I started to pile everything back in. Pictures, and letters, and memories had been spread around it for weeks. Clues, and pointers, and stories waiting to happen, with them. I’d put Andy’s letters at the top of the pile, along with my returned replies. But something made me want to have a last look at them.
Not all of Andy’s letters I’d managed to reply to. There were still one or two left. I’d read them, of course, but not needed to think about what to write in reply. If I’m honest, the replies had just been a bit of fun. A way of reintroducing myself to Andy in an unusual way. A way of highlighting the fun we’d had—the friendship we’d had. But now it was like I’d been saying goodbye to him.
I opened one of his letters at random and began to read. It was the one telling me he’d got a new desk. Such a small event. Such a forgettable event. I’m sure, had we met, we’d never even have thought to mention it. But it was a peek into a life. Small moments of normality. And those small, lost moments—once remembered—can often mean more than you could ever guess. Like a forgotten joke, or a final hug, or a local restaurant’s fourth anniversary.
In the past few months, I had a whole host of new moments to remember.
I thought back to what Lauren had said. Life is for living. A cliché, yeah, but a cliché, I now realized, for a reason. A cliché because it was absolutely true. And it summed up, in its four words, a million other things, all of which were also absolutely true.
I found another letter. A sentence jumped out. “I’m having such a lot of fun!” Another sentence. “I wish we can meet up again soon—that would be really good!”
Well, now we couldn’t.
And suddenly, it hit me. I’d been down lately because yes, I’d uncovered an uncomfortable truth. But I’d reacted in the wrong way, and that had only served to make it worse. Lauren had been right. Reading these letters made me realize how alive Andy had been. I don’t mean “alive” in a singing-and-dancing, musical number kind of a way. Nor in the way people say “I feel so alive!” after they’ve just done a bit of abseiling or jumped out of a plane. I mean alive in its most basic, normal, literal alive kind of a way. Everyday alive. Alive like we are right now. Me telling you some stuff. You listening.
Okay, so the events in question weren’t the most exciting events ever put to paper. Moving rooms. Getting a new desk. Going to Leicester for some printer ribbon. But they were life. They happened. For a brief moment of however long, they mattered.
And that made me realize that my days mattered. Whatever I was doing. Fixing a canopy. Walking about. Painting a shed.
So if even that stuff matters—what was important?
Family.
Health.
And friends.
I’d seen that tonight, with Wag. I’d seen it at Neil’s thirtieth. I’d experienced it myself, not just with the friends around me, but with the ones that I’d let go and now found right back where they were—right back in my address book.
I suddenly realized that every moment of tedium, every disappointment, let-down and sadness I’d ever felt… every moment of depression or boredom or blues, every hung-over Sunday, every heartbroken Monday… each of those moments was one trillion times better than no moment at all. Life was for living.
Finding out about Andy shouldn’t have stopped me from seeing people. It should have taught me that people are what life is all about. I should have been grabbing more chances in honor of Andy, doing more things that I was lucky to be able to do at all. Because one day is all it takes for lives to change. Every single second I’d had since I was eighteen was a second Andy had never had the chance to live. I shouldn’t have stopped for him. Like Lauren said, I should’ve started for him.
There I’d been, bemoaning the fact that I was turning thirty, that perhaps youth was ending, and suddenly that me of then—that former me—felt like the most trivial and self-absorbed man alive. I am sure there are those of you who will agree. But I’m hoping that there are others of you who will think that now—right now—you’ve got an opportunity of your own.
As for me… there was a very simple way for me to get back on the horse.
I picked up a postcard.
Peter Gibson.
I fired up my computer, clicked on my email, frantically finding one from Peter.
He’d sent me his phone number. I had his phone number. Where?
I found it.
I tapped it into my phone, and sent him a text…
Peter! Where are you? It’s Danny!
Moments later, I had a reply.
Just got up! Hello mate.
Just got up? It was after midnight! The people of Tooting must lead very exciting lives. I ignored it and urgently typed away…
Let’s meet!
I waited for what seemed like an age. I paced about. Moved things on my desk around. Peter hadn’t replied. Peter wasn’t replying.
I picked up the Book and flicked through it. I just wanted to update his address. That’s all I wanted to do. All I needed to do.
