Falls the Shadow

  But for these clear, suspended days, the light booming and echoing in the cavern of the sea and sky, bright limpid days of hope and growth. But for these.

  He lowered himself uncomfortably onto the toilet seat. His bowels began to shift soggily and he held his breath. He was used to it by now, but still it would be painful, a persistent, nagging, tiresome pain which never grew better or worse. Illness degrades a man. There is no poetry in haemorrhoids, no beauty in pain. He thought of how absurd pain was, how it laboured the point like a tedious child, how it reduced you to the common denominator of your existence; flesh and nerves. He stared at the tiled floor and noticed, after a wave of distasteful action, a solitary ant wandering amongst the mosaic designs. It was hopelessly lost. It would roam around, stopping, raising its antennae, seemingly smelling and looking around, and then continue: it went round in circles. For a split second he thought of killing it, but as the pain trickled back into his consciousness so his sympathy returned. Lost in the huge unnatural world of the bathroom, probably hungry and miles from home, it vaguely reminded him of his son, Richard. The thought process was submerged in the foul-smelling bodily function he was stoically performing.

  Washing his hands a memory floated up from the quiet pool of his past. They would simply appear like that, from nowhere in particular; perhaps they had a will of their own. The man, a huge, shabby, sun-tanned man with thick black hair, was raising his arm to whip the child with a dog lead. It was in a park near the station, a few pigeons at the terrified child's feet. They flew off at the first unbelievable lash, bursting into action like my anger. Violence, a potent seed that blooms into grotesque distorted flowers. He stopped as a woman screamed, and I felt the disappointment throb in my veins: I had wanted to destroy him. He dried his hands. A long time ago now. Now, this comfort, the settling dust of old age.

  His wife was sitting in the front room reading a newspaper. Yes, it was all very comfortable now, after the long years, through the dark damp tunnel of middle-age into virtual middle-class. A world with reduced fear. I know now that's all I want, to be rid of fear. Fear of fear, fear of becoming something I reject, fear of having to live with shadows for a roof. I'm lucky. I perform my highwire act with a safety net of pensions and NHS, co-operative funerals and life assurance. Of course there's the illness, the eventual death, probably the autumn of isolation. But there is a comfort, too, a security. I now only fear myself or the night streets. A naked man, a lost ant, Richard. He shook his head slowly. He thought he could understand him, but believed he was making a mistake. He had talked about it to his wife, they had agreed, they would not raise the topic willingly again. Richard had gone, gone to make himself suffer in a world they had eventually avoided. So be it, it was irreversible. Born to comfort and security he wanted to experience the terror of the world. Fine. At least he had chosen to do it alone, thereby avoiding his main enemy. But he'll fail, the world is too small nowadays. Everybody needs a net. Simple law of gravity: break your fall or break your bones. He looked at his wife. She had said 'at least he's a good boy; he'd never do anybody any harm'. It was true of course but, although I'd never say it, that won't save him. Deep down, perhaps at the centre of my decomposing guts, I smell that life is amoral. My good woman, I hope I die before you.