“Yes, thanks,” says Anna.
“Would you like smoking or non-smoking?”
“Non-smoking, please,” I say, just to show her that I’ve developed the power of speech.
“If you’d just like to follow me.”
On the other side of the restaurant they’ve pulled three tables together, and what looks like an office outing is in full swing. Young guys in colourful shirts smoking cigars, and girls with loud voices and bare legs crack ‘in’ jokes and indulge in flirtatious banter. Two waiters arrive with a flaming birthday cake, and the whole group lurches into a drunken chorus of ‘Happy Birthday, Dear Julie’ for a girl in a red dress, who’s turning a shade of green.
Mandy leads us to a secluded alcove next to the Gents. “Can I get you something to drink while you’re looking at the menu?”
“I don’t know about you, Anna,” I say, trying to sound sophisticated, “but I fancy a glass of wine.”
“Are you allowed wine?”
“Afraid I might get legless?”
Anna smiles. “Go for it.”
“OK, then, we’ll have half a bottle of house red, two glasses and a straw, please…oh, and a glass of tap water.”
Mandy looks bemused. “What do you want a straw for?…Oh, yeah, right.” She lingers uncomfortably, transferring her weight from foot to foot, trying to find the right words. “Er…does he need a knife and fork?”
“No, it’s OK,” says Anna, “Michael can share mine.”
♦
Anna turns out to be a great feeder. A lot of people just keep shovelling it down until it’s all gone. This is slightly less frustrating than the ‘chew everything a hundred times’ school, or the ‘constantly wiping your mouth with a napkin’ mother-and-baby method. Anna seems to have a natural feeling for the nuances of eating. She knows exactly when I need to pause for breath, and even does that thing of saving a nice bit of pepperoni for the last mouthful. It’s a luxury I’m seldom afforded.
“What do you want to do when you get out of this place, Michael?”
“I thought we were going back to college.”
“No, silly,” she says, folding her napkin into a water lily. “I mean, what do you want to do when you leave Oxford?”
“No one’s ever asked me that before.”
“Why not?”
“Because most people assume I’ll end up in a home somewhere. Mum used to say that if I prayed faithfully enough I’d be able to walk again, but I was never that stupid.”
Anna mimes playing the violin. “Oh, come on, there must be something you want to do.”
“I always fancied being the brainy one in an American high-school series. You know, the nerd in spacksavers who all the cool kids take the piss out of? Then one day I had a reality check.”
“I’m sorry,” says Anna, twiddling the stem of her wineglass, “that must have been hard for you.”
“Yeah, as soon as I realized how shit my American accent was, I knew it was never to be.”
“I wanted to be an air hostess.”
And suddenly, I’m transfixed by her breasts again. She’s done her best to camouflage them underneath that baggy jumper, but all I want to do is bury my head in them and feel the warmth. “Actually, if you really want to know, Anna, I’m going to write.”
“That’s brilliant,” she says, sounding like she means it.
“Not a lot else I can do, is there?”
“What sort of stuff? I mean novels, poetry…?”
I don’t know where it comes from, but I find myself replying like it’s something I’ve known all my life. “Theatre, I want to write for the theatre.”
“Yes, of course,” she says, “I should have guessed.”
Writing is, after all, the ultimate revenge; better than violence, better than sex. And I am the ultimate fly on the wall. Wheel me into any room, and after about twenty minutes people forget I’m there. That’s why I’ve got this flair for dialogue. I had a ringside seat for some of Mum and Dad’s biggest bust-ups. One time, they were halfway through ‘making up’ before Mum remembered where she’d parked me. “Maybe I’ll dedicate my first play to you, Anna.”
“Thanks, that’s really sweet of you.”
“What about you? How do you see your life panning out?”
“Well, if I take after Mummy, I can look forward to a lifetime of manic depression and chemical dependency, but if I turn out like Dad, I’ll probably end up as a promiscuous megalomaniac with a gardening fetish.”
“I must meet your family sometime.”
