By Kevin J. Phyland

Remus Farroway returns to his home town of Seaview — a small fishing village with a pub, a general store and three churches. He muses on that with a humourless grin. A town that feels the need for such a variety of spiritual ministrations and only one place of sin. He knows the pub. It seems a fair trade.

It's about six o'clock and the sun is setting over  the inland hills when he enters The Recalcitrant Dog, the bar's name reputed to honour the only sane creature that refused to board a fishing trawler that never returned after a winter storm.

The crowd is typically insular fishing folk and other locals. A stranger like Remus is grist for a temporary lowering of voices while he is being appraised. They see a man in his early middle years, face lined with experience, and crinkles at the corners of his eyes which they assume are smile lines but which he can assure them most definitely, are not. 

Having passed this strange test they resume their conversations and dismiss him from their minds.

After ordering a pint of mild he retires to a small table with two chairs and sits with his back to the wall and waits. Eventually the man he is waiting for arrives and takes the seat opposite. He notes that the quick glances the locals made towards this new arrival did not come with any form of apprehension. They know him.

Daniel Boreham sits and faces Remus. He is a local lawyer, about 35 years of age but slumming it in jeans, chambray shirt over a skivvy, and a peaked cap.

They introduce each other with a perfunctory handshake and commence the unpleasantness that Remus has anticipated for ten years of his life. But eighty years of the lives of this town.

“You'll be attending the service I take it?” Boreham asks.

Remus shakes his head. “Too many cameras and reporters will be there. They'll be there for me and not for Kit. It's not my day and it would detract from,” and here Remus pauses as if thinking of the exact right phrase, “...solemnity and dignity of the occasion.”

Boreham nods as though this is perfectly reasonable.

“I'll be at the graveside. It's a closed event if I understand it,” says Remus.

Again Boreham nods, but his eyes are assessing this man across the table from him. Remus thinks they find him lacking in some way. Not the heroic figure of myth. Not the giant of exploration that the media made of him on his return ten years ago.

The first man to reach another star. A journey of seventy Earth years but which only cost Remus twelve. He returned a man of just forty years of age but must now attend his only son's funeral.  An eighty-seven-year-old man who did not remember his father and who, for good or ill, did not remember much at all at the end. Alzheimer's was still a careless and cureless scourge.

Remus reflects that the costs of that mission could not only be measured in time and money. It also cost happiness — for many people — and has left regret and guilt.

His wife, Grace died in a car accident at age 45 while he was still on the way to his destination. The rest of his immediate family had also passed on as Chronos winnowed them in the usual variety of ways: some prosaic, some ridiculous, some embarrassing.

After a few tedious legal clarifications the two men take their leave of one another. Remus finishes his pint and leaves the pub for his bed and breakfast, where he will spend his last night in Seaview. His last night in England. Possibly his last night on this planet.

In the morning he dresses with a charcoal grey suit. Dark greatcoat. Black tie. The forms must be observed.

The day is sunny and mild, a strong breeze blowing toward the beach. He searches his memories. Land breeze. Remus thinks that it should be rainy on the day of a funeral. Somehow everybody should be miserable. He knows he is.

The service is some kind of unitarian thing and the sermon-giver (Remus finds the word celebrant singularly inappropriate) drones on about details of a life he can have only scant knowledge of. Ironically, thinks Remus, the man probably still knows more about Kit than his father.

After a while he notices a man watching him from the graveside. His eyes are narrowed in a calculating way as he mumbles responses to various prayers. Remus feels as though he should know who this is. His features seem familiar, and with a start he realizes that this might be Kit's own son. He never enquired too deeply into Kit's background. He felt he had no right after what looked a whole lot like abandonment.

True, the family had been looked after monetarily while he had been away, but they knew the extent of the journey, both in real time and relativistic time.

The service ends and Remus debates whether to introduce himself. He is saved the decision when the man strides purposefully towards him. 

With a searching look he introduces himself as Havel Farroway, Kit's only son.

There is no recrimination from Havel. Just a speculative look that asks what might have been.

Remus withdraws a small item from the inside pocket of his greatcoat. It is a tiny glass seagull. The sort that could be purchased for a few pence or found in the bottom of a showbag purchased at the local fair. This seagull has travelled a long way.

He passes it to Havel. “It was given to me by Kit...your father, when I left. He said that seagulls always make it back to land after a long journey. It seemed ridiculous to give it back to him at his age.” Remus trails off. Both men look puzzled and lost.

“Give it to your own kids or grandkids. If you have any?” Remus kicks himself at the thought that Havel may be unmarried and childless. Before he can amend his comments Havel simply nods.

They part.

Two words that sum up his life.

He must part again. They called him back to work and a new trip out awaits.

He departs Seaview. His home is not here. Not even on Earth. His journey is not over and he realises he does not even have the choice of the recalcitrant dog.

About the Author