by Iain Banks
A copy of that day's Sun newspaper tried to wrap itself round Graham's feet, caught in a sudden dusty gust of wind. He stepped out of it and let it flatten against some roadside railings. He smiled, recalling Slater's apoplectic reaction to Sun readers. The best time, Graham thought, was when - only a few weeks ago - they had been sitting in Hyde Park. Slater had decided that as they were all going to be around during the summer anyway, they should arrange days out, and had therefore organised a Saturday afternoon picnic, having made up his mind on the Friday that the following day would be hot and sunny, which it was.
Slater had invited Graham, Sara, and a young man Graham assumed was Slater's latest conquest, a short, muscled ex-soldier called Ed. Ed had short fair hair and wore cut-off jeans as shorts, and a green Army T-shirt. He sat on the grass slowly reading a Stephen King novel.
They had talked, at Slater's instigation, about what they would do if they won a million pounds. Sara refused to play; ask her if she ever did win, she said. Ed thought carefully, and said he'd buy a big car, and a pub somewhere in the country. Slater didn't know what else he'd do, but he'd had this great idea for using at least some of the money; go to the American South, hire a crop-dusting plane and a willing pilot, fill the tanks with a mixture of chilli sauce and indelible black ink, then fly over the biggest Ku Klux Klan march of the year. That would make their eyes water; paint the mothers! Yippee!
Graham said he would use the money to create an ultimate work of art... it would be a map of London, with every single street and house shown, and on it would be traced - in black ink, funnily enough - the path, the route that each individual person in London took that day, whether by train, tube, bus, car, helicopter, plane, wheelchair, boat, or on foot.
Sara laughed, but not unkindly. Ed thought it would be difficult to arrange. Slater pronounced the idea boring, and said that it would be boring even if the map was coloured and/or you used different-coloured inks for the trails, and anyway, his was a much better idea all round. Graham thought Slater sounded a bit drunk, and didn't reply-he just sat with a knowing smile on his face, and grinned briefly at Sara, who smiled back.
She wore a light summer dress with a high, elegant neck, and a big white hat. She had on white shoes with round toes and rather old-fashionedly large clumpy heels, and silk or silk-look stockings, or tights, which Graham thought were unnecessary on such a warm day. She leant against a tree, looking beautiful. When she put her head back, and put her arm behind her neck, he kept glancing, quickly, ashamed, at the dark length of curled hair in the exposed armpit.
Slater, in white trousers and striped blazer, complete with battered boater (real straw, Graham noticed), sat cross-legged on the grass holding a plastic cup full of champagne (he'd told Graham and Sara each to bring some food: he'd bring a Magnum).
From money, they had gone on to politics:
"Edward," Slater said. "You can-not be serious!"
Ed shrugged and lay back in the grass, one arm propping up his cropped head as he read the paperback gripped, spine broken, in his other fist. "I reckon she's done all right," he said. He had a vaguely East London accent. Slater bounced the heel of his free hand off his forehead.
"My God! The stupidity of the English working class never ceases to amaze me! What do those murderous, money-grabbing, self-seeking... bastards have to do to you before you start getting angry? Good grief! What are you waiting for? Repeal of the Factory Safety Act? Compulsory redundancy for all trade unionists? The death penalty for cleaning windows for gain while claiming the dole? I mean, tell me!"
"Don" be daft," Ed shrugged. "It isn" her fault; it's the recession, isn" it? Bleedin" Labour couldn't do no better; just nationalise everything, wouldn" they?"
"Edward," Slater sighed, "I think there's a place on the Editorial Board of The Economist just waiting for you."
"Well, you can come out with all these smart answers," Ed said, still reading, or at least looking at the paperback, "but most people just don" see things the way you do."
"Yes," Slater said, hissing. "Well, there's an open sewer at the bottom of Chancery Lane you can blame for that."
Ed looked puzzled. He looked round at Slater. "What's that, then?"
"Oh, good grief," Slater said. He collapsed back in the grass melodramatically, but left his hand holding the champagne sticking up. "Bingo!" he gasped.
