The End of Mr. Y by Scarlett Thomas (12-Jun-2008) Paperback by Scarlett Thomas

Author:Scarlett Thomas [Thomas, Scarlett]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Amazon: B011T85NTO
Publisher: Canongate Books
Published: 1600-01-15T00:00:00+00:00

My car, like everything else, is covered in snow. Large white flakes are still falling from the sky, and the street has that muffled, secretive sound that snow produces, as if the whole world is talking under its breath. There’s an old piece of cardboard balanced on a bin out by my car, and I use it to scrape most of the soft snow off my windscreen. The ice underneath is more of a problem. I don’t have a scraper, and the cardboard is now floppy and wet. In the end I put the heater on full and let the engine turn over for a few minutes until it starts to melt. I still can’t see properly by the time I set off, but I have to go. I have to find out if I am mad or in terrible danger. I wish there was a third option, but there doesn’t seem to be.

The university campus is bisected by a main road that unintentionally (or so I have always assumed) separates the arts buildings from the science labs. Usually at this time of day the road is clear: a ribbon of black tarmac with only the odd car or cyclist trundling down it, maybe leaving early, or even driving from Shelley College, on the far east side of the campus, to Hardy on the west. Today the road isn’t black: it’s a mixture of white ice and old gray sludge, and it is completely clogged with snow-smeared cars, all with their windscreen wipers going. And all over campus little groups of students seem to be making snowmen. What’s going on? Where’s everyone going? And what has happened to lectures and seminars? I can’t sit in a traffic jam all day looking at fat white blobs that—and this is a tick in my “madness” column—seem possessed, as if they have come to take over the world. Not today, please. Just let me get to Adam.

As I whisper this to myself, and as I repeat the word “please,” I suddenly wonder whom I’m asking, to whom I’m praying. I thought I was doing OK, but suddenly I’m having trouble breathing. Come on, come on. I hit the steering wheel a couple of times and then run a hand through my hair. It’s damp with sweat, even though it’s freezing outside. The traffic going this way is much worse than on the other side of the road. In fact, after a white university truck goes past, there don’t seem to be any cars coming the other way. The turning I need to take for the Russell car park is about fifty yards ahead on the right. Fuck it. I crunch the car into gear, pull out, and start overtaking the long line of cars. People glare at me. Just as I approach the turning, traffic starts coming from the other direction. Well, they’ll just have to wait. Except they don’t. Even though I’m indicating right, and it’s quite obvious what I’m trying to

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