Дэвид Митчелл - Utopia Avenue

‘Foggy day,’ Dean agreed. He walked into Chetwynd Mews and climbed the five or six steps to his front door. He was safely home. Luck had been on Dean’s side. He fished out his key …

Inside, a girl’s boots were placed neatly in the porch. Jasper appeared to have returned from Oxford early and with company.

Dean called, ‘Jasper?’

No reply. Probably they were in bed. The air was peaty with dope-smoke. Mr Kabouter was still on. Dean crossed the lounge to let in some air and light and yelped at the sight of Jude watching him from the armchair. The eggs hit the floor. ‘ Shit , Jude! Yer gave me a heart attack!’

Jude said nothing.

The shoes in the porch were hers. ‘I just popped out to buy some aspirin. A while ago. Everywhere I tried was out. Traipsed halfway across the city. Just for aspirin! Unbelievable. Fancy some eggs?’ He opened the box. Three were smashed. ‘Pre-scrambled eggs. Or d’yer fancy an omelette?’

Jude stared at him.

‘So, is, uh … Jasper at home?’

‘He arrived the same time I did.’ Her voice was off-key. ‘He let me in. He’s gone out again. I didn’t ask where.’

‘Right. Well. Nice to see yer.’

‘I called you last night to see if your flu was better, but nobody replied. So I thought I’d come up, to take care of you. I took the early train to Victoria. Nobody answered the door.’

‘Yer must’ve just missed me,’ said Dean, ‘before I left.’

‘You’re a crap liar, Dean.’

Dean acted baffled. ‘Why would I lie to yer?’

‘Don’t. Please.’

‘Don’t what?’

‘Don’t treat me like the mug I am.’

Dean wished he was safe in the future where this scene was a past mistake and he no longer felt like King Shit.

Jude rubbed her eye. ‘Everyone said you’ll think the rules don’t apply to you. I defended you. I said you had your feet on the ground.’ She stood up, went to the door, and put on her coat and boots. ‘I’d like to say, “I wish you the best,” but I don’t want my last words to you to be a lie. So … I hope you’ll find a better version of yourself than the one you are now. For your sake.’

Dean felt scuzzier than a bag of pond weed.

Jude closed the door behind her.

‘Dean?’

Amy’s looking at him. So is everyone else in Levon’s office. Bethany’s phone rings next door: ‘Good afternoon, Moonwhale?’ The international clocks chop up minutes. ‘Sorry. What was the question?’

‘I was just saying,’ says Amy, ‘if you want to dish me up any final tales of rock ’n’ roll depravity, I won’t turn them away.’

‘Oh. Yeah. Sorry. No. In bed by ten o’clock with a mug o’ cocoa and Golfing Weekly , that’s me.’

‘I can picture it.’ Amy packs her handbag and stands up. ‘Well, I think I have everything, so … I’ll leave you to it.’

Levon stands and slides the doors open. ‘When is the piece likely to run, would you say?’

‘Next week’s issue.’

‘And a review of the album?’ asks Levon.

‘That, I’ve already written.’

Dean scrutinises her face for clues.

The tip of Amy’s fang indents her lip. ‘Relax. Why bother writing eight hundred words on a band if I’ve trashed their album?’

Dean shakes Amy’s hand. She looks him straight in the eye.

Dean stared at the chair Jude had sat in. It still held the faint ghost of her body heat. Lust had caused all this trouble. Hunting girls was a kind of addiction. Sex with these strangers brought him no pleasure. Dean swore to start treating women the way he treated Elf – like people, basically. Dean heard the telephone ring. He turned off the water and went to answer it. ‘Hello?’

‘Morning, yer dirty stop-out.’

‘Rod. Sorry I … sort o’ disappeared on yer last night.’

‘No explanation necessary, Romeo. Seal the deal?’

‘A gentleman never tells.’

‘Yer naughty rock-god. Bit of yer magic dust fell on Kenny.’

