Theft

by Luke Brown

  I pretended again that I didn’t catch his tone. ‘It’s nice to have her in there. We’ve finally had a bit of interest in it, actually. We might be able to sell it soon.’

  ‘Well. That will be a handy bit of cash.’

  ‘My sister thinks that if we club together it will be enough for a deposit on an ex-council flat in very far south-south-east London where I can live and pay the mortgage while we wait for the value to shoot up when it becomes the last place anyone can afford to live. The place she has in mind is called Downhill, which sounds like somewhere in a Dickens novel. I’ve been sent a list of places she wants me to go and check out.’

  ‘How is your sister? I liked her.’

  ‘She’s OK. I hope.’

  ‘Does she always take charge of your life?’

  ‘Let me give her a ring and ask her.’

  Either Andrew hadn’t noticed I was being witty, or he hadn’t considered that I was being witty. He had attracted the barman’s attention and was ordering two pints.

  ‘I was going to get those,’ I said.

  ‘It’s fine.’ He handed me my pint. ‘Come on, let’s get out of here,’ he said, leading his way out of the scrum with his right shoulder. We went outside and found a couple of wicker chairs to sit down in next to the shop front of an architect’s office.

  ‘Well,’ he said.

  ‘OK?’

  ‘Emily asked me whether I’d been sleeping with one of my PhD students. Chloe. Whom we spoke about at the launch.’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘And with whom you saw me going into a hotel, apparently?’

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘And you told Emily you’d seen us going into a hotel?’

  ‘Yes. The Hoxton round the corner from where I work. You and I even spoke at the bar.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘You were in the bar with her. I recognised you. You came over to ask me what I was looking at and bought me a pint. I was reading a biography of George Eliot, which you commented on.’

  ‘Wait, that does ring a bell. That was you? Why’ve you never mentioned that?’

  ‘You didn’t recognise me when Emily introduced us. I wasn’t offended. I didn’t want to make you feel embarrassed about it.’

  ‘I wouldn’t have felt embarrassed. I think I— I remember that! Was that you?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Well, that’s weird. What were you doing there?’

  ‘Reading.’

  The crease in the middle of his forehead deepened. ‘Whether you were there or not, it doesn’t change what you did. I want to know why you’ve implied to Emily that I’m having an affair.’

  ‘I didn’t do that.’

  ‘It sounds to me like that is exactly what you did.’

  ‘I didn’t think you were having an affair. Are you having an affair?’

  ‘No, I’m not, and that’s none of your business.’

  ‘Great, then why don’t you apologise to me, and stop being so paranoid?’

  He spluttered. ‘Apologise to you? You’ve arrived in my life from nowhere, Paul, looking on at me in bars, coming round for lunch—’

  ‘You invited me for lunch…’

  ‘—and taking my fiancée away for a weekend and installing her in a house after suggesting to her that I’m having an affair! A house she has not returned from. And not only that but you’re pursuing my daughter!’

  During this speech I had been watching a woman approach us, a journalist who was often in the shop.

  ‘We’re about to be interrupted,’ I said.

  ‘What?’

  ‘Jenny. That one, there.’

  ‘Oh, yes. She seems familiar. Can you get rid of her?’

  ‘I can try.’

  ‘Paul!’ she said, and I stood to kiss her hello.

  ‘This is—’

  ‘I know exactly who this is, that’s why I ran over. Andrew Lancaster, so nice to see you again! How do you two know each other?’

  ‘Oh, hello. Yes, you’re familiar. How do I know Paul? Paul here is sleeping with my daughter,’ said Andrew.

  Jenny laughed and patted me on the arm. Andrew stayed sitting down. ‘He’s such a joker. Are you, Paul?’

  ‘He hasn’t said as much,’ continued Andrew, ‘but my daughter has written a column about it, so we can all enjoy the details. You’ve probably read it. Perhaps you’ve even slept with Paul too, Jenny?’

  ‘No! What a question. We haven’t, have we, Paul?’

  ‘It probably wouldn’t be very memorable,’ said Andrew.

