I arrived home late that night and went straight to my bed. I didn’t want to check my post; didn’t want to tempt the inevitable.
I was confused and not a little bewildered.
* * *
In the morning, I made a cup of tea and, after trying to come up with a dozen other ways to put it off, finally took a look at my mail.
I was pleasantly, yet regretfully, surprised. The article in De Telegraaf had obviously been published that week as promised, and people from all around Holland had sprung into action. Denise must have done an amazing job of selling the Karma Army . . . the Dutch weren’t just keen to join, but positively demanding that they be let in. Fifteen of them sent their pictures that day. Twelve the next. At the same time, the TV appeal and the article in the Aftenposten had also apparently started to make waves in Norway. My joinees had heeded my pleas and asked friends and families once again to sign up, and my countrywide radio phone-in show assaults had paid off, too, with passport photos arriving from all around the UK as a result.
I was up to 972 joinees. And yet I wasn’t as happy about it as I would have been just a month or so earlier.
The day after, more arrived. I opened the envelopes, calmly and quietly.
Joinee 973. Joinee Michaels. A zoologist from Lancaster.
Joinee 974. Joinee Rosenberg. A student at Cardiff University.
Joinees 975 and 976. The Holter-Andersens. A young husband and wife from Norway.
Joinee 977. Joinee Berens. A systems analyst from Chichester.
The next morning, when a similar amount arrived, I just sat on the floor of my living room and stared at my huge pile of passport photos. Whether I liked it or not, this was it. The end was just around the corner.
Two days later, I was up to 990. The day after that, when I’d made no effort to do anything whatsoever and had stayed in bed until nearly 2pm, I received another three envelopes in the post. I didn’t open them. The next day, I received three more. I didn’t open them either. I couldn’t. I didn’t want to look. I didn’t want to be at 996 joinees. The following day I received another four. That would take me to 1000. If I opened them.
But what if I didn’t open them? What if I never opened another envelope? What if I moved house and didn’t tell anybody? I could stop the collective from ever growing past 990. I could keep this going forever. I could be the Leader forever.
I walked around my flat with those ten envelopes in my hands for what seemed like an hour. Should I open them? Should I achieve my last ten joinees, here and now, and have done with it? Or should I hide them; deny all knowledge; live to Lead another day?
I picked up the phone and dialled. It rang, and was answered.
‘Hello?’
‘Ian, it’s Danny.’
‘Hello, mate! How’s it going?’
‘Very well,’ I said flatly. ‘Very, very well.’
‘Doesn’t sound it. Got your 1000 yet?’ he laughed.
I didn’t laugh.
‘The pub, Ian. Today. Be there.’
And I slammed my phone down, dramatically.
And then I realised what I’d done and rang him back and told him which pub and at what time, and he said could we make it a bit later, and I said okay, and he said bye and so did I.
It was just like in a film.
CHAPTER 27
18. Then those over whom Daniel had dominion, who were called Join-ees, did each divide their first-born into four parts.
19. And three parts they cast away.
I WALKED INTO the Horse & Groom to find Ian waiting for me in the corner.
‘Well, I finally did it,’ I said, sitting down.
‘You don’t seem very happy about it,’ said Ian.
‘I am. Honestly. This is what I’ve been working towards, after all.’
I sullenly placed my ten still unopened envelopes on the table in front of me.
‘You haven’t opened them!’ said Ian.
‘It’s a historic moment,’ I said. ‘It didn’t seem right doing it on my own.’
‘This is exciting!’ said Ian.
‘Well, prepare to buy me that pint,’ I said.
‘Oh. So all of a sudden it’s a bet, is it? Now you’ve done it?’
‘For the last time, Ian, it’s not a bet. But if it was, I won. So . . .’
I picked the envelopes up.
‘My final ten joinees. The last ones I need to complete my collective of 1000. This is it.’
Ian sat forward in his seat, evidently far more keen to see who’d joined me than I was. I felt like making a short speech, about how far we’d come, about what we’d achieved, but I’d probably have embarrassed myself, so I picked up the first one and just got on with it.
