30.
When they arrived on Juno the first thing Emily noticed was the serious, business like atmosphere of the asteroid.
‘That’s because there’s a lot of bossy boots up here,’ joked Zeus. ‘The shortest and bossiest of them all is in charge.’
‘Hitler?’
‘No, I’m not giving him a third chance. It’s Napoleon. Here he comes now.’
The famous general rode up on a beautiful black horse, wearing the most ridiculous hat Emily had ever seen.
‘Morning Emperor!’ called Zeus cheerfully, as they jumped out of the way of Napoleon’s horse.
Napoleon didn’t even spare them a second glance.
‘He doesn’t talk to aliens,’ said Zeus as they picked themselves out of the ditch. ‘He does a wonderful job. He’s right at home here because Juno is based on his island, Elba. It’s very Mediterranean, with beautiful villages and beaches. Transportation is by horse and they have electricity but no electronics. It the best compromise between the Stone Age and the world of today, you have the comforts, without the mental clutter of telephones, television and computers. These leaders and thinkers just thrive on it.
Passing through fields of corn and swaying wheat, and around terraced hillsides with groves of olive trees, Zeus and Emily walked along the cobbled road. After about half an hour they reached Portoferraio and sat in a cafe with a view out over the busy harbour. Fishing boats manoeuvred in the gentle breeze and unloaded the morning’s catch onto the stone pier, while battered trading barges loaded up with olive oil and iron ore. Zeus and Emily watched the world go by and had the best pizza ever.
‘May I join you?’
Emily looked around to see a tall serious looking man standing behind her. He was balding and with his grey beard, looked very wise.
‘I must be going,’ said Zeus and rushed off, leaving his half-finished coffee as if he’d suddenly remembered he had a train to catch.
‘Ha, ha, ha. Oh my God!’ laughed the man. ‘Zeus, I mean Suez, is my most interesting patient. I have yet to get him on my couch. He runs like a scolded cat when he sees me! Psychiatristophobia, we have to overcome that before I can even start to analyse him.
‘I’m Sigmund Freud,’ he continued, offering his hand. ‘They call me The Shrink!’
‘Emily Taylor,’ said Emily, shaking his hand firmly. ‘Pleased to meet you.’
‘May I join you?’ asked Freud.
‘Of course,’ said Emily. ‘Have a seat.’
Freud sat down and ordered a coffee.
‘Zeus says that you help the new arrivals adjust to life on Juno. How’s Bin going?’ asked Emily.
‘Good,’ he said. ‘I shouldn’t discuss patients but I know I can trust you. It’s a challenge to change his ideology while still retaining his brilliance. To be a model citizen living on Juno for the next five hundred years then click back to being a terrorist, on our side fighting the bad guys. Napoleon won’t take any rubbish from him; he’ll find that out soon enough.’
‘Surely if he grows to like it here, to think of it as home, he’ll fight to save it if it’s threatened.’
‘Brilliant, thanks Emily, I’ll take that approach,’ he said, sizing Emily up with gentle grey eyes.
He gave her his total attention like he could not only read her thoughts but understood why she was thinking them as well.
‘Shall we go and meet him?’ continued Freud in his kind voice. ‘He’s living just on the edge of town.’
‘Let’s, I want to beat him at backgammon.’
‘He’s not a man that likes to lose,’ said Freud.
‘Well, he’d better get used to it!’ said Emily.
‘Emily!’ said Bin, bending down to give her a kiss on both cheeks. ‘How lovely to see you again.’
His bushy black and silver beard tickled.
Once they’d sat down, he said, ‘Emily, I have a bone to pick with you.’
‘A bone?’
‘Yes a bone. You killed me just when I was about to succeed in my biggest attack ever!’
‘Well, you killed me!’
‘So its tit for tat is it? Revenge!’
‘No, you were going to kill my family!’
‘Oops!’
