MAYFLIES
© Jon Horne 2000*

The spidery ironwork of the rides and flimsy woodwork of the stalls stood together without symmetry, but in almost Eastern harmony, the ferris wheel flanked by the pirate ship and the bungee cage; the rollercoaster and the mouse looping out at angles, along with a score of unidentifiable spinning rides. Double lines of stalls snaked around the perimeter and spilled onto adjacent roads. A cloud of sound rose up from the fairground like an irresistible smell.
     Rebecca folded a stick of chewing gum into her mouth.
     "Come on," she said.
     Martin followed her onto the trail, which sped up as it descended the hill, passing tired parents on their way home, carrying flaked-out children and oversized soft toys. A policewoman on a grey horse tried not to glower at those who filtered past beneath her. A big helium balloon with a face on it was tied to the reins, bobbing as the horse shook its mane.
     They shuffled through the gate. The surge of the crowd was inexorable. Martin's feet moved as if by their own volition. He found himself spinning in slow motion. When the spinning stopped, the gate was twenty yards away, and he was in a queue for hot dogs. He stood on tiptoes, craned his neck, and couldn't see his sister anywhere.
     "Yes?" said a voice. Martin looked up. The hot dog man was peering at him through eyes made narrow by obesity.
     "No, nothing, ta."
     Martin dodged and bundled his way across the path and onto the damp grass behind a novelties stall. All around were voices that boomed and screeched, smells that were sweet and chemical. The carousel's parping pipe-organ fought a losing battle for attention with the battering-ram techno soundtrack of an aerial waltzer. Wild squeals came from one of the cars, which seemed to be veering straight for Martin's head. His fists clenched automatically. He closed his eyes, took a breath and forced his fingers to relax.
     "Martin!"
     Rebecca slapped him on the tricep.
     "Ow," he said in a deadpan tone. The waltzer car with its hysterical cargo sailed past and up into the darkening sky.
     "Where did you get to?"
     Martin shrugged. In truth, he'd been looking for the wrong girl. After a day and a half of being back home, he still hadn't got used to this new version of Rebecca. The person that he hadn't seen for five years was a fourteen-year-old - mature for her age, or at least precocious - but fourteen nonetheless. Glaring up at him was a grown woman, who he was going to have to get to know.
     "Sorry Reeb," he said.
     The glare remained for a moment, then softened into a cautious smile. The old pet-name hung in the air between them. Once as forbidden as a swear-word or a cigarette, it still carried with it an echo of Mum, yelling into Martin's ear: Your sister's name is Rebecca!
     Lights and signs grew brilliant as the sky turned navy-blue. They cut across the grass between the stalls, rejoining the polythene-covered path next to the helter-skelter. Children buzzed around at hip-height, waving glow-sticks and fighting with plastic light-sabres, while parents fretted and smoked.
     "Shall we go on something?" asked Rebecca.
     "You go."
     "Eh? Come on! How about the rollercoaster?"
     Martin shook his head. Rebecca rolled her eyes and turned away. Years ago, she would have wheedled and pleaded, pulling at his arm until it turned into a game - a giggling tug-of-war which would end when he gave in and took her on the rides.
     He watched her as she made her way over to the queue for the rollercoaster. Head up and with her hands linked behind her back, she looked as if she was pacing out the distance; this was Mum's walk, reincarnated. He shivered as the autumn chill got inside his jacket. From the length of the queue, he reckoned that he had at least twenty minutes to kill. He bought a cup of peas and slathered them with mint sauce.
     In the far corner of the fairground, by the main gate, a dark and tatty marquee was almost hidden amongst the overhanging trees. A man stood on a tea-box at the entrance, dressed like a circus ringmaster, and speaking in the stylised tones of an old-time carnival barker. Martin listened to the archaic patter, then raised his hand.
     "You sir!" said the ringmaster.
    
