The Man Who Travelled on Motorways Read online

  My nervousness was increasing by the minute: the last thing I wanted was a scene or an incident; I dread the thought of becoming conspicuous or of disturbing any living creature. That is why I have such high regard for maintaining one’s proper station in life. It is important to know who and what and where you are at all times.

  ‘Strange that we should have met just here,’ said Shirl. ‘I didn’t know you came to this place.’

  Glancing at her companion, I said, ‘I don’t intend staying very long. Do you know what times the trains are? Or the buses?’

  ‘Oh, but you’re not going,’ said Shirl. She laughed. She wore glasses. ‘We’re staying all night, aren’t we?’ she said, half to the tiny man, but not expecting or waiting for a reply, went on, ‘This place isn’t at all like it used to be. Don’t you think so?’

  ‘I can’t really remember,’ I said. I was hoping they’d go, for I had someone else to see.

  ‘It used to get very crowded,’ the tiny man said, addressing his remark to me.

  ‘Really?’ I said. Did he expect me to be surprised? I decided to show surprise, nodding my head to confirm the truth of his statement and raising my eyebrows to their fullest extent. He had the most penetrating gaze I had ever encountered. There was a handkerchief in his breast pocket on which his initials were embroidered, but I couldn’t make them out.

  ‘Oh yes,’ Shirl said. ‘Very crowded.’ Her lips were sensually thick; they seemed to invite certain disgusting physical sensations. Through the oval-shaped lenses of her spectacles her eyes were fixed on mine. I hoped the tiny man wouldn’t notice this.

  Shirl said, ‘You didn’t come to my flat after all.’

  I was astounded. ‘Your flat?’ I said. ‘I didn’t say I would come to your flat. Did I say that? I don’t remember. When did I say that?’

  The tiny man had leaned forward in his chair, no doubt so as not to miss a word of our conversation. His hands, I noticed, were pale and thin, covered in fine black hair. His sudden interest disconcerted me considerably. Shirl was not at all put out by this.

  ‘I wouldn’t have thought you were the kind of person likely to forget such a thing,’ Shirl said.

  ‘I’m sure I am not,’ I said. ‘Though I honestly can’t remember ever promising such a thing.’

  ‘Evidently you did promise,’ said the tiny man, ‘and then you forgot.’

  ‘Yes, yes,’ I agreed, attempting to smile. ‘It seems I must have done. But it is strange all the same, for I don’t believe I know where your flat is.’

  ‘Oh but I gave you directions,’ Shirl said earnestly. ‘I gave you the name of the street and the number of the house.

  It entered my head that possibly she was mistaken, but as there was little evidence of this apart from my own absence of memory it seemed that I must agree with the statement that I had indeed, at some time in the past, been invited to her flat. The tiny man’s insistence was also a factor in my acknowledging the truth of Shirl’s undoubtedly sincere conviction.

  ‘And I was all prepared for you,’ Shirl said. (What did she mean?)

  ‘Are you in the habit of disappointing people?’ the tiny man asked. He was now leaning so far forward that his head was level with the table.

  ‘No, no,’ I was quick to reply. ‘Quite the reverse, in fact. Had I known – had I remembered—’

  ‘You’ll remember next time,’ Shirl said, smiling faintly and narrowing her eyes.

  ‘Well,’ I said, nodding to the tiny man, ‘yes … I suppose next time I will remember. I shall make a – er – point of remembering. Shan’t I?’

  I wished that the tiny man would stop staring at me. His eyes were really quite peculiar. And I still wasn’t sure in my own mind what short of relationship existed between them. Was I expected to accompany Shirl to her flat? Or had the invitation been made before she struck up an acquaintance with the tiny man? But no! – Shirl had quite distinctly repeated the invitation, hinting at a ‘next time’. Then what function did the tiny man fulfil? Surely he couldn’t be her brother. Perhaps a distant relative? At any rate I wanted them to go, immediately if possible, because I had come to the Pub for a specific purpose and their presence was obtruding on the plans I had carefully laid for the evening.

