by Luke Kennard
While Karl didn’t think this was likely, he tried to channel his embarrassment, his rage and his temporary loathing for Stu into his twenty-fourth press-up. It took almost a minute.
‘That’s fifty-eight,’ said Stu.
Karl was shaking all over. His temples felt like they were going to explode and his stomach was like a sack of snooker balls. He tried very hard to lower himself again, but his arms gave out. He collapsed, hitting his nose on the floor, and started to cry.
‘I’m sorry,’ he said. ‘I’m sorry.’
‘Hey,’ said Stu. ‘Hey. Karl, stand up.’
Karl clambered to his feet and Stu took him in his arms. Karl cried hard, took big breaths and cried, his nose streaming with snot on Stu’s shoulder. Stu stroked the back of Karl’s head.
‘Let it all out.’
‘I’m sorry,’ Karl sobbed.
‘Do you know how much the last guy held out for?’ said Stu. ‘Thirty-one. And that was the best so far. You did great.’ He patted him on the back, hard. ‘You did fucking great.’
11
‘WHAT HAPPENED TO YOU?’
‘I was working out.’
‘You look like you’ve been hit by a car.’
Karl gingerly climbed into bed and put his head on Genevieve’s shoulder. She smelled of a medicated facial scrub she used sometimes, a smell he associated with their university halls: bare-brick stairwells, a pasted-up lightning crack in the side of the building.
He only realised he’d been asleep when the room filled with light. Janna and Stu were standing at the end of the bed, holding two envelopes. Karl sniffed, sat up in bed, nudged Genevieve.
‘Really sorry to wake you,’ whispered Janna.
‘We won’t make a habit of it,’ said Stu.
‘Is something wrong?’
‘No, no.’ Genevieve shuffled out of the bed and stretched. ‘Don’t apologise. I don’t know what … We never fall asleep this early.’
‘You’re exhausted,’ said Janna. ‘Poor things.’
‘We’ll keep this quick,’ said Stu. He held the envelopes out to Karl.
Karl found it hard to move his arms from his sides; it was as if an important pulley system had snapped.
‘What are these?’
‘We want you both to read a newspaper,’ said Stu. He sat on the end of the bed and Janna sat down against the wall.
‘We’ve got you subscriptions,’ said Janna. ‘To The Guardian and The Telegraph. Every day.’
‘Every day?’
‘You get up an hour early and you read them both, quickly, cover to cover, then swap. Get into the habit. It’s like keeping an allotment.’
‘I’ve tried to read newspapers,’ said Karl, rubbing his left eye. ‘It doesn’t feel like they’re for me.’
‘And that’s the problem,’ said Stu. ‘You need to be an active participant in society. We got the paper editions because the symbolism is important – you could just read it all on your tablets, but I want you to think about your parents, and how serious they seemed when they were behind newspapers.’
‘It’s not that we’re not interested in what happens in the world,’ said Genevieve. ‘Really it’s just that I’m busy or I would read one. At least once a week.’
‘But you’re apolitical.’
‘I’m disillusioned.’
‘No,’ said Stu. ‘The problem you’ve got is that you don’t feel worthy of newspapers. Be honest. A part of you still feels that newspapers are for grown-ups and that you’re not grown-ups.’
‘Look at this,’ said Karl. He had been rifling through The Guardian to the property section and had now folded it on Bargain of the Week, a two-bedroom flat for £1.2 million. ‘This is supposed to be the newspaper for intelligent poor people,’ he said, ‘but we’re completely unrepresented. Newspapers are written for the wealthiest fraction of a fraction of society.’
‘We spend most of our lives living in a fantasy of the future we think we deserve,’ said Janna.
‘This is part of the programme,’ said Stu. ‘This is something you have to trust us on. Try it for the next couple of weeks. You read the papers first thing. We discuss home and international news over breakfast. Deal?’
‘If we can talk about X-Men comic books over dinner,’ said Karl.
‘Okay, second nag,’ said Janna. ‘Teeth. Has either one of you ever been to a dental hygienist?’
