He rose and stretched. Another day to fill.

They had worked too long, he knew that, his children thought that, he knew his children thought that and they probably suspected that he knew they thought that. They never talked about it. It hadn’t meant to be like this. The original plan had been to retire and travel. He and Monica would, as they joked ‘blow all the inheritance on pointless travel until there is nothing left’, their children would laugh and express mock horror.

Then she had just upped and died. Well, no, not just that. The tests were for something minor, they had resulted in further tests ‘probably nothing’, the doctor said; but since the job had private health care, they might as well have the tests instead of waiting for the NHS to wake up and deliver the tests in 3 years time. Those tests had suggested a shadow, and the further investigation was needed. It was like going into a spiral down the plug hole. More and more and still no clarity. Until there was. Three months! Three sodding, fucking, bastard months! A whole lifetime together and three months to see her waste away in discomfort and then pain and then agony. Then ‘the rest is silence’.

He’d taken leave of absence for those three months, but the firm had subtly translated that to retirement. He understood why, but he might have liked to make the decision himself.

“Mark Darcy, single, retired, no prospects. One motorhome and no pets; seeks occupational therapy to stop going mad.” He said out loud.

Actually, he’d coped quite well. He’d patiently listened to the children’s suggestions (‘move to be nearer me Dad, not in our pockets, just closer’ had been Julie’s suggestion. She was always the caring one; but he loved them evenly and equally), thanked them, promised to think about their suggestions. They complained that he ignored their ideas. He said he hadn’t, but he had thought them through and dismissed most of what they said. Not right for him, he said.

He had forced himself out of the house, knowing that his son’s mother in law had became a kind of recluse when her husband died. She had no interests of her own and didn’t cultivate any. By contrast, Mark Darcy started by walking. A few miles at first, then up to ten, then he took off for two weeks and did the coast to coast walk. At first it was horrendous. He had to force himself to reach each destination (he had planned ahead and booked B&Bs where he thought he could get to), then it became easier, then the last two days got harder again. He ruefully accepted that he wasn’t twenty one any more, but he completed it, against the well meaning advice of the children ‘don’t do too much’, ‘you should pace yourself’, ‘who will know where you are’. To the last one, he nearly said ‘who will care?’ but he didn’t.

He joined the local choir. Two shows a year, one serious, one fun. He’d sung at school, enjoyed it, and then dropped it when he left. He had a good voice and was welcomed – there were always more screechy sopranos and contraltos than men. He made a few friends of both sexes, but nothing serious. If you’ve grown old with someone becoming more saggy, that’s one thing; but hanging out with some wrinkly, grey haired, saggy-arse (and that was himself, he laughed), no thanks.

He avoided porn, but did watch some X-rated films on TV. He would lie in bed imagining himself with the attractive woman – he even imagined himself with Jenny Agutter in Walkabout, even though she was meant to be a school girl in that. He watched Blue Lagoon too and fantacised. He wasn’t ashamed, it was all in his head, that was all. When he found the lost five year old girl in Tesco, he just walked with her to the tills and they waited until a distraught mother came up after the tannoy had announced a lost child. The girl had walked off with a cheerful wave. He’d thought it better to wait with the girl than to hand her from pillar to post.

He joined the U3A, intending to learn more about computers if he could, and found the group made up of the majority who had to have the same thing explained every week (every bloody, fucking week! was actually what he thought) and a couple who were well away. He liked to think he was largely in the second group. There was one outlier who was eighty, couldn’t retain any information ‘what’s a browser again?’ but had retained the muscle memory from being a secretary many years before and could type ‘can you tell me when exactly the next eclipse will be in our location?’ in the same time as everybody else typed ‘eclipse when’. Since the computer didn’t know where ‘our location’ was, she still got rubbish back.

So he had started making himself go out. The first few months, he had steadily cleared the freezers of their junk. His wife had liked junk food. Again the ‘advice’ was ‘are you sure?’, ‘that isn’t good for you’, and rather contradictorily ‘you should keep that in the freezer for when you can’t be bothered to cook’. Then he had happily spent time making ranges of pies and freezing them. He actually liked cooking, he liked watching BakeOff on television, and had once or twice tried to make fancy baked goods but the trouble was he couldn’t really see the point of creating an amazing design for a cake. He liked food that looked and tasted good, not like works of art. Still, he was keeping occupied.

