Matt Haig - The Humans

‘No.’

‘What do you think he meant by that? I mean: what I meant by that?’

‘I don’t know. But I have to say, you coming home and being friendly to Gulliver. That’s already out of character.’

‘Why? Don’t I like him?’

‘Not since two years ago. No. Pains me to say it, but you don’t act very much like you do.’

‘Two years ago?’

‘Since he got expelled from Perse. For starting a fire.’

‘Oh yes. The fire incident.’

‘I want you to start making an effort with him.’

Afterwards, I followed Isobel into the kitchen putting my plate and cutlery in the dishwasher. I was noticing more things about her. At first, I had just seen her as generically human but now I was appreciating the details. Picking up things I hadn’t noticed – differences between her and the others. She was wearing a cardigan and blue trousers known as jeans. Her long neck was decorated with a thin necklace made out of silver. Her eyes stared deep into things, as though she was continually searching for something that wasn’t there. Or as if it was there, but just out of sight. It was as though everything had a depth, an internal distance to it.

‘How are you feeling?’ she asked. She seemed worried about something.

‘I feel fine.’

‘I only ask because you’re loading the dishwasher.’

‘Because that’s what you are doing.’

‘Andrew, you never load the dishwasher. You are, and I mean this in the least offensive way possible, something of a domestic primitive.’

‘Why? Don’t mathematicians load dishwashers?’

‘In this house,’ she said sadly, ‘no, actually. No, they don’t.’

‘Oh yes. I know. Obviously. I just fancied helping today. I help sometimes.’

‘Now we’re on to fractions.’

She looked at my jumper. There was a bit of noodle resting on the blue wool. She picked it off, and stroked the fabric where it had been. She smiled, quickly. She cared about me. She had her reservations, but she cared. I didn’t want her to care about me. It wouldn’t help things. She placed her hand through my hair, to tidy it a bit. To my surprise, I wasn’t flinching.

‘Einstein chic is one thing but this is ridiculous,’ she said, softly. I smiled like I understood. She smiled too, but it was a smile on top of something else. As if she was wearing a mask, and there was a near-identical but less smiling face underneath.

‘It’s almost like an alien clone is in my kitchen.’

‘Almost,’ I said. ‘Yes.’

It was then that the telephone rang. Isobel went to answer it and a moment later came back into the kitchen, holding out the receiver.

‘It’s for you,’ she said, in a suddenly serious voice. Her eyes were wide, trying to convey a silent message I didn’t quite understand.

‘Hello?’ I said.

There was a long pause. The sound of breath, and then a voice on the next exhalation. A man, talking slowly and carefully. ‘Andrew? Is that you?’

‘Yes. Who’s this?’

‘It’s Daniel. Daniel Russell.’

My heart tripped. I realised this was it, the moment things had to change.

‘Oh hello, Daniel.’

‘How are you? I hear you might be unwell.’

‘Oh, I am fine, really. It was just a little bit of mental exhaustion. My mind had run its own marathon and it struggled. My brain is made for sprints. It doesn’t have the stamina for long-distance running. But don’t worry, honestly, I am back where I was. It wasn’t anything too serious. Nothing that the right medication couldn’t suppress, anyway.’

‘Well, that is good to hear. I was worried about you. Anyway, I was hoping to talk to you about that remarkable email you sent me.’

‘Yes,’ I said. ‘But let’s not do this over the phone. Let’s chat face-to-face. It would be good to see you.’

Isobel frowned.

‘What a good idea. Should I come to you?’

‘No,’ I said, with a degree of firmness. ‘No. I’ll come to you.’

We are waiting.

Isobel had offered to drive me, and had tried to insist on it, saying I wasn’t ready to leave the house. Of course, I had already left the house, to go to Fitzwilliam College, but she hadn’t known about that. I said I felt like some exercise and Daniel needed to speak to me quite urgently about something, possibly some kind of job offer. I told her I’d have my phone on me and that she knew where I was. And so eventually I was able to take the address from Isobel’s notebook, leave the house and head to Babraham.

To a large house, the largest I’d seen.

Daniel Russell’s wife answered the door. She was a very tall, broad-shouldered woman, with quite long grey hair and aged skin.

‘Oh, Andrew.’

She held out her arms wide. I replicated the gesture. And she kissed me on the cheek. She smelt of soap and spices. It was clear she knew me. She couldn’t stop saying my name.

‘Andrew, Andrew, how are you?’ she asked me. ‘I heard about your little misadventure.’

‘Well, I am all right. It was a, well, an episode. But I’m over it. The story continues.’

She studied me a little more and then opened the door wide. She beckoned me inside, smiling broadly. I stepped into the hallway.

‘Do you know why I am here?’

‘To see Him Upstairs,’ she said, pointing to the ceiling.

‘Yes, but do you know why I am here to see him?’

She was puzzled by my manner but she tried her best to hide it beneath a kind of energetic and chaotic politeness. ‘No, Andrew,’ she said, quickly. ‘As a matter of fact, he didn’t say.’

I nodded. I noticed a large ceramic vase on the floor. It had a yellow pattern of flowers on it, and I wondered why people bothered with such empty vessels. What was their significance? Maybe I would never know. We passed a room, with a sofa and a television and bookcases and dark red walls. Blood-coloured.

‘Do you want a coffee? Fruit juice? We’ve acquired a taste for pomegranate juice. Though Daniel believes antioxidants are a marketing ploy.’

‘I would like a water if that’s okay.’

We were in the kitchen now. It was about twice the size of Andrew Martin’s kitchen, but it was so cluttered it felt no bigger. There were saucepans hanging above my head. There was an envelope on the unit addressed to ‘Daniel and Tabitha Russell’.

Tabitha poured me water from a jug.

‘I’d offer you a slice of lemon but I think we’re out. There’s one in the bowl but it must be blue by now. The cleaners never sort the fruit out. They won’t touch it.

‘And Daniel won’t eat fruit. Even though the doctor has told him he’s got to. But then the doctor has told him to relax and slow down, too, and he doesn’t do that either.’

‘Oh. Why?’

She looked baffled.

‘His heart attack. You remember that? You aren’t the only frazzled mathematician in the world.’

‘Oh,’ I said. ‘How is he?’

‘Well, he’s on beta-blockers. I’m trying to get him on muesli and skimmed milk and to take it easier.’

‘His heart,’ I said, thinking aloud.

‘Yes. His heart.’

‘That is one of the reasons I came, in fact.’ She handed me a glass and I took a sip. As I did so, I thought of the startling capacity for belief inherent in this species. Even before I had fully discovered the concepts of astrology, homeopathy, organised religion and probiotic yoghurts I was able to work out that what humans may have lacked in physical attractiveness, they made up for in gullibility. You could tell them anything in a convincing enough voice and they would believe it. Anything, of course, except the truth. ‘Where is he?’

‘In his study. Upstairs.’