The Alternative Hero

by Tim Thornton

  “… so in the end,” Polly blethers, sloshing red wine into the ashtray as you briefly tune in, “I just told him it simply wasn’t going anywhere. I had no interest in surgery, or Durham, or any of his opinions really … I was honest with him … and he was fine about it, really … even paid for dinner … It’s amazing what you can achieve when you’re just honest with someone …”

  Suddenly a cartoon lightbulb appears above your head. You’re only halfway through your pint but something compels you to rise, apologise to your companion and lurch off in the direction of your flat. With a certainty that only vast quantities of beer can provide, you’ve rarely been more sure of what you need to do. Be honest. Enough of this tomfoolery, skirting around the issue. Just be honest.

  You stop off at the Turkish shop for a couple of beers (you’re not sure how long this will take, after all), pass by the abode of the man himself (no lights are on, but that doesn’t matter), descend the steps to your own flat, let yourself in, crack open a beer and settle at the kitchen table. This is the right thing. It has to be. The magic solution. The key to the lock, the long-sought combination code. The turning point, frankly. The pivot on which everything else swivels. That Zane Lowe moment. “It was really that simple, you see, Zane … all I had to do was be honest.”

  And now you’re outside again.

  And now you’re standing in front of a large black door.

  And now you’re walking.

  And now you’ve forgotten your keys.

  And now you’re looking at the moon.

  And now … Polly. In her dressing gown.

  “Clive, what the fuck are you doing?”

  “Sorry. Left my keys.”

  “Why’d you leave me in the pub like that?”

  “Sorry, just needed to … you know.”

  “You’re completely mental. And I thought I was drunk. Where’ve you been? What time you gotta be up?”

  You manage to focus on your watch. Someone must be mucking around with it. Why the hell is time going so quickly?

  “In about five hours.”

  “Ouch.”

  “Sorry, Polly. Better go to bed.”

  Bed. Now there’s a bit of rational, reasonable thinking. Bed. See, there’s still sense somewhere in that brain of yours. Amazing. It continues to operate, even at this drunken juncture. The last thought it processes before you fall into a leaden, exhausting sleep, is that you’re somehow missing something—but you can’t imagine what it could be.

  Never mind.

  You’re sure it’ll come to you in the morning.

  SUGGESTED LISTENING: The Rumble Strips, Girls and Weather (Fallout, 2007)

  Two totally separate but

  equally fucking disastrous

  outcomes of me getting

  wankered

  There’s an old Peanuts cartoon; I’m not sure if you remember it but bear with me: Snoopy wakes up one winter’s morning, he’s been sleeping on top of his kennel in the usual way he starts reflecting on how nice it is to wake up with a feeling of well-being, a cosy sensation that, although not perfect, life is generally fine and dandy. Only then does he spot this bloody great icicle with a huge razor-sharp edge, hanging precariously over his doghouse. One move and it’ll fall off, slicing him and his abode clean in two.

  Well, that’s essentially how I feel when my clock radio prods me out of slumber around seven. I have no headache. I’m warm. I had a nice dream about cooking barbecue sausages on a Norfolk beach. It’s a Saturday. Even the song playing (that stupid Libertines one about the Likely Lads) doesn’t irritate me too much. I lie there feeling pleased with myself for twenty seconds or so. But then I see the icicle. Except, in my case, there are two of the fuckers. I only see one of them right now. But don’t you worry—I’ll be seeing the other one soon enough.

  I leap out of bed and grab my bag. After a superficial look in the main section I simply unzip all the other pockets and tip it upside down. Lots of rubbish, bank statements, foreign coins, my diary, a couple of bills, but nothing else. I blunder over to where yesterday’s trousers have been unceremoniously dumped and check the pockets. Nothing. Then my coat. Fuck all. Then I try to find my phone. I need my bloody phone. Now.

  I find it under my socks and call directory enquiries while running to the kitchen for a glass of water.

