonder wood
And whistle in response to every bird
That dared to sing its song to one so still
Then fly away up and around the trees,
Able to soar and swoop at its own will
To each and every place where no-one sees
The mating rituals which, when touched by spring
The birds delight in what each union brings.
My son was just like all the birds that fly
He’d spread his wings in haste to find a mate
Betrothed, which often he’d deny
Playing with fire until it was too late.
Each maid in spring with rosy cheeks
And breasts that rose and fell, filled him with lust
Succumb she would in days and not in weeks
His true love unaware he was unjust
Till when his elsewhere pleasures reached her ears
He burnt his fingers on her pain and thus her tears.
Guy stood on the terrace, looking down upon the descending jigsaw of red, grey and black roofs that hid the town’s narrow twisting lanes. Then he gazed out towards the white flecked turquoise of the Atlantic Ocean and felt on top of the world. Spring had arrived at last and with it the visitors, business was looking up. Harriet had been right; living at the top of the town suited their family perfectly. A noisy family he thought ruefully, always squabbling and why did they always look so untidy? Guy himself was always immaculately turned out in his trademark grey and freshly laundered white.
Immediately below him a woman was hanging out washing, a lot of washing, she ran a bed and breakfast. It was a long trek for her guests, down to the smooth beach, especially if they didn’t know the way; they didn’t realise that when they booked up on the internet. Guy chuckled to himself; he could have told them the best way to get around town. He’d lived here all his life and wouldn’t dream of living anywhere else; beaches, grassy headlands, the harbour, art galleries and best of all restaurants and cafes that catered for every taste.
Harriet’s shrill call interrupted his thoughts. He called back.
‘No of course I’m not going to stand in the sun all day, yes I know I promised to go into town and get some food.’
He stretched his limbs, felt the sun on his face, sniffed the sea air then stepped forward and launched himself into the air. The first flight of the morning always felt good. He soared high, circled to test the currents then glided gracefully towards the beach, where he spotted his first business of the day, a happy family picnic. Stunned by his sudden appearance, a toddler held his arm outstretched. Guy swooped skilfully, then flapped his wings for a sharp ascent, a whole sandwich in his yellow beak.
Guy and Garriet is one of the flash fiction tales in Someone Somewhere; stories from 75 to 20,000 plus words, short stories and two novellas.
Times and Tides of a Beachwriter 