There was a marked difference between what happened on the main forum and the subforum. A delicate ecosystem existed in the former. Conversation had to be strictly on topic, and any user who flouted the rules was duly punished, sometimes severely. The most infamous example of this had been when TunnelBotherer6 had persistently posted about baseboards in a gears topic and had been branded a “waste of space” by the moderator. Chillingly, TB6 never posted again. But in the subforum, away from prying main-board moderator eyes, a slow shift occurred. Before long, it became a place where personal issues were discussed. It felt terrifying at first. It was like they were the Resistance poring over maps under a single lightbulb in a dusty cellar as enemy soldiers drank in the bar above. It had been BroadGaugeJim who’d been the first one to bring up an explicitly non-train issue.
Listen, chaps, he’d written, I wouldn’t normally want to bother you with something like this, but to be perfectly honest I’m not quite sure who else to ask. Basically, my daughter Emily got caught “cyberbullying” someone at school. Mean messages. Photoshopped pics. Nasty stuff, from what I’ve seen. She tells me she wasn’t the ringleader and feels really bad (and I believe her), but I still feel like I need to make sure she understands she can’t be part of anything like that ever again, even if it means losing her mates. Just wondered if any of you might have any advice for a useless duffer like me!! No worries if not!!!!!
Andrew’s scrambled eggs went cold as he waited to see what happened. It was TinkerAl who responded first, and the advice he gave was simple, sensible, yet obviously heartfelt. So much so that Andrew felt momentarily overwhelmed. He tried writing his own response, but he couldn’t really think of anything better than what TinkerAl had said. Instead, he just backed up Tinker’s suggestion with a couple of lines, and resolved (perhaps a little selfishly) to be the helpful one next time.
* * *
—
Andrew logged on, heard the reassuring sound of the Scotsman rushing past behind him, and waited in eager anticipation of the little breeze that followed in its wake. He adjusted his monitor. He’d bought the computer as a thirty-second birthday present for himself. At the time it had seemed like a sleek and powerful machine, but now, a decade later, it was impossibly bulky and slow compared to the latest models. Nevertheless, Andrew felt an affection for the clunky old beast that meant he’d cling on to it for as long as it still spluttered into life.
Hi, all, he wrote. Anybody on for the night shift?
As he waited for the reply he knew would come within a maximum of ten minutes, he maneuvered carefully across the rail tracks to his record player and thumbed through his LPs. He kept them in a wonky pile rather than in neat rows on a shelf—that diminished the fun of it. In this more ramshackle style of ordering he could still occasionally surprise himself. There were some other artists and albums in there—Miles Davis, Dave Brubeck, Dizzy Gillespie—but Ella vastly outnumbered all of them.
He slid The Best Is Yet to Come out of its sleeve but changed his mind and put it back. When he altered his railway landscapes that was because of the changing seasons, but there wasn’t as straightforward a logic when choosing which of Ella’s records to listen to. With her, it was just a case of what felt right in the moment. There was only one exception—her version of “Blue Moon.” He hadn’t been able to play that particular song for twenty years, though that didn’t stop the tune from filtering into his head on occasion. As soon as he recognized the first notes, pain would grow at his temples, his vision would fog, and then came the sound of piercing feedback and shouting, mixing with the music, and the uncanny sensation of hands gripping his shoulders. And then, just like that, it was gone, and he’d be looking at a confused pharmacist or realizing he’d missed his bus stop. On one occasion a few years before, he’d walked into a record shop in Soho and realized that the song was playing on the shop’s speakers. He’d left so hastily he’d ended up in a tense encounter with the shopkeeper and a passing off-duty police officer. More recently, he’d been channel-hopping and found himself watching a football match. Minutes later he was desperately searching for the remote to turn it off, because apparently “Blue Moon” was what the Manchester City fans sang. To hear the actual song was bad enough, but fifty thousand people bellowing it out of sync was on another level. He tried to tell himself that it was simply one of those unusual afflictions people suffer and just have to tolerate, like being allergic to sunlight, or having night terrors, but the thought lingered that at some point, probably, he would have to talk to someone about it.
He ran his fingers down the uneven record pile. Tonight it was Hello Love that caught his eye. He carefully dropped the needle and went back to his computer. BamBam67 had been first to reply.
Evening, all. Night shift for me too. House to myself thankfully. Seen they’re repeating that BBC thing from last year tonight? James May sitting in his shed rebuilding a Graham Farish 372–311 N Gauge steam loco. Apparently they did it all in one take. Anyway, don’t bother with it. It’s awful.
Andrew smiled and refreshed. There was TinkerAl right on cue:
HAHA! Knew it wouldn’t be your c.o.t.! I loved it I’m afraid!
Refresh. Here was BroadGaugeJim:
Evening shift for me too, squires. I watched the May thing first time around. Once he’d argued in favor of cork underlay over ballasted I’m afraid I couldn’t really take the rest of it seriously.