He had sorted out his wife’s clothes too – always hearing in his head her voice saying ‘oh no, that can’t go to the charity shop, I’ve worn it’. She had always been more fussy that him. He figured of something wasn’t good enough to sell then they could send it to a clothing skip. But he knew, he’d seen, some of the stuff in charity shops. Hell, he’d bought that non-functioning clock to see if he could make it work! People did that kind of thing. His children had been unsure if he should sort the clothes, his daughter thought that ought to be the daughter’s job, but she had shown no sign of wanting to do it. They had also been a bit miffed when he’d started on the loft – full of old crap, toys, school books. Whatever. He’d created piles for each of them – keep and deliver to them, keep for old times sake, offer to dispose of it, don’t tell anybody as nobody will remember. The loft emptied. He’d kept the fire that they had in their first flat when they married. It was probably a death trap now, but it had been his grandfather’s anyway, so that would stay for another generation regardless. He’d kept that poster that he had had up in his office room long after it was no longer politically correct; he briefly contemplated bringing it down, but no, probably not something for the grandchild (one so far) to see just yet. He’d kept his kaftan too – stupid really. Really stupid, but maybe there would be a seventies disco one day and he’d win the prize. You can’t throw away all your memories (first sex with his future wife, lying on that kaftan on the heath).

With only one car now – he gave Julia his wife’s car, Julie’s car was ready for the scrap heap. The other two had thought that unfair, even though one had a company car and one of their own, and the other had talked for ages about how people only needed one car – there was space for the motorhome in the drive. Now he could start on a few modifications more easily. He had decided to adapt it to fit the needs of a single person with the possible addition of ‘guests’ (grandchild/grandchildren?).

Yes, today was a day to go somewhere. Mark checked the local hot spots, then the further away ones, then the day’s travel away ones. Now he was retired, he tended to forget things like Bank Holidays. This one in November was new, called something like EU Day – the day the Maastrict Treaty was signed apparently. Who cares? It was a welcome excuse for a holiday. Once he was a distance away on the map, the transportation to use changed from bus to train to car to motorhome. It didn’t really matter, everywhere was busy, everywhere was booked ... except the Abbey Grange. A small site with no facilities. Okay! Booked and booked. Fill up the van with water, check the gas, throw some food in – there was a pub down the road apparently. ‘Within a mile’ the blurb said. Fine; he’d stop at the supermarket and get some fresh bread. Cheese, tick; tomatoes, tick; tea and coffee; tick. Chocolate – get it at the shop on the way. That simple.

A round robin WhatsApp to the family as he threw some walking boots and a coat in. Then he was off. Marcus, his son, breathed a sigh of relief, he had thought they should visit for the long weekend, didn’t want to.

Mark didn’t arrive until 8pm. The office was nearly shut the warden said – Mark forbore to say it couldn’t be ‘nearly’; it either was shut or it was open. Shops and receptions were binary – on/off; open/closed. He just smiled and checked in for a few days and drove to a convenient site. It was right beside a water tap, he didn’t need to fill up before leaving; he’d read somewhere that a full water tank uses a mile a gallon less fuel (or more, he wasn’t clear. Less efficient anyway). Still, such considerations are for mind-bogglingly boring people who will discuss the best route from A to B like they are invading Russia with Napoleon, not following sign posts in a huge plastic box.

Mark laughed: “Little and Large.” A well known comedy duo from his past. Opposite him, geographically and dimensionally, was a VW microbus camper van. Still, he loved them, they looked such fun. His motorhome was comfortable, good to travel in, reliable, safe, warm, cosy; people rarely said ‘fun’. The VW camper was noisy, rattly, small, uncomfortable, and definitely fun. Time for bed, he thought.

...

Waking in the morning, late as it happened. He felt relaxed. What had woken him? Was it the rain last night? No it had stopped. Oh, it was the VW. He watched a young woman in the driving seat turning the engine over and over. The noise was not that different to the food mixer at home. “She’s flooded that.” He said out loud as he put the kettle on.

