Authors: Tom Campbell
‘Well, that’s a very healthy attitude,’ said Simon. ‘It’s refreshing to meet a planner who thinks that way. As you’ve probably heard, Southwark is a particular interest of ours, but we’ve not always found it as straightforward as it should be.’
‘We ought to do something about that,’ said Felix. ‘Maybe you can talk again after the evening’s entertainment.’
But when they went back out, the mood was sombre. The match had started again, and already the red team were winning 1–0. It wasn’t obvious to James when or how this had happened, but the fact was incontrovertible and, apparently, not even that surprising.
‘Well, I was afraid something like that was coming,’ said Felix.
‘It’s no good defending as deep as this if we can’t even get the basics right,’ said Robert.
‘Hopeless,’ said Adam. ‘If we can’t deal with set pieces then we might as well go home now.’
Angus shook his head and swore with great effort but very little imagination. It was remarkable how cross he was about what was happening down below on the pitch. Although, James himself was also far more dismayed than he’d ever expected to be. Everything else – the lager, the property developers, the sausages – had been so good, it seemed a shame that the evening was now being ruined by something as arbitrary and pointless as a football match. It just didn’t seem very
fair
– after all, everyone had agreed that the other team weren’t very good, and that Chelsea ought to win. Clearly, it was necessary for there to be some element of uncertainty in football, James could see that, but did it have to be this evening?
Sensing that there was nothing he could say or do to improve the situation, James went back inside to have another beer and eat some more chips. Having a lot to drink was essential in these circumstances. Inside, people were gloomily sipping their drinks and shaking their heads at the screen. It felt, for the first time that evening, as if the country was in the midst of an economic depression.
‘I’m sorry that the game is proving to be a disappointment,’ said Simon. ‘I was promised that we were going to win this comfortably.’
James realised that his host cared very little for football. Nor did he seem particularly interested in the hospitality he was providing – he held a glass of beer like everyone else, but made no sign of drinking from it. He spent much of his life surrounded by the highest quality food and drink, but was a master of deferred gratification, and foregoing pleasures in return for greater rewards.
‘So, do you think we’re going to be able to work together?’
‘Yes,’ said James. ‘I think that’s a very good idea.’
Simon held out his hand, and James gave it a good shake. It wasn’t entirely clear what they had agreed to, but it was nice that they had. At that moment, Robert came through to join them, as if he had been called over on a sub-audio frequency.
‘Now, Robert, you’ve been chatting to James, and it sounds like we’ve got an ally in Southwark at last.’
‘Yes, I think James is the kind of man we can do business with.’
‘As Robert probably told you, we’ve got a number of potential projects in your patch. Sunbury Square is a particular interest – we submitted at the EOI stage, of course, but haven’t quite decided what to do next. I think the team had a few issues which we couldn’t make work.’
James could see that Simon had a worldview, and there was a wonderful purity, maybe even a naivety to it. He just wanted to make as much money as he possibly could. He didn’t necessarily want to spend it, he just wanted to accumulate it. It was touching, in a way, while at the same time it gave him a strong sense of purpose and competitive edge.
‘Well, I’d be very happy to talk those through with you. Is it a problem with the density targets?’
There was a huge and startling roar outside, which half a second later was repeated on the television. Felix came back into the room.
‘Okay, you’ll be pleased to hear that we’ve equalised. There isn’t long to go now, so you need to come out and get a bit Nuremburg with the rest of us.’
James allowed a flicker of irritation to pass over his face. He would have liked to have continued the conversation with Simon, to drink some more beer and say something helpful and clever.
‘Ah yes, of course, the football. We mustn’t forget what we all came here for,’ said Simon.
‘You have to be careful,’ said Felix, leading James out. ‘They’ve realised you could be valuable to them.’
‘I think I can handle myself,’ said James. ‘We were just talking business. Don’t worry, I know what these evenings are for.’