Andrew rolled his head around on his shoulders and sank down low in his chair. Now that the four of them had posted, now that Ella was crooning and a train was rattling around the room, defeating the silence, he could relax.
This was when everything came together.
This was everything.
— CHAPTER 5 —
As Andrew’s packed lunches went, this was another textbook effort, even if he said so himself. “Ham and cheese,” he boasted to the camera. “Blob of pickle goes central, then we’ll just spread it out to each corner. I like to imagine it’s a traitor’s body parts being sent to the four corners of England, but come up with whatever metaphor you want. Hang on, is this a bit of iceberg lettuce? You bet it is. So who’s coming with? A packet of salt and vinegar from the multi-bag? Tick. And how about a satsuma from the Big Red Net? Ditto. Though do be careful to check it’s not one of those sneaky ones who’s pretending to be fine despite the fact its bottom’s gone moldy. I always picture a vainglorious young soldier protesting he wants to go on patrol despite a shattered fibula, but again, do choose your own metaphor.”
He was about to launch into an explanation of his Tupperware system when he faltered, staring ahead as if the autocue had broken, the wholly unwelcome reminder of Keith and Meredith’s tag-team interrogation coming into his mind.
Sitting on the train to work (wedged into the armrest by a man whose legs were spread so far apart Andrew could only assume he was performing some sort of interpretive dance about what a great guy he was), he found himself thinking back to his very first day in the office. After his momentary excitement at getting the job, he’d spent the following days desperately panicking about how he was going to set things straight with Cameron about the small matter of his made-up family. He reasoned his best chance would be to get on with Cameron very, very quickly—to go against all instincts and actively befriend him. A few illicit chats in the corridor slagging other people off, a pint of lager after work on a Friday—that’s what people did, wasn’t it?—then he’d confess, say it had been a moment of madness between you and me, mate, and they’d chalk the whole thing up to one of those white lies everyone told in interviews.
Unfortunately, it wasn’t to be. As is dictated by UK law, Andrew had said a brief hello to his new colleagues before immediately locking himself out of his e-mails and sitting in silence for an hour because he was too embarrassed to ask for help.
That’s when he saw Cameron appear. This was Andrew’s first big chance to get on friendly terms. He was just plan
ning a witty opening gambit about his current admin crisis when Cameron, having interrupted to wish him a happy first day and rambled on and on about “KPIs” without giving him a chance to speak, concluded by asking in a voice clearly loud enough that everyone else could hear, “How’s the family? Steph and David okay?”
So thrown was he that Cameron had blown the whole thing this early, he responded to the question of how his children were by saying, “They seem fine, thanks.”
It would have been an appropriate response to an optician asking how his new lenses were, but not so much when referring to the well-being of his flesh and blood. Flustered, he gabbled on about them seeming to have lots of homework at the moment.
“Well,” Cameron said when Andrew had finished rambling. “Easter hols, soon. You and Diane off anywhere nice?”
“Um . . . France,” Andrew said.
“Oh, top banana,” Cameron said. “Whereabouts?”
Andrew considered this.
“South,” he said. “South France.”
And that was that.
In those early days, when conversation turned to family he was forced to think on his feet. He learned quickly that he could pretend to be distracted by something on his computer, or ask for a question to be repeated as if he hadn’t quite caught it, to buy him time, but he knew he needed a more long-term strategy. In his second week, there were a few days when nothing came up, and he wondered if he might be out of the woods. Looking back, he’d been incredibly naive. This was family. This was what normal people talked about. The situation wasn’t helped by the fact that Meredith seemed to exist on a diet of nosiness and gossip, constantly pressing Andrew for more specific information. A case in point had been when she, Keith and a nervous graduate called Bethany were talking about weddings.
“Oh it was so excruciating,” Meredith said, gloating about a friend’s nuptials that weekend. “They were standing there up at the altar and they just couldn’t fit the ring on his big fat finger.”
“My dad thinks it’s a bit namby-pamby for men to wear a wedding ring,” Bethany said in her quivering voice that made her sound like she was perpetually being driven over a cattle grid.
“You seeeee?” Keith said, spreading his arms wide to make his point and revealing the sweat patches under his arms. “That’s what I’ve always said.”
“Oh, I don’t know,” Meredith said. “If my Graham didn’t wear one I know he’d have all sorts of slappers crawling all over him.”
She strained her neck to try to see over Andrew’s screen.
“Do you wear one, Andrew?”
Stupidly, he actually checked his finger before saying no.
“Is that for any particular reason, or . . . ?”
Shit.
“No, no,” he said. “I just . . . didn’t think I’d like how it felt.”
