The Case of the Missing Boyfriend

by Alexander, Nick

  I hear VB say, ‘Do you have a partner, CC?’ and then Jude with, ‘She is, you know, a partner.’

  I see Darren smiling at me and hear Victor saying, ‘The abortion was fairly recent . . .’

  I try again to read the first chapter of The Blue Bistro and then give up and lie and stare at the wall instead.

  I hear Darren saying, ‘Deal with the past’.

  Victor, Victoria, partners and partners. Even before I’m asleep, the whole day feels like a riddle.

  I scream like a child in a horror film and hurl myself from the side of the bed, knocking whoever is attacking me out of the way.

  It’s completely dark in my bedroom, and for a moment I think my assailant has attacked me with a bat. I wonder where the nearest weapon would be, but then, as I scrabble my way across the bedroom floor towards the vague, grey light of the hall, I find I’m walking on rubble, and think that perhaps we’re having an earthquake and a lump of the wall fell on me. I’m sweating and shaking and my heart is racing.

  In the hall, all is incongruously quiet. I start to wonder if this isn’t a nightmare.

  I stand and grab a hefty bottle of perfume from the bathroom shelf and return to the bedroom door. It’s not much of a weapon, I know, but it’s heavy and square, and hitting someone over the head with a glass brick has got to be better than bitch-slapping them. Plus, in films, squirting it into their eyes always seems to do the trick. I have some doubts, though, about the range of L’Eau d’Issey’s squirter.

  I edge to the door. Silence. I reach out and take a deep breath and simultaneously flip the light switch and leap, ninja-style back into the room.

  And then I understand. No attacker. No earthquake. No dream.

  Just one collapsed IKEA bookshelf.

  One side of the fixture has broken free, ripping a lump of plaster from the wall, and the entire thing has hinged downwards, whacking me on the face and scattering my books across the floor. I’m lucky I’m not unconscious.

  I raise a hand to my cheek – now stinging – and return to the bathroom mirror. I have a small straight cut along the top of my cheekbone.

  One inch higher and it would have had my eye out. ‘Fucking hell!’ I mutter.

  I dab some perfume on the cut as an antiseptic, then return to the bedroom and start to scoop the books from the floor and pile them against the wall. There are a surprising number (mostly self-help manuals), and, as I build the pile, I end up surprised not that the shelf collapsed, but that it held out so long.

  I shake the white chunks of plaster from the bedding and pillows (it’s far too late to be vacuuming) and slip back beneath my quilt, and then fall surprisingly quickly back to sleep.

  When my alarm goes off at seven on Thursday morning I’m pretty sure that I have been having nightmares all night – certainly I feel tired and irritable.

  But as I lie in my bed, looking up at the damaged wall, and then over at the pile of books, thinking, Do I really have to go to work today? only one dream sequence remains within reach. I was lying on a slab, in a morgue. The slab was uneven because it was made of piles of books. Beyond my swollen belly, between my knees, Victor the gynaecologist was bobbing around, and then laboriously, painfully, pulling something out of me. At first I expected to see a baby, but then I realised, in anguish, that whatever he was delivering was dead. And huge.

  Once it was over, Victor had looked at me and smiled and done a little salsa dance. ‘Success,’ he had said. ‘All gone.’

  I looked over to see what he had removed: a bloodied adult body. A dead body. Brian’s body.

  Still thinking about taking the day off, I force myself out of bed. But when I see the state of my face, it’s a no-brainer: I call in sick.

  The cut on my cheek is tiny, but my eye has come up in a real shiner. I am stunned. I haven’t had a black eye since Ronan.

  Experience tells me that four days will be enough for the bruise to fade. By Monday, Michael-Jackson quantities of foundation will suffice to hide any remaining signs of injury.

  I eat breakfast, then vacuum the bedroom and momentarily consider trying to put the shelf back up. Though I have a box full of tools I have never been much cop with a screwdriver, let alone a drill. I think that I inherited my mother’s ‘why have a dog and bark yourself?,’ mentality as far as DIY is concerned. Which is fine, of course, as long as you have a dog. Alone, unscrewing the remaining side of the bookcase is as much as I manage.

  Without the shelf, the piled books get in my way, and, in fact, begin to embarrass me. For there’s clearly something not quite right about having fifty self-help books . . . Clearly there is something a little shameful about having so many and still not being ‘sorted’, as they say in the personals.

