Twenty Something (10 page)

Now, I'm aware that there are a number of different ways of dealing with such a set of circumstances. The most logical course of action would be to book a doctor's appointment straight away. The GP would probably tell me to stop being a hypochondriac and go home. Or, worst-case scenario, he'd carry out a series of tests, diagnose me with testicular cancer and send me in for an inguinal orchidectomy (aka chopping off the offending bollock). If that didn't work, he'd zap me with a spot of radiotherapy followed by chemo, which would at least give me an excuse for going bald. It might be a long, drawn-out battle but I would almost certainly survive. Testicular cancer is nearly always curable if found early.

The other course of action would be to ignore all the symptoms in the hope that they'll go away again.

I choose the second option.

The final straw to break Jack's back.

Buddy and Leila came round to my desk together and asked me out for lunch. I'd been studiously ignoring them both since Monday. This looked ominous.

But Leila looked radiantly happy; she had that luminescent beautiful air which girls only have when they're in love.

‘Jack,' gushed Leila, ‘I thought you should be the first to know that Buddy and I have got together. Thank you so much.'

Smash all the clocks. Piss on the pianos. Shoot the bloody dog with his bone.

‘Wow. That's, er, great. But why are you thanking me? I thought you were annoyed with me.'

‘Oh, not at all, Jacko, boy,' said Buddy. There was a look of pity in his eyes as he took me in. ‘Much better for us to have found out for ourselves.'

‘Yes,' chipped in Leila. ‘And if it hadn't been for your April Fools' joke, it could have taken us ages to find out how the other one felt.'

The illogical little filly. If I'd really wanted to help out, I wouldn't have lied to them both when entrusted with my Cupid mission. Women really are a conundrum. But unlike ‘Jimmy the barber shaves all the men on Anglesey, except for those who shave themselves. Who shaves Jimmy?', women are at least a conundrum with breasts.

Office love, it would seem, forgives all.

Buddy's hand was on Leila's thigh. How bloody dare he. That was private property. No trespassing. I love her as much as I hate Buddy. There is no doubt about it: I
have
to leave this office now.

‘Fred, I was on the BBC website again at work yesterday, and I started looking at their “On This Day” page. And you know what I found out this time?'

‘No, do tell.'

‘Well, on 9th April 2003 Saddam Hussein's statue was toppled in Iraq. On 9th April 1999 the President of Niger, a certain Ibrahim Bare Mainassara, was shot dead in a coup attempt. And I suddenly realised that, yet again, yesterday, I, Jack Lancaster, got up at 6.45am on a Saturday to go to work, showered, shat, shaved, read my book on the tube and spent twelve hours staring into space at a highly paid job that I hate.'

‘Yeah, not much has changed, has it?' said Fred.

He paused before adding, ‘Although you aren't having as much sex as you used to.'

‘Thanks. I mean, for many of the five billion human beings with whom we share this little in-joke of existence, Saturday 9th April will have been a memorable day. Thousands will have got married, had their first child or paid off their mortgages. Others will have won the lottery, visited long-lost friends or run over the cat. Relationships will have stopped and started, grandchildren born, dogs died, wars waged, deals struck, enemies made, friends lost, parents divorced. Someone, somewhere, has just this second had their first unforgettable orgasm.'

I paused, waiting for Flatmate Fred to grasp the significance of what I was saying.

‘Jack, you really are having a midlife crisis.'

‘Can we call it a quarter-life crisis at least?' I protested.

‘Sure,' he continued. ‘But crisis away. Get it out of your system. You're young and liberated. Do young and liberated things before you're too embarrassingly old to do them any more. Make love to two women at once. Nose-hoover Peruvian
narcotics off an ice ledge. Run naked through flowered fields. Stand in the middle of a chapel and scream. Live the dream.'

‘Right.'

‘I mean, there's nothing sadder than a middle-aged man with a sports car and a comb-over, combing the streets for his lost youth.'

‘Indeed. But what exactly do you have in mind? Specifically, I mean.'

‘In your case, I'd recommend trying to get sacked from work, followed by a few weeks of heavy, debauched partying, followed by an attempt to work out what your purpose in life is.'

