Starter for Ten

by David Nicholls

  And suddenly I can hear the opening of the Brandenburg Concertos playing very loudly from my room, so I grab the mugs of beer and hurry back to find him sitting at my desk with a fag in his mouth, the Bach album sleeve in one hand, the Communist Manifesto in the other.

  “So what are you these days, Communist or a Socialist?”

  “A Socialist, I suppose,” I say, turning the volume down.

  “Right. So what's the difference, then?” I know he knows the difference, and that I'm being teased, but I tell him anyway.

  “A Communist is opposed to the notion of private property and ownership of the means of production, whereas socialism is about working toward—”

  “Why's your mattress on the floor?”

  “It's a futon.”

  “Right. A fu-ton. Did the Asian babe teach you that, then?”

  “‘Asian babe’—racism and sexism in the same phrase!” I say, slipping the breasts-of-alabaster poem into the desk drawer. “Actually, Lucy's originally from Minneapolis. Just because she's of Chinese origin, doesn't mean she's Chinese.”

  “God, you're right, this beer really is piss. Can't we go down the pub or something?”

  “Bit late, isn't it?”

  “We've still got half an hour.”

  “I've got to do some reading before tomorrow morning.”

  “What have you got to read?”

  “Pope's The Rape of the Lock.”

  “Sounds racy. Do it in the morning though, yeah?”

  “Well …”

  “Come on, just a quick one?”

  I know I shouldn't go, of course. But this room suddenly feels too small and bright, and getting drunk now seems like a necessity, so I say okay, and we go to the pub.

  The Flying Dutchman is still busy when we arrive, and as I wait at the bar, I look across to where Spencer's standing, glaring round the room with his red eyes narrowed, puffing sourly on another cigarette. I get a pint for me, a pint and a vodka for him.

  “So, a student pub this, is it?” he asks.

  “Don't know. I suppose it is. Shall we see if we can find a table?”

  We squeeze through to the back, holding our pints over our heads, find an empty table and settle, and there's a moment's silence before I say,

  “So—how's things at home?”

  “Oh—wonderful. Really A-one.”

  “So what brings you here then?”

  “You invited me; come anytime, remember?”

  “Of course.” And he's silent for a moment, seems to make a decision, and then says, a little too casually, “And like I said, I'm an escaped convict, aren't I?”

  “What d'you mean?”

  “Well, let's just say I'm in a spot of bother. With the legal system.” I laugh, and then stop laughing. “What for? Not another fight …”

  “No, I got caught, didn't I? Fiddling the dole.”

  “You're joking …”

  “No, Bri, I'm not joking,” he says wearily. “How come?”

  “Don't know—someone must have told on me, I suppose. Hey, it wasn't you, was it?”

  “Yeah, Spencer, it was me. So what's going to happen?”

  “Don't know, do I? Depends on the magistrate, I suppose.”

  “You're going to court?”

  “Oh, yeah. They're having a crackdown apparently, so I'm up in court next month. Good news, isn't it?”

  “So what are you going to say?”

  “In court? Don't know yet. I thought I might say that God told me to do it.”

  “And are you still working at the petrol station?”

  “Well, not exactly, no.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because I got caught.”

  “Caught doing what?”

  He takes a large gulp of the vodka. “With my hand in the till.”

  “You're joking!”

  “Brian, why d'you keep asking me if I'm joking? D'you think this is the kind of thing that I'd find funny?”

  “No, I just meant—”

  “They had a camera hidden over the till, and I got caught taking the cash out at the end of the night.”

  “How much?”

  “I don't know, a fiver, tenner sometimes, a little bit here and there from not ringing in sweets and crisps and stuff.”

  “So are they going to prosecute you as well?”

  “No, they can't, 'cause I wasn't on the books. But let's just say my manager wasn't very happy. He's kept a load of my wages back and told me if he ever saw me again he'd break my legs.…”

  “So how much does he think you took?”

  “A couple of hundred?”

  “And how much did you take?”

  Spencer exhales smoke. “Couple of hundred sounds about right.”

