A Shock

by Keith Ridgway

  Gary grinned and took a sip of his pint and then grinned again.

  — I’m annoying them, I’m annoying you, I’m really annoying myself. So I was thinking. You know. If I’ve no money for a thing, which as we have discussed is an injustice, as you said, in itself, as you said so eloquently in fact, last time, so . . . why not correct that injustice?

  — I don’t think you’re going to be able to just walk out of John Lewis with a Nikon under your arm.

  — I know. But listen. Last time I was in there I walked home. Bit of exercise. The Vulgar Square. White All. Downer Street. Yesminister. That whole weird city from the TV news. You been there lately?

  Stan shook his head.

  — The tourists Stan. The tourists. They are fucking legion. I had no idea there would be so many. I mean, this time of year? What are they doing? It’s dreary. But there’s thousands of them. So many thousands. And every second one of them has a camera. And maybe six out of ten of those have something on my list. Nikons and Canons everywhere you look. Hanging around the necks of people from all over the world. And you know me Stanley, I’m not a snob. But these fuckers, these idiots . . .

  Stan laughed.

  — they’re pointing them — and they’re in fucking auto mode I’m fucking sure of it — they’re pointing them at bullshit soldiers on horses and at bobbies, and statues of I don’t know what, and they for certain don’t know what either, and at what they think is Big fucking Ben, and at each other. You know, posing in the only red telephone boxes left in London, have you seen these things? Pristine. No hooker cards, no piss. They probably even work. Photo ops for tourists with cameras that cost three month’s fucking rent. Shirley from Texas hanging out the door with her little union-jack flag big cheesy grin for hubby to take a snap — a snap Stanley, not a photograph, a snap — for the folks back home, on a camera I could use to change the world.

  They smiled at each other.

  — And I am convinced Stan, I am convinced

  He dropped his head low and Stan followed suit. Conspiratorial huddle.

  — I am convinced that I can snag one of these things. If I’m clever about it. And I can be clever Stanley, you know me. Grab one of these beautiful machines. Grab it back from the industrial tourism complex. From the holiday fascists. From out of all that useless junk. Put it to work Stan. Restore some balance to the world of photography, and the world of travel, and to the fucking world itself.

  He raised his eyebrows, nodded at Stan.

  — I like it, Stan said.

  — You do?

  — Yes. I mean there are some potential downsides. A traumatised visitor who spent years saving for their trip, saving for a camera to document it. Losing precious photographs of their child, who is dying of cancer, maybe it was their dying wish to visit London. But I think, all in all

  — Worth it.

  — Worth it, yeah.

  They were both slumped, heads resting in their hands, smiling.

  — Could actually do it though. Probably. There are serious crowds down there. Bumping and jostling, waiting to cross the road, cameras slung over shoulders, not a care in the world. They rest on the hip, you know? All you need is a pair of secateurs and a bag of your own. Snip . . .

  — A what?

  — A pair of secateurs. Garden clippers. Or wire cutters. But my mum has secateurs for her balcony bushes, so. Snip, drop, go. Might take a little time to find the right sort of mark. The right place. The right time. But the whole area is swarming. It would work.

  — Gary.

  He smiled at Stan.

  — I can do subtle.

  — But you’re not actually

  Gary shrugged. Sat up.

  — There’s cameras obviously, all over. But you know, a baseball cap. Sunglasses. Rain jacket. Find a blind spot after and dump them. Bag into another bag. Not a problem.

  Stan laughed.

  — Don’t be daft.

  He knew Gary wasn’t being serious. He lifted his glass and put it down again. Outside, the buses and the syrupy night.

  He was pretty sure that Gary wasn’t being serious. But Gary’s face had closed on him.

  — You’re not serious?

  He shifted in his seat and ran his hand over his head and sighed.

  — No man. I’m not serious. I don’t have a death wish.

  He looked around the bar. So did Stan. The older gentleman applauded a golf shot. Gary smiled.

  — Not much of one anyway. First you’d hear about it would be a news alert.