  ‘Andrew’s a terrific lover,’ I said. ‘He first made love in the 1960s and has been practising ever since.’

  ‘Oh, fuck off, Paul.’

  ‘This is where I work. You fuck off.’

  ‘Well, I — nice seeing you both,’ said Jenny, backing away.

  ‘Sorry, Jenny. I’m afraid this is a bad time,’ he said. ‘We were just about to have an argument.’

  ‘That’s quite OK,’ she said, and left, looking over her shoulder to see if we’d come to blows yet. I sat back down and we were quiet until she had disappeared around the corner.

  ‘It was the 1970s,’ he said. ‘What is happening with you and Sophie?’

  ‘I don’t know. I like her. She seems to like me. Ask her.’

  ‘I will. Are you sure about that?’

  I stood up. ‘Why shouldn’t she like me?’

  ‘Oh, of course she likes you: she likes everyone who annoys me. Calm down. Drink your fucking beer.’

  I sat back down again.

  ‘Sorry to ask you this, Paul,’ he said, ‘but I’m going to. Is it Sophie or Emily you want?’

  ‘I didn’t know I was being offered the choice.’

  ‘You are not being offered the fucking choice,’ he said, standing up himself now.

  ‘Calm down. Drink your fucking beer.’

  He sat down and laughed without humour.

  ‘You should be more gracious,’ I said.

  ‘I should be more gracious?’

  ‘Why are you so convinced I’m out to steal something from you? For a lucky generation you’re not very gracious. Look: they’ve got nothing, they must be desperate for what we have, let’s protect ourselves from them. Let’s sneer at their achievements.’

  ‘Your achievements.’ He laughed. ‘Well, I certainly know how you feel now. I suppose you’d have it that everything I’ve achieved is just down to luck.’

  ‘Sophie wouldn’t say it was luck. She’d say it was the deliberate perpetuation of advantage. Exploitation.’

  ‘Sophie is twenty-five years old.’

  ‘Don’t you think that might give her more insight than you into what it’s like to be young?’

  ‘Oh, it must be so boring to see the world in your terms. Everything a matter of power and justice and unfairness. Privileged vision. No agency. I know it’s circumstances that have done this to you, but it doesn’t make you any more attractive. At least Emily resists this carping on.’

  ‘Do you mind if I don’t state the obvious riposte to that?’ My drink was nearly finished now. I was glad about that.

  ‘You and Sophie are adults,’ he said. ‘Even if you don’t act like it. I wouldn’t mind what you got up to if I didn’t suspect you were gunning for me and Emily.’

  ‘Oh, come on. That’s Sophie, not me.’

  ‘I understand how Sophie feels about Emily. It’s your position I’m unsure of. What did you say? We’ve got everything and you’ve got nothing. Sophie’s not a thing, you know? She’s not my possession. You don’t win something back by having her.’

  ‘Seriously, fuck off.’

  He sighed loudly and swept his hair back. ‘If I’ve misjudged things I apologise, Paul, but I can’t be a good father and not try to satisfy myself of your motives with Sophie.’

  ‘I like Sophie a lot more than other people seem to. I’ve really missed her while she’s been away.’

  He put his empty pint glass down and sighed. ‘Perhaps I’m g
oing mad. OK. Let’s stop. Let’s say no more.’

  ‘Do you want another?’ I asked.

  ‘I’m all right.’

  ‘I hope Emily comes back soon,’ I said.

  ‘Actually, she’s back tomorrow.’

  ‘Tomorrow? Oh, great. She hadn’t let me know.’

  ‘Good. I mean, it’s good she’s coming back. Coming home. I hope you enjoy your reunion with Sophie too. I think. And Paul – the warning goes both ways with her. You might not want to get too attached to her for your own sake.’

  I wanted to ask what he meant, but I suspected I knew. Certain relationships take place over borders too bothersome to keep climbing over. He hadn’t considered that the age difference might be such a border for him and Emily, or perhaps that’s exactly what he was considering and why he was talking this way to me.

  ‘Thanks for your concern,’ I said.

  When we said goodbye we shook hands, and I held on, feeling how warm and strong his grip was, for now.

