by Robert Webb
‘Often the way!’ laughed Lawrence, shaking his head mildly and waving to a parishioner over the road who was taking the bins out. ‘Well, I’ll let you get on with it.’
‘Thanks.’
Kate wondered if she could start walking away now. But suddenly Lawrence seemed to be looking straight into the back of her head. ‘Luke must have been a great reader.’
‘Well … yes, he was.’
The young cleric with the demeanour of a kindly grandfather said casually, ‘No biggie, but you know our doors are always open.’
Kate looked down and readjusted her bag again. ‘Yes.’
‘I mean, not literally. Sadly we have to lock them between services for insurance reasons but you get the idea.’
‘I do!’ said Kate. ‘Maybe I’ll call in later.’ Of all the lies she had told this morning, this was easily the wildest.
It was so brief, his look. Almost a glance. But his eyes contained a depth of compassion that had her wishing she had never left the house.
‘God bless you, Kate,’ he said, touching her lightly on the shoulder. And off he went.
Kate moved unsteadily on her way. Jesus, she thought, what is this, some kind of a parable? Or a Mr Man book? Little Miss Topherself? Do I now have to bump into a friar, a monk and a Mormon? Are they all going to bless me? I mean, if God gave that much of a toss he wouldn’t have … But she had been down this road many times before. She would get more sense out of Johnny Rotten’s jubilee tribute to Her Majesty.
She marched into the post office and sent the memory stick back to Charles with all the bathos of a guaranteed next-day delivery. At the counter, she politely removed her earpods as the transaction was carried out. By the time she put them back in, her playlist had shuffled to Del Amitri’s ‘Nothing Ever Happens’. Leaving the post office she pulled the wire out of the phone and out of her ears, and tossed the little white snake into a bin. She hated that song. She hated walking around in a bubble. She would listen to the world instead.
Kate walked down Northcote Road reviewing her decision and finding it to be flawed. The world was shit. Whatever was good about it was nothing to do with her.
Lunch. Fuck off, lunch. She had avoided the excellent little café where she was known to the staff – they might say something thoughtful about Luke. Instead she dived through the door of an anonymous pizza chain.
She ordered a Fiorentina, taking a guilty pleasure that Luke wasn’t there to object. He was firmly of the view that, for all their virtues, eggs had no place on a pizza. Kate thought he might be right but could never pass up the opportunity of a fried egg, whether in the middle of the night or the middle of a pizza. Maybe this is what life could be like. All the everyday irritations of a long partnership amusingly redressed. Did she not have ten thousand days’ worth of minor grievances?
Yes, Luke occasionally snored but the idea that he deprived her of more sleep alive than dead was a joke. Kate didn’t used to have to swallow a vineyard before daring to close her eyes.
Yes, he was a pain in the kitchen: fussy and proprietorial. He earned very little – therefore he had taught himself to cook. And he cooked like an angel, albeit an angel who frowns and scratches his head irritably every time you start chopping an onion. But the truth was that Kate used to have a healthy interest in delicious meals and a distinct aversion to making them. Would she swap a little camaraderie over a saucepan between the hours of 6 p.m. and 7 p.m. for half a lifetime of being beautifully fed by a beautiful man?
Forget it.
Anyway, the camaraderie would swiftly follow as they ate in front of the TV and Luke turned back into a normal human. Somehow he left all his vanity in the kitchen.
And yes, speaking of vanity, there was the small matter of his work. Was she relieved not to live any more with a tortured and chronically unsuccessful writer? No, not if the writer was Luke. A week of speed-reading would end with two or three capsule reviews for broadsheet newspaper supplements. He took no pleasure in the reviews and Kate quickly learned not to praise them. What her salary mainly supported was his novel. His vast, fatally unfinished, entirely indecipherable novel that nobody but nobody wanted to publish. Yes, she admitted to herself. She was glad to be rid of that bloody book.
