magog_83

Warning for some angst! But hopefully not too much :

Waiting

It’s almost dark when he sees the man.

Tom’s been coming here for so long now that he barely notices the ebb and flow of people anymore – the sunburnt tourists with their cameras and their guidebooks, the earnest students and the excited children for whom the crumbling walls and mossy flagstones are little more than a playground.

He was one of them once, a child primed with stories of great adventures and noble quests who walked the beaten pathways and looked across low broken walls to the sea. It’s why he comes back.

Happy memories.

So it is strange that this man should stand out where so many others do not.

He thinks it’s the camera. Or lack thereof. Or perhaps it’s the way he’s standing, a lonely silhouette against the grey expanse of sea and sky, but looking inwards, staring into the ruined hall with the expression usually directed to the view at his back.

“Hello,” the man says when he is close enough to speak.

“That was the hall,” Tom gives a nod to the dark archway and the cracked flagstones disappearing into shadow.

“I know,” the man’s voice is soft and a smile passes, sad and fleeting, across his face then.

“Hard to imagine it now I suppose,” says Tom because he can’t quite make out this stranger with the dark hair and the sad eyes who has no camera and no guide book.

“Yes,” the man says, and then looks at Tom, properly looks at him as if noticing him for the first time - or recognising him, Tom thinks, and he suddenly knows that he’s seen this man before.

“You were here last year?” Tom’s voice is uncertain for a second as he tries to remember, frowning as he struggles to recall a hot summers day, the smell of cut grass, sun cream and horses, “For the mock joust? I spoke to you then.”

“Yes,” the man replies and his mouth quirks, “Just after you were nearly mown down by the charger.”

“Good lord,” Tom wonders how he could forget that, “you’re right.” He smiles at the man as he remembers and for a moment the man smiles back, then his face shutters once more and he turns away to look out across the wall to where the sea lies flat and dark.

“What are you doing here?” Tom asks after a moment and then abruptly realises how rude the question is. For several long seconds the man doesn’t speak and Tom shifts awkwardly and wishes he would turn around so he could smile or apologise or something. But the man doesn’t move and it is only when Tom has almost given up hoping that he speaks.

“I’m waiting.”

There is no weight to the reply, no catch of breath, no tremor of emotion, no sign at all that these words mean anything – but something about the way the man stands, so contained and so still, tells Tom that they do.

“Here?” He asks because it is a foolish question and because he doesn’t know what else to say to the man.

“Here.” The man replies and then turns suddenly to look at Tom again, “Here is best.”

“And will they come?” This time the silence is even longer than before but Tom just waits, wishing he could see the expression of the man before him, face now lost in shadow. He hears the man sigh, so quietly it is almost lost in the distant rush of the sea.

“I don’t know,” His head turns briefly towards the lost hall once more and then again to Tom, “But I hope so.”

“I’m sorry,” Tom says even though he doesn’t know this man and doesn’t know why this matters. But it seems to be the right thing to say because the man smiles and his eyes, for a second, are warm.

“Thank you.”

“What will you do if he doesn’t come?” The man stares at him for a long, silent moment and Tom realises he is holding his breath, as if the answer matters to him. For a long time there is only the sound of the man’s quiet breathing, the waves and the buzz of insects in the warm summer air. Then,

“I’ll keep waiting,” Tom releases the breath he should not have been holding and the strange moment is broken, “He’ll come.” Tom swallows and nods and there is silence for a while.

“I should go.” Tom says at last, “I’m meeting people at my hotel.” It seems strange and inconsequential to speak of people and hotels when the castle walls loom dark and broken around him and the man watches him, eyes dark and somehow old.

“Of course,” the man says. “Goodbye then.” And Tom nods at him again and turns to leave.

“Don’t forget your rucksack,” the man says suddenly and Tom turns to see him holding out the worn red bag that he must have put down without even realising. He smiles,

“Thanks.”

“What would you do without me,” the man says and Tom laughs and thinks how true that is.

“See you then,” Tom says and hoists the rucksack on his shoulder.

“Yes,” says the man, “goodbye.”

And Tom hears the smile in his voice and the swell of the sea and the rustle of grass and he thinks, for a second, for just a second, he hears ‘Arthur.’

But he knows that he couldn’t have.

No-one has called him Arthur since he was a little boy. He’s been Tom for so long now that his given name is lost to all but his father. And this man couldn’t know it.

He takes the rucksack then and leaves, picking his way carefully along the path. He can see the gate now and the road, almost lost in the deepening gloom. At the top of the steps he stops and turns back, one last look at the ruins and the sea, one more memory to add to a store of them. The man is still there, just a dark shape, barely indistinguishable from the walls behind him, but Tom lifts an arm and waves anyway and he thinks the man waves back. It is full dark now and a crescent moon rises over Tintagel but he needs no moonlight to find his way through the yellowing grass and dry stony earth. The ground beneath his boots is old and familiar, worn with the footsteps of centuries.

That night he dreams of old stone and dark eyes, of halls lit by fire and the smell of leather and metal. He wakes to the smell of the sea and wonders why he dreams these things.

He wonders.

And Merlin waits.

THE END

Don't ask me why I decided he should be called Tom, I didn't want it immediately obvious who he was and I figured you don't get a lot of Arthurs nowadays so I decided he would have chosen to use his second name (Thomas I suppose), I suppose being called Arthur Pendragon today could get annoying after a while. Yep, I think those are all the rubbish excuses I can come up with...

Current Mood: tired
Current Location: Home for the Holidays
Current Music: Wildwood Flower - June Carter