Girl 99

by Andy Jones

  ‘Maybe,’ she says. ‘Have to check my busy diary. Anyone else going?’

  I open my mouth to answer – affirmative or negative, I haven’t decided, but Kaz saves me the effort of choosing.

  ‘No,’ she says. ‘The boys have got a busy week, haven’t you, boys?’

  Verity catches my expression and, out of Kaz’s eyeline, grits her teeth and lashes an invisible whip. She has fantastic teeth.

  Chapter Thirteen

  Anything is ripe for a double entendre, if you put your mind to it. You can pick up a nice birdie in golf, sneak into the double top in darts and, of course, apply a delicate kiss on the pink in snooker.

  But when I point out that Douglas has just done the latter, he doesn’t guffaw like usual. Of course it isn’t funny, but it’s a traditional aspect of the game, and if I had any doubts at all, now I’m certain Doug is brooding about something.

  I lean over the table to take my shot: an easy red in the corner pocket.

  ‘One,’ intones Doug as the ball drops.

  I’m a little high for the black, so I walk around the table to take the blue. ‘Casting tomorrow,’ I say.

  ‘Aye,’ says Doug. ‘The monsters.’

  ‘A whole graveyard full of them. You got any plans?’

  ‘Six,’ says Doug, with regards to my score, rather than his plans.

  ‘Salsa tomorrow, isn’t it?’

  ‘Think I’ll gie it a miss,’ he says. ‘Talking of which . . .’

  I underhit the red, leaving it hovering over the pocket. Doug chalks up his cue and puts the ball away.

  ‘One,’ I say, noting Doug’s score. ‘Won’t Eileen be disappointed?’

  Doug slams in a black with way more force than necessary. ‘Ye’d have to ask Eileen,’ he says.

  ‘Eight. Have you two fallen out?’

  Doug isn’t given to profanity or crudity, but when he misses his next red and pots the white he lets go with a belter.

  ‘Right,’ I say.

  ‘Four to you,’ says Doug.

  We continue to knock the balls around the table, occasionally dropping one or two in the pocket, in relative silence for the next fifteen minutes or so. It’s not as much fun as a roller disco, that’s for sure.

  We’re down to the last five colours, and Doug rattles the green in the jaws of the top-left corner pocket.

  ‘Get to the allotment today?’ I ask.

  I return the favour and knock the green off three cushions, but nowhere near a pocket.

  ‘Stayed in,’ says Doug.

  ‘Catching up on sleep, I expect.’

  Doug gives me a sideways glance. ‘Aye, well, bit noisy for that.’

  Yvette.

  ‘Sorry,’ I say, ‘it just sort of happened.’

  ‘Just sort of happens affen, doesn’t it?’ Doug trickles the green into the middle pocket, and sets himself up nicely for the brown. ‘That girl from work again?’

  ‘Three points,’ I say. ‘No, she was . . . an estate agent.’

  Doug laughs. ‘Thorough lass,’ he says.

  ‘You could say that. Shot. Seven points.’

  ‘So, you’re moving?’

  ‘Dunno, Doug. Maybe. Just thought I’d see what’s . . . you know, out there.’

  ‘You’ll still visit?’

  ‘Not a chance.’

  ‘Ach, well, that’s all right then.’

  Doug chalks his cue, and flicks me a look before bending down to line up his shot.

  ‘Are you sensible, Thomas?’

  There are several ways to answer Doug’s enquiry, but I elect for the most straightforward and tell him that I am.

  ‘Well,’ he says. ‘Boys will be boys. I suppose.’

  He drops the blue and the white ball rolls up to the pink, nudging it off the cushion and into play.

  ‘Twelve,’ I say. ‘With a . . .’

  ‘Aye,’ says Doug. ‘With a nice wee kiss on the pink.’

  We play one more frame and drink one more pint of beer. I ask again if Doug would be seeing Eileen any time soon, but Doug mutters an ambivalent and non-sequiturial answer involving the words dunny, canny, wouldny, bother and bugger. So I take the hint and we walk home in relative silence. We shake hands and say goodnight on the doorstep of our empty flats, then Doug lays his hand on my shoulder, gives it a gentle squeeze and tells me, ‘Look after yourself, lad.’ His hand feels heavy, as if transmitting the weight of his loneliness. Or maybe it’s simply pushing against the weight of my own.

