Charlotte Street

  It was a face that said, ‘No longer will I accept relationship or life advice from someone wise-beyond-their-years sitting by canals in Camden or on buses through Bloomsbury or outside cafés near my flat. For you are going out with Britain’s biggest tool!’.

  It was a face that was interrupted by Paul’s monotonous barrage of hostile, unasked-for opinion.

  ‘In a way I admire you for it,’ he said, and this is where I punched him to the ground, except I didn’t, ‘but ha ha, tell you what, gents: I could never ever do what you do.’

  He shook his head and avoided our eyes, as if to say, ‘Yeah, I did just say that. End of story’ and other smug, self-satisfied phrases. This wasn’t entirely comfortable.

  I stared out at the gig, silently, my fist choking the neck of my bottle.

  ‘So, do many people come and watch you control your toys?’ asked Dev, innocently, and Paul blinked hard in mock-shock. ‘Must be a great job. I’d love to just play all day. Must be a great stress relief. Unless one of the strings breaks. That must be stressful.’

  Paul immediately knew what Dev was doing.

  ‘And what do you do?’ he said.

  ‘I work for the Ministry of Defence,’ said Dev. ‘Much more than that I can’t say.’

  ‘You’re implying you’re a spy,’ he said, flatly, unimpressed. ‘Why do I imagine you’re probably the receptionist?’

  ‘Haha!’ said Dev. ‘So are you doing any magic shows soon?’

  ‘Theatre,’ corrected Paul. ‘It’s theatre.’

  ‘Because I’ve got a four-year-old nephew who loves puppets. I got him started on the Muppet-puppets. He loves the Muppet-puppets!’

  ‘They’re just called the Muppets. Not the Muppet-puppets.’

  ‘Well, you’re the expert. You must know all about puppet-muppets.’

  ‘The Muppets are not exactly my—’

  ‘What first got you interested in the Muppets?’

  I caught Abbey’s eye. She was quietly enjoying this.

  ‘I’m not sure four-year-olds really appreciate my approach.’

  ‘Why are you approaching four-year-olds?’

  ‘Very funny.’

  ‘What’s your best puppet? Have you got a monkey?’

  ‘It must make you happy, making fun of me?’ asked Paul, and this was Abbey’s moment to step in, to say, ‘Come on, Paul, you were being a dick and needlessly patronising. These are my friends’, but instead she said, ‘Paul’s got a point. Grow up, all of you.’

  ‘If that’s her boyfriend, and he lives in London, why did she stay at ours that night?’

  We were leaning over the balcony as the roadies tinkered with huge keyboards marked Play&Record.

  ‘On-again, off-again. They must’ve been off-again. Plus, he’s quirky and bad-tempered. Sometimes that works.’

  I don’t know what I’d imagined Abbey’s boyfriend to be like. I suppose I’d imagined that he was probably quite conventional. A little stuffy. That she’d have been attracted to the not-so-obvious, and would’ve revelled in the juxtaposition, the way you sometimes see supercool Japanese girls walking through Shoreditch arm-in-arm with cumbersome nerds.

  And I was a little annoyed that he was suddenly here, in our group, unannounced. We’d gone from being a happy three to a frosty four, and all thanks to a chippy puppeteer.

  It seemed like Abbey wanted us to meet him, but didn’t want us to meet him. She wasn’t seeking our approval. Perhaps she was seeking our disapproval.

  Suddenly, from behind, a tap on the shoulder.

  ‘All right?’

  ‘Mikey!’ I said, and then: ‘How ya doin’?’

  I’d never said ‘ya’ before. Mikey was on his own as far as the other Kicks were concerned, but there were plenty of people nearby, buzzing off him, eager to talk.

  ‘Yeah, not bad, man,’ he said, and then, spotting Dev: ‘All right? Mikey.’

  ‘Dev,’ said Dev, with unexpected confidence. ‘I’m a musician, too.’

  Jesus.

  ‘Yeah? What do you play?’

  ‘Music.’

  Mikey did that thing people do where you nod your understanding but at the same time manage to imply you have not really understood at all. He turned back to me.

  ‘Hey, we gotta thank you,’ he said.

