SS Glasgow Castle 7 Chapter Seven

Weeks went by. I awoke one day startled by hot suns.h.i.+ne. As the air got warmer its perfume changed, taking on a whiff of last year's decay. Perversely, my daily routine changed in the other direction; I slept in later and later behind drawn blinds, and spent increasingly long evenings roaming around the place, doing a bit of this and a bit of that, occasionally going out on an invented errand for an hour or so. Predictably, I'd also found out that a drink or two helps ward off the melancholy that lurks in the lengthening shadows of a dying day.

I also moved on the job front in a firm and decisive manner. I refused to accept Stuart Jerome Stuart's words of gloom. I quickly found they were true. And although there was a respectable amount of freelance work floating around, there were fifty mouths busy claiming every gig available. There were a couple of people who were more impressed by my looks than by my talent, and made vague promises if antic.i.p.ated new business pitches became reality. Finally, a creative G.o.d with a gold earring, a hotshot imported from Australia, liked my stuff and told me that he was looking for an art director/copywriter team.

The following evening, having mulled things over a gla.s.s of wine, I resolved to track down Tad, my copy-writing partner at s.h.i.+t, Bulls.h.i.+t, and b.a.l.l.s. Stuart Jerome Stuart had no idea what became of him. Tad always had been a bit of a mystery man: he tended to hide behind his long hair, bushy beard, and vague p.r.o.nouncements on spiritual values. He'd have been fired within thirty eight seconds if it weren't for the fact he also wrote brilliant copy.

I finally had a go at the telephone directory and called him on a long, sunny, late-spring afternoon. Partly rationally and partly irrationally, I was expecting an answering machine. I got Tad in person.

He didn't seem to be surprised I called – but then, it was Tad's policy not to be surprised by anything. He was pretty busy for the next couple of days. Would Friday afternoon be all right? The best idea was to come down to his place for a drink; he was sure we both didn't mind saving a dollar without any pain. I wasn't quite sure whether Tad's place wouldn't cause any, but I agreed.

The appointed Friday came under a blanket of slate-grey clouds. It rained very wetly throughout the morning, and I was surprised at the amount of concern it caused me until I traced it to the fact I was afraid of having to spend money on a cab. The rain stopped by two, and soon afterwards I left with a grimly determined step; I was to present myself at Tad's at three. He didn't live far – I thought I'd simply walk there. I calculated it wouldn't take more than twenty minutes.

It took thirty five, in spite of the hurried trot I occasionally broke into when I realized I would be late. I had a st.i.tch in my side from speedwalking while clutching a magnum of cheap Beaujolais under my arm.

Tad rented out a flat in a fake Victorian townhouse on a modestly elegant street. I pushed the upper of the two b.u.t.tons by the door. Steps creaked and groaned; a dim shape s.h.i.+mmered behind the frosted gla.s.s. The lock clicked –

I was speechless for a moment. Tad had shaved his beard! His face was small and childlike in its frame of frizzy hair. The clean-shaven look didn't suit him: he had thin, bloodless lips with a sad droop at the corners.

"Oscar," he said. Then he turned round and marched off and up a long flight of narrow stairs.

I followed, stairs moaning as if my presence moved them to new heights of sadness. His flat consisted of an upper floor that had been divided into two rooms, a kitchen, and a bathroom; things were small and cramped, and there was a faint smell of pot; it seemed Tad could afford drugs, which was promising.

Tad dived into a nook I took to be the kitchen, and emerged with a winegla.s.s and two fresh bottles of beer. I had to ask him to get a corkscrew. Then we settled down in what I took to be his bedroom; it featured a sofa that looked as if it would unfold into a bed, a desk dominated by a computer, two chairs, and a bookcase overstuffed with paperbacks and magazines.

I pulled up a chair to the side of the desk and pushed the mousepad behind the monitor to create some s.p.a.ce. Tad opened the wine with much-practiced deftness and poured me a gla.s.s. I toasted him silently and took a sip of the wine. It tasted of cork.

"So," Tad said. "I finally get to thank the guy who lost me my job."

It may seem odd, but I'd completely forgotten that angle. My cheeks and ears felt hot. I drank the rest of my wine.

"I'm sorry," I said eventually.

"f.u.c.k," said Tad, "You actually look sorry. Like a f.u.c.king tomato. Relax."

He patted my arm; I grimaced, which was misinterpreted.