Flatmate Fred's a genius. That's exactly what I'll do.

Day one of trying to lose my job. Of course, I could do this the boring way and hand in a resignation letter like everyone else. But where's the fun in that? Or I could do one outrageous act — such as getting naked on my desk and dancing the Macarena with my pants over my head — which would lead to instant dismissal. But that's far too easy.

So I plan on waging a long-term war of attrition. Stage by stage I will wear the bastards down. My trench is dug and I'm coming over the top.

I started my campaign by sending an email to Buddy with every swear word I could think of spelled out in full. I'd rather not repeat the torrent of bile and invective in my diary, but the essential gist was as follows:

‘Dear Buddy (you canine copulator), I think you're a bit of a wally. Perhaps you'd like to go back to the States at some point and leave us all in peace. Jack.'

Except that, in the course of the email I managed to use thirty-five of the forty-two words which are banned by our IT department. I always wished I'd been at the meeting where that list was drawn up:

‘Derek?'

‘Yes, Martin.'

‘Can you close the door, please. This is a bit of a sensitive topic, I'm afraid.'

‘Oh sure, Derek. All very hush-hush, need-to-know basis.'

‘Exactly. Right, Trevor. Why don't you blue-sky-think this one.'

‘Sure, Martin. So far I've got “shit”, “cock”, “twat”, “nob”, “dick”.'

Nervous cough.

‘Yes, Richard. Do you have something to say?'

‘Well, yes, Martin. It's just that if we ban the word “dick”, some of my emails aren't going to get through. A lot of my friends call me Dick.'

‘Good point, Richard. I can see we're going to have to think out of the box on this one.'

Etc., etc.

My email to Buddy pinged straight back, which means he never got to read it. IT have reported me to my managing director and I am in big sh*t. Excellent. The fact that I'm dying from a lump in my bollock aside, I haven't felt this good for ages.

Big sh*t.

Rupert (bald) asked me to step into his office just after lunch.

‘Wotcha, Jack.' He punched me playfully on the arm. ‘I see your hair's still receding.'

‘Yes, Rupert, it is. One day, if the gods continue to smile on me, I'm going to be as handsome as you.'

‘Maybe, Jack, maybe. God knows, you've already got a pretty handsome vocabulary. What was going through your mind when you sent that email?'

I could have handled a dressing-down from Rupert (bald). He's early thirties, unmarried and a bit of a prat. He talks
incessantly about girls but never has one. He thinks he's still twenty-three. He's a warning to us all of how we might turn out. But he means well.

But I hadn't counted on Mr Cox joining our little discussion. I'm not sure that Mr Cox has a Christian name. He's just Mr Cox. His wife probably calls him Mr Cox. He's mid-fifties, the overall managing director for both Rupert (bald) and me, and one of the top five scariest people in the world. He came into the office, shut the door behind him and eased his pince-nez down his beak of a nose.

I'm ashamed to say I had to lock my knees together to stop them shaking.

‘Jack Lancaster, through sins of both omission and commission, it has been a little while since I, open brackets, your managing director, close brackets, have had a tête-à-tête, that is to say a head-to-head, with you.'

‘Yes, Mr Cox.'

Mr Cox hitched up his red braces and smoothed down his shiny parting.

‘And, PS, Jack,
post scriptum,
it would be untruthful of me, in my capacity as your professional and moral mentor, to pretend that this is not a bad state of affairs. PPS, to put it more simply, I am not unconcerned by your recent behaviour —
id est
, I am rather concerned.'

‘Yes, Mr Cox?'

‘
Exempli gratia, inter alia
, your electronic communication with young Mr Wilton-Steer. Pray, which unusual cognitive processes led you to conclude that this might not be an unreasonable course of action?'

I couldn't think of any reasonable answer to give this walking Cicero. So I was scared into telling the truth.

‘Love, Mr Cox, love.'

‘Love, Jack, love? Would it not be incorrect for me to conclude
a priori
that you are emotionally attached to Mr Wilton-Steer? The love that dare not speak its name?'

How do you disagree with a double negative?

‘Yes, Mr Cox. I mean, no, Mr Cox. I'm in love with Leila. Buddy stole her off me.'