‘Yeah?’

‘Oh yes. Last seen heading off for Hammersmith with a witchy maiden. Do the boy good. He’s got cum backed up to his sinuses. Stew slept on my sofa in Camden. He’s just left.’

‘All’s well that ends well, I s’pose.’

‘’Xactly. So, after such a brilliant night, it feels rude to talk ’bout money, but will yer be settling up by cash or cheque?’

Time brakes sharply, like a train. ‘For the pills?’

‘Nah. Yer bar tab at the Bag o’ Nails.’

Dean remembered. ‘Yeah. ’Course. And it came to …’

‘Ninety-six quid plus a bit o’ change.’

Time came off the rails like a train crash.

Dean didn’t have a spare ninety-six pounds.

Dean didn’t have a spare fiver.

‘Dean?’

‘Uh … yeah.’

‘Oh, good. Thought I’d lost yer. After yer went, I closed yer tab. The Bag o’ Nails isn’t the cheapest bar in London. Yer made a generous gesture, but people take the piss. I hope that was okay?’

‘Yeah. Thanks.’

‘Is this line all right? Yer sound only half there.’

As Dean was trying to work out how you tell a friend that you can’t pay them back an unexpectedly enormous drinks bill, his mind was hijacked by a memory of a hook sliding into a maggot’s mouth: Twist the hook out of his arse , said Harry Moffat, just so the point shows. See?

Post-interview, Elf and Jasper are clearing up the coffee cups while Bethany runs through the calls Levon missed. Griff is motionless beneath his cowboy hat. Dean sees a woman’s glove on the arm of the sofa. ‘Look, Amy left a glove.’

‘Fancy that.’ Elf gives Dean a loaded look.

‘I’ll see if I can catch her.’

‘She’ll be streets away by now,’ says Jasper.

‘Or,’ Elf says airily, ‘a lot nearer.’

‘When is a glove a lobster pot?’ asks Griff.

Dean hurries out of Levon’s office, out through Moonwhale’s door, and down to the landing of the Duke-Stoker Agency, where Amy is smoking a cigarette.

Dean dangles the glove. ‘Lost: one suede glove.’

‘Fancy that.’ She takes it. He pinches it more tightly. Her face says, You’re cute, but not that cute. He lets it go.

‘Do I get a reward?’ He takes out his packet of Dunhills.

‘You get to give me your telephone number.’

Yer cheeky, beautiful, slinky, curvy bitch.

‘If I give yer my number, how do I even know yer’ll call?’

‘You don’t.’ Amy holds up her lighter.

Denmark Street washes and ebbs up the stairs.

Dean holds his cigarette in her flame.

Last Supper

Upstairs at the Duke of Argyll, Griff began a headcount while waiting for his next Guinness to appear. Under a halo of Christmas lights Bethany, her theatre-director boyfriend and Petula Clark were numbers 1, 2 and 3; the well-groomed quartet of Levon, a biochemist called Benjamin, Pavel Z and the Move’s manager were 17, 18, 19 and 20; Jasper, Heinz Formaggio and the scientist from Kenya were 36, 37 and 38; DJs John Peel and Bat Segundo were 44 and 45; and Elf and Bruce, sharing a moment in a nook, were 59 and 60. Bruce was pressing his forehead against Elf’s and talking and she was smiling the smile only lovers smile. Griff feared for Elf. A crash was coming. He extracted a Benzedrine from a pillbox in his jacket pocket, faced the window and popped the bringer of peace and joy to all men. Below in Brewer Street, workers hurried home, collars up and hats down. Across the street, above a greengrocer’s, a boy of ten or so watched Griff through a window. Griff held up a hand in greeting. The boy sank away into gloom.

‘Suffering is the one promise life always keeps.’

Griff turned to find two young women sporting blood-red lips, lethal-looking hatpins, fishnet gloves, fur stoles and artful cleavage. He wasn’t sure which of them spoke. ‘Aye.’