And Now We Wait – a Dream
- Written on Nov 15th 06.
It was as if I’d appeared in the foyer of an airport. It was as impressive as it was empty. Huge window arches, sweeping swathes of light reflecting off the walls, the floor a collage of grey and brown patterns, the faint sounds of jet engines echoing around an otherwise silent shell. I stood there with my father, and we were afraid.
We nodded at each other. It started.
We began to run. Looking to my left I saw men in black raincoats with automatic weapons break out through a hinged entrance through the marble carapace. My father pushed me. Get out of here! He shouted, unnecessarily. Then I realized he meant I was supposed to leave him behind. I looked over my shoulder at his broad, heavy frame nimbly darting around a heavy door, followed closely by the men. I heard gunfire. He had died.
I ran through the large revolving door out to the street, late for my court-appointed adventure in the mountains. I had no idea why or when the court appointed. My fear (or was it guilt?) was mixed with a resolve to find why he had died.
I begged for information from friends. Why had my father been killed? Finally a fat child who I had one to school with told me to see his father, because his father was also part of the resistance. The boy’s mother had, in real life, been my piano teacher. The father was an older version of his son: fat, red-haired, and pale. What happened to my father? I asked, and he said, Go with Jane.. Jane will show you the way, after looking over his shoulders. This seemed strange. I didn’t know Jane. Then I noticed we were in a very small shop.
I went out the shop door with Jane, startled by the jingle of the bell. I knew we were in danger just being together, but she made me feel safe. She looked like a French freedom fighter from the Second World War. Like that one in Allo Allo. She smoked, and she looked at me with her small eyes full of sympathy. Perhaps her father was dead. I saw the child inside her hiding behind her pistol, hiding underneath her jacket, hiding in silence, but showing itself in the way her mouth moved. Her teeth ground as we ran. We went into a large, orange building waiting for us, and took off her coat. Underneath she wore a blue satin blazer, taking out a flat cap. The tag perched on her breast said “Jane Smith.” She looked beautiful as she brushed her off her uniform, taking a couple of seconds to pick a hair off her blazer before hiding her gun. I wondered whether this was a predicament yet, and if I should go inside. It seemed unlikely we would survive.
I stayed one pace behind as we walked into the estate. Again there was nobody around. I hadn’t seen anyone. There was one man, a guard—armed with an assault rifle—smiling serenely behind glazed eyes, and I noticed the iPod wires running from his breast pocket to his ears. He smiled not at us—he just smiled. I smelt polish and wax, and knew he would kill us if we were not careful.
Jane led me to a room full of large cubicles. It was like a toilet, but did not smell of anything. The light coming in through the window was grey. Clouds had come in. I heard a shuffle and went towards the cubicle. I slammed the door open, and I saw my father and my aunt, him in his work clothes, her in a long rain jacket like the one Jane was wearing. He had been trying to fix something out of the window, but dropped it as I came in. He turned, and, with a hint of guilt, said bloody hell Nick, now I can’t finish!
I ran to him and kicked him and hugged him and shouted at him and cried. How could he let me believe he was dead? He patted my shoulder and led me by the hand, out of the room, and we made our way outside. Jane put her hands around the throat of the guard and I saw him go limp. I felt relieved; I had been afraid for her. But now they must know about us and our escape. Whoever they were.
Outside the four of us got into the green Volkswagen Beetle, and drove towards the airport. We had stolen it from the airport some time before. The sun had come out but the streets were eerily empty, but that made for an easier time trying to see who was following us. We were all nervous that we would get caught, and knew our chances of returning the car to the heart of the enemy without getting killed were low. Jane held my hand in the back seat, and I felt her warmth. We both were sweating.
As we rolled into the car park I noticed that there were two types of car glinting in the sun. One the same as the sort we were in, the other black sedans with pinched noses and dents. All the cars looked fairly old, all were facing the same way, facing us, and there was about eight or ten feet between all of them. There were no lines on the tarmac. As we slowed one of the sedans moved. We were caught. We could never outrun it. I looked towards my father who looked towards me with a resigned smile. This is the end, he said. Oh well. Let’s not worry.
I felt the warmth in the car, smelled our sweat in the heat, wanted to hug and to scream and to run and to fight, but knew that we did not matter anymore.
More sedans started to move. The first one rammed into us, just as the second turned perpendicular to us, like a pirate ship, and the back window opened with a bazooka in it. It pointed at us and I saw the puff of smoke. Everything was silent but my mind, my insides turned out, the car split open and twisted as I rose up into the air, no longer conscious of form, but rising in the cold blaze surrounding, fascinated by the hulks of metal passing through the spaces in which I should have been, still silently rising.
I opened my eyes in bed, the sheets damp and warm. I moved my head off the pillow onto a dryer spot, and remembered the last line I had heard. As I watched my father, surrounded in white, holding open a cold, gray, metal door letting in the dark clouds outside, he turned his head and our eyes met. I heard his voice, although his lips did not move;
And now we wait for the others
