Make her calm. Make her watch some television.
Curfew her mobile fone use.
Suggest some random budget wellness break for when she’d beaten it.
Standard procedure, standard.
Your mummy was right the first time, though. Truth was, you just wanted to hit the playground in Gunnersbury Park. You were up for all the practical tasks and the drainages and the discharge, but when it came to all this crying shit, you just wanted to go Gunnersbury Park.
25
STRETCH MARKS ON the armchair he’s slumped in.
“So, what do you want – money?”
“What?”
“Do you need some money, Dylan? Will that do?”
Now that he’s lost the raincoat, his shoulders look broader. His neck proper solidness without the poncey yellow scarf. I tell Dad I don’t need no money, thanks – thanks all the same, though. Thanks.
“My chequebook’s just in the kitchen. I keep it hidden inside an old milk carton.”
I tell him again I don’t need his money. Just like we didn’t need it when I was at school. He rolls with this like it’s some fist-bump instead of a punch.
“I could do an online bank transfer right now.”
“Why do you keep making out as if I want money?”
“Well, you’ve come to see me.”
Switch to scoping out his flat. The scent of pizza and printer ink. Telling him there’s so much light and space, like I’m some bubblefart Foxton’s estate agent. Cos what the hell else am I meant to say? That I like his pet ants? Way each of them seems to divide into two as they exit the light switch. Or that his walls are more maroon than shit-brown? That who needs wardrobes anyway? Or do I tell him I reckon it’s really right-on and enviro-friendly the way he reuses envelopes and newspapers as coasters and placemats and table covers and even as actual tables? That the skid-marked bath towel makes a surprisingly versatile substitute for a Persian rug?
“Well at least sit down then, Dylan.”
The fuck has it taken me twelve whole years since the divorce to figure out the man didn’t just lose a home, he lost an actual house?
“Son, please sit.”
A three-bedroom semi, now with accessible downstairs bathroom and planning permission in place for some crazy optimism loft conversion.
Dad’s moustache starts moving up and down. Asks me if I’d like some almonds or someshit. When I don’t respond, the moustache tries again: “Cashews?”
“I just wanted to talk.”
“I think I have some pistachios somewhere … ”
I tell him I been allergic to nuts since I was born – that apparently he’d had to take me to A&E once. Then, when I finally step up and tell him I’ve come here to ask about his journalism, he thinks I’m trying to tap him for work experience. “I see – so a back scratch instead of cash?” The moustache now doing actual Pilates – not just stretching to smile at me, but taking it to some next level, like he’s smiling at the fact that he’s smiling at me. I shut that shit down with a quickness, tell him that if I needed an internship I’d score my own placement.
He fiddles with one of the improv coasters on his improv coffee table. The table’s just another stack of newspapers. The coaster basically this plastic Save-File icon. “Your mother used to be impressed with my profession. But never genuinely interested in it. Then I’d try so hard to interest her that in the end she stopped being impressed.”
I tell him I didn’t come here to talk about Mama.
“You know, your mother never—”
Tell him again: I didn’t come here to talk about Mama.
“Yes. Yes, apparently you came here to talk about my journalism.”
Before I can bring up his blacked-out stories, Dad just starts throwing stuff out there, proper rapid-fire – like as if he’s trying to demo that my asthma ain’t hereditary. Telling me all about the news service he runs as part of that insurance company’s website. How much web traffic it brings to their home page cos news spreads faster than policy premium smallprint. How he basically rewrites stories from news agencies, plus a handful of longer, in-depth stories of his own. “So just a low-key operation, Dylan. Actually, as far as the branding goes, it doesn’t have the most original name for an online news service. We just call it Latest Headlines.” He scratches the armrest like as if it’s got a rash. “Though sometimes I wonder whether we shouldn’t just call it Latest Deadlines … ”
I shoot him some semi-smiley emoji – tell him how all the journalists I see in films are always on some mad dash deadline. Should probly have sirens attached to their keyboards or something.