He made some toast and a mug of tea, dressed and saw the VW now had its ‘bonnet’ up. Being rear engined the bonnet was at the back. He sighed, looked at the weather, which at least was dry now, and walked over with his mug of tea. “Hi, problem?” The young women were standing, staring at the engine with no apparent understanding. One of the women thought of replying ‘no, we just like this view’ or something, but she didn’t.

“It won’t start.”

“Well, it’s probably flooded now. Did it try and start at all?”

“Yes, I turned the key and it was turning over but not starting.”

He tried again “But could you hear it firing at all, even at the start.” Totally blank looks. He might have asked it in Greek. “Okay, any tools?” They had a jack and a wheel brace. Well, that was better than nothing, but also useless for this. He went back and got his tool box from the back of his van.

“Oh, look, we can call someone. Honestly.” Said the blond. He had assessed them a little more now. One was five foot seven or so; slim and pale, large blue eyes that could shrink into critical slits and even change to a steely grey on occasions. Sarah had dark hair that reached her shoulders. Her friend (he was deliberately not assuming sisters or lovers) had blond hair which was slightly shorter. He could see her eyebrows were darker and assumed she dyed her hair. A voice in his head said ‘you’ll never know unless... ‘ his eyes flashed down to the apex of her legs and back. Her shorts were tight, and short. She was in sandals, bare legs (good legs, his brain suggested. He was always amazed that his biology was still assessing women for their ‘potential’), her waist was less obvious that her friend, but her bust was decidedly more obvious. It put the teeshirt under strain and again his brain said ‘nice’ before realising that he wasn’t interested, and she wouldn’t be either. She had seen the quick ‘eye flash’ up and down, and thought ‘typical man’; but wasn’t too offended. Her face had a permanent smile of perfect white teeth framed by rosy red lips. Even camping, she wore lip gloss. Her hazel eyes suggested again that her hair might not be naturally blond. Both appeared to be mid twenties.

“It’s fine, honestly. I was just going to pull all the spark plugs out ... ah yes, see?” They looked at the glistening business end of the first spark plug. “Petrol.”

“That’s good isn’t it?”

“Yes and no. Yes, it means it isn’t starting because of no fuel. No because it has flooded.” They looked concerned, “No, I mean there is too much fuel now. Petrol stops the spark if there is too much.” He stopped before going on too long. He pulled them all out. “Now, lets put these in the oven to dry out.”

“But petrol explodes, is that safe?”

“We don’t have an oven anyway.” Of course they didn’t, they had a two ring cooker and even the grill underneath was a bit of luxury. He hadn’t expected them to have one.

“No, we can do it in mine ... if that’s okay?” He added as an after thought. His wife used to tell him how he just assumed control in an arrogant way. His children never seemed to mind him fixing their damn vehicles! But apparently he had to pretend they still had control of their own cars. The two girls nodded. “Coffee? I’ve just boiled the kettle.”

“You were drinking tea.” Well spotted that girl!

“Yes, I can make tea too if you prefer. I tend to always have a drink on the go. Once the plugs are dry, we can see if they spark.”

“But the petrol!” blondy asked.

“Oh, well. There isn’t enough to blow up the oven, it should just evaporate – but I can put the oven on and let it heat up and then switch the flame off if you are concerned. And the petrol in the cylinders won’t explode unless it is compressed.” He had learned enough from his wife and two daughters to know that explaining logically and carefully that the oven would be fine would never work. He had learned to find ways around problems like this. He had just a little of the attitude of ‘silly women with no mechanical skills’; but enough of the twenty first century had seeped in to let him know that was not PC anymore. He even argued with Les at U3A when that stupid old git (he was a year younger than Mark, but still) had said women could never understand computers or map reading. He’d pointed out that he didn’t understand computers either, but that was okay apparently.

“Wow! So much space!” Said non-blondy. “I’m Cheryl by the way. This is Sarah.”

“That was my wife’s name. She didn’t understand engines either.” He laughed. “I’m Mark, pleased to meet you.”

“Sarah! He’s got a shower! ... but no bathroom?”

“I don’t have a bath; oooh you mean toilet, other side. In that cupboard like a wardrobe.”

“We have a portaloo that pulls out from under the bed. Not very private.” Cheryl explained.

“I’m sure Mark doesn’t need that detail.” Sarah added. Mark was supposing that it probably wasn’t a problem since they were both girls. Then he thought that actually having a shit probably required the other person to go for a walk. Euggghhh!

