by Jonathan Coe
Caroline and I were together for about fourteen years. In all that time, I can honestly say that she never, ever wrote to me – or even addressed me – with the kind of affection she showed to ‘Liz Hammond’ in that first email. I won’t quote it – even though I can remember most of it by heart – but I can promise you that you would not believe the warmth, the friendliness, the love she put into those words, those words addressed to a complete stranger – a complete stranger who didn’t even exist, for Christ’s sake! Why had she never written to me – why had she never spoken to me – like that? I was so shocked, and just so … wounded, that I couldn’t even reply to her for a few days. And when, finally, I did manage to write back, I have to admit that I was a little scared. Clearly I was going to see another side of Caroline if I carried on with this correspondence – a side I’d never been allowed access to during our marriage. I would have to get used to that. Anyway, I decided not to rush things. If Caroline and the non-existent Liz Hammond got too close, too quickly, then everything would soon become very complicated. I didn’t want to turn into her best friend, or anything like that, I just wanted to be kept up to date with the sort of day-to-day stuff that I was never going to learn in my guise as her ex-husband. And that was more or less what happened. I learned to ignore the jealousy I felt every time that Caroline sent a message – the sense that it was me, the man who’d been married to her for twelve years, who had always been the real stranger as far as she was concerned – and instead just concentrated on the bits of news I learned this way: the fact that Lucy had taken up the clarinet, or was turning out to be good at geography, all that sort of thing. In return I drip-fed Caroline pieces of information about my fictional self, while half-regretting that I had ever started the whole business. We swapped photographs a few times, and in return for the picture of her and Lucy standing in front of their Christmas tree (which I’ve framed, as it happens, and put on the mantelpiece) I plucked a random photo of somebody’s children from the internet and told her that this was my son and daughter. There was no reason why she shouldn’t believe me.
All sounds very sad, put like that, doesn’t it? But – to be fair to myself – I only ever did it when I was feeling especially desperate: and tonight was one of those times. Getting to know Poppy and then losing touch with her so quickly, swapping Sydney for Watford, realizing that I was no closer to my father than I’d ever been, bearing witness to the death of poor old Charlie Hayward – all of these things had upset me, and combined to make me feel, that jet-lagged evening, about as low as I’d ever felt. I needed contact with someone again, and that someone had to be Caroline, and it had to be more than the brush-off she would give me if I just phoned her up to ask how things were.
Anyway, I didn’t make it a long email. I apologized for my three weeks’ silence, saying that my computer had crashed and it had taken ages to repair. I told her that the bespoke jewellery business in Brighton was beginning to fall off a little as the credit crunch started to bite. I went on to the Daily Telegraph website to get a quick look at the news stories and asked her if she thought the government really meant it when they said they were going to ban executive bank bonuses. All of that added up to about three paragraphs, and that was all I could manage for the moment. I signed off ‘Take care and keep in touch, Liz’ and added a little yellow smiley face.
Caroline replied about an hour later. It was the usual sort of email: warm and open, full of news, the odd touch of humour, lots of heartfelt questions about how Liz was doing, whether she thought her business was going to be OK, and so on. When I printed it out it went on for about two pages. This was Lucy’s second term at her new secondary school and it seemed that she was settling in well. Her new Science teacher was ‘eminently fanciable’, apparently. Caroline finished by talking about herself a little in the last paragraph: she said that her writing was starting to gather momentum at last; she’d found a good writers’ group to attend, in Kendal every Tuesday evening; she’d achieved a breakthrough because she’d begun drawing on her own experience – mainly episodes from her marriage – but was writing it up in the third person, to give it a kind of ‘distance and objectivity’. As it happened, she’d just finished a short story in the last couple of days – would Liz maybe like to read it, and offer some helpful criticism?
