Martin Harbottle's Appreciation of Time (35 page)

To:
[email protected]

Re:
07.31 Premier Westward Railways train from Oxford to London Paddington, April 10. Amount of my day wasted: six minutes. Fellow sufferers: Train Girl, Guilty New (Spymaster) Mum, Universal Grandpa.

Happy Easter, Martin. Well, yes, I know it was Easter Sunday two days ago, but still. Happy Easter!

Actually, that reminds me – I once had to write a feature on Easter Egg packaging, back before I was on the
Globe
, back when I was freelancing and therefore basically up for doing whatever work anyone could put my way. The idea was to take a selection of the six best-selling eggs, disassemble them completely, weigh each part of the whole package separately (the cardboard, the plastic, the foil, the chocolate) and then present the results in as shocking a way as possible (twice as much plastic as cardboard! Twice as much cardboard as foil! Twice as much foil as chocolate!). And you know what? It wasn’t an entirely bad idea. It could have worked. Except it didn’t. There was more chocolate than cardboard, or plastic, or foil. The whole thing was entirely unshocking. The whole thing was as any sensible person would expect it to be. So what did I do? I lied, of course. I lied, so that I’d still get paid. And after we published it on a double-page spread, and the nation was duly shocked, and the manufacturers disputed it, and we admitted the figures were wrong, and we printed a tiny apology correcting the figures buried near the letters page, I still got paid. That, in reflection, probably was immoral. Perhaps none of us are innocent, after all.

I’ve been thinking, Martin. On my way to work today, unsure just how much of the office will still be there, will remained unpounded by the cops; unsure of whether there will be a computer to use, or a phone; unsure of how many of my colleagues will remain… I’ve been thinking – you know what we should do, if they’re going to shut the paper? We should run my story. We should nail that Scottish fool for good, once and for all. I’ve been thinking – I’m going to give that girl a call. I might talk to her anyway. I might line it all up, just in case. Just in case we’ve got nothing left to lose either way. Just in case we need the Pyrrhic victory to end all Pyrrhic victories.

Or… I could do the sensible thing. And shut up. I could do the smart thing and do nothing at all.

And in the meantime, Train Girl wants to go out again. On the way in this morning, as Guilty New (Spymaster) Mum complained about her childcare (‘And I said to her, at that price I’d want my child learning Mandarin! At that price for a morning – just a morning, mind, that’s the price for just half a day – I said I’d want my baby playing Grade 8 piano by Christmas…’) Train Girl popped the question.

She’s giving me another chance, she said. (She said it with a wink.) She’s giving me another shot at the prize. And what am I to think about that?

Au revoir
!

Dan

From:
[email protected]

To:
[email protected]

Re:
22.20 Premier Westward Railways train from London Paddington to Oxford, April 13. Amount of my day wasted: 0 minutes. Fellow sufferers: Overkeen Estate Agent.

Shock! Awe! Shock and awe! And also – blimey! It seems I got it all wrong. It seems that someone is doing something good. It seems that someone might be saved after all.

Even what’s left of the foreign desk were amazed. Even they didn’t see this one coming. (Harry the Dog’s not there anymore of course – all those arrested the other night have not been allowed back to work. They’re suspended until the police investigation is concluded. However long that takes. And so we are a skeleton staff, working on laptops: the biggest newspaper in the world reduced to resources that would embarrass most student publications. But he’s OK, anyway. I spoke to him yesterday: he’s sitting at home watching
Antiques Hunt
and
A Place In The Country
. He doesn’t seem bothered, either way. I’ve not been able to get hold of Wee Tim’rous Trainee, though. Seems nobody has. Seems she just isn’t answering her phone any more.)

Anyway. Were you as amazed as we were? A full-scale attack! A massive bombing raid! Missiles screaming out of the blue! War in North Africa! And this time, the good guys are involved. This time, for once, somebody’s doing the right thing. This time, for once, NATO and the UN have finally shown just what it is they’re about, what they can do, what they’re supposed to be there for.