Nobody questioned this, but he could still feel his neck starting to burn with embarrassment. He realized then that it wasn’t good enough just knowing the simple facts, having the general overview. He was going to have to accentuate the broad brushstrokes with finer ones. And so, later that evening, with Ella on in the background, he opened up a blank spreadsheet and began to fill in his family’s story. He started by establishing as many “factual” things as possible: middle names, ages, hair colors, heights. Then, over the following weeks, he began to add subtler details—remembering snippets of strangers’ conversations from which he’d take some minor detail, or asking himself how someone else’s news might have been dealt with by his own family. Before too long you could have asked him almost anything and he’d have had a response prepared. To look at the spreadsheet at random you might have found that David enjoyed touch rugby but had recently sprained his ankle. He was shy and preferred playing on his own rather than with friends. He’d begged for months for a pair of trainers that had heels that lit up when you walked, until Andrew had finally relented.
Steph had terrible colic when she was a baby, but apart from the odd case of conjunctivitis now and then they rarely had to see a doctor with her these days. She asked scarily intelligent questions in public, which often left them embarrassingly stumped. She had once played a shepherd at the nativity to mixed reviews from her costars, though of course they’d never been prouder.
It was the “they” part—him and Diane—that he found more difficult. It had felt okay when he’d allowed himself to fantasize during the interview, but this was another level altogether. Nevertheless, the details were all there: Diane had recently been made partner in the law firm (her field was human rights), and though she worked long hours she’d now stopped checking the dreaded BlackBerry on weekends. Their wedding anniversary was September 4, but they also had a mini-celebration on November 15—the anniversary of their first kiss (standing outside in the snow after an impromptu party in a friend’s halls of residence room). Their first proper date had been to see Pulp Fiction at the cinema. They went to her parents’ for Christmas and tended to holiday with the kids in France in the summer and Center Parcs in the autumn half term. They’d gone to Rome for their tenth wedding anniversary. When they could get a babysitter they’d go to the theater—but nothing too avant-garde, because they’d decided their time and money were too precious to fritter away on something without at least one of the leads having been in a Sunday night costume drama. Diane played tennis every Sunday morning with her friend Sue and was on the PTA at Steph’s school. She used to wear bright orange-rimmed glasses before taking the plunge with laser surgery. She had a little scar above her eyebrow from where a boy at school called James Bond had thrown a crabapple at her.
All of this had been such a full-on job that Andrew had barely found time to think about how his actual new role was going. He’d already been to two funerals and made difficult phone calls to several relatives (one of which involved having to explain to a man that if he wanted the council to pay for his uncle’s funeral then he’d have to return the laptop he’d taken from the house so that they could sell it to pay for the service). He’d even come along with Keith to his first property inspection and seen the room where a woman had taken her final breath. But all that felt like a walk in the park compared to keeping his deceit undiscovered. He was constantly on edge, waiting for the moment he got himself tangled up in knots or completely contradicted himself. But then a month passed, and another, and slowly he started to relax. All his hard work was paying off.
The moment that nearly changed everything came on a Friday at lunchtime, Andrew having spent a fruitless morning searching for next-of-kin clues in a shoebox full of papers recovered from a property search. He was absentmindedly watching some shop-bought macaroni and cheese rotate in the microwave and engaging in some idle chitchat with Cameron when the subject of allergies came up.
“That’s the hard part,” Cameron was saying. “You have to be totally prepared. It just means you’re on edge rather a lot. Especially when it comes to nuts. With Chris we just have to be extra vigilant, you know?”
“Mmm,” Andrew said, distractedly peeling back the plastic film and jabbing the pasta around with his fork. “Steph’s allergic to bee stings, so I know what you mean.”
It was only when he got back to his desk and was halfway through his lunch that he considered this little exchange. He hadn’t needed to mentally refer to his spreadsheet or desperately improvise something; instead he had quite calmly volunteered this information about Steph without even thinking about it, as if it had come from his subconscious. The fact that the detail had appeared so easily left him deeply unsettled. It may have helped his cause overall, another little piece of information to put meat on the bones, but it was the first time he’d really lost sight of why he was having to make things up in the first place. Allowing the fantasy to take over like that felt scary. So much so, in fact, that when he got home that evening, rather than updating his spreadsheet he spent the time looking for another job.
A week later, he had just come out of the church, having attended the funeral of a seventy-five-year-old former driving instructor who’d drowned in the bath, when he turned on his phone to find a voicemail from an HR person asking him to interview for one of the jobs he’d applied for. Ordinarily this would have thrown him into a panic, but he always felt curiously numb after the funerals, so when he heard the message he felt calm enough to call back immediately to arrange the interview. This was his chance to escape and finally stop the lies.
Another week later, he was climbing the stairs at the council office and feeling horribly out of breath, trying to convince himself that this was because he was suffering from a disease—possibly fatal—and nothing to do with the fact he hadn’t exercised for two decades, when his phone rang again. A few seconds later, he was wheezing that yes he’d be very happy to come in for a second interview. He spent the rest of the afternoon sitting at his desk and imagining how it would feel to tell Cameron he was handing in his notice already.
“You and the family up to anything nice this weekend, Andrew?” Bethany asked.
How Not to Die Alone Page 4