Friends Like These: My Worldwide Quest to Find My Best Childhood Friends, Knock on Their Doors, and Ask Them to Come Out and Play

by Danny Wallace

  Up ahead, a lady with a microphone was interviewing people in the queue about what Shane Warne meant to them. Some talked of his being the first bowler to take 700 Test wickets. Others, of his record for having the most Test runs without a century. And I just listened and looked a bit blank.

  Because, I’ll be honest, I didn’t really know much about Shane Warne. The only thing I know less about is cricket. Shane Warne, to me, was the sportsman you’d see on the front cover of the News of the World, standing in his underpants with a couple of models, or being funny on telly, or advertising revolutionary hair loss treatments in the back of the Sunday papers. I knew he was big, and I knew he was important, but that was all I knew.

  Still. It was enough to warrant an autograph. An autograph for Peter.

  Suddenly, the microphone lady was right in front of me.

  “And you, sir, you’re here for Shane Warne too, aren’t you?”

  The logo on her microphone told me she was from one of Sydney’s premier radio stations. But what I couldn’t tell was if we were live or not.

  “Yes!” I said. “I am here for Shane Warne. And his autograph.”

  “And what is it you like so much about Shane Warne?”

  I froze. And then unfroze.

  “Er… you know. The things that the other people were saying about wickets and stuff. And his cricket. Ing. Abilities.”

  She widened her eyes and nodded, encouraging me on.

  “He’s really good at it,” I said, swatting away at a fly that I’m not sure she could see. “At cricket. And at… sport.”

  “And are you looking forward to meeting him today?”

  “Yes, I am,” I said. “Looking forward to meeting him. Today.”

  The lady was still looking at me. Still willing me on.

  “It will be nice,” I said.

  I could tell, now, from the look on her face, that this must be live, and I had just given one of the worst interviews of her professional career.

  “Well…” she said.

  I had to say something. Something! I had to help this woman out! She was dying here, live on the air! And then, out of the blue, and as surprising to me as to anyone around me, I said…

  “I’vecomeallthewayfromEnglandtoseehim!”

  The lady looked at me. I looked at her.

  Finally my brain caught up and I heard what I’d just said.

  The woman looked shocked, and then broke into a smile. This was good! I’d rescued it!

  “All the way from England?” she said.

  “Yep!” I said. “Just to see old… Warny.”

  “You heard about the book signing in England?”

  “I like to keep my finger on the pulse,” I said, confidently. “Of Australian… book signings…”

  “So all the way from England? Where in England?”

  I thought about it. I didn’t want to get caught out.

  “Bromsgrove,” I said.

  And then I thought, why did I say Bromsgrove?

  “Bromsgrove? Where’s that?”

  Christ. Where was Bromsgrove?

  “It’s in England,” I said, quietly.

  “Well, that’s very impressive indeed. And over here, who do we have…”

  And she moved on down the line.

  The man on whose neck I’d been blowing so erotically turned around and looked at me again.

  “You know he plays in England, don’t you?”

  “Correct,” I said.

  A fly landed on my face.

  The man turned away.

  * * *

  Life in the queue was going well. We were moving forward slowly, and I’d made friends with both the neck man and the elderly couple behind me.

  “I’m actually just getting his autograph for a friend,” I told the neck man.

  “Sure, mate. Me too.”

  “I don’t normally get autographs.”

  “Or travel thousands of miles to get one,” he said.

  “No.”

  “So why are you here?”

  “I’m just meeting a friend for a pint,” I said.

  Up ahead, I could now see Shane Warne. He didn’t look particularly bubbly. The queue was picking up pace now, as he lost interest in engaging people in long chats and just signed one book after the other. The book, now that I could see it up ahead, seemed to be called Shane Warne: My Illustrated Career. I couldn’t help but worry he’d misspelled “Illustrious” (I was very good at spelling at school—I am aware I may not have mentioned this), but it seemed like the book was all just pictures anyway, so I think he’ll get away with it. But then, worryingly, I spotted the lady with the microphone. She seemed to be off-air now, and was relaxing with a bottle of water and chatting to Shane. And then she looked over at me, and pointed, and said something. I think she’d just told Shane Warne I’d traveled all the way from England to see him.

  He looked at me with some concern.

  “Could I have ‘To Peter,’ please?” I said to cricketing legend Shane Warne.

  “Are you Peter?” he asked.

  “No. Peter is my friend who I haven’t seen in seventeen years.”

  “Oh,” said Shane Warne.

  “I’m going to give it to him as a special gift.”

  “Oh,” said Shane Warne.

  “He’s just moved to Australia.”

  “Has he?” said Shane Warne.

  “I came all the way from England to see him.”