I’ve got to say, Martin, it was rather brilliantly done. Calling the head honcho over to New York like that, summoning him, in his aviator shades and all, to address the leaders of the free world, letting him think it was to welcome him into the fold… and then arresting him. For war crimes. And then launching a full-scale, coordinated, meticulously planned, fully thought-through and entirely top-secret attack on his newly won positions in North Africa.

Amazing. Like I say: amazing. Amazeballs. Shocking. Awesome.

Is it legal? Oh, who cares? There were no referendums, Parliament was not consulted, there were no debates and public deliberations. They just thought it up themselves, decided it themselves and then did it. And that’s fine by me. That’s what they’re there for – and finally, they’ve done something good, something worth the name.

So: today, the arrest, the air assault. And, we learn, armadas heading that way too. Artillery, tanks, ground and sea support. A full-scale invasion in the offing.

Oh – and you know what else? This train isn’t even delayed! Isn’t that a scream? I started writing because I just assumed it would be, for some reason, and here we are chuffing into Oxford bang on schedule! Even Overkeen Estate Agent seems surprised (‘Gotta 86 this convo, captain,’ he said just now. ‘Seems we’re running on time for once. But let’s diarise some face-time and do this skin-to-skin? Wicked. Legendary.’)

So – sorry about the unnecessary letter! But you know what? You owe me anyway, right? Those other times when I was too drunk or too upset to give you as many words as I should have? Consider this a payment. Settling the score. Until next time.

And in the meantime… News 24 beckons!

Au revoir
!

Dan

From:
[email protected]

To:
[email protected]

Re:
22.20 Premier Westward Railways train from London Paddington to Oxford, April 14. Amount of my day wasted: nine minutes. Fellow sufferers: No regulars – Saturday…

Ah, there we go. Didn’t have to wait long, did we? Twenty-four hours, that’s all it took.

Twenty-four hours. I’ve been thinking about time. About what time does. What it does to us, I mean. Time the healer, time the ravager.

This time last year Beth and I were in what we called ‘the tunnel’. Beth and Sylvie and I: our little nuclear family, in our little house in Oxford together, happy. Exhausted, of course. Frantic with exhaustion. Frazzled. Kept awake all night and sleepwalking through the day. Unable to go longer than five minutes without checking Sylvie again, making sure she’s all right, making sure she’s still breathing, making sure she’s still there. In the tunnel.

Do you remember the tunnel, Martin? Those first six weeks or so after the birth when everything’s blurred and yet hyperfocused, when you basically live on the sofa and the telly’s on 24-hours a day, when you eat what and when you can, bolting it down as quickly as possible, in between bouts of feeding and nappy changes and pacing the living room, up and down, down and up, shushing and cooing and pleading for sleep. We called it the tunnel, because it felt like we were living in a tunnel, emerging from our house once every few days or so for more supplies, blinking and squinting at the sky, the fresh air.

The tunnel. So difficult and yet, so amazing.

I remember the tiredness, most of all. The tiredness and the happiness. The 24-hour exhaustion and the almost-permanent euphoria. I remember the moment I worked out the trick to get Sylvie to sleep – at about five in the morning, it was. After trying literally every idea in every book we could find, I swapped the nursery rhymes and Mozart CDs and sound effects (waterfalls, rain, heartbeat, etc) for one of my old-school trance albums. I mean, proper, tripped-out, arms-in-the-air, processed beats stuff. Dutch, too, I think. Dutch nosebleed techno. I have no idea why I still even own it. And you know what happened? The moment it came on, Sylvie closed her eyes and fell asleep. The hypnotic rhythms, the driving, relentless, repetitiveness of it… her little face relaxed and she drifted off. Amazing. That trick lasted a full fortnight and although the neighbours probably didn’t appreciate it, I’ve never felt happier about any piece of music in my life.

So, that’s where I was a year ago. In the tunnel. And, of course, six weeks later, with a little help from old-school Amsterdam trance music, there was, as there is with all tunnels, a light at the end of it. That’s the thing with tunnels: there’s always a light at the end of them. No matter how long, how dark, there’s always a light at the end of the tunnel.

