Brand New Friend

by Kate Vane

  Now there was football on ITV, highlights of something or other. Dudley was oddly fascinated. Paolo was more fascinated with his fascination. No one else he knew at uni admitted to liking football. It was the preserve of racists and hooligans. Of course there were people who did, and the Union TV lounges would be crowded during matches, generally with aggressive blokes shouting and chanting, a poor middle-class pastiche of the real hooligans who kicked people’s heads in for wearing the wrong scarf.

  But here was Dudley, Dhanesh Gupta, who wouldn’t even be safe to go to a football match in some towns, talking knowledgeably about the game, describing particular players as ‘good’ or ‘shit’ which counted for sophisticated analysis in their current state. Paolo wasn’t sure who was playing but he felt a welling up of support for the red team, probably because when he was a kid he had supported Liverpool who played in red. It had been a hard-headed decision – he had chosen Liverpool purely because they kept winning.

  He remembered that being allowed to stay up for Match of the Day had been a rite of passage, and that watching it with his dad was pretty much the only time they found anything they could talk about together.

  The doorbell rang and they heard Claire’s voice. Probably Kev coming round for a platonic cuddle after his latest crush had looked at him funny, or something. But then Claire shouted, ‘Paolo? Dhanesh? Can you come down?’

  Dudley looked at him and raised his eyebrows and Paolo for one uneasy moment had thought he was going to say, Women, eh? In which case Paolo would have had to respond, but fortunately as they exchanged glances they just began to giggle and once the giggles had finished Paolo got up and Dudley seemed happy to follow.

  Claire was in the doorway of the room that was too small to rent, hands on hips. The sliver of space between the single bed and the door was taken up by their landlord and a guy of about their age.

  Dudley had disappeared back upstairs. Paolo realized he had probably gone to hide the dope.

  ‘He’s going to rent this room,’ said Claire. Paolo took a while to register what she was saying. He was staring at their landlord, wondering if he’d started shaving yet. Claire was always so blunt. Why couldn’t she just be nicer? The thought of Claire being nice almost set him giggling again but he knew that would be a giveaway.

  ‘Alright, mate?’ (He couldn’t, in his present state, remember the landlord’s name.) ‘How are the ‘A’ Levels going?’

  They’d had a chat about the challenges of the history paper last time he came round when they had that gas leak and the landlord said they shouldn’t have called the emergency number, he had an uncle who could have sorted it. Or maybe it was the time before after Claire had decided to gloss the skirting boards and doorframes of the living room in primary colours, and Isabel had done a watercolour ‘muriel’ of flying ducks on the living-room wall in tribute to Hilda Ogden, she said, though Paolo could swear Isabel had never watched Coronation Street in her life. Paolo had given him the benefit of his experience in exam technique with all the world-weariness that two years’ hindsight could bestow.

  The landlord was about to answer when Claire butted in, ‘And you have no right to come round here at this time of night.’

  She glared at Paolo but neither he nor the landlord felt moved to respond. There was silence for a moment, silence broken by a low moan, which was succeeded by another, longer and louder. Paolo thought he might sob. He had heard that sound before, lying in his bed, staring at the ceiling knowing that it was all that separated him and Isabel. Isabel was having sex.

  ‘She’s got a point, mate,’ he said, not from any conviction, but just because he had to break the silence or rather block out the torment in his soul.

  ‘Last time I came at eleven in the morning and you said it was too early.’

  ‘It’s my fault, mate,’ said the would-be tenant. Paolo was instantly irritated by the way he mirrored his ‘mate’, not least because he realised how false it sounded. ‘I was working in the library and then went for some tea at Nafees, and we bumped into each other there and I asked if I could come after that.’

  ‘My friend works there,’ said the landlord cheerfully. ‘He told me he had a customer who was looking for a place. It was just lucky we were both in at the same time.’

  ‘For you maybe,’ said Claire.

  Paolo had no idea what the legal position was and he suspected nor did the landlord. He wondered if they could hold him off for a while and just as he spoke Isabel’s door opened and a guy walked out.

