One Three One: A Time-Shifting Gnostic Hooligan Road Novel (39 page)

The phones always die where the hollow-way cuts between Lake Omodeo and the uplands of the Sédilo-Iloi area. But I was happy enough for our conversation to have ended on such a high point. I didn’t want to lambast ye Bard over the phone with tales of the genuine sickos who’d intruded into our every waking moments. The information would reach him soon enough. The real big news was that Mick had written a poem! That had not happened since the one-word ‘Kick’ had become an accidental semi-hit, what? Four years ago? Just knowing M. Goodby still had some fire in him was enough for me in my present state. Besides, everything Sardu was currently overwhelming me and one glimpse of Lake Omodeo’s waters had instantly set my heartbroken psyche moaning and pawing the dashboard in memory of Blessèd Anna’s star dancing so recently experienced. Everything was backing up now, memories, the lot. And as we struggled up the steep gradient before the final downhill rush past Sédilo, it was all I could do to keep my eyes on the road rather than giving myself entirely to those vivid pale blue waters. What? I saw something. Behind us still the straining knot of overtakers, before us, a warm inviting lay-by at the top of the incline into which our be-sunflowered mule now slipped gratefully and ground to a halt. We let the honking, rageful hordes surge past us, then Anna, myself and the Fiat Panda let out a collective sigh of relief. This trip, this final trip – I knew what the day would bring, but now I was having to enact it. Now, Anna and I rushed together across the main road towards the observation platform. For I had spotted far below us on the waters of Lake Omodeo the trails of spectral beings: human trails, human beings.

Forty minutes later, we stood together on the shore. I hadn’t meant for us both to climb so far down to the lakeside but climb down we had, nevertheless. Well, we had the time. We still had plenty of time. Inside the moment. Let me stay inside these final moments. Anyway, from my first glimpse of the lake whilst still at the wheel of the car, I’d spotted something very curious approaching our side of the shoreline. Thereafter, as we had shimmied and struggled down that treacherous slope, every step had seemed to transport me further and further back into the past – my own past. Now at the lake’s edge, I grasped what I was witnessing and I gasped.

Now the grand gassy cloud roared past us like some huge spectral hovercraft then set off across the shore and up the steep sheer path down which we’d just scrambled. But whereas the details within the cloud had to Anna been indistinct and blurry, to me their inner structures could not have been crisper: There at speed had passed my contraption and with it my stout Select. Each one of them I recognised, each one of them my own kind. Almost. I wanted to scream, became breathless, became faint,
I clutched at Anna and fell to my knees. On the last leg of their great journey now – Lake Omodeo being on a direct line between Madau and the Altar of Punishment – I had even spied upon the side of Bjond’s great contraption these words carved or inscribed in a rudimentary language that I
should
not have been able to read.

Now I walked in glory, now I walked in splendour – myself eternally transformed. Those who dare to tinker with the Cosmos must know – in precipitating Cosmic change – that reigns shall fall like rains, that thrones shall be o’erthrown, that those who dream of meat may yet remain unmet.

Thus it was not in chaos or with puckered sphincters that we joined the 131 at the Abbasanta junction, but in human righteousness that we headed south on those final few miles to our Santa Cristina destination. This was precisely the same route down which The Reaper would be bringing Hertzog to Opposite, and I kept an eye out to make sure that the hard shoulder was strong and wide along the entire run-up to Santa Cristina. For, if my plan went accordingly, this hard shoulder would soon become my own runway – yup, my own place of take-off. Mamma Mia, the downhill nature of the last few miles pushed our farm hack even slightly beyond its previous 73 m.p.h.! Even faster than a 1914 scout plane! Get the oxygen masks on! And as we descended
finally on to the Santa Cristina slip road, I was delighted to hear already the pulsing 20,000-watt brutality of Spackhouse Tottu’s DJ-set kicking off proceedings nice and early before guest-of-honour Judge Barry arrived at 3 o’clock. Already, I could see in the well-lit glass-fronted windows of Opposite familiar gaggles of evildoers and international ne’er-do-wells congregating for the big shebang. Bang. The time now was 2.45pm. I needed to get in there and see the lay of the land. So, passing under the 131 and parking up beside the Santa Cristina museum, I walked into the restaurant with Blessèd Anna as we’d planned, knowing that I could duck out as soon as Separatista leader Angela Solarussa had caught the ear of the gorgeous one. There was, however, a super-righteousness about today – one which inflicted poetry on to even the most exasperating of situations. And as I prepared to don the magic cloak and make for Opposite, I was delighted to see the Blessèd One lambasting one of the Hertzog Girls.

