‘Please, please, please dearest, nicest God,’ I find myself praying, ‘if you exist and even though I might have had my doubts, there’s a pretty good chance you do or else, let’s face it, angels like me would be redundant, please can this unutterable . . . emm . . . so and so, get his comeuppance . . .’ I trail off, managing to stop short of using really foul language to describe James to a higher power.
‘It’s just the two-facedness of him that I can’t take, God: him weeping and wailing and gnashing his teeth to Mum’s face, like he’s going to hurl himself into the grave on top of me because his life is so worthless without me around. Acting the part of the distraught boyfriend in public, when all along, he had that . . . floozie moved in the minute no one was watching. Sure you can see for yourself at the way he just upgrades women like cars. Rod Stewart doesn’t even go on like that. Ah, go on, God, I’m not telling you how to do your job or anything, but you’re always visiting hurricanes and tsunamis on innocent victims, how about wreaking a bit of desolation and disaster on someone who actually has it coming to them, for a change? We’re not exactly talking about John Paul the Second here: this is a horrible, hateful, cruel, malevolent member of society, who probably should have been drowned at birth to prevent him from spreading his unique brand of misery on everyone he comes in contact with. Please, it’s only fair. I mean, if you think about it, God, everyone wins. And I’ll never hit you for any favours again, swear, swear, swear.’
Just then, James remembers something and comes back from the kitchen, fag in hand, and saunters over to the coffee table right in front of where I’m sitting.
The registered letter.
He plonks right down beside me and rips it open, with me, of course, reading it over his shoulder.
It’s from the bank.
I scan down it, and can’t believe what I’m seeing. The words are swimming on the page in front of my eyes, but I’m just about able to take in the gist of it.
‘Dear Mr Kane . . . repeated failed attempts to contact you . . . mortgage repayments on the property at Strand Road now three months in arrears . . . neglected to present yourself at our scheduled meeting last week . . . very unfortunate . . . amount outstanding on your account . . . please call and arrange an appointment for interview at your earliest possible convenience . . . regret to inform . . .’
My eyes scroll down to the final, magical word.
‘. . . repossession.’
James looks at the letter in complete shock while I turn my eyes upwards to heaven, like I’m having a road-to-Damascus vision.
At this exact moment, I’ve just officially, totally, one hundred per cent started believing in God.
‘Thank you so, so much,’ I say in awe. ‘Bloody hell, you are good.’
Carlsberg don’t do days from hell, but if they did, this is how it would be. Exactly how it would pan out, in fact. Initially, I’m every bit as shocked as James is: I mean, how could he have let this happen? The deal he and I always had was that he took care of the mortgage while I took care of household stuff, shopping, groceries, dealing with plumbers/electricians/handymen whenever there was a leaky loo/central heating on the blink/broadband out of order, etc., etc. Like a fifties housewife. In fact, all I needed to complete the image was a white picket fence, a prom dress and a Liz Taylor hairdo.
Fiona used to give me a desperate time about this, and would regularly beg me to either buy a shoebox apartment somewhere and rent it out so I’d at least have something to show for myself, or else pay James rent so it was a more equal economic relationship and I wouldn’t be under any obligation to him. But did I listen to her? Like hell. With my bowels withering with embarrassment, I can even recall primly telling her that quite apart from the fact that I couldn’t afford to buy anywhere, not on a lowly assistant’s salary, and although technically it might have been James’s house, with his name on the deeds etc., we loved and trusted each other so much that it was only a matter of time before we got married and it would end up being half mine anyway.
I’d say God must have had a great laugh at that particular episode in the twenty-eight-year long-running sitcom of my life. In fact that clip would have made it into ‘Charlotte Grey: Classic Comedy Moments’, in the DVD extras of my short, rubbishy little life.
James is still beside me, still staring uselessly into space, shell-shocked, when Screechy bounds in, wearing a flowery dress Carmen Miranda would have baulked at, and demanding to know how she looks for her audition.
‘Jamie, tell me the truth, do I still look young enough to play the part of a giggling ingénue to a T? Or rather, a tee hee?’ Then she goes off into a peal of screechy laughter at her own gag.