"Forget I brought it up. It's been on my mind," he said. He looked at the bottle in his hand as if he'd just noticed it for the first time, then took a hefty swig.

"Understandably," I said.

"You know, you actually did me a favour. But tell me: why the f.u.c.k did you get a daughter into it?"

I shrugged.

"I overheard a secretary use that excuse to take off," I said. "It sounded good."

"Yeah," said Tad. "It's good, all right." He giggled and rolled his eyes.

"What do you mean by saying I did you a favour?" I asked, after a cautious pause.

Tad sighed. He swished the slops round in his bottle, staring at it as if seeking inspiration.

"You remember the time I was crying in my beer and telling you I can't write?" he asked eventually.

"You did that many times, Tad," I reminded him. "Which one do you have in mind?"

It was his turn to look like a f.u.c.king tomato.

"Yeah. Well, it was bulls.h.i.+t. I can write."

"That's what I always told you," I said patiently.

"Truth is, it's easier to write a couple of clever lines selling toothpaste or toilet cleaner or beer than it is to write a poem. And they pay so much money for writing about toilet cleaners."

I realized Tad was slightly drunk.

"So you've decided to go the artist route?" I asked, and drank some wine to conceal the ironic leer I felt breaking out on my face.

"f.u.c.king right I've decided to go the artist route." He sounded stupidly defiant. "I'm tired of selling s.h.i.+t. Have you ever thought we're actually causing social harm?"

I raised an eyebrow. I put the gla.s.s to my lips and discovered it was empty.

"I clearly remember you saying that we perform a social service," I said, pouring more wine. "That by helping sell stuff, we guarantee increased production and so, increased employment. Or something like that."

Tad waved a weary hand.

"These were the bulls.h.i.+t days," he said. "I needed bulls.h.i.+t to reconcile reality with my own ideals. It didn't work."

"I'm glad it didn't work," I said.

"I think you're taking the mickey out of me."

"You don't even have a mickey I could take."

"That's because you've taken it already."

I waved my hands, palms out.

"I surrender," I said. My gla.s.s was empty again. I refilled it.

"Listen, Tad," I said. "When I called you, I... um... I've been looking around for a job, and there's a chance that someone who doesn't want a single art director might be interested in a team. But from what you say it doesn't sound like you're interested?" I made it a question, because Tad had started to grin.

"What, work with a guy who has imaginary children?" If he was going to get never-ending mileage out of that one, maybe working together wasn't a good idea.

Tad shook his head.

"No, Oscar. I'm through." He was enjoying himself, rejecting a job that wasn't his yet. "I'm not going back to that s.h.i.+t."

"What s.h.i.+t?" I said, exasperated.

"The f.u.c.king politics. The constant backstabbing. And the nature of the job. I tell you, we're hurting people."

"Tad, gimme a break."

"No. I mean it. We are. Look at the dumb f.u.c.ks out there." Obviously, he didn't consider himself to be one. "You know what they're like. You sell them stuff, right? They're so f.u.c.king stupid half the time you want to cry. But they want to be happy. How the h.e.l.l can they be happy?" Tad asked of the ceiling.

"They should drink exclusively Happy Lemonade, trade mark registered," I said wearily.

"Exactly. When in doubt, spend some money. And we are there to tell them what to spend it on. Drink this beer and you'll have a d.i.c.k like a horse. Wash your hair with this shampoo and everyone will have your c.u.n.t on their mind. And they believe us. They'd eat horses.h.i.+t if you told them it was full of vitamins and natural fibre. I don't want any more of it. I'm finished with this."

He looked at me expectantly but I drank the wine silently, reflecting that smoking pot when unemployed can harm one's mental health.

"Did you notice I shaved my face?" he suddenly asked with childish earnestness. I laughed briefly, and nodded.

"It's because I don't grimace any more. Well, maybe when I've got a headache. At the office, it felt like fighting muscle spasms."

"And what made you grimace so much?" I asked, slowly.

"Things we all said and did. Particularly things I said and did."

"You didn't say much, and did even less," I pointed out.

"Thank G.o.d. Otherwise I wouldn't have a face left, by now."

I looked down at my winegla.s.s and twirled it around. It increasingly seemed I could drop any idea of getting myself and Tad hired as a team.

"But Tad," I said imploringly. "You've got to live on something, haven't you? I mean, what do you get for a good poem – ten free copies of the magazine?"

"I can find all the work I need through here," he said, waving at the computer with the flourish of a magician pointing out the white rabbit recently pulled out of someone's ear.