‘Hang on, hang on,’ said Ian. ‘So you’re nearly there. You don’t seem happy. When you’ve opened these envelopes, you’ve done it! That’s it! It’s over!’
‘And maybe that’s the problem. I don’t want it to be over. Hey . . .’ I said, having an idea. ‘How about we have a little wager? How about you bet me I can’t get . . . say . . . 2000 joinees?’
‘Eh? I thought you were too old for bets? I thought you’d moved on?’
‘I’m not going out with Hanne any more. I’ve moved so far on I’m back where I started.’
‘Forget it. You wanted 1000. You’ve got 1000. I’m excited! I want to see who’s joined!’
‘Okay,’ I sighed, and picked up the first envelope.
‘Hang on!’ said Ian. ‘A reminder of the averages, please. I need to know who’s ended up joining you.’
I smiled, took out my wallet, found a tatty piece of paper, and looked at my joinee stats.
‘Well,’ I said, ‘remember that the next ten envelopes could change everything by almost a tenth of a per cent each, so don’t go thinking that these are definitive.’
‘Fine.’
‘Right. My collective is . . . approximately fifty-four per cent male, forty-six per cent female. The average joinee is about 5ft 9in tall, thirty years of age and has probably spent around two years of that time in Belgium. They have nearly a quarter of a child. And – but this is just a personal viewpoint – they are very nice indeed.’
‘You may proceed.’
I opened the first envelope.
A photo fell out.
Joinee 991. A man. A man who would now be known as Joinee Long. A technician from Marlborough.
I smiled a bittersweet smile, and opened the next one.
Joinee 992. Another man. Joinee Hopkins. A Scottish plumber. Welcome.
Joinee 993. A woman. Joinee Jennings. Works in marketing, in London. Writes with glittery ink.
Joinee 994. Joinee Jack. A nine-year-old boy who wrote ‘I made a CD of the Join Me song from the Internet and I listen to it every day in the car with my dad.’ I’m willing to bet that his dad goes insane within the year. For some reason, that fact made me oddly proud. People were getting a kick out of Join Me in so many different ways. It was fun for all the family. And this moment here, in the Horse & Groom on Great Portland Street . . . this was the climax. I could feel the enjoyment creeping up on me again. And as I started to open the envelope of Joinee 995, I had to stop . . .
I suddenly found myself getting very, very excited. The sight of these new joinees, spread over this pub table, and the sight of an ever more excited Ian, made me realise . . . we were getting there. We were really getting there. Within a few seconds, I’d have my 995th joinee . . . and then my 996th . . . and just a few minutes after that I would legitimately be able to claim that I had 1000 joinees. 1000!
‘Get on with it,’ said Ian.
And I did.
Joinee 995. A woman in her thirties. Joinee Simms. She’d found a Join Me leaflet in her local library in Bristol. Hello!
Joinee 996. A Dutchman! Joinee Bos lives in Hilvershum and read about me in De Telegraaf. ‘I am happy to be with you!’ he wrote. Not as happy as I now was, Joinee Bos.
I picked up the next envelope and opened
it with a smile.
Which is to say I smiled while I was opening it, not that I have some kind of magic smile which can open envelopes.
But disaster!
‘No!’ shouted Ian, before laughing. ‘Well, it serves you right for getting so cocky!’
Gah! There was no picture with this one! It was a mere letter, from someone calling themselves Laura Fulford, requesting more information about joining . . . curses!
‘There’s still hope,’ I said, a desperate tone in my voice. ‘Sometimes people send me two at once. A boyfriend and girlfriend deal, that sort of thing. Or a mother and child – that’s happened a couple of times. It could still work out!’
Ian just smiled and sat back in his chair.
‘So close . . .’ he laughed.
I tore the next one open. There was only one picture, but thank God there was a picture at all. Joinee 997. Another Joinee Smith. My tenth. I quickly put him to one side and tore the next one open.