  “Yes, it’s a pub, the Schooner, Old Street … London … Uh, I dunno. N1? EC1? Or 2? Not sure … Right, got it … Yes, please, thanks …”

  I glug the water and frantically search the kitchen top—loads of papers and bills, mainly Polly’s—while the pub’s number rings and rings. There’s plainly no one there at seven in the bloody morning, what was I thinking? I slam the phone down on the kitchen table.

  Which is when I see the second icicle.

  My notebook, open, pages ripped out, a few scrunched-up sheets lying loose. Blue biro hanging about nearby. Empty can of beer.

  A horrible, dim memory surfaces.

  “Polly!”

  Still wearing only yesterday’s underpants, I look bloody everywhere. All over the kitchen. Out in the stairwell. Up the steps. The bathroom. My bedroom again. A cold sweat emerges from my brow, as does Polly from her bedroom: a splendour of smudged mascara, light blue dressing gown and those damn slippers with toothpaste stains.

  “Clive, what the hell are you doing now? Jesus, it’s seven o’fucking clock.”

  “I’ve lost it,” I splutter, turning my bedroom upside down.

  “Dare I ask?”

  “No. Everything. What the fuck was I doing last night?”

  “What?”

  “What was I doing? Last night. After I saw you.”

  My phone rings. I push Polly out of the way before she can answer and stumble to the kitchen.

  Withheld number.

  “Hello?”

  “Yes,” responds a male voice. “You call this number.”

  “Are you the pub?”

  “Yes.”

  “The Schooner?”

  “Yes. I am cleaner.”

  “Look—I was in the pub last night. I left something there.”

  “Yes.”

  “A plastic wallet. Two driving licences. And … um … five hundred quid in cash.”

  I realise how hopeless this sounds as soon as it leaves my lips. I half expect the bloke to laugh.

  “I check,” he says.

  “Thanks.”

  “Oh, Clive,” murmurs Polly leaning on the kitchen door.

  “Never mind all that. What was I doing?”

  “You left me in the pub.”

  “Sorry. But when you came home?”

  “You were writing at the kitchen table.”

  “What was I writing?”

  “How should I know? Looked like a letter.”

  “Fuck!” I yell, unscrunching one of the sheets of paper.

  “What?”

  “I think I wrote to Lance Webster.”

  The unscrunched piece of paper has nothing written on it. Lord knows why I scrunched it up. Another merely has the date. Which I’d got wrong.

  “So?”

  “So … I was drunk. So it was probably nonsense. So it was probably hysterical, with my stupid name at the bottom, possibly even my address.”

  “So?”

  My voice allows a bit more exasperation past the flood barrier.

  “So, Polly—he has a history of stalkers! So—I’ve probably completely sodded up my chances of ever getting within a hundred yards of him! Let alone interviewing him!”

  “Right … so what’s that got to do with you leaving money in a pub?”

  “Nothing! They’re merely two totally separate but equally fucking disastrous outcomes of me getting wankered, as bloody usual!”

  “Well, if you ask me I’d say the money thing is slightly worse, but …”

  “Shhh!”

  At the other end of the line I’m hearing steps coming back towards the phone. Steps that my entire bank balance and probably my job han
g from.

  “Hello,” he says.

  “Hi. Any luck?”

  “No, sorry. Nothing. I can ask manager when he come, he come nine thirty.”

  “Fuck. Thanks anyway, I’ll ring back.”

  I sit down uneasily in one of the kitchen chairs and think for a moment. My one advantage is that I’m awake. It’s five past seven. Time is on my side. Polly, who has a nice habit of going into maternal-style overdrive at times like this (at complete odds with the total shambles of her own life), puts the kettle on and fetches her laptop, which she places in front of me.

  “Right. Go online and check your bank balance. Work out how much you can afford to blow on this, then I’ll lend you the rest. The important thing is that you show up, on time, with a van. Then at least they can see you’re trying.”

