I look at my feet and then back at Lizzie.
I need her to know this isn’t any failing on her part, but I’m pretty sure she doesn’t want or warrant a halfhearted “It’s not you, it’s me” speech. This wording will be crucial.
“You know, none of this is you,” I say. “I accept full responsibility for my failings as a human being. Nothing that you’ve said is wrong. I am trying.”
“But your system is just still so full of Ellie.”
“I don’t know if it ever won’t be.”
She offers a sympathetic smile, takes my hand, and interlocks my fingers with hers.
“That, Mr. Marcet, is up to you.”
A shadow moves across the window above us, and I’m pretty sure it’s Seb stalking us to make sure all is okay.
It isn’t okay. We both know it never would have been. Now that it’s done, there’s a relative okayness in that.
“How about we move past prospective mates and just try for proper mates for a while?” Lizzie offers.
“That sounds like a very good idea,” I agree.
* * *
—
LIZZIE MAKES HER excuses and ducks out early. I’m pleased she does.
Even though we ended things on far more amicable terms than I thought I was capable of, it was still pretty awkward. Seb and Tom both tried to make her feel at ease, but she decided to go before the first state was declared.
Now she’s left, I have one mission on my mind. To get as paralytically drunk as I possibly can. Because I have the hand-eye coordination of a Cyclops with the shakes, I decide the beer pong game is a good place to start. I approach two strangers with dyed red and green hair respectively—I think it’s a nu-punk thing—and ask them, “Who’s up for a game?”
“All right, Granddad, we’ll play you.”
“Granddad?” I reply incredulously. “Fuck off. How old are you?”
They reply in unison, “Nineteen.”
Their first shot hits the target and I drink.
“Then how do you know Tom?”
I shoot and miss.
Again in unison, “We sell him weed.”
“So how old are you?” Green Hair asks, as Red Hair makes another shot and I’m forced to down a further half-pint of lukewarm beer.
“Thirty.”
My ball bounces off the rim of a cup and hits a couple making out on a nearby sofa. They don’t even flinch.
Red continues, “So you totally could be a granddad. Think about it. If you had sex when you were fifteen and then your son had sex when he was fifteen…”
He would have a point if I’d lost my virginity anywhere near my fifteenth birthday, but I’m not going to point out how wrong he is.
“Smoke, Granddad?” Green asks, pulling out a joint of Camberwell Carrot proportions.
“Don’t mind if I do,” I say, realizing once these words have left my mouth that I’m more than a few sheets to the wind.
As I’m about to inhale, Tom arrives in the nick of time to snatch the psychotropic substance from my fingers.
“You two, scram,” he shouts. Red and Green do as they’re instructed.
“Hey! Quit harshing my buzz,” I say in my best dude- speak.
Tom’s face is the dictionary definition of schoolmasterish.
“When was the last time you smoked weed, Nick?”
I shrug. “Dunno, about five years ago.”
“Then you are ill-equipped to handle the recreational drugs of the new generation.”
“Can I have some gin at least?”
He scolds me like I’m an errant dog.
“No. You know how you get on gin.”
* * *
—
IT’S EASY TO shake the host of a house party, and about five minutes after I find the gin, I find a new group of friends—a bunch of politiphiles sitting in front of the TV. I don’t recognize any of them so I consider it safe to join. I do this with a simple nod of the head.
The nod is returned and I take my seat between a guy in a Radiohead T-shirt who looks like a young Steve Buscemi and a girl with a Welsh accent who clearly models herself on Lena Dunham.
“This is great, isn’t it?”
My opening pronouncement is met with half-smiles and a great British discomfort.
“I mean, this guy.” I point to the screen as footage of Obama meeting and greeting the voters of America plays out. “He’s amazing.”
Welsh Lena tries to help me out.
“He really has done some extraordinary things in just four short years.”
Mini Buscemi joins in. “Imagine what more he could have done without the Republicans stopping him at every turn.”
I slap him on the leg in a far too familiar way and take his indignation up a level.
“God, you’re right. The fuckers. Why can’t they just let him be him? Sticking their noses in. Ruining something that could have been really great.”
A sober me would know my exuberance is over the top, but drunk me thinks I’m a massive winner.
“Save my seat,” I say to my new friends. “There’s something I need to do quickly.”
* * *
—
I SWEAR TO God I know that Richard is the last person I should be messaging. I was just scrolling through old messages from Ellie and I came to one that had her dad’s number in it. I can’t even remember why she sent it to me. I think her phone had died and she wanted to keep in contact. Ready access to my phone is a big mistake in my present condition. Forget fingerprint identification; the next iPhone should come with a Breathalyzer.
I’ve sent six messages and I’m halfway through my seventh when Tom and Seb appear around the corner together. That I’m sending angry messages to Ellie’s father rather than to Ellie should tell me something. But I’m in no state to say what that something is.
The first thing Seb does is take my phone away from me. This is immediately followed by Tom snatching away my drink and sniffing it to ascertain its potency.
