Marion took Graham’s hand to give it an affectionate tug, then the old couple were stomping off over the edge of the dune, Marion dropping Graham’s hand without turning to raise her arm in a final wave. As they disappeared, Ben turned to Marcie, reflecting her broad smile as he asked what Marion had meant. She explained that the old actress had offered to be a celebrant at their marriage ceremony, then seemed to realise what she’d said as she raised her hands to her mouth with a kind of shocked embarrassment.
Ben thought he understood some of her feelings as he reassured her, “It’s okay. It’s real now, isn’t it? We can take our time, to plan what we want.”
“Oh Ben, yes it is real isn’t it?” Marcie said as she stepped forward to put her arms around his waist, going on to explain, “I can feel the weight of your proposal on my finger, like I’m really aware of it. But you know I won’t be a demanding bride-to-be, don’t you? It’s not my style to be a great big show-off in a meringue dress, bossing everyone around to make my so-called special day ‘perfect’ as according to some mad ideas harvested from piles of fatuous magazines and wedding-industry marketing. It’s the marriage that’s important, not the wedding, isn’t that right? I won’t turn into a bridezilla. It will just be another step that we take into our shared future, but a significant one that’s witnessed in public.”
“Aye, for me it’s saying we’re sincere, in our commitment, when we’re already getting on with it. But it feels like we’ve already made that public, a bit, with those two. And you can have a meringue if you want. I actually wondered if you’d want to go traditional, like in your old Catholic church. I’d be fine with that,” Ben admitted, holding Marcie to him. He’d not been able to help himself from noticing that he could feel her bra straps under her thin blouse now, and therefore guessed that she must have put her underwear back on while he was away collecting the stone with Graham. He wondered at the trust she’d perhaps put in Marion to admit she wanted to do that, then go through with it, in front of a stranger as it were. Yet he said nothing about this.
“No, I don’t think so,” Marcie said, “It would seem a bit false, swearing before a dry Abrahamic god who we’ve been criticising pretty much since we first met. And if I got a special pagan dress for the wedding, I’d want something I could wear afterwards too, so it could hardly scream ‘bride’ for subsequent fun and games, perhaps out in wild nature. But that’s all for the planning which you said we could take our time over. For now shall we tidy up and follow Marion and Graham back to the village?”
Ben agreed, pecking Marcie’s smiling lips before stepping back and crouching down to gather up the blanket. As he shook it down though, Marcie remarked, “You’re right though, we did inadvertently make it public. Were you okay with that when Graham admitted what they’d seen?”
“Aye, I guess,” Ben admitted, folding the blanket as Marcie gathered their scattered picnic paraphernalia, “I wouldn’t have done it deliberately, but I’m glad it was them, in a way. Graham said he saw nothing anyway, you know, of our intimacy. They heard us, then he said just Marion saw us, but she didn’t stop to watch, sending Graham away, on patrol, both guarding us. Are you okay with it? Did I take things too far?”
“No, I wanted to do everything we did! If anything, I seem to remember that I was the one leading us on to get naughty together,” Marcie reassured him, then paused with her hand across her chest as she considered her feelings, then said, “But yes, I think I am okay with being witnessed. Like you I think, I didn’t want to be an exhibitionist, but it’s not a harmful or disgusting thing to have let someone else accidentally see us, is it? It’s wonderful to feel that union outside under the big wet sky, and it’s natural and universal, isn’t it? An honest expression of true deep love. I remember when Shona saw us in the kitchen, the very first time we truly made love wasn’t it? I was startled and scared, but we didn’t stop, did we? If I’d seen Marion peeping over the top of the dunes - and her version of the story matches what Graham told you, by the way - I think I’d have carried on anyway. I don’t want to make a habit of performing our intimacy in front of others though, you understand? There’s a naughty frisson of excitement to it maybe, but I’m pretty sure it won’t become a kinky fixation for me. Is that okay with you too?”
