Wildlife

by Joe Stretch

  Everyone ignores Janek’s outburst. He has the air of one that should be ignored. Like a drunk tramp, a boring teacher or a total psycho. Also, everyone can hear the tinny music coming from his red MP3 player and assumes it would be futile to address him.

  Joe, having tied Asa Gunn’s vein around his wrist, drops Beak onto the floor so he can have a wander around. Joe is feeling strong. The more he watches Janek panic, the stronger he feels. Whatever happens, he’s thinking, whatever we’re doing here, I’m going to be fine. I’m gonna take care of Sally, Dolly, Beak and Sam the Man. I’m going to be fucking fine. He watches calmly as Janek babbles in rhyme about the fun and funky fuck festival of a life he’s just dying to lead. He watches as Roger suppresses the pointless words that are desperate to explode from his arsehole, his nostrils, his ears and his mouth. He sees Anka holding her wrist with her finger and thumb, trying to work out how thin she is, and whether she was right to smash the other Anka’s head against those toilet tiles.

  In the centre of the room, Asa Gunn inspects his jet-black scars. ‘I used to be famous,’ he whimpers.

  The door to the room opens and there is a brief yet fairly collective sense of relief.

  ‘I was wondering when you’d turn up,’ says Joe, smiling up at the doorway.

  ‘Thank fuck,’ says Anka. ‘Thank fuck you’re here. What happened to our front-row seats?’

  In the doorway, Life has the look of someone who has been let down. She is awkward inside her beautiful red dress, upset beneath her immaculately styled golden hair. She has the look of a bride abandoned at the altar, as if she would like to rip her dress off here and now and pull at her hair till it’s ruined.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ Life says, her accent more Scandinavian than ever, almost completely stripped of Englishness. ‘I didn’t understand. I’ve been fooled. I’ve been used and so have you.’ Life starts to cry. Joe can’t believe this. Of all the people he has met, Life is one he could never imagine weeping. In the two years they were lovers, she never cried once. She was always so happy. He puts baby Sally to one side, stands and holds Life by the shoulders.

  ‘It’s all right, Lie,’ he says, reassuringly. ‘Whatever it is, I’m sure it’s fine.’

  ‘It’s not fine, Joe,’ she weeps. ‘That’s the amazing thing. It’s not fine at all. They’ve made a fool out of me.’

  Life is really letting the tears flow. She has tears round her thick red lips.

  Janek rips off his beanie and pulls himself to his feet by his curly brown hair.

  ‘Hip to the hop, don’t stop the rot,’ he cries, his voice shredded with fright. ‘I’m so laid-back I’m motherfucking snoozing, I’m born to win, you won’t catch me losing . . . What am I saying?’ he shouts, staring psychotically at Life as she weeps uncontrollably. ‘Promises are panes of glass. Let me love you up the ass. Promises are panes of glass. Let me love you up the ass!’

  There is no time to consider replying to Janek. Because Roger’s face just explodes with words:

  ‘Allow me. Allow me,’ he blurts. ‘It’s all wank. It’s all total bollocks if you think about it. All us young people wandering around, moaning, getting fucked up. It’s a snoring waste of time, all of it, a boozing, boring waste of time. We do not eat rats or cats or dogs, this is not the French Revolution, we do not wave flags, we do not stand together, we do not mutter to each other in gutters and we should not be miserable, we should not be the miserable ones –’

  With the help of Joe, who holds down his flailing arms, Anka succeeds in regagging Roger with the knickers.

  ‘Perhaps you’d like a bracelet,’ says Asa Gunn timidly to Roger once he’s fully gagged. Roger growls at the former pop star, biting down hard on the underwear.

  ‘Who?’ says Anka, turning to Life angrily. ‘Who is using us?’

  Sally starts crying now.

  ‘Come on, Life,’ shouts Anka. ‘Tell us what’s going on.’

  Sally stops crying the moment Joe puts her over his shoulder. He shakes his whole body gently and the baby is calm. He touches Life on her shoulder.

  ‘Lie, it’s OK, I’ll look after you.’

  Hearing this, Life, too, stops crying. She stops abruptly. She stops because she knows that Joe can’t look after her and because, in any case, she doesn’t need looking after. Above all, Life Moberg knows that you can’t go back, you just can’t. Whatever emotions you feel for those held prisoner in your past, you cannot set them free. She sniffs a snotty sniff and wipes her eyes. She exhales. She runs a hand through her golden hair and approaches Asa Gunn with an air of professionalism.

