by William Boyd
Of course, there is still the problem of money … Resolution five: find a short-term, interesting, well-paid, part-time job.
Sunil comes out from the café and Moxy asks for the bill.
‘On me, ladies,’ he says. ‘Happy New Year.’
Bethany likes his Liverpudlian accent.
Moxy says she has to go as she’s ‘on air’ at midday. She reads the news, weather and travel reports on a small digital radio station called Radio Lube. It doesn’t pay well but it is the media, at least, Moxy says. Her dream is to be a TV presenter, or one of the guest presenters, of a TV show. Children, Reality, Quiz – she doesn’t care. She also works part-time as a website designer – she says she’s paid but Bethany doesn’t believe her as she’s also still living at home, with her parents in Wandsworth. Moxy hugs her goodbye, they promise to text each other, to meet up for a drink. Bethany watches her walk away – a pretty girl on the Fulham Road – surely the men should be queuing up? …
Sunil comes out again and sits down at her table. He has lank long hair and wire-rimmed specs that fail to disguise his good looks.
‘You got a second, Bethany?’ he asks.
Bethany says she has – she likes Sunil.
Sunil starts talking about his band, the music he makes. ‘We got a couple of tracks on our website,’ he says, writing down the address.
‘What’s it like?’ Bethany asks.
‘Very electronic,’ Sunil says, ‘but not dance/hip hop, you know. More electro-folk-modern-classic.’
‘Oh yeah,’ Bethany says, ‘like chamber-pop.’
‘No,’ Sunil says. ‘Nothing like chamber-pop. Listen to it, you’ll see.’
‘I’ll hear,’ Bethany says.
Sunil looks blank for a moment. ‘Yeah, you’ll see what we do.’
Bethany stands. ‘Great,’ she says, ‘thanks for the coffee. You should talk to Moxy if you want some work done on your website.’
‘What kind of name is Moxy?’ Sunil asks.
‘Her real name is Araminta,’ Bethany says. ‘Araminta Trinder – but she didn’t like the way it nearly rhymed so she changed it. See you.’
She heads off but Sunil calls her back. He looks nervous all of a sudden, tucking his long hair behind his ears.
‘Can you sing, Bethany?’ he asks.
Bethany says, immediately, without thinking, ‘Yes, course I can. Why?’
‘We need a singer,’ Sunil says. ‘Somebody cool and beautiful, like you.’
Bethany narrows her eyes and stares at him forcefully, sceptically.
‘Hey. Are you joking me?’ At moments like these she knows she resembles her mother a bit. That look.
‘I’m dead serious,’ Sunil says. ‘Come down to the studio – meet Sven. I’ve told him all about you. Give it a try. Nothing to lose.’
‘Maybe I will,’ Bethany says. ‘I’ll listen to your music – see if I like it.’
‘It’s very electro,’ Sunil says, almost plaintively. ‘But we feel we need a voice.’
Bethany walks along the Fulham Road heading for her mother’s house in Hollywood Road. We need a voice, Sunil said. Bethany sings out loud in a husky low jazzy monotone – ‘I have a voice, a voice that can sing almost anything, do-bee-dad-dad-da-boo, yeah, yeah, I can sing for you, baby, any time of day, yeah …’ It sounds pretty good, she thinks. She’s never thought of a singing career. Why not? Maybe Sunil and Sven are talented. Maybe their electro-folk-modern-classic sound could catch on.
Bethany pictures herself on one of those late-night television music shows. What would she wear? She would be very still, she thought, as she sung, holding herself immobile, concentrating on the song and its lyrics. She would write the lyrics, definitely. Sunil and Sven could add their music once she’d written the words.
She turns left into Hollywood Road and for an absurd moment thinks she sees Sholto across the road from her mother’s house. She laughs to herself: get a life, girl. Then she realizes – it is Sholto.
‘Fucking Sholto,’ she says, out loud. Then, anger building in her like a mushroom cloud, she yells, ‘SHOLTO!’
Sholto looks round and takes off, running up Hollywood towards Cathcart Road. Bethany is after him immediately, thankful that she’s wearing flats, and quickly begins to gain on him – a fact made all the easier because Sholto is carrying two rucksacks, one slung over each shoulder. He skids into Cathcart and then begins to slow. Bethany catches him and pushes him against a wall, tears of pure rage in her eyes, wanting to strike him.
