Nicola Barker - Clear - A Transparent Novel

So will it hold together when I’m finally done? Will it be waterproof? Are all the fragments in place? Are my fingers clean? Is the glue strong enough?).

Okay. Okay . Try and be kind , will ya? I’m sickening. I’m gummed up.

Remember earlier, much earlier, before the plague?

‘All this damn rancour ,’ Bly grizzles, once she’s hauled me off the pavement, apologised profusely (on my behalf), retrieved Hilary’s (not so ‘hilarious’ now , eh?) headscarf from my frenzied clutch, returned it, and cluckingly dusted down the arms and elbows on my heavy-wear jacket, ‘what’s the point of it?’

‘Rancour?’

I do the wide-eyed act.

(My philosophy: if in any doubt, deny, and deny passionately.)

‘You attacked him.’

She gives me a reproachful look.

‘He kicked me first,’ I squeak, ‘and anyway, I only licked him. In most “advanced” cultures a lick is a sign of overwhelming benevolence.’

‘To a dog, perhaps.’

‘All that bloody piety ,’ I growl (conforming to type), and setting my (now, slightly wonky) sights back on work again. ‘I mean who suddenly gave all these skanky New Agers such ready access to the fine, moral high ground? They have no right to it. They don’t pay any damn rent . They’re just Ethical Squatters …’

(Bly neglects to congratulate me on what I feel is my peerless use of morality-based real estate imagery.)

‘You’re honestly trying to tell me,’ she scoffs, ‘that Hilary offends your “Christian sensibilities” in some way?’

‘Yes,’ I gabble defensively, ‘ and fucking Blaine, for that matter…’

‘How?’

Uh …(Now I’m flummoxed. Just give me a second…I’m harbouring the pox , remember?). ‘Well…the adverts , for starters. The TV adverts. And before this whole thing even started , there he was, like the proverbial bad penny, hanging around town and behaving- at every opportunity- like a real celebrity dick . Cutting off his ear at a press conference. Getting tough-nuts on the streets to punch him in the guts. Prancing around on the London Eye. I mean big fucking deal . Is he meant to be an Artist , or some kind of low-rent carnival entertainer?’

I pause and cough.

( Shit , man, I’m pent up .)

‘Is it really any wonder,’ I continue, ‘that people’ve got so confused and pissed-off?’

‘The TV ads…’ she nudges me.

‘ Yeah . The TV ads. They were unbelievably provocative…’

‘Not so’s I remember…’ she debunks.

‘You don’t have a problem, then,’ I gabble, ‘with some trumped-up, two-bit American magician — best mucker of those social stalwarts : Uri Geller and Michael Jackson — drawing casual but explicit parallels between his million-dollar, Sky sponsored, money-making antics, and the trials and tribulations of the Son of God ?’

Bly merely cocks her head.

‘The dark corridor ,’ I twitter, ‘the raised arms , the grandiose music , the portentous voice -over…’

‘So what? ’ She throws up her hands. ‘Who cares?’

‘Who cares? Who cares? Lots of people care. Because it’s sacri-bloody-legious. It’s arrogant. It’s outrageous. It’s wrong .’

‘Oh. Fine ,’ Bly snipes, caustically. ‘It’s suddenly against the law now, huh , to employ basic Christian iconography in other walks of life?’

(Iconography?! Man . What’s happening to these females lately?)

‘Yes. Yes . It is . Against the laws of good taste ,’ I gurgle: ‘Just look what the Muslims did to Rushdie : a fatwa, for writing some crummy piece of undigestible fiction . But when Blaine compares himself — his so-called “struggle”, his theatrics — to the trials of Jesus Christ, we’re all just meant to go, “ Uh , oh, good, yeah …”’

Bly puts up a hand to stop me: ‘ How did he compare himself?’ she asks.

‘In every way. The imagery. The whole presentation of the thing. All the “forty-four days in the wilderness” malarkey…’

‘Forty days,’ she chips in.

‘Pardon me?’

‘Forty days,’ she yells. ‘You’re standing here as Christianity’s chief defender and you don’t even know the number of days involved.’

‘So Blaine cocks a snook at Christ by going four days longer !’ I exclaim. ‘Wow. You surprise me.’

We enter the foyer. ‘Okay…’ Bly pauses thoughtfully by the front desk. ‘I’m perfectly willing to concede to your idea that the Christ thing is implicit in what he’s doing…,’ she frowns, ‘but you already told me how it was the Kafka story that inspired the whole stunt. You were burning my damn ear about the subtle ramifications of the so-called “Korine connection” all bloody morning…’

‘So what?’ I shrug. ‘Blaine’s just cherry-picking. He’s trite. An opportunist. A cultural slut.’

‘Uh- uh ,’ she uh- uhs . ‘It’s not simply a question of cherry-picking, it’s about experimentation, about pushing buttons, crossing boundaries. He’s transgressing .’ She pokes me in the chest with her beefy finger. ‘He’s making you think .’ Another poke. ‘He’s making you question . He’s being intellectually flirtatious…and — at some fundamental level — I think he’s probably just taking the piss a little…’

‘Maybe he is,’ I squawk (I hate this idea, somehow — to be the punchline of Blaine’s joke ? How infuriating is that?). ‘Maybe he is taking the piss, but how can we possibly be expected to tell , when he’s so unreservedly smug and pious and American and humourless about it? Funny ?!’ I point, dramatically, in the general direction of the Illusionist’s box. ‘You call this funny? Slumped in a plastic tomb , twenty-four/seven? Waving occasionally? I thought he was meant to be a fucking show man.’

‘That’s his style.’ Bly rolls her eyes. ‘That’s his trip. And maybe — bottom line — you just don’t get the joke. Or perhaps what he’s doing is more complicated than you think. Maybe it’s the very multi-layeredness of the whole thing which is putting your back up. He’s confusing you. He’s challenging your preconceptions. You don’t like that.’

I sneeze. She ducks.

‘We’re all such rugged bloody individualists lately,’ she murmurs, searching in her bag for something: ‘The ex I was just telling you about— he was a perfect case in point. And the people on that site you showed me, the stay-awake bullies, they all think they’re standing out from the crowd, that they’re defending something, that they’re really cutting a dash…’

She hands me a tissue: ‘But they’re not individuals at all . They’re just deluded conformists.’

‘How so?’

I cover my nose and blow.

‘Well this guy — my ex; his name was Steve — was completely obsessed by his Landcruiser. He lived in Stratford, for Chrissakes, and the parking was a nightmare. But he loved that car…’

I blow again.

‘…Because it was big, for starters, and utilitarian-looking, and tough, and it made him feel like an outsider, like someone who would drive over the pavement if he needed to — bend the rules a little, you know? He felt armour-plated in that thing, like an urban warrior .’