  On further reflection, there’s also something rather sinister about the fact that the shelf that Brian put up has combined forces with my fifty failed self-help books to try to murder me in my sleep. By the time I have had lunch, it’s decided: with the exception of Living Life Lightly, (which, presumably was the straw that broke the IKEA shelf ’s back) the books have to go.

  I phone SJ and ask her if she can swing by on her way home and run me to Oxfam.

  It’s twenty to six when I open my front door. Her face falls. ‘Fucking hell,’ she says. ‘You have been in the wars.’

  ‘I know,’ I say. ‘It looks worse than it is.’

  ‘It looks like you’re back with Ronan,’ she says.

  ‘I know.’

  ‘You’re not, are you?’

  ‘Of course I am,’ I say, rolling my eyes. I grab her hand and pull her through to the bedroom and nod at the missing lump of wall. ‘Bookcase fall on lady face,’ I say.

  ‘OK. I believe you,’ she laughs. ‘Fuck though! And you were asleep?’

  ‘Scared the shit out of me. I thought I was being attacked.’ I glance at my watch. ‘Can we get a move on though? They said they close just after six.’

  We load the seven bags of books into her Megane. ‘Are you sure you want to come with me with that face?’ she says. ‘Cos I can just drop ’em off and come back if you want.’

  ‘It’s fine,’ I say. ‘You can take them in if you want . . . I can stay with the car in case of traffic wardens and stuff. At least they won’t mess with me looking like this.’

  ‘So you were asleep,’ she says again, as she pulls out onto Regent’s Park Road.

  ‘Yeah. My first reaction was to run into the bathroom for a weapon.’

  ‘Have you got one? A weapon?’

  ‘The only thing I could find was a big bottle of perfume.’

  ‘Ooh,’ SJ giggles. ‘I’ve got a bottle of Paradise and I’m not afraid to use it.’

  ‘Actually it was L’Eau d’Issey – a big bottle though. I wouldn’t want to be whacked over the head with it.’

  ‘You look like you have been,’ she laughs.

  ‘Yeah, well . . . My second thought was that it was an earthquake. The books made a hell of a noise.’

  ‘Well, we do get a lot of earthquakes,’ SJ says mockingly.

  ‘Well, my logic circuits weren’t working too well at three a.m. God, it’s good to see you. It’s been ages.’

  She glances at me and smiles. ‘Yeah, I know. Sorry about that.’

  ‘Oh, I’m not . . . I’m just saying.’

  ‘No. So, why are you dumping the books? Can’t you just fix the shelf?’

  ‘They make me feel a bit funny, to be honest,’ I say.

  ‘Because they attacked you in your sleep?’

  ‘Well exactly. No, they’re all personal development books . . . Yoga and crystals and . . .’

  ‘Self-help shit?’

  ‘Exactly.’

  ‘I remember you doing yoga. You lasted about a week.’

  ‘Three days. On the third day I cricked my neck and that was that.’

  ‘I never knew you were into crystals though.’

  ‘I was when I was eighteen. I just never threw the book away.’

  ‘
Right. What about those stupid balls that Cynthia gave you?’

  ‘The Qui Dong balls? Yeah, they’re in the boot, along with the instruction manuals.’

  ‘I still don’t see why you have to get rid of them today,’ SJ says.

  ‘They’re just embarrassing somehow,’ I say. ‘And depressing. I have every self-help book ever written and my life’s still a mess.’

  ‘Well, I think we’ve all got a few of those kicking around. You haven’t got any on dreams, have you? Cos I’ve been having really weird ones since they put me on oestrogen.’

  ‘No,’ I say. ‘I think I need one. I’ve been having really freaky dreams too.’

  ‘So the real reason you’re dumping this lot is to make room for more,’ SJ laughs.

  ‘You know me so well.’

  ‘Anyway, this is it,’ she says, pulling up on double-reds. ‘So, you stay here, just in case, and I’ll just dump them and run away before they look at them and think that I’m the sad-ass?’

  ‘Exactly.’

  Back at the house, SJ offers to help me put the shelf back up, but once she inspects the damage she declares the task beyond even our combined capabilities. ‘Even George can’t fix that,’ she says. ‘You need a plasterer or something. Plus, you don’t want it coming down on you again.’