‘Don’t hit me,’ Sholto pleads, in between huge gulps of air.
They stand facing each other for a while. Bethany feels herself beginning to calm down. She steps back – Sholto looks different. He’s wearing black, top to bottom: black Converse sneakers, tight black jeans, black leather blouson over a black hooded sweatshirt, black scarf. Even his two rucksacks are black. He looks different, somehow. Then Bethany realizes it’s his hair. The wild tufts and waves have gone. His hair seems blonder, also, and it’s swept forward over his forehead and on to his cheeks even, like a kind of hair-helmet, as if his hair is embracing his head. Bethany’s not sure if she likes it that much.
‘How was Namibia?’ she asks, her voice reedy with cynicism. ‘Or should I say Alaska?’
‘I’ve been living in Amsterdam,’ Sholto says.
‘Oh, great,’ Bethany says. ‘Brilliant – so far away. Why Amsterdam?’
Bethany senses rather than sees the tears well in Sholto. He pinches his temples fiercely and shuts his eyes. She can see his knuckles whiten as if he’s trying to force his eyes together in his head to form one Cyclopian eye.
‘I’m sorry to get so emotional,’ Sholto says in a small croaky voice, ‘but I think I’m gay.’
That evening after supper Bethany asks her mother if she knows many gay men.
‘Almost every man I know is gay,’ her mother says, and starts to list them: Nico, Luis, Terry, Fela, Toshiro, Clive …
‘Is Clive gay?’ Bethany asks. ‘I thought he had a wife and two kids.’
‘So did Oscar Wilde, darling,’ says Alannah, thinking. ‘Well, he’s certainly bi. Whatever. In fact I thought your father was gay for a while after he left – but I was clearly wrong about that.’ Alannah looks at Bethany shrewdly. ‘Why do you want to know?’
‘I’m just curious,’ Bethany says and then, as casually as she can manage, asks, ‘Have you ever had an affair with a gay man?’
‘No,’ Alannah says with a sigh. ‘Sometimes I wish I were gay: life might be simpler, but unfortunately I’m attracted to the opposite sex and that happens to be male. Hetero man for me.’ She looks at Bethany again. ‘Do you think you’re gay?’ she asks.
‘No,’ Bethany says. ‘Sholto does.’
Bethany meets Sholto in the Kafé Klee. She decides she really does not like his new Amsterdam hairstyle. He seems more relaxed, more like his old laconic self.
‘I’ve found a flat,’ he says with some pride. ‘Kentish Town: two bedrooms, sitting room, kitchen and bathroom.’
Bethany asks how he can afford it. The last job she was aware that Sholto held down for more than a week or so was replacing and watering plants in office blocks, working for his brother.
Sholto shows her – under the table – a big wad of money, blocks of euros with rubber bands round them.
Bethany does a quick count. ‘That’s nearly 8,000 euros,’ she says. ‘You’re not selling drugs, are you?’
‘Giel gave it to me,’ Sholto says. ‘He told me to find a flat. Had to put down £2,000 as a deposit.’
‘Who’s Giel?’ Bethany asks quietly, suspecting the answer.
‘He’s my friend from Amsterdam,’ Sholto says.
‘Your lover,’ Bethany says.
‘Sort of,’ says Sholto. ‘It’s complicated.’
‘How did you meet this Giel?’ she asks.
Sholto tells her: he was at Heathrow, that day he’d left her, trying to figure out how to get to Namibia. He started a conve
rsation with this guy – an older guy, late thirties. He said he lived in Amsterdam, suggested that Sholto check out Amsterdam for a few days before he flew on to Africa – there were plenty of cheap flights from Schiphol. Sholto shrugs.
‘I can’t really explain why,’ he says, ‘but I went to Amsterdam with him and never left.’ He frowns for a moment, then smiles. ‘Do you want to see the flat? You can choose your room.’
Bethany says she’ll think about it, somewhat astonished at Sholto’s nerve. Does he think this is normal? First he leaves her, just like that, walks out of their flat and their life together to go ‘travelling’. Then he doesn’t make contact with her for months, and then he turns up outside her mother’s house, tells her he’s gay and asks her to move into his new flat with him. Bethany steps outside for a smoke.
