I woke up this morning in the middle of a canola field, the sun was shining and warming my naked body, and it complemented so well the light breeze blowing across the prairie that I was in near total comfort. Sometimes it was sun and breeze together, but the occasional switch to a stronger breeze was a nice alteration as a waft of coolness over me was refreshing.
I was bleeding from my left inner thigh, quite high and close to my penis. I felt the wound and when I brought my hand closer to my face for closer examination, there were two conclusions that kept me just lying there as before. Yes, there was blood on my hands, but the wound was not keep, just a cut really, though I had no idea how I might have sustained it. I did some triage though. Used saliva and rubbed lightly on the cut to clean it, and then pressed my thighs together to prevent anything from getting into it, or an insect deciding it wanted to have a look or a feast.
I sat up and looked around. I could not be more in the middle of nowhere. Metre-high canola as far as I could see in all directions, with nothing but the blue sky meeting up with the grain all around.
I thought back to the previous night. I had applied the prescribed topical cream to a patch of warty skin as my dermatologist had recommended. I blanked at first on where I had been applying this for the past couple of weeks—was it something on my neck? did I have some messy STI? or was it in fact my upper thigh? I lay back down again and pondered the options. I’m a stickler for facial health care and maintenance—a barber recently told me that I have the most beautiful and the softest skin she had ever seen—and so the neck seemed like an eliminable possibility. And of course the more I thought about it, usually during surges of sunshine when the breeze abated, the more obvious the conclusion was that a topical cream on my neck couldn’t logically cause a cut on my thigh.
It was easy to eliminate the STI possibility, as I hadn’t had sex without a condom for over twenty years (a messy divorce and I had lived solo since then, but sometimes it clicked with a woman and we had sex). Though, hold on there, mister. My family doctor who had referred me to the dermatologist had told me that some sexually transmitted viruses can remain latent in the body for years, decades even, and can be actuated by everything from COVID to simple stress. Again though, there was an actual cut on my thigh, and my penis looked healthy, no blood at its orifice, as it relaxed on its side against my other thigh.
So the question was how I got this cut. Now that the pressing of it against my other thigh felt like it had staunched the minimal bleeding there was, I carefully separated my legs. It was a raw and fresh and harmless little scabby line that had left a barely visible pinkish simulacrum of itself on the other side. I looked closely at the original. It was hardly anything and I knew from experience in previous mishaps that it would be one of those cuts that leaves no scar ultimately. There would be a gestation, now in progress, during which it would be at its most vulnerable tenderness. This would be the time to avoid touching as much as possible in order to prevent an abortion and a starting-over. Eventually I would notice that the top of the cut—a scratch, really—now consisted of hard little red dots lined up for their fate. When showering or with my feet resting comfortably on an outdoor ottoman, I would brush at the little battalion in order to clean myself or shoo away a pesky mosquito, and the single foes, defenseless, would fall. Just a few battles, and my leg would be my own territory again.
If food and drink were not necessities, and if the approach and arrival of night and cold not inevitable, there would be only a short list of reasons why a naked man in a field should do anything. But I had already witnessed the sun reach the apex of the rollercoaster track, pause a moment to admire the view and muster its power, and some artificial lights had been turned on by carnies, against the night and to guide the other visitors at various points of the insubstantial perimeter around me. It was time to act.
I wrested myself from the grainy earth, the relaxed muscles complaining about the task ahead. How far away was the brightest of lights in front of me as I got to my feet? A light stroll, a year, a light year? I pressed forward and the canola stalks slowed me down, but there was the advantage of predictable footfalls. No rocks, no papers, no scissors. I had mostly hope even though as I walked toward the perimeter light I got no sensation of making progress. I wasn’t running toward my fiancée at the airport just back from Zembla and the mere metres between us decreasing so visibly that our hearts pumped harder and it was a momentum spurt at the end when we nearly knocked each other over. (This actually happened twelve days before my wedding, but a year and three days later I found out about the gold-digging and the infidelity and had her killed by a trusted friend whom I later killed as well when the inept investigation turned up nothing.)
I stopped to rest from both the exertion and the tedium. I was heartened that the sun was still coasting down and that the air was still not cold. Maybe it was all the walking? But maybe if I didn’t make it tonight I could in fact sleep another night (a first night?) outside exposed in the field covered with broken stalks like a collapsed hut? I plopped myself down in the lotus position as standing was giving me no relief. There was peace and I had some minutes to think. The only mystery was why I was naked in a field located I wasn’t sure where. Probably near the Peace River but my concept of distance and direction, meager at the best of times, were ruined here where I had nothing to grasp onto. The horizon seemed like infinity.
I scoured my memory, also never functioning at its best capacity, but I did remember two sets of basics. One was where I was yesterday, and the other was, well, who I was. Living solo in Fairview. I taught at the polytechnic. I had a girlfriend I saw fitfully, and several young students, men and women, boys and girls really, who provided me with sex in return for passing grades. I was lying earlier. I just take what I can get, something that comes my way, something that I seek out for quick pleasure or gain. My body works, my mind is feeble, and my sense of integrity disappeared somewhere along the way as I started living like a dog.
But yesterday, yesterday I was alone in an abandoned building on abandoned farmland, happy solitude, and I knew where I was. I have a memory of being awash in silence for a couple of hours, and as I started to fall asleep, sounds, I heard the sounds of people talking. The voices were muffled but it sounded like maybe half a dozen people and at least a couple of women. No one locks anything in Fairview and so I heard the doors of my car being opened, and some whoops of glee as they found things. Some of them evidently knew that it was the teacher’s car. I got up to investigate, hiding myself but peering out. I was quiet but they made their way toward the building as the logical place that I would be. I’m not sure what they intended. I’m not sure if anyone knew me or cared about that if they did. I’m not sure how long it took and how I managed to stab them all. Things like that happen to people when they’re not expecting anything but the prosaic.