The kettle boiled and he made a pot of coffee, turning off the oven and putting in the spark plugs. He had a thought and turned the gas on for the boiler. He suspected he’d need a shower later.

He even found some biscuits – though he did notice that the sell by date was two months ago. They were a little soft but that didn’t matter; well not to him anyway. The coffee finished, they walked back and he connected up one spark plug “With a bit of luck it just got damp last night...” The spark plug didn’t spark. “Oh, that’s disappointing. Okay, let’s see...” Sarah and Cheryl both assured him that it was fine, they’d call an engineer out. “Well, if you would prefer that, I won’t mind. But I really don’t mind taking a little further look either. Honestly up to you.” They smiled and said they didn’t want to put him to any trouble and they should be in the AA or RAC, but they hadn’t had the VW long and it had seemed okay up to now. Sarah and Cheryl wittered on behind him as he reached further in, then he pulled his arm out. “Oh, could you just take the key out. It’s just that fan – if the engine turns over it will cut my arm off.” Then he just carried on. He traced the HT to the coil. They all looked in reasonable condition. He was smiling. This was old-fashioned technology; mechanical points, no electronics to speak of; something he could understand.

The girls started to help, holding wires, handing spanners and screwdrivers “No the cross-headed one. No it isn’t cross, the end is in the shape of a cross. I like the idea though ‘hand me the good tempered screwdriver.’” The engine was not in good shape. Which is to say it was robust, but filthy. He was wiping the wires to see what colours they were, and checking for cracks. Finally he was just starting to give up when he suggested turning over again “The engine I mean, haha” Yes, they understood that, at least. There it was! The wire was fine at first, but the rattling and shaking moved it back towards the engine and there was a small spark across. Once it was there, the wire shorted out and the coil didn’t charge and the spark didn’t spark and the engine didn’t start. He disconnected the wire, cleaned it, weighed up whether to remake it or insulate it. “I’ll put some tape round it, then it is still the same colour as the wiring diagram shows. Otherwise a mechanic won’t know what it is for,”

Reconnected, turnover and the sparks sparked. Replace them and ... nothing. “Try again. And again.” Sarah was just going to ask whether this would flood the engine again when the lawnmower size engine rattled and wheezed into life, and then settled to a comfortable noise of a bag of nails being shaken like maracas. “Oh WELL DONE!” Sarah shouted and kissed him on the cheek, collecting a grease streak from his face onto hers. Cheryl, not to be outdone, hugged him and came away with an oily hand print on the back of her tee shirt. Not on her shorts, she noted. She wouldn’t have been surprised, actually at that moment wouldn’t have minded. She knew what call-out fees over a bank holiday would be. “Can we buy you a drink?”

“We’ll need to get cleaned up. I put the boiler on, if you fancy a warm shower.” he answered. “You can close the back off completely. Totally private.” The possibility of lack of privacy vied with the possibility of a warm shower instead of a bowl of cold water in their own camper. The warm water won.

“But we’ll use all your water! You should go first.”

“Not a problem. I can refill the tank from that tap and the boiler will take about an hour to heat up again. There isn’t an inexhaustible supply, so ... well you should be quick.”

“We can share? With each other I mean.” Sarah said. “Don’t get your hopes up yet.” and laughed. He laughed back. He had no hopes to get up. Why would he? So they went into the back of his van, he showed them the controls and how to close the door. “Oh, can we use your loo too? Is that okay?” Cheryl wondered if that was a step too far.

“Of course. The door either closes the toilet off or the whole of the back.” He meant that they could either use that first or just be visible to each other. Evidently, at least one of them wanted more than a pee as they opted to use it first.

“Seems unfair that you have to empty it ... I mean...” Cheryl was saying.

“When we went away together, I never once persuaded Cheryl, my Cheryl, to empty the toilet cassette. Seems some things remain a man’s job regardless of feminism.”

Then they shut the door. Then they opened it again: “Forgot towels!”