Marcie was gripping the wine bottle whilst Ben was stuffing the folded blanket into the rucksack, but she still managed to draw his hips to her belly, wrapping her free hand around his buttocks. Ben answered, “Aye, it’s all good. Maybe we should take more care though, not get so carried away, if we’re cuddling outside another time.”
“Maybe,” Marcie conceded with a cheeky smile, “Or maybe not. Fucking you beneath the open sky feels so great! It is a kind of magic we make each time, I think. What did you want to do with this wine by the way? We could pour it as a sacrificial libation on this stone, making our own little extra rite to consolidate what is certainly a momentous day, which we’ll surely cherish in our memories.”
“Aye, that’s a sound idea,” Ben agreed, adding, “I saved the cork, to try resealing it, but it would have been difficult anyway.” He was about to put the rucksack down, but then he remembered Marcie’s token that she’d given him that morning. Confident that she’d agree, he asked, “But shall I get Little Danaë out to join us?”
He found the plastic figurine, then carefully set her down on the barnacle-crusted rock that he and Graham had dropped unceremoniously onto the sand, before putting the rucksack aside and stepping around the rock to face Marcie. He squatted down once more to try brushing any detritus off it, but the marine encrustations were stuck had and abrasively rough on his hand. As he rose to his feet again, resigned to the unforgiving rock being what it was, he looked into Marcie’s warm brown eyes and asked, “Do you want to start again?”
“Yes, if I can remember the sense of what we said earlier,” she agreed, then paused to take a deliberately deep breath, drawing her shoulders back and seeming to instantly find an impressive degree of dignity and composure. After her pause, she began in a steady low tone, “Mother of the land, mother of the sea, mother of the sky, you’ve supported our supine bodies in our shared pleasure, your briny flow has moved within and between us, your gentle rain has blessed our union. We honour you and give you thanks.”
Marcie solemnly poured a dribble of the wine onto the rock, careless of the splashing droplets bouncing back across her skirt and the toy pirate, then she passed the bottle to Ben. He caught her eyes, and she returned his sincere smile of thanks, then he held it ready to pour whilst he let his own thoughts settle, before slowly saying, “Fathers of this land, ancestors of this place, who followed the Heathen gods, and the early Christians, who declared this island holy, witness our betrothal, and look kindly on our union, when we declare our wedding vows, and beyond, into our unknown future.”
He tipped the bottle a little further and was surprised by the slug of wine that seemed to leap from it, yet he held steady and unflinching as he watched it fall onto the now special rock, trying to follow Marcie’s calm example as some splashed back onto his jeans. He thought there was still just a little wine in the bottle, so he handed it back to Marcie, muttering, “Last one, maybe.”
Marcie seemed to fill her lungs to their full capacity as she drew a great breath, which she exhaled forcefully before taking another and solemnly intoning, “Now we empty our simple chalice on this hallowed place, offering the last of our shared cup to its spirit, to the genius loci, the landvættir of Lindisfarne, whose unseen company we are in. We offer this wine, sweet juice of the sun-ripened grape, bearing the southern soil’s essence in its terroir, darkly fermented with moist warm yeast, magically transformed by its own intoxicating spirit, the aqua vitae, the water of life. May it be a token of our shared being that we have invested in this place, a symbol of our blood, our sweat, our tears, our mingled semen and oozing lubrication, our flesh, the smell of our intimate hair and our skin’s oils, the fleeting cries of our ecstasy on the air, the rich golden yolk of our fertility, gifted to this sanctified and memorialised place. Mother, father, hear us! We spill our fluids in your honour, we offer thanks, and we crave your blessing for our union.”
Ben felt awestruck wonder at Marcie’s creativity, and somehow humbled by her words too, though he knew Marcie would never critically judge his own weak contribution. So he set aside his hint of shame as he sincerely gave a murmuring echo, “Bless our union.”
