Acid Lullaby (Underwood and Dexter)

by Ed O'Connor

  He climbed from the shower and studied himself in the bathroom mirror. His face seemed unfamiliar to him. He had the contours and structure of a man and yet he felt curiously inhuman. He wasn’t even sure if his limbs were attached properly, they seemed to be floating away from him: he had to keep pulling them back.

  You sailed in a ship with golden sails under the milky ocean.

  Max was confused. The voice sounded like his but he knew he hadn’t spoken.

  You sailed in a ship with golden sails and saw the face of God.

  The voice was right. He had seen the face of God. God had Max Fallon’s face. He tried to structure his thoughts. Maybe there was another possibility.

  After what we put in your drink I’m surprised you’re with us at all.

  That voice wasn’t his, he whirled around almost losing his balance. ‘Who the fuck said that?’

  This is a dirty fucking cab, I’m surprised you’re with us at all.

  Max staggered out into his hallway. He knew there was someone in his flat. He could hear them talking.

  They had put something in his drink: something that had turned him into a god.

  He squinted at the unfamiliar shapes of his flat and began to laugh. He could hear everybody. Everybody in the world was having a conversation and some of the things they said were really funny. He stumbled into his living room and listened to mankind chatter in his head.

  Max heard them debating what kind of god he would be. What was His name? He knew that God had a name but he couldn’t remember it.

  What kind of god couldn’t remember his own name?

  At Cambridge he had studied philosophy. Surely he could find an answer.

  Socrates told Meno that knowledge is stored memory. Five multiplied by five makes twenty-five. But how can someone recognize that twenty-five is the correct answer unless they already know? Max possessed the knowledge that he was a god. But how could he recognize that god unless he already knew its identity?

  Unless the answer already lay in his memory?

  12

  On Monday morning Max, dressed in jeans and a jumper, walked outside. He had forgotten to put on his shoes and the ground felt very cold. He waved down a cab and gave the driver an address. He found it difficult to speak: impossible to articulate the strange and beautiful sentences that were forming and reforming inside his head. They were the pieces of a jigsaw: splinters of memory and knowledge that were slowly coming together through waves of pain.

  Max found the journey through West London peculiar. He felt as if he was seeing everything in negative. The streets and faces seemed drained of colour and expression as if frozen in the white light of an explosion: an expressionless, colourless city. It was a grey wasteland of mobile phones and wandering dogs, crumpled suits and loose change, cheese sandwiches and tube tickets. It bored him and he began to fall asleep dreaming of a temple to befit his new divinity.

  The taxi jerked to a halt outside the British Museum thirty minutes later. The connecting window slid back. ‘That’ll be seventeen fifty please mate,’ the cabbie barked over his shoulder.

  Max’s eyes struggled to focus on his new location. ‘Where are we?’

  ‘British Museum. Russell Square. That’s what it said on your bit of paper.’

  This is a dirty fucking cab, I’m surprised you’re with us at all.

  ‘What did you say?’ The cabbie turned in anger.

  ‘I didn’t say anything,’ said Max, looking around for the source of the voice himself. ‘Here’s some money,’ he handed over a note. ‘Keep the change.’

  ‘This is a pony, mate!’ called the cabbie as Fallon stepped outside.

  Max tried to filter his confusion. He steadied himself on the pavement and looked up at the huge white bulk of the British Museum as the cab pulled away behind him. He couldn’t see any ponies.

  Negotiating the steps up the main atrium was trickier than he had expected. Once inside the vast glass, domed space he found himself at an information desk. There was a middle-aged woman smiling at him.

  ‘You look lost,’ she volunteered, looking with interest at his bare feet.

  Max nodded. ‘You can help me. I am looking for Mister God.’

  ‘Excuse me?’

  ‘Mister God Expedition,’ he said suddenly finding his own words confusing, before he remembered the impenetrability of the divine language he had absorbed.

  ‘Oh!’ the woman exclaimed. ‘The Gods and Myths Exhibition. I’m sorry I misheard you.’ She handed him a free programme and pointed across the Atrium, ‘It’s on the Upper Floor. Take the lift. Go through Roman Britain and follow the signs.’