     Rebecca was near the front of the queue, but decided not to bother. She only wanted to go on the rollercoaster so that she could scream and grab hold of Martin - although even that might not have got much of a reaction.
     Terrible things happened to runaways; she couldn't pretend she didn't know that, but the past few years hadn't been a picnic for her either, what with Mum and Dad, and all the things that Martin had run away from. Anyway, he didn't seem damaged; he just seemed bored.
     She was halfway up the ferris wheel when she saw him, his fair hair and white jacket picked out by the orange glow of a street-light, in front of the dull green canvas of the boxing booth, by the Gregory Boulevard gate.
     Rising higher, becoming ever more detached from the fair, she watched people being spun senseless and screaming on the rides, while the music thumped mercilessly around them. Most of her friends would be down there somewhere, but she couldn't see any of them; only Martin, luminous in the corner of the field. Then he disappeared into the marquee.
     Most of the younger children were going now. Families were being replaced by adolescents who ran in packs, segregated by sex and sometimes by race or dress. In an hour or so, when the older kids and students were in the majority, these divisions would break down, and Goose Fair would become a throng of couples, brought together by instinct and taste rather than habit. Later on, when the factory workers came out of the two-to-ten shift, the crowd would age by another five or ten years, and the groups would split and reconstitute again. Rebecca imagined the crowd as if it wasn't made up of people coming and going, but as a single generation, living like mayflies, going through their whole lives in one long, intense day.
    
     Rebecca handed over two pounds and entered the boxing booth. She scanned the dimly-lit, half-full benches for her brother. She was sure she'd seen him go in.
     He was sitting on the edge of the ring, leaning on the bottom rope. She resisted the urge to run over to him; instead she linked her hands behind her back and carried on walking, slowly.
     "Hiya Reeb," Martin said. One of his eyes was nearly closed, and he had a cut lip. One of the boxers was helping him untie his gloves. They were huge and heavy. Martin's arms hung like dead weights by his thighs.
     "Hello Martin."
     "I lost."
     "Looks like it."
     There was a pause while the boxer pulled the gloves off Martin's hands, which looked as sore and swollen as his face.
     "Cheers."
     Rebecca peered into Martin's eyes.
     "What?" Martin said, when the boxer had gone.
     "Nothing. I'd better get you home."
     "No, tell me, please."
     "Later."
     They left by the Gregory Boulevard gate, walked without speaking to the Mansfield Road corner, and crouched beside the giant goose in the middle of the roundabout.
     Martin said: "Do you want me to go?"
     "What?"
     "I don't mind. It wasn't fair of me just turning up."
     "No!"
     "What is it then?"
     His speech was distorted, as if he was sneering. Half of his mouth was swollen shut.
     "Alright," Rebecca said. "For a start, what were you doing fighting? I saw you go in. I thought you'd gone to watch."
     Martin snorted and said: "I was tired of running away."
     Rebecca stood up and faced away from him. He remained squatting on the ground. Then she turned around and kicked him on the knee, knocking him over, onto his back.
     "What's this all about?" she shouted. "You sound like you're reading lines. Talk to me!"
     He picked himself up, and stood, bending and rubbing his knee. He looked back towards the fairground, then up at the goose, anywhere but into Rebecca's eyes.
     "Yeah, you're right." he said.
     "What?"
     "I practised what I was going to say when I came back. Look, can we start again? This is all going wrong."
     "Yeah, it is."
     "Let's go back in. Pretend I just got here. I'll take you on the rollercoaster. Then we'll go for a drink. We can talk."
     "You'll do that?"
     Awkwardly, Martin touched Rebecca's arm. He said: "It'll be a start, right?"
     She took his hand and gave it a squeeze. Martin pulled away sharply and grunted in pain.
     "Bruise," he said.
     Rebecca put her hands in her pockets and looked down at her feet.
     "Listen, I'm sorry I kicked you."
     "Come on," Martin said.
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* This story was written for a competition in the Nottingham Evening Post, so it might be © them.
It didn't win. In fact I don't recall anyone winning...
Anyone know what happened?
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