--------REX--------

 REX
...

Rex had wedged himself inside of her until the drunk-guts spilled. Now he pushed his head deeper into the indent of the pillow and stared again at the half-baked foetus on the window ledge. An alien outline, it floated in what looked like pickling wine, the first sunlight picking out the tiny hands and feet, a present from her brothers.

Rex squeezed his eyelids, put on his warmest clothes and placed the jar in the bottom of the supermarket trolley. It was 5:30 am when he started the first push up the hill.

The road was something like a forgotten high street, cutting the two sides of the estate into east and west. At Rex’s back lay the long expanse of windy sea and the length of spit leading back to the mainland. Before him, in the distance of the hills end, the large iron gates of the prison. He pushed up past the rows of sea spat housing, pushed up past the sleeping convenience stores, pushed up past the battered streetlights still marking out his shadow.  

Rex carried on, red faced and puffy in his thick black jacket and sweatpants. As he reached the midway point, he paused for a second to remove his hat and wipe his shaven head with a heavy hand. His breath shot out in long jets before him. He pushed upwards.

Luther stood up in the black room and kicked around for his shoes. He didn’t get out much and it wasn’t until the afternoon that he’d seen the first pictures of Rex flash up across his gamer-screen. “WTF": Rex following the trolley past smoking onlookers, panting behind it up past the pub, staring straight to the hilltop as Wendy’s scratch-faced brothers hassled at his arms.

Luther stumbled out of his front door and caught sight of his friend silhouetted above, and pulling up a hand to shadow the light, he ran towards the ascending figure,

“Rex mate wait, what the shits?”

But Rex trudged on, head down, Luther drawing alongside the cart, panting, grabbing at the jar inside. He held it up in front of his face,

“What the fuck Rex. What the fuck?”

Rex’s steady feet had paused and his arms become tense. His knuckles tightened around the trolleys grip as he lifted his eyes onto Luther. It was that look. The same he had given Wendy and her brothers. The big round eyes, tensed forehead, half-open grin, twitching red cheeks, Luther spoke but his voice was dropping from under him. The trolley began to shake violently. The front wheel crushing against Luther’s foot as his old friend pushed again, pushed again upwards.

And it continued like this, through into the winters evening. Rex lifting the trolley and its contents to the top of that hill, pausing sometimes to look up and wipe his beating head, then down again, letting the trolley slide out in front, lashing it to him with one limp arm, his red face relaxed to a serene stupor.

“He’s sleeping”, said Margi, smoking in her dressing gown in the crisp morning sun.
She re-tied the quilting round hard rolls of fat.

“Oi”

Margi shouted from the small huddle, “Go home and get a fucking job boy, your not even mad you’re a fool” Her friend placed a hand on the old woman's shoulder but she was shouting louder now, people were watching. She finished her cigarette in long drags, threw it to the floor and slammed the door behind her.

It was a child that noticed it first, reaching out an empty finger from the perch around his mother’s neck. Rex’s new cargo: a heap of broken child’s toys clattering about the base of the trolley.
 The toys were old. Missing feet and decapitated heads. The child strained, his mother turned and struck by the sinister aspect of the scene, let out a scream and grabbed for her telephone.

By night the horror had circled the estate. And in the houses, and in the pubs, the speeches rose. “He must be stopped” the drinkers cried. But by ten their bellies were full, defiance settled to a sea of drivelled expletives. It was the mouth of the drunkest, slobbering, smoking, taking in a large throat of warm beer and spitting the song across the din,

“Rex Rex, why do yaa carry tha load
Rex, Rex, why do ya carry tha load
Ya mother was a teaser and ya dada a toad
Rex, Rex, why daya tha carry load”

And the landlord was sickened, and the huddle forced out into the roadway. Louder they grew, aiming their voices to the trudging figure above.

“Rex boy”

A single gruff voice struck out,

“Rex boy, what sullied play thing tomorrow boy?”

And the question rang out across the mist. Rex approached the hill’s summit. The group grew tired and spread out to their separate houses and beds. Rex turned and looked up towards the sky. The city was silent now beneath him. His face was old and hard, a ball of thick spit running from his Jaw.

Day 4 and Rex’s body bent behind the new weight. The thick length of splintered wood, braced up against the trolley sides in two stout pieces. The children wouldn’t taunt him now, the smokers timing their breaks to miss him.

It was Wendy who dared to draw the closest. Leaving from her garden on lame horseback. A young frail figure, pulling up above him on the highest grass bank, ‘Why?’ She would have asked, but couldn’t speak; she saw her dead child, pulled from beneath, shaking in its tomb against the lumber. “Why Rex?” her breath cut a thin line through the frost, turning her horse and with a swift kick was gone.

But her brothers wanted details, something to rest their money on. “I don’t know” Wendy whined, the pale skin bruising already. “Some wood I think, it’s a post or something”. They scrolled down the flickering teletext, their eyes on the odds. “It had some kind of writing on it, Chinese or something”.