The general election was in a few days. Slater couldn't believe that people really were going to vote the Conservatives back in. Graham wasn't so sure it was such a bad thing, but he kept this private; Slater would have exploded. Graham agreed slightly with Ed; he didn't think anybody could do very much about the economic situation of the country. Certainly he thought the Tories spent too much on arms, especially nuclear weapons, and maybe they should spend more on things like the Health Service, but he admired Mrs Thatcher a little, and she had had a famous victory in the Falklands. He knew it was all rubbish, but he had felt a sort of grudging pride when the Army marched into Port Stanley. Ed didn't seem bothered about letting Slater know what he thought; Graham wasn't sure whether to admire him or feel sorry for him.
He felt somewhat put out when he realised that Ed probably wouldn't care what he thought.
Ed stood up. "Well, I think I'll go an" hire a boat. You want to come?" he looked at Slater, then Graham, then Sara, who shook her head. Slater lay on the grass while Graham looked at him.
"There's a terribly long queue," Slater said. They had already discussed hiring a boat.
"If we don" queue we won" get a boat," Ed shrugged. He stuffed the paperback into the rear waist of the denim shorts, against the small of his back. Slater said nothing, stared at the sky. "Well," Ed said, "I can queue anyway. You come down later when I'm nearer gettin" a boat, if you like." He stood there.
"Sometimes," Slater said, addressing the sky, "I think it would be nice if they just got the war over with now. One ten-megaton over Westminster now, and we'd hardly know a thing... just vaporised dust mixed up with the grass and the soil and the water and the clay and the rock..."
"You're a right bleedin" pessimist," Ed said. "You sound like some of them C.N.D.-ers sometimes, you do." He nodded down at Slater, hands on hips.
Slater kept staring at the sky. Then he said, "I do hope you're not now going to tell me once again what a fine bunch of lads you met in the Army."
"Shit." Ed turned away, shaking his head, and started walking off towards the Serpentine and the boat houses. "Well, if you don" want to fuckin" defend yourself..."
Slater lay there for a moment, then jerked upright, spilling a little of his champagne. Ed was about ten yards way. Slater shouted after him, "Well, when it does fall, and you do fry, I just hope you remember what a fucking wonderful idea you thought it was!" Ed didn't react. People in nearby deckchairs and other groups of people also sunning themselves did, though, looking over.
"Sh," Sara said lazily. "You won't do any good shouting at him like that."
"He's an idiot," Slater said, collapsing back on the grass.
"He's entitled to his views," Graham said.
"Oh, don't be stupid, Graham," Slater snapped. "He reads the Sun on the bus every morning going to work."
"So?" Graham said.
"Well, my dear boy," Slater said, talking through rictused lips, "if he spends half an hour each day shovelling shit into his brain, you can't expect his ideas to do anything else but stink, can you?"
"He's still entitled to his views," Graham said, feeling awkward under Sara's gaze, her cool regard. He played with a few blades of grass, twisting them in his fingers. Slater sighed.
"If he had any of his own, I might allow you that, Graham, but the question is: are the proprietors of Fleet Street entitled to Edward's views? No?" He came more upright, leaning on one elbow and looking at Graham. Graham made a face and shrugged.
"You expect too much of people," Sara told Slater. He looked at her through hooded eyes, one eyebrow raised.
"Do I indeed?"
"They're
not all like you. They really don't think the way you do."
"They just don't think, period," Slater snorted. Sara smiled and Graham was glad she was talking; it let him look at her, drink her in, without either of them feeling embarrassed.
"That's just it," Sara smiled. They do, of course they do. But they believe in different things, they have different priorities, and a lot of them wouldn't want some perfect socialist state even if you could bring it about." Slater snorted with derision at this.
"Great, so they're now getting ready to vote themselves five more years of cuts, poverty and exciting new methods of incinerating millions of our fellow human beings. Certainly a long way from your ideal socialist state; what is this, the de Sade school of political sociology?"
"So they get what they deserve," Sara said. "Why do you pretend to care so much more about them than they do themselves?"
"Oh, fuck," Slater said, "I give in." He collapsed back on the grass. Sara looked at Graham, smiled and raised her eyebrows conspiratorially. Graham laughed quietly.
She hurt his eyes. She sat in the shadow of the tree, but the whiteness of her skin, the bright shoes and stockings and dress and the hat all reflected sunlight from the brilliant sky, and he could hardly look at her for the glow which struck his eyes.
He drank his champagne. It was still cool; Slater had brought the bottle inside a cool-bag, and it lay by the tree trunk, in shadow like Sara. Slater had been genuinely offended when Graham, told to bring glasses, turned up with only plastic cups. He thought Graham would understand.
Graham had been a bit worried about Slater meeting Sara; the last time either of them had seen her had been earlier that same week, and he thought Slater might have mentioned it. They had gone together up to Half Moon Crescent, on a day when Sara had suddenly cancelled their afternoon walk along the canal. She'd been abrupt, even distressed over the phone, and he had been worried. He had decided to walk up that way anyway, just to be there, in case there was anything obviously wrong. Slater had been concerned, too, both at Graham's obvious agitation, and at Sara's state as Graham described it. Graham didn't mind his friend coming along: he was glad of the company.
They started out walking, but then on Theobald's Road Slater insisted on getting a bus. Graham pointed out that a 179 only went as far as Kings Cross, which wasn't very far and not even in exactly the right direction. Slater said it was in roughly the right direction, and anyway his new shoes were tight and he didn't want to walk all that way. At King's Cross he got them a taxi. Graham said he couldn't really afford... Slater told him not to worry; he'd pay. It wasn't far.
In the taxi. Slater suddenly remembered something; he had a present for Graham. He dug into his jacket pocket. "Here," he said, and handed Graham something hard wrapped in tissue paper. Graham unwrapped it as the cab went up Pentonville Road. It was a small glazed china figurine of a woman, naked, with large breasts and her knees bent, feet under her buttocks, legs spread out. Her tiny face was set in an expression of ecstasy, her shoulders were thrown back as though she was forcing her conical breasts higher, and her hands were down at her hips, open and delicate, each finger carefully moulded. Her genitals, in the quick glance Graham gave them, seemed rather exaggerated.
"Is this supposed to be some sort of joke?" he said to Slater.
Slater took the figurine back with a grin and produced a pencil from his inside pocket, "No," he said, "it's a pencil sharpener; look," and he inserted the pencil between the model's legs.
Graham looked away, shaking his head. "It is just a little bit tasteless."
"I have more taste than anchovies in garlic butter, you young pup," Slater said. "I was just trying to cheer you up."
"Oh," Graham said, as the taxi turned left. "Thanks."
"Huh," said Slater, sitting forward in his seat to make sure the taxi driver went the right way as they approached Half Moon Crescent. "I spent several days making that for you."
"I said thanks," Graham said, then, "Oh, tell him to stop here; don't want to get too close." He checked the street to make sure Sara wasn't around; they were still in Penton Street, but you never knew.
The taxi stopped. "Let's have a drink," Slater said.
"I'll tell you one thing," said Graham, as Slater led him across the street into a pub called the White Conduit.
"What?"
"You forgot about how to get the shavings out." Graham held the china figure up in front of Slater's face. Slater frowned, looked at the over scale-sized orifice. His lips tightened.
"It's your round; I'll have a pint of lager," he said, and went to sit at a window seat looking down the short stretch of Maygood Street to Half Moon Crescent.
They heard Stock's bike ten minutes later. They both stood up and looked over the top of the window curtains, which hung from a brass rail halfway up the window. A large black BMW bike turned down Maygood Street. The person riding it wore black leathers and a black, full face helmet with a heavily tinted visor. "Yup," Slater said, "that's our man,"
Graham caught a glimpse of the bike's number: STK 228T. It was the first time he had seen the bike since that night in January when he first met Sara, when they had arrived here in the taxi. He hadn't thought to look at the bike properly then, and had always avoided coming up this way when he knew Stock was about. The rider straddling the machine got off it, took its key out and went - not entirely steady on his feet, Graham thought - to the door of Sara's flat, and put a key into the lock. Seconds later he was gone.
"Did you think he looked six foot?" Graham said, looking at Slater as they sat down. Slater nodded, took a drink.
"Easily. Looked a bit tipsy, I thought. What a hunk, though, eh?" He waggled his eyebrows up and down theatrically. Graham let his shoulders slump, and looked away.
"Do you mind?" he said. Slater nudged him.
"Don't take it so hard, kid. I'm absolutely certain it'll all work out. Believe me,"
"Are you really?" Graham said, turning to his friend.
Slater looked into Graham's face for a few seconds, watching him bite his lower lip, then his own lower lip trembled and finally a smile burst out over Slater's face as he turned away, shaking his head, sniggering.
"Well, to be honest, no, but I was trying to be encouraging. Good grief, how on earth should I know?"
"Jesus," Graham breathed, and finished his half pint of bitter. He stood up, sighing. Slater looked at him unhappily.
"Oh God, you're not going out in a huff, are you?"
"I'm just going outside for a little bit... to have a look round. I won't be too long."
"You know," Slater said, weakly slapping the table top beside his drink, "Gates, you're going to have to get those lines right before we hire the ice-breaker." The last few words were barely comprehensible as Slater collapsed, forearm on table, head on forearm, his back shaking as he laughed, muffled grunts of mirth echoing off the floor beneath him. Some of the older customers in the bar looked at him suspiciously.
Graham frowned deeply at Slater, wondering what on earth he was talking about, then left and went for a quick, stealthy walk round the back of Half Moon Crescent and up a little side alley, listening for any shouts or arguments from inside the flat. There was nothing. He went back to the pub, where Slater had bought him a pint. As Graham sat down Slater started to shake and his face went red; tears appeared in his eyes, and finally he had to splutter, "Fucking Norwegian bastards!" He fell sideways on the bench seat and doubled up with silent, spasmic laughter. Graham sat, feeling terrible, hating Stock and Slater and feeling sick about Sara and what she might be doing right now, and half-wishing that the pub landlord would throw Slater out.
Luckily, despite his threats. Slater did not tell Sara he and Graham had been there that day. They sat in the park later that week, getting slightly drunk on the champagne, and Slater talked about lots of things, but not that.
"I've just had this great idea," he announced from the grass, holding up his plastic cup. They had almost finished the champagne.
>
"What?" Sara said. She sat against the tree, Graham's head on her shoulder. He was pretending to be asleep so that he could keep his head there, near her soft, warm-scented skin.
"Interdopa," Slater said, waving the cup around at the still blue sky. This hippy turns up on your doorstep, bums a fag off you and shoves a lump of crumpled silver paper into your hand..."
"Put me down for the inaugural run," Sara laughed gently. Graham wanted to laugh, too, but could not; better to rest here, feel her lovely body shake, tremble under his head and touch...
He still remembered that feeling; weeks later he could still shiver at the thought of it. It was like the first time he had ever spent a night with a girl, back in Somerset. The next day, with his friends in the pub at lunchtime, watching a local football match in the afternoon, having dinner with his parents that evening, later watching a film on television at a friend's house, he kept having flashbacks; a flesh-memory of the feeling of that young woman's skin would suddenly make him shudder and his head swim. He recalled with some shame that he had been naive enough at the time to wonder if this feeling was love. Luckily he hadn't talked to anyone about it.
He could see the White Conduit ahead now, and he remembered how wretched he had felt that afternoon. Since then he had been back here once again when he knew he wasn't expected. He'd said to Slater he was going home, when they parted at lunchtime in the sandwich bar in Red Lion Street, but in fact he came up here, and saw Stock arrive on the bike not long after he started watching. This time Sara was visible, moving about in the room she usually greeted Graham from when he pressed the entryphone buzzer. Stock had let himself in, and Sara had not reappeared.
Graham felt sick, and left soon afterwards. He got throwing-up drunk all by himself in Leyton that night.
The day in the park had been good, though. He had kept his head on Sara's shoulder for ages, until his back and neck ached, but she hadn't appeared to mind, and once had even stroked his hair, absently, with one caressing hand. Ed had come back later on; he'd had a half-hour's row on the Serpentine.