“There are some in the cupboard on the left of the bed, just use them. It’s fine. It looks like rain again.” It did, the clouds were starting to gather. There was an ominous tinge to the clouds actually. The water came on, and he had a huge desire to see if they were actually sharing the shower (there was just about enough room, he and his wife Cheryl had once done that, just to see); or waiting for each other. He suspected the latter. He didn’t check; he went outside and noticed that the back bedroom blind was not right down. Cheryl – his wife – had always kept the back window blind right down, but he liked the light and even at night he kept it on the next catch up to allow a few inches of light in. It was still at that level. Having reversed in, the back window just looked out onto a thick hedge, so there wasn’t really a problem. He made a point of walking right round the front of the van to the outside hatch that held the hose pipe. A voice was saying ‘you could legitimately accidentally walk round the back and glance in’ in his head, but he didn’t. Back round the front, he hooked up the hose to the filler and connected it to the tap by the road. The one down side of the shower was it took an amazing amount of water. As he rolled up the hose, he noticed a young lad at the back, creeping along the hedge.

“Oh! There’s a boy!” The boy hadn’t even noticed that, if he’d looked to his right he would have seen two luscious ladies. He was too busy playing hide and seek to care about a view of half dressed women. He was probably about ten, so he might have reached the age to be interested. The girls pulled the blind down, and failed to clip it shut properly. It shot up to expose the whole window. Luckily the boy had moved on.

“The blinds are a little fiddly, umm ... can I help?” Mark said loudly through the door. “Oh, wait a minute ... Oh, yes. Fine, come in.” he opened the door to see two young women dressed in quite revealing towels. The towels were fine for drying your body, but they didn’t do a good job of covering up everything. He didn’t mind seeing their shapely thighs and the valley between Cheryl’s larger breasts; but he made a point of not staring. He walked across and pulled the blind down and clicked it into place.

“Sorry about that ... I’ll make some lunch shall I?”

“You sure? I mean we can wait and make it while you shower?” Cheryl was actually thinking that he was still oily and greasy.

“Yes, that’s a better idea. Okay, I’ll make some tea anyway.” So he did just that.

They had more tea and more biscuits; but it was the tea that resulted in the three of them each needing the bathroom again. “We should use ours really, rather than filling up yours.” Another problem had arisen. They could put their dirty clothes back on, but they would rather put on clean. But the clean clothes were still in the VW.

Mark suggested “I tell you what. Take my dressing gown and put that on, one of you. Actually I don’t think anybody would notice if you dropped the towel and walked over as you are -”

“Maybe so, but I’ll not take that chance if it’s all the same to you.” Sarah laughed. Cheryl watched her friend stand, turn her back and in a nearly seamless move drop the towel and pull on the dressing gown at the same time. Nearly seamless; and if Cheryl noticed the naked boob for a second or two; she was sure that the man would. He said not a thing, nor made any show of seeing the young, perky (only word for it) breast with its red peanut at the tip; but she was right, he had seen. The sight of a naked, hot blooded, verified, genuine breast actually cheered him up even more. It was always good to be reminded.

There was nothing sleazy or pervy about the gentle flirting banter. It was the kind of thing that used to be perfectly acceptable to both genders in a past not that long ago. Nowadays, the killjoys, the humourless, the politically correct in all things, had made it risky to say such things; you might get a lecture, or, as had happened once to Mark just before he retired, accused of sexual harassment – he had said to a particularly stupid, ignorant woman ‘you look nice, your hair is brilliant’. It had been an off the cuff remark as they had been waiting for a meeting to start. He protested that if she could feel offended at him saying something like that, then he could feel offended that she thought him so predatory as to be hitting on her. But apparently offence can only be taken one way, not two; men aren’t allowed to feel offence for being misjudged. On that occasion, two other women – including a particularly fabulously shaped black woman who could have been a model rather than working in their company – had said they didn’t think there was a sexist bone in his body (which he knew was not true having found a little surge of lust at the long shapely legs of Razmi Alkolla). But it had been a lesson in how to undermine any friendly atmosphere and team spirit.

These two girls seemed happy enough to engage in gentle banter with a slight sexual overtone. His daughter had once said there was no such thing as innocent sexual banter. He felt this was proving her wrong.

Sarah and Cheryl now had clothes, he showed them how to pull all the curtains in the main part of the van, went into the back and closed the door and put on the shower. It was good that this site allowed grey water to drain away into the grass. Most insisted on proper use of the campervan service grid to empty, but a shower or two would have filled up his tank probably. He started with warm water, shampooing quickly, knowing it could run out since it hadn’t been on long enough. But scrubbing the oil from his arms took longer than he’d planned and the hot turned to warm turned to freezing cold “Ahhhhh!!! - no no, I’m ffffine. Just the warm water has run out and I’m covered in soap.”