  “Bloody hell, Spencer …”

  “They were paying me one pound fucking eighty an hour, Brian, what the fuck did they expect?”

  “I know, I know!”

  “Anyway, you're a Communist, I thought you didn't agree with private ownership.”

  “I don't, but Marx is talking about the means of production, not the contents of the till at a petrol station. And besides I don't disapprove, and anyway I'm a Socialist. And I just think, well, it's a shame, that's all. What do your mum and dad say?”

  “Oh, they're very, very proud of me,” and he drinks about half a pint in one go. “Anyway. The point is I'm well and truly fucked.”

  “But you'll get another job, though, won't you?”

  “Oh, definitely—an unqualified, unemployed petty thief with a criminal record. In terms of today's competitive job market, I'm absolute fucking gold dust. Want another pint?”

  “A half, maybe.”

  “Well, you'll have to get them, I find myself a little embarrassed, financially speaking.”

  So I head to the bar again, and get the pints in, and accept that I'm probably not going to get round to reading The Rape of the Lock tonight after all.

  Needless to say we're the last to leave the pub. After they've called last orders, Spencer takes it upon himself to pour the remnants of other people's discarded drinks into our glasses, something I haven't done since I was sixteen, maybe, so that by the time we get back to Richmond House, we're both pretty pissed. There we finish off the mugs of milky home brew, and open the two cans of Special Brew that make up Spencer's luggage, along with the Daily Mirror and a half-eaten pasty. I tell him all about New Year and Alice, and my version of the encounter with her naked mum in the kitchen, and Spencer unclenches a bit, and laughs for the first time, a proper, generous laugh, rather than a sneer or a snigger.

  Then I get up to change the record, and put on The Kick Inside, Kate Bush's remarkable but challenging debut album, and he reverts to type, laughing all the way through “The Man with the Child in His Eyes,” and taking the piss out of my record collection and the postcards on my wall. To distract him I put on the tape he made me, “Bri's College Compilation,” and we both slump drunkenly back on the futon and watch the ceiling buckling, warping and revolving over our heads as we listen to Gil Scott-Heron singing “The Bottle.”

  “You know you're in this, don't you?”

  “In what?”

  “This song—listen …”—and he crawls on his hands and knees over to the music system, presses stop and rewind. “Listen very carefully.…” And the song starts, a live recording, the first sixteen bars just electric organ and percussion, and then a jazz flute solo starts, and Gil Scott-Heron says something I don't quite hear.…

  “Get it?” says Spencer, excited.

  “No … ?”

  “Listen again, cloth ears, listen properly,” and he presses rewind, stop, play, turns the volume to full and this time I hear Gil Scott-Heron say, quite clearly, “Brian Jackson on flute for ya!” and the crowd applauding.

  “Get it?”

  “Yeah!”

  “That's you!”

  “Brian Jackson on flute!”

  “Again …”

  And there it is again
—“… Brian Jackson on flute for ya.”

  “That's amazing, I've never heard that before.”

  “That's because you never listen to the compilation tapes I make you, you philistine bastard,” and he crawls back to the futon, flops on his back, and we listen to the song for a minute or so, and I decide I quite like jazz after all, or soul or funk or whatever this is, and resolve to explore the world of black music more fully in the future.

  “So's Alice the one you fancy then?” says Spencer eventually.

  “I don't fancy her, Spence, I love her.…”

  “You love her.…”

  “I looooove her.…”

  “You loooooove her.…”

  “I absolutely, completely, totally love her, with all my heart.…”

  “I thought you loved Janet Parks, you fickle tart.…”

  “Janet Parks is a cow compared to Alice Harbinson. ‘Not Janet Parks but Alice do I love / Who shalt compare a raven to a dove?'”

  “Whassat then?”

  “Midsummer Night's Dream, act two, scene three.”

  “Jackson, you pillock. So will I meet her then, this Alice?”

  “Maybe. There's a party tomorrow night if you're still around.”

  “Want me to put a word in for you, mate?”

  “No point, mate. Like I said, she's a goddess. What about you, though?”

  “Not me, mate. You know me, I'm a robot.”