‘How does that differ from a dentist?’ said Karl.
‘It’s like the difference between a doctor and a coroner,’ said Stu. ‘Not even joking.’
‘We are incredibly backward about teeth in this country,’ said Janna. ‘It’s seen as separate from health. Most of the population, they might as well be walking around with radioactive waste in their mouths. Name any disease: your teeth and your gums can give it to you. Do you floss?’
‘No.’
‘Genevieve?’
‘Once.’
‘Why did you stop?’
‘I meant once in my life. It was horrible.’
‘Okay. We’ll start with flossing. There’s a complete guide on your tablets with films.’
‘I can’t believe this is part of The Transition,’ said Karl.
‘There’s very little point in any of this if you’re not even taking care of your own mouth,’ said Janna.
12
6 A.M. KARL’S tablet played the theme from Super Mario Bros. 3 and Genevieve’s played Rachmaninov’s Piano Concerto No. 2, very loud. A fresh copy of The Guardian and of The Telegraph lay at the top of the ladder.
‘You know the servants used to iron the newspaper for the master of the house?’ said Karl, rubbing his eyes and dropping The Telegraph on top of Genevieve.
‘Why?’
‘I don’t know. Because it was crinkly, I guess. Which do you want to start with?’
‘Ugh,’ said Genevieve. ‘I don’t even care about myself in the morning, let alone the bloody world.’
Soon, though, they were talking about a fire in a National Trust property which had destroyed a gargantuan cache of Pre-Raphaelite paintings; the unusually high temperatures on the Continent; and the cultural tensions between the French- and German-speaking citizens of Switzerland, and were able to continue the conversation over breakfast with Janna and Stu.
‘You really need to start with the decline of the Roman Empire to understand the situation,’ said Stu, taking a bite of croissant. ‘The original population were Helvetic Celts.’
‘I’m pretty sure that’s a font,’ said Janna.
Once he was alone in the house, Karl took to reviewing a retro-look anti-SAD desk lamp with unusual enthusiasm. It was fun having opinions about things. Also, he had been keeping up the press-ups, trying to do ten every hour so that he could hit the ground running in Stu’s next workout. The tension in his chest muscles was a novelty, and when he dropped the paperclip he was fiddling with and leaned out of his chair to pick it up, his stomach didn’t feel like a balloon he was trying to fold in half. It hurt, certainly, but it was a new kind of pain, an earned pain. ‘This lamp is the Switzerland of desk apparatus,’ he wrote.
He checked Study Sherpas© and found that someone called Cynthia Palmer needed an A-level coursework essay on contemporary British fiction. ‘Really need an A*’ was her only communiqué. A-level essays were a cinch – he could ace them in an hour while talking to someone on the phone. Karl spun the fruit machine in his head, tapped out a title – ‘A Comparison of Representations of Masculinity in the work of Martin Amis and Ian McEwan’ – and brought up three novels apiece on eBeW.
After three hours he had finished the essay and four reviews and thirty press-ups, in spite of thinking about his Polaroid of Genevieve. He started to consider his position. It meant that Janna and Stu were snooping and, well, so was he. It meant that either Stu or Janna was looking for some kind of an edge. Or fancied his wife. Or had designs on his wife of some kind. Or it was part of The Transition which would later be revealed to him. Or Stu was
a bigger perv than he was, and Genevieve was his wife, dammit, and that was his photo of her awesome body. Karl stood up and started pacing from his study to the bedroom and back again. That’s the problem with self-respect, he thought. You start to feel offended when someone insults you.
He completed eight circuits of the room and the study. He was an inveterate pacer. Genevieve said it was the only reason he wasn’t fat. He stopped in the bedroom, looked out of the window and decided to channel his irritation into some more press-ups. He hit the floor, staring straight ahead at the foot of the bed. One … Two … The familiar pulsing in his temples. Three … Four …
Something caught his eye. The word NOT was carved in tiny letters into the foot of the bed, next to a rough downward pointing arrow.
‘Not?’ said Karl, out loud.
