Incredible Bodies

by Ian McGuire

  The phone rang. Morris, more on principle than anything else, checked his watch and frowned before answering. The voice was male, southern. He asked for E.

  ‘Who should I say is calling?’

  ‘Kidney.’

  ‘He calls himself Kidney,’ Morris said, holding the phone.

  E straightened up, reddened slightly.

  ‘Nick, hi,’ she said. She sounded nervous. Now Morris stared. E waved him away. He looked back at the TV news – bankruptcy, asylum seekers, film premiere. Nick Kidney, of course, the artist. He and E must have hit it off the other week – didn’t they go somewhere with the kids? He heard the whispery shiver of Kidney’s voice. E laughed. Morris glanced at her. It was like glancing at himself, catching a sight of his own reflection in a window – that initial interest when you think it’s someone else, someone else who looks likes you, and then nothing, the blank similitude of recognition. It was just E, just Morris. He could never see her with fresh eyes any more than he could see himself. Could never see her as other people, Kidney for example, saw her. That was why this was happening, he supposed – not that he disliked E, not even that he was bored, but that he couldn’t see her any more. He envied Kidney that. Whatever his motives (and really, she was six months pregnant so how bad could they be?), at least he could see her, he could encounter her qualities and strangeness, he could be surprised by them.

  E was looking through her Filofax. The news was coming to an end.

  ‘I’ll have to speak to Morris,’ she said. ‘Yes, we’re going to watch Going Critical, one of Morris’s friends is on.’ Kidney said something loud and rather lengthy. E laughed again. ‘Did he really? Isn’t he hateful?’

  Hateful, Morris thought. What a peculiar word to use.

  E put down the phone. Her face was smiley and a little flushed.

  ‘Nick,’ she said. ‘He’s invited us to another opening in London. He said they reviewed one of his shows on Going Critical a year ago. Geraint Davis called him an intellectual jackanapes, and described his work as the spiritual equivalent of bowel cancer. Toby Royale loved it of course.’

  ‘Of course.’

  ‘Which one do you prefer, Geraint or Toby?’

  ‘They can’t be separated. Preference is meaningless. I tell my students they’re perfect examples of a mutually constitutive binary. They need each other: without “Geraint”, “Toby” doesn’t exist, and vice versa.’ He was making quote marks in the air. ‘You can’t have one without the other.’

  E stifled a yawn.

  ‘Like love and marriage, you mean?’

  ‘Er, no, more like good and evil.’

  From the TV came a tootle of cool jazz. The Going Critical logo smouldered briefly on the screen before being replaced by Adam d’Hote, who looked, Morris always thought, rather like a pink Pacman.

  ‘Good evening everyone.’ He paused. ‘And welcome to Going Critical. Our guests this evening are, as usual, the ever-irascible Geraint Davis and the only mildly amusing Toby Royale. And, not as usual, from the dark satanic mills – or should that, given its reputation for drug-fuelled clubbing, be dark satanic pills? – of Coketown, writer, academic and sometime intellectual dom-inatrix, Zoe Cable.’

  There was applause. The camera stopped lightly, like a skimmed stone, from Adam to Geraint, Geraint to Toby, Toby to Zoe. Zoe was wearing a boob-tube and a dog collar – she looked sardonic, bored and intellectually dangerous. Morris shifted in his seat.

  ‘Does she always dress like that?’ E asked.

  ‘Like what?’

  ‘Like it’s 1982 and she’s just been to the youth club disco.’

  ‘It’s deliberate.’ Morris said. And then, as if to cover himself, ‘I would imagine.’

  First up was Tet, a film about the Vietnam War. There was a short clip of two soldiers shouting at each other in a foxhole. ‘George Clooney and Russell Crowe enjoying a Tet à Tet,’ joked Adam d’Hote. ‘Geraint?’

  Geraint Davis appeared at first not to have heard. He remained crouched and motionless in his chair for several seconds. Eventually he wobbled his jaw and slowly sat upright. He was wearing a woolly cardigan and an open-neck check shirt. His haircut, grey and frizzy, seemed to be at odds with itself.

  ‘I find the premise of this film,’ he began, ‘deeply offensive, deeply offensive.’ (Quick cut to Toby raising his eyebrows, Adam looking interested, Zoe looked bored, sardonic, intellectually dangerous. Back to Geraint.) ‘The Vietnam War was not an American tragedy, it was a Vietnamese tragedy. One million Vietnamese died against fifty thousand Americans. But how many Vietnamese people do we see in this film? I counted them – forty-eight.’