  And so we sit down with a cup of tea and attempt to analyse our dreams instead.

  SJ’s are pretty strange, involving rides along Blackpool beach on pregnant donkeys. ‘And I’ve never even been to bloody Blackpool,’ she points out.

  ‘But nothing bad happened?’

  She shakes her head. ‘Nah. It was just a nice day out.’

  ‘So it’s a good omen. Because the donkeys were pregnant, right?’

  ‘I suppose so.’

  I then tell Sarah-Jane about my nightmare involving Victor and dead Brian, and then, perhaps because of my newly damaged bedroom wall, I remember the dream I had in the Negresco in Nice and tell her about Brown Eyes shagging me and then morphing into Brian.

  ‘So what do you think?’ I ask her.

  SJ shrugs. ‘You’re right,’ she says. ‘They’re strange. Or bizarre, as you would say.’

  ‘Do other people really not say bizarre?’

  ‘Not much,’ she says. ‘Not as much as you.’

  ‘Maybe their lives aren’t as bizarre as mine.’

  ‘Maybe. You really need to get rid of that fucking tree, by the way.’

  ‘I know.’

  ‘It’s out of hand. You should call the council.’

  ‘I know. So what about my dreams? Is that it? Bizarre? Is that your verdict?’

  ‘Yeah.’

  I wrinkle my nose. ‘I thought hard about analysing yours,’ I say in a sullen voice.

  Sarah-Jane sighs. ‘I don’t think you’d like what I think, that’s all.’

  ‘Oh come on, SJ.’

  ‘Well they’re a bit mad, really,’ she says.

  ‘Mad.’

  ‘Yeah. And Brian keeps coming up.’

  ‘So you’re going to say that I’m still in love with Brian or something?’

  ‘No . . .’ She swallows and looks out of the window again, then turns back to face me. ‘But I do think you have issues. It’s not that hard to interpret, is it?’

  ‘Isn’t it?’

  ‘You need professional help, to get rid of Brian once and for all.’

  ‘To rip his dead corpse from my womb?’

  ‘Well, yeah.’

  I tut. ‘That would be fine, except that I got rid of Brian years ago.’

  ‘Yeah. Only you haven’t. Or you wouldn’t still be on about him all the time.’

  ‘I’m not on about him all the time. I never think about Brian.’

  SJ raises an eyebrow.

  ‘OK, we’re talking about him now . . . but that’s just because of the dream.’

  She shrugs. ‘You dream about him, we’re talking about him . . . I just think maybe you need to see someone, to help you deal with all that stuff better.’

  I snort and shake my head.

  ‘And now you’re annoyed with me,’ she says.

  ‘I’m not. It’s just that I have dealt with all that . . . honestly . . . ages ago.’

  ‘You never even cried. Not when you got the abortion. Not when Brian dumped you.’

  ‘But you know I don’t cry like you do.’

  ‘Did you cry when Waiine died?’

  ‘No. I told you. The last time was when Dad died.’

  Sarah-Jane nods thoughtfully. ‘I’m not saying you’re a loony or anything.’

  ‘Well that’s a relief.’

  ‘But I do think you should talk to a counsellor or something.’

  I nod. ‘I understand what you’re saying, but I don’t know for the life of me what I would talk about.’

  ‘About the dreams. About what Brian did to you. About how you felt. About losing Waiine. Cos I know you think you’re fine. But I don’t think you are really.’

  ‘Thanks for the vote of confidence.’

  ‘Well, you did ask.’

  ‘You’re right. I did.’

  ‘Don’t see a Freudian though. They’re all really fucked up. See a Jungian.’

  ‘Since when were you such an expert anyway? Have you seen a shrink?’

  ‘Nah. George’s sister has been doing the rounds for years, though.’

  ‘Hasn’t worked for her though, has it?’

  Sarah-Jane ignores this comment. ‘She said most of them are Freudians – they think everything is to do with fancying your parents or something.’

  ‘Yuck.’

  ‘Exactly. But she’s seeing a Jungian guy now, whatever that means. It’s supposed to be much more wholesome anyway. And they’re really into dreams apparently. ’

  ‘Right.’

  ‘I could get you his number.’

  ‘No thanks.’

  ‘Your call.’

  ‘Right. So, more tea?’

  SJ glances at her watch. ‘Nah, I need to be getting home. George will be back soon.’