“It’s got nothing to do with being on the clock,” goes Dad. “It’s because we accentuate the death tolls, of course – otherwise what would be the point in having a news service on a life insurance website?” Nodding with his moustache instead of hs neck. “Now I know what you must be wondering, son: but what if nobody dies in the story that I’m writing? Well, even if there’s no actual death toll, you can always speculate that people could have died or they might die – or maybe that they’re in the process of dying.” Then he throws down a For Example: “Your university must be having a student newspaper, Dylan. Well, any story they publish about any aspect of campus could easily be massaged a little in order to add one or two paragraphs about the number of students who commit suicide each year because of exam pressure – even if it’s just a story about something boring and non-lethal like library funding. You just stick in a sentence that says libraries also provide sanctuary for students who otherwise would get anxious studying alone in their bedrooms – followed by all the suicide statistics. And then, like that, the boring library-funding story becomes a death-risk story. In my job I’ve found that there’s always a death-toll angle or a death-related tangent – doesn’t matter what the story is.”
I’m all like “erm” and “um” and shit – fat-fingering my response again. Finally, it comes out like this: “So you basically saying you are an insurance salesman after all?”
Neither Dad nor his moustache gives a ruffle. “I’m sorry, son, but I think you must be having a very naive impression of the dishonest mainstream news media. Even when I worked for the newspaper, the editors there would get squeamish if there wasn’t enough death in a story. Because all news stories are about selling something, Dylan, only usually it’s about selling the news. If a local council opens a new school, the local media outlets can’t just report on the school, they have to find the one person on the planet who happens to be unhappy about the school so that they can report on a row. The conflict and the division. And if there isn’t a row, they’ll find a row about the lack of a row. Well, tell me, son, how is that different from me highlighting the potential death tolls from a new school because of the increased road traffic? My stories have to sell life insurance; their stories have to sell the news – the point is neither of us is really telling the reader all that much about the actual school.” He hits his pause button for a few secs, but his moustache carries on going without him, like as if it’s revving up for the next bit. “And it’s the same damn thing when the news media tries to be balanced and neutral. They think that being balanced makes them objective. Tell me, how the hell is it objective to balance out a story by airing the views of hate preachers and far right neo-Nazis? Or by giving space to climate-change deniers spouting falsehoods sponsored by oil companies?”
Dad starts telling me how being balanced and telling the truth are full-on different things. Says balanced stories are contradictory – that you just end up telling two contradictory facts. Says balance should just be some last resort for when you can’t actually find out the actual truth. Carries on chatting about the “dishonest mainstream news media” while chucking actual newspapers onto his improv coffee table – so basically it’s like he’s just building a bigger coffee table. “And of course these days they have to sell the stories even harder.” Thud. “Everything’s now on the same screen so people assume ev
ery piece of content is equally important, equally credible.” Thud. “It’s like having to sell broccoli to kids inside one big giant sweet shop.” As he starts shit-fitting about all these tooth-decayed kids, Dad starts jabbing a paper in my direction. Won’t even let me cut in with my own side of the story. Starts going on about clickbait and that – like as if he knows that’s exactly the topic I wanna click on. “And, sure, people may say that they want calm and factual, good-quality journalism. But believe me, the web-traffic data suggests there’s a big difference between what people say they want and what they actually click on, son.”
I try jumping in – show my daddy that I know someshit. Tell him the reason that crap content and proper stories all look the same is cos fone screens are small so you gotta simplify the design of everything.
Dad actually laughs at me. Says the tech giants have made fortunes by blurring the lines between advertising and journalism and promotions so that it all just becomes “content”. Says that, compared to all them blurred lines, him using news stories to openly sell life insurance is pretty harmless.
I grab my rucksack like as if I’m gonna bail. Like as if I don’t wanna know where he’s going with all this. Tell him again that his flat has so much light and space.