‘Let’s have the game of backgammon we never finished last time,’ said Emily. ‘Best of three, winner plays Freud.’
Emily didn’t go down without a fight but half an hour later it was Bin who was playing Freud. Over the past few weeks they had become good friends and chatted away amicably during the game. Bin won but Emily had the feeling Freud let him. It was decided that they’d have fish for dinner at Freud’s house; they just had to catch it first.
Freud’s boat was lovely; a Mediterranean style fishing boat, about six metres long with a lateen rig. They rowed clear of the dock then set the large triangular sail and tacked their way back and forth through the moored boats. Once clear of the breakwater they bore off to a beam reach and headed across the bay, heeled right over with the waves splashing over the rail.
Anchoring over a rocky reef, they fished up golden snapper using silver lures, which they jiggled up and down just above the bottom.
Bin seemed to be really enjoying himself, ‘All those years hiding in dark, dingy caves in Afghanistan I used to dream of doing something like this, having a simple life, catching a few fish and growing vegetables. No politics, no fighting and no killing!’
‘You’re welcome to use my boat anytime you want to go fishing or exploring,’ said Freud. ‘Just send the odd fish my way.’
‘Deal!’ said Bin. ‘They tell me that this is just an asteroid, but it seems like Paradise to me!’
Another guest came for dinner at Freud’s house. Freud called him The Professor, but he introduced himself as Albert. He looked vaguely familiar with his wild frizzy hair and bushy moustache.
‘Poke your tongue out,’ said Emily.
He looked a little surprised, but obliged.
‘Yes it’s you!’ said Emily. ‘There was a picture of you on our classroom wall.’
Emily cooked the fish, baking it in foil with sliced peppers, lemons and herbs, and served it up with yummy new potatoes from Freud’s garden.
With Emily, a psychiatrist, an astrophysicist and a terrorist, sitting around the same table, the dinner time conversation was pushed and pulled in odd directions, with Bin Laden seeing potential for global destruction in the theory of relativity and Freud spotting hidden meanings behind every word.
After dinner Freud and Bin Laden went out on the terrace for a smoke, leaving Emily and Einstein sitting at the table, sipping on mint tea.
Einstein seemed a little uneasy, as if not quite sure what to say to a thirteen year old girl. Eventually he cleared his throat and said, ‘It fascinates me how they make these asteroids work, white rings and black holes, absolutely incredible. I would love to see a black hole.’
‘Can you keep a secret?’ asked Emily.
‘I keep lots of secrets!’ he said, his eyes sparkling mischievously. ‘I love secrets.’
‘Good,’ said Emily. ‘Close your eyes and put out your hand’
She took Enzo out of her pocket and placed him on Einstein’s hand.
‘Keep your eyes shut and try to guess what it is.’
‘Well it has an odd texture, not smooth and not rough. It’s not hot and it’s not cold. It doesn’t weight anything, yet it has incredible presence, bizarre.’
‘Open your eyes.’
‘What’s that?’ he asked, looking at the strange object in his hand.
It was black, yet glowed and has small flecks on magma moving on its surface.
‘Meet Enzo. Enzo the black hole!’
‘Aaagh,’ yelled Einstein in surprise, throwing Enzo up in the air.
Enzo slowly descended, sucking in a couple of dinner plates just to show what he was made of.
Regaining his composure, Einstein said, ‘Please let me hold you again.’
Enzo mov
ed over and landed on Einstein’s hand.
‘Amazing!’ he said smiling.
Hearing the sounds of the others coming back, Emily took the cage out of her pocket and Enzo rushed in. The cage snapped shut and Emily placed it back in her pocket.
‘What was that?’ whispered Einstein.
‘White rings, antimatter,’ Emily whispered back, delighted to see Einstein’s mouth drop.
As the others sat down, Emily said, ‘I hear you’re learning to play stress, Albert.’
