All we have, p.16
All We Have, page 16
“I have,” Dan nodded.
“And Tamara? And Ferg? They’ve been with you all your life?”
“Yep. At least, they’ve always been around,” he qualified, “but we don’t always hang out together or anything. We have our own friends, and we’re quite different from each other. We don’t like all the same things or even get along all the time.” He paused, then continued “I guess the best comparison in your world that I can think of is to a...well to a family.” I wasn’t sure how I felt hearing Tamara described as his family.
“Maybe something like the cast of a play? Or even a movie?” I suggested, thinking about all the articles I’d read in trashy magazines that discussed the connections formed by actors when they worked together on a production for a while. How some even made a point of working with the same director, the same crew over and over again. I’d recalled reading that many began to feel like the cast and crew were extensions of their family, at least for as long as the film making lasted.
“Ye-es, I suppose so,” Dan said. “But more so, because for us the production is never over. Or rather, if it does end, then we do too. But that hardly ever happens,” he rushed to add. “I’ve never known it to happen in my lifetime, and I’ve only heard rumors about others that have gone that way.”
I tried to imagine being born fully formed, as Dan had been, and with a readymade ‘family’ that you already knew all about. No having to learn how to walk and talk, or how to read and write. “So it’s pretty unlikely you’re ever going to die then,” I said this thought out loud. “Do you even get older?” I looked at him, realizing the answer was obvious even as I asked it.
“Well, no, that’s one way we can’t change. The only characters who can age significantly are those who do so in their narratives. They get to choose what age they want to be, from within their range.” He looked slightly wistful. “I’ve only got a really narrow range.” I had to try not to stare then at the seventeen-year-old male body sprawled beside me. It was just too weird to contemplate that this was as old as he would get, that he couldn’t get older because the older Dan simply didn’t exist, not anywhere, and so never could.
I thought about all the plans I had for my life, once I finally got through the awfulness that was the school system, and felt suddenly sad at the thought of never being able to grow older. Something of what I was feeling must have showed on my face, because suddenly Dan stopped talking and looked away from me, staring at the water. I didn’t know what to say then. I felt overwhelmed by everything Dan had told me and had no idea what to say in response. I just sat looking out over the water, wondering where we went from here, and whether Dan had any idea more than I did of how two people from such different worlds could ever be together. Perhaps it was more if than how.
“Are you up for a swim?” I was grateful when Dan’s voice cut through my thoughts. He stood up as he spoke, and I looked at the hand he offered me for a second before I grabbed on to it. Pulling me to my feet he grinned at me, ignoring my momentary hesitation. “Are you a good swimmer?” he asked. He was still holding onto my hand, and I have to say it felt nice. I really didn’t want to spend any more time brooding over what he’d told me or what it might mean for us and out very new friendship.
“Um, yeah I am actually.” Okay, I know I said I was bad at all sports, but I should really have qualified that statement. Land based sports were never my thing, but years of swimming lessons paid for by my water-safety obsessed parents meant I was a strong swimmer, if a little slower than the average.
“Cos there’s something I want to show you.” he pointed to the darkest part of the river, which also meant it was the deepest, a still pool undisturbed by the current that was bubbling through the rest of the river. “Over there. And it’s pretty deep, so you need to be able to hold your breath for a while.”
I shrugged. “No problem. What are we waiting for?” Letting go of his hand, I slipped off my sandals, and pulled the straps of my sun dress off my shoulders, letting it fall in a pool of cotton at my feet. Dan’s eyes widened when he saw my itsy bikini, and I felt a bit awkward for a moment, but he didn’t comment, thank goodness, just pulled off his t-shirt and tossed it onto the rock. He took my hand again and we were wading into the water. It was so cold I had to concentrate hard on just breathing, and didn’t have the energy to feel even a bit embarrassed. All my energies were going into not going into hypothermic shock. Although it was a sunny day, much of the river was shaded by the overhanging branches of the trees that lined its banks. As the water reached my waist, I couldn’t help letting out a gasp. It was so cold, like stepping into a pool of just melted ice. “You - have - g-g ot - to – be - kidding,” I managed to stutter.
