harrow

The child gets into bed with his parents. It must be a weekend morning. The room has long dark curtains. Which might have been dark green. The wallpaper has a design on it. The bed is against the back wall. It seems big.

The child listens to the breathing of his parents. He hears the rhythms overlap. He chooses one breath, and tries to breathe in time with it. Sometimes all three sets of breathing overlap. More often than not they don't. He lies there for what seems like the longest time in the world. Time doesn't have much meaning for him. He listens to the sound of breathing. He feels their breathing in his rib cage. He tries to breathe in time to it. He wants all the breath to be one.

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Across the road there's a greengrocer. The boy goes there with his mother. His mother chooses vegetables and the greengrocer places them in a brown paper bag. He spins the bag round, holding it by the corners. There's a magic to it. The boy watches the bag spin through the air. The greengrocer grins and hands him the bag.

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The boy's alone in the flat. Just for a while. No time at all. His little sister's crying. The boy peers through the curtain. He's waiting for his mother to get back. He thinks there's a point at which he will start to worry. That point hasn't arrived yet, but he knows it will do.

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In the back garden, a hole is being dug. Yellow Submarine plays on the radio. The hole is enormous. It's as big as the whole garden. It goes down for miles. He can imagine this hole going all the way to the centre of the world. His father tells him that if they keep digging, they'll end up on the other side of the world. He asks where that is. His father tells him that's Australia. He doesn't know where Australia is.