Cupid's Dart

by David Nobbs

  When I returned to her we sat in easy, companionable silence for a few moments, watching the noisy, restless multinational bustle of the pub. It was lovely. It was our very first easy silence together, and I knew that the evening had been a considerable success.

  'Why's your lecture called the Ferdinand Brinsley Memorial Lecture?' she asked at last.

  'So that we won't forget Ferdinand Brinsley, who he was, what he did.'

  'Who was he? What did he do?'

  'I've forgotten.'

  We laughed. We laughed and laughed and laughed. When we thought that we were about to stop, we laughed again. It was truly a shared laugh. I don't think I had ever been as happy in my life as I was during that laugh.

  FIFTEEN

  I was living in suspended animation, waiting for our week together to begin. I found myself getting dressed, making coffee, even giving supervisions and lectures, but I felt detached from it all. I was doing it all from memory, as if I was a computer just following a programme that it had been set. I found it impossible to do any work on the Ferdinand Brinsley. Had I been Descartes, I might have said of myself 'I don't think, therefore I'm not.'

  Then I discovered that the World Darts Championship was on the television, not just in little bits but almost the whole thing, on and on and on. And on and on and on. And on and on and on and on. I hadn't even begun to realise how big an event it was. I thought I ought to watch a bit of it, so that I wouldn't seem like a total idiot next week with Ange. So, between supervisions and lectures, there I was, in my rooms in the cloistered calm of the college, with the sound on fairly low so that nobody would know, watching this extraordinary happening.

  It seemed to me to be the most boring activity that I had ever witnessed. I didn't know how I could stand a week of it, even with Ange.

  The commentators went from banality to absurdity to an enthusiasm which seemed to me at first to be totally false, to be a desperate attempt to breathe life into this deadly dull sport. 'The nation is awash with darts fever.' 'There's a global explosion in the world of darts.' 'He comes from a town called Alpen, so he obviously likes his breakfast.' 'Northern Europe is on fire this week.' 'That was the biggest come-back since Muffin the Mule.' 'The passion is tangible.' 'The crowd are braying for a result.' 'This is World Championship darts. This is the greatest pressure you can feel.'

  But as the week wore on – not that I was watching all the time, of course – a far worse interpretation dawned on me.

  They meant every word of it.

  I imagined Kant and Spinoza sitting watching the darts, hearing the Master of Ceremonies yell out at the top of his voice, 'Let's play darts', at which the crowd . . . well, they did what you learn that crowds always do when you watch sport on television – they erupted.

  The maximum score you can get on a darts board is one hundred and eighty. Every time this happened – and it happened amazingly often – the score was yelled out – 'One Hundred and Eighteeee' – and large numbers of boards with 180 on them were held up amid wild cheering. The room in which the matches were played was huge, and filled with tables of casually dressed, mainly young people drinking pints of lager. There was lager as far as the eye could see. I would be there next week, feeling a real fish out of water, but with Ange.

  'Pint of lager, Spinoza?' 'Thank you, Immanuel – you don't mind my calling you Immanuel, do you? – I thought Critique of Pure Reasoning was wonderful.' 'S'ssh, Spinoza, he's got a three-dart finish.'

  How could anyone with even half a brain go to darts and enjoy it? Playing it was bad enough, but watching it . . . I'd rather sit with my mother.

  I couldn't believe it. They showed action replays. A dart flew through the air on to the board, and they showed a replay of it in slow motion. The linguist in me felt offended at the term action replay in connection with the replaying of an incident that had contained nothing that I would describe as action in the first place.

  I learnt that a match consisted of five sets, and a set consisted of five legs, and each leg began at 501 and the score moved down until you got a final double. That seemed like an awful lot of match to me. I was going to be bored stiff. Then, to my horror, I discovered, from something one of the commentators said, that the matches got even longer with each round – seven sets, nine sets, eleven sets.

  Then suddenly there he was, on my screen, invading the privacy of my rooms. Tons Thomas. He was burly and sweaty and had a beer belly. How on earth could she fancy him? I noticed that they didn't call him Tons, they called him Geraint. I was shocked to find how much I wanted him to lose. I discovered that he was expected to lose, he was an outsider, a long shot, a qualifier. But he won that first match. I had to admit, though, that he had a captivating, good-natured Celtic smile, and not many gaps between his teeth, and that he was gracious and modest in victory.