“Wait, Dylan, listen to me,” he says. “Why can’t you people be patient enough to listen when a man needs to properly explain something? I’m trying to tell you that not every media outlet or journalist acts admirably when they’re compelled to compete life and limb for people’s increasingly dwindling attention. Much less when they’re forced to compete for their own son’s affection.”
After that we both just sit there in silence like one of them mis-married couples who shoulda got divorced while they still had functioning sex organs or something. Cos what the hell are you meant to say to something like that? Only thing I know for cert is that there ain’t no bailing now – for me or for my dad. He fones his friend or colleague or story contact or whoever to tell them that he’s sorry, but he’s gotta work late in the office. “I’m sorry. What can I say? I’m always working late. You all go ahead, though – the reservation is under my name, Nick Deckardas.”
Soon as Dad hangs up, he clocks my fuckstruck face. “What, Dylan? So I lied about working late in the office. It’s hardly a crime, son.”
I ask him why he said his name is “Nick”.
“Because I changed it when I started this job. My colleagues couldn’t pronounce Ramnik. I tried using the name Ram for a while, but they thought I was talking about RAM data storage.”
I tell him it stands for random-access memory. I tell him I prefer the name Ram to Nick. I don’t tell him that Ram is also my secret pet name for Ramona even though Ramona doesn’t do pet names.
“Of course you prefer Ram to Nick,” he goes. “Ram is an Indian name. And your mother’s family never thought I was Indian enough.”
I tell him I didn’t mean Ram in the Indian sense. I meant it as in the male animal thing.
Dad just grunts and heads to the bathroom or toilet or men’s room or whatever – and let’s just say it ain’t exactly soundproof. That time Mummy told me about his bowel issues. Felt like she was actually dissing me – or at least dissing half my DNA.
“There’s some beer in the fridge, son.”
I take the hint and take my ass and my rucksack to the paper and cardboard recycling plant he calls the kitchen.
“Do you want it in a glass, Dad, or is the bottle fine?”
“Let’s not have a conversation while I’m in the bathroom, son.”
If I was going for the full Kleenex-and-violin effect, I’d tell him I’ve chatted to Mum in the bathroom on the regular. Her holding the flush handle, me holding her hand.
“The glasses are in the cupboards along the top,” he calls out. “Not the cabinets along the bottom – the cupboards along the top.”
So of course I start opening the cabinets along the bottom – just for the fuck of it, like I need to rack up some acts of teenage disobedience. Check out all his top-secret frying pans and saucepans while my dad is on the shit-pot. Also, crockery, Tupperware, obligatory unopened rice cooker. But, wait – what the fuck? – also his socks, boxers, pyjamas, woolly jumpers. In another kitchen cabinet, his vests and T-shirts. In another, his shoes, flip-flops, bedroom slippers. In another, books, more newspapers, more books. One big fuck-off book in particular – some black, leather-bound beast of a book lying right at the back like some well-fed rodent. On the cover, the word “Cuttings”. Inside it, scrapbook pages rammed with newspaper clippings that have literally been cut-and-pasted. Yup, I shit you not: each clipping is a story written by my dad during the year he worked at the paper. Only this time, ain’t none of them are blacked out with marker pen. Soon as Dad flushes the toilet, there’s some tremor action in the tower-block of dishes in his kitchen sink. Like as if his crockery is warning me not to.
Dad don’t ask why the hell we’re drinking beer outta teacups. He just says, “Cheers.” And then: “Son, I’m sorry it’s taken us so long to have a beer together.” And this happy moment right here is where tonight’s episode should end. Dad’s gesture of fatherly fatherliness and whatever. His stories weighing down in my rucksack like some cliffhanger in a doggy bag. Shouldn’t even take time to down my beer, what with it being in a teacup and all. But turns out that Dad’s got other plans. He pours another cupful then hits me up once again with the question: “Do you want money, Dylan?”
“Dad, didn’t we just do all this already?”