“Mummy’s always on at me to bring a ‘chap’ down for the weekend. She says if I don’t meet someone at Oxford, I never will.” A malicious grin flickers across her face. “Serve her right if I turned up with someone like you.” She buries her face in her hands the moment she releases what she’s said. “Oh, bums…sorry, I didn’t mean…oh, God…look, Michael, I really am…”
She continues burbling apologetically until one of the office party stumbles past us, on his way for a piss. “That your boyfriend, darling? Good in bed, is he?”
For a moment, Anna looks like she’s going to burst into tears. “Yes, he is, actually. So why don’t you take your pathetic little tool to the lavatory and go fuck yourself.”
I didn’t realize she had such a way with words. The office boy seems just as stunned as I am. As he slopes bog-wards, Anna turns to me and explains: “I’ve got this really annoying little brother.”
And now it’s my turn to be embarrassed. “Sorry, Anna, have you got my Colosac?”
“That sachet thing?”
“Yeah.”
She fumbles around in her orange rucksack. “It’s somewhere here. Yuk, I’d forgotten I had that. Yes, here you go. What do you want me to do with it?”
“Just empty it into my glass of water, if you don’t mind.”
“What is it anyway?”
You have to become immune to this sort of thing. Like diabetics who casually shoot up at dinner parties. Only with Anna, for some reason, I don’t really feel like discussing the details of my bowel-management programme. “It’s a laxative. I tend to get a bit…you know.”
“What, constipated?”
Mandy has plonked the bill and some little round mints on a saucer in front of Anna.
“Yeah.”
“Tell me about it,” says Anna, reaching for a mint. “Ever since I told Daddy I wasn’t going to read law, I’ve had terrible trouble with my shitting. The doctor said it was IBS – irritable bowel syndrome?”
“I read about it on the Net.”
Mandy waits patiently, but I sense she’s getting increasingly uncomfortable.
“Don’t worry, Anna, I’ll get this.”
On the way back to college, I do something that would normally make me puke. I take an inventory of the moment: every sight, every sound, every feeling. That way I can recreate it for myself when I’m all dressed up with nowhere to go. I note the way Anna treads on the inside of her foot, the shape of her nose, the colour of her hair and the way her breath explodes into the privileged Oxford air. In Beaumont Street, a loud, posh bloke declaims, “Piss off, Rupert, she’s taken,” a pub band pumps out Bowie and, miraculously, I feel my perennially pissed-off countenance relaxing into the beginnings of a smile. What’s totally incredible is the way these cold grey buildings, which yesterday seemed only claustrophobic and depressing, have suddenly taken on the golden hue of vintage Disney.
“Why are you doing it, Michael?”
Shit, I hope she can’t read my mind. “Doing what?”
“This documentary thing. I don’t understand why you’re doing it.”
“Didn’t you hear what Nikki said? I’m striking a blow for the differently abled.”
“That bitch. Come off it, Michael.”
“If you must know, I’m doing it to please my mum.” Anna nods gravely, as if she understands exactly what I’m talking about. “She thinks God’U get a kick out of seeing the little cripple boy on the box.�
�
“Oh, my God.”
We make the last part of the journey in silence. And all the way I’m trying to figure out what Anna’s ‘Oh, my God’ means. Is it because she’s sickened by the thought of a television quadriplegic, or could it be an expression of sympathy? Search me. I never bothered learning about female psychology. I always thought that knowing the Top Twenty from 1954 to the present day would be more useful. Everything I know about the opposite sex, I’ve learnt either from my mother or from Internet porn. Faced with a real woman, I’m beginning to wish I’d done my homework.
“Goodnight then, Michael,” she says, holding open the door to my rooms. “Thanks for a nice evening. It really took my mind off things. We must do it again sometime.”
“Yeah, that’d be good.”
“See you at the run-through tomorrow.” She holds her hand in the air and makes it tremble melodramatically. “I’m so nervous, aren’t you?”
“Not really.”
It’s only when she bends down and kisses me on the cheek that I start getting panicky. It doesn’t do for quads to get attached to anything. When he, she or it starts legging it, you’ve got fuck all chance of catching them.
The Actor
“Aren’t you going to suck me off before you put me to bed, Timothy?”
