Don't Tell Me the Truth About Love by Dan Rhodes

Author:Dan Rhodes [Dan Rhodes]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781847676214
Publisher: Canongate Books
Published: 2009-04-15T00:00:00+00:00

Landfill

First

After the council took away his bins he had to break into the landfill site to get rid of his rubbish. He compressed about a fortnight’s dead wood into a hessian sack, and carried it into the night. The welkin’s luminescence lit his journey through the deserted streets, across the disused aqueduct and to the high wire fence that marked his destination. It was at least four times his height. Looking through to the other side he saw a band of grass several yards across before the waste began. He hadn’t remembered it from his previous trips to the periphery of the site, and realised that there was no way he could execute his original plan to scramble to the top of the fence and empty the sack straight into the dump. He would have to climb right over, cross the grass and leave the rubbish within the defined inner perimeter. Otherwise, come the morning, his isolated waste would be found and possibly traced. He could see no real alternative.

With the sack in his right hand he gripped the wire and climbed, struggling to get his boots into the barricade’s small diamonds. When he neared the top he was able to haul the sack over, and it thumped on to the grass. In moments he was over the top and scrambling like a squirrel down the inside. He leapt the last few feet and landed by the sack. He picked it up and hauled it over to where the recently mown grass ended and the rubbish began.

He walked into the leavings for a couple of minutes, watching his boots as they trampled broken glass, household leftovers, builders’ waste, plastic sacks with concealed contents and just about every other class of refuse. He stopped, dropped the sack on to the debris and looked around. Floodlit by the stars, the scene was almost entirely monochrome. For a moment he thought himself a detail in a fading photograph, and was glad he had climbed right in. He absorbed the atmosphere for a while longer before untying the sack, kicking it over, heaving it upside down and emptying it. Seven rats the size of baby badgers streaked on to the scene, and began to eat what they could of his kitchen scrapings. Startled by this intrusion, he quickly turned to leave.

By the edge of the tip, where the grass began, he saw the silhouette of a figure standing still and looking in his direction. His heart almost exploded, and he jerked to a halt and froze. Instinctively, he dropped the empty sack. Someone must have called the guard. He felt his insides cramp as he searched for a solution. He turned and looked behind him. There was nothing but rubbish as far as he could see. If he ran away he would almost certainly be found at daybreak after a miserable night with the rats. Reluctantly, he chose to walk towards the guard and present himself.

As he neared, he saw that the figure was a girl.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.