Camping has never been so exciting...
“Luci... Luci...” Natalie whispered as she prodded her sleeping friend in the ribs. “Have you got the torch?”
Luci moaned and rolled over. It was pitch black and she was bleary eyed and tired. “What you up to?” she replied yawning.
“This is stupid, I’m going to wet myself any second,” Natalie replied kicking off her sleeping bag. She shivered beneath the thin tent fabric as her bare legs struggled into tracksuit trousers.
“Just take a leak under a tree.”
“It’s like minus ten out there, no way am I putting my arse any where near any creepy crawlies.”
“Don’t be so pathetic.”
“You’re no help,” Natalie said as she blindly thrashed her hand around on the groundsheet between the two airbeds, feeling for the elusive torch amongst the mass of clothes, towels and maps. “I’ll brave the dark.”
All was quiet as she emerged from their two-man tent, save the gentle whistle of the wind and the delicate babble of the stream a few feet away, screened by shivering trees that swayed against the white of the half moon.
The ground was damp underfoot, wet grass slapped at her trainers as she stumbled upwards across the uneven campsite towards the toilet block. She shivered beneath the clear, April night sky. There was still a bitter bite to the wind, the leftovers from winter. She caught sight of the dimly lit wooden toilet block, primitive and uninviting at the top of the sparsely tented campsite but her attention was caught by voices floating up from the dip to her right, masked by trees. Her curiosity won over her bursting bladder as she sidled beneath the cover of the domineering old oaks.
Down in the dip a bonfire crackled, flicking its tendrils of welcoming heat high into the cloudless, black sky. A group of lads filled the air with raucous laughter as they drank cans of lager. Natalie shivered from where she peered out behind a tree. One of the lads was drunkenly strumming his guitar, disturbing the stillness with talentless chords, another two, one dark haired, the other blond and tanned, looked as if they were in the midst of a drunkenly animated discussion. Natalie noticed the other friend stood alone, beer in one hand, cigarette in the other with his back to the bonfire and his friends; he took a drag on his cigarette and gazed upwards. Natalie caught his eye.
Startled, she dropped her gaze and hurried back up the grass and into the ladies. She checked each toilet for paper and cleanliness before plumping for the middle one and locking the door. Thousands of goosebumps formed on her legs as she hovered over the toilet seat as long legged spiders danced around the lonely light bulb subjecting her to their unwanted company.
She didn’t think anything of it when she heard the wash room door scrape open, then footsteps sound on the wooden floor. She didn’t think anything of it until the footsteps stopped, immediately outside her closed cubicle. Then she heard a
cough. A man’s cough. Natalie’s heart thudded to a halt.
“I saw you watching us,” he slurred his words. The smell of smoke filled the compact washroom. She heard the sizzle of dying embers as his foot ground the glowing cigarette butt firmly into ashes on the wooden floorboards. She could hardly breathe as her fingers clenched her shivering knees. “You didn’t have to hide away in the trees. Could have joined in the party.” He spoke slowly and deliberately as his
footsteps shuffled closer to the locked door. “You gonna to talk to me?” He sounded as if he had his lips pressed against the peeling paint of the door.
“You shouldn’t be in here.” Natalie spoke firmly, trying to control the shaking in her voice.
“Ah man, I’m only being friendly,” he said, sounding hurt. The cubicle door shook as he leant against it. “You smoke?”
Natalie kept quiet as she carefully pulled her trousers up, all the time her eyes remaining focused on the backs of the scuffed Nike trainers at the base of the door. Her heart flipped at the sound of his laboured breathing, at the scratch of a match bursting into flames.
“You’re a quiet one,” he said. Smoke billowed in through the crack of the door.
“Would you please get out of here,” Natalie said in desperation as she looked furtively behind her at the tiny cobweb encrusted window just above the toilet.
“Ah, come on talk to me, what’s your name?”
Her jagged breathing filled the silence.
“I’m Reece, nice to meet you,” he said.
“Natalie.”
“No kidding! My ex was called Nat. Right bitch she was!” He laughed, the door rattled. Natalie found nothing to laugh at.
“So what do you do Nat?” he whispered, she could just make out his mouth pressed against the crack, his words sliming into the cubicle. She shivered. Stepping back her leg whacked against the rim of the toilet bowl, claustrophobia hemmed in on her as her heart thudded faster and faster, pent up emotions creeping up her spine.
She forced herself to breathe deeply, trying to regain her composure, there was something about the tone of his voice that was all too familiar. She'd come on holiday to escape, not to feel trapped any longer. “I’m a fitness instructor,” she said.
“Hey, a fit bird.”
“Well that’s the arsehole way to describe me,” her fists clenched.
“Don’t you get cocky,” Reece replied. The stub of his cigarette suddenly came flying over the door at her, raining minute shards of glowing embers into the cubicle.
“What is this, some twisted power trip? Makes you feel good?” Natalie asked kneading her hands into balls, feeling her body fume with bottled feelings aching to escape.
“I like the sound of you, Nat,” he said. “Are you here alone?”