“Yes. And you said you wanted to talk about journalism. Well, now we’ve talked about it.” He nods towards the old milk carton.
“You don’t need to keep telling me where you hide your chequebook. If I needed some bucks, I’d earn them myself – I got my own business.”
“What business? You’re a student.”
So then, mainly to just change the channel, I give Dad the download on my start-up. The Dumbfuck’s Guide to Data Entry. A day in the life of a data temp. (Also: how tons of students have now got their own business on their CV.) (How your actual degree is just the footnote.) (How I set the thing up so that I could chip in when Mum’s sickness made her too sick to work two different jobs.)
“So does this business of yours have a name?”
“I just call it Company A.”
“Eh?”
“That’s just what they call companies in our Business Studies module. As in, Company A merges with Company B and together they appease the regulator by spinning-off Company C.”
Dad asks how come I didn’t mention my start-up when we linked up yesterday. I tell him he didn’t ask – didn’t even ask what subject my degree is in. Then he starts sipping his teacup of beer like it’s actually tea – sweet, milky tea. And, fuck knows why, but the sight of him doing this makes me tell him that I got a confession. And, next thing, I’m vomiting it all out to him like some sickly child who chunders just to get hugs and cuddles. Tell him about the digital archive I been helping to compile for my start-up’s latest client. Tell him I know he worked for the same newspaper for a year – back when I was a baby or a foetus or, whatever, a semen. And I tell him about how his stories ain’t allowed to be entered into the online archive. But I don’t tell him about my run-in with the managing editor who tried to suss out if I was related to him. And I deffo don’t shoot my mouth about the two Botox men.
When Dad lowers the cup from his face, I have one of them freaky facial-recognition moments. The man’s wearing the exact same look that our GP did when she knew straight away for sure what was wrong with Mum without having to hedge shit or refer her to a specialist. Her stethoscope underlining an actual smile on her face – not cos it was good news, but cos at least this time she knew exactly what to tell us.
“Dylan, you make it sound as if there’s some big mystery going on with my stories. The reality of the matter was more straightforward. Cost-cutting. Profit-maximising. More content to churn out and less time for each story. Th
e more they cut the headcount and increased the workload, the more the rest of us had to obey the basic laws of physics and cut corners.”
I tell him I no longer follow him.
“Well, obviously I made things up, son. Not the actual stories, you understand, just the quotes. Of course, not the quotes from government or corporate officials, just the eyewitness quotes from random members of the public, who I also made up – Joe Bloggs from Buckinghamshire or whoever happened to be visiting the brand-new shopping mall or stuck in the traffic jam or walking past the fire or what have you.” He hits me with another For Instance: “Peter Smith, an accountant from London, was cycling past the arson-damaged school on his way to work: ‘Flames were coming out of the windows like wings,’ he said. That sort of thing, Dylan. I mean, you have to appreciate what happens when stories become sausage meat for these giant digital content machines. I mean, it’s not as if—”
“Wait, Dad – just press pause for one sec. Just tell me straight up, yes or no, are you actually saying you wrote fake news stories? You actually made shit up?”
“Not the stories, Dylan, just the eyewitness quotes. Just the ones from Joe Bloggs from Buckinghamshire or whoever from wherever. It wasn’t fake news – fake news is when you deliberately present falsehood as fact. This was just about cutting corners to keep up with the workload. It wasn’t fake stories, it was just fake quotes. And fake names.” My eyes hit the deck. “Everybody did it in some form, Dylan. Either they just rewrote press releases or they didn’t properly verify things or they just made things up. Same difference. But I got caught, and because I was the newbie in the newsroom I was made an example of. Although nobody except the editor and managing editor even knew just how many quotes I’d actually faked – everyone thought I got fired for doing it just the once. A one-off occurrence by a one-off rogue reporter. That’s how the paper managed to own up while at the same time hushing the whole thing up. And I suppose that’s also why they blacked-out all my stories.”
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