Adam Thirlwell - Lurid & Cute

with firearms for accessories

In Hiro’s opinion, the first problem was the eternal problem of cashflow — and of course I could not disagree at all, it was the pure difficulty now in our lives — but also, added Hiro, the more difficult conundrum was this: we did not want to work for it. His basic thinking was: if it’s possible theoretically to get rich quick, why take your time? Or, to put this more philosophically, the gangster in her desire to get rich quick is doing something of extensive resistance to the social order. She is very much bored with the world of work, and this is not, perhaps, to be despised, or at least certainly not so stupid. And Hiro now, it turned out, was also in this business — and to prove his point he then brought out a very gorgeous gun, not so much the Uzi or small-bore but some sort of petite Magnum, I’m not so sure of the category, and the sight of this machine on Hiro’s knees in a retro cafe, with photos of dead stars from the worlds of snooker or daytime television, caused an excited response in me which is not I think unusual, because it’s not so ordinary to have a gun in your life, or at least not if you are the kind of innocent prodigy and general person I am. But also I would say that if you have never held an object that looks like a gun in public you have not lived. Whether replica or real, it doesn’t matter. The thrill is cool.

— The fuck is that? I said.

— It’s kind of obvious? said Hiro.

And I did not want immediately to seem too reluctant or disapproving, partly because in the end the person with the gun in their hand is always very persuasive, but also because I had this theory that I could make at least some people very happy, and maybe in the end the only person this was true of would be Hiro, so how could I deny him? And also as I said, I was slightly sad and angry at my station in this life. I had this melancholy rage inside me and that’s a destabilising condition to be in when trying to make your everyday moral decisions.

in a criminal plan

How little equipment do you ever need to be convincing! Already I had learned this in the bodega incident. The merest replica of a pistol is enough to make you feared and this was after all not, said Hiro, the true and crazy thing itself.

— It’s not? I said.

— Man, no, he said.

True, it was more real than a water pistol. On the other hand, he pointed out, it was less real than a real gun.

— Is just a replica, said Hiro.

— It still looks real, I said.

— Well, sure, said Hiro. — Why wouldn’t it?

How many doubles, really, does a tale need? For while it’s easy to do things with water pistols and so on, argued Hiro, if you want to do something a little grander or more serious then you do need better props, or so he had decided, while roaming the lovely wide-open illuminated spaces of the computer screen. The water pistol was good for speed effects, but if a gun looks real, like truly real, with appropriate safety catches, finishes, sheen and so on — that’s as real as it needs to be if you do not intend to use it, and most of the time a gun in civilised society is precisely not intended to be used, it’s much more a general way of talking to other people, a sign like fishnet tights or lunatic lunettes.

— What, I said, — do you mean by more serious?

— Well, let’s say, the nail salon? said Hiro.

I do think we live in a very dangerous age, I mean dangerous for one’s moral life: for in the previous eras there was always a problem of materiel for the beautiful soul who wanted to express herself, I mean it was perhaps not so easy for the average bookish student in the marshland cities or slum conurbations to get hold of a gun, or other accessories, nor the many wraps of opium that their heart may have desired. But now so many things are available from the flat depths of a computer screen, and while that’s surely an advance for civilisation, it’s perhaps also a drawback, too.

— OK, keep talking, I opined.

When we had done that thing with the water pistol and bodega, Hiro pointed out, at no point had I complained, so why, he wanted to know, would this be different? If the prop was slightly more menacing, still, in its essence, it was not more menacing at all since in both cases the implement was not truly real. So that if my worry was for the safety of the people who would be threatened, I did not need to worry, just as if my worry was for our own safety, then there as well he thought I should be happy, since what security detail or panic button would a nail salon ever have? For after all, continued Hiro, it was just a place of harmony and perfume, to which no one with any aggressive intent ever went. Sure, there would be CCTV and so on, but since the CCTV is the worst cinema experience in the world, with only blurred and minute figures, that did not need to worry us either. While morally , nothing could go wrong because such an establishment would be very much self-contained, with insurance schemes in place for precisely this kind of sad and inevitable event. Every shop on every street must expect this, said Hiro, the way a woman must expect a man at some point to hustle her against a wall and explain stupidly that he loves her. So that in conclusion, I suppose, his basic argument was that so long as nobody suffered you could treat crime as a pure and singular event.

HIRO

Like, does it really matter if you hold up a retail outlet? I mean: who gets hurt?

ME

I no follow.

HIRO

The girl you point the gun at or whatever, the bayonet, is going to get her money back, the company behind that shop is going to get its money back, the only person who pays is the major insurance executive who is very far away and more importantly can take it.

And I felt a slight annoyance — it was inhabiting me very gently, the way the giant wind inhabits the tops of the eucalyptus trees and acacias — that Hiro obviously felt it would be so difficult to convince me, and if he thought that I would not be easy to convince I wanted very much to prove him wrong.

— Let’s do it, I said.

— You sure? he said.

— I know it, I said.

If you have no way of demonstrating skill in the rest of your life, it’s really restful to think that there may be one small way you will be able to succeed. And after all, I was thinking, as I took the last bite of my doughnut half, so many things were now different in my life to how I had thought they would be long ago. The old thinking seemed no use. I know the usual thinking is to separate the inner from the outer, to argue that OK sure there can be an aesthetic interest in let’s say grazing the brink of horror in any number of thought experiments and bagatelles, in considering murders as so many objects deserving of aesthetic attention, like statues, pictures, oratorios, cameos, intaglios, and so on, but that if at any point you succumbed to the actual realisation of such thought experiments the feeling would only be one of repulsion and squeamishness. But I was suddenly not so sure. It seemed a distinction that was perhaps more useful for the general social contract than just true. And what I wanted was excitement in my life. The lack of excitement seemed a very serious problem and I would do anything, I began to think, to see that excitement return — in whatever zany form. Please interest me! I was imploring to the world. It was like being a lover of animal rights but still in the end having this total need to sit out in the dying sun while watching the matador kill the bull. Definitely I was curious as to what a heist might actually be. I was gangster, I agreed, in this: if you have to find money in this world, it’s always best to do it quick. That’s just obvious when you think about it. What’s worse than suffering ennui?