  ‘I’m afraid you won’t be performing today after all,’ she says. The ex-pop star is instantly upset. ‘I wasn’t as powerful as I thought,’ Life continues. ‘I was deceived and I’m afraid I didn’t have the authority to hire you. I’m sorry, Asa.’

  Asa Gunn looks at his wrist, wrapped in his own veins. ‘So no comeback?’ he says, quietly. ‘No comeback.’ Ten seconds pass like knife-wielding teens on stolen bikes until, quite suddenly, Asa bites down hard on his bottom lip before opening the door and charging through the group of ironically shellsuited goons, screaming, ‘No comeback! No comeback!’ and he is never heard of again.

  Life pulls the door shut then turns to Anka and Joe. ‘I thought I was in control. I thought I was living the life, you know, the dream.’

  ‘Who?’ blurts Anka, as if she’s not sure what the word means. ‘Who’s in charge?’

  ‘You don’t get it,’ says Life. ‘You don’t get anything. All this stuff about the Wild World. It’s us. I mean literally, you and me, Roger, Joe, Janek. The Wild World is us.’

  25

  DOWN ON THE pitch, the players are emerging from a tunnel situated in the corner of the stadium just below the banqueting suite. Some of them wave at the cheering fans; others stare down at the scrolling turf, deep in concentration.

  Up in the banqueting suite, the atmosphere is hushed and expectant. Relatively little of the cheers and boos of the crowd outside can be heard in here. It’s weird to be sat in silence so close to forty thousand screaming people. Weird to see so many fanatics waving flags and shouting insults at a field, while you yourself are sat quietly at a beige table in a long beige room, watching an empty stage, not knowing quite what you’re waiting for.

  Next to the stage, five or six of the shellsuits are huddled together and talking in excited whispers, smiles bursting across their faces whenever they speak. Turning momentarily from this huddle, one of them addresses the audience. ‘It shouldn’t be too long now, ladies and gentlemen,’ she says. She’s just a girl, a girl with a fringe so straight it could draw blood. Having reassured the waiting guests, she returns to the group and rejoins the whispering. A soft murmur travels round the increasingly stuffy room. Shoulders get hunched. Palms are revealed in gestures of not knowing. Some people even yawn.

  Not one person from the fabulously unimpressive list of D-grade celebrities that Life invited to the launch of the Wild World has been allowed in. They turned up in terrible clothes and faces rendered foul by fleeting fame. They got told to fuck off. They got told that the young girl, Life, did not have the authority to invite them. They were told that Life, like them, like everyone else, has misunderstood the Wild World.

  There are no celebrities in this room. These people who sit silently round these tables are strangers. They are mostly elderly. Judging by their expensive suits and smart, understated dresses, they are rich strangers, strangers from business, strangers from the aristocracy, even strangers from the government. Irritated by the lack of activity on the stage, most have turned to watch the beginnings of the football match through the long window that stretches all the way down the suite. They watch as a fat man is introduced to both teams.

  A minute or two later and the referee blows his whistle and the match kicks off. In the banqueting suite, a few of the guests even call out. ‘Come on, Chelsea,’ says an old man with a wet, white side parting and a highly reflective face. ‘Fuck o
ff, Chelsea,’ cries a gentleman wearing a monocle. The guests in the banqueting suite seem so old. The men are wearing waistcoats. Their facial hair is cloud-like and ludicrous; their skin is creased and uneven. The women, too, are old except for their make-up, which cakes over their thinning skin and invents curious eyebrows where little hair now grows. On the table at the front, which Life had intended to share with Janek and Joe, Roger and Anka, a typically elderly couple have become captivated by the football match. The two of them stare at the pitch with fixed, glazed eyes. They watch as one of the players in blue begins to run down the wing, attempting to trick the defender with various step-overs and dummies. The elderly woman, her soft white hair tied into a bun, takes a cigarette from a silver case and places it in her mouth; she nudges her husband, requesting that he light it.

  ‘It seems, darling,’ says the old man, removing a gold lighter from his waistcoat pocket, ‘that football has changed a great deal since our time.’

