And be better off than you are...

I turned with more than displeasure on my features. 'Who are you to stop me, to question me?'

'Who are you to raise your voice to me?' He countered swiftly.

'Don't you ever give a straight answer to a question?'

'Yes. What would you like me to answer?' I was thrown again. He had a habit of saying precisely the wrong thing.

'Well, look...' I trailed off. Just what was going on? I felt as if I'd been set up. 'What are you doing here? Do you really own this field?' He smiled and answered my questions in reverse order.

'Yes, I own the field, and a few other things. I'm here doing what you're doing; waiting, thinking relaxing, questioning.' Once again he described me too well and I flushed with anger. I expected a camera crew any second and I convinced myself it was a setup, some weird prank.

Nobody materialised and I examined him again with a sigh. 'You have questions?' He cocked his head at the strangeness of it all.

'Yes. Doesn't everyone? I'm pretty sure most people have a lot of questions. Look at children: they have a thousand questions a second, they crave information.' Another thought came to his mind and he added it quickly. 'And love, they crave love too.'

'Listen, Captain monologue, if you're gonna get all 'pop psychology' on me then you can do one!' I hooked my thumb over my shoulder and fixed him with my best 'don't mess' stare. He smiled plainly in response, the most dull and terrifying thing he could have done.

Suddenly, mercifully, it was quiet and I used the time to look around. It was the same as ever, which comforted me. The two trees side by side, mine and its partner and on this side a stump, which never grew.

I don't know whether he cut it or treated it, but it never grew. I shivered suddenly and sat on the stump. I was tired and my anger no longer reined in my curiosity. I let it run free and the words jumped from my mouth, almost as if on there own.

'You never told me any of your questions.'

He smiled. 'No, I didn't, did I. But you see, the question is never as important as the person asking it.'

'What, never?' I was shocked by his assertion and thought hard on it.

'Never.' He seemed so certain, so sure and steadfast that I knew I wanted to topple him.

'I'm sure I've got questions that could prove you wrong.' I smirked.

'In which case you'd probably prove me right, don't you think?'

My head span as he talked us in circles again, I felt like a dancer who didn't know the steps, dancing in a sliding, tilting, dance hall. I felt like a pinball and it tired me. I searched for a question, any question. I wanted to be right - I wanted to win.

'Why is everybody bored, why can't we just be nice? Why is there suffering?'

'Those are good questions. Still, why you ask it is more interesting than what you've asked.'

'Never a straight answer.'

Never a minute to spare, to listen.'

Chastised, I sat and glared at him. He smiled slowly and proceeded to ask me a question.

'Have you ever tried to be nice, to stop the suffering?'

'I wouldn't be able to change a thing.'

'Well, if everybody feels like that, nothing will change.' I smirked and prepared my 'pop psychology' quip again. He beat me to the punch.

'Tell me if I'm wrong.'

I opened my mouth, then closed it again. I thought back through my life and cringed as it played out in its awful technicolour glory. Over stimulated, under activated, incessantly impatient; I was hardly a model of world changing glory.

My introverted reflection brought into the light how little I knew of my own personal inquisitor. I looked him up and down and saw nothing of merit. Just some guy on some hill. Actually, I decided, I wouldn't settle for just that information anymore: it was time to ask some more questions. I stood up and found his eyes.

'You're a conundrum chum, I don't know anything about you and you think you can pull me apart like a lab rat, or a pigs heart. Well, I want to know who you are and what you're really doing here.'

My challenge was borne of equal parts curiosity, annoyance and fear, and as I met his eyes I searched them for any sign of the same. And for an ending to this absurd saga.

'I thought you already knew.'