  I discover I can physically withdraw two hundred, and God knows what I’ll do for the rest of the month. Polly, bless her, lends me the other three. I phone and wake various other people as I dress and jump on a bus to Holloway: a couple of people from work (“Was there cash in the packet as it was being passed round? Are you sure? Yes, yes, I know Ron’s going to crucify me,” etc.), the Turkish shop, the other pub, the bus company, none of whom reveals anything useful, while the perpetual question of what the hell I put in that letter rattles around at the back of my mind like a broken exhaust pipe. Incredibly, all this frantic activity manages to cancel out the vicious hangover I certainly deserve, although that probably says more about the general level of alcohol present in my body these days than any psychosomatic theory one could consider.

  I pick up the van—a suitably knackered-looking Luton—and clatter back down the Holloway Road without further mishap. It’s eight thirty when I pull up outside our grey office building. I’m greeted by a few tired and grumpy faces from last night; everyone cheers up considerably when I inform them of my impressive blunder. Ron hasn’t appeared yet so we retire to the café round the corner, where I drink coffee like a man possessed and interrogate my colleagues. No one seems to remember anything. One of them suggests the bar staff pilfered it when collecting glasses. Further speculation seems pretty futile. The unanimous view is that I’m fucked. I groan and order another coffee. I picture Lance Webster opening and reading my letter. It’s nice to have another self-made catastrophe to focus on. It’s times like this that I thank the gods I never started smoking.

  My mobile rings at nine. It’s Ron.

  “Good morning, Clive.”

  “Morning, Ron. We’re just having a coffee.”

  “I see the vehicle is currently parked in a car-parking space that ceases to be free at nine thirty. Now, what I propose is that you give me the keys, and while you commence shifting some of the objects downstairs I’ll familiarise myself with the van and find a free car-parking space.”

  “Ah, yes—um, good idea, Ron, but I need to just quickly have a word with you about something, if you just wait there …”

  I run round the corner. He’s standing by the van wearing an absurd pink and purple fleece and jeans that look like they’ve just come out of a packet. Bright white unbranded trainers. His glasses are held on by a yellow elastic band. None of which makes him look any less scary. Gingerly, I tell him the news. His reaction is interesting.

  “Oh, fuck!” he exclaims.

  Ron is not a man who says this word very often. He looks genuinely gutted, and stares at an unspecified object halfway down the road for what seems like the next ten minutes while I stand there stupidly.

  Finally he sighs and says, “Well, these things happen, I suppose, but I can’t believe you couldn’t have been more careful.”

  And that, it seems, is that. I actually think he’s far more upset at not being able to drive the van than he is about the money. Of course, that could very well mean that in his view, the money is not his problem.

  The rest of the day passes at an unbearable crawl. The van now being solely my charge, I spend most of the time either sitting in it, driving it or standing next to it, wondering if my parents will lend me some money, if my bank will extend my overdraft limit, if there’s any space left on one of my credit cards. And when I’m tired of thinking about those things there’s always the rich worry-seam of the Webster letter for me to relentlessly mine. It’s amazing how my brain has recorded none of the contents whatsoever, although—crazily—I somehow recall the shape of the text on the page. For some baffling reason I balanced it all in the centre, starting with the greeting, the sentences spreading out below, line by line, wider and wider like a Christmas tree, a design decision that will certainly lend currency to the argument that he’s being addressed by a gibbering lunatic. Mercifully, I don’t think I went beyond one page. I hope to buggery I didn’t mention I was the guy working in the vet’s.

  We continue shifting and packing the rickety truck with endless loads of paraphernalia, Ron in his element, presiding over the process with mathematical precision. One wonders why he became an accountant at all and not the boss of a removal firm. Only after every cubic centimetre of space is filled and the van’s arse begins to sag dangerously am I permitted to trundle round to our new premises: an even more depressing sixties block behind Brick Lane. There I find a second team of weirdos, who reluctantly extinguish cigarettes and get busy hauling the stuff inside every time I appear. Towards three o’clock, when the old office finally starts looking emptier than the new one, Ron accompanies me on one of the trips to find four of his employees relaxing in the car park with pints from the pub round the corner.