  The woman leans so the tip of her cigarette enters the yellow flame. She inhales on it, exhales and then crosses her legs, reclining at a relaxed and thoughtful angle.

  ‘Perhaps you’re right,’ she says. ‘I’m told these men are all autistic orphans, that they’re raised in fields with only footballs and one or two volumes of pornography to entertain them.’

  ‘Is that right?’

  ‘It’s what I’m told. They make good money, of course, but . . .’ The woman delays exhaling a lungful of smoke while a free kick is taken on the pitch below. The ball sails over the bar. The woman blows smoke into the air. ‘. . . but most of these men will die very, very young. They won’t live to be as old as us. It’s sad.’

  The two of them watch as three or four players from each team suddenly get into an argument. They start pushing each other, bringing their foreheads very close together and exchanging fierce stares before their respective teammates start pulling them apart and the referee starts issuing yellow cards.

  ‘Yes,’ agrees the old man softly, ‘it is sad.’

  The elderly guests’ attention is grabbed so firmly by the minor brawl taking place below them on the pitch that none of them notice when the lights of the banqueting suite slowly begin to dim. ‘Send the tosspot off,’ shouts a grumpy-eyed man with a dragged-down face and a top hat, thumping the thick glass window with a white and weakly clenched fist. No one notices when a spotlight ignites and shoots a bright beam across the half-light of the room. Only the shellsuits by the stage turn to stare at the spotlit doorway. They’re more excited than ever.

  ‘Look, everyone,’ shouts the girl with the dangerous fringe, appealing to the guests, trying to drag their attention from the game with frantic flaps of her arms. ‘Everyone, look. Please. Ladies and gentlemen. If we could have your attention.’

  Music begins to play. The sound of an orchestra swelling to crescendo is played through large speakers. The elderly guests begin to struggle round in their seats, opening their mouths slightly and craning to look over their shoulders at the door beside the stage. The timpanis join the orchestra, hit firmly, tribally; the music is getting louder and louder. The fluorescent young at the front are clutching each other’s shoulders, stooping slightly and peering into the bright light of the doorway. ‘Get ready,’ shouts the girl with the murderous hair, satisfied now that the elderly guests are no longer watching the match but have turned to view the event. ‘This is it,’ she shouts. A shadow appears in the doorway, silhouetted by the spotlight’s beam. The elderly guests begin to nudge each other, forgetting about the match. ‘Look,’ they say, shouting to be heard above the now deafening music. ‘Look at that. What on earth could that be?’ Answers are not heard. The music can get louder. Trumpets, bassoons, trombones and always the rageful dum-dum-dum of the drums. The figure is on the move. It’s a man. A man dressed in a spotless white suit. He steps out of the doorway and up onto the stage, tracked always by the spotlight.

  When they see him properly, the gasp given off by the elderly guests could suck the features from your face. Their eyes open too wide in horror. Each of them suddenly resembles the gingerbread dead: shocked and simple. The lady with the drawn-on eyebrows and the caked face lets out a scream, tossing her cigarette into the air. There is chaos. On the table near the front a man removes his top hat and he and his wife take turns vomiting into it. Some of the men even struggle to their feet and begin waving ivory-tipped walking sticks at the stage in protest. They’re made to sit back down by the shellsuits who can’t help but smile and applaud even while forcing guests to return to their seats. The man, meanwhile, has made it to the podium at the centre of the stage. The orchestral crescendo seems intent on going on forever. How long can a group of people go on getting louder and louder? It’s unclear. The man straightens the cuffs of his white suit and sends a smile spinning round the room like a boomerang before catching it in his teeth and winking at his horrified audience. Next he feigns a grimace that seems to acknowledge the absurdity of the music and the fact that a football match is taking place in a packed stadium outside the window. To the shellsuits, the man nods, acknowledging their generous applause and their crowd-controlling skills. But not even his evident good grasp of facial expressions can strip the shock from the faces that stare back at him. A woman has removed a red silk glove from her hand and is attempting to blindfold herself. Men bite into their own fists. Women weep. When the recording of the orchestra finally comes to an end, it is replaced by a discordant arrangement of sobbing, loud breathing and human groans.

  ‘Please,’ says the man, gesturing for quiet with both hands. ‘Please, ladies and gentlemen, please settle down.’