As I ducked under the 131 in Jim Feather’s magic cloak, I grinned as I visualised Blessèd Anna still tearing a strip off the visibly intimidated Hertzog Girls. Holy shit, now it struck me hard just how Anna would have freaked if I’d let her in on my plans! With the time now approaching ten minutes to blast-off, I piled into Opposite in order to check out this dreadful Bugs Rabbit knees-up. Who would be the first baddie I’d bump into? Oh joy. As I slipped be-cloaked through the big glass entrance door I recognised those ugly tones straight away!

Right next to me – well, miles below me – stood the diminutive
Bugs Rabbit himself, a shot of Fernet Branca in one hand, a copy of Van Der Graaf Generator’s epic LP
Pawn Hearts
in the other. Now, he was waxing lyrical about their evil sound.

Now, in explanation, Bugs Rabbit opened the Van Der Graaf gatefold to reveal a bizarre scene indeed. The striding blackshirted hippie sax player, carrying a football under his left arm and fascist-saluting with his right, advanced at a pace towards a great cast-iron plinth on which stood the other three blackshirted band members, each of whom was fascist-saluting equally vigorously back at him. No wonder they were so big in Italy!

On the wall behind Akkrum ‘Pit-Yacker’ Sneek and Cowtown Unslutter was a huge monochrome art poster of Eric Clapton emblazoned with his hateful 1976 stage rant:
Stop Britain from becoming a black colony. Get the foreigners out. Get the wogs out. Get the coons out. Keep Britain white. I used to be into dope. Now I’m into racism. It’s much heavier, man
.

Now, Bugs Rabbit walked over to his electric piano and tinkled upon the ivories, as though willing the rest of them over. D major to C major he jammed, over and over and ruddy over again. Like Diana Ross’s ‘Chain Reaction’, like the most redundant garage soul song ever, so compelling I wanted to throw up! Gradually, the Mackenzies wandered over and started to
jam, even the Japanese dudes from Nurse With Mound. Until eventually, as the sub-sub-Standells groove of ‘Come Back and Haunt Me’ hit the twenty-minute permakraut plateau, every one of the invited flotsam and jetsam, the underworld dignitaries, the Axis of Evil that had made our lives so much less: all had accumulated Joe Cocker and Leon Russell’s Mad Dogs and Englishman-style around this self-made star of the keyboards. There in the huddle sat Bugs blissed out, shining like that penis that plays for David Letterman. An ugly customer playing free for other ugly customers: World Ugly Customers. Over Bugs’ monotonous beatbox-driven soul prowl, Luis Mackenzie was at the Green Matamp DJ booth spinning Fripp & Eno’s ambient twenty-minute extravaganza ‘Swastika Girls’, whilst José at the Orange Matamp DJ booth span a cappella soul from the Expressions, bringing the whole cacophonic jam into Faust territory. How am I forgetting? Down the decades, these cunts had knocked out some of my favourite-ever music! These were the Spackhouse guys who’d nicknamed themselves Wallace & Gromit because of their vast height difference. But then, why should I expect great musicians to have morals? Mick Jagger? Detestable. I’d kill him with my own bare hands. Shaun Ryder’s despicable murders? Inexcusable. Had Breakfast lived, he’d have nailed that chav for sure! But to speak of poor poor Leander was to speak of the Devil. For now, over in the corner corridor slightly away from the musicians, I overheard what I could not believe I was hearing.

Through a slit in the cloak, I checked the big Opposite map now no more than ten feet away – I felt sick. If Cape Town was Cágliari, Mafeking was Alghero, Pretoria was Sássari City and Ólbia was Durban? Then Kimberley had been Macomér! Breakfast had been trying to warn us. Simple as that. Even as he fell to his death had dear Leander tried in vain. But what had been Boerishly clear to Leander had been opaque and unfathomable to us lot.