It gave me a sick feeling in my stomach to be doing this, I must admit. I felt as though I was rifling through Caroline’s underwear drawer or laundry basket. Even so, there was a kind of ugly fascination to it, which kept drawing me back. It intrigued me that she could feel so much for an imaginary person (Liz) and so little for a real one (me). My memory darted back to Poppy’s uncle’s letter, and the point at which it chronicled Donald Crowhurst’s descent into madness. What was it that he had written in his logbooks? He’d started by trying to work out the square root of minus one, and this had led him into some crazy speculation about people mutating into ‘second generation cosmic beings’, relating to each other in a way that was entirely non-physical, non-material. Well – perhaps he hadn’t been going mad after all. Round about the year 2000, he’d predicted, hadn’t he? Pretty much when everybody started using the internet, in other words. An invention which now allowed someone like Caroline to have her closest relationship with someone who was just a figment of my imagination.
I put her email away, rubbed my eyes and shook my head vigorously. This was an absurd line of thought. I didn’t want to follow Donald Crowhurst into that dark tunnel, thank you very much. I would go downstairs to make myself a cup of tea. And stop this ridiculous charade about ‘Liz Hammond’ in its tracks while I could. That had been my last email. No more subterfuge. No more pretence.
All the same, I was curious to read that story.
9
‘Now I know what you’re thinking,’ said Trevor. ‘You’re thinking that, potentially, we’re standing on the brink of an economic catastrophe. Right on the edge of the precipice.’
Actually, that was not what I’d been thinking. I was thinking how good it was to see Trevor again. I was thinking that his energy and enthusiasm were just as infectious as ever. I was thinking how nice it was to be sitting next to Lindsay Ashworth, the unexpected third member of our party, who had been introduced to me as his ‘colleague’. And I was also thinking that I would not have thought it possible for anybody – not even Trevor – to discourse at such length, with such animation and single-mindedness, about toothbrushes: a subject from which he had not deviated once in the half hour since we’d taken our seats in the hotel bar.
‘Well, we’re all nervous about the economic situation,’ he continued. ‘Small businesses are going to the wall left, right and centre. But Guest Toothbrushes, I have to say, are pretty well placed. Capitalization is good. Liquidity is excellent. We’re confident that we can ride this recession out. Not complacent, mind you. I never said that we were complacent. I said confident – quietly confident. Isn’t that right, Lindsay?’
‘Absolutely,’ said Lindsay, in her gentle, measured Scottish brogue. ‘Actually, Max, Trevor made a very good point in our strategy meeting earlier today. Do you mind if I paraphrase, Trevor?’
‘Paraphrase away.’
‘Well, Trevor’s point was this. And it actually takes the form of a question. Well, three questions, in fact. We’re heading into a major global recession, Max. So let me ask you something: will you be replacing your car this year?’
‘I doubt it. I’m barely using it at the moment, actually.’
‘Fair enough. And are you planning to take your family abroad this summer, Max?’
‘Well, the rest of my family sort of … don’t live with me any more. I expect they’ll be taking their own holiday.’
‘Point taken. But would you be taking them abroad, if they still lived with you?’
‘No, I doubt it.’
‘Exactly. So in the light of the current economic problems, you’re not going to be replacing your car, and you’re not going to be taking a foreign holiday th
is year. Tell me this, though, Max.’ She leaned forward, as if to deliver the killer blow. ‘Are you planning to cut down on cleaning your teeth?’
I had to admit that I had no plans to cut down on cleaning my teeth. In this way, I proved her point triumphantly.
‘Exactly!’ she said. ‘People will always clean their teeth and will always need toothbrushes. That’s the beauty of the humble toothbrush. It’s a recession-proof product.’
‘But,’ said Trevor, holding up his forefinger, ‘as I said before, this does not give us cause to be complacent. Oral hygiene is a very competitive market.’
‘Very competitive,’ Lindsay agreed.
‘Intensely competitive. Full of some extremely big players. You’ve got Oral-B, you’ve got Colgate, you’ve got GlaxoSmithKline.’
‘Names to reckon with,’ said Lindsay.
‘Gigantic names,’ said Trevor. ‘These are the Goliaths of the toothbrush business.’
‘Good image, Trevor.’
‘It’s Alan’s, actually.’
‘Who’s Alan?’ I asked.
‘Alan Guest,’ Trevor explained, ‘is the founder, owner and managing director of Guest Toothbrushes. The whole thing is his baby. He used to work for one of the majors but after a while he decided, “Enough’s enough. There has to be an alternative.” He didn’t want anything more to do with the giants, or their business models. He wanted to be David.’
‘David who?’ asked Lindsay.
‘David the little guy who had the fight with Goliath,’ Trevor explained, slightly irritated by the interruption. ‘I don’t know his second name. History doesn’t record his second name.’
‘Ah. Now I get you.’
‘Alan realized,’ Trevor continued, ‘that he couldn’t take on the majors on their own turf. It wasn’t a level playing field. So he decided to move the goalposts instead. He had a vision, and he saw the future. Like Lazarus on the road to Damascus.’
‘He rose from the dead,’ said Lindsay.
‘What?’
‘Lazarus rose from the dead. It was someone else on the road to Damascus. Lazarus never went to Damascus, as far as I know.’
‘Are you sure about that?’
‘Well, he might have done – who knows? Maybe he popped into Damascus now and again. Probably had relatives there, or something.’
‘No, I mean are you sure it wasn’t Lazarus who had the vision?’
‘Ninety per cent sure. Maybe ninety-five.’
‘Well, it doesn’t matter. Like I said, Alan saw what the majors were doing wrong. He saw where the future lies: green toothbrushes.’
‘Green?’ I said, puzzled.
‘I don’t mean the colour. We’re talking about the environment, Max. We’re talking about sustainable energy, renewable sources. Let me ask you – where do you think most toothbrushes are made?’
‘China?’
‘Correct. And what are they made of?’
‘Plastic?’
‘Right again. And what are the bristles made of?’
I could never answer questions like this. ‘I don’t know … Something synthetic?’
‘Exactly. Nylon, to be precise. Now what does that sound like to you? To me, it sounds like a recipe for environmental disaster. Dentists recommend that we change toothbrushes every three months. Four times a year. That means you’re going to get through about three hundred toothbrushes in your lifetime. Worse than that, it means that in the UK alone, we probably throw away about two hundred million toothbrushes every year. Good for the big corporations, of course – it means people have to keep buying new ones. But that’s old-style thinking, Max. You can’t put sales ahead of the environment any more. For the sake of humanity, we’ve all got to change our tune. The profit motive has to play second fiddle. It’s no use the band just playing on while the Titanic sinks. Somebody’s got to start rearranging the deck chairs.’
I nodded wisely, doing my best to keep up.
‘Now – Alan knew the solutions weren’t difficult to find. They were right on his doorstep, staring him in the face. He knew we were standing at a crossroads. There were two obvious roads to go down, both leading in the same direction, and the signposts were pretty clear.’ He reached into the inside pocket of his jacket and pulled something out. I thought it was going to be a pen, but in fact it was a toothbrush. ‘Option number one,’ he said, ‘a wooden toothbrush. Beautiful, isn’t it? This is one of our leading models. Handmade by a company in Market Rasen, Lincolnshire. Made from sustainable wood, of course – one hundred per cent European pine. No damage to the rainforests here. And when you’ve finished with it, you can throw it on the fire, or shred it and put it in the compost.’
I took the toothbrush, weighed it in my hand appraisingly and ran my finger along its elegant curves. It was a handsome object, there was no denying that.
‘What are the bristles made of?’ I asked.
‘Boar-hair,’ said Trevor. He noticed that I recoiled slightly. ‘Interesting reaction, Max. And by no means uncommon. What’s the problem, exactly? Much better than nylon. Very good for the environment, using boar hair.’
‘Unless you happen to be a boar,’ Lindsay pointed out.
‘I don’t know,’ I said. ‘There’s just something a bit weird about putting pig’s hairs in your mouth when you’re cleaning your teeth. Something a bit … unclean?’