  After Doug lets himself into his flat, I spot a brown envelope lying on the doormat inside the communal porch.

  Stamped on the front in red letters are the words Penalty Charge Notice. Sixty sodding quid for parking illegally in a restricted zone on Highbury fucking Terrace, Islington. What I want is a stiff drink, but after screaming silent expletives in every room of the flat, I text Sadie a sarcastic thank you, make a pot of calming primrose tea and settle down to watch a little TV before bed.

  Beside the remote control, however, is a packet of candy Love Hearts – standing upright on my coffee table like a stick of pastel dynamite. And only a rabbit boiling in my Le Creuset stockpot could induce more dread than the sight of this dreadful love token from my estate agent.

  Between Sadie and Yvette, it’s getting so I’m afraid to be in my own home. I deadbolt the door, turn off my phone and pour myself what Doug would call a ‘good glug’ of whisky.

  Chapter Fourteen

  Casting is fun maybe the first two or three times you do it. After that it’s a bad case of déjà vu. Imagine watching looped repeats of the same commercial again and again and again, only each time with a different actor. That’s casting. We’re looking for actors that fit the scripts and can take direction; someone Ben can work with over a long day under hot lights. I’m here to take notes, liaise with the casting director and make sure everyone has the right kind of coffee. Some castings – those involving lingerie models, for example – are more bearable than others – those involving howling, screaming, yowling children pretending to be monsters, for example.

  Groaaaaan.

  ‘Next.’

  Mneaaaaarrrr.

  ‘Next.’

  You’re looking for that little something extra.

  Arghhhhhhh.

  A spark.

  Vvvvrrrrr.

  Personality.

  Brrrrraiiiiiiiiinnnnnnsssssss.

  Someone like Alice. As well as an eerie undulating quality to her ‘brains’, nine-year-old Alice has a great zombie walk – rhythmic, rickety and dislocated, like an undead body-popper. Plus, Alice has unfortunate bug eyes which she can cross one at a time or both together. We’ve found our first zombie.

  Verity is passing the time by sketching caricatures. So far today, she has drawn a vampire Holly, a werewolf Tom and a Verity with a bolt through her neck. Right now she is outlining a zombie Ben that doesn’t look too dissimilar to the one beside me, drinking his fourth espresso of the morning.

  Ben yawns expansively, and I watch as Verity captures the gesture in pencil.

  ‘You’ve captured his eyes beautifully,’ I say.

  Verity smiles as she opens up a cavity in the side of zombie Ben’s neck.

  ‘Wait till you have kids,’ says Ben. ‘See how funny it is then.’

  Ben’s yawn is contagious and, fight as I might, I can’t suppress one of my own.

  ‘Your baby got a cold, too?’ says Verity.

  ‘No baby, no cold,’ I say. ‘Stayed up late watching a movie.’

  ‘Anything good?’

  ‘Total Recall,’ I say, feeling myself flush.

  ‘Get your ass to Mars.’ This from Ben.

  ‘Dick,’ Verity mutters under her breath.

  Ben double-takes as if he’s misheard. ‘Excuse me?’

  Verity laughs. ‘Sorry, I think out loud when I draw, apparently. Philip K. Dick. Wrote the short story Total Recall’s based on. Only it’s called something else.’

  ‘There you go,’ says Ben
. ‘That’s our something new for the day.’

  ‘And he wrote Blade Runner,’ says Verity. ‘But that one was called Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?’

  ‘You into sci-fi?’ I ask.

  ‘Not exactly,’ says Verity. ‘But I am a bit of a book nerd. And I’ve got a big brother.’

  Holly escorts our next actor into the room and Ben orders another coffee.

  Garrrrrrrr.

  ‘Next.’

  Uurrggghhh.

  ‘Next.’

  Ooooooooooo.

  Next. Next. Next. Next. Next. Next.

  Uuuurmphhh . . .

  George has definitely got ‘something’. Although not a something you’d want in your own child, or nephew, or kid next door.

  His hands hang limp at his sides, he rolls his eyes back into his skull and fixes you with a boiled-egg stare, then he shuffles slowly – inexorably, you feel – forward. From the depths of his belly, George dredges up a sound that lies beyond our alphabet, and a gob of spittle spills from his slack mouth.

