Nirvana Bites

by Debi Alper

  I popped next door and found Robin hunched over Nick’s laptop at the kitchen table. I accepted a cup of peppermint tea in an effort to assuage the forces of darkness at work in my intestines. Robin told me he had heard from the guy in the lab, who had analysed the transit gore.

  ‘Pig,’ he said. ‘It’s pigs’ blood.’

  I wasn’t quite sure how to react to that. On the one hand, we knew it had come from something previously alive – and better pig than person, let’s be honest. I also thought it might be positive that it was a large animal. I mean, if it had been cats’ blood say, or rabbits’, it would have taken an inordinate quantity of small furry animals to provide that much gore. Pigs are bigger and also, I have to say, less well endowed in the cuteness department. On the other hand, how much blood does the average pig have? Enough to cover a transit? Or just a Fiat Uno? How many pigs might we be talking about?

  The next obvious question was, who would have access to pigs’ blood? Farmers? Butchers? Satanists? Slaughterers? What if it was infected with foot-and-mouth?

  ‘Robin,’ I asked, ‘I don’t suppose you know of any–’

  I didn’t get a chance to finish. ‘As a matter of fact,’ he interrupted, ‘I do.’

  ‘How do you know what I was going to ask?’

  ‘Because I thought of it first.’

  ‘Thought of what?’

  ‘OK. You tell me what you were going to ask.’

  ‘Fuck it, Robin. I’m not in the mood for mind games,’ I snapped. ‘I was thinking about abattoirs.’

  I know,’ he said, with a self-satisfied smirk. ‘I know that’s what you were thinking. And I also know where the nearest one is. It’s in Kent. It’s called Meacham’s Meat Products. They provide for the bottom end of the market. Economy sausages, cheap pies, pork scratchings, that kind of thing.’ Robin grimaced and retched. He wiped his mouth with the end of his plait, forcing me to suppress the urge to do a bit of retching myself.

  ‘How do you know about them?’

  ‘Nick and I targeted them a couple of years back.’

  ‘Oh, I remember that. Was that them?’

  ‘Yeah, MMP. Murdered Mammal Products. We tried to organise a picket.’

  ‘And got beaten up, as I recall.’

  Robin shuddered at the memory. ‘The bastards had these hoses that sprayed all this shit out at us. Literally shit. Pigshit and offal and stuff. We couldn’t get the stench off our skins for days.’

  So we knew of a source for pigs’ blood not a million miles away, with some dodgy dealings to their name. A clue. Maybe. Worth pursuing anyway, given the dearth of anything remotely resembling a clue so far.

  We sat and drank our tea in silence for a while.

  ‘I’m really worried, Jen,’ Robin murmured, gazing into his South Park mug. ‘We still haven’t heard anything from Nick.’

  ‘Look, Robin,’ I said in a soothing voice, ‘Nick’s a big boy. He can look after himself.’

  Robin looked sceptical.

  ‘Maybe he’s met someone. He’s probably ensconced with some woman even as we speak, shagging his brains out.’

  Robin shook his head. ‘He’s got no clothes or anything with him. And anyway, there’s no way he would miss tomorrow.’

  I was mystified. ‘Tomorrow?’

  ‘Fuck me, Jen. Where’s your head at? I think our stapled friend has stolen your psyche. Tomorrow’s Mayday, right?’

  Shit! I often have trouble knowing which day of the week it is. But I am usually aware of which month we’re in. I tried to cover myself.

  ‘Oh yes. Of course. I know that. And you’re right. Nick wouldn’t miss it and I bet we bump into him there. Just remind me of the plans again?’

  Robin was unconvinced by my fumbled attempt to save face, but was kind enough to play along, saving his contempt for Stan’s corrupting influence rather than my appalling lapse of memory. I made a mental resolution to withdraw every now and then from Stanworld and Deadfatherworld and check out Realworld, in case there was anything going on I should know about.

  We agreed to meet at some unearthly hour the following morning. I’d have to try to get an early night. Coming over all unnecessary at the Triple X had been a warning: my sleeping patterns were fucked, and my eating habits weren’t too hot either. I’d need my strength if I was to have any chance of success at dealing with this Life stuff. Robin showed unexpected sensitivity and offered to let the others know the coup. Or maybe he could see how out of it I was and was just being pragmatic.

