Join Me

by Danny Wallace

  I looked up to see that the girl behind the counter was having a little trouble. She’d taken the rather small onion I was buying out of its bag and was comparing it to little pictures she had on her till. She didn’t seem to be able to find one to match.

  ‘S’cuse me,’ she said. ‘What’s this?’

  ‘That’s an onion,’ I said, wondering whether this girl harboured any real ambitions for a long-term career in the minimarket business.

  ‘Right,’ she said. ‘Only it’s not on here. I don’t know what price it is.’

  ‘Oh,’ I said, looking at the onion in her hand, like that would give any clues as to its price.

  ‘So it’s an onion?’ she asked. Well, it was worth asking again, just in case I’d got it confused with a box of Coco Pops or a copy of Front magazine.

  ‘Yes,’ I said. ‘It’s an onion.’

  ‘But what would it be called on here?’ she asked, indicating the price list Sellotaped to the front of her till, as if they’d have provided her with a list written in Spanish, or something.

  ‘Well . . . probably “onion”,’ I said. I wasn’t being very helpful, but to be honest I shouldn’t have needed to be.

  ‘Right. Yeah, it’s definitely an onion,’ she said. She rescanned the list. ‘Nope. I’m sorry, I don’t know how much this costs, so . . .’

  She shrugged her shoulders and raised her eyebrows in a what-can-ya-do? way, and put the onion to one side.

  ‘Hang on,’ I said. ‘I need that onion. You can’t not sell it to me.’

  ‘I’ve no way of knowing how much it is, sir.’

  ‘Well . . . take a guess, or something. I can’t be the first person to buy an onion in this place. You’ve a whole bag of them over there.’

  ‘Tell you what,’ she said, glancing from side to side even though we were completely alone, ‘have this one on me.’ She chucked the onion in the bag, smiled, and continued packing my bags.

  ‘So . . . are you cooking tonight?’ she said.

  Apparently the fact that she’d saved me about 12p in onions meant that we were now bosom buddies, and would presumably be going out clubbing together later.

  ‘Yes, I am, I’m afraid.’

  ‘You’re probably a much better cook than me,’ she said.

  ‘At least I know what a fucking onion is,’ I said, and headed home.

  I didn’t say that really. I mumbled something about not being very good really, blushed, and then headed home.

  Once there, I gave Joinee Saunders a call.

  ‘Danny! Hello! I’m just scanning the front page of the Inverness Courier in to email to you. Join Me’s front page news!’

  ‘Front page?’ I said in disbelief.

  ‘Well, like I told you, the paper heard about the good deeds I was doing in the name of Join Me, and wanted to interview me. They sent a photographer round and took a picture of me in front of the cathedral wearing my Join Me T-shirt under my dog collar! I had a bit of explaining to do today. It took me by surprise a bit, because I walked into Safeway and there I was – all over the place! I look like a fat Gary Barlow. Not that there’s any other kind. Anyway, the Bishop thought it was fantastic. Ooh – hang on, I just got a text message.’

  The Bishop thought it was fantastic! Brilliant. I waited while Gareth fumbled with his mobile.

  ‘It’s from my mate Johnny. It says “CLERGY BRAINWASHED IN CULT SCANDAL!” He’s a joker!’ And then we both laughed and said goodbye.

  I virtually skipped to the kitchen, chopped my onion up and heated a pan to fry it in. But then curiosity got the better of me and I went to my computer to see if Gareth’s article had arrived in the sixty seconds I’d been in the kitchen. It hadn’t, so I kept pressing ‘Send & Receive’ until it had.

  There he was, proud, noble Gareth, staring into the middle distance in his Join Me T-shirt, with the magnificent cathedral towering over him.

  SIGNING UP TO ‘KINDNESS’ COLLECTIVE

  A CLERGYMAN serving at Inverness Cathedral has been recruited into a new flock.

  Rev Gareth Saunders, a curate at the cathedral, is now a man with a double mission, spreading the word not only about the Church, but about ‘Join Me’ – an informal group which started almost as a joke but is now bringing people together from across the world.