Sunil joins her. ‘Did you check out the website?’ he asks.
‘Yeah,’ Bethany lies spontaneously. ‘I see what you mean about needing a voice.’
‘Exactly,’ Sunil says, with enthusiasm and relief. ‘You’ve got to come down to the studio.’
‘Where’s the studio?’
‘It’s in Sven’s flat, in Streatham. We’ve got everything we need there.’
Bethany exhales. It’s only 4 January and the year is speeding up.
‘What’s the name of your band?’ she asks.
‘Xenon,’ Sunil says.
‘Why Xenon?’
‘Because it sounds like a sort of cool distant planet,’ Sunil says.
‘Actually, Xenon is an inert gas,’ Bethany tells him, gently.
‘Oh. Right.’
‘We’ve got to get a new name, Sunil, I can’t be in a band named after an inert gas.’
‘You think of a name, Bethany,’ he says. ‘I know it’ll be great.’
Bethany walks round the flat in Kentish Town. It’s ground floor and the kitchen is quite new. She’ll need to repaint her bedroom, of course, but it’s not bad. Also there’s a little tufty patch of back garden with an ancient apple tree – which is pleasing, as she’s never really had a garden of her own.
‘What do you think?’ Sholto asks.
‘It’s pretty good,’ says Bethany.
‘I’ve paid two months’ rent in advance,’ he says, ‘so, everything’s cool, you know.’
Everything’s not remotely cool, Bethany knows, and she’s about to say – what’s the deal with Giel? – when there’s the sound of a key in a lock and a skinny young woman comes in wearing a red leather coat and a red beanie. Sholto gives her a kiss.
‘Hi,’ he says. ‘Noémie, this is Bethany.’
Bethany raises a hand and says hi.
‘Bonjour,’ Noémie says. ‘Excuse me, one moment.’ She whips off her beanie cap to reveal cropped spiky blonde hair. She’s so thin and frail she makes Bethany feel like a giantess. She darts into the bathroom.
‘Who’s Noémie?’ Bethany asks.
‘She’s from Brussels.’
‘Who’s Noémie?’ Bethany repeats, patiently.
Sholto runs his hands through his neat Amsterdam hairstyle, disarranging it.
‘She’s Giel’s wife,’ Sholto says. ‘She’s staying here for a couple of weeks.’
On the bus back to Fulham, Bethany goes through the pros and cons. Sholto said that he and Bethany would share the big bedroom. As long as Noémie was staying there would be nothing to pay. Then she’d go and the flat would return to them. On further questioning, Sholto admitted that Giel might be popping over from time to time. He and Noémie were looking for premises to start a club.
‘I miss you, Bethany,’ Sholto had said, ‘I feel I need to spend time with you, make up,’ adding that he’d told Giel all about her.
A ‘club’, Bethany thinks. Maybe they’ll play electronic music. Maybe she and Sunil and Sven could do a gig there …
She looks out at the wet streets, her stop coming up. The rain has gone and the sky is brightening, promising some sunshine. Maybe Sholto is right: it’s a stroke of luck – moreover it solves all immediate problems and confirms several of her New Year resolutions. She and Sholto could share a bed, no problem, but that hair would have to go.
Suddenly she freezes – she has it. An inspiration. The Promise of Sunshine. She likes that. Sounds good. She steps off the bus and walks up Hollywood Road. Her mother will pretend to be upset but will secretly be delighted she’s leaving home again. Yes, it might work out, everything: Sholto back, the new flat, her resolutions already on the way to being achieved.
She hears applause in her ears, shouts of acclaim, whoops, whistles … Ladies and gentlemen – finally they’re here, what you’ve been waiting for, big hand, please welcome Bethany Mellmoth and the Promise of Sunshine!