  I came home and rang Mags at work. She said she’d be willing to Stan-sit while the rest of us were out ‘peopling the barricades’, as Gaia would say.

  ‘I would have taken the day off anyway,’ Mags sighed. ‘But I wouldn’t have joined you guys on the streets. It’s not my scene, know what I mean?’

  I did know what she meant. The Mayday posse would be an eclectic assortment of anarchists, eco-warriors, squatters, animal-rights activists, Wombles, punks and pagans. With a small smattering of SWP hacks desperately trying to ride the anti-capitalist bandwagon while simultaneously pretending they were leading it – and fooling no one in the process. The rest of us Nirvanans would fit in fine. As a black lesbian, Mags felt her struggle was elsewhere. I respected her stance. I often wondered why she chose to stay on in Nirvana. Often wondered, but was always grateful.

  I spent the rest of the day in the garden, working up a sweat and working out the demons. Stan lay on a blanket and watched me as I worked in silence around him. Along the left-hand side I planted tomatoes, lettuces and courgettes, on the right, what I hoped would turn into a riot of flowers with a herb garden in the plot next to Mrs V’s fence. Maybe their soothing aroma would have a calming effect on Tyson, who spent the entire time I was working head-butting the fence. I used the best seedlings Stan’s money could buy, delivered in a van from Dulwich Garden Centre. Never thought I’d see the day. I left the middle area bare, where the lawn had been. Maybe I’d order turf another day. I dotted the garden with paper cups buried up to their rims in the earth and filled them with beer to catch the slugs and snails. A nasty business, but I was fucked if I was going to all this trouble to provide a varied diet for our slimy friends. I hoped it wasn’t too bad a way to die. Stan helped by drinking some of the beer.

  15

  MAYDAY DAWNED BRIGHT and early. Actually, that’s not true. Mayday dawned early, but it sure as hell wasn’t bright. Rain spilled from leaden skies that held no promise of improvement. We met at Gaia’s and studied our Mayday Monopoly Game Guide. This was a glossy forty-page A5 booklet listing the anti-capitalist actions across London. Impressive. New technology had a lot going for it if it enabled the good guys to produce something that looked this professional.

  ‘Take back your life as you pass go,’ it trumpeted. Then it gave a short radical history and summary of targets for each of the areas on the Monopoly board.

  We drank coffee and ate croissants while plotting our part in the downfall of capitalism. We saw no contradiction in using Stan’s money to pay for bourgeois luxuries to give us strength in our purpose. Anyway, it was Fair Trade coffee, and the croissants – well, they were bloody nice anyway.

  Robin stood and issued a call to arms by reading the last paragraph of the booklet in a theatrical voice. I could tell he was imagining himself taking his place in revolutionary history.

  ‘“On Mayday the Dionysian Underground (the post-situ anarcho-surrealist network) intend to reclaim the dice and roll it on the streets of London. Join us, if you will, or better still reclaim the dice for yourself and subvert the game.” Come on, guys. Let’s go!’

  We had decided to split up, and meet later at Oxford Circus for the mass ‘shopathon’. Frank and Robin went off to join the Critical Mass bike ride, intended to snarl up King’s Cross. Gaia headed for Mayfair, where she was meeting up with some animal-rights activists targeting a butcher’s which, according to the booklet, was a ‘purveyor of bourgeois delicacies like foie gras’, and the Connaught H
otel, where a portion of caviar costs £120. Ali and I made our way by bus and foot to Pall Mall, intending to lay siege to the World Bank.

  We were cold and wet by the time we arrived, to be greeted by the sight of a triple row of helmeted cops with visors down and truncheons drawn. Over their heads I could just make out the group of dangerous renegades responsible for their presence: five bedraggled comrades tried to look angry and defiant, but only succeeded in looking damp. The incessant rain drenched a single banner printed with the immortal words SMASH CAPITALISM AND REPLACE IT WITH SOMETHING NICER.