  It took Max half an hour to find the exhibition. He had a vague sense of what he was looking for: a fragment from his childhood, a story his mother had told him in India. He needed to fill in the blanks but the specifics eluded him. He found himself staring at fragments of clay pots and strangely patterned coins in glass cabinets; at carved animal figures and bronze statues. None of them made any sense to him: they were disjointed, like the wreckage of an explosion scattered through time. Coins from Mesopotamia, figurines from Egypt, jewels and sword handles hauled up from the ancient earth and deposited, absurdly, in the London Borough of Camden.

  A tour party drifted past him. He decided to drift with them. The obese and breathless male tour guide was talking in an abrasive American accent that cut across Max’s whis­pering mind like a flamethrower.

  ‘The last set of artefacts relate to ancient Hindu religious writings and myths.’ He gestured the group to join him around a large display cabinet. Max pushed himself to the front of the group. ‘The British plundered a number of Hindu religious sites in India and Kashmir during the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. These illegal excavations revealed a number of extraordinary artefacts relating to the religious practises of the Vedic Civilizations. The museum has chosen the artefacts that you see in the cabinet as illustrations of scenes from the Rig-Veda. This was an epic Sanskrit writing produced two thousand years before the birth of Christ.’

  Max stared into the cabinet. His attention was focused on a small wooden carving about seven inches high. He had seen it before: a photograph in one of his parents’ books. It was a carved depiction of the Hindu deity Soma. The name was familiar to him. Suddenly he remembered a children’s costume show that had taken place at the English School in Delhi some thirty years previously. Each of the expatriate children had come dressed as a figure from Hindu mythology. His friend Josh Gould had been Indra; little Kathy Desborough had been an implausible Shiva. Max’s mother had dressed him up as Soma, the god of plants and the moon. He had worn a tall hat bedecked with plastic jewels, a white billowing tunic and a plastic belt made silvery with glitter. He had carried a beautiful heavy-headed red flower. He had won the competition. His costume was the best. Max suddenly recalled the dream of his mother, standing on top of the mountain with pride swimming in her eyes.

  Stunned, he watched as the lights in his eyes whirled around the face of the wooden icon. His face. He tried to read the typed card that had been placed next to the carving;

  ‘Soma the Hindu plant god is described in over 120 verses of the Rig Veda. It was believed that the other Gods obtained immortality by ingesting the essence of Soma. The Rig Veda describes the mixing of Soma juice with milk and curd to produce the elixir of immortality.’

  Now, Max remembered the legend of the Soma. The strange deity whose existence was indistinguishable from the liquid that fed the God’s immortality. The Soma created at the churning of the ocean. He had drunk the Soma. He had seen the face of God in his dream.

  His face.

  He remembered a car plunging into black water: thick muddy water like chocolate milk gagging in his throat. He heard the silent scream of his birth.

  Knowledge flowed from memory. He finally recognized the knowledge he had always ignorantly possessed. It had been unlocked. Now he remembered.

  13

  Max Fallon did not ret
urn to Fogle & Moore until the Wednesday after his confrontation with Crouch and Aldo. His mind had cleared sufficiently for him to understand the urgency of the phone calls he had received from the office: the growing sense of irritation that underpinned the voices on the other end of the line.

  He did not feel confident enough to drive: he had still not yet mastered the lights behind his eyes and so had risked the Underground. Delays on the Jubilee Line meant Max had been forced to change to the Docklands Light Railway. The agonizingly slow progress of the train as it crawled out of Limehouse towards Canary Wharf had encouraged Max to close his eyes. When he opened them again he was in Island Gardens at the southern tip of the Isle of Dogs with Canary Wharf Tower blinking behind him.

  Max was relieved to find a taxi outside Island Gardens and eventually arrived at Fogle & Moore shortly after nine. He found the lifts difficult to understand. He rode the crowded lift up and down the hollow spine of the building until he remembered the location of the bond-trading floor. He recog­nized his office at the far end of the trading pit and walked steadily but uncertainly towards it. Danny Planck caught up with him quickly.

  ‘Welcome back, Maxy, feeling better?’

  Max looked at him, curious and only half-understanding. ‘Migraine,’ he said.