  ‘What? You haven’t gotta thank me,’ I said, modestly, but pleased for whatever he was about to say.

  ‘Nah, man, you’re part of our story now, yeah? We stapled your review to about two hundred EPs, delivered ‘em all over town by hand, one of them ended up in a pile on a man’s desk. He chucked most of them out but your thing caught his eye so he stuck it in his bag, listened to it in his car, gave us a call that nigh …’

  I smiled a big smile. He kind of had Abbey to thank for that review.

  ‘We’ve got our first airplay, we’re here with Play&Record, we’ve got journalists saying we’re the new whatevers—’

  ‘Who are The Whatevers?’ asked Dev, but we ignored him because we’re cool.

  ‘It’s all coming together, man! I was saying to Phil the other night, we should get Jason to be our official rock biographer. You can tell it how it was, from the start! He said I might be getting ahead of myself.’

  Over his shoulder, I could see people observing our conversation. They were watching Mikey. He was becoming someone, and they could sense it.

  ‘So, anyway, we owe you, yeah? Beer soon?’ he said, backing away, a twenty-year-old with the world at his feet, pointing his bony fingers at me and smiling, like I was someone, too.

  ‘Deffo!’ I said. ‘Deffo, man.’

  We watched as Mikey was swallowed by the small crowd. Hipsters and girls younger than Abbey, with homemade Kicks shirts and bangles.

  I turned to Dev, proud.

  ‘Do you think he knows you listen mainly to Hall & Oates?’ he said.

  In the corner of my eye, I thought I saw Abbey push through some double-doors, hiding her eyes.

  We stayed to watch Play&Record. I composed my review in my head. Mikey had inspired me. I could make a difference! I could be a part of things! I might only be a cog in what Paul would probably disparagingly call ‘the machine’ before smiling at his own originality, but I could make of my cogness what I liked. And maybe it’d mean Play&Record would like me, too. I must be a terrific music journalist, to have spotted The Kicks so early on, and to have played such a part in their story.

  Play&Record, I decided, blended emphatic, anthemic powerhouse rock with downbeat trip-hop melodies. Also, that’s what their publicity flyer said.

  I cast my eye around the room, looking for Abbey. She was nowhere to be seen. Paul remained by the bar, arguing with a blonde girl, probably about Proust and his influence on European puppetry. I really did not like Paul one bit.

  In fact, I suppose if I were still a teacher, I would mark him like this:

  Paul: is a knob.

  And then I’d blame it on one of the kids.

  ‘We should’ve got Matt out,’ said Dev. ‘He could’ve found a metal post and smashed all Paul’s puppets. Did you call him?’

  ‘I did,’ I said. ‘No answer.’

  ‘Why the hell is she going out with him?’ he said, as we shifted our collars in the wind that buffets you up Pentonville Road. In six minutes, we could catch Oz before he closed and stuff our faces with chilli sauce. ‘I mean, people are funny, aren’t they?’

  ‘Maybe she loves him.’

  ‘She can’t love him. What’s to love? He’s like one of those tennis ball launchers, firing chippy opinions into your face from three feet away then looking over your shoulder. Every time he looks back at you it’s just to fire another ball into your face.’

  ‘He’s pretty tiring.’

  ‘He’s worse than that. He’s like … he’s like something worse than that.’

  ‘Hey, why was your dad at the shop the other night?’

  ‘My dad?’

  ‘Yeah. Abbey said she saw him at the shop, and—’
>
  We turned as we thought we heard someone shout something behind us, but quickened our pace. What was it? A fight? A mugging?

  We saw Abbey padding up the road, her bag flinging itself around her as she ran.

  ‘Can I stay at yours tonight?’ she asked. ‘Paul’s got to be up at five.’

  ‘Puppet emergency?’ I said.

  ‘Shut up.’ She laughed. ‘So can I stay at yours?’

  I tried to see if she looked like she’d been crying, but the air was cold and we all did.

  ‘Sure,’ I said.

  ‘I brought treats!’ she said, brightly, and patting her bag.

  ‘We’re off for a kebab,’ I said.

  ‘Of course you are,’ she said, pushing into my arm, affectionately. ‘Of course you are.’

  Back at the flat, Abbey had laid out her treats on the table, next to mugs of milky, sugared tea.