  ‘Oh, you did not count them?’ mocked Toby Royale.

  ‘Yes I did,’ shouted back Geraint Davis. ‘I have freeze-frame on my DVD. Forty bloody eight, I tell you. It’s an obscenity!’

  ‘I thought George Clooney gave quite a fine performance as the emotionally troubled Sergeant Troy,’ said Adam soothingly.

  ‘Not at all,’ shouted back Geraint Davis. ‘It’s Californian navel-gazing. The self-indulgence makes me want to puke.’

  ‘Toby?’

  ‘This,’ Toby said in his carefully crafted North London accent, ‘is a movie about sin and redemption and the painful path to moral enlightenment.’ (Since Toby swallowed his ‘t’s, ‘enlightenment’ was not an easy word for him to pronounce – he appeared to chew it as much as say it.)

  ‘That’s poppycock,’ heckled Geraint.

  ‘I agree with you, Adam,’ Toby continued. ‘Clooney’s central performance as Bob Troy, a man who is trying to draw himself back to human decency, is truly magnificent. This is Clooney at his very finest – he combines the louche sexiness of Montgomery Clift with the ravaged emotional intensity of Orson Welles.’

  ‘Orson Welles?’ spat Geraint. ‘Welles was a genius. Clooney is a clothes horse, a mere cipher. The film is a moral atrocity.’

  ‘Zoe?’

  Zoe sprang to life. Her make-up gleamed. She seemed suddenly chirpy, fresh and extremely well caffeinated.

  ‘Well Adam,’ she confided. ‘This is really a film about gay sex. It’s pro-buggery and anti-war, which is in my opinion a hell of a combination.’

  There were several seconds of uproar. Toby Royale laughed loudly, Geraint Davis howled in protest and Adam d’Hote made a flustered demand for clarification.

  ‘But Zoe, there’s no sex in this film at all,’ he said.

  ‘Not as such, Adam, but the central relationship between Clooney and Crowe is obviously highly eroticised. Remember the scene with the grenade launcher? The swimming pool in Saigon? It’s Oscar Wilde with flamethrowers.’

  ‘These characters are all straight, Zoe,’ smiled Geraint with paternalistic moderation.

  ‘Oh come on, Geraint. No one’s really straight. Not even you.’

  The camera switched to Geraint Davis who looked momentarily distorted, like a bad flash photograph of himself.

  ‘God, she’s rude,’ said E.

  ‘Yes, I know.’ Morris was rather awkwardly developing an erection. He crossed his legs and swallowed. He was looking fascinatedly at the the soft right angle of Zoe’s bare shoulder, like the bend in a pale brown pipe. He was remembering its texture, its heft in his palm as he held her.

  ‘Do you find her attractive?’ E asked. She seemed genuinely curious.

  Morris swallowed again.

  ‘The make-up, boob-tube etcetera, is all post-feminist. She’s reclaiming female pleasure and autonomy.’

  E shifted her weight and grimaced. ‘Yes, I suppose some men go for that,’ she said.

  ‘You think it’s a sham?’

  ‘It’s just a bit obvious. She strikes me as the type of woman who wears expensive lingerie. It’s like she’s scared of being too clever. She’s over-compensating.’

  The thought of Zoe in expensive lingerie made Morris temporarily breathless.

  ‘Academics are never scared of being too clever,’ he commented after a moment. ‘
That’s what it’s all about – who has the biggest brain.’

  ‘It may be about relative organ size, Morris,’ E said archly, ‘but from what I’ve witnessed the brain is rarely the organ in question.’

  Morris felt mildly reprimanded. Did that make sense, he wondered, or was it just an offshoot of his web of undersoil guilt? He felt, perhaps for the first time, briefly scared of E, of her powers of discovery and complication.

  The next topic for discussion on Going Critical was Rufus Sump’s latest novel, Playing Lawn Darts With Henry Kissinger, a dysfunctional family saga set in 1970s New Jersey.

  ‘Toby?’

  ‘I’m actually a huge fan of Sump. Minnesota Cheeseshack was, in my opinion, one of the great satires of the 90s. His engagement with the psychotic underbelly of the American boom is truly unparalleled. Mailer, Roth, Updike, Sump: these to me are the American post-war writers.’

  ‘And did Playing Lawn Darts live up to these rather elephantine expectations?’ Adam d’Hote prompted.