‘Yes, but remember what I told you? Never forget that they’re capitalist swine and you mustn’t give anything away too easily. You’ve made a good impression; I saw that. But you need to make the most of it. Anyway, you can always talk to them later. You should really watch some football now.’
Back out on the balcony, James could see that things were more exciting. More importantly, he had drunk a great deal of lager, and was now prepared to annihilate himself for the common cause, to forego his ability to reason effectively and make sound judgements. For the rest of the match, he would enthusiastically defer to the wisdom of the crowd. He would risk his happiness on something he had no control over, identify with one group of immensely wealthy footballers whom he had never met, and develop an intense hostility for another. In short, he was going to be a
fan
.
‘Come on,’ shouted Adam. ‘Come on, come on, you arseholes.’
‘The referee doesn’t have a fucking clue,’ said James, for no particular reason.
Adam shook his head approvingly. ‘Too fucking right,’ he said. ‘Where is he from, anyway?’
‘He’s a fucking
Austrian
,’ said Angus.
Even James could tell that Chelsea were playing well now. They had much greater possession of the ball and were kicking it forward more often. They were running faster than the red team and seemed to be trying harder. There was a reason for all this urgency. It seemed that Chelsea had to win the game. For reasons James accepted but didn’t quite understand, a draw would mean expulsion from the competition, and nobody would regard such a thing as any more satisfactory than actually losing.
‘Ten minutes left,’ said Angus. ‘Come on, you fuckers.
Come on
.’
James was now incredibly anxious. The red team didn’t look in the least like scoring, everyone was agreed on that point, but the big problem was that Chelsea had to score and there was nothing he could do about it except watch and shout. Harmful chemicals were building up in his bloodstream.
‘I’m not enjoying this in the least bit,’ said Adam.
‘These overpaid homosexual fuckers are going to fuck it up for us,’ said Angus.
James went back inside and swiftly drank some more beer. He had now drunk six pints of lager and was, to all intents and purposes, drunk. Adam and Felix came with him.
‘Jesus Christ, we better win this,’ said Adam.
‘Do you think we can?’ said James. ‘I think we’re going to fuck this up. I can’t see us scoring.’
There was a weighty pause, and then Felix spoke. ‘Don’t worry,’ he said. ‘We’re going to win this.’
Adam and James nodded. No wonder Felix was so professionally successful. He was a leader and radiated assurance, good faith, fearlessness and a lack of moral scruple. He was very different from James. He was the very opposite of Lionel. No wonder people bought all those hair products and chocolate bars he marketed.
They went back out on to the balcony, and sure enough, eight minutes later, Chelsea had won the match, just as Felix had said they would. Although James had been watching intently, he still had little idea how it happened. There had been a corner kick, and a jumble of bodies and thrashing arms and legs as red and blue players jumped around and, essentially, fought one another. After five seconds of this, the ball bounced into the net. He was pretty sure that the scorer had been black and that he had meant to do it.
The euphoria was comprehensive. Adam and James and Angus were clutching each other tightly and swearing joyously. Robert the developer and James the planner embraced. He was the poorest person there, but it didn’t matter. He still didn’t like football and could barely name two members of the Chelsea team, and that didn’t matter either.
‘We’ve fucking done it,’ shouted Adam. ‘We’ve fucking done it.’
The referee ended the match immediately afterwards as if, just like the girl serving drinks, he too was under instruction, and they marched triumphantly back inside. Adam was right –
they
had done it, they had made the emotional investment and it had paid off.
‘Thank fucking Christ for that,’ said Angus. ‘We need to celebrate this one properly.’
‘Well that’s easily done. Come on through,’ said Robert. ‘James – let’s speak again very soon. Why don’t you come over to visit at the office? Something tells me we’re not going to talk business again tonight.’