He started patting the floor under the bed, feeling under the bed frame. He stuck his head under the bed. He turned on the tablet for light and slid it under with him. not_all_transition.com was carved into one of the wooden slats under the mattress.
Karl put www.not_all_transition.com into his tablet, and the screen went white. He hit refresh and the same thing happened. Then it told him that the connection had timed out. The second time it told him that the site was unavailable, and then the screen froze. He made a mental note to check in an internet cafe. There were still internet cafes, presumably.
He restarted the tablet. When it came back on, the screen was prompting him to complete his 500-word journal from last night or lose a merit point. He texted Keston.
– Favour to ask you.
The reply felt almost implausibly instant:
– Anything for my favourite screw-up.
– That was quick. Bored much?
– I’m at work. This is one of eight conversations I’m having, mother.
– Haha.
– Haaaaaa. So this favour? U want someone killed?
– Any chance you could look into our mentors’ previous protégés?
– WHAT?
– Just the names.
– Karl, what do you think I am, a PI from the 50s?
– So no then?
– I could *probably* find out. *Probably*, but for the love of God, why do you want to know?
– Curious.
– Is it all going wrong? Are you not having fun?
– Everything’s fine.
– My advice, Special K, is to keep your head down for six months and count yourself very bloody lucky you’re not in prison.
– You’ll do it, then?
– SIGH. EYEROLL. Don’t make me use emoji again, K-dog.
– You’re the BEST, Keston. Beston.
When he was making his 4 p.m. cup of tea, Karl heard a key in the lock and saw an outline of a tall man through the glass. Stu was first back, which was unusual.
‘Hey there,’ he said and dumped his heavy shoulder bag in the hall with a thud.
‘Good day?’ said Karl. It flashed into his mind that the bag was full of human limbs. He shook the image off.
‘Meh,’ said Stu. ‘Got another one of those?’
Karl took down a mug.
‘What do you actually do at The Transition?’ said Karl. ‘Apart from looking after us, obviously.’
‘God,’ said Stu, rubbing his face. ‘Don’t get me wrong – I love the company, but it’s like having three jobs sometimes. There are some pretty ordinary things about running a building of that size – the stationery and catering alone have their own finance team, you know? And now we’re having some issues with Transition Netherlands … it’s exciting, but it’s more chaotic than usual. I work in our Relationships department. Dispute resolution. When things break down between mentors and protégés, etc. …’
Stu had taken off his boots and replaced them with some kind of textured rubber socks. He paused to take a swig of tea.
‘Ah. Doesn’t come up often, you’ll be pleased to hear, but, well, we’re all human, aren’t we? Not everyone’s as lucky as me and Janna.’
‘Aw.’
‘Seriously – you’re a peach. You’re both peaches. Got a couple “on the run” at the moment. Silly sods. I liaise with Legal a lot. Strategy meetings. Internal and external reviews. They find a way of making a pretty sweet racket you used to care about into a royal pain in the arse. Like any job, basically.’
‘That’s the truth,’ said Karl.
‘We’re actually going to be advertising an IT position soon,’ said Stu. ‘Could use someone with your work ethic.’
‘Ha!’ said Karl. ‘My work ethic.’
‘I’m serious,’ said Stu. ‘I know you worked your arse off trying to pay down those seventeen credit cards. I’m going kiteboarding – could you tell Janna? Next workout on Sunday, okay, big guy?’
13
THEY SLEPT LATE on Saturday morning and then watched a chef and an actress searing scallops on the corner television.
‘Do you like her?’ said Genevieve. ‘She’s your type, isn’t she?’
‘I like women who look like you,’ said Karl.
Genevieve mimed retching.
‘No, it’s true. Whenever I have a crush on someone there’s something oddly familiar about them, and then I realise it’s because they remind me of you in some way.’
‘So your ideal woman,’ said Genevieve, ‘is someone who looks like me but isn’t actually me.’
‘That would be super-hot,’ said Karl, stretching.
‘It’s hurtful. You think you love me, but you don’t love all of me.’
‘I’m sorry,’ said Karl, ‘I’ve lost track of whether this is a serious conversation or not.’