  ‘Unfortunately not, Adam. I found the narrative circuitous and lacklustre. The characterisation, usually Sump’s strong suit, was lackadaisical to say the least. All those brothers and sisters, you just forget who they are.’

  ‘So, Sump on autopilot. Geraint?’

  ‘I disagree. I thought this was absolutely terrific. Sump’s previous work has in the main been execrable, childish nonsense – toilet humour for the MTV generation. Minnesota Cheeseshack is no more great satire than My Fair Lady is great socio-linguistics.’

  ‘Don’t knock My Fair Lady,’ yelled Toby

  ‘But at last,’ Geraint continued without pause, ‘Sump has grown up. This is thoughtful, intricate, moving. For once he eschews the sensational in favour of the true. I read it all in one night, and I ended up in floods of tears.’

  ‘I agree with Geraint,’ said Adam briskly. ‘I found the mother’s death scene achingly real. Zoe?’

  ‘This most important character in this novel is obviously the dog,’ said Zoe.

  ‘Dog? What dog?’ Geraint Davis looked around, bewildered as though he had suddenly been dropped by parachute on to a vast and trackless moor.

  ‘Hooydunk, the schnauzer,’ said Zoe. ‘He appears in chapter eighty-one. The references to Tolstoy and Kafka are obvious, but I think Sump goes one better by giving Hooydunk a kind of omniscience – the dog is the voice of God, geddit? Simple but brilliant. The margin is the centre.’

  ‘So you liked it?’

  ‘No, I only liked the dog. Actually, I loved that dog, but the rest is trivial and sophomoric.’

  ‘You didn’t find the death scene achingly real?’

  ‘It’s Little Nell in a duplex. Grow up, Adam.’

  Adam d’Hote’s face, which was permanently pink even under make-up, flushed to an orangey shade of purple.

  ‘You think dogs are more important than real human beings?’

  Morris had watched every episode of Going Critical and he had never before seen Adam d’Hote annoyed.

  ‘None of it is real, Adam. It’s all made up,’ said Zoe with a grin.

  ‘You know, Kidney never returned my messages,’ said Morris.

  ‘Yes, he’s like that.’ E’s eyes remained fixed on the TV.

  ‘Is he?’

  ‘I believe so. He has a well-cultivated reputation for rudeness.’

  ‘So I shouldn’t be offended?’

  ‘No, I think you should be. His aim is usually to offend, but then again, since that’s his aim, the best way to get back at him would probably be to take it in your stride.’

  Morris thought about this for a while.

  ‘Why should I want to get back at him? Doesn’t the urge to revenge suggest a certain depth of feeling, a certain back history of antagonism? Whereas Nick Kidney and I have never met. Our only link is that he failed to return my messages.’

  ‘True, but isn’t it possible that ignorance breeds intensity of feeling? That we feel strongest about those people we barely know, that we hear about or glimpse but never meet. And conversely that close and continual contact leads inevitably to a levelling down of emotion?’

  ‘I see your point,’ said Morris. ‘It’s very Proustian.’

  They had moved on to a naturist version of A Midsummer Night’s Dream.

  ‘The Bard bared,’ said Adam. ‘But what is the point of it all? Zoe?’

  ‘It’s the id, to be monosyllabic, Adam. To me, the nudity was a treat. It’s a play about sexual fantasy after all. This production goes straight to the nub and stays there. It’s a little unrelenting perhaps but the unconscious can go on a bit, can’t it?’

  ‘If you go down to the woods today, you’re in for a bloody big surprise, apparently. Geraint?’

  ‘I was terribly bored. Cock and arse, cock and arse, what ever happened to the iambic pentameter? Whatever you say, Shakespeare’s about language. You can show me all the pubic hair you want but if you can’t speak the verse I say “piss off mate”.’

  ‘So, enunciation not depilation. Toby?’

  ‘Let’s cut to the chase, Adam. Does anyone actually like this stuff?’

  ‘Shakespeare?’

  ‘Yes, people don’t really like seeing Shakespeare, it’s just a way of being pompous, like opera.’

  ‘Shakespeare’s worthless. Geraint?’

  ‘That’s patent nonsense, Adam. Reverse snobbery at its worst. Please don’t blame Shakespeare for the rampant idiocy of contemporary culture. If people don’t enjoy a good production of Shakespeare, that’s their stupid fault not his.’

  ‘Harsh words. Zoe?’