  He had brown hair loose to his shoulders and a beard. He looked like Jesus in the picture his mother had on her bedside table. Except that even in the agony of death Jesus kept his loincloth on.

  ‘Bathroom upstairs, is it?’

  Paolo nodded and Jesus set off, passing Dudley on the stairs. Dudley rejoined them, giving Paolo an exaggerated wink, the kind of wink that would have communicated to anyone with half a brain what he had been doing.

  Claire glared at the patron of Nafees. ‘There’s not even room to stand up in there. Why would you want to rent it?’

  ‘I only want to sleep in it,’ he said. ‘I’ll be at uni most of the time. I’m studying engineering so I don't get much time off.’

  ‘Dhanesh is studying engineering too,’ said the landlord, looking hopefully at Dudley.

  ‘Yeah? What course?’ asked his would-be housemate.

  Dudley opened his mouth as if to speak but instead started giggling.

  The door to Isabel’s room was slightly ajar and he saw a thread of blue light through the gap. He could hear a low murmur, or was it a moan? More subdued than before. He tried to imagine what she might be doing in there alone, then he tried not to, then he began to laugh, then Jesus walked among them once more, his knob swinging jauntily.

  He went in but didn’t shut the door. And then another guy appeared, this time pale with a bleach-blond crop. He wasn’t naked. Well, not exactly. He was wearing a T-shirt and an earring. He didn’t ask for directions or acknowledge any of them, he just walked purposefully up the stairs, his pale buttocks moving rhythmically beneath the hem of his T-shirt.

  Paolo watched them as if hypnotised, then tried to draw his attention back to the conversation in the the formerly spare room. It seemed he had missed a crucial step.

  ‘Come round to mine tomorrow,’ said the landlord, ‘and we’ll sign the paperwork.’

  ‘Don’t we get a say?’ asked Claire.

  ‘I told you when you moved in,’ said the landlord.

  ‘We didn't think anyone would be stupid enough to rent this room,’ said Claire, glaring at the unfortunate would-be tenant. He looked apologetic and said it was fine.

  ‘You can’t accept an apology I haven’t made,’ said Claire.

  ‘I meant the room is fine.’

  ‘There isn't enough room for five people,’ said Claire.

  ‘But you've got room for visitors,’ said the landlord pointedly.

  ‘I won’t be any trouble.’

  ‘It isn’t personal,’ said Claire. She turned to Paolo and Dudley as if she expected them to say something but Dudley seemed to find the whole thing hilarious and Paolo was nursing a broken heart.

  Dudley shrugged and went back to his room. Claire looked at Paolo as if to say, Don't leave me on my own with this.

  The landlord said, ‘Can you clear your stuff out of the wardrobe?’

  The wardrobe was full of clothes. Some were elegantly expensive, some were vintage, none of them looked like Claire’s. Claire seemed almost as put out by the idea that she would have need of a spare wardrobe as she was by the new tenant, but he didn’t hear her response.

  He had to get away. He headed up the stairs as fast as his legs would carry him. He had heard a voice, he wasn’t sure if it was the word of Christ or the peroxide puppy, saying petulantly, ‘It’s my turn!’

  After they left, Claire climbed the stairs. He thought she must be going to the bathroom, she never came to Dudley’s room. She didn’t
believe in TV. But she came straight in and, apparently forgetting her previous objection to cash crops, took the joint when he passed it to her.

  ‘This is a nightmare,’ said Claire. ‘He’s an engineer.’

  ‘Dudley’s an engineer,’ said Paolo but Dudley was apparently unfazed by the slur.

  ‘He’s got zits,’ said Dudley.

  ‘He can’t help that,’ said Claire. ‘But he can help that he wears trainers and white socks and stone-washed jeans and he’s got a non-hairstyle that if it could be bothered would be a mullet. I bet he’s a Tory.’

  Dudley turned towards her. ‘You need to be more tolerant. Not just think that everyone has to be like you.’

  ‘I think she’s being ironic,’ said Paolo.