“This is gin! I warned you about the gin! You’re not good on gin, Nick.”
“But it makes me feel like I’m in Nineteen Eighty-Four,” I slur.
“Why would that be a good thing?”
“Who have you been messaging, Nick?” Seb asks, trying to both get the conversation back on track and limit the damage I’ve done.
“Doesn’t matter, does it? I’ve sent ’em. Too late, my friend. The joke is on you.”
I snatch my phone back and peg it away from them as fast as I can.
* * *
—
BACK IN THE house, under the warm glow of the TV and David Dimbleby, I rejoin Welsh Lena Dunham and the young Mr. Pink. My reappearance isn’t met with the applause I was hoping for, and the gin bottle I’m carrying is eyed suspiciously.
“So, where were we?”
Silence.
“Gin? Anyone?”
I offer my bottle and it’s politely declined.
“That was it. We were talking about the Republicans being absolute shits. Do you remember 2008?”
They offer polite nods.
“God, that was amazing, wasn’t it? All that hope. All that potential.”
I drink from the bottle, the glass I was carrying long gone.
“He was so young then. So much of his life ahead of him. Something great in front of him. Something really amazing.”
Welsh Lena and Young Steve are now looking at me with completely different eyes. Where once there was irritation and discomfort, there is now concern and compassion.
“Are you okay?” Young Steve asks.
“I’m good. It’s all good. He just needs a second chance, doesn’t he? To make it right. To fulfill that promise.” I take another swig, leaving snot and tears on the lip of th
e bottle.
“Gin?” I offer again.
“No, you’re all right, mate.”
Welsh Lena waves to beckon someone over. Out of the corner of my eye I see Tom and Seb striding toward me.
“Give us the bottle, Nick.”
I make a meal of standing up and extend my right arm to hold them back as I bring my left arm and the bottle up to my mouth. Give me a little oblivion.
By the time they’ve pried the drink away from me, there’s only backwash left.
That old familiar feeling of the floor giving way takes over. The walls and ceiling no longer mesh. I hear the next sentence out of my mouth before I’ve said it. Before everything goes black.
“I might have made a mistake.”
NOVEMBER 5, 2008—4:21 A.M. GMT
OBAMA 273
MCCAIN 141
BARACK HUSSEIN OBAMA PROJECTED TO WIN THE PRESIDENCY
The TV camera cut to Sarah Palin and the revelers booed like they were at a panto. The hipster in the beanie hat (indoors, with the heating on, I mean) said, “It was a shame that she had to be the first-ever female vice-presidential candidate,” and Tom nearly exploded at the misinformation, giving chase to him around the house chanting “Geraldine Ferraro” over and over again like he was Al Pacino in Dog Day Afternoon.
Dave from work—who I hadn’t seen all night because I had spent my time with The Most Amazing Woman in the World™—was standing beside me.
“Who’s that?” he asked, without a hint of irony.
I wondered how in-depth my response should be seeing how (a) little of any information I passed over would be retained, and (b) I was too distracted with trying to see where Ellie had gone. Had she had a change of heart and run after Captain Beefcake? Had she been abducted by a crocodile? Had she decided that this night was perfect as it was and therefore she was going to bail on me?
Nah. Only an idiot would come up with a plan like that.
“That’s Sarah Palin,” I said.
A lightbulb went on above his head and I momentarily considered that I might have underestimated Dave’s knowledge of current affairs.
“Right, of course. Nailin’ Palin,” he said, referring to a topical and reasonably well-put-together skin flick. “Have you seen it? Nailin’ Palin?” he asked.
Just as I was about to answer truthfully, Ellie popped up beside me.
“Have you, Nick?” she asked, all teeth and mock fluttering eyelashes.
I gulped, shuffled my feet, and made some indistinct sounds that were open to interpretation until she finally let me off the hook by saying, “I have. The resemblance is uncanny.”
Keep trying, Ellie, I thought. My mind is made up. Like 2Pac.
Damn, I’m cool.
“So, enough about satirical spank material. I was just chatting to my friend”—she pointed to a fashionable twentysomething with big, frizzy eighties hair—“and she says that the Prince Charles is showing Cinema Paradiso on Sunday.”
I remember clearly how she left little pauses between every other word of the next sentence.
“Do you…want to…go with…me?”
Remember the plan, Nick. Remember the One Perfect Night plan.
“Err,” I said.
“Err” was not what she expected to hear.
“Sorry,” she leaped in quickly. “That was probably way forward. Forget it. I didn’t mean to.”
The situation had become so obviously uncomfortable that even someone as unobservant as Dave cottoned on to what was happening.
What was happening, though?
I couldn’t very well say yes to her invitation. I mean, I was sort of being an arsehole by just disappearing, but I’d be more of an arsehole if I arranged a date and then never saw her again by standing her up. But this “err.” This “err” was just brutal.
“No, I mean, that definitely sounds like something I could do. Would do. But I’d have to check I’m not working. First.”