  ‘Slap me round the head with a haddock, Adam, but I find two hours of nakedness pretty pleasurable. Libido is classless. Toby should really remove that chip from his shoulder, it’s spoiling the hang of his Armani suit.’

  ‘Nakedness is poor reward for three hours of tedious gob-bledegook,’ said Toby. ‘Like watching porn while wearing a wetsuit. If you want sex, turn to Channel Five.’

  ‘When I want sex, I certainly don’t turn to Channel Five, Toby. Your idea of pleasure seems rather monolingual, shall we say.’

  ‘This is all a half-veiled insult to the working classes,’ bellowed Geraint.

  ‘The working classes are dead,’ said Toby. ‘Get over it.’

  ‘I’m not dead, you bastard.’

  ‘Does he always get that angry?’ asked E.

  ‘No, only on special occasions. It’s been a good show.’

  ‘Zoe’s held her own.’

  ‘She’s got a gimmick. That’s the key. You have to have a gimmick and stick to it. Otherwise, you’re just chaff in the wind.’

  ‘Sex?’

  ‘Exactly, she does sex. That’s her niche.’

  ‘The others weren’t expecting it.’

  ‘No, she had the element of surprise. Next time they’ll be waiting for her.’

  Adam d’Hote was signing off. There was another tootle of cool jazz. E yawned and began to untangle herself.

  ‘I’m going to bed then. By the way, have you got a boner?’

  Morris looked down.

  ‘Yes, but it’s just theoretical.’

  Their eyes met for an implacable moment, then turned away again. Morris felt strangely non-stick.

  ‘OK then, goodnight.’ E staggered away. Beneath her borrowed pyjama jacket her belly was big, brown and pod-like.

  ‘Goodnight.’ Morris waved. It felt both sad and relieving, like saying goodbye to someone he had been seated next to on a long-haul flight. He switched to Channel Five.

  Chapter 22

  In Zoe Cable’s mind, the Hub was beginning to form. It was coming together with inexorable, inevitable force, like a spiral galaxy condensing out of the chemical riot of the big bang. They had come through the first round of bidding with ease. Their only rivals now were Clapham College and the University of West Lanarkshire. The final decision would be made by a panel of four under the chairmanship of Gantry Hellespont. Zoe’s conference itinerary that summer h
ad been designed to bring her into collision with those five people as frequently and as intimately as possible.

  23 June – the Cairo Conference on Urban Selves. Zoe Cable reclined in the stern of a large felucca, sharing a dizzying sheesha pipe with Angus Deedpole, Emeritus Professor of Social Engineering, University of the Wirral. They were discussing the films of Vincent Price. Deedpole was passionate about the films of Vincent Price. When he had appeared on Mastermind in 1982, Vincent Price had been his specialist subject. He had scored eleven points, passed on two and been beaten into second place by a heating engineer from Gorton.

  ‘I just love the ending of The Fly,’ said Zoe.

  Deedpole nodded wildly in assent. ‘Heelp me! Heelp me!’ he cried in a weeny fly voice. ‘Chilling isn’t it?’

  ‘And isn’t The Masque of the Red Death extraordinarily prescient?’ she went on. ‘I mean it’s the AIDS panic thirty years early.’

  Deedpole sat straight up, his eyes wide with excitement. ‘Exactly,’ he said. ‘Exactly. That’s exactly what I’ve been saying. But why does no one else see it?’

  ‘They don’t see it?’

  Deedpole’s head shook with the sad regularity of a metronome.

  ‘Not at all? I can’t imagine why not,’ said Zoe. ‘I mean, isn’t it obvious?’

  ‘Isn’t it though? Isn’t it just.’ The vehemence of Deedpole’s nodding was now beginning to threaten the stability of the felucca. Their laconic steersman, Abdul Aziz, cast him a look before hawking a large goober into the Nile. ‘It’s right there!’ shouted Deedpole, as though pointing to his theory on a large-scale map.

  They tacked into the shadow of the Sheraton pizzeria. A dead donkey floated past with its legs in the air like an upturned coffee table.

  ‘It’s probably too audacious for the current climate,’ said Zoe. ‘People do get terribly hung up on details of chronology.’

  ‘But that’s just it,’ agreed Deedpole, whose most recent article on HIV and The Masque of the Red Death had been turned down, to Zoe’s knowledge, by at least three separate journals. ‘It’s just detail, minutiae. Why can’t people see the big picture any more?’

  ‘We need to move the profession beyond that,’ agreed Zoe. ‘We need a return to boldness, innovation, size.’