Now, under the cloak of magic, I slipped out of this nest of vipers, this armpit of the universe, this rotting cow in the middle of a mountain stream. And as I closed Opposite’s big glass front door behind me, I thought of poor Jim Feather putting all of this
together, suffering in the heat and daily fighting off the righteous rage of the Separatistas. I watched those so-called Christian fuckers boozing it up in their middle-aged
Mere Christianity
reunion and I reckoned even Jesus Christ would have rained down heavy blows upon their wretched self-serving butts. Now, I ran under the 131 back up to the museum, where Anna was engrossed in a deep head-to-head with Angela Solarussa. She broke off as soon as I approached, took my arm and held me tightly, nuzzling up to me as we walked into the museum’s quietest corner. Here, Anna explained that she’d screamed so loudly at the Hertzog Girls that she’d left them both shaking. Oh, and we must leave for Fertília Airport soon in order to make my UK flight. I knew I had to act before that tripped-out version of ‘Come Back and Haunt Me’ had concluded, and I had to act now. I acted. I thrust Jim Feather’s magic cloak into Blessèd Anna’s dainty mitts and told her I needed to grab something from the rear of the Panda 4×4. Then, I seized her butt with both hands and pulled her whole lovely self up to my mouth. Sparks of electric metallic blue stuttered and shook in metaphysical tune-up. Not like kissing on earth, this was like kissing once had been. Broken-hearted but undaunted, now – hoodwinking her that it would be just two minutes, four minutes, ten minutes, no more – I walked Anna back to Angela Solarussa’s table and headed for the exit. For a minnow microsecond, the world stopped on its axis. We had known each other. She looked at me across the room one final time. We stared at each other, smiling. Then we were parted forever.

Now I drove the Fiat Panda back under the 131, past Opposite, wherein ‘Come Back and Haunt Me’ was still raging at fullest stretch. Now, I reversed back up the northern slip road on to the hard shoulder, and continued thereafter in reverse at around
25 m.p.h. grooving quite nicely alongside the fast-rushing oncoming traffic. To the seasoned driver, this is easy: the hard shoulder is a full carriage wide and I reversed the Panda 4×4 at speed, heading backwards up my narrow allotted strip, keeping an eye out for when I hit a distance of three miles away from the Santa Cristina exit. In this old trundler, I needed three run-up miles in order to build up sufficient speed. Right there I parked. Now I waited. I was positive that providence would today show me a clear path and bid Bad Riddance to the Opposite Club and its entire contents. Still I waited in that tin car, jostled by juggernauts and petrol lorries.

Then I saw The Reaper hurtle out of the horizon: its halogen headlights that burn the eyes even in daylight. Now I started my run. My run! Ha! This farm vehicle’s nought-to-sixty should be measured in minutes not seconds. How glad I was that I’d given myself a full three miles to gather my speed. But hunched now over the steering column, my white-knuckled hands hooked around the ripped, worn plastic steering wheel, my back clenched into an artichoke knot, my craned neck shuddering and shaking, how I willed and willed any possible extra m.p.h. out of this dwindler. Now, to my utmost surprise did the Fiat Panda respond at last, until I had built up to a not unhealthy 60 m.p.h. See me now, Blessèd Anna. Now this steed of the hard shoulder grew wings, became a turbo shopping trolley, became a worthy mount and me a worthy charge. One mile from Destiny, now The Reaper’s headlights appeared in my mirrors and now I did act. Pulling out without signalling, I overtook a slow-moving tractor then
refused
to re-enter the slow lane. Blue motorway signs for the Santa Cristina exit now loomed. Behind me a barrage of car horns, truck horns, the klaxon chorale of The Reaper itself. I pulled into the slow lane just long enough
to release past me the log jam of furious motorists, then pulled out suicidally
again
into the path of The Reaper itself. On came those bright lights now even brighter. Now stood up all of The Reaper’s occupants, furious and fist-waving through that vast panoramic windscreen. Not three but five, all five of the Porcu quintuplets there raised their middle fingers at me. And now, even as we approached Santa Cristina’s junction – approached at deadly speed – did The Reaper’s frustrated Porcu driver even attempt to undertake me in the slow lane.