Дэвид Митчелл - Utopia Avenue

‘Here’s to “A Raft And A River”,’ says Griff. ‘Could be a single.’

‘Or a damn good B side.’ Dean wipes froth off his lip.

Elf raises her half-pint of shandy to Mecca. ‘Safe travels in the States. I’m jealous as heck. Think of me now and then, stuck here with this lot, while you travel around like a Jack Kerouac character.’

Dean and Griff find this amusing, so Jasper acts a smile.

‘You’ll be touring America,’ predicts Mecca, ‘soon. You four have a special chemistry. It’s fühlbar – what is fühlbar ? I feel it.’

‘“ Palpable ”,’ suggests Elf.

A group files in wearing Carnaby Street fashion and longer hair than Jasper. Nobody gawps. In Soho it’s the squares who are freaks.

‘Guys,’ begins Elf. ‘I’ve been thinking.’

‘Uh-oh,’ interrupts Dean. ‘Sounds serious.’

‘I’ve tried to like the Way Out as a name. Truly. But I’ve failed. And half the people I’ve told it to keep saying “The Far Out” by mistake. It’s not sticking. Can we – please – think of a new name?’

‘What,’ says Dean, ‘right now?’

‘Soon it’ll be too late to change,’ says Elf.

Jasper lights a Camel. Griff asks, ‘Crash us a fag.’

‘“Crash us a fag”…’ Dean misunderstands; or pretends to, for comic effect. Jasper isn’t sure which. ‘Nah. A fag’s a queer in the States. It’ll give people the wrong idea. Keep looking.’

‘Write a joke book,’ says Griff. ‘Start with your sense of timing.’

‘I’m kind o’ getting used to the Way Out,’ says Dean.

‘Why settle for a name you’ve had to get used to?’ asks Elf. ‘Why can’t we have one that makes you think, What a great name! at first encounter? Mecca. “The Way Out”: do you like it?’

‘She’ll agree with yer,’ says Dean. ‘She’s a girl, too.’

‘I would agree with Elf also if I was a boy,’ says Mecca. ‘“The Way Out” is flavourless. It is not even properly bad.’

‘Yeah, but yer German,’ says Dean. ‘No offence.’

‘To be German is not an offence to me.’

‘I mean , yer’ve got German ears. We’re a British band.’

‘You do not wish to sell records in West Germany? We are sixty million. A big market for British music.’

Dean exhales smoke ceiling-wards. ‘Fair point that.’

‘To point out the obvious,’ says Griff, ‘most bands are “the”–somethings. The Beatles. The Stones. The Who. The Hollies.’

‘Which is why,’ says Dean, ‘we shouldn’t follow the herd.’

‘“The Herd”.’ Griff tries it for size. ‘“Ba-Ba-Black Sheep”?’

Dean sips his London Pride. ‘My second choice for the Gravediggers was Lambs to the Slaughter.’

‘Great,’ says Elf. ‘We can come onstage in bloodied aprons and with a pig’s head on a stick like Lord of the Flies .’

Jasper guesses this is sarcasm, but is less sure when Dean asks, ‘What did Lord of the Flies sing?’

Elf frowns, then asks, ‘Seriously?’

Dean asks, ‘Seriously what?’

‘ Lord of the Flies is a novel by William Golding.’

‘Is it? Frightfully sorry.’ Dean does a posh accent. ‘Not all of us read English at university , you know.’

Jasper hopes this is banter and not a verbal knife fight.

‘New American bands –’ Griff muffles a burp ‘– have names that stick in the head. Big Brother and the Holding Company. Quicksilver Messenger Service. Country Joe and the Fish.’

Elf spins a beer mat. ‘Nothing too wordy or gimmicky. Nothing too obviously desperate for attention.’

Dean downs the rest of his pint. ‘So what is the perfect name, Elf? Fairy Circle? The Folk Tones? Illuminate us.’

Griff munches a pork scratching. ‘The Illuminators.’