For years, his working title for it was Whatever. Kate wondered if that projected to potential readers a kind of who-gives-a-shit? attitude which they might not enjoy. In 1998, she was browsing in a Brixton bookshop when she came across a book called Whatever by Michel Houellebecq. ‘There’s no copyright on titles,’ Luke had sniffily observed. As the French author’s fame grew for reasons that perplexed them both (Luke was jealous and Kate just thought the guy was a douchebag), Luke began an artistic journey that would see him grudgingly update his working title every few years. From Whatever to Whenever to Why? to, briefly, Who Cares? And then triumphantly back to Whatever. But Luke worried that he would be accused of plagiarism and that was not to be borne. By the time of his death, Luke’s unpublished masterpiece was called Fuck Off.
He had asked Kate on a regular basis to read his book. She had done so with increasing concern, gradually transforming over the years into something like helpless dread. She was a wide reader but even as Luke’s most supportive critic she felt hobbled and stupid. Luke had an English degree and surely knew what he was doing. She must be missing something. He had talent, she could see that. But as the years passed, Kate had begun to form a conclusion that she had been trying very hard to avoid.
Kate had swallowed the pizza almost whole and now munched on a piece of unripe mango. The truth was that as a writer, Luke had been hampered by just two problems:
1. He hated his readers. His insecurity didn’t even want them.
2. He hated stories. He would do anything to avoid telling a story. Stories were for idiots.
He wrote to impress Kate. And also his imaginary professional critics. One day, they would surely praise his beautifully balanced sentences in sentences which were themselves beautifully balanced. But the book was never published and the critics never got the chance. Kate was glad. They’d have killed him. She was almost grateful that the tumour got to him first.
She finished her fruit salad and asked for the bill. No, there was no upside. All this blood-sugar giving her a temporary buzz of serotonin was not to be trusted. You don’t abandon a long-planned suicide just because you’re feeling happy. That would be madness.
She left a twenty-pound note as a tip. She didn’t need money any more. And how had she earned it? At least Luke had tried to make something. What kind of person was she? Rejoicing in the absence of her husband whom she had basically neglected to death? She was right the first time. She was a shithead.
She put her purse and phone in her bag, astonished that she hadn’t ordered any wine. What was that about? Was mineral water going to salve her conscience? Stupid, appalling arse. Stupid, awful bastard deserves to be found half-eaten by Wallace the mouse.
‘Are you all right?’ asked the waitress, a woman of about twenty with a Warsaw accent. Kate fancied practising her Polish but was instantly engulfed by another wave of futility. Practise it for what?
‘Oh yes, of course! It was all delicious, thank you.’ Kate rose from the table in a flurry of apologies and jacket- and bag-flapping.
‘You are hitting your head with back of dessert spoon?’
‘Was I? That’s right, yes. I’m a drummer. I was practising.’
The waitress creased her brow and started to clear the table. Kate edged round to get out.
‘This tip is mistake?’ the girl said, discreetly holding up the twenty.
‘No, that’s for you.’
‘You are very kind lady.’
‘I’m really not.’
‘Good luck with your drumming.’
‘Yep. Cheers.’
Young people. She walked along Northcote Road with her self-loathing temporarily reflecting outwards like an evil lighthouse. Young people being nice. What did they know, anyway? Vic
ars and waitresses barely out of puberty. With their lightness and innocence. They’ll learn. She thought a hefty dose of Danielle’s worldly sarcasm might cheer her up. Did she want to be cheered up? Oh, stop asking questions. Go away, head. She crossed the road and entered the bookshop.
‘Well, it’s one or the other, isn’t it?’ Danielle was explaining to a middle-aged customer as if he was seven. Her eyes darted to Kate as she walked in and then she continued. ‘We don’t do deals on audiobooks because we don’t sell them. So you could actually read …’ She swiftly moved her dangling half-moon glasses up to her eyes. ‘… 60 Movements of Shame by F. Windsor-Loveridge or you can buy the audiobook elsewhere and have it read to you …’
‘It’s actually for my wife.’
‘No doubt … Or she can have it read to her by Helen Mirren.’
‘Ooh! Is it Helen Mirren?’
‘Yes, Dame Peggy Ashcroft was unavailable and Joanna Lumley recently sustained a head injury while shark-fishing off the Great Barrier Reef.’
The stern bookseller in her late sixties looked at the man with stone-cold gravity.