‘I’m just a beginner, two player. George, one of our sentry slugs is teaching me. It has taken a bit of getting used to the fact that we’re one of the stupidest creatures in the Universe. Me,’ he said smiling, ‘winner of the Nobel Prize, thinking I was smart with my theory of relativity, and all the time the slugs in my cabbage patch were playing six player stress with Martians. Ha, ha, ha, sometimes it’s good to be bought down to Earth!’
Emily spent the night at Freud’s house and caught up with Zeus at the cafe the next morning. They sat in the sun and had fresh croissants and washed them down with hot chocolate.
‘You must meet my most interesting person before we go,’ said Zeus. ‘It’s a bit of a hike.’
Serenaded by crickets and cicadas, Zeus and Emily walked out of town, across fields and up through oak forests until they reached a green valley full of washing lines.
‘Is this where they do the laundry?’ asked Emily.
‘No. This is where John Smith lives.’
‘John Smith? I’ve never heard of him.’
‘No one has, but he has touched each and everyone’s lives.’
Walking through the lush grass under the washing lines Emily noticed something odd. Pegged out on the washing lines were socks, each held in place by a plastic peg of a matching colour. The pegs might match but the socks didn’t, no two are alike. There were hundreds of them, thousands of them, millions of them.
‘Odd,’ she said.
‘Have you figured out who John Smith is?’
‘A sock thief?’
‘Close. He is the sock thief. Ever gone to put your socks on and there’s one missing?’
‘Yes.’
‘Well, you’ll find it here!’
Seeing a man in the distance pegging up socks, Zeus said, ‘There’s John, he’s a retired town planner from Basildon.’
Seeing them coming, John put down the sock he was pegging up. ‘Suez, good to see you,’ he said, shaking Zeus’s hand. He introduced himself to Emily and they walked up through the rows of washing lines chatting. Emily was delighted to meet someone from England; someone on the same wavelength that understood the unspoken bits between the words.
‘Let’s have a cup of tea,’ said John when they reached his house.
Sitting in dappled shade under the grape vines, John’s wife, Daphne, brought them Earl Grey tea and scones with jam and clotted cream. They sipped their tea from fine china cups while John recounted his greatest exploits to Emily.
Daphne gave him a kick or a nudge once in a while. ‘John, you do go on, you’re boring the socks off them!’ she scolded.
John was wonderful. Emily had never met someone who was so passionate about what they did: a left foot size 3 from the Prince of Borneo; a black, calf length wool, size 9 from 7 Seagull Close; a size 10 gumboot sock from Taihape, New Zealand, green and yellow stripes....
‘But how do you do it now?’ asked Emily. ‘Everyone wears sandals here.’
‘I have a few of Napoleons,’ said John, gesturing in the direction of a line of left foot size sevens hanging behind him.
‘But now,’ he added, giving Emily a wink. ‘Suez has taught me to teleport!’
‘Suez, you didn’t!’ she exclaimed, kicking Zeus under the table.
July turned to August, and August to September. Emily liked September, it was the best month; the sun was still warm but had lost the hard edge he had over the summer months. It was the perfect month for surfing. The September wind blew down the valley, smoothing out the swells into even lines and blowing the crests back in sheets on white spray.
Depending on the angle of the swell, Jesus and Emily surfed the river month or the point break in front of her house. Emily had grown taller and stronger and could now catch the big waves. She loved zooming down the near vertical faces then zigzagging along the wall of water, shredding it with her board. Sometimes the lip of the wave would curl over and she’d be inside a green barrel of water, others she would wipe out and get swirled around like she was in a washing machine
Azziz and Emily took Trigger on treks exploring the island. She still had a bit of a crush on Azziz, coming over all funny if he touched her and laughing too loud when he told a joke. She thought of avoiding him altogether but she liked his company and didn’t want her crush to affect their friendship.
‘He’s not my type, he not my type,’ she kept telling herself. ‘If we get together, it’ll end in tears; mine!’