She’d upended the bottle as he spoke, and the last splash of wine splattered against the rough rock. Then she surprised him by raising both her arms above her head and letting out a high whooping cheer, casting the bottle aside carelessly to let it impact softly against the sloping sand. She didn’t hesitate to step up onto the wet rock, still barefoot, then grabbed his head in both hands, pulling him to her for a firm kiss as she faced him nearly at eye-level for once. Ben embraced her, putting his hands to her waist, then finding them slipping under her blouse across the warm skin of her ribcage. Moving instinctively, he slid his flat palms toward the edges of her breasts, now once again in the lacy satin cups of her bra, feeling the delicate textures of the fabric and her silken skin through his fingertips as they squashed their lips together.
But Marcie was already forcefully pulling him away from her, with her fingers tangled in her hair. She exclaimed with mock exasperation, “Enough! I’m a disgrace, still snotty with tears, humming with dried sweaty smells, and truly swampy down below. We need to get back. I know we’ll make the tide in good time, but I desperately need a shower before we go out this evening. I’m thinking it will have to be a quick turnaround at the flat before we go over to Sofie and Geoff’s.”
Ben agreed, even as he wondered that Marcie might have realistically considered they could slip all the way back into their earlier intimacy. The thought intrigued him, even though his arousal felt sluggish after all that they’d already done, then he wondered if something had already changed since he’d made his proposal. He held her hand with a performance of chivalry to help her step down from the rock, then gathered up the Playmobil toy and the discarded bottle to put in the rucksack as she sank to the sand to put her boots on, cleaning her damp and sandy feet as best she could with her socks. As they did all this, moving purposefully, he asked, “Does it feel different now, do you think?”
Marcie asked him what he meant, and he explained, “Kissing, petting, now we’re engaged, now you’re my fiancé, now we know we’ll be husband and wife?”
“Yes and no, I guess,” Marcie said, rising to her feet and stomping her feet as Ben shouldered the rucksack. “This way?” she asked, confirming Ben’s intuition of the direction back towards the main path that would lead them to the island’s village and carpark.
They began walking, and Ben expected Marcie to expand on her answer, but she paused and turned as they crested the dune at the edge of their special hollow. With a playful but slightly sad tone she said, “Bye-bye, rock. Bye-bye birthday picnic spot and love nest. Thank you.”
Ben self-consciously echoed her as he grasped her hand, “Aye, thank you. We did it well, by that spirit of this place, I think.”
“We certainly did,” Marcie agreed, tugging him away as they resumed their walk at a vigorous pace. She went on, “There was a lot more than a picnic lunch going on there, a lot more than even I’d anticipated when I snuck away that tube of gel, ‘Just in case.’ But to go back to your question, it perhaps does feel different kissing you, letting you cuddle up to my body, now that I’ve got your ring on my finger. It’s silly, isn’t it? It feels almost like we’re turning ourselves into grown-ups now. But really nothing has changed, even by you popping the question and me saying yes. In a way I wonder if I’d already hitched myself to you, if we made that bond, braiding the Norns’ threads of our fates together as Marion put it, if that happened almost before I knew you. Thinking back, I remember sitting in the back of the ambulance holding your hand and trying to see if your lips were still blue under the oxygen mask. I didn’t know what was going on, but it seemed as if the world had tilted sideways, making everything that I’d thought that morning, making my whole sense of self, suddenly seem foolishly naive and obsolete. It was perhaps at that moment, before either of us knew it, that we truly became a couple, became life partners, as if there were genuinely some divine power that had stretched out a finger to nudge us together.”
“I don’t really believe that,” Ben admitted, “Not that we didn’t become a couple then, before we knew it ourselves. That makes lots of sense. They saw it, the staff in the hospital, didn’t they? I was wearing your Nanna’s charm, so it seemed obvious to them. But I still don’t believe that was God, answering your Nanna’s prayer.”