  ‘It’s all gone tits up this week. Market is saturated. That prick Pippen at Fulton Steel is having a baby about his deal. He wants to launch, I think it’s a bad idea. There’s four jumbo deals in the market already today. We need to post­pone but he’s got to hear it from you.’

  Max nodded. ‘I need a drink,’ he looked around at the blurred room, ‘someone get me a fucking grapefruit,’ he frowned, ‘grapefruit juice.’

  They entered his office and Max fell into his seat.

  Planck seemed anxious. ‘So why don’t I get Liz and we’ll call this tosser straight away and put the deal back.’

  ‘Sounds good,’ Max agreed. He looked out of his window. There was something sitting on the window ledge. It was like a bird but seemed to be carved of stone. It had the face of a gargoyle. It turned its head to look at him. Max blinked and it had gone. Confused, he stood and stared out at the distant brown swirl of east London trying to see where it had gone. In a new corner of his mind he realized why the demons were following him.

  ‘Hey you!’ said Liz as she re-entered the room with Planck, ‘you feeling better? I’ve been worried. I called you about fifty times.’

  Max recognized her. He could still feel her sweating under­neath him. Still smell her perfume on his bed sheets. This was Liz. He liked Liz. ‘Migraines,’ he said forcing a smile, ‘bad week.’

  Planck leaned over the star-shaped speakerphone and called Andrew Pippen’s number. It immediately connected and rang twice.

  ‘Treasury,’ snapped the voice at the other end.

  ‘Andrew, it’s Danny Planck here with Liz Koplinsky from Fogle & Moore.’

  ‘Right. About time.’

  ‘I’ve got Max Fallon with me.’

  Pippen’s voice lost a little of its edge. ‘Good. Are you feeling better, Max?’

  Max started as he realized a small bottle of grapefruit juice had appeared at his elbow. He unscrewed it and took a greedy gulp.

  ‘Spiffing, Andrew. I understand you are concerned about your deal.’

  Pippen spoke with a new urgency. ‘Indeed. In your absence I have been receiving confusing messages from your staff about the viability of Fulton Steel’s bond issue.’

  ‘Oh dear,’ said Max sagely. He imagined ripping Pippen’s head off. He would secure it with rope and dangle it above his desk.

  Planck took over, sensing Fallon was not on top of his game, ‘Andrew, the message has been consistent and it has been clear. We think you are a viable credit but the timing is bad.’

  Pippen was beginning to sound angry. ‘I want to launch today. Otherwise I’ll offer the deal to Deutsche Bank.’

  Max had heard enough. The blood from Pippen’s ragged neck was splattering on his blotter. ‘Andrew, you appreciate straight talking and I respect that. Here’s what we’re going to do. We are going to launch this baby today.’

  Planck was shaking his head and desperately making gestures at Fallon to stop.

  ‘This morning, in fact,’ Max continued. ‘We will buy back unsold bonds and make the market liquid. We’ll launch in twenty minutes.’ Fallon pressed the cancel button on the phone.

  ‘Max, what are you doing?’ Planck was horrified. ‘You’ve committed us to a deal that can’t work!’

  ‘Don’t be such a faggot,’ Max snarled. ‘It’s my responsi­bility. Get on with it.’

  ‘Your responsibility,’ Planck reiterated, pointing at him. ‘I hope you heard that, Liz.’

  ‘I am a director. I get paid to take responsibility,’ Max proclaimed. ‘There are leaders and followers. There are gods and mortals. I’ve been carrying you for too long. Go and earn your bonus for once.’

  Danny Planck stormed out of the office in disgust. Liz looked in shock at Fallon. ‘Maxy, maybe you should be at home. You don’t look well.’

  ‘Something’s happened.’ He frowned trying to remember the strange floating faces, the voices, the pain. ‘That guy you dated.’

  ‘Crouch?’

  ‘Him.’ Max could see Crouch in his mind’s eye, standing over him, saying something.

  ‘What about him?’

  Max suddenly lost his train of thought. For a split second he saw Liz Koplinsky on her back giving birth to his baby. She was screaming. Screaming.

  ‘Max?’

  He was back in his office. Liz stood in front of him. Fallon rubbed his eyes.