This time last year I was still just a junior reporter on the showbiz desk, recycling press releases and handing over all my tips to others. I was getting stories (I had contacts all right) but by the time they ended up in the paper they rarely had my name on them. I was barely getting bylines. This time last year the
Globe
was only just beginning to get touched by scandal. It was still the biggest newspaper in the world, capable of toppling Premiers and crushing any who dared cross it.

This time last year I could never have dreamed this is where I’d be right now. Beth gone. Sylvie gone. And showbiz editor of the paper as it enters its death throes.

We got a paper out tonight. Unbelievably, with our student rag set-up, our laptops and cheap mobiles, our almost complete lack of original stories and pitiful excuses for scoops, with our skeleton staff and no access to our own archives… we got a paper out. I suppose that’s an achievement in itself, but really: it’s hardly worth it. I wouldn’t bother buying it tomorrow, if I were you. Unless it’s just for curiosity’s sake.

And you know what else? It was this time last year I started writing to your customer complaints department. They never did write back. Did I ever tell you that, Martin? Your customer complaints department – they never wrote back to explain the delays on my trains this time last year. You might want to have a word with someone about that, eh?

Au revoir
!

Dan

From:
[email protected]

To:
[email protected]

Re:
20.20 Premier Westward Railways train from London Paddington to Oxford, April 17. Amount of my day wasted: eight minutes. Fellow sufferer: Sauron Flesh Harrower.

Here we are again, Martin. We’ve had quite a run, recently. We’ve been averaging three delays a week. What’s happening? Taken your eye off the ball? Taken your foot off the gas? Or are you just giving up? Have you taken a good long look at the situation, decided it’s hopeless and stopped even trying to do anything about it?

Hey, guess what? I’m a little tipsy (obvs) – but then, I kind of feel I deserve it. And after all the nonsense and despair of the last few weeks, I’m drinking (for once) because, believe it or not, I’m in a good mood. Some things have gone right, for once!

I was offered a job today. I think. Well, no, I’m sure, actually. I got a call, on my new mobile (my first question, as it always is these days, was ‘How did you get my number?’ The answer: ‘You tell me. How would you have got your number?’ I liked them for that. It was a good answer). The call was from a PR company. The top PR company, as it happens. The one who looks after the interests of the cream of the country’s celebrities, the proper A-listers, the sort of people so rich, so famous, they don’t need to pay for anything, they don’t need to do anything… and anything they do is deemed newsworthy.

They want to talk to me. They’ve followed my career this past year with interest, they say. They want to have me in for a chat. Because there’s a position. A senior position. They need someone to – and this bit wasn’t actually said explicitly, but it was implied heavily enough for anyone but an idiot to pick it up – control the press. To make sure that bad news is buried and good news makes the front pages. They need someone to head up that particular department: the ‘media management’ department. And I’ve been a journalist long enough, I’ve had enough battles with PR companies, to know exactly what media management means.

But then, why not? They are the top dogs. And they’ve been following me with interest! They’ve been keeping an eye on my career, watching my rise through the paper. They want me – and they want me in a senior position! On serious money!

It’s worth a chat, right? It’s not journalism – it’s kind of the opposite, to be fair, it’s a sort of anti-journalism – but then so what? They want me! I’m flattered, Martin. They’ve made me an offer it’s very hard to refuse.

There is one slight drawback. Because do you know who one of their major clients is? Whose interests they look after?

Yep, got it in one.

And could I bring myself to suppress stories on our famous friend? Could I swallow my pride and promote his supposed good works, place pieces about his heart-warming quirks and his charming eccentricities? Could I?

I’ll think it over.

But anyway, even that isn’t what’s staving off the black dog today. There’s something else, something apart from work, something away from the rest of the world. I spoke to Beth at the weekend.

And I mean ‘spoke’, too. There was no shouting, no crying; there were no accusations or recriminations, or resentment or anger. We just spoke. Like two grown-ups. Not exactly like man and wife, not yet… but not like two people who hate each other either. We spoke for about half an hour, after she’d put Sylvie to bed. And when I hung up I realised I was smiling.