Dan didn’t answer. Letting go of my hand he dove under the surface of the water. I watched his long shape undulating through the river, his legs dolphin kicking strongly and silently away from me. He travelled around five meters, then came up in a rush of water and limbs, like he’d been released by some spring coiled on the bottom of the river. He was laughing, shaking his head so water from his hair flew everywhere, including towards me. I cowered back, holding my hands in front of me in an entirely ineffectual attempt to deflect any droplets from landing on me.
“Ok. Your turn,” He shouted over the sound of the water bubbling between us, nodding at me and smiling that perfect smile of his. But this time it didn’t have its usual effect.
“No way, I think I’ve definitely changed my mind about this swim,” I replied. I’d managed to get my stutter under control but was not entirely confident of exactly where my toes were in relation to the rest of me. They’d gone completely numb.
Dan was wading back to me. I watched fascinated as the rivulets of water glistening on his bare chest ran away, leaving behind a sprinkling of diamond droplets that sparkled in the dappled sunlight. He stopped about a meter from me. Perhaps he’d sensed my instinctive, split second decision that if he came too close I was going to turn and wade as fast as my senseless feet would carry me right on out of that river. “Come on,” he coaxed, holding out his hand. “You’ll want to see this. I guarantee it.” Meanwhile the numbness was migrating up my legs, it had almost reached my knees at this point. I hesitated a moment, all my rational impulses telling me to get out of there before I froze to death. But he smiled that wide, beautiful smile of his and this time I succumbed to his charm. What the heck, I thought, feeling slightly lightheaded as I overrode generations of carefully honed survival instinct. How much colder could I get at this point anyway?
Taking Dan’s hand, I dove under with him, and swiftly learned the answer to that question. Straight away, as soon as the cold water closed around me, I realized my mistake. Shooting up out of the water like racehorse out of the gates I spluttered, my lungs desperately requesting oxygen, my entire body aching. Even my teeth were cold. I had the worst case of brain freeze ever and as I stood there, gasping and spluttering, I was sure I felt my internal organs shifting, shrinking together, as if trying to get into a defensive huddle against this sudden imposition of Arctic conditions. “Are you mad?” I managed to snarl at Dan as he emerged from the water beside me. “This water is insanely, unbelievably, COLD. It’s like plunging yourself into a bathtub of ice. A lot. And wait, don’t tell me,” I raised a hand that I swear was turning blue to forestall the suggestion I knew was about to come out of his mouth. “You want me to go under it again so you can show me something?” My voice rose at the end of this statement, emphasizing my firm belief in his complete and utter lunacy at that moment. “Nothing could be that interesting,” I concluded, shaking my head for emphasis and regretting it as soon as I did, as icy droplets in my hair flew off and landed on my bare skin.
Dan had the grace to look just a little contrite. “It’s pretty cold,” he agreed, with complete verbal inadequacy, “but it’s okay once you get used to it. As long as you keep moving,” he added, as if imparting a pearl of wisdom previously unknown to those indulging in such madness as swimming in rivers that should be declared human health hazards.
Against all my body’s screaming instincts, and because without movement I didn’t know how I was going to be able to feel my body sufficiently to make it go in the direction of the riverbank, I lowered myself back into the water, performing what my gym teacher referred to as “washing machines” under the water, which amounted to moving my arms vigorously around my torso whilst simultaneously pumping my legs up and down. He was right, I realized after a minute or so of this inelegant but effective exercise. I was warming up, at least a little bit. Dan was nodding encouragingly, and at that point I realized he wasn’t the model of perfection I’d imagined because if he was, I wouldn’t have this barely controllable urge to smack him one with the block of ice that was my right hand. Suppressing this impulse on the grounds that it would use up crucial energy more urgently required for keeping me from freezing to death, I kept swishing and pumping until I could feel my legs again, then my feet, and eventually even my brain freeze receded to just a dull ache.