  ‘I detest people who give offence,’ the tiny man said suddenly. At this Shirl laughed. ‘Don’t you?’

  I wasn’t sure who had asked the question; not that it mattered, for of course I agreed wholeheartedly with what had been said.

  ‘Don’t you?’

  ‘It’s the most unpleasant of things,’ I said. I was surprised to find that this statement – could one call it an accusation? – had nettled me. It had made sweat break out on my body. Were they suggesting that it was I who had given offence? Was that what they were getting at? If so, I should have liked to have known what led them to this conclusion, and what specifically I had said or done that had apparently been sufficient cause to give offence. As I say, I should not disturb a mouse if I could help it.

  I said brusquely, ‘I also detest those who make wrongful accusations. There are plenty of them about if one cares to look far enough.’ I guessed that my severe tone would check them in their stride; it would certainly demonstrate that they couldn’t get away with everything, even if they thought they could.

  ‘We must be off,’ said the tiny man, finishing his drink and standing up all at once. So they closed ranks and retreated at the first sign of battle! Secretly I exulted. Such arrogance deserves to be stepped on instantly, as one would destroy without hesitation an ugly crawling slimy thing crossing one’s path.

  ‘Well, be seeing you,’ said Shirl, rising with what seemed to be a disquieting amount of hesitation. What else was she hinting at? Was she trreying to lure me? Did she, in fact, want me to strike the tiny man?

  Something surprised me at this moment. Now having risen, Shirl, it appeared, only came up to the tiny man’s shoulder. Not that she was tinier than he, but rather that he was taller than her. This amused me for a moment; then it upset me, because in point of fact the tiny man was quite tall – still extremely thin, but much taller than I had at first supposed. I am very small myself, with a deformity of some sort on my back, and I have a natural antagonism towards people who are tall and straight. Shirl was not very tall (taller than me, however), but round and plump, with pertinent breasts. I began to hate them both for their tallness.

  ‘Are you staying?’ Shirl said. She plucked the tall man’s handkerchief out of his breast pocket to dab her lips and I saw the initials GD embroidered in green, set slanting across one corner.

  The tall man repeated Shirl’s question. His tiny black eyes were fixed viciously upon me. How I wished that one of the roaming gangs would set upon him as he walked along and kick him and hurt him. It would teach him a lesson. I could see the boots going in – one of them my boot – knocking the senses out of him. Sometimes I have wished evil on certain people and evil has befallen them, and how I wished evil on the tall man! If he thought he could intimidate me he had another thing coming.

  Looking towards the door I saw Val catch sight of me. I had sensed that she was here somewhere (I have a sensitivity about such things). With Shirl and the tall man gone I could concentrate all my powers on the reason I had come to this dreadful room in the first place. And why had I come here? Even now, thinking back, to recall the purpose of my visit nauseates me more than I can say. A devil, or a demon, had driven me to seek out the one person who so repulsed me that all my being quivered in disgust and loathing, yet who also generated within me the most intense kind of exitement. All my life I have had to contend with these two opposing forces; they have warred incessantly and torn my insides to shreds, destroying in the process the good, noble ideals to which my being aspires. Why must each person be at civil war with himself?

  Be that as it may, Val and I had an understanding. We met infrequently, usually after dark, and always scurrying away at once to remote, innaccessible places where we were certain not
to be disturbed. In truth this was not the entire reason. I could not – would not allow myself – to be seen in her company a moment longer than was absolutely necessary, and so no sooner would we meet than I hurried her away down a dark street or hired a taxi to take us miles from anywhere, up there on the wild swinging moors. Even in broad daylight one could walk all day and not see another human soul. In the summer (which this was not) the sun beat hotly on the coarse rasping grass and in the valleys were the rigid smokeless shapes of mill chimneys, embarrassed by the unaccustomed clear air.

