EIGHT
As he passed through the sleepy village of Garsdale the sun was just about threatening to appear over the hills to his East. He was close enough to the border that those hills were in The South, capital T capital E, even if they lay to his east at the moment. He had to remind himself not to call it The South or South Britain sometimes. In his line of work you never knew who might take offense to such a thing. He wasn’t entirely sure if each nation didn’t still claim the entirety of Great Britain for itself, it wouldn’t surprise him. It was, he sleepily reminded himself, The Workers Republic of Britain.
Ahead of him, he could see the barriers across the road, their reflectors catching his headlights. He turned down his headlights as he pulled into the gravel surfaced car park and pulled up a familiar looking Eucort GTI hatchback. Even his car was austentatious, the flash bastard, thought Geoff. Maybe he was being too harsh, he followed up. Even if someone is a annoying, if you keep making them to be awful in your head then you’re going to hate your day at work. Just be professional!
“Geoffers!” Brian beamed as Geoff entered the small brick building. He raised an eyebrow “Are you even supposed to be here today?”
“ Kayleigh called in sick,”
“Probably just women’s problems,” Brian remarked, Geoff resisted saying something. He was fairly sure Brian was baiting him. So what if it was? Geoff thought. He briefly considered kicking Brian in the spuds all day for four days a month, just to see how his attitude might change. “I don't know,” was all he managed, putting aside the violent fantasy. Geoff dumped his back just inside the door and quickly collapsed onto one of the two wheely chairs in the front office that overlooked the road. Brian was almost comically opposite to him. Brian was short, Geoff was tall. He was fit, Geoff was somehow skinny and fat at the same time. Brian was flashy and tidy, Geoff was proud of his subdued scruffiness. He looked at Brian briefly. Even his uniform looked smarter and cleaner than Geoff’s although that might have more to do with the fact that Geoff had come in at a moment's notice. The finally frustrating thing was if he wasn’t such a horrible person in Geoff’s opinion, Brian would be really cute. In appearance (and appearance alone) Brian reminded him a bit of Olly. Oh shit! Olly! “Oh shit!” Geoff exclaimed.
“What's wrong?” Brian asked chirpily
“I was supposed to be going for coffee today with Olly,”
“That’s your, er, boyfriend, yes?” the word got stuck in Brian's throat. It shouldn’t, Geoff thought, he votes liberal.
“Yes! Except now I can’t!” he sighed. “Maybe I can reschedule.”
“Phone him,”
“I will in a bit, it's his day off too, so he’ll still be asleep,” Geoff explained, and stood. He wandered into the back to make himself a coffee and see what was in the staff fridge that was his, or he could nick.
“Your girlfriend is in today?” Brian called through to him.
“Fuck off!” he called back.
“She is though. Her and that one with the daft beard,”
“I wouldn’t call her that,” Geoff chuckled.
“What?”
“Never mind, and she’s not my girlfriend,”
“I thought you said you went both ways,” Brian said, walking through to the miniscule staff kitchen. “Make us a brew would you?” he added, his voice distinctly Edinbrugh to Geoff’s native Cumrbian.
“Doesn't mean I’m polyamorous, not that there's anything wrong with,” he paused, “Just fuck off, her names Caz,”
“Caz is it?” Brian sang, delighting in winding Geoff up.
“Caroline, I think, I know, you know, you speak to them too,” Geoff said as he made a coffee of some nonspecific brand from some nonspecific American puppet state.
“But you speak to her a lot, not thinking of defecting are you?” Brian asked.
“What? And miss out on your company? Get prescribed a job by some great bureaucracy and learn to love it or else, Pray to a shrine of Willie Gallagher every night. ” Geoff knew he was being facetious but couldn’t be bothered to correct “Go join a union though” he added
“You’re in a union,” Brian remarked as Geoff poured him a cup of tea.
“Yes, but one with some teeth, sugar?”
“No thanks,” he took the tea, “yeah and have to mind every word you say for fear of sounding counterrevolutionary and for fear of pissing off whoever is in charge at that moment,” Geoff handed him a cup. “Like I said I’m not defecting, where are the night shift?” Geoff said, changing the subject. “Left the moment I turned up, nothing to report as per usual,” Brian said as they went back through to the main room. “Even though there needs to be at least two people on duty at once, and their shifts hadn’t ended yet,”
“Yep, you sound surprised,”
“Pfft,” Geoff said, plonking himself in a chair and sipping his coffee.
The sun was peaking over the hills now and cast long golden outlined shadows over the desks. Over the road Geoff could see two figures talking. Instead of the security vests and blue shirts of the the RGB they were in distinctly military gear of the Worker’s Defence Force, privately outsourcing being anathema to the Worker’s Republic. He waved sleepy to them. One of the figures, Geoff couldn't tell which with the glare of the sun behind them, waved back. This made him glad he worked here when he did. He remembered seeing pictures of these guard posts growing up,news footage of armed soldiers on both sides in stories on the Soviet Wars and threatening a horde of Southerners rushing over the border. A tiny tiny part of him wished for that, at least it was something to do. “Ever wonder why it's so quiet?” Geoff mused aloud. Brian thought on this for a second then
“Because anyone travelling north or south is going to take the I-1 or 3 or fly or a train or basically any route except a tiny winding road
“Isn’t it suitable out the way though, like, a less obvious route to flee north, or south I guess,”
“Mate, if the government is that bothered they’ll have the CIA spying on the whole border or some shit, I dunno,” Brian shrugged, taking the other seat in the control room. “Besides it's not like it's the nineties, anyone that bothered about fleeing from the South would’ve done it by now,” Geoff yawned and stood again. He knew he’d fall asleep in that chair for now. The cabin was overcompensating for the cold was the heating was making him drowsy.