“No, I don’t think it was like that either really,” Marcie agreed, still clinging to his hand as they strode on below the fast-moving clouds, “Despite all my Sunday School classes, I can’t accept there’s a Zeus-type figure or even a kindly faced Jesus sat on His throne in heaven, interfering with our lives when it suits His plan. But maybe it works the other way around. These mad life-changing things just happen as we play out our natural human drama, so we need to put a shape on them, because they are genuinely shaping our lives. But when we invoke Jesus - or the Norns or Zeus or a big cuddly lion, or even the vaguely defined feminine fertility in nature - all we’re really doing is drawing an outline around the shadows that play on the wall, cast by the flickering candlelight of our lives.”
“Very profound,” Ben said with a light chuckle, though he was genuinely impressed by her insight.
“Don’t tease!” she chastised him, “I’m struggling to put this into words, but I just have a sense of something that’s bigger than us, even if it comes from us, which disappears like smoke when I try to grasp it with a rational train of thought.”
“I’m sorry, I shouldn’t tease,” Ben said earnestly, “You know I agree with you, deep down. A part of me thinks, well, I sometimes think we’re actually finding a spiritual truth. When we invoke Mother Nature, we really are just talking about God, talking to God, as others with faith would.”
“I wonder if you’re right, Ben,” Marcie admitted thoughtfully as they walked on, “I’ve felt the same way. Even though we’re making it up as we go along, with our little prayers and rites, it is like we are still connecting to something which is that transcendent divine spirit. And it’s just the same thing that all religions tap into, something everyone has some innate perception of, even if it is just our imaginations catching a form in a shadow that looms over our life experiences, over all human cultures. I wonder if we’re finding something for ourselves that other people just get from their priest or rabbi or imam. Or maybe not those ordained teachers who read it from a book, but the mystics, the ones who can’t help but share their transformative direct contact with the divine. I’m thinking of the half-forgotten women like Hildegard von Bingen or Julian of Norwich, but also perhaps the local Saint Cuthbert or even the Buddha. Maybe that’s all Jesus was too, a guy who’d had some mystical experiences, perceiving Jehovah directly, which he then just had to tell people about, even if that got him into fatal trouble with the authorities.”
“That’s a big thing to say,” Ben remarked. After a deep breath, he tried to explain his own view, “I wouldn’t go that far, claiming we’re on our way to becoming gurus or prophets. But it’s just when we’re really close, when we’re in the current, in the flow of nature, making love but still saying that stuff out loud, it feels we’re almost touching a true mystery, almost seeing the higher power at work. It’s not something I’ve ever experienced before, not in a church, not with any previous lover - not even something I’ve felt up in a tree, supported in its mighty flexing arms, when the wind’s playful and the sky looks beautiful, clouds moving through the blue like great sailing ships. But perhaps that’s the closest I’ve come, before you, maybe even just way back when I was a boy - like when I first discovered my perch in that ash tree, the one we found together at the top of the copse, when we visited Dad on the farm, you know, when we made love on the crow’s nest platform?”
“I know the one,” Marcie said with a dreamy smile, “How could I forget? And maybe that’s all it is, it’s just that we’ve found our own way to have great sex together!”
“Aye!” Ben laughed, “We’re just mucking about with religious gibberish, while getting on with really comfortable fucks, which make us feel good. But I still love the way we play with these ideas. I love the little rituals we do, the words you come up with, and I love all these stories you’ve opened up for me, the myths and the fantasy books. I don’t know what I really believe, deep down, but I know we’re good together, right to our roots.”
“Thank you. I want us to keep that alive, that playfulness with those serious and deeply evocative stories. It’s like I’m rediscovering them with fresh eyes when I see your response to them. And you’re really great at coming up with ideas and words for our games too, you know? I want us to keep enjoying those, even if the words that come from my mouth during those other little rituals we do end up being a bit odd sometimes. What did I say earlier, saying your big stiff spermy Roddie was the Lamb of God?”
“It’s all good, it truly is,” Ben said sincerely, smiling at the memory, remembering the rich taste of Marcie’s intimate flesh that he’d noticed in their shared arousal too, “I want us to keep that alive too. ‘Odd’ is good. It’s life, our new life. We must keep times like today - playing, making love in the dunes, celebrating life - we must keep practising, as long we’re able.”
