Dickhead in the Garden

There’s a dickhead in the garden, says my mother, peering behind the curtain.

Mother! I cried. We’ve talked about this. You must not judge people with such terrible severity. I also feel that dickhead is something of an outdated pejorative. It might even be problematic.

No, he is, she whispers. He definitely is, her face is pressed up against the glass.

How do you know he’s a dickhead?

He’s watching a video of Andrew Tate. He’s also wearing a MAGA hat.

Oh my god! I screamed. A proper dickhead! You’re right.

And I storm to the window to see the man, red baseball cap on backwards, puffed up biceps and large iPhone held aloft, with the sermons of Tate blaring out from within.

The dickhead nods and laughs enthusiastically, pouring protein powder into his mouth from a jug and spitting it across the garden floor.

Told you, my mother nodded proudly, I have not lost my ability to discern a dickhead, my boy, don’t you worry about that.

What does he want? I huddle closer to the window. How did he get in?

Hard to say, says my mother, still watching carefully. Dickheads are difficult to predict.

We observe the dickhead for some time. He cackles maniacally as something particularly problematic is said by Tate and then glares up towards the house.

Do you think he can see us? I ask mother.

Hmmm, she ponders, not sure.

The dickhead remains for some time, fixed to his phone, the odes and nodes of other dreadful men filtering up into his consciousness. As the afternoon exhales and deflates, he lies down and begins hurling pebbles from the garden at the sky.

What is he doing? That devil, I ought to-

Shush, says mother, let him tire himself out.

The man continues flicking pebbles into the sky but as mother predicted, soon, he lazily rolls over and looks back at his phone. He scratches his head.

She taps gently on the window.

Time to go home now, she says, go on, off you go.

He looks up, some leering possibility that he has heard us but it is as if from some other place, an echo of an echo, a refracted reflection split into its own visible spectrum.

He stands now, and comes closer to the house.

Oh, oh, no! I cry.

Shush, says mother, he’s alright, he’s alright.

The dickhead approaches us at the glass of the window, and stares fiercely through. He raises a hand to where my mother’s is pressed against the glass, pushing it tenderly in return.

Shush, she says, shush now.

And now he turns suddenly, scuttling back under the tree. He stays there for several days and my mother and I alternate in keeping watch, checking on him, wondering when he might leave.

Should we, should we call someone? A bishop? The police! I say.

No, no, she says. He’ll leave in his own time.

She begins to leave food for him, sliding warm and full plates to the edge of his outdoor area. Occasionally, he appears to have some curiosity about them, but he consumes nothing that is not of his own accord. The plates remain full and begin to sweat and decompose in the sunshine. After several weeks, the dickhead begins to decay gradually before our eyes, formerly engorged biceps grow empty, punctured balloon, air hissing as it escapes. His face grows gaunt, hair and cheeks thinning.

Why doesn’t he eat? I whisper. Why doesn’t he nourish himself?

My mother ponders longer. I think he does not want to.

Months pass and I lose interest, returning to my own device. Mother stands watch, persistent and kind until the end, as the dickhead loses his bodily form and tails off like the end of a dream.

At least I tried, she says, scraping one final untouched plate into the compost bin.