  “I find it improbable that you have moved all the furniture to its correct place, and completed setting up the electronic equipment,” he reflects, shortly before going inside to discover his hunch is correct.

  Typically, Michael doesn’t appear until around six. He strides about in his suit, concentrating on the less essential aspects of the undertaking: finding a place for the coffee machine, putting up the pictures, the calendar and various statistical charts, instructing a few chaps to install his orthopaedic chair. Just before seven, after I’ve swung the van into the new yard for the last time, Michael does that annoying thing of beckoning me over with his little finger.

  “So, Clive. Sounds like you had a colourful evening last night. Has someone reimbursed you?”

  I’m agog.

  “Er … no?”

  He extracts ten fifty-pound notes from his wallet as if he’s giving me change for milk. I swallow hard, fighting to remain dignified, although frankly I feel like kneeling down and kissing his brogues.

  “Oh, Michael, that’s really good of you … I wasn’t expecting that, to be honest.”

  “Well, that’s the kind of company we are, Clive. We give our staff money and they go off and lose it.”

  He smirks and strides off towards Ron, who is happily changing a strip lightbulb in the foyer.

  The phrase “more money than sense” has regularly been bandied around in the region of Michael, but never before has it been of such miraculous benefit to me. Thank God for the upper classes. Whether Ron will approve of Michael’s munificence is another matter but, for the time being, I have the luxury of unrivalled worry-time devoted to the Webster letter.

  The plan is that I take the van home tonight and return tomorrow for some final bits and pieces, which effectively means I have my own set of wheels for the evening. I phone Alan and, not going into too much detail, request an emergency meeting. His expert knowledge of Webster’s brief spell as the object of a nutter’s desire will hopefully inform me a little of the reaction I might expect. I set the van’s controls for the heart of Crouch End—but never get that far. I’m just crossing Essex Road when my mobile rings. Home.

  “Polly,” I answer.

  “Clive, where are you?”

  “Um … Islington, near Canonbury I’m driving. I’d better be quick.”

  “Are you coming home?”

  “Yeah, eventually. Just having a quick beer with Alan first. You all right?”

  �
�Look, there are some men here to see you.”

  “Men? Which men?”

  “They say they’re associates of …” I hear someone say “Mr. Webster” in the background. “Did you hear that? Mr. Webster.”

  A swarm of butterflies lets rip in my digestive region. This is my life, ladies and gentlemen. Jesus O’Fuckwit, how do I get into these things?

  “Ah. Um … okay. Don’t … don’t let them in.”

  “They are in.”

  “Shit. Okay—don’t let them further in. I’ll be home in ten minutes.”

  Instantly I’m picturing a few plug-uglies from The Sopranos, or the Kray twins, or at the very least some Vinnie Jones figure accompanied by, perhaps, Ken Stott, standing in our hallway giving poor Polly intimidating stares. So, after I’ve broken all the speed limits back up the Essex Road, buggered the suspension on the speed bumps and found somewhere to dump the van, I am somewhat surprised and relieved to find two middle-aged crusties who I instantly recognise as former members of the Thieving Magpies road crew, sitting at our kitchen table sipping tea. In fact, I think I’ve an even more involved recollection of them, although I can’t presently place it. They rise as I enter, politely introduce themselves as Stan and Malcolm, and for the moment seem fairly reasonable and unthreatening. Nonetheless, their smart, dark jackets, chunky no-nonsense raver’s jewellery, thick tattooed arms and hardy complexions suggest they are not to be fucked with. Malcolm, the slimmer and probably older of the two, asks the questions while Polly lurks supportively in the doorway.

  “So. You know why we’re here?”