The elder of the two brothers looked up, scowled, and put an arm around the rocking chair. “Put a pound on tomorrow Paul, and another on Friday, he can’t go any longer than that I reckon”. Paul nodded, squinting into the controller sniffling, “You’re right I reckon, your right bruv, you’re right you’re right”.

And the town woke again to the solid step. The money changed hands; he was still on the hill, and with no new luggage to his collection. Or that’s what the first call said. Until the old gambler, an ex church man, pulled up beside the trolley, desperate from his loss.

“Tell me Rex.”

The gambler’s greased hair bounced across the trolley bars. He drew in closer to Rex’s ear and mumbled on,

“It’s uncle Danny son, tell me what you’re up to yea”

But there was no reply, his only rebate, the first sight of the hidden load; a thick ring of broken glass, tapered around the trolleys grip.

The churchman turned to the crowd “He’s got something I say, the fighter’s carrying glass, it’s glass”, and the gambler scampered off. An inspection was made and money changed hands. Rex was left alone again, the white knuckles dripping blood, the face as straight as ever, quiet again, onwards into the thickening ice. 

And it was this night, the coldest of the year as yet. The wind had turned, blowing away over the grazed sea. Behind the cover of the hill, the town was still. A baby woke and screamed across the 4am silence. Rex looked up into the opening skies, his wide teeth shaking like claws. Another dawn was coming, another present. The baby screamed ‘til the mother woke, then the listless schoolchildren. By the time the drunks arrived, the cries had all been shed. The wind whistled softly round the point, money changed hands in disgusted breath.

No one had guessed it. Rex’s newest sin. A trail of limp fingers: brown, ripped, jewelled, digits, trailing the cart on tethers behind. They bounced and scraped at the wind, clawing for some inanimate purchase. They twisted at Rex’s feet and forced him to kick out. They skipped across the cobbles and tore themselves in curb grates. Onwards Rex pushed, lower and lower still. His head level with his handle, heavy clouds coming in from the open seas. The doors were shutting, of houses, of shop fronts.

He was only a shadow now, in living rooms, hovering over fires in hushed breath. His cart caught in the morning’s mist. The new offerings piled high: food cartons, plastic wrappers, and something spilling from the lids. The red, fibrous, the slimy and almost beating, it looked like dinner, it looked like...

On the morning of the Sunday, the clouds had settled, banks of mist against the street sides. Shouts could be heard, hidden figures crept from doorways,

“Stop this boy, stop now, you must”

Margi’s wobbling neck hung beneath her, tears eroding rivers through the flesh,

“Stop this please, we can go back”

But he walked on. The crowd of black figures closing in, a shard of light illuminating the trolley.  Rex’s newest gift, scrapped the sides of the splintered wood. The crowd dropped to their knees. It was fear, a shrouded black figure, somewhat female. Margi screamed,

“No, please boy no”

And the clouds followed with a deep rumble. The wheels of the deathly cart screeching, tracks of sticky blood stretching out behind.

The people cried. The skies opened and lashed upon them. Water vast and quick, the streets at once, slick dark torrents. The sky announced again with deep horns, the rain coating faces like oil.

It gushed through the pavements, Rex’s true tread bracing against the tide. The new black figure leaning heavy atop his shoulder, the skies sounds electric, a body bursting pitch, Rex’s left foot slid. First one and then another, his gigantic figure falling onto a clawing arm. The legs driving forward like a crippled horse, kicking trenches up behind ‘til the road was only water. And then he slid, the trolley lashed against him, the battered body closing in its limbs.

The man and load bounced across the black cobbles. The clouds were lifting now, the sun breaching out across the raging seas. The crowd gathered.

 Many denied it afterwards. But all of them had seen. That familiar face, bobbing its final breath’s between the bloodied rocks and white water. A man, a boy again: the cheeks soft, the mouth arched, the eyes wide.

Rex stared ahead into the open sky. The people hung in black lines over the bay. Rex stared ahead into that newborn sun. The wind ceased. The sea became flat. The dark night closed.

In the still of the new morning the radios could be heard once more. Large breakfasts were being laid across the tables and the smokers awoke with renewed thirst. The drinkers dug for change in limp pockets, smacking together their dry lips. Children moaned for more and the parents slapped their faces red.

Out on the streets, the people walked with their heads held high against the echoes of Rex’s wheels. The schools would again be opened. It was donut pie Mondays at the Potsun’s bakery. The old life of the streets would stir at once, laughing and smoking it’s way towards the high street and arriving at the crossroads in an awesome horror, a single poisonous breath.  

'Cause the pictures were real, and the sounds were too real, cracking across the sun-scorched streets: three new carts, three old characters. The lame-headed brother, the stuff-necked denouncer- the friend: echoing shadows clinging to their chosen cargo. Could the picture be taken twice, was there reason enough or resolve? The bone white knuckles and that staunch earthly face. Resilient, divine.



...............................................................................................................