‘It’s always serious,’ said Genevieve.
‘What part of you don’t I love?’
‘You don’t love me when you think I’m ill. You think I’m a different person.’
‘When you’re ill,’ said Karl, ‘you’re annoying and you’re mean to me. Afterwards you don’t remember anything you said or did. I’m supposed to love that? It’s not you.’
‘But it is part of me.’
‘No it’s not.’
Genevieve laughed.
‘No, look,’ said Karl. ‘If you broke your leg I would love you, but I wouldn’t love the fact that you’d broken your leg. I’d hate that you’d broken your leg.’
‘So you’d stop loving my leg,’ said Genevieve.
‘No.’
She looked at her legs. ‘Which leg are we talking about, just to be clear?’
‘That’s beside the … Let’s say your right leg.’
‘Poor old righty,’ said Genevieve, patting her leg. ‘Best not get broken if you want to keep your husband.’
Once Stu and Janna were awake Karl slipped downstairs and timidly enquired what the itinerary for the day might be. Janna laughed and said it was whatever they usually did on a Saturday. Except it had to be free. They took a walk in the park.
‘This is a great park,’ said Genevieve, surprised. ‘I can’t believe we’ve never walked around it before.’
Stu’s Iro looked especially pointy that evening. He cooked sea bass with kale and charlotte potatoes and, as it was Saturday, they drank a lot of white wine, a Riesling so dry it was almost salty.
‘We’re going to talk about money,’ said Janna. ‘This is going to be invasive and disrespectful and I apologise in advance.’
‘We’re not proud,’ said Karl.
‘This is a parable from the Transition handbook,’ said Stu, holding up a glossy black paperback with a thoroughly cracked spine – the Mentor’s Edition. He read: ‘“A stray dog was starving to death outside the butcher’s. Over time he learned to do tricks. He walked on his hind legs, he balanced a stone – a little piece of gravel from the front garden next door – on the end of his nose and flipped it in the air, catching it in his mouth. It was impressive. Every now and then, a customer would pat him on the head and tell him he was a good boy. Once, once, a kind old woman gave him a piece o
f her chuck steak. Day in, day out he carried on walking on his hind legs, getting better and better at flipping the stone off his nose. Some people were amused, but a lot of people didn’t really care for dogs anyway, especially strays. Meanwhile the other dogs went round the back to the skips at the end of every working day and helped themselves.”’
Genevieve added a sugar to her coffee.
Janna and Stu looked at Karl.
‘Do we discuss the parable?’ said Karl.
‘Just let it filter in,’ said Janna.
‘Keep it in mind,’ said Stu.
Janna was staring at Karl. ‘This is going to be a little uncomfortable,’ she said. ‘That’s normal. Play along, okay?’
‘Okay,’ said Karl.
‘Do you like your jobs?’
‘Sometimes,’ said Genevieve.
‘No,’ said Karl.
‘Genevieve,’ said Janna. ‘What do you bring in a month, net?’
‘Fourteen hundred,’ said Genevieve.
‘Karl?’
‘It varies.’
‘On average.’
‘I usually clear a grand,’ said Karl.
‘I think you need to be a little more realistic,’ said Janna. ‘What was your rent?’
‘Six fifty a week,’ said Genevieve.
‘Christ.’ Janna sat back. ‘Savings?’
‘Oh, we’re both in significant debt,’ said Karl.
‘There was a problem with a car,’ said Genevieve.
‘And you want to have children?’
‘At some point,’ said Karl.
‘Sooner rather than later,’ said Genevieve.
‘The thing I don’t understand,’ said Janna, ‘and forgive me for being direct, but what, exactly, is it in your circumstances that you expect to change? Are you hoping to win the lottery? Sell a screenplay? Write a hit single?’
‘We’re hoping for a land reform act,’ said Genevieve. ‘First kill the landlords.’
‘Let’s be honest,’ said Janna. ‘Some grim realities. There was an era, some years ago, when teaching could be considered a career. Those days have passed. If you choose to do a job like that you really need a private income.’