  ‘Just leave me alone.’

  The Fulton Steel Euro bond issue was launched at 11a.m. that morning. The price collapsed in the aftermarket. Fogle & Moore Investments lost approximately half a million pounds in twenty minutes trying to support the issue. And it kept getting worse.

  As the mess unfolded on the financial news screens, and tumult grew on the trading floor, Danny Planck picked up his phone and called Richard Moore, the company’s Chief Executive.

  In the midst of the chaos, its chief architect disappeared.

  In a different part of the building, Simon Crouch handed in his resignation to Susan Joyce, the head of personnel.

  ‘I must say, Simon,’ she commented, ‘this is rather unex­pected.’

  ‘It’s a two-month notice period,’ he said, ‘I’m happy to work it all.’

  ‘That probably won’t be necessary. Perhaps you could stay until you’ve done a handover.’

  ‘Whatever.’ He couldn’t believe he was leaving: five years of grief, commuting and stress up the spout because of some girl.

  ‘Can I ask you why you are leaving?’ asked Joyce who was overheating slightly in her pink woollen suit. ‘You always seemed to be Fogle & Moore through and through. Your assessments have all been exemplary.’

  Crouch wondered whether he should be honest: whether he should tell Joyce that he had got himself stupidly involved with a woman at work, that she had shat all over him, that he had dropped acid into Max Fallon’s drink then kicked the incapacitated wanker into a bloody mess.

  ‘Personal reasons,’ he said simply, ‘no reflection on the company. I’ve had some happy times here.’

  ‘Do you have another job lined up?’ Joyce was discreetly making notes. Crouch knew the score – her next question would be ‘And how much are they paying?’ Personnel always liked to be on the money.

  ‘No, I don’t. I’m going to take a break for a few months. Maybe travel. I’ve been doing this job since college and I reckon I owe myself a breather. I’m thinking of going to Thailand. You know, see some temples. Sit on the beach. Take stock of things.’

  ‘Very brave of you,’ Joyce observed, closing her file. ‘It’s hard, isn’t it. The pressures we all work under now. Sometimes, the courageous thing to do is to say “enough is enough”.’

  Max Fallon returned to the office at ten the followi
ng morning. After the launch of the Fulton Steel issue, he had returned to the British Museum and assimilated as much information as he could about the Soma legend. He had purchased a couple of relevant books in the museum shop and then walked down to Charing Cross Road where he eventu­ally bought a copy of the Rig-Veda. He spent the evening in his Chelsea apartment trying to understand the strange text and relate it to his experiences. The whispering had kept him awake.

  When he eventually arrived on the trading floor, Richard Moore was waiting in his office. Moore was immaculately attired in a navy pinstripe and scarlet tie. His neat white hair exaggerated the hard lines of his face. As Max entered the room, he realized he had forgotten to shave.

  ‘What’s going on, Max?’ he asked. Moore didn’t mince words.

  ‘Sorry I’m a bit late, Richard. Bloody migraines.’

  Moore looked surprised. He knew the trading floor was a rough environment but he did not expect his senior managers to swear at him. However, he had more important issues to discuss.

  ‘What happened yesterday, Max? Fulton Steel was a disaster. A first year graduate wouldn’t have made the mistakes that you did. We lost best part of a million quid by the close of trade.’

  ‘Ouch,’ Max giggled.

  ‘I don’t find it funny. That money is coming out of the bonus pool. We all have to pay for it.’ Moore studied Max’s dishevelled appearance. ‘Look at the state of yourself, man! You haven’t shaved, your suit jacket doesn’t even match your trousers.’

  ‘I’ll wear whatever I like. It’s my trading floor.’ He leaned towards Moore conspiratorially. ‘Promise you won’t say anything, but I am becoming a god. I swear. Even my dick is getting bigger.’

  Moore had seen enough. Danny Planck’s assessment had been correct. ‘Max, I want you to listen to me very carefully. You are going to come upstairs with me to personnel. I have a strong suspicion that you have been taking drugs. That is not permissible on a trading floor as you will know from your contract of employment. Personnel will organize for you to take a drug test in the company medical room: a blood test and a urine sample. Do you understand what I am saying to you?’