Joinee 998. Still only one picture. Joinee Allison. Shit. Why didn’t she have a twin? Why are some people so inconsiderate? Come on. Please . . . the next envelope has to have two pictures . . . don’t tease me like this . . . don’t make me fight for 1000, then not want 1000, then want 1000, then not have 1000 . . . this has to be over . . .
I opened the envelope.
I took out a piece of paper.
I unfolded it.
And I found just one, single, solitary passport photo.
Joinee Selby. Joinee 999. A man who looked, in his photo, like I felt. Deflated. Beaten. And largely disappointed with life.
‘Christ . . .’ I said. ‘I thought that’d be it. I thought I’d be done today.’
‘I think it’d be quite funny if you gave up at 999 joinees,’ said Ian, a little unhelpfully.
‘This isn’t a joke, mate. I know I have to make it to 1000. If I stop, or if I fail, it sets a disturbing precedent for the rest of my life. If I give up, it might mean I’ll always give up. It’ll make me a quitter. It’ll mean I started something I couldn’t finish.’
‘You’ll get another joinee,’ said Ian. ‘You can’t help it. You’ll be up to 1000 in no time.’
‘But I’m exhausted. I genuinely thought that would be it. I was getting all excited. But there’s always tomorrow’s post, I suppose. See if anyone else joins up.’
‘So you’ve still not won the bet.’
‘It’s not a bloody bet!’
‘No, I know . . . thing is, though, there’s still one envelope left . . .’ Ian was pointing to an envelope tucked behind the pub menu. I’d apparently overlooked it.
‘Eh? How did I miss that?’
It was white, slightly creased, and marked ‘Join Me, PO Box 33561, London E3 2YW’, but interestingly, there was no stamp on it. How did it get here? Maybe it had fallen out of one of the others? I held it up to the light, and yes – there was what looked like a passport photo inside. I realised just how badly I wanted this to be it.
‘This could be the final one!’ I said, not quite believing my luck. ‘Oh, thank God! My 1000th joinee!’
I tore it open. I took the picture out. I studied it. And I couldn’t quite take it in.
It was Ian.
‘Well . . .’ he said, smiling. ‘I’d been waiting for the right moment . . .’
I shook his hand, more firmly and with more manly meaning than I think I’ve ever shaken anyone’s hand with before. There was high emotion in the air. But I just didn’t know what to say.
‘Now,’ said Ian, standing up, ‘I reckon I owe you a pint.’
Well . . . a bet’s a bet, I suppose.
* * *
When it sank in, a few moments later, I felt brilliant. Brilliant, as Ian and I drank our celebratory pint. Brilliant, as we phoned some friends and told them where we were and got them to celebrate with us. Brilliant, at midnight, in a curryhouse in Soho, sharing six bowls of Chicken Dansak and ten naan breads between the lot of us. And brilliant, as I awoke the next morning with a hangover that I felt, for once, I had well and truly earned.
I was shattered by the strange mix of emotions; delighted that I’d done it, disappointed that it was over. But today wasn’t a day for sitting in bed watching Kilroy and regretting the drinks of the night before. So I sprang into action. I made a few phone calls and got dressed. I found a colour photocopier in the print shop down the street. I scattered handfuls of passport photos across it, and took dozens of photocopies, until I had a duplicate of each and every joinee. And then I went home and put the originals into a small box, I put the small box into a small bag, I caught the tube to Paddington, I clambered aboard the Heathrow Express, I checked in at the airport, and I caught a plane to Switzerland.
There was now just one thing left to do.
CHAPTER 28
5. And Daniel cried, Hearest thou not, Swiss?
I WAS TENS of thousands of feet in the air, somewhere over France or Germany, with my small box of joinees on the tiny tray table in front of me, marvelling at their cheeky, grinning faces.
I had my 1000 joinees. I’d achieved my goal. I’d achieved Gallus’ goal. I’d managed to get 1000 people to Join Me.
And it felt good. In fact, the night before, with my friends, in the pub, it had all seemed like such an achievement. A pointless quest which, somewhere along the line, had managed to take on a vital point and a real meaning – not just to me, but to 1000 other people, and to the 1000s more people whose lives they were touching through unexpected good deeds and random acts of kindness.