  Join Me was created when advertisements appeared in London newspapers asking people to ‘Join Me’ by writing back with a passport-sized photograph.

  The person whom respondents found they were joining is Danny, who prefers not to give his surname although he does reveal he used to work for catalogue sales firm Argos.

  Surely it couldn’t be long before the Argos people got in touch with some kind of big-money sponsorship offer? But the article continued . . .

  Danny (25) is encouraging his joinees to carry out ‘random acts of kindness’, but insists Join Me is not a religious organisation. ‘I’m not religious in any way, but funnily enough I’ve had two vicars join me,’ he said.

  One of Join Me’s two vicar followers, Gareth (30), says: ‘It seemed like a good idea and could lead somewhere positive, so I said “Yes”, although I didn’t know much about it then.’

  Heavy-metal fan Gareth, who has been at the cathedral for three years, has been undertaking missionary work on Danny’s behalf, not only wearing his Join Me T-shirt, but distributing leaflets about the group.

  Fantastic. Join Me was indeed front-page news! Gareth revealed in the accompanying email that he had further plans. In the days that followed, news of Gareth’s involvement in Join Me had made it to local radio stations, church websites, cathedral newsletters, and even the Daily Express.

  I was inspired by Gareth’s efforts. And I thought back to our time together. He’d been so insistent I listened to his advice, and although I’d met the fantastic Dr Spacetoad off the back of it, I hadn’t done as much meeting and greeting as I’d thought was appropriate, since I’d given my word to a man of the cloth. There just hadn’t been time to do it. But that’s what Gareth does every day in his job. And that’s a big part of why people believe in what he does, and what he stands for. The personal contact.

  I had to continue to apply that to Join Me. There was a chance that people not as dedicated as Gareth would begin to lose interest. I couldn’t allow that to happen. Before, I hadn’t wanted to go out and meet too many people, because it was easy to be mysterious from behind a keyboard. And I had to be mysterious, because I hadn’t known what to tell them; we didn’t, after all, have an aim. But now, now we had a purpose. We had a mission. I felt far more able to go out and meet people, to tell them about the way of Join Me, and urge them to do their good deeds on each and every one of our Good Fridays. I was going back to basics, taking the message of the Karma Army on the road. I worked out a route that would take me past the home towns of several joinees, and ordered my tickets. I phoned joinees in the areas I’d be visiting, and arranged times to meet. It all happened in less than thirty minutes. It was remarkably easy. This was going to be good.

  That night over dinner (I burnt the onion) I told Hanne that the following day I would be popping back to my parents’ house in Bath to say hello to my mum and dad. And I would be. But I would also be going in order to meet two of the founding members of the Bath Collective: Joinees Sansom and Jones. They’d written to me requesting an audience. They wanted to collaborate to do good deeds, but they wanted my advice on how to do it. A trip to Bath was the least I could do to guarantee their loyalty and help stir up some goodness in the South West. But I wouldn’t just be in Bath. Oh no. I’d be working hard on the campaign trail, meeting as many joinees as I could in a day and ensuring their continued commitment to the cause.

  The next morning, I jumped on an early train out of London and an hour and a half later I’d arrived at Bath Spa train station. I walked the five-minute walk to my parents’ house, said hello, had a quick cup of tea, and then headed into town. I met Sansom and Jones outside Bath Abbey. We headed for the Pump Room to have a cup of
tea and a sit down. I chatted to them quickly and efficiently. Sansom works in web design. Jones works for a Labour counsellor. I gave them some extra leaflets and stickers to aid their word spreading, and they thanked me as if I’d just given them each a cheque for two hundred quid. Then it was time to be off. I had a long day ahead of me.

  Joinee Jonathan and I met after a twenty-five minute train journey out of Bath, in the small town of Chippenham. We sat in a café near the station and he revealed to me that he wanted to play a bigger part in the world of Join Me. In many ways, he wanted to be the Watson to my Holmes.

  ‘I think it’s great that you meet your joinees,’ he enthused. ‘It’s inspiring. I think more people should know about it. I want to chronicle your journeys. I want to chart them. All this good that’s happening – it should be told to the wider world. There could be a book in it!’