  ‘Is tonight a shagging night?’

  ‘Nope. That’s Wednesdays and Sundays. Thursday is curry night.’

  ‘You cook a curry every Thursday?’

  ‘Me? Don’t be daft. George picks up a takeaway on his way home. I have chicken biryani; George gets prawn madras.’

  ‘Every Thursday?’

  ‘Every Thursday. I can’t help it. I love chicken biryani.’

  Slowdown – Speedup

  By Monday morning there remains only the vaguest sign of my literary mishap, a scar so tiny that an intentionally clumsy daub of spot-cover is enough to make it vanish entirely. I’m pretty certain that there will be no scar either as, being blessed with my mother’s miracle skin, I have healed invisibly from far worse incidents.

  My BlackBerry has been silent all weekend, but when I find that my inbox on the Mac is empty too, I phone Jerry, our IT man to check that everything is still working.

  ‘Everyone is saying the same thing,’ he informs me. ‘Just send yourself an email and you’ll see – it’s all working fine.’

  ‘You’re right,’ I say. ‘Sorry to trouble you. It’s just all a bit biz— spooky how quiet it is.’

  ‘Spooky!’ Jerry says, making me wish that I had gone with bizarre. As I hang up, I hear that he is singing the theme tune to The Twilight Zone into the receiver.

  ‘Hello, beautiful,’ Mark, standing just behind me says, making me jump.

  ‘You’re back!’ I laugh, standing and hugging him. ‘It’s been biz—weird not having you around . . . Now you’re not upstairs any more, well, when you’re not at work either, I really miss you.’

  ‘I missed you too,’ he says. ‘So what’s going on here? It’s like a ghost town!’

  ‘I know. It’s bad, huh? I was just phoning IT to check . . .’

  ‘Yeah, I heard. I just went to see Stanton and he said that with the exception of Grunge!, everything’s on hold.’

  ‘Wel
l, Grunge! is pretty much done now,’ I say.

  ‘You know that even Grunge! are thinking of pulling their ads, right?’

  I frown. ‘What do you mean, pulling their ads? They can’t. They’re already programmed.’

  ‘Dunno. You’ll have to talk to Peter, but he got a call when I was with him and that’s what it sounded like.’

  I shake my head. ‘But they can’t,’ I say. ‘Not till the end of the year, not till next summer in fact. It’s all booked. It would cost them almost as much to cancel as to carry on.’

  Mark shrugs. ‘As I say, talk to Peter.’

  ‘I will. So how was Scotland?’

  ‘Wales.’

  ‘I thought you were at Ian’s.’

  ‘At his sister’s, near Cardiff. It was gorgeous. Amazing scenery. We see so little of Wales on the telly and stuff. It’s a beautiful place.’

  ‘But full of Welsh people.’

  Mark frowns.

  ‘Sorry. I had a bad experience once – couldn’t get anything to eat because they thought I was English. Kind of put me off.’

  ‘Oh right . . . I expect it depends where you go. I quite like them . . . Ian’s sister and her husband are lovely anyway.’

  ‘So, getting on with the in-laws! Nice.’

  Mark nods. ‘Yeah,’ he says. ‘It was ace. Really.’

  ‘So why the long face?’

  ‘I’m sorry?’

  ‘You don’t look like a man in love. A man in love who just got back from a week’s holiday.’

  ‘Oh it’s just this place, freaking me out. I can’t believe how dead it is.’

  ‘Right.’

  ‘Plus, you know how it is . . . When you get back from holidays and everything . . . I’d rather be in Wales shagging still.’

  I laugh. ‘Mona’s law,’ I say.

  ‘Exactly,’ Mark says. ‘Seriously though, aren’t you worried?’

  ‘Worried?’

  ‘Well, it can’t carry on like this for long, can it?’

  ‘No,’ I say. ‘No, I suppose it can’t.’

  In a meeting that lasts most of the afternoon Peter Stanton and I discuss the Grunge! account. He tells me that the slowdown is starting to hit retail hard – high street shops are announcing 70 per cent collapses in their sales volumes, and though initial returns from our campaign were good, overall sales in the sector are plummeting. Even Levi’s have decided to scale back their US campaign for the jeans, and Harper & Baker are rumoured to be laying off a third of their workforce. Stanton doesn’t need to tell me that unless something happens soon, the same thing will be happening here.