🛤️the lane

Zippy came past at about half past six that morning at full speed, shouting, and I could not make out one word in three.

"Say that again. Slower."

And Zippy hummed a whole song first — the whole thing, all the way to the end, standing still in the road — and then said it again at a speed a fluff could write down: that the path was much longer than anybody thought and there were hooks the entire way and if we only did the pretty bit we would run out of day.

I went and found somebody with a pencil. Everything that happened afterwards started there.

While the rest of the land was still arguing about breakfast I went down the path at full speed to look at it — the whole route, gate to bridge to orchard to the long bend and back — because somebody ought to look, and I am always the first to go when nobody else will.

It took much longer than I expected. That was the first surprise. In your head, a path you walk every week is short. Under your feet, at a run, in the almost-dark, it goes on and on, and then there is more of it round a corner you had forgotten was there.

The second surprise was the hooks. Little iron ones, set into the posts, one every few paces, the entire way. I started counting them and gave up somewhere past the orchard, which for me is not very far past the beginning.

So I ran back with two facts in me and no way at all of getting them out.