The Alternative Hero (31 page)

“He’s fantastic,” comments Webster.

“Of course,” I concur, “but hardly the type of thing that would put you in the mood for a kids’ book. No, I reckon you’re onto a good thing, and with those illustrations I think it’ll be a lot of fun.”

“Wow, Alan. You’re actually starting to sound relatively optimistic.”

“Thanks,” I reply, with a guilty smile. “But it needs some work still, I think … to bring it up to the standard of the illustrations.”

“All right then, Mr. Expert. How about this? I’m going away in a week’s time. Until then I’ve got quite a bit of production work to do,
so what if … we reserved an entire afternoon of mucking about, properly, at my computer, on my stuff—and some of yours, if you want—get it into a shape where I think it’s fun and you don’t think it’s crap. Then we’ll go have some nosh in a pub.”

The pair of trappist ales I’ve consumed leave me so delighted with this idea, which I assume means a visit to his flat, that in my rush to accept I don’t think to ask him where he’s going. But then, I suppose it doesn’t really matter.

After we’ve drained our beers and said goodbye (he’s going onwards to town in another taxi), I board the bus and feel something approaching contentment. It’s perhaps on the same rugby pitch as that rush of pleasure I received all those years ago, at the Harlow Square, frugging away, not five yards from Lance Webster, feeling that you’re genuinely where the action is; that the best of life is occurring right there, and that you’re not merely looking at it through a frosty window, vicariously trying to catch whatever scraps you can. I may not have my award-winning story of the last days of the Thieving Magpies, but in a funny, roundabout sort of way, I have become good friends with their lead singer.

All in all, quite a good thing.

And that’s not all, folks.

When I finally return home—via, of course, the off-licence (well, I’ve got something to be happy about now, haven’t I?)—I treat myself to a round of the “Best of” game. This is a game where you close your eyes and stand in front of your CDs or records, letting your index finger search freely, and whatever album it eventually arrives at, you have to play the best song—in the picker’s opinion—of that artist or band. Playing this game at Alan’s is amazing because of the size of both his speakers and music collection; at my place it’s a bit limited, but I crack open a beer and shortly find myself listening blissfully to Beck’s “Sissyneck,” the Foo Fighters’ “For All the Cows,” REM’s
“Orange Crush” (their best song is actually “Sweetness Follows” but I decided to bend the rules a bit in the interest of keeping things happy), The Cardigans’ “Been It,” Senseless Things’ “Easy to Smile,” Radiohead’s “Talk Show Host,” Thieving Magpies’ “Little House on the Flight Path,” Blur’s “Blue Jeans,” ABBA’s “Hole in Your Soul,” Drugstore’s “El President,” Beef’s “Lazen Hags,” The Beatles’ “Lady Madonna,” The Mission’s “Tower of Strength,” Pop Will Eat Itself’s “Inside You” and finally “Walk-In Disaster” from Lance Webster’s solo album. After this I get Magpies-centric and also play “A Good Time Was Had by None” and the live version of “Zeitgeist Man”—a relentless, charging stomp of a number, which finds me leaping around my room as if at the gig itself. I catch my reflection in the window and wonder what on earth Lance would think if he could see me now, merely hours after asking which band he once belonged to, bouncing to his records with such verve that I actually whack my head on my standard lamp and spill some beer on my laptop.

I notch the volume down a tad and mop my long-suffering computer with an old T-shirt, then decide to make sure everything’s still working by checking my emails. Imagine my surprise when there’s one sitting there from a certain “William F”—which turns out to be this:

Thoughts that immediately strike me:

1. There appear to be no hard feelings. Or maybe life is just too damn good now for him to care.
   

2. Clearly he no longer lives in London; I wonder if he works out of his firm’s New York office?
   

3. He “sold a flat in Farringdon”? The “a” would suggest it’s one of many. Hmm. How the other half live.
   

4. Seems to be a funny blend of modesty about his business and artistic achievements with a David Brent-style pretend modesty regarding his personality (the comments about the riots and being a lunatic). Generally he sounds levelheaded, though.
   

5. He’s right. Amazon
   should
   start paying me.
   

6. He’s also right about Alan. I love him dearly but a dullard he certainly is.
   

But really—how interesting. I wonder what he’s like in person. I know it shouldn’t affect the way I think, but it seems funny that someone so obviously successful could be … normal. I suppose I’ll be finding out in a few weeks when he jets in.

Billy Flushing. Good grief, Charlie Brown.

And after that, something quite strange happens. Although it’s just past ten o’clock on a Saturday night, and I’ve had no more than three drinks today, a bizarre wave of tiredness engulfs me and I decide to go to bed. I stick on something mellow (Elliott Smith’s
XO)
and settle down to an unusually satisfied and worry-free sleep from which I don’t stir for the entire night, apart from when Polly crashes in around three to ask if I’ve got any spare condoms.