He hesitated. ‘Well, I’ll probably …’
‘Lumley can still talk but only with a heavy Australian accent.’
‘Right. I’ll probably get the audiobook.’
‘It’s ruined her voice career but I believe she’s secured a lucrative television commercial for a leading brand of Australian lager. So that’s a happy ending of sorts.’ Danielle handed the book back to the customer with the full implication that it was now his job to return it to the shelves.
‘Yes,’ said the man. Kate had been pretending to peruse the foreign reference section. She straightened her face and turned to see the man carefully leave the book on the bestseller table and head sheepishly towards the door.
Danielle suddenly beamed at him. ‘Have a lovely day, sir, and hope to see you again.’
The man smiled back. ‘Yes,’ he said. And then, as he opened the door, ‘I could probably get the audiobook from Amazon, could I?’
Kate took in the full glory of Danielle’s immovable smile as she replied, ‘I insist that you do.’ The customer nodded with relief and left.
Kate replaced an updated version of Learn Russian Today! and wandered towards the counter. Danielle regarded her with a wry twinkle, scratching her head through her mass of curly grey hair.
‘I wonder if you can help me?’ said Kate as if she hadn’t been a regular visitor to the shop for fourteen years. Danielle leaned both heavy arms on the counter, raised her eyebrows and gave a slow, camp blink of anticipation.
Kate went on, ‘I’m looking for a book called How to Destroy Your Business Because You’re a Luddite and a Literary Snob and You Obviously Should Have Gone into Teaching Instead of Retail. Do you have it?’
‘I’ll just check.’ Danielle disappeared under the counter and rose up again with her middle finder extended at Kate. Both women cackled with glee and Danielle came round the counter to give Kate a hug.
‘That jolly well hurt my knees,’ Danielle said into Kate’s ear. ‘I’m extremely cross with you.’
‘Sorry about that,’ said Kate, not minding the embrace. Danielle smelled of lavender and civilisation. They parted and Kate glanced round the almost deserted shop. ‘So, business is booming?’
Danielle turned with a studied nonchalance and followed Kate’s gaze down to the far end of the shop, a distance of about seven metres. A mother and child were chatting happily over a picture book in the carpeted kids’ section. ‘Not exactly,’ she said. ‘But then you and Luke were the only customers I could tolerate.’
The hug, the instant mention of Luke – to Kate, it all seemed rather bold. Was it? Or was this just what friends did? She couldn’t remember. ‘What was so special about us?’ she asked, keeping her gaze on the little family and beginning to breathe more deliberately, hoping it was undetectable.
Danielle turned back to Kate and leaned an elbow on her counter. ‘Well, you bought ’em by the yard, which is always endearing.’
Kate felt a tiny withdrawal of love. She said, ‘So you don’t mind turning a profit from time to time?’
Danielle looked past Kate, through the shop-front to the street outside. ‘Well, that was a joke, dear, but there are yards and there are yards. You and Luke seemed interested only in the good ones. Betty and I used to refer to you two as “The Goodyards”. There’s no harm in liking customers for their taste.’
No, this was too much talk of Luke. Kate needed very badly to change the subject. She said quickly, ‘That’s nice. And how is Betty?’
Danielle pursed her lips and wandered back round to her side of the counter. ‘Her arthritis is a continuing embuggerance but she soldiers on in a stubborn kind of Canadian way.’
Kate was sure she had somehow disappointed her friend and now felt about as miserable as she did when she woke up. What was she doing in here anyway? She started thinking of an excuse to leave but Danielle was talking again.
‘But I’m not really a literary snob, you know.’ She looked over to the paperback bestsellers. ‘I’ve read most of the books on that table and they’ve all got something to recommend them. We can’t all be James Joyce, for heaven’s sake.’
Kate wasn’t sure why but she felt uncomfortable with this line of conversation. She frowned and picked up one of the loo books next to the till: The 100 Best Things You’ve Forgotten About the Nineties. Danielle seemed to take Kate’s silence for an objection and carried on. ‘Or Shakespeare, for that matter. Not everyone wants to read “Light thickens and the crow makes wing to th’ rooky wood”. Some people are perfectly happy with “The sun went in and it was all getting a bit tense”. Good luck to them, say I.’