  ‘Trust me,’ I said. ‘There’s not.’

  ‘You never know! I’d like to write a kind of modern-day Bible about what you’re up to. The Book of Joinees. I’m fairly sure we could get a publisher interested. If you could spare me just a few minutes every week to tell me what you’ve been up to I could write it up for you.’

  I told Joinee Jonathan I’d email him when I could, and he should feel free to send me his interpretations. I had a feeling he would anyway. And then it was time to get back on the train and leave Chippenham far behind.

  Well, several miles behind.

  My next stop was Swindon. A joinee named Ms Taylor had been trying to convince her friend Rachael that she should join . . . but Rachael wasn’t sure. I agreed to stop off at Swindon not only to meet Joinee Taylor – an English teacher – but to help badger her mate into signing up, too.

  ‘The only thing I don’t understand,’ said Rachael, ‘is what any of this is about.’

  ‘Is that all?’ I said.

  ‘Yes,’ she said.

  I pulled out a small box full of passport photos.

  ‘It’s about this.’

  ‘Passport photos?’

  ‘Yes. Passport photos. Would you have sent me a passport photo just because you saw a small ad asking you to?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Or if you read about it on the Internet? Or someone gave you a flier?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Well, these people did. They had faith in a thing they knew nothing about. They took a chance on something. And it turned out to be something they liked. All I’ll ask you to do is perform one random act of kindness to someone who’s not expecting it, each and every Friday.’

  Rachael looked unsure at first, for a moment I thought I’d lost her. Joinee Taylor clearly saw my concern, and nudged her friend, who finally, thankfully said ‘okay’, and smiled. I marched her to the photo-booth at the station, she had her picture taken, and she presented it to me. I popped it in the box and thanked her from the bottom of my heart. Job done. Another one in the collective. Another vessel for good deeds created. Another step closer to my 1000th joinee.

  Joinee Taylor and new Joinee Rachael waved me off as the train moved away, and I sat down and awaited my arrival at Didcot Parkway.

  There, I stood in a thin rain until I was met by an unsure looking man with a wispy moustache, who turned out to be Joinee Anderson, a part-time mechanic who’d travelled to meet me from Banbury.

  We sat in his car in the car park and he offered me one of his sandwiches. I was told I could choose between ham and pickle or cheese and Marmite. I chose cheese and Marmite. He’d also brought ‘two cartons of drink’. I chose blackcurrant and apple. I can’t remember what he chose.

  ‘So, I must say, Danny, I didn’t really know what I was getting into with this whole Join Me business. But I’ve been trying to do my bit for you. Last Friday I repaired a car and didn’t charge for the oil change.’

  ‘Did the car belong to quite an attractive woman?’ I asked, having met mechanics before.

  ‘Well . . . yes,’ said Joinee Anderson, and we laughed.

  Joinee Anderson – first name Daniel – had heard about Join Me while listening to BBC Radio Oxfordshire in his garage. He’d been repairing a grey Volvo 340 when he heard it being talked about, and abandoned his work for a moment to check the website on the computer in the back office.

  ‘And that was that. I had an old photo of myself lying around so before I knew what I was doing I’d sent it in. I almost forgot about it until you sent me an email telling me to go out and do good deeds. I’ll admit to you I didn’t bother the first week. I was too embarrassed. But then I saw what other people were doing, and I thought “sod it”.’

  ‘So you started giving free oil changes to women you fancy?’

  ‘Among other things.’

  I felt good. Thanks to me, fit birds in Banbury were getting free oil changes. Not many people can say that.

  It was soon time for my next train, and I bid Joinee Anderson good-bye, telling him to spread the free oil changes around a bit, and not just give them to girls he fancied, and he promised he would.

  ‘The next minger I get in the garage won’t know what hit ’er,’ he said. ‘First-class service all the way!’

  At Reading Station, I’d arranged to be met by Joinee Thomas, a student at Reading University. I say ‘arranged’. She obviously thought it was a far more casual agreement, because she didn’t bother turning up. Either that, or she’d told one of her friends that she was planning to meet some bloke she’d met on the Internet.