‘
O tempora, o mores!
Leila Sid-day-bot-tome?'

I stifled a giggle.

‘Yes, Leila Sidebottom.'

Mr Cox glared at me down his pince-nez.

‘Young man, I will not be corrected on my pronunciation by someone with a vocabulary as vulgar as yours. This is your final warning. You are not here to fall in love. You are not here to embark on courtships
in situ
. I do not pay you for your abusive electronic communications. I pay you to maximise value for our shareholders. Be so good as to leave my presence and do that now.
Mutatis mutandis
, you might make a respectable banker one day.'

‘Yes, Mr Cox. I do hope so.'

Cunnus maximus.

First boys' night out in over a month. Buddy wasn't invited (for obvious reasons), but it was the first time that the core four of us had been together since the disastrous game of ‘I have never'.

Rick and Jasper joined Flatmate Fred and me, and we drank ten beers each before getting changed and going to School Disco at the Hammersmith Palais. I've never felt that easy about the whole schoolgirl erotica thing. It strikes me as slightly odd that a society that is so vigilant about paedophilia can actively promote school uniform as saucy attire.

Slightly odd. But who cares? Twentysomethings look great in short pleated skirts and white shirts. Hell, when you're wearing your ten-pint beer goggles, fortysomethings look great in short skirts.

Which is lucky, because the Palais (and what a palace it is)
was full of middle-aged secretaries on hen nights. It's enough to make you feel proud to be British. Ageing Italians don't dress up like slags and go on the pull. Arab women don't behave in such a debauched fashion.

Fortunately, we found a corner with some younger-looking slags and we were soon gyrating away merrily to S Club 7. I felt a hand on my trousers and a tongue in my ear.

‘Take me back to yours.'

She was fit, or at least she acted fit. It would have been rude not to. Jasper and Flatmate Fred, who were dancing either side of another girl, gave me a big thumbs-up. Rick waved from the bar where he was ordering Smirnoff Ices and chatting up the cross-dressing barmaid.

So I did the honourable thing, took her back to mine and took her to heaven and back five times before sunrise. It was even better than sex with Lucy, because there was no gulf between what it was supposed to mean and what it actually meant. It was raw and it was inevitable and it was very, very good.

I recall one particular highlight when she put a finger up my bum.

‘Don't touch me there Oh touch me there Touch me there.'

Spring is in the air, and I am one frolicking, randy ram.

I am no expert at one-night stands — in fact, this was my first since university — so I had no idea of the etiquette the next morning. Was I meant to wake her up and sleep with her again? Did she expect a cuddle? Did she want breakfast? Could I walk around my own room naked? Were we meant to go to a Sunday-morning church service together? And why was my school tie knotted around the bedpost?

So many meaningless questions and only one really counted: what the hell was she called?

She was still asleep, so I had a rummage in her handbag, which was lying by my bed. I fished out a credit card — ‘Miss P. M. Gilmour'.
Oh shit-sticks
. Was it Polly? I was pretty sure she was a Polly. She looked like a Polly. Definitely not a Penelope. Or was she Pam? What if she was called by her second initial? Mandy, Marian, Mary? She was hardly the virgin Mary. Miss P. M. Gilmour. I couldn't call her Miss Gilmour.

‘What are you doing in my handbag?'

Polly/Marian had woken up and wasn't looking very happy.

‘Oh. Sorry. I was just being nosy,' I stammered.

‘You can't remember my name, can you, Jack Lancaster?'

‘No, don't be silly. Of course I can remember your name.'

‘Well, what is it then, Jack Lancaster?'

‘Er, Miss Gilmour?'

At which point Rick, Flatmate Fred and Jasper all charged into my room singing ‘Build Me Up Buttercup' and tried to give me a wedgie.

Miss P. M. Gilmour gathered up her tattered dignity and her school uniform and ran outside.

‘Polly, Polly, I'm sorry. come back.' I ran after her.

Miss P. M. Gilmour put her head round the corner and said in a voice loud enough for everyone to hear, ‘Jack, it's Prudence. And, by the way, you've got a small cock and you're crap in bed.'