  For a second it works, the crowd quietens and the elderly people stare at the floor, eyes wet with concentration. But the moment they raise their heads cautiously to look at the man, they begin to shriek with disgust even louder than before. The man shrugs. He’s annoyed. ‘Yes,’ he starts saying. ‘Yes, it’s true. Yes.’ The crowd gets no quieter. The sickly couple at the front are in need of a second top hat. ‘Yes,’ says the man, stepping down from the stage and deciding to shout. ‘Yes, ladies and gentlemen, you’re all correct!’ He brings a fist slamming down onto the table nearest to him and finally the elderly people regain a degree of composure. The man smiles sympathetically, nodding a little. ‘There,’ he says. ‘Thank you.’ He returns to the podium while the last sobs subside.

  ‘Ladies and gentlemen, let me reassure you. What you see here is just a trick. There really is no need for you to react like this. Please, take a moment to become accustomed to it. I shan’t be offended.’ The man smiles and leans forward with both hands on the podium. ‘What you see here is the result of plastic surgery, I assure you,’ he says. ‘See this as simply an arrow pointing in the direction of your future. Surely you must have anticipated this. Surely you have heard.’ The man deepens the pitch of his voice to lend it gravitas and says, ‘A Wild World will come. And with it the end of our days. Then finally, armed with our future, a dickhead will rise from among us.’

  The elderly crowd erupts once more, taking immediate offence at the idea that this . . . this dickhead at the podium is some sort of prophet, some sort of Jesus, a messiah or a seer with a penis on his head. How dare he? They fire questions at him and in response the dickhead, that is to say the rather genuine dickhead from whose forehead a dick definitely droops, begins to try and restore calm once more, saying, ‘It’s Marlon Brando’s, if you must know. Jesus! If you must know, it belonged to Marlon, yes, a real star, my God, would you all calm down?’

  Under his penis, the dickhead is a man of about thirty-five. He has eyes and a short back and sides. He’s handsome. The football match seems like a distant memory to the elderly audience who look up at him. It is only the dickhead’s persistent shouts of ‘Would you like to know your future?’ that finally causes silence to fill the room, preceded by some angry, elderly cries of ‘Who are you? Who are you?’

  ‘My name,’ says the dickhead, ‘is Ian. And that’s about
as much as I’m prepared to say about myself. My past, like the past, is not relevant. Sure, I was a schoolboy, somewhere, once, I was a student even, but not in this country. My calling was a higher one, you see. I have no past. My name is Ian.’ The dickhead is almost chanting. ‘I have no past. My name is Ian. I am he that will rise, as it was foretold, he that will rise, armed with our future, forehead thus adorned. I’m here to talk to you about the Wild World. I have no past. My name is Ian. I like sport, music and film.’

  There is a modest round of applause that seems to signal that the audience has come to terms with the contents of Ian’s forehead.

  ‘And so the Wild World,’ Ian says, his voice calm and authoritative, vaguely light-hearted. ‘Yes, the Wild World. I must start by saying that a lot of rubbish has been spoken in recent months about the precise nature of it. In actual fact, the Wild World is . . .’ He trails off and begins lightly tickling the tip of the dick with his index finger. ‘You people,’ he begins again, his hands returning to the podium, ‘some of you people must remember the interwar years, yes, you’re about that age, aren’t you? Most of you, I’m sure, recall the aftermath of the Second World War. Do you? Yes, I’m sure you do, judging by your white hair and your old skin, I’m sure you do. Of course, I’m quite young and I might be wrong, but I dare say the best way to describe the Wild World to you is to go back to the twentieth century and . . .’ Ian feigns a slanted and puzzled expression. ‘Maybe not,’ he continues, tickling his penis once more, perplexed. ‘Yes, maybe not. Because I dare say, judging by some of the very grey complexions in this room, some of you remember the nineteenth century, am I right?’

  A murmur of agreement grumbles in certain sections of the room. A man at the back says, ‘I do.’

  ‘Yes,’ says Ian, his excitement growing, ‘you remember the nineteenth century! Super. You do, no doubt, recall the cotton mills of Oldham and Manchester, hundreds of chimneys on the skyline, the birth of the modern world, the behemoth of industry, the long working days? Tell me,’ shouts Ian towards the man who remembers the nineteenth century, ‘what was it like?’