  “You must love someone.…”

  “Only you, mate, only you …”

  “Yeah, well, I love you too, mate, but that's not sexual, romantic love, is it?”

  “Oh, yeah, definitely sexual. What d'you think I've come all this way for? It's because I want you. Give us a kiss, big boy,” and Spencer jumps on me and sits on my chest, making wet, smacking noises, and I try to push him off, and it turns into a scuffle.…

  “Come on, Bri, give in, you know you want to.…”

  “Get off !”

  “Kiss me, my love! …”

  “Spencer! That hurts! …”

  “Don't fight it, my darling.…”

  “Get off me! You're sitting on my keys, you bender.…”

  And then there's a knock on the door, and Marcus stands blinking in the doorway, mole-eyed behind lopsided aviator specs, in his ruby-red toweling dressing gown. “Brian, it's two-fifteen, is there any chance of you turning the music off ?”

  “Sorry, Marcus!” I say, and crawl across the floor toward the stereo. “Heeeeelloooo, Marcus,” says Spencer. “Hello,” mumbles Marcus, pushing his specs up his nose. “Marcus's a lovely name, Marcus …”

  “This's my best mate, Spencer, Marcus!” I say, slipping on all the S's. “Just keep it down, will you?”

  “Okay, Marcus, nice to meet you, Marcus …” and, once he's closed the door, “… bye, Marcus, you wwwwwanker.…”

  “Shhhhh! Spencer!” But with the music off, it doesn't seem so much fun anymore, so with some difficulty, and quite a lot of noise, we get the heavy iron bed frame out from behind the wardrobe, and tip it over next to the futon. There's a brief debate as to who should sleep where, but Spencer gets the futon, because he's a guest, after all, and I lie on the bare wire bed frame, fully clothed, beneath a pile of coats and towels, with my head on an inch-thick polyester pillow, feeling the floor buck with my head on spin underneath me, and longing to be sober again.

  “So how long you staying for, Spency?”

  “Don't know. A couple of days, maybe? Just till I can get my head sorted out? 'S that all right, mate?”

  “'Course's all right. Stay's long's you want. 'S what friends are for, isn't it?”

  “Cheers, mate.”

  “Cheers.”

  After a while, I say, “But you're all right, mate, aren't you?”

  “Don't know, mate. Don't know. Not sure. How 'bout you?”

  “'M all right.”

  And after a while, he says, “Brian Jackson on flute!”

  And I say, “Brian Jackson on flute …”

  And he says, “And the crowd goes wild.…”

  And then we fall asleep.

  27

  QUESTION: How is the “calumet,” a central ceremonial object in Native American culture, more commonly known?

  ANSWER: The peace pipe.

  At about four-thirty in the morning I throw up.

  Thankfully I stumble down the corridor to the bathroom just in time, but when I look up from the sink, wet-lipped, pale and shaking, at my reflection in the mirror, I nearly throw up again because it becomes clear that I have transformed in the night into some kind of freakishly hideous man-lizard, with a diamond-shaped pattern of scales all down one side of my face. I cover my mouth to suppress my scream, and then realize that it's just the imprint of the bed frame's wire mesh on my face, so I go back to bed.

  The alarm goes off at 8:15, like an ice pick in my ear, and I lie in bed and listen to the rain pelt against the window. God knows I've had hangovers before, most days, in fact, but this is a strange new kind—almost hallucinatory. It's as if my whole nervous system has been recalibrated, so the slightest sensation—the rain outside, the light from the anglepoise, the smell from the empty can of Special Brew that's rolled under the bed frame—all have a grotesquely exaggerated effect. All my nerve endings seem uncomfortably alive and twitching, even the ones inside my body, so that if I lie still and concentrate, I can actually feel the shape and location of my internal organs; the lungs bellowing wetly, the exhausted, perspiring yellow-gray mass of my liver slumped against my backbone, the engorged, aching, bruised purple kidneys, the hot, spasming lower intestine. I try to move, to physically shake this last image out of my head, but the noise of my hair rustling against the pillowcase sounds massively amplified too, so I lie very still on my side and look at Spencer, lying a few feet away, his mouth pouting open slightly, a damp patch of opaque saliva soaking into my pillow. I'm lying close enough to smell his breath, which is stale, muggy and warm. God, I'd forgotten about the skinhead haircut. He looks like a Fascist; a good-looking, charismatic Fascist, but they're the worst kind, as history tells us. What if people see me with him at the party tonight, and think that I'm friends with a Fascist? Maybe he won't be here tonight. Maybe he'll have gone home. Maybe that'll be for the best.