  And then Shane Warne smiled, and realized I’d said “him,” and not “you,” and he said, “Thank God.”

  I flew from Sydney to Melbourne that night, as tired and as jet-lagged as any man alive. I texted Peter.

  I’ve made it!

  In the morning, I’d find his response, sent just moments later, but not soon enough to catch me before I fell asleep.

  Great! Let’s meet in South Yarra! 3 p.m. tomorrow!

  3 p.m. South Yarra, Melbourne.

  I walked into the pub, wondering if I’d recognize the man waiting for me. Just as I’d now done so many times before.

  And, like every other time, the connection was instant.

  “Peter!”

  “Dan!”

  “How are you?”

  He looked exactly the same. Exactly the same.

  And we hugged.

  “So you’re in Australia now!” I said, delighted.

  “It seems you are too! What the hell?”

  We sat down. He had a pint waiting for me.

  “Did you at least get to see a bit of Sydney?” he asked.

  “Well, you know what it’s like. I was straight off the plane and then I bumped into bloody Shane Warne, so…”

  Peter chuckled, thinking I was joking. And yes, it was a chuckle. That’s what Peter does.

  “I felt guilty I hadn’t seen you in London,” I said. “And I needed to update my address book. I’ve been doing that a lot lately…”

  “How do you mean?” asked Peter.

  And so I explained.

  “I think that’s great,” he said. “You lose touch with people too often as you get older. It’s too easy to do. The world’s supposed to be smaller these days, but it still feels pretty big. Especially after twenty-four hours on a plane. But moving here has made me realize it’s even more important to stay in touch with people. The time difference makes it harder to call people, and I guess email helps a lot, but there’s no real substitute for—you know—hanging out.”

  “So how did this happen?” I asked. “One minute you were in Tooting, and the next…”

  “Yeah. Well, I guess it had to do with turning thirty,” he said.

  So. Another one. Another friend not comfortable with the leap out of his twenties. With growing up. Becoming a man. I put it to him.

  “Well, no, not really… it was more of a legal thing… I had to get a work visa before I was thirty, and so I had to act fast. We decided, applied, and that was that.”

  “We?”

  “Me and my girlfriend,
Clare. She’s out here too. We left London with a rucksack, basically. And now we’re looking for work.”

  “So it was as quick as that?”

  “Basically. We had a bit of cash saved up, so I quit my job and came over. Time was running out. We had to do it before we were thirty…”

  “And when are you thirty?”

  “I was thirty on Tuesday.”

  “Tuesday? But it’s… Thursday!”

  “I am now a thirty-year-old man!”

  I looked at Peter, proudly. He’d done it. He’d made it to thirty.

  “What did you get for your birthday?” I asked, because that’s probably what I’d have asked him when we were kids.

  “A video game and a ride in a sports car.”

  And I laughed. Because that was probably the answer he’d have given me when we were kids.

  “So what are you going to do over here?”

  “Experience it. This wasn’t a work thing. In some ways it was an anti-work thing. But I’m not an idiot. We’re renting out our place in London so we’ve got some security, and I’ve got a job offer back in London. But who knows what’ll happen? If we like it, we’ll try and get sponsored and stay. At the moment we’re only allowed to work in any one place for three months, so we have to keep moving.”

  “Like the bloke from Highway to Heaven!”

  “Very much like the bloke from Highway to Heaven. Only not so angel-based. I actually feel a bit brave…”

  I loved it. Peter was living his dream. He’d rebelled against what we’re supposed to be doing at thirty. At being locked down, grown-up, mortgaged-to-the-hilt and nine-to-fived.

  “It’s funny, though,” he said. “Because I don’t feel thirty. I think of my dad at my age. They’d already had me and my brother by the time they were in their early twenties. I mean—that’s grown-up. People getting married, having kids… they had so much more to worry about. And less money to do it on, probably. I feel guilty sometimes… if it’s raining, I can get a taxi, if there’s no food, I can get a takeaway… I’ve just got less responsibility. I guess we all do, compared to how our parents were at our age… I suppose it’s just easier to worry about getting older now. Because we’re doing it later. There’s not as much structure. Personally, I think there should be a timetable, like at school. 25: Meet a girl. 27: Have a kid. 29: Buy a sports car…”

  “Or a display cushion…”

  “I’m not sure any man’s old enough for that,” said Peter.

  I smiled. And then his face lit up.

  “Hey, so who else have you seen?”

  “Well, Anil…”

  “Anil?”

  “… he’s now an architect, just like you!”

  “No way!”

  “And Simon—he’s a Toby Carvery bigwig with an interest in quantum physics…”

  “What?”

  “Remember Cameron Dewa?”

  “The Fijian kid?”