For once, a chapter ends on a happy note.

But don’t you worry.

I’m sure I’ll fuck it all up somehow.

You know what it’s like on one of
those
days.

One of those days when it’s like you’ve got a million things to do. So many things that you actually make a list, as your mother used to tell you to do, although her lists are more likely to consist of things like “pick up beef from butcher’s, have hair done, order flowers” rather than the fascinating contents of the following:

So, you’re up on time, jeans and T-shirt, cup of tea and straight outside, cursing at the pissing rain, leg it to the dry cleaner’s to collect your suit, grab the laces and Polly’s stain remover (don’t ask), and belt back home before everything gets drenched. You’re the world’s worst shirt ironer but it starts to look wearable after about ten minutes, so you sling in some toast and settle down at the kitchen table for the first of your phone calls.

The council tax one is without hitch, but when you ring the housing-benefit office you get put in a calling queue for about twenty minutes. You clutch your mobile between your ear and shoulder and continue with your tasks: buttering and eating toast, cleaning and polishing shoes. Halfway through relacing them you finally reach the front of the queue and a wonderfully circular conversation ensues:

“We don’t seem to have your claim on our system.”

“I sent the form in ten days ago.”

“Sometimes it takes up to three weeks to be put onto our claiming system.”

“So where is it now?”

“In our queuing system.”

“How do I know it’s definitely been received?”

“You could speak to the queuing department, but you’ll need a claim number for them to be able to find your form.”

“Can I get a claim number?”

“Not until the form gets put onto our claiming system.”

And so on. You hang up and proceed to what should be a more straightforward experience: ringing your bank. Wrong. Straight onto another queuing system, and with the clock nearing quarter past nine there’s no choice but to continue your chores with your phone still wedged under your ear, your head cocked at a neck-cricking angle. Finally you speak to a human being and—after surprisingly little persuasion—your wish of a few extra hundred quid is granted. You’re just reaching for your to-do list to get the next item, when one of the items decides to get you.

“Hello?”

“Clive! It’s Maggie!”

You dispense with your sister as swiftly as you can without having an argument, then continue your way down the list. Pretty good idea, really, this list. Those parents, eh? Occasionally they have a point.

Quarter to ten and you’re on the bus, one of those disorienting rainy bus journeys where you can never see where the hell you are. Finally the Job Centre appears through the steamed-up and splattered windows; you dash through the rain to catch your ten minutes of hearing about all the exciting data-entry vacancies north London has to offer. Then it’s back on the bus for more wet public travel, and this time you’re not so lucky: there’s something happening at Angel so the bus has to go some crazy route which not only takes you miles in the wrong direction, but the added traffic is horrendous. Ten minutes of trying to circulate the Old Street roundabout and you’re getting your sweat on in your woollen suit, toying with the idea of bus hopping, but it’s so hard when you can’t see where the fuck you are—and would a different bus necessarily be any quicker? Suddenly a picture appears in your head of Mr. James Brandish (a City recruitment consultant you’ve been hooked up with via an old university
friend) tapping his watch as it nears five past eleven, mentally crossing off the many human-resources departments who simply wouldn’t accept this lateness. You stand up and stumble to the back of the bus, leaning over to wipe a peephole in the condensation so you can see if any potential connecting bus is behind. A glance at your watch (10:46), a final flash of James Brandish—and you belt down the stairs, beg the driver to let you off and race through the rain to catch another bus just as its doors are closing.

10:58 and you’re pelting down Hatton Garden (past the jewellery shop where you considered buying an engagement ring five years ago), nearly enjoying a collision with a bike as you hurtle round Holborn Circus and finally coming to a halt outside the office in question. You’re dripping with sweat and your hair’s all over the place, but you decide this can be more easily explained than lateness of even a minute, so you tuck in your shirt and firmly press the intercom.

It’s important to reflect on the circumstances which sometimes guide us in a slightly curious direction. London is not an easy city: its size, expense, weather and transport system are often enough to drive one potty, and this has so far been, in a number of ways, a fairly typical London morning. The next fifty minutes, in a very different way, are also highly representative of the kind of minutes one can experience in London when knowing the right people. An old university friend is often the best of references; the sort of connection which can turn “sorry,” “nothing at the moment,” “not the sort of skill-set we can place” and “goodbye” into “excellent,” “inundated with opportunities,” “should find you something by the end of the week” and “see you soon.” Certainly, they will not be the sort of jobs you crave, but needs must when Satan gobs in your wallet and blows his nose on your career-development plan. A brisk handshake, a
promise of a phone call on Thursday morning, a last glug of Marks & Spencer’s organic coffee later and you are back on New Fetter Lane in the drizzle.