  ‘Thank you, George,’ says Ben.

  But George keeps on coming.

  ‘Okay, George,’ I say. ‘That’s great.’

  Relentless.

  ‘Cut!’

  When George stops two paces in front of our table, I’m leaning away from him to the extent that I’m bruising my vertebrae against the chair’s backrest.

  ‘How was that?’ he asks as his eyes swivel back into place.

  I take a breath and lower my shoulders from up around my ears. ‘Truly disturbing,’ I say.

  ‘Thank you very much,’ says George. ‘Can I go now?’

  As fast as your creepy little feet can carry you.

  Horrible kid, great zombie.

  Frankenstein’s monsters are a little thinner on the ground. The role requires a degree of physical presence that your average nine-to-thirteen-year-old doesn’t possess. A square head would also be handy; but this, too, is unusual in schoolchildren.

  ‘Maybe we’ll dig up something after lunch,’ says Ben.

  ‘Let’s hope so.’

  ‘Get it?’ says Ben. ‘Dig up . . .’

  ‘Ah,’ says Verity. ‘That would be one of those dad jokes.’

  ‘Fine,’ says Ben. ‘I’m going to find a table to sleep under.’ And he does exactly that.

  ‘Sunshine?’ whispers Verity.

  ‘Excuse me?’

  ‘There’s a balcony on top of the building,’ she says. ‘Views all over Soho.’

  ‘It’s raining,’ I tell her.

  Verity produces a purple telescopic umbrella from her bag. ‘Stick ’em up,’ she says, levelling the thing at my chest.

  I flash back to my date with Flo: me doing the same thing Verity is doing now – pointing Flo’s polka-dot umbrella at her across a table. That night went the way it did, and it occurs to me how much of our lives come down to luck and timing. Right person, right place, right time is what you’re looking for, but my judgement stinks and my timing is lousy. Even so, I feel an instinctive sense of Verity’s ‘rightness’. It’s not about lust – despite her smile and her eyes and her quite fantastic legs – it’s about something less easy to pinpoint. There’s a wavelength, I think. Like being the kind of person who holds up another person with a telescopic umbrella.

  And yeah, her legs really are wonderful.

  ‘Don’t look so alarmed,’ Verity says, swinging the umbrella under her arm. ‘It’s not loaded.’

  ‘Come on then. Show me this balcony.’

  The streets are black and shining with rain, and the tourists and lunchtime workers sprint from awning to doorway, oblivious to Verity and me peering down on them from the sixth floor of this dirty Soho building. Verity’s umbrella has a narrow radius, so we are squashed close together as we spy on the hoi polloi.

  Verity looks different today, and if you were to walk past her in the street you could be forgiven for not recognising her. Although I think I would. Her hair is styled in a tight French plait. Or maybe it’s a Dutch braid, I always confuse the two. In stark contrast to the rollergirl get-up, Verity has something of a sailor vibe going on this afternoon: Breton top, sharply ironed culottes and open-toed sandals. Maybe she has another date tonight. Something on a yacht, perhaps. A very expensive one.

  ‘Are your feet not cold?’ I ask her.

  ‘Freezing,’ she says. ‘But I’ve got wicked blisters from those pigging roller skates.’

  ‘Ouch. Still, it’s good to try new things.’

  ‘Verity is the spice of life.’ She says it with such deadpan delivery that I glance sideways, unsure whether or not I misheard. ‘It always comes up sooner or later,’ Verity says.

  ‘Funny.’

  ‘Yeah, I suppose. The first ninety-nine times, anyway.’

  Verity’s whole demeanour is calmer and more measured today. The nervous energy has given way to a more laidback and natural disposition.

  ‘So, no more roller discos?’ I say.

  ‘No more Geoffrey,’ she says, twirling her umbrella and sending out a scatter of raindrops.

  ‘Your boyfriend?’

  Verity laughs. ‘My date. We never progressed to the boyfriend stage. First date, last date,’ she says.

  I take care not to sound too interested in this development. ‘I see. It’s just with you saying “date night”, I assumed it was a regular . . . you know, fixture.’

  ‘Oh, it is,’ Verity says. ‘I’m a serial dater. Tuesday nights are date nights whenever I can make it.’

  ‘A serial dater?’