‘Unless the show is South Pacific,’ I cut in over her, ‘tell her she looks like a fiesta del failure.’
James shakes his head at the sound of me, wincing, like he’s just been stung by a wasp. But, unbelievably for someone who’s insensitive enough to move into a dead girl’s bedroom with her ex-boyfriend, then parade around in her dressing gown, Screechy looks at him askance, and seems to pick up on his dark mood.
‘What’s up, Jamie honey? What’s in that letter? It looks like . . . something official. Parking fine? Jury duty?’
He doesn’t answer her at first, just slowly palms his eyes, then hops up, stubs out the cigarette, grabs his car keys, and in a single bound is over to the hall door, suddenly in a mad, tearing rush to get out of there. Then he turns around, like this is the first time he’s even noticed she’s in the room.
‘This? This is nothing, babe,’ he grins, shoving the letter from the bank into his jeans pocket. ‘Hey, you know what? I once had to shoot an adaptation of Little Women where three out of the four lead actresses all pulled out the week before principal photography. This, believe you me, is nothing.’
Minutes later, we’re in his car, he’s on the phone, and I’m listening in to every word, like a radio play.
‘We understand how regrettable this situation is, Mr Kane,’ the bank manager is saying, over the car’s Bluetooth sound system. A nasally, thin, weedy voice which immediately gives me a mental picture of some kind of rodent. ‘But sadly, we feel we’ve extended every courtesy to you, and now we’re left with no choice but to proceed with the course of action outlined to you by registered mail.’
Clearly uncomfortable with the word ‘repossession’, then.
‘Yes, but you have to understand that in my business things are in a perpetual state of highs and lows,’ says James, brimming over with misguided confidence, while I’m beside him, shrivelling up with mortification, glad I never owned a home in my whole life, so I never, ever, ever had to have a conversation like this. ‘I need for you to bear with me, that’s all. I can guarantee that in three months’ time, when finance is in place for my next TV project, all arrears will be paid in full. With interest. With penalties. With anything you want. Come on, you’ve been dealing with me for a long time, you know I’m good for it. Can’t you just be patient? Is that too much to ask for?’
‘From our viewpoint, Mr Kane, sadly the answer is yes. It is too much to ask for. We don’t make exceptions when mortgages are almost eleven months in arrears. Plus we feel that our patience has already been stretched to breaking point. It’s regrettable, but there you have it. I would strongly suggest that you call into the branch as a matter of urgency . . .’
The irony is, there’s me feeling like I could throw up at the thought of the house being repossessed, even though I never technically owned it, and am already dead, so it’s not like they can throw me into debtor’s prison or anything, but Mr Cool Hand James actually interrupts his bank manager to tell him that he’s another call coming through, and that he’ll call him back. I mean, I’ve heard of being overly self-assured but this is really taking the piss.
‘Just so you know?’ I say to him. ‘If you honestly think that treating the man who has the power to make you homeless, like someone you can just brush off the phone is a good idea, then . . . then . . .�
�
‘Jesus,’ he says, swerving the car at the sound of my voice. Just then the oh-so-urgent other call comes through on the speakers, and once again, I’m tuning into a radio play.
‘Ehh . . . hello? Is that James Kane?’ says a deep, baritone voice, putting me in mind of an opera singer who weighs in at about twenty stone.
‘Speaking. Is that . . . ?’
‘Thaddeus Byrne here. I hope this call isn’t interrupting you?’
Thaddeus Byrne . . . I immediately start racking my brains to drum up where I know that name from. Then it hits me. The ex-priest. Author of Let He Without Sin. The book which James paid through the nose to option, for his famous more-boring-than-watching-back-to-back-reruns-of-Big-Brother, non-existent, practically unfinanceable TV series.
‘Hey, Thaddeus, man, great to hear from you!’ smarms cackhead. ‘All good with you?’
‘Well . . . actually . . .’ comes the booming baritone, and call it angel’s intuition but I know, just know in my waters, that there’s trouble ahead. ‘I’ve just had a call from Declan at Meridius Movies,’ Thaddeus eventually says, or rather bellows. ‘About your meeting with Sir William Eames?’