  We decided to make our way over to Oxford Street, even though it was early. We sat under a bus shelter in Regent Street and munched on sandwiches washed down with a flask of coffee that Ali had packed earlier. We chatted with the other people milling around. Most of the shops were boarded up but there were a few bemused tourists wandering the streets, huddled under umbrellas.

  There were already a couple of hundred people round Oxford Circus, and it wasn’t long before we were joined by a posse from the White Overalls Movement Building Libertarian Effective Struggle, a.k.a. the Wombles. It was hard to see how a paranoid media had managed to create an image of these guys as psychotic anarchist maniacs – the real hard nuts. In reality, they looked more cuddly than threatening, with their foam-rubber ‘armour’ under white boiler suits and wearing dust masks. One had a teddy strapped to his shoulder. If he hit someone with it, would it constitute assault with a deadly weapon? You could just imagine the scene in court:

  ‘Yes, Your Honour. The weapon had straw stuffing that could have resulted in a very nasty scratch, as well as a vicious pin-like device securing the eyes…’

  Ali was deep in conversation with a small guy with green hair and swimming goggles. He introduced me. The guy’s name was Buzz. He had stuffed penguins strapped to his forearms. I bet the riot cops really quaked in their steel toecaps when they saw him.

  Things moved so fast, none of us knew what was happening before it was too late. One moment we were plotting our part in the downfall of capitalism and the next we were surrounded by a wall of cops three deep and backed up by horses. They pinned us in so tightly we were jammed up against each other with no way out. We started angry, went through defiant and unbelieving and ended up in numbed exhaustion. Eight hours. Eight sodden, cold, frustrated, tired and hungry hours. The men pissing through the railings into the station. The women forming protective barriers round those of us forced to squat when the pressure on our bladders proved intolerable. As Buzz said, maybe the rain wasn’t all bad – at least it washed away the flow of piss.

  I watched in fury as the cops ignored a woman who begged to be allowed through to pick her child up from school. The ‘good’ ones were impassive. The bastard ones laughed and taunted her. A guy I’d seen earlier who had half his head shaved and half a beard hurled abuse at them and was felled by a vicious truncheon blow to the head. Two others climbed on to the canopy over John Lewis. Amid cheers from the crowd, they tore a CCTV camera from its mooring and threw it to the ground. One tiny victory.

  It was dark, still raining, still cold by the time the cops allowed us to trickle out a few at a time. Some people were moving on to Regent Street to wreak a bit of revenge and head off the feelings of powerlessness. I admired their energy. I had none left.

  That was Mayday, that was.

  We came home via the Curry in a Hurry takeaway and walked up Kirkwood Road munching on vegetable samosas and onion bhajis. The only other things on my agenda for the day were a bath and bed. I hoped Stan would already have crashed. When we stopped outside Ali’s house to say goodnight, I glanced up at my window to see if the lights were on. They weren’t. But the news was not good. The window on the right-hand side was blind. Instead of streetlights reflecting off glass, a sheet of hardboard reflected only more rips in the fabric of my life.

  ‘Oh shit,’ I breathed.

  Ali followed my gaze. He put his arm round my shoulders and together we walked up my path.

  As soon as my key turned in the lock, Mags was at the door, her bulk blocking out the light.

  ‘It’s OK,’ she said. ‘It’s nothing to worry about.’

  That worried me straight off. ‘Unless you’re going to tell me it was smashed by a kamikaze pigeon with a baseball bat in front of several reliable witnesses, I don’t honestly know how you can say that,’ I replied, resorting to sarcasm to cover my trembling.

  We leaned against the wall in the hallway as Mags explained what had happened. At about six o’clock she had popped to the corner shop for Rizlas and air. It was clear that spending a whole day with our stapled friend had proved a huge drain on her supplies of ganja, oxygen and patience. When she got back ten minutes later, the window was broken, the lights were off and Stan was in the bedroom cupboard.

  ‘It was just a brick, Jen. Probably just kids. It’s happened before.’

  I looked dubious.

  ‘It’s a coincidence, Jen,’ Mags insisted.

