Page 84 of Rhymes with Metaphor
“Another jam tart?”said Reg.
“I’m full.I’ll explode.”
“That’s the idea of a picnic.”Reg lay beside Joel, and they basked in the sun, digesting their meal.
“I’m so tired, Reg,” Joel murmured.
“Sleep, then.I’ll keep watch.”
Joel fell asleep, and Reg watched him, feeling an unusual calm and peace, reflecting that he had never seen anything so pleasing as Joel right then, so completely unguarded.A beetle landed on Joel’s shoulder, and Reg gently brushed it away.And the next thing he knew, he was scrabbling for something to write with again, a poem opening up around him like a flower in the sun.
The sun was descending by the time Joel woke.Reg had already finished his poem and packed the remains of their picnic away.
“Are you up for some strenuous exercise?”said Reg.
“As long as I can rest after.”
“Good.Because the tide’s come in, and we can’t go back the way we came.We’ll have to go over the hill.”
And so, Reg took Joel to the concrete steps than rose almost vertically through the wood at the edge of the park.Joel kept a good pace at first, but before too long, he started flagging, hauling himself up by the thin handrail.He slowed to a crawl, then stopped and sat on one of the steps, head bowed, elbows on knees, breathing heavily.
Reg sat beside him.No one else was on the stairs—it was too ridiculously hot for climbing.
“Are you all right?”said Reg.
“Are they called ‘the Golden Stairs’ because people puke on them when they try to climb them?”
“Please don’t be sick on the stairs.You’ll be fined for littering.”Reg shrugged off the picnic basket, dug out a bottle of Orangina, and handed it to Joel.
Joel drained the bottle and passed it back to Reg.
“More?”
“Please.”
Reg handed him another.This, he couldn’t finish.When Reg reached for it to take a sip, Joel stopped him.“You’ll catch mono.”
“If I was going to catch your mono, I’d have caught it in Blackberry Lane,” said Reg, finishing the bottle.
“How much further?”
“We’re two-thirds of the way.The view from the top is worth it, I promise.”
With Reg’s help, Joel slowly got to his feet.
“This is like Martin’s cottage in Canada when I helped you upstairs.”
“That was you?”
“Yes, it was.Don’t you remember?”
“I was too out of it.I didn’t know what was real.”
“We’ll go as slowly as you like,” said Reg, thinking Flip would have vaulted the steps three at a time and been waiting for Reg at the top, mocking him for being out of condition.
They emerged from the trees onto the great and perfect dome of a grass-covered hill, two hundred feet above the beach, overlooking the stretch of coast from the beach to Friar’s Point.
“Told you it was worth it,” said Reg.