"You must be good with this box," I said wonderingly.

There was what's popularly known as a pregnant pause.

"Tell me, Tad," I said, voicing a thought that suddenly popped into my head as I sat looking at the cramped room, "Tell me this. What do you use the other room for – taking long, after-dinner walks?"

"It used to be my girlfriend's room," said Tad. "She split soon after I, after you and I got fired."

"How disgusting," I said.

Tad looked uncomfortable.
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"Actually, it gets worse than that," he said, after a while. "I told her to move it myself. She was constantly at my throat about getting a new job. And while I still had a job, she was always telling me how she pined for the days when I was but a penniless poet."

"Yes, but what's with the room?"

"She accused me of coveting it for myself. Told me that was the main reason I told her to shove off. So naturally I can't use it now. She visits, sometimes."

"I see," I said.

There was a long pause, and it wasn't one of those pregnant pauses. It was a singularly barren pause; neither of us had anything left to say. Tad stared at his bottle and after maybe half a minute made the discovery that he'd ran out of fuel. He excused himself and got up. The refrigerator door wouldn't shut the first time around and I heard him spit out a curse and whack it with his palm. It closed with a fat slam.

I left the new, holy Tad alone with his beer very soon after that.

* * *

The Australian hotshot had made it clear he wanted a team; I didn't even bother calling him again. Instead, I set my sights on the Christmas season, remembering Jerome Stuart's a.s.sertion that things would change then.

Mindful of Stuart's wisdom, I also spared no effort continuing to look for freelance work. However, my efforts were mostly unsuccessful, although I did get a tour of a Girdle Museum set up by a manufacturer of hosiery. I'd contacted him because I'd heard he wanted a catalogue; I got the tour instead.

The manager and owner of the hosiery operation took me around the museum's three rooms in person. He was a tall, lanky man with big bony wrists and a shock of short blond hair that contrasted oddly with the frown ploughed into his forehead. He only needed a dog collar to look every part the disapproving parson. While we stood in front of one of the cabinets and looked at the complicated webbing meant to envelop a woman's waist and hips, he told me, in a reverential tone, that all the girdles had been designed and made by men – older men. He sounded as if it was deeply significant. In the end, he didn't want me to do his catalog.

Then, Christmas came. The antic.i.p.ated flood of hirings turned out to be a trickle from a half-closed tap. Some people got hired; others got fired. Jerome Stuart got me two interviews; neither went well.

Donna cl.u.s.tered round: she invited me to dinner on Boxing Day. We ate her family's Christmas leftovers and talked about a lot of things without actually talking about anything. I did tell Donna about my run of bad luck, and asked if she could store my furniture in the garage if the necessity arose; she agreed after I'd explained I would take everything apart, so that there would be just a few flat boxes.

When we got to coffee, I got to meet the cousin who had decided to rent my former study. It was none other than the famous Fabio with the flair for turning speeding tickets into drug possession charges. He was a very handsome young man; tall, well built, with longish black hair slicked back with gel. He pa.s.sed through quickly on his way to his room (it used to be my study); but when he paused to shake hands and introduce himself, he shot me a very knowing look from the bottom of his dark eyes. I had the brief feeling he knew things about me, secrets deduced from clues I'd left behind.

When I was leaving, Donna pressed a large envelope into my hand, saying it contained papers of mine. I opened it on the train home. There were some old letters, old work samples, and a slim wad of hundred dollar notes held together by a paper clip. I felt doubly humiliated – because she gave me the money, and because I couldn't afford to give it back.

On the first day of the new year, I left my studio and moved into the meat merchant's former house, next to the toilet. The unemployment money was in its last month.

The very next day, I was woken up by a big engine rumbling nearby. My room faced the back; I got up, mystified, and peered out. It had snowed again during the night; everything stood out in stark black and white. The back gate – wrought iron, as the fence, probably dating back to the meat merchant days – the back gate was wide open, and there were fresh tire tracks in the snow.

There was a van parked right under my window. Its side door was open and as I watched a man emerged, carrying a large carton. He jumped to the ground and carefully placed the carton on the lip of the loading floor, wiped his palms on his hips, and took out a pack of cigarettes. He had thick blond hair cut very short, and as he slid a cigarette out he looked up at my window, squinting. I saw a wide sunburned forehead with pale eyebrows, had a fleeting flash of pale eyes, square jaw, and a determined thin mouth. Then he bent his head down to light his cigarette.

It was Kross.