The hospitality was as relentless and indiscriminate as ever. More trays of lager and new bowls of chips were being brought in, even as people were starting to leave. But James had no intention of going just yet. They each reached for a glass and held it upwards, clashed them together like Viking warriors and took long, deep gulps
‘Well done, everyone,’ said Robert. ‘It was close, but a mightily deserved victory.’
‘Yes, thanks Robert, that was immensely enjoyable,’ said Felix. ‘And all the more so for conforming so beautifully to Aristotle’s first principle of drama.’
‘Too fucking right,’ said Angus.
‘Fucking cheers,’ said Adam. ‘We’ve fucking done it.’
They brought their glasses together again, and drank some more. Adam did some more swearing, he was getting better and better at it, while Angus made some homophobic remarks, which Felix in particular seemed to enjoy. Out of the corner of his eye, James could see the Korean girl, who was looking prettier than ever, arriving with a tray of brandies.
‘James, I’m going to leave you to your festivities,’ said Simon, handing him a business card. ‘But you’re very welcome here anytime. Just give me a call. And do fix something up with Robert – there’s plenty for us to talk about.’
James took the card. It hadn’t just been a good evening, it had been a highly successful one, and in this world the two were indistinguishable. Felix was right: he wasn’t a town planner, he was a planning professional – it was a crucial distinction. He might not be leaving the public sector just yet, but it looked like his years of public service were coming to an end.
11
London is an increasingly polarised city.
–
The London Plan
, Section 1.27
It was just as James had suspected. Alice had a boyfriend. Not just a lover, but a partner. He dreaded to think what he did for a living or how she’d met him, but the substantive fact was that she was in a structured sexual relationship – probably highly sexual, given it was Alice. He’d emailed her suggesting they go for a drink and, two days later, she’d replied in a hastily written email full of heartless typing errors, saying that she was going to be away with Sam for a week, as if he ought by now to be well aware who Sam was, and that she’d be sure to get in touch soon.
Well, that was fine. He was really fucked off about it, but it was fine. After all, it had never been his intention to go back out with Alice. Not now, not after all these years. It wasn’t part of the plan: it wasn’t what he wanted and it clearly wasn’t what she wanted. So what did he want? It was one of the first things Felix had asked him and he still wasn’t sure. On balance, what he would probably settle for was for her to be
impressed
with him. If it was his name she could be mentioning in dinner-party conversation, instead of all the writers and broadcasters she’d slept with. If she could be irritating and undermining her current boyfriend by continually banging on about James and all the astounding things he was up to – well, that would probably do.
All of this was unlikely to happen because, and there was no getting away from this, he was a town planner. Who on earth was going to talk about him at a dinner party? In all of history, how many famous town planners had there been? There was Baron Haussmann in Paris but he was controversial at best, there was Robert Moses in New York, who turned out to be wrong about everything, Albert Speer, who was only famous because he worked for Hitler, and then there was Abercrombie, who was indisputably great and good, but whom no one apart from other planners had ever heard of. And if there were any monuments to planners, then it came only after forty years of public service followed by a short fatal illness, and never amounted to anything more than a plaque on a park bench or, maybe, just maybe, having a Town Hall committee room named after you.
‘James, are you confident the average housing densities are compliant with the LDF?’
James looked around, and wondered for a moment where he was. In a meeting, obviously, but it was difficult to be certain which one. Lionel was speaking, Rachel wasn’t there, Kemal from Finance was – although that meant nothing and there was every chance that he wasn’t actually supposed to be. But the silly cow Jane who looked after the website was there, and so was that cocksure bastard Alex Coleman and Henry, a research officer who nobody knew much about and looked too old for his job title. So there was a good chance it was one of those entirely useless monthly planning-communications matrix meetings that Andrew Metcalfe had initiated six months ago, shortly before losing his job, but which no one had ever got round to cancelling. The truth was, James didn’t know. He had got into the office with an incredible hangover, turned on his computer, read his emails, noticed that a meeting had just started, and hurried to the room. All he had done since then was eat biscuits and drink tea and think about Alice.