The To-Do List (26 page)

       
I made sure that my first email to Susie was chirpy and not at all stalkerish:

Dear Susie,

It’s Mike Gayle here. I was a judge with you on the Book Awards. I was just wondering whether it would be okay to bring a couple of mates up to Leeds to watch
Countdown
being filmed. Hope you’re well!

Mike x

Dear Mike,

Do come to
Countdown
and bring some friends! Just let me know when you have in mind.

Hope you’re well.

Susie x

Great, I thought to myself, another tick. But then I realised I could kill two birds with one stone and follow up on a promise that I had made earlier in the year and before I knew it I was writing another email.

Dear Sam,

Remember how I said that now that we were friends again that we shouldn’t lose touch? Well me and Arthur and his bird are coming up to Leeds. How do you fancy meeting up and coming to see
Countdown
being filmed?

Less than a minute later I received the following reply:

Wahey! Do I ever! I love, love, love
Countdown
! Let me know the dates and I’ll book the day off work.

Sam x

So, suddenly it was on. Me, Arthur, Amy and Sam were heading over to Yorkshire TV to watch
Countdown
being filmed.

Sam looked well and happy and was overjoyed at seeing Arthur for the first time in a decade. I introduced her to Amy and they exchanged comments about how much they loved
Countdown
and how excited they were at the thought that they might get to meet the show’s main presenter, Des O’Connor.

       
We were all laughing and joking so much that we didn’t pay much attention to the huge coaches lined up on the double yellow lines outside the studios. Had we been paying attention we would have gleaned an early indication of our fellow audience: a sea of old people. One hundred and twenty of them covering every shape and size. There were tall old people and small old people. Old people in wheelchairs and old people on crutches. Old people who looked like old people versions of Hollywood stars (Danny De Vito, Will Smith and Nicole Kidman) and old people who looked as though they were seconds away from taking their last breath. All we could see was old people.

       
And then there was us. Four youngish-looking people dressed like students.

       
‘It’s like being in the nursing home in
Cocoon
,’ said Arthur. ‘I’d guessed that old people were into
Countdown
because my mum loves it but this is ridiculous.’

       
‘Do you think they’ll turn on us?’ grinned Amy. ‘You know, start a fight because we’re on their turf?’

       
‘They’ll be fine,’ I replied, ‘I’ve got an affinity with old people because like them I enjoy moaning, hate being cold and am partial to the occasional Werther’s Original.’

       
Realising that we were blocking the only door into the foyer and risked being tutted into oblivion we tried to make ourselves as inconspicuous as possible, a task not helped by Arthur gleefully taking photos of us against an octogenarian background.

       
After half an hour or so some trendy-looking twentysomethings wearing headset microphones and carrying clipboards appeared as if from nowhere and began their spiel about the dos and don’ts of watching
Countdown
. The old people ‘oooohhhed’ and ‘aaahhhed’ at all the right moments while Sam, Arthur, Amy and I looked on in a mealy-mouthed fashion as we tried to hide our resentment at no longer being the youngest people in the building.

       
The lead youngster-with-head-mic clapped his hands to get our attention.

       
‘Right, we’re going to go into the studio now so could we have anyone in a wheelchair or with a physical disability going in first, then the following guests: Mike Gayle, Arthur Tapp, Samantha Campbell-Midford and Amy Langham.’

       
If it had been a competition to find the best way to embarrass four thirtysomethings in front of a crowd of old age pensioners, the youngster-with-head-mic would have won hands down. As we joined the queue behind the extra elderly and infirm and ahead of people some forty years older than us, we could feel the eyes of every pensioner in the room boring into the back of our skulls, as they silently asked themselves, ‘What’s so special about that lot that they get to go in front of us? We fought world wars and made this nation great. All they’ve done is leech off the government, listened to loud rock music and taken drugs.’

       
It was the very definition of the walk of shame.

       
The stress and strain we had endured was worth it to see Arthur’s face light up when the production assistants handed him an official
Countdown
notepad and pen. We got to have our photos taken on the podium in front of the
Countdown
Conundrum. Even I was aware that we were standing on hallowed ground. All in all it was everything that we’d hoped would be.

It was just after eleven by the time Amy’s Fiat Punto pulled into my road. Climbing out of the car Arthur thanked me for sorting everything out.

       
‘You should get your own TV show called
Mike’ll Fix it
,’ said Arthur.

       
‘I’m already working on it.’

       
As I scrambled around in my bag for my front door keys and Amy beeped her car horn goodbye, I thought to myself that this was what the List was all about. Making things happen that wouldn’t have happened if I hadn’t pulled my finger out. My head suddenly flooded with things I was desperate to do. Heading inside I made my way upstairs and went to my desk to find the List and work out which particular item would make the most sense for me to do next but when I opened the drawer I was shocked to discover that it wasn’t there. I checked all the drawers, the top of my desk, my shelves, the bed, my bag and my coat but to no avail. Panicking, I turned the entire room upside down before acknowledging that somehow, somewhere, I’d lost the List.

PART SIX

September – The End

(During which I mostly try to fill the huge empty void caused by the absence of the List)

Chapter 23: ‘Learn to look after your things.’