“Are you okay now?” Dan asked. I just nodded, not keen on speaking on the grounds that if I opened my mouth all I’d be doing was letting precious puffs of body heat escape. “Ok, just follow me, it’s not too deep,” he assured me. I watched him descend under the water again. Unsure why exactly I was letting him talk me into this, I gulped in a huge breath and plunged after him, just managing to keep my eyes locked onto the blurry sight of his kicking feet through the water, which grew darker as we went deeper and away from the illumination provided by the sunlight. And then I saw it, up ahead. It looked just like a giant transparent jellyfish, spread across a couple of meters at the bottom of the river, and I knew at once it was another curtain. And it was an amazing sight, translucent and gently swaying against the pull of the current but not moving away, as if it was anchored to that particular section of the river by invisible ties. Of course, I remembered, this stretch of river had been in Bill’s book, so it made perfect sense that it was the site of another access point into Dan’s world.
As I watched Dan seized one end of the curtain and lifted it up, turning and gesturing for me to go under. As I swam past him, I felt my lungs near to bursting from the effort of being under the water for so long. Once I felt my feet float free of the trailing curtain, I kicked hard upwards, straightening my arms and reaching towards the light and air I needed. Finally I reached the surface, as first my hands and then my head broke clear of the water. Dan emerged right next to me, and we clung to each other and gasped for breath for a few moments.
As soon as Id caught my breath I moved to disentangle myself from him. He let me go without comment, perhaps sensing that I was suddenly all too conscious of his bare legs and chest being in such close proximity to my own scantily clad body. Luckily the blush that would generally have suffused my face at that point and made my feelings about this interesting situation abundantly clear was shut down by the chill of the surrounding water. Not sure what to say at this point, I took the coward’s way out, swimming away from him and towards the large boulder we’d been sitting on moments before. After a couple of strokes I put my feet down and discovered I could feel the rocky riverbed beneath my feet again. I stood up and looked around.
The river looked the same, but different at the same time. Here the edges of the water came slightly higher up the river’s bank and although all the large rocks were in the same positions, some of the smaller ones had moved. A large log that I’d not seen before lay across one part of the river, causing a break in the current. But the most obvious difference between this dimension and the one we had just left became more obvious as I waded closer to the spot where we had been sitting. A yellow and red tartan picnic rug was spread across it, and in the middle of this sat a large wicker picnic basket. I turned to look back at Dan, who I could hear approaching through the water behind me. “Lunch” he announced, nodding at the basket.
“But...we had the cool bag with lunch in it,” I protested. “I saw it, you packed it with Meg. It had water in it....” I trailed off, remembering Dan had been the one to get the water bottles out for us. I hadn’t actually seen inside the cool bag, or even so much as lifted it, at all.
“Meg and I faked it.” He shrugged, looking pleased at my surprised reaction. “I told her I’d something special planned. Come on,” he urged, giving my bare back the briefest of pushes with his hand. “I’m sure spending all this time immersed in freezing cold water must have given you an appetite.”
Two minutes later we had clambered out of the river, scaled the rock again, and were seated on the rug, the picnic basket between us. Dan had one of its two hinged lids open and was busily rummaging in its depths. “Ok, we’ve got some cold chicken, tomatoes, lettuce, some brie I think and some bread. How about I rustle us up a chicken sandwich?” He offered, glancing at me for my approval. By this point I was realizing how inconvenient it was that all my clothes and towel were in another dimension. The sun was hot, and I was warming up quite quickly, but eating lunch with Dan clad in nothing more than a skimpy blue bikini was making me feel a tad uncomfortable. I stole a glance at him, and realized with relief that he was now wholly concerned with his body, not mine – specifically, his empty stomach. He had the bread cut already and was piling on layers of fillings so high I wasn’t convinced I’d be able to get my mouth around the finished product. As if sensing my eyes on him, he looked up. “Want to get the drinks sorted?” He waved a knife at the picnic basket. “There’s ginger beer in there somewhere I think. And a slab of fruit cake.”