  “He lives in London now, but still keeps a small village in Fiji…”

  “God, I’d love to see those guys again…”

  “Why don’t you?”

  “You make it sound easy.”

  “But it is. That’s the thing. It’s really easy. Why don’t you do it?”

  Peter gestured around him.

  “I’m kind of in Australia now…”

  “But one day—why don’t you do it?”

  Peter thought about it.

  “I guess I could. I guess I should. Thing is, half the time, when you lose touch with people, you don’t mean to… I mean, there are some people you want to lose touch with, some you can afford to, some you’d hate to, some it just happens with… and it’s difficult to get back in touch. You have to break the silence. They could say, ‘I’m not really all that bothered…?’ Did that ever happen to you?”

  “Yeah. Once. A guy called Tom.”

  “What happened?”

  “He just said he wasn’t interested.”

  “You see, that’s what I’d be scared of. That rejection. I guess it’s easier to email someone and if they don’t reply you can always pretend they didn’t get it. The reason I haven’t done it is a fear of rejection.”

  “But for every Tom, there’s been a Cameron, a Mikey, a Lauren… a you…”

  “I think it’s difficult, though, to get in touch with the people you were a kid with… because you weren’t formed people then. You could’ve changed in a million ways, either good or bad. From university on, I think it’s different. You are more or less the same person. But it’s difficult to reconnect with people who might not even be the same person you knew…”

  I thought about what Peter was saying. He had a point. But, from experience, I knew it could work out. If only you’d give it a chance, it could work out. And I knew how to prove it to him.

  “Let’s try it!” I said.

  “Eh?”

  “Let’s try it right now!”

  I got my phone out.

  “Who are you ringing?”

  I found the number, and pressed Dial. Peter waited while I pressed the phone to my ear. It rang once, twice…

  “… hullo?”

  They sounded knackered.

  “Anil?” I said, and Pete’s face lit up.

  “… I think so,” said Anil.

  “What time is it over there?”

  “It’s… seven in the morning…”

  “God—sorry, did I wake you?”

  “Yeah…”

  “What time do you get up?”

  “Ten past seven.”

  “Oh. Well. Anyway, guess where I am?”

  “The Congo?”

  “No! I’m in Australia.”

  “Oh… what? Why?”

  “I just popped over to see Pete!”

  I’d never get bored of saying it. There was a pause.

  “Peter Gibson? What’re you… what’s he…”

  “Here!” I said, and handed the phone to Peter.

  “Anil! Hello, mate! How you doing? I’m doing well! We’re sitting here having a beer in Melbourne, talking about old times… yeah, I just quit my job… yeah…”

  And I sat back, and I watched Peter reconnect with Anil. Again, this was like a human Facebook. Joining the dots. Connecting the networks. Updating addresses. And Peter and Anil chatted, and reminisced, and told each other of their lives now… just like they’d been hanging out for years.

  “So you’re an architect? Me too, mate, me too! What you doing? Your part three? Next year? Cool—I did my part three two years ago, so been in London for a while… hey, if you ever want to come and work in London, mate, send your CV in, we’re looking for people all the time… about a hundred people, I’m sure there’d be something for you if you ever want to get out of Huddersfield…”

  I smiled broadly. Wouldn’t it be great if Anil and Peter, my two architect friends who I’d played keepy-uppy with and cheated on maths homework with and walked home from school with, ended up working together?

  “You’ve got a northern accent now! Ha ha! Hey, I’m trying to remember the last time we met—I can remember going round to your house and doing some coloring-in… or maybe bowling for someone’s birthday…”

  I smiled. We were always going bowling for someone’s birthday. And then I realized that there was something else about what Peter had just said that had struck a chord… something to do with something Anil had told me that night with Mikey and Simon in Loughborough… what was it?

  “You should see the houses round here, mate, the one-off architect-designed ones… land is so cheap, not like in Britain, trying to get as many units into as small a space as possible… you should come and work in Melbourne! Maybe we can go into business! Listen, I’ll get your email off Danny and send you an email—let’s definitely definitely stay in touch! Cool!”

  And he handed the phone back to me.

  “Anil!” I said.

  He sounded wide-awake now.

  “That was so great!” he said. “And weird
, too!”

  “How so?”

  “Remember the last time I saw you… I told you about the day that weird guy came up to me when I was in my car?”

  I thought back.

  “The one who could read your mind?”

  “Yeah! Well, he said that I would meet up with an old friend soon and have a good time. That was you. And remember he also said that this could help me make a decision about whether to stay in Huddersfield, or do something else. He said it would lead to new opportunities.”

  “Okay…” I said.

  “And now Pete’s just said I should send my CV in to his work! I’d love to live in London for a bit…”