It was a short-lived affair; Simon Butterworth normally goes in for thrusting city girls with a penchant for entry-level sadomasochism, not altruistic fair-traders like Jennifer Jane. Jennifer Jane (or JJ as I steadfastly refused to call her) smelt of orange peel, and worked with mentally handicapped children. I remember her saying that although they struggled with basic syntax, most of the kids could swear like troupers before they were into grown-up nappies. I’m not at all surprised that Michael constantly assaults me with a crude barrage of double entendres, but I refuse to be flummoxed by them. “Oh, very well then, if you really think it’s necessary.”
“I’m getting a bit blocked up.”
“And how was your meal with the delightful Anna?” I say, reaching reluctantly for the suction machine and feeling a bit like the comic at the end of a panto who gets a kiddie up on stage and asks him if he’s married.
“Good, thanks.”
“Hope you didn’t do anything I wouldn’t do,” I say, loosening his straps and preparing to winch him onto the bed. “It’s always a bad move to go too far on a first date.” You see, I’m trying to keep the mood as light as possible, because it doesn’t get much more disgusting than this. And please remember, ladies and gentlemen, that I’m only getting a couple of quid above the equity minimum. “The eagle has landed,” I intone through my cupped hands. “I repeat, the eagle has landed.”
I roll him onto his front and start drumming on his back to loosen the mucus, just as Mrs Owen instructed. This part of the operation is vaguely therapeutic; it’s the next bit—where I stick the nozzle in his mouth and hoover around until the container is full of his greeny-coloured snot – that is particularly sordid. “Are you sitting comfortably? Then I’ll…”
“Sorry, old chap. You’ll have to speak up. I can’t hear a word you’re saying.”
Without his microphone, he has to bust a gut to make himself heard. “Tell me everything you know about women.”
OK, so I’ve had a few drinks, but I could have sworn he just said…
“Please, Timothy. Tell me what you know about women.”
There’s an amusing Christmas novelty publication which consists entirely of blank pages, and goes under the title Everything Men Know About Women. Personally, I would have little difficulty in filling several pithy volumes on the subject of the opposite sex. However, as I hoover around at the back of his mouth, Michael’s seemingly reasonable request throws up a couple of pertinent questions: First of all, why in the name of Jehovah does he want to know about women? And second, perhaps less obviously, why ask someone whose first love dumped him for the second-eleven goalkeeper, whose marriage proved shorter running than an Andrew Lloyd Webber flop, and whose most durable relationship to date has been with a battery-powered piece of plastic?
“Michael, old chap, you’ve come to the right man.”
♦
The snot jar brimmeth over. Michael is tucked up in his undulating bed, eyes half-closed, doubtless suffering from information overload but grateful, I’m sure, for what can only be described as a master-class in the art of love. “Remember, Michael, one of the reasons you should never try and make contact with your first love – apart from obvious things like she’s probably married, with children who have violin lessons, and a husband called Clive—is that the older you get, the easier it is to categorize them. I can’t tell you how painful it is to discover that the gloriously eccentric, incandescently attractive individual who you thought you’d worship for ever was just a middle-class horsey with overtones of RAF.
“And don’t forget, your first arty fuck-up may seem a rare and exotic species – and the sex is invariably fantastic – but believe me, as soon as you see that copy of The Bell Jar on her bedside table you should run like buggery.
“What I think I’m saying is that it’s a jungle out there—dog eat dog, every man for himself. And this is the frightening part, Mike: there are no rules. Oh, sure, I can give you a couple of pointers – they hate it if you call their bluff and start talking about your feelings, and on no account should you attempt to share the contents of your Dream Diary – but like I said, what can you do if one minute she’s telling you she’s not ready for commitment and two weeks later she’s married to a man from the motor trade?
“And don’t get me started on oral sex. Now there’s a bone of contention. You see, Michael…Michael? Yes, well, maybe that is enough for one day. I suppose some of that should be on a strictly need-to-know basis. I mean, it’s not as if you’re actually going to be able to use any of it.”