The page fell open on a random page.
A page which read: Forever Friends.
I stared at it.
A moment later, my phone buzzed. The reply was in.
Ah, it read.
My house. Grown-up. 2006.
Dear Andy,
Well, I suppose this will probably be my last letter to you. One that I won’t even send. But one that’s definitely worth writing.
I’m sorry I didn’t reply to your letters more when I was a kid. I’m sorry I once “borrowed” that Action Man with the beard that you had, without ever giving it back. And most of all, I’m sorry we never got to meet again.
Friendships are all too easy to let slide. I’m going to do my best never to let it happen again. Not with the important people.
I’m glad I at least got to read your letters again. I’m glad I was able to revisit times in my life, and people from those times, and remember the small and inconsequential events that suddenly don’t seem quite as small, nor half as inconsequential.
I think you’d be pleased to know that I’m about to rekindle another friendship. A friendship that I could’ve rekindled at any time over the past few months, but always put off. Because there always seemed like there was something else I had to do first; somewhere else I had to be.
I’m going to find Peter Gibson. And if a friend is worth a flight, this friend must be worth a lot.
I’ll tell him every thing I’ve done, from start to finish. And maybe one day he’ll get in touch with some people that mean something to him. Maybe one of them will then do the same.
It’s been a blast, Andy. Thanks for being part of it, even if you never meant to be. I’ll say hello to Peter for you.
Your friend,
Daniel
CHAPTER NINETEEN
IN WHICH YOU MAY BE SURPRISED TO LEARN THAT DANIEL IS NOT AT HOME…
Soon after.
It was hot where I was.
Far hotter than London had been. Far hotter than I’d been expecting.
I was standing outside the arrivals lounge, my phone in my hand. It seemed just as confused as I was. I wanted to dial Peter’s number, wanted to tell him I’d made it over. But my phone was still adjusting to the time difference, and still trying to find its new network for the week.
Finally, as I was fumbling with my sunglasses and trying to work out where I’d put my wallet, it went off.
A phone call.
I answered it.
“Hey, Dan…” said Hanne. “Are you out?”
“Well, sort of,” I said.
“Whereabouts? In town?”
“I’m actually in Australia.”
A beat.
“You’re… what? What are you doing there?”
I thought about it.
“I’m just meeting a friend for a pint.”
The moment I’d received Peter’s “Ah” text, I knew there was a problem. As we’ve already established, anything starting with an “Ah”
usually points in that general direction. I’d ended up phoning him.
“Where are you?” I’d said.
“I’ve moved to Melbourne,” he said, laughing, and my heart had dropped to my feet.
Melbourne.
“I hadn’t been planning it long, but the time just seemed right. I told you I was leaving work!”
“Yeah, but I thought you’d maybe be moving to Swindon, or something…”
“Never mind. I’ll be back in a year or two. We can meet then—we’ve waited this long. Or if you’re ever out here. I mean, let’s face it, we were never going to meet while we were both in London, were we? That would’ve been far too convenient…”
* * *
And now here I was.
I hadn’t booked my ticket on a whim. I hadn’t just upped and left London. I’d considered all the options very carefully.
But none of them seemed as attractive and necessary as seeing Peter again.
Plus, I’d had good news. Excellent news. Akira had finally written back. Okay, so it wasn’t the heartfelt, I’ve-missed-you missive I’d been hoping for. If anything, it was quite “professional.” But it was something.
Hello Daniel,
I was in Sapporo Hokkaido, north in Japan, to participate Digestive Disease Week—Japan 2006 from 13th to 15th October.
This is an academic meeting of the Japanese Society of Gastroenterology and the Japan Gastroenterological Endoscopy Society.
I am a member of these society, and I presented rare case of the familial adenomatous polyposis.
I will make a study of Colonic cancer from this November.
How about you, Daniel?
Akira
I hadn’t really known how to respond. I couldn’t exactly say “me too,” could I?
But check it out: not only was Akira a medical doctor, he was studying cancer, probably with a view to eradicating it altogether! Akira was helping solve cancer!
Receiving this email had made my mind up for me about visiting Peter—because a plan had started to form…
But a plan like this needed backing. Support. Permission.