  ‘That’s nice,’ her friend would have said. ‘And how very modern of you. I assume it was through some kind of secure, official dating service?’

  ‘No,’ Joinee Thomas would have said, ‘He is a sort of cult leader and I have agreed to do his bidding.’

  Her friend would have then called the relevant university authorities and had Miss Thomas sedated.

  I kicked about Reading Station for half an hour or so, studying the various student-types as they walked past, but no one seemed to be looking for me, so I bought myself a Mars bar and sat on one of the benches waiting for the next train to London. I knew I had to be on the 18.34 train in order to make it back to London in time for my final appointment of the day.

  As I sat there, though, I had time to think about my next joinee visit. I was supposed to be meeting Joinee Benjamin, a man who, for various reasons, had made me feel rather uncomfortable each time we’d emailed. He’d been incredibly insistent that he wanted to meet me, though, and that was one of the reasons I’d decided to go out and meet others, too. While Joinees Anderson, Taylor, Rachael, Jonathan, Sansom and Jones had been a delight to meet, I had the feeling Joinee Benjamin would be rather more difficult.

  His emails were always slightly cryptic, for a start, and his attitude sometimes rather suspicious, but I kept telling myself not to be silly. He’d joined me, after all, and if that wasn’t enough to recommend a chap, what was?

  I’d printed out his questionnaire in order to bone up on him before we met, and I read it on the train back into London. It was strange. While most people were inclined to give me their life stories, Joinee Benjamin had chosen to leave many questions blank and answer other questions with questions. It was all very odd, and I learnt virtually nothing from it.

  In addition, there was his photo. Now, this was puzzling. On his questionnaire, Benjamin claimed to have been bom in the 60s, making him around 40 or so. The passport photo he’d sent me, however, was clearly taken in the 70s. It was old, and slightly yellowed, and showed a man already in his fifties, wearing an orange shirt and a large kipper tie. I couldn’t quite work out what was going on here. Was I being played? I was intrigued.

  I dashed through the slanting rain, out of Paddington station, and across the road, where I found the tiny café we’d agreed to meet at. There were about six people. A couple, two men on their own, and a pair of Italian students. I couldn’t see Benjamin anywhere, so I took a table at the back and ordered a cup of tea.

  Five minutes passed. Then ten. I was sitting in a prime pos
ition – no one could miss me if they walked in, and I could see anyone approaching the café for quite a distance. Surely I wasn’t going to get stood up again? Was someone bumping off my joinees before I got to meet them? Unless the person I was going to meet was already here? I looked around. The couple and one of the men had gone, which only left the two Italian students, and the bloke who looked like a bored commuter, eating a baked potato and reading the Evening Standard on the other side of the room. I thought about leaving. But moments later the man I would come to know as Benjamin walked into the café, brushed the rain off his shoulders and strode purposefully towards me.

  ‘You’re Danny?’ he asked.

  ‘Yes,’ I said.

  ‘Benjamin,’ he said. I was slightly taken aback. He certainly looked very different from how I’d expected. He looked nothing like he did when his passport photo was taken. He had a different hairstyle, for a start, and he had an ear-ring, and he’d even gone to the trouble of having a completely different face. I began to suspect he’d tried to dupe me with that photo of someone else.

  A waiter took his coffee order, and Benjamin started to drum his fingers on the table nervously. He had very clean fingernails. The rest of him was very neatly turned out, too.

  ‘I watched you, er, walk in,’ he said. ‘I was in the, er, café opposite.’

  ‘Oh. Am I in the wrong one?’

  ‘No. I was sitting there, just watching, just watching.’

  ‘Oh.’ I said. There was an awkward silence. I didn’t really want to ask him why he’d been sitting there, just watching, just watching.

  ‘So . . . it’s nice to meet you,’ I said.

  ‘Mmm. I’ve been looking forward to meeting you too.’

  Another awkward silence.

  ‘You’re not quite as I imagined you,’ said Benjamin. He had a bloody cheek. He’d sent me a photo of some pensioner from the 70s.

  ‘Well . . . you’re not quite the same as you look in your photo,’ I said.