‘Yeah, yeah?’ says James, and it’s only a measure of how important to the company Thaddeus is that he doesn’t come out with his usual, unbelievably rude catchphrase: ‘Whatever it is, gimme the last sentence first.’
‘Declan said that finance for bringing my book to the screen has effectively fallen through.’
A snorty, disparaging laugh from James. ‘Complete nonsense, Thaddeus, and you have my word as a gentleman on that.’
‘Your word as a what?’ I spit out, almost making him crash the car. Shite. I better shut up if I want to find out what this call is all about.
‘That’s not what your colleague at Meridius is saying. Also, he’s suggesting that we now look at a possible co-production to get this off the ground.’
‘That’s one hundred per cent right,’ says James with such conviction I’m almost forgetting that he’s the one who normally baulks at the very mention of a co-production. ‘Yeah, we’re actively looking into possibly putting something together with the BBC, and I’m confident that I’ll have news for you asap.’
‘James,’ says Thaddeus gently, but then as an ex-priest, I suppose he’s no stranger to treating people with extreme sensitivity. ‘I’ve just told your colleague, and I feel it’s only fair to tell you, too, that I’m deeply unhappy with this latest twist in, may I say, a catalogue of one delay and setback after another. It’s amateurish to say the least. Also, from where I’m standing, it’s starting to reek of unprofessional, unacceptable behaviour.’
OK, maybe not so hot on sensitivity, then.
‘Yes, but, Thaddeus, this is the way that the TV business works, delays are par for the course . . .’
‘You’ve had the rights to my book for almost two years now, and nothing’s happened. I could have sold them to a dozen other production companies, but I gave them to you because you faithfully promised that the project would be fast-tracked and hitting the screens while the book was still on the bestseller lists. You’re an experienced producer, James, so you hardly need me to point out to you that that hasn’t happened. You sat on the rights and did nothing.’
James is sweating now, actually sweating, which never happens.
‘Yes, but in our business, this is par for the course. We’re currently sounding out the right TV company to co-produce this astonishing project, and let me tell you something, you have no idea the money that will be injected into this. The production values I’m planning will be through the roof. Think shooting in sepia, think intercutting with Pathe newsreel footage from the fifties, think jangly piano music . . .’
Typical James Kane dazzle-them-with-shite talk.
But, by the sounds of it, he picked the wrong person to schmooze.
‘James,’ thunders the voice over the speakers, sounding more and more like James Earl Jones. ‘You don’t understand. I’ve been listening to this from you for two full years. Your time’s up.’
‘I’m sorry, Thaddeus,’ says James, nearly hitting a cyclist that’s meandered out in front of us. ‘What did you just say?’
‘That, as you’re well aware, my contract with you runs out at the end of this month. And I thought it only right that I should let you know I won’t be renewing it.’
Strike three takes place all of half an hour later. In the upstairs office at Meridius Movies, where poor, unknowing Declan is at his desk on the phone, when James bursts in, flames practically shooting out of his nostrils.
‘What the fuck did you think you were doing, telling Thaddeus Byrne that we couldn’t get finance for his TV series?’
‘I’ll ring you back,’ says Dec, tactfully ending his call, then hanging up.
‘I asked you a question.’
‘I heard you,’ says Dec, cooler, still in control. ‘The answer is, I dunno, maybe telling the truth? Affording one of the elder statesmen of literature in this country the courtesy of letting him know exactly where we stand on this project? Have you any problem with that?’
‘Emm . . . why don’t I go out and get us all some . . . emm . . . lattes?’ says Hannah from her corner desk. I’m so engrossed in the row that’s brewing that I never even noticed her quietly sitting there. James ignores her as she grabs her bag and slips out. Not even flirting, not even eyeing her up. He must be annoyed.
Good.
‘He’s withdrawn the rights, because of what you just said to him, Dec. Which, in case you hadn’t noticed, leaves us with precisely nothing. No product. Nothing on the table. Nothing in the pipeline. I don’t get you, why couldn’t you have kept your fucking mouth shut? I’d have strung Thaddeus along and probably had a co-production in place by the end of the week.’
