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Fear is those fifteen minutes in the morning I need every day to recall who I am. Not where I am, or what day it is, these matters are easily forgotten and should cause no dread on my behalf. No, I forget who I am. Where I am follows naturally, though not always swiftly, once I have determined who proprietor of my mind is. Fifteen minutes is the time I need to establish who it is that the aches, the dry mouth, the sore throat, and the endless coughing belong to. I need that moment every morning to recall the last few minutes of the previous night, trace back why I would be in said place and carefully reconstruct a personality and history. And a name. Perhaps that is most frightening of all; the times I can’t for the life of me recall my name. A quarter of an hour in the morning, in which I just lie there, in bed or on a sofa, thinking my own life together. And I’m never really happy with the outcome. It’s a monotonous game; the answer is always the same. Sometimes the process of thought is disturbed by a Russian voice and I might be smashed into reality before truly recalling the reason for my being in the vicinity of anything Russian. Those days I usually spend wholly confused about exact reasons and courses. This can then be cured by the only thing Russian that has never betrayed me: vodka. Still, I much prefer my fifteen morning minutes in frightening silence.
Fear is knowing. Knowing I am stuck in this godforsaken country. Knowing the only way I’ll ever return to England is in a small silver pot. Knowing that the Southampton coast line was the last of English soil I would ever see. I knew it then, that fateful dawn. That’s why I couldn’t take my eyes off it. Melancholy will kill me, I know, and though it does terrify me, I am beginning to welcome the idea. ‘Guy? Oh, he died of a splintered heart. No, not a broken heart, a splintered heart. With each passing year a new fraction shattered, but the heart never truly collapsed. It kept itself together until it was nothing but shards and tatters. Sharp flakes that slowly cut and tore up his soul.’ I did conjure plans to return, but I was discouraged. By the Russians, by Donald, by every single English newspaper accidentally finding its way to my letter box. Going back would mean exposure of everything and everyone, a short trial and a definite sentence. I fear that. I should fear that. But eventually, I think I just fear them - the ones who can get their hands on an an English newspaper and shove it through my letter box. The ones who control every inch of my life in this country. I see them all around, and when I don’t see them I know the room is bugged. I feared them since that first week of debriefing. A word, I’m afraid, that no longer holds amusement value to me.
Fear is that book staring at me from the bookshelf, taunting me; 'The Art of William Blake'. A book by my dearest and closest friend, neatly inscribed with words of dedication on the first blank page. It is the only thing that tells me Anthony is alive and it does so poorly, for it was sent here once and that was it. Anthony didn’t send it himself. The inscription isn’t dedicated to me. He has never written, never returned a single one of my letters, never left a message. He has done nothing to allow me the belief, the imagery, the wild fantasy that he is still a friend. It angers me, it saddens me, but above all, it frightens me. What has happened? What caused this complete silence, this increase in prudence? What frightens him? Of course, I know the answer. He fears exposure. I understand that. But if he could just write something. Anything. It need not be lengthy, it need not be informative, if it could just be his handwriting and his words to me. Has he forgotten me? Has he stopped caring? Has he moved on? Has he moved on? How appallingly unfair that would be. Fear is that the only things I have left to remind me of him are that book and the tattered old coat he gave me years ago. Scratch all of that: fear is I might forget him.
Fear is relative. As a young boy I feared the strokes that were bound to be given when I did something against the rules or against housemaster’s liking. At Cambridge we feared collectively the development in Europe and the disregard of our own country. As a spy, I feared getting caught, fear with an edge of excitement to it. It was dangerous, but we laughed in its face. In later years, slowly but surely, the fear started creeping up that we were no longer fighting for any cause. That we were just fighting to survive. It was the sort of fear I have never learned to deal with. And the day we left England, the day we got so close to exposure we could feel its breath, all excitement abandoned and what was left was stone cold fear. It would go wrong, we might get caught, and everything would be ruined. But I must confess I also feared that I would stop the car and not care anymore about what happened next. We succeeded to flee and that was it. The game was over and since I recall fondly the childish fear of the young boy getting strokes.
Fear is that bright light speeding towards me (or am I speeding towards it?). The overwhelming silence, the comfortable numbness, the soft coldness, the unavoidable brightness. It should not be frightening, I should not be afraid. But, alas, I am shitting my proverbial pants. Proverbial, because I can’t really feel any fabric on me anymore and I can’t move my head or hands to check any of my surroundings. I can’t seem to divert my eyes from that light. Is this a proper moment to start believing in an omnipotent creature and hope that my journey will not end in one of the deeper layers of Hell? Is it a time to recall every prayer I ever learned in order to make God like me better? Or is it perhaps time to realise that the blinding light is nothing more than the street lantern I passed out at. Is it raining? Somehow, even though I have lost sensation in every part of my body, it feels as though it is raining. It should be raining. I should like to think it is raining. It would be like a small indication that someone is displeased to see me go. I suppose I’m delirious. And the light is crashing towards me. No famous last words. What’s the point if no one is there to hear them?