  We shared the sofa, but not the treats. Abbey jumped straight in.

  ‘Spacecakes,’ she said, anticipating them, welcoming them, the way I’d say ‘Big Mac’.

  Not since university had I had a spacecake. They just didn’t seem to figure in the real world of traffic jams and tube strikes and pay-as-you-go. I was tempted for just a second, just to remember that one night of staring, blank-eyed, at a Leicester University halls of residence doorknob, but declined. Dev looked frightened by them, as if Abbey had just revealed she was a heroine dealer and all her friends were coming round to stay. Abbey munched on, undeterred.

  ‘So The Girl. What’s happening with The Girl?’

  ‘Not much,’ I said. ‘Nothing, really.’

  ‘Oh, come on,’ said Dev, excited. ‘We found the man. The man from the photos.’

  ‘Her man? Chunky watch man?’

  She sat up, delighted.

  ‘We don’t know if he’s her man. We just know he’s a man.’

  ‘How did you find him?’

  ‘Fate!’ said Dev, finger-in-the-air.

  ‘But really?’

  ‘He was on Charlotte Street. He works there. And then we followed him into a restaurant and started chatting to him.’

  ‘OhmyGod are-you-serious thatisbrilliant,’ she said, breathlessly. ‘You followed him! What did you talk to him about?’

  It was exciting, to see her excited.

  ‘Did he mention The Girl?’ she said, pressing on.

  ‘Nope,’ said Dev. ‘But he will! We’ve been going to events where we think he’ll be, only it turns out he doesn’t go to them, but one day she’ll be there and we’ll pounce!’

  We all pretended that didn’t sound sinister.

  Abbey smiled, then stifled a yawn. She sat back in the sofa, wriggled herself comfortable.

  ‘That’d be amazing if that happened,’ she said. ‘I wish I had a dream to follow. Like, a practical one. Not just a dream dream, but a dream you can make come true.’

  ‘An ambition?’ said Dev.

  ‘That’s a better word. Yeah, I wish I had an ambition. I just sort of drift. Or help other people with their ambitions. You know, Paul had never written a serious theatre piece before I made him do it? Then I forced him to sit down and a week later Osama Lovin’ was done. I’m a dream-facilitator without a dream of my own.’

  ‘That would be a terrific line in a musical,’ said Dev. ‘You should suggest it to Paul.’

  She yawned again.

  ‘What are we doing tomorrow?’ she said.

  I shot Dev a look, a please-no look.

  ‘It’s Sarah’s engagement party tomorrow,’ he said.

  ‘Are you going?’ said Abbey. ‘You should go. Are you invited? You should be invited.’

  ‘I’m invited. I’m going.’

  ‘He’s bricking it,’ said Dev, finishing the last of his tea.

  ‘I want to come with you,’ she said, her eyes closing. ‘Let’s all go. I want to see what you’re afraid of.’

  ‘I’m not afraid,’

  ‘You’re so afraid of these people, because you can’t control them. They control you. You shouldn’t be controlled by people. You should be free. We should all be free.’

  I think the spacecakes had kicked in.

  ‘Being free to do what you want is the important thing. That’s why you should find The Girl. That’s being in control. You should definitely find her, Jase. For me. No, for you.’

  And by the time I’d worked out how to respond, and tapped the rim of my mug in thought, Abbey was asleep on my shoulder.

  Carefully, I moved away, gently lowering her head towards a cushion. I laid a Garfield blanket over her, moved her bag to where she’d find it in the morning, and paused a second.

  Peeping out from a sidepocket was a CD marked ‘Abbey’s Songs’.

  SEVENTEEN

  Or ‘And That’s What Hurts’

  I turned the page, and then turned straight back to read it again.

  ‘I didn’t think anything would happen when I placed the advert,’ says James Ward, who placed it in the Scottish listings magazine, the List. The subject of his advertisement was a young lady he spotted in a travel bookshop.

  ‘I’d always been dubious about love at first sight, but I think that must be what it was,’ says Mr Ward, now a Flow Cytometry Operator at the University of Edinburgh. ‘She was tall with short black hair, big blue eyes and a lovely smile.’