“No.”
“With a boyfriend, huh?”
“No, just a friend. Quality time, away from bastards like you.”
“Don’t tell me, boyfriend troubles.”
“None of your goddam business,” she replied as a tear trickled down her pale cheek. She was fed up of feeling broken, being treated little better than a piece of dirt.
She had taken time out of her life to forget the pressures of reality and now this. She leant back against the cubicle wall and listened to his teasing tap on the door, his slurred, dull words prodding her with incessant questions. Her eyes fixed upon a fat, evil looking spider creeping across the low ceiling, moving from the grimy light bulb, sidling closer and closer.
She’d had enough. If it was the choice between facing the huge spider or the drunken arsehole the other side of the door, the arsehole won no problem. She was cold and tired and he was still talking at her, still taunting her with his drunken drivel.
“Who are your friends?” Natalie asked, as she quietly slipped the door lock from out of its snug hole.
“Conversation starter at last,” he said smugly. She could still feel his weight leaning against the door. “They’re mates from Uni, well Kev and Paul are, Kev does same course as me, Paul’s a Bio Chemist type, lazy bastard, does no work, goes
drinking every night and still gets a 2:1 average. Me other mate Scott I’ve known for years.”
It was getting serious now; the spider was hovering right above her head. Any second it was going to bungee jump on its spindly cord and plant its hairy legs on her skin. She shuddered at the thought, took a deep breath and lunged at the toilet door just as Reece was telling her about a ‘bird’ he and Scott had both had. The rickety door crashed open, sending him flying and Natalie stumbling out of the cubicle, intense pain pounding at her shoulder where she had made impact with the door.
“What the…” Reece said as he floundered on the floor, looking in bewilderment at Nat, looming over him.
“I teach martial arts,” Nat said pointedly as he struggled to his feet, his drunkenly uncoordinated legs and arms flaying in all directions. He grabbed the sink behind and released the churning contents of his stomach.
“That’s pathetic, a man like you not being able to hold his booze, shame on you.”
He slowly turned to face her, wiping his dripping mouth, his other hand still clutching at the sink. “I didn’t think…”
“That I’d face up to you, well you misjudged me, it’s about time I faced up to someone,” she smiled at him, inwardly laughing at his pathetic state. “I will have a cigarette,” Natalie said decisively, her eyes fixed on Reece. He was different to the image in her mind. His voice had induced a picture of a drunken lout, clean-shaven, muscular and toned from football or any other mind numbing team sport. Not quite the stubbley, wiry, peculiarly attractive specimen leaning on a basin in front of her, barely able to keep his eyes open.
He thrust the nearly empty packet in her direction and waved it in front of her eyes, taunting her as if to say ‘come and get it’. Natalie stepped forward and slipped a cigarette out. Reece lit it, his movements laboured from alcohol. “I thought you didn’t smoke?”
“I never answered your question,” Natalie replied smoothly, taking a drag, forcing her eyes not to water. “But you’re right, I don’t.”
“I was hoping you’d be blonde,” he said looking at her seductively, she watched his eyes wander from her straw coloured bed hair downwards. He reached a hand forward and ran cold fingers down her face, then running them across her chest and stomach.
“I was hoping you’d piss off,” her reply was sharp and uninviting, yet he let his hand linger, stroking the layers of clothing and the thick fleece hugging her body.
“What makes you think you can treat me like this?” Natalie asked as she flicked ash onto the floor.
“I got beer back at the tent, you could come back, you know…”
“Just because you’re drunk, you think you can act like an arsehole and then in the sober light of day when your poxy party is nothing but smouldering ash and your heads grinding in agony you can apologise for your behaviour and hey! everything will be okay.”
“We can just have a bit of fun.”
“Fun? You think I’ve had fun, locked in a toilet, freezing cold, scared out of my mind because of you, playing games?” She paused as she slowly took his hand in hers and drew a final intake of foul tasting smoke into her mouth. A stupid grin
spread across his face as he managed to haul himself away from the sink. Natalie soberly watched as his other hand moved to his flies.
The tiny particles of smouldering flames glowed brighter as Natalie gently blew on the butt of her cigarette. The burning heat fizzled into smoke and pain as Natalie ground it into his forearm. Reece struggled as the heat pressed deeper into his arm, as Natalie kept her firm hold on him, watching his eyes water as a cry escaped from his once grinning lips. Done, she shoved him away, sending him crashing into
the sink, his numbed senses fully alive with burning anguish. “Go to Hell,” she said with deep satisfaction.
She dropped the squashed cigarette butt at his feet and watched in amusement as he held his arm under cool running water, his own salty tears dripping on the mark
on his arm. Natalie paused when she reached the graffitied door and before kicking it open said, “A little reminder for you to remember me by in the morning.” With that she escaped into the moonlit night, the wind refreshing on her fuming cheeks as she wrapped her fleece closer to her body and headed back to the tent ignoring the sobbing from the ladies and the flickering light from beyond the shadowy trees.
Critique/comments welcome
Average Score: 7.5 / Votes: 4
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