‘If I had a corker,’ says Elf, ‘I’d suggest it. But at the very least, something less random than the 2i’s guy’s misunderstanding? A name that sends a message about who we are as a band.’

Dean shrugs. ‘So, who are we? As a band?’

‘We’re a work-in-progress,’ says Elf, ‘but looking at “Abandon Hope” and “A Raft And A River”, we’re oxymoronic. Paradoxical.’

Dean squints at her. ‘Yer what?’

‘An oxymoron’s a figure of speech made of contradictory terms. “Deafening silence”. “Folky R&B”. “Cynical dreamers”.’

Dean assesses this. ‘Okay. Based on our catalogue of two songs. Your turn, Jasper. It’s Moss, one, Holloway, one, de Zoet, nil.’

‘I can’t shit songs out on command,’ says Jasper.

‘Maybe not the best metaphor,’ suggests Mecca.

Griff does his gur-hur-hur . ‘Ladies and gentlemen, please give a big hand to – the Song Shitters!’

Elf asks Jasper, ‘Do you think we need a new name?’

Jasper considers. ‘Yes.’

‘Any ideas up those embroidered sleeves?’ asks Dean.

Jasper’s distracted by an eye that appears in a clear swirl in the design on the frosted window. It’s an inch from the pane. It’s green. It meets Jasper’s gaze, blinks, and its owner moves on.

‘Sorry,’ says Dean. ‘Are we boring yer?’

I’ve been here before. ‘Wait …’ Dream-lit snow, or swirling blossom, or filigree moths … a street-sign, on a wall … Jasper closes his eyes. Words emerge from memory-hiss. ‘Utopia Avenue.’

Dean makes a face. ‘Utopia Avenue?’

‘“Utopia” means “no place”. An avenue is a place. So is music. When we’re playing well, I’m here, but elsewhere, too. That’s the paradox. Utopia is unattainable. Avenues are everywhere.’

Dean, Griff and Elf look at each other.

Mecca clinks her vodka glass against Jasper’s Guinness.

Nobody says yes. Nobody says no.

‘My darkroom is calling,’ announces Mecca. ‘I have a busy night.’ She tells Jasper, ‘You can be my assistant. If you want.’

Dean and Griff clear their throats and exchange a look.

It means something but I don’t know what.

Elf rolls her eyes. ‘Subtle as a brick, boys.’

Jasper and Mecca wait on the platform at Piccadilly Circus tube station. Groans, gusts and echoes from the mouth of the Underworld resolve into half-melted voices. Ignore them. He lights a Marlboro each for Mecca and himself. The Piccadilly line is the deepest in central London, according to Dean, so its stations were used as bomb shelters during the Blitz. He imagines people huddled here, listening to explosions on the surface as powder trickled from the ceiling. Further up the platform, a cultured drunk is half singing Gilbert and Sullivan’s ‘I Am The Very Model Of A Modern Major General’ but he keeps forgetting the words and starts again.

‘Can I ask a question that is not my business?’ asks Mecca.

‘Sure.’

‘Is Dean taking advantage of you?’

‘He’s not paying rent, it’s true. But I’m not, either. I’m flat-sitting for my father. Dean’s truly broke. Elf’s flat only has one bedroom. Same story with Levon. Griff’s living in a glorified garden shed of his uncle’s. So, Dean either stays in my spare room or he leaves London and then we’d need a new bassist. I don’t want a new bassist. Dean’s good. So are his songs.’ The rails quiver. A train’s approaching. ‘He spends most of his dole on groceries. He cooks. He cleans. If he takes advantage of me, and I take advantage of him, is it still taking advantage?’

‘I guess not.’

A sheet of newspaper spins along the track.

‘He stops me staying too deep inside my head for too long.’

Mecca drags on her cigarette. ‘He’s very different from you.’

‘So’s Elf. She keeps a little notebook to record her purchases in. So’s Griff. The King of Chaos. We’re all pretty different. If Levon hadn’t assembled us, we wouldn’t exist.’