  — Don’t think a camera thief gets that sort of thing.

  — They’d shoot me Stan.

  — Well I’m not sure about that, but

  — Oh you’re not sure about that?

  — Who’s going to shoot you?

  — I’m in Whitehall, Gary said. I’m on that crossing, you know, literally across the road from the Houses of Parliament. I’m two minutes from Downing Street. There are cameras everywhere. There are cops everywhere. And I’m going to prowl around looking for the right camera on the right person, I’m going to hang around, for hours maybe, with a pair of fucking

  He laughed.

  — a pair of fucking secateurs? A baseball cap, sunglasses, with my beard and my black skin? Stanley, bruv, I’m going to get shot.

  He laughed loudly, shook his head.

  — Of course I’m not fucking serious.

  There was a shriek from across the room and Stan jumped, turned. A man stood up suddenly from one of the low tables. A woman ran in short steps towards the door, a snapped, sickly look on her face. The man stuck out a leg and stamped hard on the floor. Did it again, knocked against the table. Someone else stood up. Stan caught a glimpse of darting grey along the bottom of the bar to the corner, where it disappeared. He flinched. Mouse.

  There was general laughter. The woman who’d run to the door stayed there, and the man went to join her, carrying their drinks.

  — The fucking thing touched me! she said, furious. It was on my foot!

  — Well it won’t be back.

  — And what were you trying to do? You want mouse guts all over your fucking shoe what’s wrong with you?

  He laughed. Gary was laughing too. They sat at another table, the couple. Some other people moved around as well. Stoker was chatting to two young guys Stan recognised from the Lettsom. Ran a youth group or something. He was clutching one of the guy’s arms and they were laughing uneasily with him.

  Harry had stayed in the back room during the commotion. Now he came through to the front clapping his hands, pretending nothing had happened.

  — Who’s next now please? Yes Lilly, same again?

  — Bit busy for mice, said Gary. Usually only see them when the place is empty. Last week. Or when were we here? Last time. Saw a couple that night, nosing around in the corner.

  Stan said nothing. He watched Stoker as the boys disengaged from him slowly and headed towards the door.

  — God bless! Stoker called after them. God bless!

  Stan eyed him, fixed him. He didn’t know what he was. He liked to talk to everyone, liked to think he was everyone’s friend, but Stan had never heard a good thing about him. Now he was looking around. Stan wanted to catch his eye, and his leg twitched, and he wanted to look at him, stare him down, unnerve him, let him know that Stan saw him, that Stan was fucking watching him. Anything, the slightest thing, and he would see it. Stoker didn’t notice him. Didn’t look at him. Instead he ran a finger over his thin lips and disappeared through the arch to the back bar.

  — I absolutely fucking hate that guy, he said.

  Gary followed his gaze.

  — You hate Harry?

  — No. Stoker.

  — Who?

  — Stoker?

  — Who’s that?

  He looked
at Gary.

  — The creepy guy. Old suit. The skinny guy, looks like a fucking vampire. Came and said hello to us.

  — Yano?

  — What?

  — Yano. His name is Yano. Where did you get Stoker from?

  — Someone told me he was called Stoker.

  Gary laughed.

  — Bram Stoker? Someone was having you on Stan. Does have a touch of the Dracula about him. But he’s all right. It’s Yano. Or Yaniv. Or Yanko or something. Little strange yeah, but who isn’t? Why do you hate him?

  — I thought he was Irish.

  — You hate the Irish?

  — No, no. I thought his name was Stoker and that he was Irish and I hate him because he gives me the creeps. He says the weirdest things.

  — Well I don’t know. I don’t think English is his first language. Was Bram Stoker Irish?

  — No. I’ve seen him drinking leftovers close to closing time.

  — Ok. I’ve done a bit of minesweeping in my time Stan. It’s not, you know, it’s not exactly the blood of the young.

