The Hoarder

Kendal stood up from his chair.

"Right. Well, that's all settled then and I'll wait to hear from you in due course."

Kendal held out his hand for Michael to shake it.

Michael realised that he was being dismissed and with a mixture of chagrin at not being the instigator and relief that it was all over, he attempted clumsily to get up from the armchair into which he was well and truly wedged. I really ought to do more core work, he thought as he used his arms to lever himself out, not able to do it without the extra propulsion.

He eventually got up and offered his sweaty hand to Kendal who grasped it firmly, his palm being noticeably cooler and smoother than Michael's own. Kendal placed his other hand over the top of Michael's and said, looking directly into Michael's eyes, "It's been a pleasure, Michael."

There was a moment between them. Michael found himself focused on Kendal's face, their proximity to each other. The fact that Kendal was grasping his hand, which didn't allow him to move back, meant that their eyes locked. Michael's instinct was to try and take his hand away but there was no way of doing this without rudeness or even force and so, he held eye contact with Kendal, despite the discomfort it gave him.

Kendal's eyes were a hazel colour, he noticed, warm and intelligent. His face was lined but not remarkably so and there were no folds of crinkly skin or stray hairs which had escaped the old man's diminishing eyesight during his grooming routine. This man was clean and, to all appearances, respectable. He had lines curving up from the corners of his eyes but Michael noticed a small ridge between his eyebrows which indicated concentration or deep thinking or determination of some sort. Michael still felt wary but also reassured by the man's gaze and the pressure he applied to his palm.

Michael eventually uttered, "Likewise," and felt the strength of Kendal's grasp lessen as he smiled at Michael.

"Well, you'd better be off to your next appointment or is it back to the office now?"

Michael felt a little like he'd been released from a tractor beam. "What? Oh, yes, back to the office now. No more appointments today." He resisted the temptation to add "Thank goodness" as he did feel like he'd been put through more than usual, despite the fact that there had been no confrontation to speak of, no objectionable faeces or food waste (although there was a rat) and it had all passed relatively easily. However, he felt strange, "unsettled" his mother would call it, by the whole encounter. He looked around to gather his things, securing his iPad under his arm, ready for the scramble back through the tangled mass of Kendal's accumulated detritus. He wasn't looking forward to it.

"Will you be alright making your way back out?"

Again, Kendal seemed to have anticipated his thoughts and Michael looked at the old man, who was now wearing a wry smile.

"I think so, yes," Michael said, smiling weakly in return as Kendal led him towards the front door. The scent of nature growing hit Michael's nostrils as he headed out. Taking a moment before tackling the oppressive mass of stuff and potential vermin, Michael breathed deeply and chanced a look around. His perspective of Kendal's plot was different from here. Ahead, loomed the obstacle course of random objects at the end of the blue path. Here, where he stood, he could see that the immediate area outside of Kendal's house was more than just cottage garden. There was a neatly arranged and weeded vegetable patch and a greenhouse which seemed to be made from an amalgamation of glass panelled doors and discarded windows, wooden-framed and painted, the glass shiny and pristine. He could see the red of tomatoes and the yellow flowers of cucumber plants. There were cold frames as well as a potting shed and trees with small offerings of fruit adorning their branches. Terracotta pots of herbs were dotted everywhere. It was orderly but wild. Michael was no gardener but recognised that what Kendal had created here was something pretty special.

"Well, Michael, I wish you well and thank you for visiting me here today."

Michael nodded and breathed deeply again as if drawing courage for the scramble back to his car from the air around him.

"And you know, Michael?" Kendal placed a hand on his shoulder.

Michael felt the firm but warm touch of the older man and stopped.

"If the world should turn," and here, Kendal lowered his tone to reflect the seriousness of what he was suggesting, "darker at any point and you need somewhere to turn, you can always come here, lad. I'll be here to..." Kendal paused as if searching for the right word to convey what he would offer, which would be what ? Survival at best? A relatively longer time on Earth than the rest of his countrymen and women? A delaying of the inevitable? Kendal could have said all this and more as he knew that darkness was coming but why panic this young man? What would that accomplish? He'd see it for himself. Even if he didn't regularly watch the news, the whims of men would bludgeon their way into the innocent's life without subtlety, tact or announcement and there would be no way not to confront them, or hide depending on your outlook.

Kendal settled instead for a simple word that encompassed it all, finishing his sentence with "help" whilst smiling beneficently.

Michael's manners kicked in. "Thanks, Mr. McIntyre. I'll bear that in mind but hopefully, it won't come to that."

Kendal's smile wavered a little but he just gripped Michael's shoulder more firmly, squeezing it a little, before removing his hand altogether.

"I hope you're right, Michael. Sincerely I do. Now off you go and take care now."

And with that send-off, Michael headed with trepidation towards the tangled mess before him with Kendal observing from his cottage doorway.

Kendal watched as the young man made his ungainly way through, his youthful clothing visible through the chinks where light fell. He watched as Michael got to his car although he couldn't discern Michael's features, just the shape of him as he moved and the noise of a car door being opened and then closed and then of an engine starting.

Before going back into his cottage, Kendal repeated once more, quietly to himself: "I hope you're right," and then turned, went inside and closed the door.

Something about his meeting with Kendal McIntyre had touched Michael. It wasn't a nerve; it was something deeper than that. For the first few days after their meeting, Michael had found his mind returning to what Kendal had said. Michael would remember a phrase but then he'd dismiss it just as quickly with a shake of his head and a muttering of "Paranoid nonsense" or "Bloody doombringer!" before focusing on what he had to do. But it kept nagging him, Kendal's attestations about the whims of men, and Michael found that he was drawn to the news more, listening to podcasts, reading articles, spreading the net of knowledge wide to information gather.

He delayed getting his report in and he wasn't sure why as he was always diligent. It was the first time he'd had to be chased by his manager. Michael, if he'd have been prone to more self-evaluation, would have realised that his reluctance stemmed from a deep-seated feeling in his gut, that maybe Kendal was right.

His delve into current affairs became more than that. He borrowed books from the library and looked back at history. He was astonished about how little he knew.

And he became curious about Kendal and who he was. Kendal had no social media presence which wasn't surprising as he was old, Michael reasoned with himself, but still, you'd expect there to be something about him somewhere. Even using his position at the council to look at less accessible records, Michael couldn't find out anything about a Kendal McIntyre to either refute or corroborate what Kendal had hinted at as his past occupation.

The man was a mystery and Michael was becoming obsessed. Even his mother had noticed a change in his behaviour.

"Are you alright, son?" she would ask and Michael would respond with a "Yes, I'm fine, Mum," because how could he explain that he was concerned with what an old man had told him about the whims of men?

But it wasn't many more days after Michael's visit with Kendal, 60 to be precise, when drones started to whizz overhead and army vehicles suddenly drove on the streets that Michael realised that darker times had indeed arrived.

This is Part 8 of a serialisation I have written. For Part 7, go here: