Black Swan Green

by David Mitchell

  ‘Taylor!’ He’d caught me avoiding his eye.

  ‘Yes, sir?’

  ‘In need of a little focusing, hmm? If a is eleven and b is nine and x is the product of a times b, what is the value of x?’

  The answer’s a piece of piss, it’s ninety-nine.

  But ‘ninety-nine’ is a double-N word. A double-stammer. Hangman wanted revenge for my stay of execution. He’d slid his fingers into my tongue and was clasping my throat and pinching the veins that take oxygen to my brain. When Hangman’s like that I’d look a total flid if I tried to spit the word out. ‘A hundred and one, sir?’

  The brighter kids in the class groaned.

  Gary Drake did this loud croak. ‘The boy’s a genius!’

  Mr Inkberrow takes off his glasses, huffs them and polishes them with the fat end of his tie. ‘Nine times eleven equals “a hundred and one”, you say, hmm? Let me ask you a follow-up question, Taylor. Why do we bother getting up in the morning? Can you tell me that, hmm? Why oh why oh why do we flipping bother?’

  Relatives

  ‘They’re here!’ I yelled, as Uncle Brian’s white Ford Granada Ghia cruised up Kingfisher Meadows. Julia’s door closed as if to say, Big deal, but a volley of getting-ready noises banged downstairs. I’d already taken down my map of Middle Earth and hidden away my globe and anything else Hugo might think babyish, so I just stayed sat on my window sill. Last night’s gale’d sounded like King Kong trying to yank our roof off and was only just dying down. Across the road, Mr Woolmere was hauling off bits of his blown-down fence. Uncle Brian turned into our drive and the Granada came to a rest alongside Mum’s Datsun Cherry. First out was Aunt Alice, Mum’s sister. Then my three Lamb cousins piled out of the back. First came Alex in a THE SCORPIONS LIVE IN 1981 T-shirt and a Björn Borg headband. Alex is seventeen but he’s got bubonic zits and his body’s three sizes too large for him. Next was Nigel the Squirt, the youngest, busy solving a Rubik’s cube at high speed. Last came Hugo.

  Hugo fits his body like a glove. He’s two years older than me. ‘Hugo’ would be a cursed name for most kids but on Hugo it’s a halo. (Plus, the Lambs go to an independent school in Richmond where you get picked on not if you’re posh but if you’re not posh enough.) Hugo wore a black zip-up top with no hood and no logo, button-fly Levi jeans, pixie boots and one of those woven wristbands you wear to prove you’re not a virgin. Luck loves Hugo. When Alex, Nigel and me are still swapping Euston Road for Old Kent Road plus £300 and praying to scoop the kitty from Free Parking, Hugo’s already got hotels on Mayfair and Park Lane.

  ‘You made it!’ Mum crossed the driveway and hugged Aunt Alice.

  I opened the window a crack to hear better.

  Meanwhile Dad’d come round from the greenhouse all togged out in his gardening gear. ‘Blustery weather you’ve brought us, Brian!’

  Uncle Brian’d hauled himself out of his car and did a jokey step-back-in-amazement when he saw Dad. ‘Well, catch a load of the intrepid horticulturist!’

  Dad wagged his trowel. ‘This blooming wind’s flattened my daffodils! We have “our man” do the lion’s share in the garden, but he can’t come until Tuesday, and as the old Chinese proverb—’

  ‘Mr Broadwas is one of those priceless village characters,’ said Mum, ‘who’s worth twice what we pay him because he has to undo all the damage Michael wreaks.’

  ‘—as the ancient Chinese proverb goes, “Wise Man Say, to Be Happy for Week, Mally Wife. To Be Happy for Month, Sraughter Pig. To Be Happy for Rifetime, Prant Garden”. Rather amusing, eh?’

  Uncle Brian pretended to find it rather amusing.

  ‘When Michael heard his ancient Chinese proverb on Gardeners’ Question Time the other day,’ Mum remarked, ‘the pig came before the wife. But look at you three boys! You’ve shot up again! Whatever are you putting on their corn flakes, Alice? Whatever it is, I should put some on Jason’s.’

  That was a kick in the ribs.

  ‘Well,’ Dad said, ‘let’s all get inside before we get blown away.’

  Hugo received my telepathic signal and looked up at me.

  I half waved.

  The drinks cabinet is only opened when visitors and relatives come. It smells of varnish and sherry vapours. (Once, when everyone was out, I tried some sherry. Syrupy Domestos, it tastes of.) Mum had me haul a dining-room chair into the living room ’cause there weren’t enough. These chairs weigh a ton and it banged my shin something chronic but I acted like it was no sweat. Nigel flumped on the bean-bag and Alex got one of the armchairs. Alex tapped out a drumbeat on the arm-rest. Hugo just sat on the rug, cross-legged, saying, ‘I’m fine here, Aunt Helena, thanks,’ when Mum told me off for not bringing enough chairs. Julia still hadn’t appeared. ‘I’ll be down in a minute!’ she’d hollered, twenty hours ago.

  As usual, Dad and Uncle Brian kicked off with an argument about the route from Richmond to Worcestershire. (Each was wearing the golf jersey the other’d given him for Christmas.) Dad thought the A40 would’ve clipped twenty minutes off the A419 route. Uncle Brian disagreed. Then Uncle Brian said when they left later today he planned to drive to Bath via Cirencester and the A417 and Dad’s face lit up with horror. ‘The A417? Crossing the Cotswolds on a bank holiday? Brian, it’ll be living hell!’

  Mum said, ‘I’m sure Brian knows what he’s doing, Michael.’

  ‘The A417? Purgatory!’ Dad was already leafing through his AA Book of British Towns and Uncle Brian’d sent Mum a look that said, If it makes the old boy happy, let him. (That look got on my wick.) ‘We have these innovations in this country, Brian, commonly known as “motorways”…here, you need the M5 down to Junction Fifteen…’ Dad stabbed the map. ‘Here! Then just head east. No need to get bogged down in Bristol. M4 to Junction Eighteen, then the A46 to Bath. Bob’s your uncle.’

  ‘Last time we went to see Don and Drucilla,’ Uncle Brian didn’t look at the AA Book of British Towns, ‘we did that. Took the M4 north of Bristol. Guess what. Stuck, bumper to bumper, for two hours! Weren’t we, Alice?’

  ‘It certainly was quite a long time.’

  ‘Two hours, Alice.’

  ‘But,’ Dad countered, ‘that was because you got caught in a contra-flow when the new lane was being built. You’ll zip along the M4 today. Clean as a whistle. Guarantee it.’

  ‘Thank you, Michael,’ Uncle Brian said mewily, ‘but I’m not really a great “fan” of motorway driving.’

  ‘Well, Brian,’ Dad clomped shut his AA Book of British Towns, ‘if you’re a “fan” of crawling along at thirty in a convoy of geriatric caravanners, the A417 to Cirencester is the route for you.’

  ‘Come and give us a hand, please, Jason.’

  ‘Give us a hand’ meant ‘get everything’. Mum was showing Aunt Alice her recently souped-up kitchen. Meaty smells leaked out of the oven. Aunt Alice stroked the new tiles, saying ‘exquisite!’ while Mum poured three glasses of Coke for Alex, Nigel and me. Hugo’d asked for a glass of cold water. Then I poured a bag of Twiglets into a dish. (Twiglets’re snacks that adults think kids like but they taste of burnt matches dipped in Marmite.) Then I put everything on a tray in the hatch, go round and carry it to the coffee table. Dead unfair I had to do everything. If it’d been me and not Julia who was still in my room, they’d’ve sent in a SWAT squad by now.

  ‘The memsahibs have got you well trained, I see,’ said Uncle Brian. I pretended to know what a memsahib was.

  ‘Brian?’ Dad waved the decanter at him. ‘Drop more sherry?’

  ‘Why the heck not, Michael? Why the heck not?’

  Alex grunted as I gave him his Coke. He scooped up a fistful of Twiglets.

  Nigel did this perky ‘Thanks very much!’ and grabbed the Twiglets too.

  Hugo said, ‘Cheers, Jace’ for the water and ‘No thanks’ to the Twiglets.

  Uncle Brian and Dad’d left Driving and moved on to the Recession.

  ‘No, Michael,’ Uncle Brian said, ‘you’re mistaken, for once in your life. The accountancy
game’s more or less immune to economic doldrums.’

  ‘But you can’t tell me your client base isn’t feeling the pinch?’

  ‘The “pinch”? Blimey O’Riley, Michael, they’re taking it in the teeth! Bankruptcies and foreclosures, morning, noon and night! We’re rushed off our bloody feet, pardon my French. Swamped! Tell you, I’m grateful to that woman in Downing Street for this financial – what’s that latest fad? – anorexia. Us number-crunchers are making a killing! And as partners’ bonuses are profit related, yours truly is sitting rather pretty.’

  ‘Bankrupts,’ Dad prodded, ‘are hardly repeat customers.’

  ‘But with a never-ending supply,’ Uncle Brian glugged his sherry, ‘who gives a tinker’s cuss? No, no, it’s you shop folk that my heart goes out to. This recession’ll bleed the high street dry before it’s finished. Quote me on that.’

  I think not, said Dad’s wagging finger ‘The hallmark of switched-on management is success in the lean years, not the years of plenty. Unemployment may be up to three million, but Greenland took on ten management trainees this quarter. Customers want quality food at bulk prices.’

  ‘Relax, Michael,’ Uncle Brian did a jokey surrender, ‘you’re not at a seaside sales conference now. But I think you’ve got your head in the sand. Even Tories are talking about “tightening belts”…Unions dead on their feet, not that that’s a bad thing in my book. But we’ve got British Leyland haemorrhaging jobs…the docks dwindling away…British Steel imploding…Everyone ordering ships from South bloody Korea, wherever that is, instead of the Tyne and the Clyde…Comrade Scargill threatening revolution…it’s difficult to see how it can’t have a knock-on effect on frozen crispy pancakes and fish fingers, in the long run. Alice and I do worry, you know.’

  ‘Well,’ Dad leant back, ‘it’s very good of you and Alice to worry, Brian, but the retailing sector is holding its own and Greenland is robust.’

  ‘Very glad to hear it, Michael. Very glad indeed.’

  (So was I. Gavin Coley’s dad was laid off by Metalbox in Tewkesbury. His birthday at Alton Towers was cancelled, Gavin Coley’s eyes sunk into his skull a few millimetres and a year later his parents got divorced. Kelly Moran told me his dad’s still on the dole.)

  Hugo wore a thin leather cord around his neck. I wanted one.

  When the Lambs visit, salt and pepper magically turn into ‘the condiments’. Dinner was prawn cocktails in wine glasses for starters, lamb chops with chef’s hats with Duchesse potatoes and braised celery for main, and a Baked Alaska for ‘dessert’, not ‘afters’. We use the mother-of-pearl napkin rings. (Dad’s dad brought them back from Burma on the same voyage he got the Omega Seamaster I smashed in January.) Before starting the starters, Uncle Brian opened the wine he’d brought. Julia and Alex got a whole glass, Hugo and me just half, ‘and a whistle-wetter for you, Nigel.’

  Aunt Alice did her usual toast, ‘To the Taylor and Lamb dynasties!’

  Uncle Brian did his usual ‘Here’s looking at you, kid!’

  Dad pretended to find that rather amusing.

  We all clinked glasses (except Alex) and took a sip.

  Dad is guaranteed to hold his wineglass up to the light and say, ‘Very easy to drink!’ He didn’t let us down today. Mum shot him a look, but Dad never notices. ‘I’ll say this much for you, Brian. You can’t half choose a decent plonk.’

  ‘Fabulous to earn your stamp of approval, Michael. Treated myself to a crate of the stuff. Comes from a vineyard near that charming cottage we rented in the lakes last year.’

  ‘Wine? The Lake District? Cumbria? Oh, I think you’ll find you’re mistaken there, Brian.’

  ‘No, no, Michael, not the English lakes, the Italian lakes. Lombardy.’ Uncle Brian whirlpooled his wine round his glass, snuftered it and glugged it back. ‘Nineteen seventy-three. Blackberryesque, melony, oaky. I concur with your expert judgement, though, Michael. Not a bad little vintage.’

  ‘Well,’ said Mum, ‘dig in, everyone!’

  After the first round of ‘delicious!’es Aunt Alice said, ‘It’s been all go at school this term, hasn’t it, boys? Nigel’s the captain of the chess club.’

  ‘President,’ said Nigel, ‘actually.’

  ‘Beg pudding! Nigel’s the president of the chess club. And Alex is doing incredible things with the school computer, aren’t you, Alex? I can’t even set the video recordery doo-dah, but—’

  ‘Alex’s streets ahead of his teachers,’ said Uncle Brian, ‘truth be told. What is it you’re doing with it, Alex?’

  ‘FORTRAN. BASIC.’ Alex spoke like it hurt him. ‘PASCAL. Z-80 Code.’

  ‘You must be ever so intelligent,’ said Julia, so brightly I couldn’t tell if she’d said it sarkily or not.

  ‘Oh, you bet Alex is intelligent,’ said Hugo. ‘The brain of Alexander Lamb is the final frontier of British science.’

  Alex glared at his brother.

  ‘There’s a real future in computering.’ Dad loaded his spoon with prawns. ‘Technology, design, electric cars. That’s what schools should be teaching. Not all this “wandered lonely as a cloud” guff. Like I was telling Craig Salt – he’s our MD at Greenland – just the other—’

  ‘Couldn’t agree with you more, Michael,’ Uncle Brian made a face like an evil mastermind announcing his plan for world domination, ‘which is why Alex is getting a hot-off-the-press twenty-pound note for every grade A this year, and a ten-pound note for every B – to buy his very own IBM.’ (My jealousy throbbed like toothache. Dad says paying your kids to study is ‘derelict’.) ‘Nothing beats the profit motive, right?’

