What went wrong? Nothing and everything. Nothing: we had a nice evening, we had sex that humiliated neither of us, we even had a predawn conversation that I and maybe she will remember for ages and ages. Everything: all that stupid business when I couldn’t decide whether I was going home or not, and in the process giving her the impression that I was a halfwit; the way that we got on brilliantly and then had nothing much to say to each other; the manner of our parting; the fact that I’m no nearer to appearing in the record sleeve notes than I was before I met her. It’s not a case of the glass being half full or half empty; more that we tipped a whole half-pint into an empty pint pot. I had to see how much was there, though, and now I know.
Eleven
All my life I’ve hated Sundays, for the obvious British reasons (Song of Praise, closed shops, congealing gravy that you don’t want to go near but no one’s going to let you escape from) and the obvious international reasons as well, but this Sunday is a corker. There are loads of things I could do; I’ve got tapes to make and videos to watch and phone calls to return. But I don’t want to do any of them. I get back to the flat at one; by two, things have got so bad that I decide to go home—home home, Mum and Dad home, congealing gravy and Songs of Praise home. It was waking up in the middle of the night and wondering where I belonged that did it: I don’t belong at home, and I don’t want to belong at home, but at least home is somewhere I know.
Home home is near Watford, a bus ride away from the Metropolitan Line station. It was a terrible place to grow up, I suppose, but I didn’t really mind. Until I was thirteen or so, it was just a place where I could ride my bike; between thirteen and seventeen a place where I could meet girls. And I moved when I was eighteen, so I only spent a year seeing the place for what it was—a suburban shit hole—and hating it. My mum and dad moved about ten years ago, when my mum reluctantly accepted that I had gone and wasn’t coming back, but they only moved around the corner, to a two-bedroom semi, and they kept their phone number and their friends and their life.
In Bruce Springsteen songs, you can either stay and rot, or you can escape and burn. That’s OK; he’s a songwriter, after all, and he needs simple choices like that in his songs. But nobody ever writes about how it is possible to escape and rot—how escapes can go off at half-cock, how you can leave the suburbs for the city but end up living a limp suburban life anyway. That’s what happened to me; that’s what happens to most people.
They’re OK, if you like that sort of thing, which I don’t. My dad is a bit dim but something of a know-all, which is a pretty fatal combination; you can tell from his silly, fussy beard that he’s going to be the sort who doesn’t talk much sense and won’t listen to any reason. My mum is just a mum, which is an unforgivable thing to say in any circumstance, except this one. She worries, she gives me a hard time about the shop, she gives me a hard time about my childlessness. I wish I wanted to see them more, but I don’t, and when I’ve got nothing else to feel bad about, I feel bad about that.
They’ll be pleased to see me this afternoon, although my heart sinks when I see that fucking Genevieve is on TV this afternoon. (My dad’s top five films: Genevieve, The Cruel Sea, Zulu, Oh! Mr. Porter, which he thinks is hilarious, and The Guns of Navarone. My mum’s top five films: Genevieve, Gone With the Wind, The Way We Were, Funny Girl, and Seven Brides for Seven Brothers, You get the idea, anyway, and you’ll get an even better idea when I tell you that going to the cinema is a waste of money, according to them, because sooner or later the films end up on television.)
When I get there, the joke’s on me: they’re not in. I’ve come a million stops on the Metropolitan Line on a Sunday afternoon, I’ve waited eight years for a bus, fucking Genevieve is on the fucking television, and they’re not here. They didn’t even call to let me know they wouldn’t be here, not that I called to let them know I was coming. If I was at all prone to self-pity, which I am, I would feel bad about the terrible irony of finding your parents out when, finally, you need them.
But just as I’m about to head back to the bus stop, my mum opens the window of the house opposite and yells at me.
“Rob! Robert! Come in!”
I’ve never met the people across the road, but it soon becomes obvious that I’m in a minority of one: the house is packed.
“What’s the occasion?”
“Wine tasting.”
“Not Dad’s homemade?”
“No. Proper wine. This afternoon, it’s Australian. We all chip in and a man comes and explains it all.”
“I didn’t know you were interested in wine.”
“Oh, yes. And your dad loves it.”
Of course he does. He must be terrible to work with the morning after a wine-tasting session: not because of the reek of stale booze, or the bloodshot eyes, or the crabby behavior, but because of all the facts he has swallowed. He’d spend half the day telling people things they didn’t want to know. He’s over on the other side of the room, talking to a man in a suit—the visiting expert, presumably—who has a desperate look in his eye. Dad sees me, and mimes shock, but he won’t break off the conversation.
The room is full of people I don’t recognize. I’ve missed the part where the guy talks and hands out samples; I’ve arrived during the part where wine tasting becomes wine drinking and, though every now and again I spot someone swilling the wine around in their mouth and talking bollocks, mostly they’re just pouring the stuff down their necks as fast as they can. I wasn’t expecting this. I came for an afternoon of silent misery, not wild partying; the one thing I wanted from the afternoon was incontrovertible proof that my life may be grim and empty, but not as grim and empty as life in Watford. Wrong again. Nothing works, as Catweazle used to say. Life in Watford is grim, yes; but grim and full. What right do parents have to go to parties on Sunday afternoons for no reason at all?
“Genevieve is on the telly this afternoon, Mum.”
“I know. We’re taping it.”
“When did you get a VCR?”
“Months ago.”
“You never told me.”
“You never asked.”
“Is that what I’m supposed to do every week? Ask you whether you’ve bought any consumer durables?”
A huge lady wearing what appears to be a yellow kaftan glides towards us.
“You must be Robert.”
“Rob, yeah. Hi.”
“I’m Yvonne. Your host. Hostess.” She laughs insanely, for no discernible reason. I want to see Kenneth More. “You’re the one who works in the music industry, am I right?”
I look at my mum, and she looks away. “Not really, no. I own a record shop.”
“Oh, well. Same thing, more or less.” She laughs again, and though it would be consoling to think that she is drunk, I fear that this is not the case.
“I guess so. And the woman who develops your photos at Boots works in the film industry.”
“Would you like my keys, Rob? You can go home and put the kettle on.”
“Sure. Heaven forbid that I should be allowed to stay here and have fun.”
Yvonne mutters something and glides off. My mum’s too pleased to see me to give me a hard time, but even so I feel a bit ashamed of myself.
“Perhaps it’s time I had a cup of tea, anyway.” She goes over to thank Yvonne, who looks at me, cocks her head on one side, and makes a sad face; Mum’s obviously telling her about Laura as an explanation for my rudeness. I don’t care. Maybe Yvonne will invite me to the next session.