I turn out the light. And I’m actually feeling quite pleased with myself, until I suddenly remember SOWINS’s frank appraisal of my people skills. Who am I trying to kid?
If twenty-two months of marriage taught me anything, it’s that I don’t know the first thing about women.
The Quadriplegic
When people think they’ve got to know me (and a crippo ‘chum’ can be a nice little calling card for the concerned liberal) one of the first things they ask is, “Can you walk in your dreams?” I get it nearly as often as, “Could you have children?” When I’m in the mood, I spin them some half-arsed crap about slow-motion prancing through poppy fields. But the truth is, I don’t dream much – you have to sleep for that.
If anything was going to set me yawning it was the lamentable tragedy of De Niro’s love life. The trouble is, when the lights go out and it’s just me and my amazing dancing bed, I lie awake and brood.
The night I was born (4.50 a.m., 6lb 7oz), Dad staggered punch drunk into the hospital car park and celebrated with a miniature cigar. He was always boring me shitless with that story: “I turned on the car radio, Mikey, and do you know what the first song I heard was? “I Can See Clearly Now”.” (He couldn’t sing, my dad, but he liked to have a go.) “I knew then that everything was going to be OK. ”
So how come he can’t bear to look at me? How come the only contact I ever have with him is a crap birthday present and a tin of Quality Street at Christmas? Stupid dickhead; stories ought to mean something, but they never do.
Mum genuinely believes that God’s up there helping her find the best-value bananas in Tesco’s. She’s got this keyring with WWJD on it: “What would Jesus do?” Once you’ve sussed that, everything else falls into place. Finding meaning in life comes so much easier when you’re terminally stupid. It’s all very well for the able-bodied brigade to wank off about karma, and how we spackers must have been Adolf Hitler in a previous life, but the problem of suffering is a lot more difficult to come to terms with when you’re the one in pain.
And I thought I knew all about pain. So imagine how delighted I was to discover a brand new agony I hadn’t e
ven thought of. Unrequitable love has to be the shittiest torture in the book. Even if (miracle of miracles) she did like me, there’d be nothing I could do about it. Talk about a head fuck.
And you know what the worst thing is? Even a complete spastic could see that the only sensible course of action is to steer well clear of Anna, and try not to give her a second thought. But I can’t wait to see her again. So I lie in the dark, reliving every moment of our conversation in the restaurant, counting the minutes until the run-through tomorrow.
∨ The Opposite Bastard ∧
10
What a Rogue and Peasant Slave am I
The Actor
I can’t tell you how much I’ve been looking forward to this. All through the day I’ve caught myself humming snatches of that song from West Side Story. Although I’ve sat in on a couple of rehearsals, it’s only tonight, when they run it for the first time, that I’ll be able to get a true picture of just how appalling this production is really going to be. There’s nothing more elevating than someone else’s theatrical disaster; when it comes with an ‘I told you so’ attached, it’s little short of thespian paradise.
Philip Sidney has gathered his troops about him for one of his rousing pep talks. Unlike his pathetic band of sycophants, the only reason I’m basking in his shadow is because I’m pretty sure it’s being filmed. “All right, people, now listen carefully. This evening we’re going to try and stagger through the first half. Nikki will be sticking her oar in from time to time…”
(Nervous laughter.)
“But essentially this is for you. I don’t want you to think about an audience at all. We’ve got another three weeks for that – thank fuck! So just feel your way carefully, and above all be brave! Now, before we start, Piers is going to take us through the salute to the sun and some chi kung.”
Piers, our reluctant Horatio, is clad only in black Lycra. I pose satirically behind him as he takes the entire company (apart from our Twinkle, of course) through the first few pages of Teach Yourself Some Eastern Bollocks, which he pretends to have picked up in India during his gap year. There’s far too much of this sort of thing if you ask me. It starts in the big companies (how else do you fill eight weeks of rehearsal?) where you’ll often see a movement guru instructing some queeny old ham in the ancient art of standing on one leg, and breathing (from the diaphragm) with a finger up your arse. Like the professional foul, it’s only a matter of time before it works its way down to the lower leagues.
The Opposite Bastard Page 10