“We can boil a kettle and wipe you down with warm flannels.” Sarah shouted through the door with a laugh.

“No, I just have to not be a wimp! It’s a far far better thing I do...” and he leaped back into the freezing cold water, steeling himself not to scream. “The best thing about a cold shower is you feel warmer when you get back out.” he said loudly through the door, not adding ‘and your bits shrink to peanut size, and your lust gets washed down the drain’.

Finally the three looked presentable again. Having shut all the curtains, they hadn’t noticed the steady change in the weather, so it was only when they stepped out, finally, that the drop in temperature was noticed. It was cold! Sarah and Cheryl went back, once again to get jumpers to put on. They hadn’t brought much with them as it hadn’t been expected to get too cold, even though it was November. Mark put his waxed jacket on over a large woolly jumper and they started to walk to the pub. The road sign said the name of the village ‘1 1/2 miles’. “So unless the pub is outside of the village, ‘within a mile’ is optimistic.” Mark observed; still they had set off now. A flake of snow drifted down. “Snow?!” It’s November!” Now he wished he had left the gas on and the heating running, even though that went against all the good advice about using motorhomes and gas. “Still, I can put the fire on when I get back.” he thought.

The pub was indeed in the village. It had lit the fire and there was a warm fug inside. They would have ordered some food, but “Sorry guys we stop doing food at the end of September, no call for it.” Mark considered pointing out that he and the girls were calling for it, so clearly there was a call. Still, no point in complaining. They sat in a corner with their two pints of bitter and a white wine. Sarah quaffed her beer and got a frothy moustache. Cheryl smiled and said “Mark, wipe her mouth for her, I’m going for a wee in the luxury of the warm with a proper flush.” Sarah wiped her mouth with the clean handkerchief he gave her; even he recognised that reaching across and wiping her face was crossing a boundary. Cheryl came back “Well, it flushes, but it’s across the yard in an outhouse. Definitely not warm.”

Behind them a large man was talking to his two friends. They were sitting in the window seat and looking out. “Ha! This is November and it’s snowing hard now. The weather forecast says it will freeze tonight, so it isn’t like this is going to melt. No-one will get up Darrowby until it’s gritted, except you, Tony. That Chelsea Tractor finally has a use, I suppose you’ll keep it in the garage so it doesn’t get wet.”

“Oh, haha. You’re just jealous. A four-wheeler like my Range Rover is exactly what you need now.”

“Yes, a gas-guzzling four by four. I couldn’t afford to drive to the shops in that thing, not without a second mortgage.”

“Still, what price global warming, eh? Clearly my Range Rover isn’t heating the atmosphere enough.” The three – Sarah, Cheryl and Mark – each caught each other rolling their eyes at the man’s comments and laughed.

“Still, I can’t really comment. My motorohome uses loads of diesel. I guess yours is a lot more acceptable.”

Sarah replied: “Well, it is old and rather inefficient where fuel’s concerned.” They all agreed that it would be a sad day, but probably an inevitable one, when vehicles like the VW aircooled microbus no longer existed. “Do you think we should head home before we’re stuck?”

“I think we’re too late already. The snow is settling. Darrowby is a 1 in 4 – sorry a twenty percent – I’d not get up that now, I’m not sure you would.” Mark said.

“Actually 1 in 4 is twenty five percent. But I think you’re right.” Cheryl chimed in. “Good job the VW is warm and cosy ... oh no wait...” she laughed.

The walk back was into the snow. It was an unexpected blizzard and now their coats were getting blasted. Withing half a mile none of them were water proof, in the next mile their jumpers started to get wet and cold. By the time they reached the site, the track in was well covered, a van had tried to get out before it got stuck, taken the bend too fast and slid into the gate post. It was stuck in the mud. This time Mark opted to let others deal with it. “Well, that settles it. We won’t get past him anyway until he moves. Front wheel is off the tarmac and in the mud. I think he may be here for a while. Look come into mine, I’ll put the heating on. I should have left it on I think.”