  ‘I’m not,’ said Claire. She took another pull on the joint before speaking softly. ‘I’ve spent my whole life with people who aren’t like me. I grew up with them. I went to school with them. I’ve had them take the piss and touch me up at work and in the pub and in the street. There are people who are not like me running the fucking country, shitting on the rest of us. They’re in my head and they’re out there, everywhere. I just want home to be the one place where I don’t have to deal with them.’

  Paolo zoned out. He had more immediate concerns. Isabel was having a threesome. And it wasn’t even midnight! Had she even had time to get drunk?

  Paolo was good at pulling. He was frequently mocked for it but he knew that his success was the subject of some awe. He was often, privately, asked for advice (on one occasion, excruciatingly, by a very drunk Claire) on the secret of his success. But even he had never had a threesome.

  Isabel had broken his heart all over again. Her moans would fill his dreams for months to come. What was a mullet in the spare room compared to this?

  37

  Isabel.

  Paolo wondered where Isabel was now. In Tibet maybe, learning to meditate, or painting in a Croatian mountain village, or running an expensive gallery selling imported artisan crafts in an English seaside resort which she had, by her mere presence, made immediately fashionable. He was somehow sure she was not in London or he would have bumped into her, in that way that London was both big and small.

  When he found she was in Edinburgh, it was not a great surprise. Edinburgh was like London without the pollution. Small but cultured. He hadn’t found her on LinkedIn but she had a page on Facebook, set to friends only like Claire’s, with a picture of a smiling blond boy of about seven as her avatar. Her son? He did the sums. Perhaps she was a late mother, or perhaps the boy was now a man but the photo was precious to her.

  He sent a message. He waited, thought of times when he’d been on assignment in some far-flung city, decompressing in a hotel bar, and daydreamed that she’d walk in, swathed in raw silk and handcrafted jewellery, with that mocking lopsided smile.

  Eventually she replied and they did a quick back-and-forth.

  She was living in Portobello. Edinburgh’s seaside. So he hadn’t been far off. He told her he had to be in Edinburgh for a meeting. She said she had the morning free as she was on a late shift. Late shift? Was that a joke? Picking the kids up from piano lessons? Holding an opening at a high-end art gallery? He’d know soon enough.

  Paolo’s taxi from the airport took him to an attractive stone-built house with a neat front garden, near the beach at Portobello. It was only when he got to the door he realised it was divided into flats. Isabel’s was at the top of the house. The attic.

  He rang the bell and waited for her voice through the intercom but she just buzzed him in. He walked up the stairs, conscious that his heart was beating violently like an adolescent with a crush.

  She opened the door. There was that moment of adjustment as he took in who she was now. She was still tall (of course she was still tall, he chided himself) and slim but the look he’d imagined – maybe an asymmetric tunic, understated and flowing, accentuated with striking hand-made jewellery – was absent. She was wearing a pair of jeans and an outsized hoodie. Her hair was no longer platinum but ash-blond turning to grey and her face was drawn and bare of make-up.

  ‘Come in,’ was all she said.

  She took him through a small hall into a small kitchen. It was a little shabby. Not shabby as in shabby-chic, just shabby. A small table with matching chairs, cheap units, basic white goods. He saw an espresso jug perched on the stove. He wondered if it was the same one but didn’t ask.

  Isabel put coffee on. He remembered watching her do it like it was a holy ritual and today it was the same. Water, then coffee, then the cinnamon sticks. While the water boiled she asked him about his journey, then she served the coffee in two small white cups. She didn’t offer milk and sugar. Perhaps she remembered how he liked it, or perhaps she didn’t have any.

  She sat at the table and gestured for him to sit opposite her. She pulled a cracked saucer towards her, and produced a tobacco pouch. Before he knew what was happening, she’d rolled and lit a cigarette. He felt a thrill of outrage. Of course smoking was common in Egypt and he still knew some smokers in the UK, but even the most hardcore would retreat apologetically to the garden for a smoke after dinner. He knew Isabel would have to go two floors down to get outside, but she didn’t even open the window!

  ‘So,’ said Isabel, almost meditatively, between puffs. He thought about how his coat would need to go to the dry-cleaners. Was it too late to ask to hang it up somewhere?