“As long as we’re brave or foolish enough to, perhaps,” Marcie said, glancing up at him with a guilty grin as she swung his hand. Then a troubling thought seemed to occur to her as her heavy eyebrows creased in a frown, “We were lucky it was just Marion and Graham who found us, I think. You noticed I’d got my bra on again when we cuddled just now? I did feel a bit self-conscious without my underwear on when they turned up, to be honest. I showed them your silver hammer without thinking, but I saw Graham’s embarrassment when he went to look at it. He must have noticed my chest instead, which made me feel embarrassed too. After you went off with him to find the stone, I confessed to Marion that I needed a wee. That gave me an excuse to grab what I needed out of the bag, then pop over the edge of the dune to squat down out of sight, where I could give myself a wipe down and put my knickers back on.”
“I’m sorry,” Ben admitted, feeling a little ashamed that he’d put her in that situation, but she dismissed his apology.
“Don’t be daft! It’s not your fault, and we were having fun, weren’t we? But when I came back with a little dirty bag, Marion said something about understanding my need to go, then admitted that she’d heard us at it long before they announced their presence. She’d heard the animal noises I was making when you were inside me, I think, but when she realised what was happening she sent Graham off and set herself as our guard, without spying, she claimed, and as you said. Well, I was embarrassed again, but she seemed so kind and light-hearted about it that she put me at my ease. I felt okay about wriggling back into my bra in front of her then, though I kept my blouse on you understand. Holy Island’s beaches are hardly the south of France, are they?”
“She didn’t tell you if they’d done the same, did she?” Ben asked with curiosity, clarifying, “Well, even just getting together for a kiss maybe, on the lonely coastline. Graham said they weren’t lovers, but I think he wished they were.”
“No, she didn’t say anything about that. We genuinely did talk about escaping the Catholic church though, and how you never really left it behind completely,” Marcie admitted. But she was obviously giving the old couple’s relationship some thought as she went on, “It sounded like they’d got up to something in Morocco all those years ago though, didn’t it? Wasn’t Marion implying they were in the nude together in that tent under the stars? I’m not sure I could ever imagine carrying on like that with just casual friends on holiday if there wasn’t something at least a bit sexy going on too.”
“I don’t know,” Ben reflected, “What you said earlier, maybe we are exhibitionists, just a tiny bit. But maybe Marion is even more so, being an actress and all. What do you mean though, about not escaping the church? Will we end up getting married in one, after all? Will we need to speak to a priest, to show we understand our vows properly, before God and all that?”
Marcie laughed lightly, then reassured him, “I really don’t think that’s likely. I’m not sure exactly what Marion and I agreed, but I think for me it’s more about it getting under your skin, priming you with those outlines for the shadows on the wall. It’s like the way that my first impulse is always to invoke Holy Mary, when I’m surprised, when I’m upset, and when you’ve brought me to the moment that my orgasm finally comes home too! It’s nothing to do with priests or Mass, but it’s something I instinctively reach out and grasp for, like a comfort blanket from infancy, even though it’s really not a thing in my adult life at all now. Hmm, and Marion was curious about the Maltese too. I guess that snagged the attention of the performer in her. She told me that as a girl she’d been both transfixed and frustrated in equal measure by the church Latin when she tried really listening to it. Perhaps that’s one of the reasons she got into performing her jibber-jabber, as she called it, in the first place.”
“Well, they were an interesting couple,” Ben reflected, “They must be good walkers too. I thought we might overtake them, but I’ve not even caught sight of them.”
Marcie agreed with him as they closed in on the village. They’d found the bridleway that ran across the fields between it and the dunes earlier, and it seemed to have taken them barely any time at all to cover this final short leg of their circular walk, Ben thought. Yet though the view was clear across the fields, they’d not seen any other walkers at all. However, now that they were approaching the car park itself, Ben was surprised to see a crowd of older men along with a few women, all in biker jackets, which seemed to be milling around the very spot where Marcie had parked the car. He pointed this out to Marcie, and she said that she hoped nothing was wrong, though she seemed mildly curious rather than genuinely worried.