  The first thing to find was always a hollow, a small depression, some shallow private place warmed by the sun and immune to prying eyes. Then I would tell her – without any preamble and as crudely as I could – to get undressed. She would obey without question, slowly, to my commands, removing her garments one by one, following the instructions I rapped out to her precisely to the letter: if she did not she knew the consequences. It was always my policy to have her undress completely, but to remain covered with certain undergarments so that I could see what effect they had, contrasting their flimsy, transparent appearance with the fullness they were supporting and partially concealing. As always on these occasions I took along an empty camera, the purpose of which was to deceive myself into believing that the exercise was one of pure art and objectivity. Having told her to partly remove a garment as far as the knees I then made her open her legs as far as the restricting garment would permit, and all but inserting the camera lens into the apex of her limbs, clicked the shutter several times to signify that her diseased cunt was now a matter of photographic record.

  During all of this she remained pallid and mute, bending herself to my will as so much dull animal bulk, heavy with boredom and empty with incomprehension.

  A fine bodily thing about her was the size of her breasts. The sheer enormity of her breasts. They were perfect in that each breast was in itself larger than her face; the shape and line of them were less important than this one primary fact. A favourite vantage point was to be had from directly below: she standing with legs apart above me and thrusting out her breasts for me to catch the outlines of her nipples against the sky. In this position, too, it was useful to have her bend outward at the knees, thus opening up to my gaze every innermost detail of her vulva, prepuce and clitoris. Not to study this disgusting spectacle, but in order to make the strain on her limbs grow to intolerable limits, I issued strict orders that she was to remain rigidly in this position until otherwise instructed. The sun being hot on my face, I would rise up and wander away for a while, taking a casual stroll to look down into the town or towards the wet black strip of road shivering in the heat, occasionally glancing back from various viewing points to see how she looked and to what extent detail was visible. It sometimes amused me to wonder at the reactions of a stranger, should one appear suddenly over the moor, coming upon this girl in a state of extreme impropriety. However, no one ever did appear, unfortunately.

  Odd funny little gimmicks would occur to me from time to time, such as taking with me a candle to be inserted into her, and setting it alight, leaning back contentedly in the sun to watch the slow, steady progress of the invisible flame towards her pubic hairs. These, by the way, were reddish and sparse, and in some ways this displeased me, for I rate a woman’s voluptuousness pro rata to the amount of body hair. It amused me to wait until the last possible moment before removing the candle, to see in Val’s complacent expression a twitch of emotion, a shudder of hurt. Oh, my mind was full of devious little tricks! Another consisted of having Val press her breasts into the ground: the grass was sharp, and with any luck would slice finely into one or other of the white breasts, nicking it keenly and drawing blood. To aid this I would straddle her shoulders, or kneel into the nape of her neck, enjoying the knowledge of what this additional pressure might be doing to her. In this position I would read a chapter of a book or a magazine article, only shifting my weight to bear down more firmly, pressing her into the ground. The moment of greatest anticipation, of course, was when I released her and allowed her to rise; her ugly flattened breasts re-formed into their hanging shape, the nipples now raw and angry, and innumerable criss-crossed lines and indentations were imprinted in the bulky smoothness. I would bid her stand in front of me, and to her blank face would laugh at the pitiful sight she presented, making remarks aloud to myself and the world in general about her pathetic gross body, its features and failings, the misproportion of it, and what a complete and utter disaster she was as a so-called human being.

  These experiences built up to a climax, as is normally the case; up to this point I had been most careful not to reveal any part of my own body. Now I told her to disrobe me, with the proviso that she cleansed each portion with her tongue as it was opened to the light. This procedure took some considerable time, leading gradually to the action of her kneeling between my legs and licking my private parts. Whether or not she appreciated the privilege of being allowed to perform this, I never dained to inquire, or indeed discovered. All this while I subjected her to constant abuse, a stream of patient, well-spaced vilification relating to the coarseness of her nature and the ridiculousness of a situation in which she was allowed even to approach me. But of course it was lost on her; I had long ago ceased to believe that contact between us was feasible.