“Ok, whoa there buddy,” I held up a hand in mock protest. “Just who did you get to do your catering? The Famous Five?” I quipped, kneeling beside the basket and opening the flap he had indicated. I put on a fake upper class British accent. “Let’s have fruit cake with lashings of ginger beer, eh Timmy?”
Dan looked affronted. “I packed it myself,” he said stiffly. “I’m sorry if it’s not to your taste.”
I felt bad then. I’d been making a joke, one I thought he’d get, given he was a book character himself. He must have heard of the Famous Five, surely? “I’m sorry, Dan,” I said contritely. “I was trying to be funny. About the Famous Five, not about you or the meal. It’s lovely of your to have taken all this trouble.” As I spoke my hand found the lid of a bottle of ginger beer. Pulling it out, I opened its twist top and offered it to him.
“This Famous Five.” He looked confused as he took the glass from my hand. “Am I supposed to know who they are?” I stared at him, amazed.
“You’re telling me you’ve not heard of the Famous Five?”
“Not that I recall,” he replied, frowning a little. “Why? Who are they?”
“Only Enid Blyton’s most famous creations,” I gasped, letting the fruit cake fall back into the basket. “In my grandmother’s day they were all the rage. George? Timmy? George had cousins, Julian and Dick?” I ticked the famous names off on my fingers as I listed them. “They had a younger sister, a rather dim girl called Anne. She was the one who always had to do the cleaning and the cooking,” I added. “Not that she seemed to mind, poor girl.” I grimaced at the thought of poor Anne, remembering my grandmother had said she was always the one who always ended up with the dishes at the end of a day’s adventuring.
“Oh, hang on.” Dan groaned. “Right. Sorry. Yes, I do know who you mean.” He looked slightly put out. “I didn’t know they were called that. And I don’t know them all, just Anne. The rest of them I’ve just seen around a bit, now and then.”
“Just Anne? But they go together. They’re sort of a....package deal.”
Dan shook his head. “I hate to shatter your illusions, but Anne hangs out round here quite a bit of the time, and I’ve never seen these brothers or that cousin of hers. But I’m guessing from your shocked expression that, where you come from, the five cousins are inseparable?”
“Well, Timmy’s a dog,” I replied, “so technically not a cousin as such, but yes. They’re a rather irritating bunch of do-gooder, nosey-parker children, and their dog, and they have the knack of attracting criminals wherever they go.” I was rather running on at the mouth by this point. “Everyone but Anne tends to spend lots of time off getting firewood, particularly when there’s any real work to be done,” I finished.
“Sounds like you don’t much like them.”
I shrugged. “My grandmother was a huge fan and tried to get me to read them when I was nine or so. I read a couple of the books, but I couldn’t get into them.” I laughed at the remembrance. “Mainly because the male characters spent the whole time bossing the female ones about. That’s why they’re now seriously uncool.” I looked at him curiously. “How did you meet Anne?”
“Well, like I said, she hangs out round here quite often. And I’m pretty much always here. So we end up getting together now and then, help each other out with stuff. She used to be really busy, but lately she’s had plenty of spare time. I guess that’s what you would consider a symptom of being uncool.”
“What do you mean?”
“If those books she’s in are not big sellers at the moment, that means they’re not attracting a huge readership. Any character in that situation gets more free time for hanging out with her friends in this world. That’s how it works. The more popular your book is, the more you get read. The more readers you have, the less down time you get. Those Twilight kids, for instance.” Dan rolled his eyes. “When that book first came out, I’d see them around a bit. And boy, that Bella can be pretty annoying” I nodded in sympathy at this. “They were pretty busy right from the start, and for a while you never saw them at all, but now they’re around a lot more. It’s pretty easy to work out who’s in and who’s out. The ones whose books are on the best seller lists, well them you just never see. At least not until people move on to the next big thing. Sometimes it can take years, but it always happens eventually.”