  And then there was Nineteens Normanton, as large as life. No, larger. He was burly and sweaty but he did not have a beer belly. He was all muscle. He looked as if he'd been quarried rather than born. How on earth could she fancy him? I noticed that they didn't call him Nineteens, they called him Craig. He was expected to struggle in his first match against a very promising player from Holland – 'They're breeding darts players instead of tulips now' – but he won too. I wasn't pleased. I felt jealous of him. I had to admit, though, that he was an impressive figure, in the way that Ben Nevis is impressive, and that, although barely articulate, he too was modest in victory.

  I had realised by now that it was inevitable that I would also see Shanghai Sorensen, and that I would want him to lose, and that he would win, and so it proved. He was tall and relatively slim and he definitely didn't have a beer belly. I had no difficulty, unfortunately, in believing that she had fancied him. I noticed that they didn't call him Shanghai. They called him Bent, which is a rather unfortunate name that Danes sometimes call their children. 'You were wrong, Shakespeare,' thundered the commentator, as Bent Sorensen scored a maximum. 'There's nothing rotten in the state of Denmark after all.'

  I wondered if I would be able to contain my jealousy and remain pleasant to Ange.

  I had to. There was no other way.

  'This event is the jewel in the crown.' 'Everyone wants to feel part of the party.' 'If you could bottle this atmosphere and sell it, you'd be a millionaire.' 'We're not down the Dog and Duck now, I can promise you.' 'Let's play darts.' 'Game on.'

  I was going to have to dredge up some enthusiasm from somewhere. My life depended on it – literally.

  No. That was what one of the commentators had said 'He has to finish with these three darts. His life depends on it – literally.'

  My life did depend on it metaphorically, though. My life with Ange might even depend on it literally. Without Ange I would have no life. So, yes, on reflection, my life did depend on it – literally.

  Horrified though I was, I found it difficult to switch the darts off. It was quite a relief, therefore, to have to, in order to go and buy a cake, and visit my mother.

  The Saab seemed very sluggish that Wednesday afternoon, as if it shared my reluctance to arrive at the Home.

  I took refuge in fantasy once again as the tension in my stomach increased. Again I was utterly unconscious of passing through several roundabouts as I imagined my conversation with my mother.

  'I've brought a cake for you, Mother.'

  'Thank you. You're a good boy'

  'I'm not a boy, mother, I'm fifty-five, a man, a lover.'

  'What???'

  'Well, not literally. I haven't even fucked her yet.'

  'Alan!!!!'

  'I've only known her for just over a fortnight, mother. She calls herself Ange Bedwell.'

  'Oh, Alan, stop it.'

  'But it isn't her real name. Her real name is Angela Clench – she's one of the Gallows Corner Clenches.'

  'No. Stop it.'

  'No, mother, this is a girl who has slept with lots of the top darts players, so it's quite a feather in my cap. She's been fucked by Tons Thomas and Ninete
ens Normanton, so I feel pretty privileged.'

  'I don't feel well.'

  'She works as a temp in the office of a skip-hire firm in Romford. She's an Essex girl.'

  'I can't breathe.'

  'I won't be able to see you next week, I'm afraid. I'm neglecting my work on some excuse or other – this could cost me what's left of my career, but who cares? – and I'm spending the week with her at the World Darts Championship, and sleeping with her in a pub where a woman called Viv is apparently a hoot.'

  'Aaaaargh!!'

  'Help! Help! I think my mother's had a heart attack.'

  The Home's car park is unnecessarily large, a constant rebuke to uncaring relatives and friends for not going to visit the elderly people within as often as the planners had calculated. As I parked I felt shocked by my realisation of the sharp moral decline that had developed in my fantasies in only five days.

  It was so tempting. It wouldn't be wicked. It would be a mercy killing. She got no pleasure out of life now. I don't know that she ever had got much pleasure, but now she got none. Only a couple of weeks ago, when I had told her that I hadn't wanted to give her food poisoning because it might kill her, she had said, 'Why should you think that would upset me? What sort of a life do I lead?'

  I put the carrier bag on the table.

  'It's lemon drizzle this week, Mother.'

  It was undeniable that it would be convenient for me. I loathed these weekly visits. I was going to loathe them even more as my life with Ange developed.

  'M'mm.'

  I was utterly tired of not being properly thanked by this graceless old woman. She didn't deserve to live.

  What was I thinking about? It had just been a private joke, a wicked little thought.

  I had to tell her that I couldn't come next week, because of the darts. I couldn't tell her that, of course. I almost couldn't tell her at all. It never crossed her selfish mind that I might have a life, that I might have things to do. I felt even more claustrophobic than usual in her room that afternoon, more claustrophobic even than in the tiny, windowless room in which I am writing this.

  I screwed up my nerve. This was so difficult.

  'I . . . I'm afraid I won't be able to come and see you next week, Mother.'

