Forty Metres of Cord at the Lake

Koji stands in the changing hut at the swimming lake. He holds a heavy reel of orange cord. The hut smells of wet towels and old wood. Along one wall there is a bench, and behind the bench there is a single socket.

It is the only socket within a hundred metres. Koji has checked three times.

"Right," he says to the empty room. "You can do this."

Tonight is the first open-air film night of the summer. Forty people have promised to come with blankets and folding chairs. Koji has borrowed a projector and a big white screen. He has even brought a bag of snacks for the children. The only thing missing is electricity, and the socket in the changing hut is the answer.

The problem is distance. The best place for the screen is a flat piece of grass beside the water. Everyone can see from there. That is nearly fifty metres from the hut. Koji's cord is forty.

He plugs one end into the socket and walks outside, unrolling the cord as he goes. The path is narrow, with a fence on one side and a row of bushes on the other. Twice the cord catches on a branch, and twice he goes back to free it. By the time he reaches the grass, his arms ache and his shirt sticks to his back.

He holds up the end. It stops a long way short of the screen.

"Of course," he says.

He is still looking at the cord when a voice shouts from the jetty. "Hey! What are you doing?"

A woman in a yellow lifeguard jacket is running towards him. She is about thirty, and she has a whistle around her neck and a very worried face. This is Elan, who looks after the lake. Koji met her once, last week, when he asked about hiring the grass. She said it was fine.

"Hello, Elan," he says cheerfully. "I am setting up for tonight."

"I can see that." She points at the cord with a shaking finger. "That is a mains cable. It is running from the hut to the water's edge. Please tell me you are joking."

"The water's edge?" says Koji. "Well, near it. The screen is going to be just over there."

"A screen?" Elan looks even more alarmed. "In the water?"

"Not in the water," he says. "Beside it."

"You told me you wanted to put something electric into the lake," says Elan. "You said it in your message."

Koji frowns. He takes out his phone and scrolls to the message he sent on Monday. He reads it aloud. "I need power right at the water for the film."

Elan stares at him. Then she takes the phone and reads it herself. Her shoulders slowly drop.

"Right at the water," she says. "I thought you meant right in the water. I thought you wanted to light the lake from underneath. Last year a man tried to hang coloured lamps from the jetty. I had to throw him out."

"Coloured lamps?" says Koji. He starts to laugh. "I only want a projector."

"I am so sorry." She puts her hand over her mouth. "I have been awake since five, and my brain has gone to sleep. I was ready to take your cord and throw it in the bin."

"I would have helped you," says Koji. "It is very heavy."

For a moment they both stand in the evening light, laughing like people who have survived something dangerous. A duck watches them from the shore with great interest.

Then Elan gets serious again. "Safety first," she says. "If we put a cable across a path, someone will fall over it. If a child pulls the plug, the film stops. And if we have any water on the ground, I do not want a plug anywhere near it."

"Then tell me what to do," says Koji. "I am not an electrician."

"Neither am I," says Elan. "But I must explain everything to the insurance company." She wipes her forehead. "Come with me."

She leads him to the boat shed behind the hut. Inside, between a pile of orange life jackets and a broken oar, hangs a second reel of cord. It is old, but the plug and the wire both look sound. Elan tests the plug with a small meter that she keeps on a hook.

"This one is dry and clean," she says. "It is twenty metres. If we join the two, we have more than enough."

"But the join," says Koji. "It will be on the grass. What if somebody spills a drink?"

"Good question." Elan looks around the shed, then lifts a plastic box from a shelf. "We put the join inside this. It is a waterproof box we use for lifeguard radios. And we raise it on two bricks."

Koji clicks his fingers. "And I can fix the cord to the fence with tape, so nobody trips."

"And we lay the part by the path under the rubber mats from the changing hut," says Elan. "I will bring them."

It takes them half an hour. Koji runs the first cord along the fence line, pressing it flat with his palm. Elan carries the mats, and she kneels at every corner to check the cable lies safely underneath. They fit the join into the waterproof box, close the lid and set it on the two bricks. Then they walk back along the whole line and test it with Elan's meter.

"Everything is dry," she says. "Nothing is touching the water."

"Not even a little?" asks Koji.

"Not even a duck."

By seven o'clock, the first families arrive with blankets and baskets. Children run along the shore and shout at each other. Koji plugs the projector into the long cord, and the white screen glows with a small blue square. A cheer goes up from the grass.

Elan stands at the back with her arms folded, still watching the cable. When nobody trips over it for ten minutes, she finally relaxes and sits down on the bank.

Koji comes over and sits beside her. "Thank you," he says. "Without you, I would still be standing there with a very short cord."

"And without you, I would have thrown away something good," says Elan. "Next time, please say 'beside the water' in your message."

"Next time, please read to the end before you panic," says Koji.

"Fair," she says. She nods towards the screen, where the opening music has started. "What is the film tonight?"

Koji smiles. "It is a story about a giant shark."

Elan looks at the dark lake. She looks at forty people on blankets and at the cable lying safely on the land. "Good," she says. "Then I am very glad that everybody is staying out of the water."