They both became more concerned when they drew closer though, as they saw that there genuinely did seem to be a grizzled biker gang clustered around their small purple Ka. One of the figures must have spotted them approaching, as there seemed to be some nudges and urgent mutterings, then suddenly a familiar face emerged from the clustered bodies.
“Marcie, Ben!” Marion announced, stepping forward with her arms outstretched, now wearing a heavy biker jacket of her own over her dungarees and blouse. Ben noticed Graham in the crowd then too, looking a little guilty whilst the other bikers gawped and grinned at them. Marion had kept talking as she approached, “I’m glad you’re here, but I think I’ve got some explaining to do. We got back to the bikes quickly after we left you. I mentioned to the mob that we’d met a lovely young couple in the dunes who’d just that moment got engaged, and they immediately agreed they wanted to congratulate you and to, well let’s say, ‘Send you off in style.’ I really hope you don’t mind, but Graham remembered how you’d described your wheels, so when we worked out which was your car, us girls pooled our lipsticks, then we got to work with a few decorations for the happy occasion.”
Ben heard a few low but seemingly genuine wishes of congratulations and best wishes from the biker gang as they parted, giving him and Marcie a proper view of the car. The words “Just gettin’ hitched” were drawn in large curling letters around a bulging heart across the back window, all in vivid pink and red lipstick. As Ben moved around, still gripping Marcie’s hand, he saw on the other windows images of more hearts, flowers, stars and even a well-drawn cartoon cherub, complete with a bow and arrow, wings and a little proud penis. Someone had written their names around these motifs, having obviously made a wild guess at the spelling for Marcie’s name, rendered as ‘Mahsee’.
“I’m sorry if we got carried away,” Graham muttered, stepping forwards too now, “I know it’s not like we’re sending you off in your real wedding car, but maybe we all like the idea of sharing in a bit of that romance.”
Ben had given Marcie an anxious look when he first realised what they’d done, but he’d seen her smile, even though he thought he saw a blush slightly too, and he was grinning broadly himself now too. “No problem,” he reassured Graham as Marion took Marcie’s elbow in her hand, guiding her closer to the car, into the heart of the crowd. Ben went on, thinking to compliment what he guessed was Graham’s work “It’s well done, a real treat.”
“It’s a wonderful surprise!” Marcie finally admitted too, with a little laugh, speaking a little louder than Ben, “I’m so glad we met you, that you witnessed Ben’s little performance, and that you had the idea to mark our special occasion this way. Thank you all for this, and for your kind thoughts.”
This provoked another heartier round of congratulatory remarks and other appreciative noises from the crowd, which came together in a kind of cheer as Marcie held up her left hand. She turned around in a little twirl, before gripping Ben’s hand firmly with her right, saying shyly but clearly, “And here’s the ring!”
That cheer was repeated with much more enthusiasm and volume when Marcie surprised Ben by grabbing his head and pulling him towards her for a kiss. He was even more surprised when, with everyone watching, she met his lips with her mouth ajar, then responded enthusiastically when he tentatively reached for her tongue with his. They were immediately entangled in a passionate exchange, hungrily chewing for each other as Marcie thrust her tongue deep into Ben’s mouth. Yet despite the uproar this caused in their audience, it was over in a flash. Ben found himself staring deep into Marcie’s wide sparkling eyes as they pulled apart, grinning at each other in their shared breathless excitement.
Marion was patting them both on the shoulders, saying quietly, “I’m so glad you played along with this daft old bird’s idea. You’re a beautiful couple, so natural, so perfectly in love.”
“Well, thank you Marion,” Marcie said, releasing Ben’s head, then turning in a half-circle to say loudly, “And thank you all. It’s a big day for Ben and me, and you’ve made it extra special for both of us. We’ll cherish the memories.”