  Would it work? Would it kill her if I told her about Ange? No. She was tougher than that.

  'But you always come and see me.'

  It was true. I hadn't had a holiday longer than six days for nine years because of our Wednesdays. Nine years of bloody Wednesdays. Even if it didn't kill her, surely it would shorten her life? No. It would lengthen it. She would thrive on the disapproval. In any case, if I told her and she didn't die, I would have to visit her when she knew about Ange, and I couldn't face that.

  'Yes, well, next week I can't. I'm sorry.'

  I was disappointed with myself for saying that I was sorry. I ought to be above such petty lies, especially when I had to tell such big lies.

  'I . . . er . . . the fact is, Mother, I . . . I'm going to a big conference in Prague.'

  I wished I hadn't used the Prague excuse. It was foolish of me. I was actually going to a big conference in Prague in a month's time, and I would have to think of a new excuse then. I was going to have to tell more and more lies in the weeks and months to come. Oh God.

  'Oh, well, that'll be fun for you. They say Prague's very beautiful. Think of me, won't you, stuck here?'

  No, if I wanted to kill my mother, I would have to murder her.

  That was ridiculous. It shocked me that I could even think such a thing. I banished the dreadful thought from my mind, and took refuge in my first safe subject.

  'So, what did you have for lunch?'

  'Some kind of meat. I don't know what. I'm losing my sense of taste, Alan.'

  All my mother's few pleasures were being taken from her, one by one. It would be a mercy killing.

  No!!

  I broke out into a light sweat all over my body. How could I get through another ninety-four minutes? There were no safe subjects any more.

  SIXTEEN

  I picked her up at Dangley Bottom Station, as arranged. She had two big, heavy suitcases.

  'Can't wear the same things twice, know what I mean?' she said. She put the cases down and gave me a kiss full of promise. I found it hard to believe that I was being kissed like that. 'You got time off, then,'

  'Well, I phoned Lawrence and said I was staying with friends and had gone down with the flu.'

  'I'm impressed. I'm really impressed. Well done, Alan.'

  'I didn't find it easy to sound flu-ridden. I hope I was convincing. I felt very nervous.'

  My lie was just one of the things that was making me feel nervous. I was nervous about being a fish out of lager at the darts, about our nights in the pub, about whether I would have the energy to laugh when Viv was a hoot, about how much I would stand out in the crowd with my old-fashioned shirts and sweaters, about how jealous I would feel about Tons Thomas, Nineteens Normanton and Shanghai Sorensen. I crashed the gears before we'd even left the car park. Ange gave me a look, but didn't comment. I wanted to say, 'Well, at least I can drive.' It surprised me that she didn't drive, but I was pleased about it. It gave me a rare advantage, an advantage I'd lose if I crashed the gears too many times.

  There were no more disasters as we straggled through Dangley Bottom, past the roadworks, past the sad park, past the boarded-up village shop. My spirits sank at the sight of the Royal Oak and it's pot-holed car park It looked as if it had seen better days.

  'This is Alan, Viv.'

  'Ah! So it really is a double this time. Hello, Alan. I'll show you to your room.'

  Viv had flaming red hair, and a sad, sagging face. Like her pub and her car park she looked as if she had seen better days. I tried to look younger than fifty-five. I knew that it wasn't working.

  She led us up a narrow, creaking staircase. The room was friendly, flowery, a bit ragged at the edges. There were an alarming number of cracks in the low sloping ceiling. The doors of the wardrobe had swollen from the damp and didn't close properly. The bed looked as if it might sag. I wondered how much action it could take, and how much action it would see.

  We unpacked. I let Ange take all the wire coat hangers and piled my clothes neatly on the only armchair. She removed two large pieces of stiff cardboard from one of the bags. She had written the number 180 on them in huge, slightly babyish figures. Dear God, I was going to have to leap up and wave one of those about, and it was going to be on the television. Supposing Lawrence saw. Oh God! I hadn't thought of that. No, he would never watch darts. I was quite safe.

  'This is it,' she said, as we went back to the car. 'This is the best moment of all, just before it starts, when it's all still to come.'

  'Viv didn't seem much of a hoot, to be honest,' I said, as I drove away from the pub.

  'I know. She's . . . er . . . this bloke she's been with has only gone and ditched her, hasn't he, the bastard?. It's hit her bad. I thought she looked terrible. To be honest, Alan, I'm not sure how much of a hoot she'll be this year.'

  I couldn't tell her how deeply relieved I was, and I felt ashamed of it as well. Viv was unhappy, her emotional life shattered, and I was relieved. It was the casual nature of the selfishness that shocked me.

  I seemed to be shocking myself rather a lot lately.