‘Lots of people would agree with you,’ said Trevor. ‘And you can’t expect them to change their attitudes overnight. If you’re going to preach to people, you’ve got to convert them first. It’s a gradual process. All roads lead to Rome, but it wasn’t built in a day. And so, for the more conservatively inclined, we have … this.’ He produced another toothbrush from the same pocket. It was pale red, almost transparent. ‘Good old-fashioned plastic handle. Good old-fashioned nylon bristles. But …’ He twisted the top of the toothbrush, and the head came away neatly. ‘… Completely detachable, you see? Throw away the head after you’ve used it, and the handle will still last you a lifetime. Minimal damage to the environment.’
‘And minimal profits,’ I said.
Trevor gave a pitying laugh and shook his head. ‘The thing is, Max, we don’t think that way at Guest. That’s short-term thinking. That’s thinking inside the box. We’re outside the box. In fact, we’re so far outside the box, that the box is actually in another room, and we’ve forgotten where that room is, and even if we could remember, we’ve given the keys back ages ago, and for all we know the locks might have been changed since then anyway. None of that matters, do you see?’
‘Yes,’ I said. ‘Yes, I’m beginning to see.’
‘We’re not saying that profitability isn’t an issue,’ Lindsay put in. ‘Profitability is very much an issue. We have to stay ahead of the competition.’
‘Lindsay’s right. The fact is, we don’t have the field to ourselves.’
‘Really?’
‘You see, when you’re like Alan, and you have truly original ideas,’ said Trevor, ‘it’s inevitable that other people are going to have them as well. There are plenty of wooden toothbrushes on the market. Plenty of toothbrushes with detachable heads, too. But this, we think, is the killer. Nobody else has one of these.’
From his pocket he drew a third toothbrush. It was the most unusual one yet. Yes, it was wooden, but the head – which seemed to be detachable – featured an extraordinarily long, thin, synthetic brush which swivelled when you twisted it. It was a thing of beauty and wonder.
‘I can see you’re impressed,’ said Trevor, with a smile of satisfaction. ‘I shall leave you to contemplate that for a few minutes. Same again, for both of you?’
While Trevor was away at the bar, Lindsay and I seemed to reach an unspoken agreement that we would not talk about toothbrushes. Unfortunately, since we knew so little about each other, it was hard to think of anything else to talk about. A situation like this would normally have embarrassed me, but today I was feeling far too cheery to be discomfited by it. My thou
ghts, you see, were full of Poppy, who had made contact with me again that afternoon. My mobile phone had already been replaced – without having to change the number – and this meant that Poppy had been able to call me today with an invitation to dinner: dinner on Friday evening, at her mother’s house, no less, where I would have the chance to meet (among other people, I assumed) the famous Uncle Clive. All day the world had been seeming a better, friendlier, more hopeful place as a result – which was why I now found myself smiling at Lindsay with what looked (I hope) like genuine warmth. She was in her late thirties, I guessed, with platinum blonde hair cut into a Louise Brooks-style bob. By now she had taken off her businesslike grey pinstriped jacket to reveal a white sleeveless top which showed off her pale, slender arms. I wondered if Trevor had told her much about me: anything about our long-standing friendship; the many years we had been neighbours in Watford; what a fine, upstanding, reliable, sociable chap I was. That sort of thing.
‘Trevor tells me that you’ve been suffering from clinical depression,’ she said, draining the remains of her gin and tonic.
‘Oh, did he mention that? Well, yes – it’s true. I’ve been off work for a few months.’
‘That’s what I heard. I must say I was surprised. You don’t look to me like someone who’s very depressed.’
This was good news, at any rate. ‘I think I’m over the worst now. In fact I have to go into work on Friday, to see the Occupational Health Officer. They want to know if I’m going back, or if they can, you know … let me go.’
Lindsay took the slice of lemon out of her glass and bit into it. ‘And … ?’
‘And?’
‘Are you going back?’
‘I’m not sure,’ I said, truthfully. Then: ‘I don’t really want to. I feel like starting afresh, doing something totally different. Not really the right time to do that, though, is it? Not with the job market the way it is.’