  Mr Ward’s advert in the next week’s edition of the List read: You were reading a book on Perthshire, I was the man standing with two coffees. I wish I’d offered you one. Maybe now?

  That was four-and-a-half years ago. Now, he and Jenni Bale-Ward are married and have an eighteen-month-old son, Henry.

  ‘I have always thought that if you don’t take your chances you’ll end up with absolutely nothing,’ said Mr Ward.

  ‘Breakfast!’ shouted Abbey, loudly, from the living room.

  I took the chance.

  I’d lain in bed last night staring at the ceiling and thinking about what Abbey had said about ambition. She didn’t seem the sort not to have any dreams. She seemed the sort to have a million. And I don’t mean that she’s flighty, or scatterbrained, although coincidentally she is both of those things. I just mean for someone so full of life, so full of joy, I found it hard to believe she could be so empty of dreams.

  Ambition wasn’t a word I was unfamiliar with. Sarah and I had had ambitions. At first, they were huge and vast and yet still felt oh-so achievable. We’d work as hard as we could for a year or two. I’d make head of department; she’d become a senior analyst. We’d save our money, Sarah would hit her targets, we’d only spend the bonuses on things we really wanted, like breaks in the Cotswolds or a weekend in New York. We’d buy the small house we were renting in Fulham for a steal, paint the whole thing white, retile the bathroom and sell it on for sixty grand above its value. Then we’d take a year out, fly to Thailand, buy a rickety canary yellow VW camper and live off rice throughout southeast Asia for twelve tanned months.

  Then: stage 2. We’d return to the UK rested and wise, and Sarah would be begged to return to work, where she’d be made some kind of senior partner and impart her newfound Eastern philosophies in front of shocked boards and impressed clients, and I would write up my notes from the road and secure a three-book publishing deal and a post as Contributing Editor to a travel magazine called something fancy and ethereal.

  But you know what? Things got in the way. The car needed a new exhaust. One night the clanking we’d assumed was a burglar dragging his spanner across our railings was instead a thoughtful suicide note from an unhappy boiler. I got dragged into more and more meetings at work, my shoulders became heavier, my dreams fell further away before ever getting any closer, we’d weekend in Whitstable but never New York. It was like we were constantly waiting for the Mad Men finale to come on, but the announcer kept saying we had to watch yet another episode of The One Show first.

  We decided to concentrate for a while on the achievable: the house. But then Mrs Lampeter got sick, and her son took over
her interests, and he convinced her to sell up, and must’ve seen the same episode of Sarah Beeny as us, because four months later the house had white walls and a retiled bathroom and laminated flooring and was on for sixty grand more than it was worth.

  So we moved to north London, where Sarah didn’t hit her targets and I failed to make head of department.

  And then one day Sarah had a miscarriage.

  I know.

  I’m sorry.

  I didn’t mention it before. I didn’t want it to cloud your judgement or tug on your heartstrings. I didn’t want you to know what we’d lost, knowing what surrounded it. Because that’s all you’d have thought about; all you’d have considered.

  Does it make it worse, what I did to Sarah, when she’d had a miscarriage a year before? Yes. Yes, of course it does. So maybe, if we’re being honest here, that’s why I didn’t tell you. And now that we’re laying our cards on the table, now that we’re going for it, here’s the worst thing, the thing I still find hardest, the thing I hate: selfishly – unforgivably – some little part of me in there felt relief.

  Horrible, I know. Horrible is how I feel even just putting that to paper. But honest and above board, too, and I hope you’ll at least take that into account, because that’s got to count for something.

  We hadn’t planned it. We just found out one day that she was pregnant. A week of panic, of highs and lows; a week of planning then followed.

  And another day later, as quickly as that: nothing.

  For Sarah, it changed things irrevocably. Made her focus, realise what she wanted, what she nearly had, how selfishly we’d been living our lives. She was destroyed and distraught at first, and I was strangely jealous of her instant connection with something that never even was; that she could picture a future far better and more fulfilling than the lowly ambitions we’d carefully shared and nurtured since day one, all based on something that was there just a moment. And I imagined she hated me for not having that too, not wanting it like she now did. But all I could think about was how life had nearly changed. How little control I actually had over my own destiny. How unhappy I was not … doing something.