  I looked at Ali, who gave a tiny shrug. I didn’t believe it for one moment. Neither, it seemed, did Stan, who had only agreed to come out of the cupboard when he realised that an angry Mags was far more terrifying than any shadowy figures who might be lurking in the street. After a raid on his toilet bag, he’d crashed on her settee and was still there, snorting and dribbling. Mags had swept up the glass, tacked on the hardboard and tolerated the intrusion. I dreaded to think how long I’d be paying her back for this. And all so I could spend an entire day achieving fuck-all in the struggle against globalisation.

  I slept in my own bed that night, but in my sleeping bag. I still couldn’t face the prospect of Stan’s scuzzy sheets. I wondered if I could claim new bedlinen as a legitimate expense. I didn’t fancy the idea of staring at the front room window’s blank eye all night. Or the way the light in the room would be subtly changed. I’d phone a glazier first thing next morning.

  Amazing thing, money. Before, if a window had needed replacing in one of the flats, it would have taken weeks, or even months. There would have been meetings to discuss budgets, assess priorities, allocate tasks, draw up schedules… Then more meetings to reprove members who had not completed their allotted tasks, thereby preventing work progressing further and necessitating revised schedules. Now all I had to do was open the Yellow Pages and phone AA Glaziers. I didn’t even need to ring round to compare quotes.

  I had no idea if Stan was keeping count of how much dosh he was shelling out. I certainly wasn’t. At first I thought it strange that a man like Stanley Highshore would be dealing with so much cash, but then I realised that a man like Stapled Stan had no choice. There’d be no point going to all that trouble to keep his identity secret and then buying a load of bondage gear and charging it to his platinum card. The bottom line was, I doubted if any one of us, with the exception of Mags, could have laid their hands on so much as a quid that hadn’t previously nestled in Stan’s designer pockets. The government may have been agonising over whether to join the Euro, but Nirvana had embraced the Stan-o with open arms, a welcoming heart and a bottomless pocket. And we hadn’t held a single meeting to discuss it.

  Now that I thought about it, that might be something that required further examination. Some other time.

  16

  I DID THE glazier thing in the morning, with a small surge of joy and a slightly larger twinge of guilt. It felt strange paying someone to do something we’d always taken pride in doing ourselves. Strange, but not entirely without satisfaction. Such is the seductive power of money.

  It was Ali’s turn to Stan-sit. Mags told us before she headed off to work that he was still spark-out. And unless yesterday’s anxiety attacks had diminished, he would be unlikely to dare set a foot outside the front door. Even so, I left Ali ensconced in my flat and locked the front door on my way out, just in case it occurred to Stan to do a runner and leave us with his shit. And without the compensation of his financial input.

  I was off to see Della. There was still no
reply from her phone, but she only lived in Stockwell, so I thought I’d chance a visit. I was going to get a minicab – east to west of the city being harder to negotiate than Berlin before the Wall came down – but I rejected the idea and took my bike instead. I felt chastened by the lungfuls of pollution I would be forced to inhale. Environmentally sound and physiologically shite.

  Della’s address turned out to be a ground-floor conversion flat in one of those enormous houses on Clapham Road. I remember her once boasting that Joanna Lumley was a neighbour. I chained my bike to the railings and rang her bell. (Della’s, not Joanna’s.)

  A couple of minutes passed. I was about to try again when the front door opened and a small woman with Princess Leia hair bounced out. I put my hand out to stop the door closing and watched her trot down the concrete steps and off up the road without a backwards glance.

  I stepped inside a parquet-floored lobby. Della’s door was to my left. There was another directly opposite. Facing me, a carpeted staircase rose to the flats upstairs. I knocked on Della’s door. No response. The air smelled of pine air freshener. I was just jotting down a note when the door opposite opened and a man carrying a bag of rubbish stepped into the lobby.

  He was small, plump and balding. He jumped when he saw me and was about to leap back into his flat, but I put my palm flat against his door before he could shut it.

  ‘Excuse me,’ I said, ‘I’m looking for Della? From Flat I?’

  He swallowed nervously, his Adam’s apple jiggling in the V of his white aertex shirt.

  ‘Um…are you a friend?’ he asked, his eyes darting round the lobby, anywhere but at me.

  ‘Yes,’ I replied. ‘A good friend.’