“And it’s Ben’s birthday too!” Marion announced to the crowd in a loud voice, prompting another ragged cheer and shouts of happy birthday. But Marion obviously hadn’t finished with her plans yet as she went on, “Now what say you, posse? Shall we make a cavalcade for the freshly betrothed couple as we head back for the mainland?”
This was met with enthusiastic agreement, even as it prompted the crowd to disperse. Marion bowed her head toward Ben and Marcie with a theatrical performance of conspiracy to explain that the gang would get their bikes ready, then ride across the causeway with them. She said they could follow her and Graham, and the rest of the mob could find their own places out in front or behind the decorated car. She confirmed that Ben and Marcie had planned to set off for home now anyway, before warning them that it might take a while for the bikers to get themselves organised. Then with a final squeeze of their shoulders, she excused herself and made a swift exit from the carpark to collect her own Harley.
Some of the biker crowd were still drifting around as Marcie and Ben looked again at the greasy red graffiti across Marcie’s car. Ben was glad to greet them individually, shaking hands and thanking each one for their congratulations and best wishes. He repeated the story to a few people that he’d been planning to propose on their birthday picnic outing for a while, whilst Marcie assured them it was a big surprise. They agreed it was a complete coincidence that Marion and Graham had caught them just as Ben was down on one knee, without mentioning the previous act in that particular performance. When none of the bikers dropped any hints that they suspected there might have been more to the story, Ben felt confident that Marion and Graham had been as good as their word in keeping the more intimate scene that they’d witnessed a secret.
Marion herself pulled up just a few moments later, wearing an open-faced helmet as she sat astride a long low motorcycle, its idling engine making the characteristic loud chunter of the Harley Davidson’s V-twin. She left it running as she stepped off and kicked down its side-stand, nodding to Graham as he pulled up just behind her on a larger feet-forward machine with high chopper handlebars. She scolded the other bikers who were still hanging around, telling them to get a move on, then asked Marcie if she and Ben were all set.
Marcie looked at Ben, who nodded and confirmed that he’d drive, as he finally got around to putting his rucksack into the abused car, then Marcie asked Marion if she was some kind of leader for the bike gang. Graham, who’d dismounted to stand by them himself, laughed at this, whilst the older woman denied it. But then she went to admit that they were just a bunch of overgrown recalcitrant kids who sometimes needed to hear a firm commanding voice to get their collective arses into gear.
Then she suggested that Ben should get in the car and follow her, to drive a short way up the road where the club could form up around them. She dismissed his concern that they may get in the way of the other tourists, some of whom had been looking at their gang in the carpark with curiosity or even suspicion as they got into their own cars to leave the island. She told him that the other drivers could work out how to pull around them or just wait if they’d rather, as it wasn’t often that those on two wheels got to call the shots. Ben and Marcie just looked at each other, then happily went along with Marion’s plan, seemingly sharing a mixed sense of self-consciousness and pride in the special treatment they were getting as they got into the car and pulled away, smiling and waving to the others from their rolled-down windows.
Once they’d pulled up to a stop on the road once again, it turned out that Marion had been right - it was taking quite a while for the biker gang to get themselves organised, with lots of shouts back and forwards over the growing noise of the throbbing engines. Ben watched the leather-clad backs of Marion and Graham as they stood astride their bikes just ahead of Marcie’s quiet car, waiting for his cue as they twisted about to check what was going on and raised shouts of their own. Then, almost when Ben least expected it, he saw Marion raise a fist, holding it high as she kicked her bike into gear and pulled away.
Then they all crept forwards, slowly at first, leaving the tiny village of Holy Island behind them as they passed the open fields. These gave way to the low dunes as they picked up just a little more speed and rolled forwards onto the causeway. Ben was awestruck at the gathered sound of the bikes all around them, guessing that their riders were slipping their machines’ clutches to deliberately over-rev the low-tech engines. He risked taking his eyes off the road and their immediate escorts, less than a car’s length in front of them, to glance cautiously across at Marcie. She seemed to be smiling in confused wonder as she took everything in, then she noticed his eyes on her and she shot her beaming grin back his way just as he turned back to the road, also reaching across to squeeze his knee.