  Mum stepped in. ‘And how about you, Hugo?’

  At last I could study Hugo without pretending not to.

  ‘Mainly,’ Hugo took a sip of water, ‘I’ve had some lucky races in the canoeing team, Aunt Helena.’

  ‘Hugo,’ Uncle Brian burped, ‘has showered himself in glory! By rights he should be the head honcho oarsman chappie, but some stuffed fat-arsed governor – oops, pardon my French – who owns half of Lloyd’s Insurance threatened to kick up a stink if his own Little Lord Herbert Bonks wasn’t appointed. What’s that child’s name again, Hugo?’

  ‘You might mean Dominic Fitzsimmons, Dad.’

  ‘“Dominic Fitzsimmons”! Couldn’t make it up, could you?’

  I prayed the spotlight’d swivel its gaze towards Julia. I prayed Mum wouldn’t mention the poetry prize, not in front of Hugo.

  ‘Jason won the Hereford and Worcester County Libraries Poetry Prize,’ said Mum. ‘Didn’t you, Jason?’

  ‘I had to write it.’ Shame boiled my earlobes and there was nowhere to look but at my food. ‘In English. I didn’t’ (I tested the word know a couple of times but saw I was going to stammer spastically on it) ‘I didn’t realize Miss Lippetts was even going to enter it.’

  ‘Don’t hide your light under a bushel!’ cried Aunt Alice.

  ‘Jason won a splendid dictionary,’ said Mum, ‘didn’t you, Jason?’

  Alex the Git fired his sarcasm below adult radar. ‘I’d really like to hear your poem, Jason.’

  ‘Can’t. Don’t have my exercise book.’

  ‘What a pity.’

  ‘The Malvern Gazetteer printed the winning entries,’ said Mum. ‘Alongside Jason’s mug-shot, in fact! We can dig it out after dinner.’

  (Even the memory was a torture. They sent a photographer to school and made me pose in the library reading a book like a complete gaylord.)

  ‘Poets,’ Uncle Brian smacked his lips, ‘so I’ve heard tell, catch naughty diseases from Parisian ladies of ill repute and die in draughty gavottes by the Seine. Quite a career plan, eh, Mike?’

  ‘Wonderful prawns, Helena,’ Aunt Alice said.

  Dad said, ‘Frozen, from Greenland in Worcester.’

  ‘Fresh, Michael. From the fishmonger’s.’

  ‘Oh. Didn’t know there were still any fishmongers left.’

  Alex dug up the poetry prize again. ‘At least tell us what your poem
was about, Jason. The blossoms of spring? Or was it a love poem?’

  ‘Can’t see you getting much out of it, Alex,’ said Julia. ‘Jason’s work lacks the subtlety and maturity of The Scorpions.’

  Hugo spluttered, to niggle Alex. And to tell me whose side he was on. I could’ve kissed Julia out of sheer gratitude. Almost.

  ‘Wasn’t that funny,’ Alex muttered at Hugo.

  ‘Don’t sulk, Alex. It ruins your good looks.’

  ‘Boys,’ warned Aunt Alice.

  The posh gravy boat was passed around the table. Between my creamed potatoes and my miniature Yorkshire puds I created a Mediterranean of gravy. Gibraltar was the tip of a carrot. ‘Dig in!’ said Mum.

  Aunt Alice was the first to say, ‘Divine chops, Helena.’

  Uncle Brian did a crap Italian accent. ‘Dey melt-a in da mouth!’

  Nigel grinned adoringly at his dad.

  ‘The secret’s in the marinade,’ Mum said to Aunt Alice. ‘I’ll let you have the recipe afterwards.’

  ‘Oh, but Helena, I’m not leaving without it!’

  ‘A smidgen more wine, Michael?’ Uncle Brian topped up Dad’s glass (from the second bottle) before Dad could answer, then his own. ‘Don’t mind if I do, Michael, thanks. Here’s looking at you, kid! So Helena, I see your mobile pagoda hasn’t gone up to the great Oriental junkyard in the sky yet?’

  Mum put on her polite puzzled face.

  ‘Your Datsun, Helena! If you weren’t such a wonderful cook it’d be difficult to forgive you for breaking the First Law of Automobiles. Don’t trust a Jap or the tat he churns out. The Germans’ve got the right idea for once. Seen the new Volkswagen adverts? There’s this pint-sized Nip, running round trying to find the new VW Golf, then it drops from the ceiling and flattens him! Wet myself first time I saw it, didn’t I, Alice?’