  She sipped her coffee. He sipped his. It tasted just how he remembered. There wasn’t much in the kitchen otherwise, none of the touches of individuality he recalled appearing through the year in Isabel’s room – the art posters, the clothes that she hung outside the famous wardrobe because they were vintage and stylish, the photos pinned to a line with pegs, darkroom-style.

  Just one child’s photo stuck to the fridge. Full colour. The one he’d seen online. All blond curls and promise. But where was he? Paolo was suddenly afraid to ask. There was no indication that he lived here. Was he dead?

  Her eyes followed his. ‘Pawel,’ she said. ‘He lives downstairs. He helped me set up my Facebook page.’

  ‘I thought he might be yours.’

  ‘Mine?’ She sounded amused.

  ‘How did you come to be in Edinburgh?’

  She managed to convey with a vague sweep of her hand that there was a long and involved story behind that, but she wasn’t going into it now.

  ‘So,’ she said, ‘I read the news. Mark was a liar, and they think he might have killed a man.’

  ‘Again,’ said Paolo softly.

  Isabel looked surprised, whether at his words or his treachery Paolo wasn’t sure. He told her about the fire and the professor. He didn’t mention the missing device.

  ‘So,’ she said. ‘You think Mark was involved in this fire?’

  ‘I think someone we knew might be.’

  ‘And you want my insights? You know I wasn’t involved in your revolutionary sect.’

  She was laughing at them.

  ‘You might have seen something.’

  ‘Someone sneaking from the house in a balaclava carrying a bomb?’

  Now he was laughing. He sipped his coffee and said, ‘I’ve seen Claire.’

  Isabel shrugged.

  ‘Why did you leave?’ he asked. He fell just short of saying ‘me’ or the slightly less needy ‘us’.

  ‘I don’t know. I just wanted a change.’

  ‘Sick of Saint Claire?’

  Isabel puffed meditatively on her cigarette then said, ‘It was easy for Claire to care about exploited banana farmers or displaced rainforest dwellers because she didn’t have to meet them. They were never going to disappoint her like the rest of us.’

  He guessed it must have been tough being adored. He didn’t blame Isabel for making the break, even if it was her decision which ultimately led to the break-up of their house.

  He had finished his coffee. He wanted to stay but he sensed that wouldn’t be welcome. Isabel just looked at him, seemingl
y unwilling to break the silence.

  ‘So, you’re working for a bank?’ He had gleaned that much from Facebook.

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘I never imagined you in finance.’

  ‘I’m not really in finance.’

  ‘What, then?’

  ‘Customer experience,’ she said, languidly.

  ‘Marketing?’

  ‘I work in the call centre.’ She put on a fake voice. ‘Good evening, Paolo. Is it alright if I call you Paolo? How may I help you today?’

  He wondered how she’d got here, but he couldn’t find a way to ask, so he stood up.

  ‘It’s been nice to see you.’

  ‘You too,’ she said, with that amused condescension that used to melt his heart.

  Perhaps her life wasn’t as it looked at all. Perhaps she only confined people to the kitchen who she didn’t like. Maybe the living room was full of books and original art. Her own photography or fascinating pieces she’d found in a salvage yard and made uniquely her own. But she didn’t let him find out.

  He felt saddened as he left Isabel’s house. Her pallor, the colour of the winter sky, was already infecting his memories. He could feel the pixels of his inner vision subtly shift, the perfection of his remembered Isabel crumble and fade.

  Smoking in the house, though. His clothes reeked of it.

  38

  Mark came round one evening when no one else was in. Claire was working in the Union bar. She had panicked because she had an overdraft of about three quid at the end of last term. Paolo was overdrawn within a week of getting his grant and didn’t see what the fuss was about.

  Mark asked if he wanted to come for a drive. He had to see a gardening client out on the North York moors.

  Where Paolo came from, ‘garden’ meant a lawn with flower beds round the outside, probably containing roses. The fact that grass grew was a source of great anguish to his father, especially in the spring. He’d once written in an essay for his ‘A’ Level English that maybe this was what Eliot had meant by ‘April is the cruellest month’. His teacher had responded that examining boards did not award marks for being clever. Paolo had retorted wasn’t that exactly what they were supposed to do?