As a child how many times had my mum told me to take better care of my things, otherwise I’d ‘live to regret it’? A hundred? A thousand? Probably more like ten thousand. And now here I was, alive and regretting it. Big time. And if my mother had been right about this, what else might she have been right about? Would my finger get stuck up my nose if I carried on picking it? Would I catch a cold if I went out in winter without a vest? Would I not feel the benefit if I kept my coat on indoors? And though these thoughts raised a small smile, it faded all too quickly once I recalled what had led to them in the first place. I went downstairs to enlist Claire’s help.

       
‘It’s got to be here somewhere,’ she reasoned. ‘You’re never without it. It’ll be in your office somewhere.’

       
‘I’ve already checked.’

       
‘But how well did you check? Remember that time when you were completely convinced that you’d lost that £500 that you’d taken out to pay the builder and how you got me and my mum to scour the streets for it while you turned the house upside down looking for it? Where was it in the end?’

       
‘On my desk.’

       
‘And was it even hidden under anything?’

       
‘No,’ I sighed. ‘It was just sort of sitting there.’

       
‘And what about the time we were supposed to be going out for an anniversary meal and you thought you’d lost the car keys somewhere between the car park and the restaurant? We spent the entire night walking backwards and forwards looking for them – with me in my heels! – and where were they in the end? Inside your suit jacket where you insisted you’d checked a million times. I couldn’t look at you for days without wanting to throttle you. See? There’s hope yet. More than likely it’s somewhere obvious just waiting to be found.’

       
‘Okay, you’ve made a pretty good point,’ I conceded, wondering why these things always happened to me. ‘I’ll check again.’

       
I spent until just after midnight going through my office, the bedrooms, the kitchen, the living room, the bathroom, the conservatory and even the cellar. I checked inside cupboards, toy boxes, the oven (even I thought that was a long shot); underneath beds, duvets, sofas, tables and small children. I went through the newspaper and magazine stack, my record collection, the food cupboards, our wardrobes and the drawer by the back door (noticing en route that it was fast on its way to becoming repopulated with takeaway menus). I then checked the roof area next to the skylights, the garden shed, the newsagents up the road, the lining of my black suit jacket, underneath the front wheel of the car, the bath, inside my printer’s paper drawer and between the pages of my copy of
War and Peace
. It wasn’t there.

       
Thoroughly dejected I returned to the bedroom where Claire was giving Maisie her midnight feed.

       
‘I can’t find it anywhere,’ I said flopping down on the end of the bed.

       
‘Didn’t you make a copy of it?’

       
‘Of course I didn’t,’ I snapped. ‘It was a handwritten To-Do List, why would I bother making a copy of it?’

       
Claire glared. ‘Well I can think of at least
one
good reason.’

       
‘I’m going to have to try to remember every single thing that was on the list aren’t I?’ This was going to be like that time that I’d deleted three weeks’ worth of work by accident and all anyone would say by way of sympathy was: ‘Ooh, you should have backed it up on one of those little memory stick things, shouldn’t you?’ I dropped my head into my hands. ‘It’ll take me weeks to remember and copy all that out again – weeks that I should be spending actually doing the List instead of trying to re-create it.’

       
‘Look, Mike, you’re being hysterical,’ said Claire. ‘You’re not thinking properly. Wherever it is it can’t be that far if you’re referring to it every five seconds. Now think: where is the last place that you can remember having it?’

       
‘I don’t know,’ I cried hopelessly.

       
‘Did you take it with you to Leeds?’

       
I shook my head. ‘There was no need.’

       
‘So it was something that you did before you headed off for
Countdown
?’

       
‘I did quite a few things in the days before I went to
Countdown
.’

       
‘Okay, well, in the morning take the last three and start there and see what happens.’

       
While I considered this advice, I sat watching Maisie have her feed. She looked so relaxed, so at peace with the world that I wondered what was the point of growing up if it’s only to find yourself thirty-six years old with a 1,277-item To-Do List. Maisie had nothing to do but finish her midnight snack and get back to the business of sleeping. An ideal world if ever there was one.

       
‘Fine,’ I said. ‘I’ll come to bed now and start retracing my steps in the morning.’

It was just after nine when I turned up on Danby’s doorstep.

       
‘You’ve lost your list?’

       
‘Exactly.’

       
‘So what are you doing here?’

       
‘Retracing my steps.’

       
The reason I’d started with Danby’s house was because the day before I headed off to Leeds Danby and I (from nine in the morning to five when his wife got back from work) were attempting to break a world record. Not any specific world record you understand but any world record able to be broken in a two-bedroom terrace in Kings Heath with the minimum amount of props or expenditure of cash.

       
Item 862: ‘Break a world record just to see if you can’, was on the To-Do List because there had always been a small part of me that suspected it wouldn’t be that hard to do as long as you applied yourself and chose a relatively straightforward record with which to do battle. Given its borderline silliness I had run this idea past Alexa, who reassured me that she had had various thoughts along similar lines. With the thumbs-up from the List’s official moral compass, I’d recruited Danby and divided the day into seven-hour-long ‘Record Breaking slots’ (with an hour off for lunch) and drew up a list of seven records to attempt. Despite a valiant effort on both our parts (especially when it came to catching stacks of coins from the end of our elbows and eating baked beans with cocktail sticks) we failed to get anywhere close to a world record, let alone breaking one.