I’m not saying we changed the world. I’m just saying we changed some people’s worlds. Maybe in the tiniest ways possible, but . . . you know . . . maybe not. Maybe, now, they’d be more inclined to do the same for someone else. Maybe that person would do the same for yet another someone else. Maybe one day we’d all be doing it. Maybe one day we’d all be able to claim that we’d made hundreds of old men very happy, affected Belgian social policy; really been part of something.
But I’d taken it as far as I could, for now. I had to move on, and put a stop to this obsession with my joinees. I had to go back to normality – the normality Hanne had so craved. I missed her, and I missed what we had. But at least I’d seen this through. I’d proved to myself that even the smallest ideas can grow into something . . . well . . . rather wonderful.
But would this really be the end of the Karma Army? Well, no. I didn’t think so. An email from Joinee Reverend Gareth Saunders that morning had proved that much to me. ‘Join Me,’ he wrote, ‘has just become a part of everyday life. If it’s Friday: right! I’ve got to do some random act of kindness. Even if Join Me stopped today, I would probably continue doing random acts of kindness, because I’ve seen the difference that it makes to people. It cheers them up, and for a moment makes them feel special and noticed and important.’
That summed it up, for me. I hoped that maybe my other 999 joinees thought the same. I flicked through my box of photos. Hundreds of happy, smiling faces. So many people I’d met, or at the very least corresponded with. So many I now counted as genuine friends.
There’s Joinee Jones, the squid man. Right behind him, Joinee Cobbett. There’s Gaz, and Whitby, and Saskia. There’s Joinee Jenni. The Newcastle boys. Joinee Jade of Durham. Estelle. Dr Spacetoad. That nutjob Joinee Benjamin.
A thousand people I would never ordinarily have met. A thousand people who wanted noth—
Hang on.
Joinee Jade of Durham?
What was it about Joinee Jade of Durham again? What was it about that face? That name? What was it she’d done?
Oh . . . Oh, fuck.
* * *
‘Please . . . please!’ I begged. ‘You have to join me! Please!’
The woman was wide-eyed and startled. She shielded her child’s ears and tried to walk around me. I turned and gabbled at her as she did so.
‘I thought I had 1000 joinees but then I realised that one of them had left Join Me ages ago because she didn’t know what it
was all about and I forgot to take her picture out of the pile and she’s been there the whole time and now I know I’ve only got 999 joinees and now I need another one really quickly!’
I was in the middle of Zurich, standing on Bahnhof Strasse, holding a big white sign that read JOIN ME SWISS, and I was now responsible for reducing a small child to tears. I still couldn’t believe my own idiocy. Joinee Jade! Why had I kept her picture in the pile? Why hadn’t I thrown her away? She’d found it easy enough to ditch me . . . and what must the person sitting in the seat next to mine on the plane have thought of me? A red-faced, swearing man counting and recounting and re-recounting a huge pile of passport photos and always coming up with and spitting out the same infuriating number: 999! Gah! 999!
I still needed one joinee! Success and glory had been unfairly batted out of my hands. I had come to Switzerland to finish this, to bring Gallus his joinees, to end the quest, and just when I’d been on the brink of success, I’d been pushed to the brink of insanity.
‘Please!’ I yelled at a man in a hat. ‘Just stop! Just stop for a second!’
‘No time,’ said the man.
‘Please! I’m on a flight home tonight . . . I need someone to join me before I can go home! I can’t go home without having done this!
The man said nothing and walked straight by. It was awful.
Five minutes later and things had got so desperate that I was standing by the side of the road, pleading with the motorists stopped by a red light. I tapped on someone’s window. They didn’t roll it down. They didn’t even look at me. This was all getting too much. I’d bought a ticket home for that night. My plan had been to get to Switzerland to deliver my joinees to Gallus and then fly home and fall asleep. I couldn’t face the stress and strain of Join Me any more. I needed rest. Recuperation. And most of all, I needed another bloody joinee.
I scoured the street for potential joinees . . . the place was packed with shoppers . . . surely, surely one of them would have time for a chat?
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