Since finding out about Andy, I’d abandoned the idea of Man Points. There seemed to be little purpose to them anymore. I’d simply undertaken the necessary works on the house because I’d wanted to—I’d needed something to occupy my mind and time. But now I’d realized maybe I needed something to fall back on. Especially if I was going to sell the idea to Lizzie.
Lizzie had, of course, been incredibly supportive of the whole endeavor. And she’d been there to quietly pick up the pieces when it had all gone wrong. But jetting off to Australia—to her home country, without her—had seemed a little too much to ask with no payback…
And so I’d found the list that Ian and I had made that sunny afternoon in the garden. And I’d studied our thoughts, and tried to work out what I’d need to do to make this happen…
I wandered around the house, reading it as I did so… but discovered that, strangely, most of the items on the list had already been done…
Painting the skirting boards (3MP)
Sorting the table (2MP)
Cleaning the…
Fixing the…
Replacing the…
… all done!
The only thing left over, in fact, was mending that broken socket. And that was only worth 1MP!
“I’ve done most of it,” I said, almost in awe. And then I realized what that meant.
I was a man.
I was still a man who needed to get permission to go away, but I was a man nevertheless.
“I’ve done most of it!” I said, again, shaking my head.
Who needed Paul?
“Done most of what?” said Lizzie, suddenly there. She was carrying a bag of shopping, and was sticking her headphones in her pocket.
“This!” I said, holding up the list.
“Ah!” she said. “The List!”
“The Man Points list!” I said.
“Yes indeed.”
“So I was hoping I could trade these in. Because I need to go on another trip.”
“Another trip?” she said. “To meet an old friend?”
“Yes,” I said, handing it to her.
“Peter?” she asked, casting her eye down the list. I could see her looking from left to right, taking in all the ticks I’d added.
“Hmm…” she said.
And then Lizzie looked at me, and looked again at the list. And then she did something remarkable. She tore it up.
“I agree with Ian,” she said. “I think Man Points represent an oppressive regime which removes the fundamental human rights of the adult male.”
She hugged me.
“Go and see Peter. And say hello from me.”
It was 2 p.m. and I was in Sydney with almost a day to kill.
In my nineteenth hour on the plane, cramped and pushed up against the window, with a baby crying behind me and a man next to me who’d annexed my foot space, I’d begun to lament the fact I hadn’t pounced on Peter when he’d been in Tooting.
But now, here, in the blazing sunshine and with happy-faced Australians all around me, I was excited.
More so, since I’d had a text from Lizzie.
Off to bed. Call me in the morning, baby. PS. Some messages for you at home. One is from a guy named Chris saying you should call him… could it be?
Could it be?
It had to be! Christopher Guirrean had got my letter! You see? Everything was suddenly working out. And being here, in Australia, demonstrating my commitment to the cause, was all part of the fun.
Yeah, so me and Peter would have had a nice evening in a Tooting pub, talking about London, and living in London, and how different London is to where we’d grown up… but I now realized that this was where Peter’s life was now. And I was here, right at the start of it. A whole new chapter in his life. Plus, he’d been right. Just as Londoners never see all the things that London has to offer precisely because they can, it’d been too easy to see Peter there. Now that there’d been the chance that we’d never meet again—with him as far away as it’s possible to be without starting to come home again—I had to see him. It was an address which, more than ever, needed updating.
I grabbed a cab, and headed into town.
I love Sydney.
It’s the way cities should be. Historic and futuristic, wide, bright and beautiful. The last time I’d been here I’d had a strange conversation with a girl who, because I wear glasses, thought I was perhaps more intelligent than I am, and attempted to get me to pontificate on her city in quite a poncey way.
“What’s the first word that pops into your head when I say ‘Sydney’?” she’d said.
“Poitier,” I’d said, in response.
“Hmm,” she’d said, leaning forward onto the table, fascinated. “And what would you say is particularly poitier about Sydney?”
Now, here I was again, down by the harbor, taking in the Opera House and sipping a frappacino, trying to convince my body not to give up the fight by using sunshine and caffeine.
I watched the news on a TV hanging outside the café.
“We’ll be back after the break,” said the anchor.