  ‌

  ‌Sixteen

  Towards the end of the session you ask me if I realise I only ever talk about Andrew with a tone of moral disapproval.

  ‘Do I?’

  Even though the rest of the time I pride myself on not adopting ‘conventional morality’.

  ‘I don’t mind conventional morals at all, if they’ve been given thought. I don’t see what that’s got to do with it.’

  But monogamy isn’t important to me, is it?

  ‘It should be for him. I don’t know how he has the energy at his age. He’ll give himself a heart attack.’

  Which is a neat way of avoiding making explicit your judgement.

  ‘What judgement?’

  What judgement could I make of him? Of this type of behaviour?

  ‘… That he treats Emily badly. That he treats Chloe badly. That conducting non-monogamous relationships is harmful, is that what you’re driving at? That there’s something compulsive and cruel about it?’

  That’s what I seem to think.

  ‘Fine. If you insist. Monogamy is the best system we have to avoid hurting people, to avoid chaos. We should all get married as soon as possible.’

  *

  Sophie and I were texting. She was still on holiday.

  You’re not bothered about monogamy, are you? she wrote.

  Not really. I don’t need to own the person I’m with.

  I didn’t think so.

  Why?

  I’ve just been thinking about polyamory. I think I’m a polyamorist.

  Right.

  And you are too?

  I wouldn’t put it on my CV. It’s a sexual perversion to commit secretly, not a philosophy we should proudly brag about.

  You are so old. It is not a perversion!

  I don’t mean that’s a bad thing. Nothing wrong with perversion, not in private. Or in clubs for those with niche interests.

  I think it’s something we should be honest about. State it proudly. Desire can be an emancipatory force.

  So who else do you want to fuck?

  The texts had been arriving quickly but the reply to this one took longer to come through.

  Er, the thing is, I slept with an old friend last night.

  I took some time to think about this and her texts carried on.

  Antonio. Please don’t mind. It didn’t mean anything. We were all quite high.

  I thought for a while, about Antonio, and the sitcom he was writing, and his pleasant good manners, his fastidiously clean white trainers, his baby-smooth cheeks, and his earnest penis which he probably popped in a glass of disinfectant when he went to bed at night, and I wrote back, That’s OK. Don’t worry.

  You’re so enlightened.

  You’re so slutty.

  I don’t use that word even ironically.

  I haven’t ever used it negatively.

  That’s irlvnt.

  I’m sorry.

  That’s OK.

  I’m not sorry.

  That’s OK too. Given the circumstances. Would you mind if I did it again?

  She was good at talking dirty.

  I had no idea what she was doing with me.

  I suspected I had some idea of what she was doing with me.

  But even relationships sparked by malice and anger develop a tenderness to them.

  Just please tell me it was only once when you get back.

  *

  Amy hadn’t sounded so approving of me for a long time when I told her I had been offered the job at the publishing house. She came over one Sunday after running her stall on Brick Lane.

  ‘That must have been tiring,’ I said.

  She was visibly pregnant now, with a neat little bump showing though her jumper above her denim skirt.

  ‘Nah, I just sit down when I need to,’ she said. ‘And people seem to buy more from me. It’s like I’ve achieved charitable status.’

  We were sitting in the kitchen, drinking tea. She looked around her and I saw the wonky cupboard doors and old cooker through her eyes.

  ‘It’s a good cooker, that,’ I said. ‘Much more useful than the modern style. See the grill pan at the top, separate from the oven? That’s incredibly useful.’

  ‘I believe you.’

  ‘Because if you’re grilling something in the oven, the fat goes everywhere and you have to clean your oven every—’

  ‘I believe you! Though I don’t believe that oven has ever been cleaned.’

  I did not confirm or deny this.

  ‘I can’t believe you’re actually going to leave this place,’ she said.

  ‘Nor me.’

  ‘It will be good for you.’

  ‘In what way? I will lose all my freedom and have to spend every hour working to pay the rent or the mortgage.’

  ‘Mortgage. We can do this.’

