Free The Weightless World by Anthony Trevelyan

slot-machine spangle – suddenly rising, suddenly falling.
    ‘It seems you’ve had an accident,’ Ess said then, with an air of delirious forced jollity. ‘Actually there’s no seems about it, you’ve had an accident. You were struck by a car. Late last night. Do you remember that?’
    Did I? There was something: a distant sensation of force, of massive displacement, glancing volume.
    ‘You were in town late last night. You were crossing a road, a side street… Not that there’s anything to worry about. I want to make that absolutely clear. Any minute now one of the quacks’llcome in and say the same thing. You’re going to be rather sore, probably going to feel like you’ve been roughed up for a couple of days, headaches, bruises, that sort of caper. But nothing broken, thank goodness. Just a touch of, let’s say, joggling about . A modicum of joggling about to your back, to give it its technical name, but no cause for concern whatsoever. You’re going make what’s called “a full recovery”.’
    I tried to nod, but this was difficult to do too. I wasn’t in any pain; for now my main sensation was one of lightness. My whole body felt light, insubstantial, its separate parts independently fluttering and flickering.
    ‘The important thing now is to get you well again. Take it from me, that’s priority one. Any minute now your mum and dad are going to waltz in here with some corroborative quack, and don’t worry, at that point I’ll give you some peace. I only want to make sure you know that whatever it takes, however long it takes, we’re all in this with you.’
    Ess paused. While I waited I seemed to rise towards the ceiling, which was covered with thousands of shiny dark specks. But were the specks on the ceiling or inside my eyes?
    ‘Naturally I’m referring to this, to the accident. But also to the other matter.’
    I looked at him, his clenched and priestly face, his streaked eyelids, his sandpapery cheeks. An agonising thought occurred to me. Had he been sitting there all night ?
    ‘We’re going to do everything we can. Resolute, the board, the entire company. Because we care about you, because we love you, and from now until you don’t need us any more, this is priority one.’
    *
    I’m about to ask Harry if we’re far from this interesting lunch venue he’s promised me when he steps off the pavement and waves for me to follow him along a narrow, stone-walled alleyway. I hesitate, my feet teetering on broken stones, then follow.
    After several worrying turns the alleyway opens out on to a large, surprisingly quiet and leafy square enclosed by high walls and dominated on one side by a construction site. The rest of it is scorched earth, bright clay, a dazzlingly complicated tree. At first the eerie hush of the place makes me think Harry and I must be here alone. Then I see we are not.
    ‘What do you think?’ he asks, with a sweep of his hand at the construction site. It’s not immediately clear whether something is being put up or taken down, built or unbuilt.
    ‘What am I looking at?’
    ‘My pride and joy, my labour of love, my pet project and old-man’s folly. Otherwise known as The Harry Altman School for Wayward Girls.’ He laughs, then adds with a startled look, ‘That’s a joke. I mean it’s going to be a school. The wayward girls thing, that’s a joke. Let’s have a look around.’
    As we approach the site we pass groups of young men sitting quietly in the square, to whom Harry calls with a raised hand of greeting. The men look up at him, nod then look away. Harry stops to talk to one man in particular, the site foreman, or ‘the redoubtable Rajeev’. Harry introduces us, and Rajeev nods and smiles to me pleasantly enough, and we shake hands, me stooping while he continues to sit with his friends. Harry asks Rajeev if he could be prevailed upon to find us some lunch, and Rajeev nods easily.
    Harry and I pass on to the site. Up close, there’s not a lot more to see