The break started. A man shouted incredibly loudly about a new CD that was not available in the shops. “BUY THE GREATEST BEER SONGS EVER!” he yelled. And then it was straight back to the news.
I headed towards George Street and the city center, and began to walk around the shops. My flight wasn’t until 7 p.m., and it would only take me about…
Hang on.
I turned around, and saw a man with a small entourage walking past me. One of them had a headset on, and there was a woman with a clipboard, looking nervous. And the man at the center of it all, the man they were clearly all worried about, looked strangely familiar.
But no. It couldn’t be.
You don’t just turn up in Australia and immediately see…
Bloody hell. It was.
; The man had been stopped by someone with a camera and obligingly had his photo taken with them. And then signed an autograph. And then someone else was upon him, apologizing for the intrusion but immediately videoing him on his phone… was that…
It was Shane Warne! Perhaps the most famous Australian in… well… in Australia. Even on a global basis, there are only a few more well known than him. Kylie. Jason. Mick Dundee. Dame Edna. Wolverine. And that’s almost half the country.
Here he was—Australia’s cricket captain. Media darling. Devil of the tabloids, with his sex scandals and his straight-talking and his blond highlights. A sporting hero, right here in the middle of a shopping center in Sydney. Surely he’d shop online? Surely he’d get everything for free, anyway? What was he doing?
Suddenly, I realized it was a pity I’d stopped collecting autographs as a kid. Getting Shane Warne’s to go with my Barbara Windsor, Phillip Schofield and Emlyn Hughes would have been a real boost to my collection. My grandchildren would never have had to worry about money again.
But alas, I am not an autograph hunter. Not anymore. I had my three, and that was fine by me. I decided to move on, but as I turned around, I saw a giant poster.
COME AND MEET SHANE WARNE!
Shane will be signing copies of his new book at 2 p.m. at Angus & Robertsons!
I looked at my watch. It was ten to two. I suppose I could get an autograph. I’d probably be first in the queue!
* * *
The queue stretched pretty much all the way back to Britain.
I’d decided I would get Shane’s autograph, not for me, but for Peter Gibson. Because it had suddenly struck me what a fine gift that would be. A proper Australian gift. A welcome-to-your-new-life gift. If Shane Warne would agree to condone Peter’s decision to move here, surely his stay in this fine country would be blessed forevermore? It would be like being in a Travelodge in Reading, finding a copy of the Bible and seeing it had been signed, “Enjoy the stay! Love, God!” You’d think, “I’ve chosen the right hotel here.”
My fellow autograph hunters in the queue were an incredible mix of people. Old, young, couples, strange men in jumpers, the odd Brit—everyone. But the queue was incredibly slow-moving, and it was hot. Having come straight from the airport, I had my rucksack with me and I was a slightly disheveled mess. I’d spent a moment in the arrivals lounge bathroom, attempting to make my hair not look like I’d been sleeping on it for a day, but then realized that’s pretty much what it looks like anyway, so I just wiped some wax across it and hoped for the best. But this, I’m afraid, was to be to my detriment. The flies in Australia are big fans of the faint smell of sweat—particularly, it seems, when mixed with that of hair wax. I’d started to be bothered by six or seven of them, and they buzzed around me, sometimes landing on my face, sometimes just whizzing by, but all of them definitely interested in getting to know me at an unusually intimate level. I’d begun to furiously swat at them with a small leaflet a lady had given me about some kind of horse-racing event, but I realized my actions had begun to make me look mental. I couldn’t walk off for fear of losing my place in the Shane Warne queue, so had to keep insanely and randomly hitting out with my leaflet, before coming across the perfect solution. Blowing. A sharp blow would panic the flies for a second, and off they’d go, before returning in force. All I could do was breathe in and then maintain a steady flow of air from my mouth, changing the angles every few seconds in order to discourage them from coming back by confounding them with unpredictable currents. It was working pretty well. Until the man in front of me turned around and gave me quite an aggressive look, and I realized I’d essentially been blowing erotically on the back of his neck for the past few minutes. I decided to welcome the flies back into my life.
Friends Like These: My Worldwide Quest to Find My Best Childhood Friends, Knock on Their Doors, and Ask Them to Come Out and Play Page 31