Kate flipped through the book impatiently and stopped at a picture of Bret Easton Ellis, one of Luke’s favourite authors. It was suddenly incredible that Danielle was still talking.
‘No,’ Danielle sighed, ‘give me a tolerable yarn, a joke or two, some evidence of a brain, some evidence of a heart, and really I’m perfectly …’
Kate snapped the book shut and slammed it down on the counter. ‘Why can’t you just fucking leave it?’ she barked. Danielle looked at her in astonishment. ‘He had a tumour in his head the size of a fucking kumquat, right? Of course he was obsessive! Of course he’d spend all day figuring out where to put a comma. All of it: random sentences in Latin, characters who talked backwards, whole chapters with no spaces, ten pages devoted to the comparative crown green bowling prowess of David Bryant versus Tony Allcock. He wasn’t trying to be James Joyce. He was just ill, right? Sick.’
‘Kate, I’m sorry. I really wasn’t talking about—’
‘At least once a month for twenty-eight years. “Kate, darling, have a look at this, would you?” “Yes, of course, darling, is it your book?” “Yes, it is my book – I think you’re going to love what I’ve done.” “Righto, darling – oh, I see you’ve gone back and re-written Chapter 412 in rhyming couplets.” “Yes, I have – it’s good, isn’t it?” “Yes, of course it is.”’
‘Kate, dear—’
‘Constantly, stupidly encouraging him when all the time it turns out that the appropriate response to reading that stuff was: “You need to see a doctor.” Ever tried saying that to a writer? It really doesn’t go down well.’
‘Well … no.’
Kate took a breath and searched her bag for a tissue. Danielle found a little pack under the counter and gave it to her. ‘Thank you,’ she said, drying her eyes and blowing her nose. They both turned to the window. Clapham life went on regardless. A young couple, each holding a hand of their three-year-old in purple dungarees, swinging her up in the air as they ambled by.
More quietly, Kate said, ‘He didn’t even like bowls.’
Danielle allowed a pause to open up and then said carefully, ‘I’m almost afraid to ask but … have you seen a doctor?’
Kate clicked back onto autopilot. It had been silly to take control of the stick, how
ever briefly. Autopilot had a confirmed destination and was much less bumpy. She gave her friend a mouth-only smile and stuffed the wet tissue into her bag. ‘Yes. Yes, I have. Don’t worry, there’s a plan.’
‘Indeed?’
‘Yeah, I’ve just been dithering about whether to get on with it.’
‘Good. And … would it be too much to ask what the plan is?’
Kate straightened the little books on the counter, efficiently putting The 100 Best Things You’ve Forgotten About the Nineties back in place. ‘Oh, you know, therapy and exercise and eating well and leaning on my friends. Hanging out with the guys at work, who are all lovely. And my mother’s been a real … resource, actually, and she’s really helped me. Basically looking after myself a bit better, you know?’
Danielle looked like she didn’t have much choice but to believe her. ‘Well, that all sounds very sensible.’
‘It does, doesn’t it? Anyway, sorry for the meltdown. See you soon.’ Without making eye-contact, Kate left the shop, closing the door gently behind her.
She struggled through her own front door, juggling her keys and a bottle of Smirnoff Blue Label, which she had carried bagless from the off-licence at the end of the road. She bummed the door shut behind her and groaned. Going out had been a mistake. Also, the house was really beginning to stink. She only noticed when she came back from going out, so obviously the solution was to stop going out. She wanted nothing more than to sleep. One more dream of Luke. One that didn’t go wrong or end too soon.
How many more final straws did she need? She couldn’t bear to think of the mortifying blow-up at poor Danielle. This is what comes of letting people care about you, she thought as she slouched down the hall. Well, no more of that.
She froze at the entrance to the kitchen.
‘Hi Kate!’
Toby was at the sink, the sleeves of his shirt tidily rolled up to the elbows. ‘Hope you don’t mind. I’ve got the dishwasher going but it’s always best to do the heavy stuff by hand.’