  There had been movements with Mum’s house. Since the price had dropped more people had come to see it and one couple seemed keen. ‘They liked Mum’s sense of style,’ Amy told me. ‘Emily’s been helpful. She kept the place tidy and let people in.’

  ‘Emily’s great,’ I said.

  ‘Are you…?’

  ‘What?’

  ‘You have a look in your eye.’

  ‘Emily is lovely. Emily is getting married to a man who owns a flat worth close to two million pounds.’

  ‘How do you know how much it costs?’

  ‘I’ve looked it up.’

  ‘I thought you hated property websites.’

  ‘I despise them.’

  ‘Yeah, well. You can soon have your own two-bedroom bachelor pad to woo her with, if you pay attention to them for a little bit.’

  ‘It’s not exactly going to be a babe magnet. This place you’re on about is in the middle of nowhere.’

  ‘It has great transport links.’

  ‘It does not.’

  ‘You can be in the centre in half an hour.’

  ‘Thirty-four minutes. One distant corner of the centre. After a quarter of an hour’s walk to the train station. It would take forever to get here.’

  ‘What’s so good about here?’

  ‘Oh, nothing, I suppose. It’s just home, that’s all.’

  ‘You need to stop being so sentimental. You need to be realistic.’

  ‘I know.’

  ‘How was your trip home?’ she asked, in a softer tone.

  ‘Chaos. It won’t even be home after we’ve sold the place, you realise? The house or the town. We’ll lose them both at the same time.’

  She slapped her hand on the table. Of course she had realised. She’d been trying to get me to realise that ever since Mum died. ‘We need to make our own homes now. This’ – she looked around her, at the torn lino, the chipped paint and yellowing walls – ‘is not it.’

  My phone began to ring before I could disagree. Sophie. She was walking past. She was going to pop in.

  ‘Sophie’s going to nip over,’ I said.

  ‘Sophie? You’re still knocking around w
ith her, that one who wrote the column about you?’

  ‘About slumming it with a decrepit hipster, yeah.’

  ‘She’s not home, either.’

  ‘No, she’s round the corner.’

  ‘You know what I mean.’

  ‘Give her a chance. I like her. What about you? Your man in Bristol? The yoga guy.’

  ‘Acupuncturist.’

  ‘That’s what I meant. What are you going to do about him?’

  ‘They’re not nearly the same thing. But that’s my news. I’ve told him. Ben, his name is. I’ve told Ben.’

  ‘Wow. What did Ben say?’

  ‘He said, like I suppose was reasonable, “Are you sure it’s mine?” though I flew off the handle a bit at the time.’

  ‘Well. He might have responded more sensitively.’

  ‘He might have. Anyway, the violence of my reaction seemed to convince him that it probably was his.’

  ‘Right. And what did the rage therapist say when you told her that?’

  ‘She said, “Men.”’

  ‘And the man? What does he think?’

  ‘He says he wants to be involved.’

  ‘Great.’

  ‘He seemed almost pleased after he got over the shock. He’s going to come to the next scan, the twenty-week one.’

  ‘Right.’

  ‘Which is weird, right?’

  ‘It doesn’t have to be. Perhaps he likes you.’

  ‘I barely know him at all.’

  ‘And now you’re, er…’

  ‘Stuck with him, yeah. Well, I’m not, as much as my baby is.’

  ‘But you liked him when you met him, presumably.’

  ‘I did. Anyway. He’s coming over in a couple of weeks to help get the new flat ready for the baby. Do you want to come and meet him, and make sure he doesn’t murder us both?’

  ‘Yes, of course,’ I said, and then there was a knock on the door. I went to let Sophie in.

  ‘Sophie, my sister Amy. You met each other briefly at Emily’s launch.’

  They smiled at each other and Sophie looked down at Amy’s bump. ‘Wow,’ she said. ‘Wow.’

  Amy smiled again. ‘I was just about to leave.’

  ‘Congratulations.’

  ‘Thanks.’

  But on the way out Amy took some time running over the plan again for buying a place, to make sure I understood, and was convinced, and knew what I would need to do – and Sophie, who had sat down on the kitchen counter, grew restless while she did.