‘Well, I don’t happen to think that it’s OK to string people along, as you put it,’ Declan bats back, keeping his voice steady and letting James do all the roaring. Bloody hell, Dec is certainly good in a row. Tough and firm. In fact, if it wasn’t for the still-living-with-his-mammy thing, I’d nearly start to find him attractive.
‘You’re nothing but a big-mouthed arsehole,’ James roars at him, ‘and I hold you personally responsible for us losing those rights. Now what are we going to do?’
‘James, you need to listen to me, because I’ll only say this once. Are you aware that I’ve been here all morning, in fact, pretty much all week, trying, pleading, begging anyone to come in and co-produce with us? And you want to know the answers I’m getting? No. Because no one in the town wants to work with you. That’s why. And to be brutally honest, I can see exactly where they’re coming from. You’re boorish, you’re difficult, you wouldn’t know a schedule if it walked up and introduced itself to you . . .’
‘That is such horseshit . . .’
‘. . . you lie so much, I sometimes wonder if it’s something pathological in you . . .’
‘. . . oh, piss off with yourself . . .’
‘. . . you seem to think scruples is a hairdresser’s on Leeson Street . . .’
‘. . . bollocks . . .’
‘. . . you don’t pay people properly, me included. You spend money you don’t even have . . .’
‘. . . complete crap . . .’
‘. . . you think you can manipulate everyone around you just by charming your way around them . . .’
‘. . . can I get a word in here, please?’
‘. . . you mistreat actors and actresses, bar the ones you want to shag . . .’
‘Don’t fucking talk to me like that, do you realize the day I’m having? And now I have to take this shit from you?’
‘Well,’ says Declan, drawing himself up to his full height with great, unyielding dignity. ‘Let me tell you something. Your day is about to get a whole lot worse.’
‘Jesus, what now?’
‘I quit.’
Chapter Fifteen
FIONA
. . . has started making fau
x calls. I know because I catch her at it, back at her house later on that evening, when school’s out for the day. You know, picking up her mobile, blocking her number (clearly, she’s not new to this lark), then ringing a certain other number, then hanging up after the phone’s rung only once or twice. Next thing, she’s putting the kettle on, then parading up and down the rug in front of her fireplace, rehearsing a speech out loud and doing the dance of the faux call.
It goes a bit like this.
Three paces to the right, then three to the left, then she grabs the fireplace with both hands and shouts out loud, ‘For Jaysus sake, he’s only a fella! With a receding hairline!’ This is then followed by four paces across the room to where her mobile is perched on the sofa, picking it up, clutching it to her bosom like a prop dagger in a Shakespeare play, then hurling it back on to the sofa and striding towards the kitchen to check and see if the kettle’s boiled in the meantime. She repeats this about three times, all the while saying, then self-editing, then abusing her speech.
‘“Emm . . . Tim! Hi! Long time no hear!” Shite. Too casual. Too bright and breezy for a guy whose marriage has just broken up. Also, why the hell am I sucking my stomach in? It’s the phone for God’s sake, it’s not like he can see me. OK, take two. Try telling the truth.’
She clears her throat then puts on this sexier, breathier voice.
‘“Ahem, ehem. Tim, Fiona here. Wilson, you roaring eejit. Before you pick yourself up off the ground in shock at my calling you after all this time, let me tell you the chain of events that led to this. You see, I had the most mental dream that you and Ayesha broke up and I just wanted to get in touch to commiserate . . .” (Then back to her normal voice, thank God.) NO!! Total crap AND a barefaced lie. I did a jig for pure joy when I heard that the beautiful rumour was true, that you’d finally seen the light about Miss Ayesha, she of the amber, tangerine and burnt-orange false-tan palette. OK, scrap that, take three.
‘“Ahem, ahem. Tim, you won’t believe this, but for absolutely no reason at all you were on my mind, so out of the blue, I decided to get in touch. But of course I only had your UK number. Then I called your mum to get your new Irish mobile number, just so you and I could have a long overdue catch-up chat. For no other reason, no ulterior motives whatsoever, cross my heart. Imagine my astonishment when she said you and Ayesha had split up . . .” (The normal voice again.) SHITE!! A Leaving Cert English student would phrase that better. And an amateur actress would make it sound more convincing. Right then, take four.’
If This is Paradise, I Want My Money Back Page 22