Free The Real Thing by Doris Lessing Page A

would be room for the red van to go past, but only just. The sensible thing was for the red van to reverse.
    It was evident that this was a question of Principle. Principle was what we were up against. The red van was faced with a woman driver who wouldn’t give way. The Escort was faced with an unreasonable bully of a man. The woman driver was damned if she was going to go through this ridiculous business of reversing and then going sharply back into a silly space that wouldn’t evenhold the Escort, when for the van to reverse would be the work of seconds.
    There were cars on the other side of the red van, a line stretching all the way up the hill.
    They hooted. The Golf in front of me hooted to keep them company. Then the man in the Golf got out and walked to where he could stand by the window of the Escort and talk to the woman, and after that he went to the window of the red van.
    He turned and slowly came back. He had decided to find it entertaining. His face was all resigned, amused philosophy. He was waggling his hands, palms down, on either side of his thighs in the way that says, ‘Here we have a pretty kettle of fish! However, let’s keep calm.’ He shrugged and got into his car. Then he stuck out his head and signalled to me to reverse. Just behind me on my left was a street going off up a hill, but a girl in a Toyota blocked the way. She was in trouble with a lorry, behind her. The man in the lorry was shouting that everything was the fault of the woman driver up in front, but the Toyota girl wasn’t going to have that. She said nothing, but sat smiling, a tight angry little smile. The man in the lorry jumped down, shook his fist at the Toyota, then-for good measure-at me, and strode smartly up past us both and past the Golf, and reached the two vehicles standing nose to nose. He had not been able to see from the cab of the lorry that the red van-male-was more in the wrong than the Escort. He shouted a little at the woman in the Escort, just for the look of the thing. She was now smoking so energetically that it seemed the driver’s seat was on fire. He did not bother to speak to the driver of the red van, from which one could deduce that he could see it would do no good. He came back, not looking at the man in the Golf who-he could now see-was not going to be an ally, but probably regarded him as at fault, thenpast me, then past the girl in the Toyota. He climbed back into his cab and looked to see how he could reverse to let the Toyota go out left. But behind him now were several cars. He shouted at them to reverse, and while we couldn’t see them it was evident they were furious too, because they were hooting. At last he was able to reverse a short way. Then the woman in the Toyota began complicated to-ings and fro-ings to get herself out into the leftwards street. Then she had gone, and I wanted to reverse, but the lorry had already come forward. This made the Golf in front of me start a frenzied hooting. He shouted at the lorry to go out left. But the lorry wasn’t going to leave the scene, because one or other of the two contenders for being proved in the right of it ought to give way, and he was going to wait until he, or she, did. Now this man tried to reverse again, to let me and the Golf out, but meanwhile other hooting cars had pressed up behind him. It took time for him to slowly press back and back so that I could reverse, and go off into the side street. The man in the Golf reversed the very second he could, which meant he was going slowly back towards the lorry that was coming slowly forwards. As I left the scene the two were shouting at each other.
    I drove up the street. You can, if you want, turn so as to rejoin the street I had just extricated myself from. Why did I decide to do this? The spirit of obstinacy had entered me too. Besides, I didn’t
see
why I had to drive half a mile out of my way. In short, no, there’s no excuse. I rejoined the street about twenty yards past where the