Stranger

Bill wasn't sure how long he'd been sitting on the bench. Maybe an
hour, maybe more. The cold had seeped through his trousers and through
his jacket and lay like a damp rag against his belly and chest. He knew
he'd stared blankly at the doctor, who had repeated the words, more
loudly the second time. Bill had said nothing in reply, just picked up
his hat, walked out of the room and left the doctor in his white coat,
the case file pressed to his chest, eyes cast down. He'd walked from
the hospital in a daze, saying to himself - over and over - What now?
And his mood still hadn't lifted; this fresh sense of disconnection, of
being adrift. He saw everything now as though through smoked glass, the
distant world and its strange symbols, newly incomprehensible: trees,
path, sky. Everything was out of kilter. He pulled his hat down and
folded his arms, hugging himself in the cold.

At his back lay the cemetery and its wintry array of headstones. In
front, the low mossy wall and gentle slope down to the tracks and the
trains. Beyond that, railings lost in a tumble of weeds, then smoky,
uneven brickwork - the backs of houses overlooking the square.

He had decided to walk from the hospital, rolling the word around in
his head like a smooth pebble: inoperable. And, as usual, he had sat on
the bench to watch the trains rush by, the sound growing to a roar
before dying away, leaving a tight silence, broken only by the stir of
breath in the trees and the murmuring hum of traffic on the Brompton
Road.

A stranger came to sit on the bench. Bill hadn't seen him approach, but
there he was. Bill looked over and half-smiled as the stranger looked
over and half-smiled back. He peered at the stranger's clothes and felt
the stranger's eyes in turn take in his scuffed wax jacket, his tired
cords rubbed bald across the thighs, his brogues, conker brown and
cracked, his wild hair peering out in grey tufts from under his
hat.

The stranger looked familiar. Maybe he was another cemetery regular or,
more likely judging from his age, an old friend of Julie's. Maybe. They
would be the same age, roughly. The stranger and Julie. What? Thirty
now? Thirty-two? This boy looked thirty. What would she be doing today;
what would she be thinking? He felt the familiar tightening in his
chest and pushed the thought away.

A plane passed overhead, on its slow drop into Heathrow. It slid
through the thin air with a high, descending whine, its belly black
against the backlit November clouds. What kept it up and kept it
going?

'Watching the trains,' said the stranger.

Bill glanced over, 'Yes.' He did look familiar: like a character from a
half-forgotten film. 'I come here a lot. Just, you know,' he nodded at
the track, 'watching the trains.'

'Time to think.'

'I suppose so. Though you can think too much, can't you?'

They sat in silence for a minute, the wind stiller now. The stranger
seemed insubstantial; not so much seen as sensed - through the bench,
in the air.

'You think a lot.'

'Well?' Bill hesitated, unsure how to deal with this. 'If I'm honest,
maybe this is more about not thinking. About certain things, at least.'
He stretched and settled, alert for the new - the newly discovered -
presence inside him.

'You think I'm being intrusive, but I can't help wondering what you
think about.'

'I don't think you're being intrusive?' Bill heard himself say, as
though from a distance. 'Look, I'm sorry. I have got some things on my
mind. Some bad news. Personal.'

Bill felt the stranger's weight shift and he half-turned to see that
the stranger had also half-turned, mirroring Bill: leg crossed
ankle-to-knee, arm along the back of the bench.

'You mind me asking.'

'I don't mind you asking. What do I think about?' He paused and looked
up at the clouds streaming overhead. What had he ever thought about
before today?

They both turned and watched as a train roared by, faces frozen ghostly
white at the windows, heading north towards the suburbs.

'You want to throw yourself on the tracks.'

He looked at the stranger looking straight back at him, 'I don't want
to?'

'You want to throw yourself on the tracks. You thought about it a
little last week and you thought about it a lot yesterday. And today
your life has changed and you can't think about anything else. You want
to throw yourself on the tracks. It might be the solution. That's what
you think about.'

Bill said nothing. He sensed the air, set heavy around him like cold
porridge. He felt fogged in. All he could see was the stranger; all he
could do was talk to him. The humming in his head grew deeper.

The stranger continued, his voice low, 'Bill, you're sixty?'

'How the hell do you know my name?' But even as he said it, he
knew.

The stranger paused, watching as Bill's realisation settled on him like
a sweat. 'You're sixty. You live alone in a studio flat, with old
newspapers stacked by the kitchen door. You have to unplug your kettle
to plug in your two-ring hob. Among the clutter on your little
mantelpiece there's a creased photo of the daughter you never see. You
have things you need to tell her now, but your pride stops you. You
know this. You drink to make it better but it only makes it
worse.'

'That's not true!' Bill leant towards the stranger now, feeling anger
flood his face, his eyes roaming over the stranger's features. What did
he want? He had to break out of this, this trance. 'That's not true,'
more quietly this time.

'It's not what we wanted, is it?' said the stranger. 'Shall we
walk?'
Bill nodded and they started towards the perimeter path that ringed the
cemetery. They were alone. He looked at the stranger properly for the
first time and saw - the set of his features, the stooped heft of his
shoulders - who he was. He said under his breath, 'This is
ridiculous.'

'Is it a surprise?'

Bill shrugged.

'In effect,' the stranger smiled now, 'you called me.'

Bill said nothing. He looked at the stranger's clothes; his shoes,
anciently familiar; his hands an echo of his own. 'Maybe I did.' He
knew he had. 'So what have you come to say?'

They were at the entrance to the cemetery now, the gates raven black
and final. There was no sound, no traffic; the world held in a dead
fog.
'You know.' The stranger spoke again. 'That life goes on. That's all.
It just goes on.'

Bill stood alone at the gates for a second, then turned to the
street.

THE END