He walked outside, warming his hands on his coffee as it steamed into the cold air, mixing with the condensation with his breath. He leant on the concrete barrier between the main control room and the road. Behind him was the start of the Worker’s republic and to his right was the eastbound stretch of the road with its large steel barrier, emblazoned with the Union Jack of the RGB and the Red, Green and Wreath of the WRB. The same covered the other half of the road, but he noticed was in slightly better nick than “theirs” was.
“Morning,” a distinctly southern voice said. He looked up to see a woman in army fatigues and a matching cap on the other side of the road, leant on the concrete support for the barrier. Her hair was tied back into a tight bun and Geoff was almost pleased to see she looked as tired as him. “Caroline, good morning,” he called across the road, freezing up a bit on formality.
“Geoffrey,” she said, mocking him. “How are you? Or is it too early to tell,”
“That obvious is it?”
“I remember you saying you live about an hour away, so you must’ve had to get up quite early, I guess I’m lucky to have the barracks,”she said, walking out into the road a bit and leaning on her side of the West bound barrier.
“Yeah, but I get my own bedroom,” he smirked. Both sides seemed to have an amiable rivalry. Geoff generally didn’t give a shit about politics until he was speaking to the guards from the south.
“And I bet the rent is astonishing!” she smirked back.
“Not in Kendall it's not,” he added back. “Try living in Glasgow, your eyes would be out on stalks,”
“It’d be nice to visit,” she remarked. Go to George Square, pay my respects to Maxton and all the old guard, I don’t suppose there’s a statue or anything?” she enquired
“I think there’s a blue plaque,” Geoff said, trying to remember, “Like, a little blue plaque, George Square has a statue of,” he paused again, “I want to say President Foot? Lloyd George?”
“Which one?” Caz enquired
“The one that was president?” he tailed off, “It's been ages since I lived there, like, ten years since I left university,” there was a pause while Geoff took this last bit in. Caz apparently paused to let him. “Right, makes sense, it's not like we have statues of heroes of the north,” An awkward pause. “No offence Geoff but you look like shit, even from across the road,” she called,
“I was out drinking last night, today was supposed to be my day off. Someone called in sick,”
“Ah, that makes sense,”
“What,” he paused,it was kind of obvious he was searching for conversation at this point but anything to distract himself from his hangover, “What do you guys drink in the south?” Caz laughed.
“What do you think? Beer, cider, lots of little local breweries,”
“Not like,one brand of people’s beer?”
“Not any more, my dad used to drink this mass produced stuff back in the eighties, I say mass produced, each brewery made it slightly differently, so a pint of Worker’s Rest in Gloucester was different from Worker’s rest in Swansea, people used to travel miles for something they could technically get basically next door,”
“Caz, incoming!” Geoff heard Sam, the other guard from the south yell out the door of their guardpost. “Here goes!” Caz said with a smile, turned away from Geoff and went back inside. Geoff looked up the eastbound lane, a small hatchback, something relatively new but unmistakably had the utilitarian appearance of a socialist built car. Geoff figured it was British, Scandinavian, maybe soviet. It pulled up to the barrier. Caz walked over, now toting a pistol at her hip, in the doorway of the checkpoint was Sam carrying something more intimidating. Geoff walked back inside and watched from their check point.
“How's the missus?” Brian enquired.
“Shut up,” Geoff said plainly, watching the car. There was clearly a disagreement between caz and the man driving the car. Geoff grabbed a radio and walked back outside to get a better listen. “You have to understand, my brother lives in Edinburgh, you’ve got to understand I need to get to the north, he’s not very well,”
“Sir, this road doesn’t lead to Edinburgh, your best bet would be to take the Autoroute B and cross the border at Darlington,”
“I know but I thought the traffic there would be awful, cross here head up to Carlisle then across, I’m only coming from Harrogate, you see,” the man continued, flustered
“Do you have the correct paperwork?”
“I’ve got my passport,” he said rummaging around in the passenger side of the car, and finally showing it to Caz. “See,”
“Sir this hasn’t been signed off by your Union representative, or the travel records office.”
“I didn't have time, I didn't plan for him to fall ill!” he snapped
“Sir,” she continued, “without it being signed off by a representative of your trade union and registered with the TRO, I can't allow you to pass,”
“He might have only days to live!”
“Sir, the rules are the rules, if you want to head back to Harrogate, speak to your union committee,and register the travel online you might be able to cross later today, otherwise I cannot let you cross the border,”
“But surely you,” Caz fixed him with a stern but neutral stare, “Fine,”
Geoff watched as the man performed a U-Turn, the clutch of his car creaking and jamming as he went from reverse to forward and back again several times.
“They really don't help the cliches about socialist built cars do they?” Brian remarked
“That's a bit harsh of Caz though isn't it? His brother could be dieing,”” Geoff said,seemingly having a completely different conversation
“Assuming he’s legit” Brian said plainly. “and rules are rules, we’d have to do similar checks remember,”
“Good