Then almost as quickly as they’d started driving along the true causeway, they were back on the mainland and driving along a seemingly mundane country lane. But the pack of motorcyclists clearly had some special plan still in hand as Hog after Hog overtook them at thundering volume. Ben expected they’d all get queued up to join the A1, where he knew they’d have to part company, but as they approached the junction it seemed that wasn’t going to happen. In baffled surprise, he saw the bikers had blocked the traffic, hazard lights flashing, facing down any challenges or complaints from the regular drivers with the unflinching walls of their presence, across both the southbound and northbound lanes.
Marion had obviously expected this as she slew her bike to a stop, bearing right across the carriageway, gesturing for him to turn left. As he slowly rolled onto the Newcastle-bound lane, the arrayed bikers collectively raised their left hands whilst revving their throttles to a new crescendo of brutish noise. Ben was waving his own free hand from the window, then he felt a moment of alarm as Marcie quickly released her seatbelt to boost herself up, pushing her head, shoulders and torso right out of the passenger window. Ben glanced over to see her gripping the window frame firmly with one hand while she waved her other arm enthusiastically, whooping and hollering, “Goodbye! Thank you! Bless you all!”
The moment passed and she slipped back into her seat with a big, contented sigh, buckling her seatbelt back up. Ben felt her hand on his knee once again as he built up speed and rolled his own window up, anxiously checking his mirror to see what the bikers were up to. Through the pink letters across the back window, he caught a glimpse of them wheeling around, and guessed there may be some frustrated traffic rushing up behind him soon, but he put any concerns aside as he said to Marcie, “Well, that was something special.”
“Yes,” she said with breathless excitement, “I could never have imagined I’d be at the centre of something like that! What a mad, mad day you’ve turned this into.”
“It wasn’t my fault,” Ben protested, “I just bought a ring for you. Those bikers are the mad ones. And you’ve done your bit too, played your part, helping to make it such a mad, memorable day, starting with your amazing surprise costume, then doing what you did, in the bedroom, but in the dunes too. And I’d have never organised that log for the yard, without your encouragement.”
“Well it’s not over yet,” Marcie remarked with a sigh, “We’ve got our diner date with Sofie and Geoff yet. I hope they’ve not got any more mad surprises for us lined up too. My head might just pop!”
“No, it will just be a nice meal, a few glasses of wine I guess, with a quite cosy film to watch, before we snuggle down on their sofa-bed,” Ben reassured her.
“I’m not sure the hyped-up sci-fi virtual reality gritty cyberpunk action fight-fest that is the Matrix - with its mind-bending philosophical questions about the true nature of reality, identity and free-will - is really a quiet cosy film,” Marcie teased him, “But at least we’ll know what to expect, I guess.”
“‘Take the red pill, Marcie,’” he half-quoted with a chuckle, “‘Stay in Wonderland, and see how deep the rabbit hole goes.’”
“I’m already there, Ben,” she assured him, “Thanks to you, I’m falling through empty space in wide-eyed wonder, crying, ‘Curiouser and curiouser!’ Headed who-knows-where.”
They drove in contented silence for a while, then both started speaking at the same time. They laughed, then Ben asked Marcie to go first. She said it was nothing important, she was just wondering if he was hungry after their adventures and what was quite a modest lunch for him. Ben reassured her that he thought he’d last until they reached Sofie and Geoff’s, and reminded her that modest portions fitted his new diet and healthy regime just fine. He checked that she was okay too, that she didn’t want to pick up a snack at a roadside cafe.
Marcie reassured him that she’d be fine, as she was sure they’d eat well this evening, then asked Ben what he had been about to say. He explained that he was only going to ask if she wanted to put the Earthsea story CD back on. She said with a warm fondness that she’d like that, though she thought they hardly needed the escapism, then she agreed with Ben about how nice it was to let the stories wash over them while they drove like this.