  With Val kneeling and in an attitude of prayer before me, and I standing, would jerk forward my abdomen and strike repeatedly at her pale, broad face with the blunt, heavy end of my cock. Eventually it would emit premature semen, thick globular strings of stuff which stuck in shiny patches to her brow and cheeks. Only when I experienced the approaching sensation of release and exorcism in my loins would I permit her to actually take the cock in her mouth and savour its full largeness and strength. At these moments I sought to empty myself into her, urging the pumping action with all the exhortations I could summon, striving to achieve the optimum disposal of stuff through the stiffened muscle and into the gaping orifice available for the purpose. Not a drop must be wasted. And Val, to her credit, gulped at it gratefully. There were times, I will admit, when I deliberately withdrew so that some of it spilled onto her chin, making it shiny-wet, splashing down to spatter her white swaying breasts. This was of the utmost necessity, because only in this way could I despoil her to the point where she became sub-human, or, to be more exact, non-human. As you will have gathered she was less than real to me: devoid of personality, identity, separate existence even. Therefore to enable her to fulfil a meaningful role (in other words, to become real) it was essential that Val be made to occupy a position of the most base and ignoble kind. She was to be human and yet non-human, existing and yet non-existent.

  On other, still sunny days I would have her lie spread-eagled, naked, while I walked barefoot over her body. My only cause for complaint was that she rarely, if ever, complained. Standing on her open thighs, with my cock erect, I would savour the feeling of warm unstable fleshiness beneath my feet; then moving along would place my two feet on her two breasts, maintaining this position until either I grew tired of it or Val was having difficulty in drawing sufficient breath to replenish her lungs. Interestingly enough, standing thus, her face was masked by my cock, which in its aroused state interfered with my line of vision. It had the effect of considerably improving her looks. And when her chest had begun to heave with the effort of supporting me I would at once squat directly above her and lay my complete assemblage on her face. Her hot, rapid breathing was a pleasing stimulation, leading quickly to an abrupt, uncontrolled discharge which was directed onto various aspects of her features. Once, quite inadvertantly, it spat in her eye, causing some discomfort, but as this was hardly my fault I did not see how I could be held responsible, nor did I feel in the least contrite. I could hardly be blamed if another person insisted on keeping his or her eyes open under such circumstances.

  It was in this very position too – I should mention – that most frequently the mystical revelation came upon me; it was here that I came nea
rest to perceiving the precise reality of the secret underlife to which I have referred. In this situation I saw with utmost clarity the planet we inhabit as separate from the space which surrounds it: the skyline itself was the finite limit, and beyond was an endless void into whose depths one could plummet at any moment: I felt in acute physical danger of falling from the surface of the planet, arms and legs splayed outwards with centrifugal brute force, tumbling headlong into the furthest, deepest reaches of blackness and infinity. At the same time I knew beyond doubt that Val had been born with no other purpose than to lie thus beneath me. She was of the planet, created out of it, and the strands of life which ran through the rocks, the earth, the air, also connected her to them and me to her. Time, space and human existence were all one and the same, indivisible, the one entity.

  She came across to me in her lumpy sweater, scratched shoes shuffling in the debris, the hair on her head sticking out at all sorts of ridiculous angles. There were holes in her tights.

  ‘Hello, stranger,’ Val said, her eyes bulging through her thick glasses. No doubt she was without undergarments, for there, clearly to be seen, were the outlined protruberances of her nipples.

  ‘You dirty fucking whore,’ I said to her, unfailingly, as ever, disgusted.

  IV

  Committing to paper the tangled world in which we live is not the easiest of tasks – nor the most rewarding, I might add. But as we slowly progress, hacking our way through the undergrowth, I hope eventually a glimmer of light will appear, that you will begin to comprehend the alternative universe of which I speak.