Hot day

By Maxim Griffin.

High summer, late July hot – a Saturday – a list of important jobs has, for the time being, been set aside – the citizens of the town are all in agreement that today is the day to grill meat outside – a collective haze over the gardens has begun to accumulate – there’s a pub band a mile or two away who are making a passable stab at ‘Bad Moon Rising’.

Thirty degrees – bit too hot really – the dog moves with the shadows that travel around the garden, settling for the relative coolness of the nettle patch – the ants in their millions are moving eggs across the concrete – earlier, after the inevitable list of fresh horrors, your telephone declared it to be the hottest day of the year.

Looking down the red terrace ends of Victorian redbrick – they glow in the sun – extra red against the azure afternoon – bare-chested old men with wheelbarrows make their way to the allotments round the back of the lane – the lane is unadopted and rough, the council won’t touch it – every now and again someone fixes a patch with whatever method seems best – him from up the road is being helped by a lanky teen to fill the big holes outside 55.

The road is quiet enough for children to bike up and down and an alliance of three houses with big families take turns in keeping watch – sitting out on watch is not unpleasant – a drink and a book maybe to hand, occasional orders barked or disagreements settled – those without bikes run behind – even the quiet boy from 18 is out – ice lollies are produced – bog standard rocket lollies and plenty of them – it is wise to keep a brace of lollies to hand when watching the road – before long, everyone is hot and sticky and they pile into the garden of the boys from 28 where a cache of water pistols is kept.

Rituals
The parcel man makes his deliveries and accepts the offer of a lolly – the happy black dog at No.9 barks at his arrival and is fussed in return – this is the ritual – the van makes its appointed stops and trundles to the top of the road and away – at the top of the road is a 60s semi in a perpetual state of falling apart – two tabbies patrol the flat roofed asbestos garage – bindweed of various styles occupy every crack, a citadel of fruit heavy brambles crawls to the chimney pots – every road knows this house and attaches the same folklore to such a house – the big rubber stamp says HAUNTED – empty for 20 years – should be knocked down – there’s a son, they think, down south, doesn’t want to know – children on bikes have been told to stay away.

Older men who do not go to the allotment sit on the sitting wall – the man who owns the sitting wall comes out on fine days and sits, then other men sit with him – conversation goes this way and that, topics vary – fellows come by, park a bum, chunter and carry on – maybe stop on the way back from the shop too.

Next door have set a paddling pool for their toddling grandchildren – two gardens over and a water fight has turned nasty – the hollers of injustice, tears – who squirted who – who fired the first shots? Someone tries to lay down a simple set of rules, a Geneva Convention of garden combat – it doesn’t hold – tears of rage follow as they are sent to calm down.

A gaggle of young men are on their way and are going there in high spirits – they walk along sharing purple tins of fruit laced cider – they call in at their friend’s house, one of the tiny terraces set back away from the rest – the stop is brief – they pour along the road with four-can enthusiasm and turn left at the bottom of the road – their enthusiasm is still audible after they are out of sight.

Sights and sounds
A family arrives on foot at the house of friends – a birthday perhaps – summer dresses, bags from the shop – they’ve brought fizz and cheesecake – the men will stand by the grill while burgers are spun and sip Italian lager – sun-fried children retreat inside to tablets and Minecraft – the fizz is uncorked, startling local pigeons who were already on high alert – a pair of juvenile peregrines have ruled the sky across town for the length of the summer – the swifts are too fast for them but the pigeons are rich pickings – the men at the grill look up as the calls of the peregrines turn to shouts of triumph – talons fixed into the unlucky target – a pigeon screams as it is flown away to certain doom in the peregrines’ eyrie in the spire – shrieks of terror bounce off red brick gable ends.

Teatime, or thereabouts – the youngest of the bike children has gone down, skidding through the gravel and dust – that moment of silence, a cry that never comes – a graze, a flesh wound, no tears – everyone is called in – be out after tea? Yup! – we’ll see – everyone’s a bit frazzled – yeah, bit of quiet time now perhaps.

A few big clouds track west to east – slightly cooler – the dog is still in the nettles – maybe time for a walk – she hardly stirs – maybe not then – you’ve prepared a meal that reminds you of dad – boiled ham and new potatoes, pickled onions and watercress – time for a beer then – you step gingerly across the ants, still busy in their works – the dog pads over as you sit on the bench – a big cold gulp – now you sit.

If you listen carefully you can hear the distribution of plates and cutlery all over town – the songs of various distant stereos blend into one ambient hum, an unintended collage of sound – you lean an ear in, trying to pick out a familiar tune, but the threads you recognise shift and vanish on the breeze – a mower kicks in to add drone to this mix – a blackbird sits on the fence, takes a look around and adds bright spiralling solos, and you sit and listen for a long time.

We Recommend

Sprinting ahead to Paris

Howzat, for an English summer?

A rural lifeline

Another green world

Walk this way…

Taking to the skies

View all