She props herself up on an elbow and kisses me on the chest. “Look, Rob. It happened. It was good that it happened in lots of ways, because we were going nowhere, and now we might be going somewhere. And if great sex was as important as you think it is, and if I’d had great sex, then we wouldn’t be lying here now. And that’s my last word on the subject, OK?”
“OK.” There could have been worse last words, although I know she’s not saying anything much.
“I wish your penis was as big as his, though.”
This, it would appear, judging from the length and volume of the ensuing snorts, giggles, guffaws, and roars, is the funniest joke Laura has ever made in her life, the funniest joke that anyone has ever made, in fact, in the entire history of the world. It is an example, I presume, of the famous feminist sense of humor. Hilarious or what?
3. (Driving down to her mum’s, second weekend, listening to a compilation tape she has made that features Simply Red and Genesis and ArtGarfunkel singing ‘Bright Eyes.’)
“I don’t care. You can make all the faces you want. That’s one thing that’s changing around here. My car. My car stereo. My compilation tape. On the way to see my parents.”
We let the ’s’ hang in the air, watch it try to crawl back where it came from, and then forget it. I give it a moment before I return to fight possibly the bitterest of all the bitter battles between men and women.
“How can you like Art Garfunkel and Solomon Burke? It’s like saying you support the Israelis and the Palestinians.”
“It’s not like saying that at all, actually, Rob. Art Garfunkel and Solomon Burke make pop records, the Israelis and the Palestinians don’t. Art Garfunkel and Solomon Burke are not engaged in a bitter territorial dispute, the Israelis and the Palestinians are. Art Garfunkel and Solomon Burke … ”
“OK, OK. But … ”
“And who says I like Solomon Burke, anyway?”
This is too much.
“Solomon Burke! ‘Got to Get You off My Mind’! That’s our song! Solomon Burke is responsible for our entire relationship!”
“Is that right? Do you have his phone number? I’d like a word with him.”
“But don’t you remember?”
“I remember the song. I just couldn’t remember who sang it.”
I shake my head in disbelief.
“See, this is the sort of moment when men just want to give up. Can you really not see the difference between ‘Bright Eyes’ and ‘Got to Get You off My Mind’?”
“Yes, of course. One’s about rabbits and the other has a brass band playing on it.”
“A brass band! A brass band! It’s a horn section! Fucking hell.”
“Whatever. I can see why you prefer Solomon to Art. I understand, really I do. And if I was asked to say which of the two was better, I’d go for Solomon every time. He’s authentic, and black, and legendary, and all that sort of thing. But I like ‘Bright Eyes.’ I think it’s got a pretty tune, and beyond that, I don’t really care. There are so many other things to worry about. I know I sound like your mum, but they’re only pop records, and if one’s better than the other, well, who cares, really, apart from you and Barry and Dick? To me, it’s like arguing the difference between McDonald’s and Burger King. I’m sure there must be one, but who can be bothered to find out what it is?”
The terrible thing is, of course, that I already know the difference, that I have complicated and informed views on the subject. But if I start going on about BK Broilers versus Quarter Pounders with Cheese, we will both feel that I have somehow proved her point, so I don’t bother.
But the argument carries on, goes around corners, crosses the road, turns back on itself, and eventually ends up somewhere neither of us has ever been before—at least, not sober, and not during daylight hours.
“You used to care more about things like Solomon Burke than you do now,” I tell her. “When I first met you, and I made you that tape, you were really enthused. You said—and I quote—‘It was so good that it made you ashamed of your record collection.’ ”
“Shameless, wasn’t I?”
“What does that mean?”
“Well, I fancied you. You were a DJ, and I thought you were groovy, and I didn’t have a boyfriend, and I wanted one.”
“So you weren’t interested in the music at all?”
“Well, yes. A bit. And more so then than I am now. That’s life, though, isn’t it?”
“But you see … That’s all there is of me. There isn’t anything else. If you’ve lost interest in that, you’ve lost interest in everything. What’s the point of us?”
“You really believe that?”
“Yes. Look at me. Look at the flat. What else has it got, apart from records and CDs and tapes?”
“And do you like it that way?”
I shrug. “Not really.”
“That’s the point of us. You have potential. I’m here to bring it out.”
“Potential as what?”
“As a human being. You have all the basic ingredients. You’re really very likable, when you put your mind to it. You make people laugh, when you can be bothered, and you’re kind, and when you decide you like someone then that person feels as though she’s the center of the whole world, and that’s a very sexy feeling. It’s just that most of the time you can’t be bothered.”
“No,” is all I can think of to say.
“You just … you just don’t do anything. You get lost in your head, and you sit around thinking instead of getting on with something, and most of the time you think rubbish. You always seem to miss what’s really happening.”
“This is the second Simply Red song on this tape. One’s unforgivable. Two’s a war crime. Can I fast-forward?” I fast-forward without waiting for a reply. I stop on some terrible post-Motown Diana Ross thing, and I groan. Laura plows on regardless.
“Do you know that expression, ‘Time on his hands and himself on his mind’? That’s you.”
“So what should I be doing?”
“I don’t know. Something. Working. Seeing people. Running a scout troop, or running a club even. Something more than waiting for life to change and keeping your options open. You’d keep your options open for the rest of your life, if you could. You’ll be lying on your deathbed, dying of some smoking-related disease, and you’ll be thinking, “Well, at least I’ve kept my options open. At least I never ended up doing something I couldn’t back out of.” And all the time you’re keeping your options open, you’re closing them off. You’re thirty-six and you don’t have children. So when are you going to have them? When you’re forty? Fifty? Say you’re forty, and say your kid doesn’t want kids until he’s thirty-six. That means you’d have to live much longer than your allotted three-score years and ten just to catch so much as a glimpse of your grandchild. See how you’re denying yourself things?”
“So it all boils down to that.”
“What?”
“Have kids or we split up. The oldest threat in the book.”
“Fuck off, Rob. That’s not what I’m saying to you. I don’t care whether you want kids or not. I do, I know that, but I don’t know whether I want them with you, and I don’t know whether you want them at all. I’ve got to sort that out for myself. I’m just trying to wake you up. I’m just trying to show you that you’ve lived half your life, but for all you’ve got to show for it you might as well be nineteen, and I’m not talking about money or property or furniture.”