  He wanted to say to Gary that there should not be mice in a pub. That it should not be a matter of laughing and a bit of a commotion then forgetting about it. He wanted to tell Gary that he should have said that he’d seen mice the last time. Because he knew that they had been sitting at the same table, in the same position, and that meant that Gary had seen mice behind him, behind Stan, as he talked to him. Over his shoulder. At his back. Nosing. What did that mean? Nosing? They served food. They stored glasses on low shelves. It was disgusting. That was a different thing though. He wanted to say that Stoker, or whatever he was called, had something about him that Stan felt to be obscene. But he could not say that either because he had no idea what it meant.

  Anxiety reversed through him and he turned cold and the night seemed glaringly bright and he bristled with discomfort. He hated every single stupid fucking thing.

  They were quiet for a while. Gary watched him, looking where he was looking. Stan went for a piss and took his time and gave himself a bit of a talking to. But when he got back he was still shifty and shut down.

  Gary asked him, nicely, about Maria, about work, about his meetings. Stan couldn’t shake his sulk. Stoker reappeared and stood near the door and looked at them for a moment but Stan only glanced and felt a tapping in his jaw of confusion and a milk-white dread, and Stoker went away.

  Everything was wrong. They didn’t have a second drink.

  Stan didn’t see Gary for a while after that. He put it out of his mind. He was busy with work, attending party meetings, union meetings, trying to spend all the spare time he had with Maria, who was depressed, and he wasn’t worrying about Gary. Why should he worry about Gary?

  Maria fell off her bike one day and Stan left work early to go and be with her and they told him that unless there was a doctor’s note or a police-reference number then he wasn’t entitled to emergency time because there was no proof of an emergency and they were taking three hours off his pay and he owed them three hours. He got on to the union and they looked at the contract and told him he had no entitlement to the pay but he shouldn’t have to make up the time. He told his boss and his boss said fine, but I’ll remember this. Stan told him that he’d remember it too because his wife was injured, and traumatised, and here was Stan having to deal with a juvenile piece of intimidation from a new manager who was perhaps out of his depth and could maybe, who knows, do with some advice from central office about the handling of this issue and would he like Stan to put in a call? Then they had a brief staring contest that Stan won, and that seemed to be the end of it. Absurd.

  Maria wasn’t his wife, and she wasn’t really injured, or traumatised, but she was depressed, Stan thought. She didn’t want to do anything. She claimed she was fine. She’d had a scare, that was all, but she hadn’t been hurt beyond a bruised arm and a cut on her leg. She was quiet though. She said she was working. And she did spend hours just writing in her notebooks. And that was good, because she hadn’t done that in a while, and he knew that it was important. But he couldn’t get much out of her. She was not fully there.

  He next saw Gary at a demo against the plans to redevelop Elephant and Castle, down at the council offices on Tooley Street. He was right at the other side of what was a surprisingly big crowd, and Stan saw him and then lost him, saw and lost him again, and it took quite a while before he realised that he had a camera. Gary had a camera. Stan waved at him and Gary held the camera in the air and waved back and they both smiled at each other, but Stan was deep in conversation with a sympathetic councillor about strategy and he couldn’t go over and when he looked for him later he couldn’t see him. The camera had seemed something like the things he’d been looking at. He texted him but there was no reply. On his way home he called him but there was no answer.

  Then a few days later there was an envelope on the doormat. Nothing on the outside. Inside, a photograph of Stan at the demo, chatting to the councillor. It was zoomed in. It was black and white. It was a good photo, Stan thought, atmospheric, like one you might see in an article about people to watch in South London politics. The Ones to Watch on the Left. Two men in conversation, caught side-on as they faced each other, with an out-of-focus background of figures and placards and movement. He could do with a haircut. He called Gary. Left a message.

  — I really like it, thanks for dropping it in. Is this . . . oh, it’s just paper. So it’s printed? Like, just on a printer? See I haven’t a clue. Camera looked great, from a distance. I look very cool don’t I? Be good to see you soon. You should come over. Or we can get a coffee or something. I’m around this weekend.

