Heaven Can Wait

HEAVEN CAN WAIT

By

George Hughes

SMASHWORDS EDITION

* * * * *

PUBLISHED BY:

George Hughes on Smashwords

Heaven Can Wait

Copyright © 2013 by George Hughes

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This book is a work of fiction and any resemblance to persons, living or dead, places, events or locales is purely coincidental. The characters are a production of the author’s imagination and are used totally fictitiously.

Adult Reading Material

HEAVEN CAN WAIT

CHAPTER 1

The time: Early November, sometime in the late 1960’s.

The place: Slap-bang in the heart of the north of the English countryside.

*****

Jarvis belched as he twisted over slightly to one side of his seat; his beady red forehead furrowed; his grimy, wrinkly face contorting all the more as he rasped out an almighty fart, grunted, then heaved a long sigh of relief as he grinned to himself, amused at the best entertainment he’d had all day, along with the eased pressure in his belly as he squinted ahead into the darkening, wet gloom of the country lane beyond the pale yellow light cast by his headlamps.

Not that anyone would have heard anything over the deafening roar of that engine, mind.

Last drop, then I’m done for the day he mumbled to himself as he felt the roughness on his tongue as he licked the salty moisture from his sweat streaked whiskery top lip, before miserably settling down to more monotony as he thought of old Johnson at the garage ahead, waiting for this next delivery.

Suddenly, he lurched as he gasped a breath, his ham-sized fists gripped the shuddering oil blackened steering wheel rock solid.

"JESUS CHRIST" he roared above the din of the engine in amazement as his stomach muscles tensed like catgut on a violin, his teeth clenched hard, his lips pursed tight sealing his mouth, not even daring to breathe in once more in case he tasted it on his tongue again, as his grimy hand began to fumble madly for the lever, desperately trying to wind down the mucky window in his blind panic.

He quickly, as far as a fumbling, overweight, middle-aged moron could, shoved his filthy, balding head out through the half-opened window into the cold pattering rain, streaking the salty muck on his face all the more, before he sucked in deeply some cool, clean, god-given fresh air.

What the thunderin’ hell made that bloody stink? That’s flamin’ rotten, he bellowed out loud to the world with a look of disgust on his face as he tried to spit the horrible, lingering obnoxious taste from out of his mouth.

He stayed like that, driving along the darkening, deserted country road with his head stuck out in the rain, sucking in the cold evening air over his tongue to purge that abhorrent taste away as the wind blew fronds of his greasy hair, what there was of it, all over the place, for what must have been a full minute or more.

O.K. Admittedly; perhaps he wasn’t the brightest lorry driver in the world.

*****

Once he’d done the delivery the next thing on his agenda was looking for a good, warm bed for the night, and as luck would have it he knew of a cheap transport caf not too far away that did bed and breakfast.

More than anything else he needed a bath, along with a good nights kip, as he’d spent the last three nights parked on some back roads, just to save the cash, and he’d been kept awake by the cold, shivering like mad once the hot cab had cooled down, or by the sheep bleating and coughing for the best part of two nights. You wouldn’t think that they bleat all night would you?

With his lorry trundling along another back road, this time a short cut he knew to the caf, splashing through the many puddles after the recent heavy downpour and sending great cascades of spray into the hedges at the roadside, he spotted a pale blur through the muck and streaks on his windscreen (because the best his wipers did was smear oil and muck everywhere) out there in the darkness ahead, just beyond the light from his dim, but full-on, headlamps, so he cautiously slowed down, although the most he would be doing in that old heap along those back-roads was around thirty, as his brakes weren’t up to much at the best of times.

As he got closer he realised it was the back end of a black and white cow, along with three others, darker coloured and not too easy to see at first, out of their field and loose on the road ahead.

After eventually grinding to a halt, he sat there looking at the cattle just in front of his lorry, unsure what to do as he rubbed his whiskery chin; after all, he knew nothing about cattle.

OK, he’d seen them being driven along roads in the past, but they were so big now he was close-up; dirty great things with massive clouds of steam rising up off their backs. Just look at the size of them damned horns. I’d better watch out. They could easily do a mischief, an’ no trouble at all, he mumbled to himself. I s’ppose I’d better get these bloody things back in the field in case owt else come along here he continued as he pulled out his engine stop and climbed nervously down, out of his hot cab into the cold rain.

He moved cautiously towards them, nibbling uncertainly at the inside of his lip with what few yellow front teeth he had, ready at a moment’s notice to turn tail and dive back into the safety of his cab, at the same time looking for the hole in the fence where they had got through, but they ambled away from him ahead into the gloom beyond the light of his yellow headlights, which were still full on.

Picking up courage from this, he approached only to see them move away from him again, and then once more, and all the time his confidence was growing.

He could see the field’s barbed wire fence at the roadside on his right with nothing but blackness lying beyond it, and decided to climb through and circle ahead of the cattle, that way he could drive them back down the road and hopefully into the field they had escaped from, wherever that was.

Once he was through the fence and away from the lorry he could not see anything around him as it was so dark. He could see the lorry with its headlamps on over on the roadway with the tall hedge behind it, and he could just about make out the cattle beyond the light, but everywhere else was pitch black.

The only thing he was aware of was the sound of the splatting rain on the wet grass at his feet. He looked down but could not even see his holey boots in the blackness, and it was then that he began to get a little hot, despite the cold rain that had chilled him once he was out of the cab.

He thought he could hear something faint in the distance.

Was it distant thunder, was it thumping machinery, or was it hooves? The more purposefully he listened, then gradually the louder it got, rumbling and continuous.

He began listening intently for the sound, first this way and then that, and back again to the first direction. Was there some mad bull out there in the darkness? Was there some huge, angry beast, heading towards him; its sharp pointed horns ready to rip him apart or even trample him underfoot, squashing the living daylights out of him?

It was getting louder and louder the more he listened for it. He began sweating like mad the more he tried to find the source, despite the autumnal chill in the air, but it was a cold, fear-clammy sweat. His imagination was running wild. It would be on him any second.

He shut his eyes, his fists clenched up to his chest, his breath held, otherwise unable to move. He could feel his heart pounding heavily in his chest while the noise in his ears was deafening, thundering, getting closer, louder, making him sweat all the more, waiting for what was to come.

Frozen rigid to the spot and feeling faint as the all-enveloping thundering ate into his mind making his panic grow, trembling all the more, his head started to swim as thoughts of being thrown into the air like a rag doll at any moment went through his mind.

He just about felt the warmth of his pee running down his leg.

The next thing he was aware of as he opened his eyes was that he was laid out on the floor with the cold rain pattering on his face. He felt cold all down one side of his body from the wet, cold ground and everything was so utterly black.

It took him a few seconds to realise he was laid down on the sopping wet grass before he began to rise and he soon regained his senses as he glimpsed his lorry over at the road, with its headlights still on, and then remembered what he was supposed to be doing as he listened for the hoof beats, but they were