“You’re not,” Dave piped up.
“What’s that?” I asked.
“You’re not working. It’s Lizzie on the mid and me on the close Sunday.”
I watched Ellie become hopeful once more and I wanted to punch Dave for making me be the one who had to dash it all again.
“So, Sunday?” she asked.
“Can I get back to you on that? I just know there’s something I’m forgetting.” I was about as convincing as Heather Graham’s cockney accent in From Hell.
“Sure,” she said, trying for carefree. “I’m just going to go for a quick smoke. Join me if you want. Or don’t. Your call.”
I presented her with the most awkward double thumbs-up as she walked out through the kitchen. Dave turned to look at me.
“Dude. What are you doing?”
Shut up, Dave, I thought to myself. I have a plan. A plan to protect myself. A plan to keep things perfect. It’s a perfect plan.
At the hospital, two nurses and one doctor are bemused and amused by my request for directions to the maternity ward. I know I’m not bleeding because I keep dabbing my hand to my cheek, but I’m guessing by their reactions that the bruise around my eye has started to swell and I wonder if they think I have concussion.
I don’t remember hitting the coffee table with my face and I certainly don’t remember lying sparked out on Tom’s living room floor. I do remember coming to with a package of frozen peas on my face.
I feel awful. And not just because the booze is still sloshing about my stomach and my head is pounding from my Glasgow kiss of Tom’s IKEA furniture. I feel awful because when I sobered up and checked my phone, I had five missed calls from Andrew and six from Gabby.
Gabby went into labor at exactly 11:21 P.M. and less than three hours later, Freddie Dylan Marcet was born. Of course the baby got her last name; it was a minor miracle that Andrew never had to change his own surname after their wedding.
Mother and baby were both doing well, Andrew informed me, but they wanted to keep them in overnight anyway. I was invited to come and visit as soon as I wanted. I chose right away.
“Nice shiner,” the lady on the desk says. “You sure you’re in the right place?”
“Pretty sure,” I reply. “Gabby Marcet?”
The receptionist raises her eyebrows.
“Did she give you that?”
“No, she’s my sister.”
“It’s just, well, she’s got a tongue on her, hasn’t she?”
I nod in sympathy and grin to myself at the thought of Gabby shouting swears loud enough to wake the coma patients on the top floor.
“Down the hall, first room on the right, last bed on the left.”
Despite her and Andrew’s ridiculous wealth, Gabby still refuses to go private. Even during their failed attempts to conceive, she believed wholeheartedly that the NHS would come to her rescue, repeatedly saying, “Why should I get care that others can’t afford?”
I share her principles now, but would I if I actually had money? Who knows?
I find the room, and there they are, nearest the window. I see an image that I know I’ll keep with me until my mind eventually turns to mush. Huddled together on the bed, this perfect family unit. Gabby, Andrew, and what I assume is Freddie. I assume because without getting closer, honestly it could just be a bunched-up towel wrapped around a bunch of other towels. But the way they’re looking at this thing…
Total and utter devotion.
And then they look at each other. And I get it. I finally do. After all these years.
I don’t want to spoil the moment, so I just stand and watch for a while, until a cranky midwife the shape of a bowling pin pushes me into the room.
“You make a good window but a terrible door,” she says inexplicably as she barges past. I wonder what clashes she and Gabby have gone through as Ga
bby and Andrew finally look up from their firstborn and wave me over.
“Hey,” I say in a hushed tone.
“Hey,” they both reply, replicating my resonance.
“Jesus, what the hell happened to your face?” Gabby asks, again keeping the volume at a respectable level.
“Should we see the other guy?” Andrew tries. God, he does try.
“Good one. Anyway, how’s this guy? Hey, Freddie, it’s your Uncle Knick-Knack.”
His eyes are tightly shut and his little monkey hands are clasped together. It’s a shame, but Gabby’s soppy personality I witnessed from the door has already disappeared. I wonder which version Andrew gets to see when they’re alone.
“Get us two coffees, Andrew,” she commands, and he jumps to attention, reciting our preferences off by heart.
Gabby shuffles up the bed and pulls across a little plastic cot on wheels, lowering Freddie in like she’s auditioning for a remake of The Hurt Locker.
She peers closer at my injury and winces. “So, what the fuck happened to your face?”
“Had a date with a nice girl. Took her to a party that I shouldn’t have. Got so drunk I passed out. Had my fall broken by a helpful table. How was your night?”
“Some black shit came out of my vagina about seven, which was the worst possible thing that could happen because it meant the baby had shat himself inside me, which they’re not supposed to do. Got in the car. Drove here. Well, Andrew drove to begin with, but he was being a pussy waiting for red lights and pedestrians, so I took over.”
“Vin Diesel’s got nothing on you.”
She mimes a tiny bow and winces.
“Which turned out to be the right thing to do, because little Freddie here came out almost instantly.”
“I’d say you had the better night then.”
She looks over at her sleeping angel and smiles.
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