  Then he sent him a text saying all of the same things, because there was a good chance that Gary wouldn’t listen to a message for weeks. He put the photograph up on the wall in their main room. Maria liked it. She told him he looked conspiratorial and clever. And that he could do with a haircut. Stan wondered how Gary had been able to afford it. He didn’t tell Maria about Gary joking that he’d steal it. He didn’t want her to even have that in her head.

  A couple of days later another photograph arrived. Again, an unmarked envelope, a black-and-white print, Stan on his own this time, walking towards the camera. He couldn’t place it. Gary hadn’t replied to his messages. Walking towards the camera but obviously unaware of it, looking to the side. Just head and shoulders. It might have been on the day of the demo, but the background was completely blurred and it was impossible to tell. Stan was wearing the same jacket. It was the only jacket he had.

  — Gary give me a call will you?

  Maria thought it was funny. Like he was a mafia boss, snapped surreptitiously leaving the funeral of someone he’d had bumped off. She started naming people he might want bumped off. He didn’t think it was funny. He put it back in the envelope and left it on the table.

  The next day there was another one. Stan, walking along Walworth Road. He’d been coming home from a meeting — he remembered this — he was eating a bag of crisps because he’d been starving and the meeting had run on, and his jacket was over his arm because it was warm, and his bag was hanging off his shoulder pulling his shirt sideways. He could see now that his jeans were a bit short on him. Maybe a bit tight too. He’d had a haircut. The photo was . . . two days old. And it was taken from above somehow. From the front, from somewhere across the road he thought, and from a height.

  — What the fuck? he said aloud.

  Maria wasn’t there. It was early evening. It was warm out but the flat was cold. He stood with the photograph in his hand, examining it, wearing the same jacket, with the same bag on the table in front of him, looking at his own face from some impossible angle. He tried to think what buildings there were around there that Gary might have been in. What was he doing? He called him but it didn’t ring this time.

  He took down the first photograph from the wall, and put it with
the other two into the envelope and put them in a drawer. He said nothing to Maria when she came in. But he also said almost nothing at all, so she asked him what was wrong and he told her. He took out the photographs and laid them on the table side by side. She shrugged. It was just Gary. She didn’t find it weird. She didn’t think it creepy. Just a bit . . . Gary. And, she said, he took good photos. She looked at Stan carefully. What, she asked him, was he worried about? He couldn’t say. But he was anxious. The photographs, and Gary’s silence, seemed to amount to something. He had a vague and, he told Maria, inarticulable idea that they constituted a challenge. He felt them as an affront, a question. He could not relax. Maria told him to go see Gary if he was so stressed about it. She seemed annoyed. It was just after seven. He put his jacket back on and went out.

  It was still bright but the lights were lit. He walked beside lines of stationary cars and buses and trucks towards the Green and he could taste the fumes and his eyes were tired. He’d known Gary since they were teenagers. Fourteen, fifteen, Gary getting bullied and Stan deliberately putting himself beside him, just offering friendship by being there and Gary accepting, eventually. Like that. He remembered it like that. They used to go down the Elephant after school and sit in the shopping centre and talk about books and music. And there was Roy, and Ahmad and his sister Noor who was into football more than the boys. Gary didn’t care about football at all, but Stan tried to care about it because it was the thing that people cared about when they didn’t care about anything else. And he liked Noor. Then one day she had said something to Stan that made it clear she thought he and Gary were boyfriends. And he remembered how confounded he’d been by that, how embarrassed. He’d been so annoyed at Noor. How could you think that? And it made him back right off and leave Gary be. And he remembered that his mother had asked him where Gary was these days, that nice boy Gary. And his father looking at him suspiciously. And he remembered that he had gone for a long walk and had had a word with himself, told himself to be big, be brave — or don’t be a fucking coward anyway — be friends with your friend, and he remembered going down there, where he was going now, going down and surprising Gary and he remembered how happy Gary had been to see him, and they’d gone out and got chips on Walworth Road, just the two of them, laughing, having a laugh. Like that.