Eight …
Bethany sits patiently on the Tube train that is stuck in a tunnel somewhere between Knightsbridge and South Kensington. She’s unperturbed; she’s calm – because this is normal, this is life. This situation conforms to her new understanding of the world and the human predicament. Life, she now knows, is a malfunctioning system. Failure, breakdown, dysfunction – this is the norm. As soon as you acknowledge this fact then everything becomes easier. ‘Things Go Wrong’ – this is the essential feature of our world. It applies to washing machines, motor cars, computers, staplers, central heating, ballcocks, the Internet, stock markets, incredibly expensive fighter aircraft, printers, toasters, nuclear power stations, kettles, cameras, fountain pens – and, of course, human relationships of all kinds. Things Go Wrong.
This will be her new dictum, her private mantra – she’ll write it on a piece of card and stick it above her desk … She senses irritation, panic, frustration building amongst the other passengers in her carriage. They see this enforced wait in a tunnel beneath London as abnormal, wrong, anger-inducing. Big mistake – a train that runs smoothly and arrives on time is the exception to the implacable rule. Once you understand that then life’s irritations and inconveniences change their nature – it’s like complaining about the weather. What’s the point? You get the weather you get. Look at me, Bethany thinks, look how at ease I am. And, she notices, someone is looking at her – a young guy diagonally opposite with short, dark cropped hair and a pointed Robin Hood beard. He’s attractive, handsome in an unobtrusive, unshowy way, Bethany sees instantly, but there’s something wrong with his good looks, something not quite right. Maybe it’s the short hair, she thinks, as if it’s growing back after a brain operation. Or, she thinks again, it’s as if he’s a soldier and has grown the beard to demilitarize himself, somehow.
She looks down at her book, slightly irritated that their eyes had met and that therefore he knows she knows he was looking at her. She turns a page. Metamorphosis and Other Stories by Franz Kafka. She hears the guy clear his throat in the way that a throat-clear can be a signal, like a ‘shhh’ or a ‘tsss’. It says: look at me. Unreflectingly, she looks up.
He is holding up the book he is reading. The Trial by Franz Kafka.
The train starts with a lurch.
Bethany walks up the Fulham Road towards her mother’s house, her rucksack heavy on her back and her carrier bags bumping annoyingly against the side of her knees. There is no humiliation in coming back to live at home, she says to herself, reasonably – that’s what ‘home’ is for: a place you can come back to when required, no questions asked. Perhaps it’s a little awkward that she left home a mere five days ago, she admits, but that’s life – certainly that’s life as a dysfunctioning machine, as she now understands it. When she called her mother to say she was coming back there was little welcome in her voice.
‘What’s wrong?’ Bethany said.
‘I’ve met someone,’ her mother said. ‘It’s a bit inconvenient having you in your room, just at this stage, if you see what I mean.’
‘I won’t be there long,’ Bethany reassured her. ‘It’s just a blip.’
‘Five mistakes’, Bethany writes in her diary.
Meeting Sholto.
Getting upset
when he left me to go travelling.
Missing him while he was away, thinking I was still in love with him.
Not telling him to fuck off when he came back.
Not believing him when he said he was gay.
Agreeing to share a flat with him and his gay lover Giel.
Not moving out when Giel’s wife came to stay.
Bethany crosses out the ‘five’ and writes ‘seven’ in its place.
Bethany goes down to the Kafé Klee and asks for Sunil. Sunil quit, she’s told. Had a row with the manager and walked out. Do you know where he lives, Bethany asks? No one knows where he lives. So much for Sunil asking her to sing in his band. She checks her mobile but she doesn’t seem to have Sunil’s number. Shit. She buys a cappuccino and sits down.
Her mother has asked her to stay out of the house until at least 2 a.m. Her new friend, Demerson, is coming for dinner. Bethany is to come home late and go straight to her room as quietly as possible.
‘Hi.’ She looks up. The guy from the Tube who was reading Kafka is standing there. She knows this is not a coincidence. He asks if he can join her and she says yes, after a second’s pause.
‘You followed me from the Tube, yesterday, didn’t you?’ she accuses him.
‘I was going the same way as you,’ he replies.
‘Then you stalked my house and followed me here,’ Bethany says.
‘I saw you walking in the street and followed you here,’ he says. ‘You had this aura about you. You’ve broken up with your boyfriend, haven’t you?’
‘How can you tell?’ she asks, unreflectingly.
‘Because of this aura around you. I can sense someone with an aura.’
‘Aura you just a twat?’ Bethany says, sharply.