  ‘You know what they say about kissing frogs.’

  ‘That you need to kiss a lot of ’em?’

  ‘Well, there you go.’

  ‘But no prince, I take it.’

  ‘They’re harder to find than you might think. Have you heard about that experiment?’

  ‘Haven’t there been a few?’

  Verity inclines the umbrella away from me for a second, briefly exposing me to the cold rain. ‘Hey!’

  ‘No brolly for smart alecs. It’s the rules.’

  ‘Right,’ I say. ‘No. I haven’t heard about the experiment.’

  ‘So they got forty volunteers. Twenty men, twenty women. And they stuck a number – from one to twenty – on everyone’s back, so they couldn’t see it but everyone else in the room could.’

  ‘Based on how they looked?’ I’m a little appalled at the idea.

  ‘No, arbitrarily. Like a substitute for real-world attractiveness. You might have a big fat guy with BO and pimples, but if he’s a Twenty, then he’s the most desirable guy in the room.’

  ‘Got you. I think.’

  ‘So you’ve got a guy One and a girl One, a guy Two and a girl Two. All the way up to . . . ?’

  ‘Guy Twenty and girl Twenty.’

  ‘Okay. And they told everyone to go and pair up with the highest number they could. But remember, they have no idea what their own value is.’

  ‘Interesting.’

  ‘I know! So guess what happens.’

  ‘Everyone tries to pull the Twenties?’

  ‘Get you, well done. The Twenties are surrounded by guys or girls wanting to hook up with them. So they quickly realise they’re high value. All that interest, you see. So they reject the Ones and Twos and all the low numbers. And the low numbers, well, no one’s interested in them, so they realise they are low value and start buzzing about the place trying to hook up with anyone who’ll have ’em. Like the drunk kid at ten to two in any nightclub in the world.’

  ‘Proving?’

  ‘Well, at the end of the experiment – within a number or two – all the high numbers paired off with the high numbers and the low numbers with the low numbers.’

  ‘Like beautiful couples and—’

  ‘Not-so-beautiful couples. Exactly. Well, kind of – you see mismatches, don’t you? Something else compensating, like talent or personality or—’

  ‘Money.’

  ‘That too. Proving . . . I dunn
o, that—’

  ‘It’s a numbers game?’

  Verity sighs. ‘Maybe. I was going to say that there’s someone for everyone. But, yeah, you’ve gotta find ’em first. Got to keep kissing those frogs.’

  We have been gazing across the rooftops as we’ve talked, and watching the rain and the traffic and the scurrying figures below. Not looking at each other, so it’s hard to tell if this silence is awkward or not. It doesn’t feel awkward. I chance a sideways glance at Verity, who seems temporarily lost in her thoughts.

  My phone rings in my pocket. I take it out to check the caller and wince.

  ‘Work?’ asks Verity.

  ‘Estate agent,’ I tell her. ‘I’d better . . . you know.’

  Verity inclines the brolly away from me. ‘See you for the werewolves,’ she says.

  ‘Hello,’ I say into the phone, with as much formality as I can muster. ‘Tom Ferguson.’

  ‘Hello, lover boy,’ a voice whispers.

  I wait until I’m in the stairwell and the door has closed behind me before I answer.

  ‘Hello,’ says the voice again. ‘It’s Yvette. From Foxtons. Haven’t forgotten me already, have you?’

  ‘Yvette, hi. Sorry, I was . . . we’re casting.’

  ‘So glamorous,’ Yvette says, and it’s clear that she means it. ‘I called yesterday but couldn’t get you.’

  Five times!

  ‘Sorry. No phones allowed on location.’

  ‘I measured and photographed the flat . . .’

  Yvette says this as if it’s loaded with subtext. As if she’s describing her underwear, perhaps.

  ‘Great.’

  ‘Did you get my pressie?’

  My stomach clenches. ‘Right . . . the sweets.’

  ‘Love Hearts,’ Yvette corrects in a put-out baby voice.

  ‘Yeah, of course, Love Hearts.’ My voice echoes in the stairwell, and I check behind me as I trot down to the ground floor.

  ‘Around five?’ Yvette says, and I realise she is waiting for an answer to a question I haven’t registered.

  ‘Five?’

  ‘Saturday.’

  ‘Excuse me?’

  ‘For the viewing.’