  Getting up and sitting on the edge of the bed frame feels Herculean, and I can actually hear the contents of my stomach shift and settle, like a thin plastic bin bag full of warm, gently effervescing custard. The idea of changing out of last night's clothes seems frankly untenable, so I don't, and I'm not even sure if I can lace up my shoes without throwing up on them, but I manage somehow, then pull on my coat/blanket and manage to leave the house with Spencer still asleep, and walk up the hill toward the English Department. There's a steady drizzle, and a squally wind. I had this fanciful idea that I'd be able to read The Rape of the Lock as I walk, but the pages are getting soaked, and besides it's all my nervous system can handle just to walk without falling over.

  Outside the lecture hall, I lean against the wall and rub my hands briskly over my face to try and give it some color other than gray, when I see Rebecca Epstein striding out through the gate. For a second I imagine that she's seen me but decided to just walk away, but that can't be right, because that would mean that she's ignoring me.

  “Rebecca!” I shout, but she's stomping off down the street, the collar of her black vinyl coat turned up, head down against the rain. “Rebecca … ?” I hold on to the bag of fizzy custard, and try to run without moving my head.

  “Rebecca, it's Brian!”

  “So it is. Hello, Jackson,” she says blankly.

  “How are you?”

  “Fine.”

  And we walk on a little farther.

  “Good lecture?” I ask.

  “Uh-huh.”

  “What was it on?”

  “Do you really want to know or are you just making conversation?”

  “I'm just making conversation.”

  I think I see t
he ghost of a smile, but maybe I imagine it because the next thing she says is: “Shouldn't you be heading off to a lecture yourself ?”

  “Well, I was meant to, but I'm not sure if I'm up to it somehow.…”

  “What's it on?”

  “Do you really want to know or are you just … ?”

  “You look like shite, by the way.”

  “I feel like shite.”

  “Good. I'm glad.” She seems hostile. She always seems hostile, of course, but more so today. We walk on a little farther, with me just behind her, and I wonder how someone with such short legs can manage to walk so much faster than me.

  “Becs, are you angry with me or something?”

  “ ‘Becs' ? Who the fuck is ‘Becs' ?”

  “Rebecca, I mean. Well, are you?”

  “Not angry. Just … disappointed.”

  “God, not you as well.” She looks me in the eye, for the first time. “I just seem to be disappointing everyone at the moment. I don't know why. I'm trying hard not to, really I am.” She stops at this, and we stand in the street in the rain for a moment while she looks me up and down.

  “You do know your face is completely gray, don't you?”

  “I know.”

  “And you've got white stuff in the corner of your mouth.”

  I wipe it away with my coat sleeve and say, “Toothpaste,” though I'm not sure if it is. “Look, have you had breakfast?”

  “What about your lecture?”

  I remember my resolution, to attend every single possible lecture, but Rebecca feels more important than resolutions, so I say, “I think I'll skip the lecture,” and she thinks for a moment, then says, “Come on, then,” and we walk back down the hill.

  The steam and grease from the breakfast specials fog the café window, condensing on the cold glass, and dripping down and pooling on our red Formica table. Rebecca and I have got a booth to ourselves, with a mug of tea for her, and milky coffee, a can of Coke, a crispy bacon roll with brown sauce and a Mars bar for me. Rebecca's doodling in the steam on the window with her finger, while I say, “… he's getting done for fiddling his dole, which I think is outrageous, personally. I mean, if you think about the huge amounts that all those fat-cat businesses get to fiddle in tax evasion, and no one bats an eyelid …”