Staying Alive. Matt Beaumont

tumescent, throbbing tumours.

      I need to get home. Now.

      I see a taxi—a rare sight in Docklands at this time of day. A rare sight at any time of day. Docklands is placed next to Papua New Guinea in the cabdriver’s atlas. I stick my arm out. Barely slowing, the taxi swings through a dizzying U-turn and pulls up in front of me. The driver’s window slides down and a cheery voice calls out, ‘Where to, chief?’

      ‘South Woo—’

      The rest of the word comes out as a stream of vomit that pebble-dashes the Rimmel poster on the cab door—it looks as if Kate Moss has suddenly quit extolling longer, lusher lashes in favour of drawing attention to the horror of eating disorders.

      ‘Drunken fucker,’ the cabby shouts as he accelerates away.

       I wish—I truly, truly wish.

       nine: i said run!

      thursday 20 november / 11.04 p.m.

      What am I doing here?

      It’s barely an hour since I gave the taxi a spray job. Here is nowhere near South Woodford. Here is Barnsbury Square, Islington. I have no idea which house they live in, but it’s surely close. I start in the northeast corner and set off. Halfway round I spot the Bentley. I can’t be far away. Resisting the urge to give the car a good kicking, I look at the houses. They’re only terraces—albeit nice, big terraces—but each one must be worth over a million. I walk along the iron railings that separate them from the pavement and peer down into the basement wells. Most of the windows are shuttered, but light pours out of one—shining like an irresistible come on. I stop and look inside. A couple sits at a rustic pine table. In front of them are half-empty glasses and dirty plates decorated with scraps of rocket, Parmesan shavings and smears of glossy, dark brown sauce.

      I look at the couple. He’s thirty-ish, deliberately unshaven. A chunk of surgical steel glints in his eyebrow, paint splatters his jeans. A decorator? Eating rocket in Barnsbury Square? More likely he spends his working days in a barn-like studio off Old Street roundabout which he shares with canvases and objets trouvés—AKA shit from skips according to Brett, who’s something of an art critic. She’s long and angular in a way that a scout from Storm would describe as momentous before booking her on the next flight to Milan. Her hand is on his leg and they’re laughing.

       I remember that. Laughing. With Megan. Her hand resting casually on my thigh.

       Jesus, what the hell am I doing here?

      Did I really think I’d see her and him through an un-curtained window? And even if I did, what was I proposing to do? Ring on the doorbell and invite myself in for coffee? Slip a burning, petrol-soaked rag through the letterbox? I should have known that the journey would leave me feeling embittered, not to mention bitterly cold—it’s mid-November and all I’m wearing is a flimsy suit.

      I half turn to walk back the way I came, but before I can take a step, a second woman comes into view. I only catch her as a blur out of the corner of my eye, but in our five years, eight months, one week and three days together her every molecule was processed and stored in my head so that—however brief the glimpse and obscure the angle—she’s instantly recognisable.

      I turn back and look at Megan. She’s putting a fresh bottle of wine on the dining table. She’s laughing, too, sharing in the hilarity with the artist and the model. He isn’t far behind her. His arms reach around her waist as she refills the wineglasses.

      Sandy sodding Morrison.

      Queen’s bastard Counsel.

      I try desperately to recall the last time that Megan and I had friends round for dinner. Did we rustle up something with Parmesan and wilted rocket? Was there wine, marinated olives and lashings of laughter? Did we ever invite anyone to dinner at all? Because right now I honestly can’t remember doing so. Not once.

      My tears make her appear in soft-focus and, therefore, more perfectly beautiful than ever. Silently I plead with her to look up and see me. She doesn’t, though, and as my hysteria subsides I’m glad. She surely thinks little enough of me as it is. I don’t need her to add pathetic stalker to my list of failings. I turn again and this time I stride purposefully away.

      But I stop when I reach the Bentley. I don’t know why, but I peer inside. He’s a scruffy git. One hundred and seventy grand spent on the car and he treats it like a dustbin. The ashtray is overflowing and belongings cover the seats and floor. My car is spotless. OK, it doesn’t happen to…you know…go, but you won’t find so much as a sweet wrapper in the ashtray. How can Megan live with such a slob? I know my…er…orderly nature irritated her towards the end, but did she really have to rush so madly to the other extreme? It’s like…I don’t know…Brad Pitt, for example, dumping Jennifer Aniston and going out with a really fat girl with dull, lifeless hair. Like he’s got a point to make and he wants to rub it in his skinny, glossy-maned ex’s face. I bet Jen would be cut to the quick and, well, I’d be totally with her.

      My eyes tour the car’s interior. I can see old newspapers (the Guardian of course), exhausted fag packets, a bag of Murray Mints ( Murray Mints—way too Freudian), a fat, dog-eared law book and…a white, lacy bra. It’s there on the back seat next to a crumpled pair of 501s, three soppy compilation CDs and a few snaps of Megan and me frolicking on a beach in Kos.

      She made such a fuss about coming to pick up the last of her things—‘ You know how I’ve got to have all my stuff around me’—yet now it’s obvious that she didn’t really want them; she simply didn’t want them to be anywhere near me. The realisation hurts me almost as much as ‘Murray, I’ve…I’ve met someone.’

      I can’t take this. I’m about to walk away for good, but something else catches my eye—a small rectangular box in the rear foot-well. Though most of it is hidden beneath the driver’s seat, I can make out the glint of the elegant gold lettering stamped into its lid. I can’t actually read it in this light, but I know what it says: J.P. STEIN OF HATTON GARDEN.

      So she never found the ring. It must have jostled out of the carton along with her other things and it has lain on the floor ever since. This new knowledge takes some of the edge off my hurt—at least she and Sandy haven’t been holding the sparkler up to the light, admiring its exquisite ( J.P. Stein’s adjective) cut and laughing at the sad, clingy mug that bought it.

      But I need the ring back. I’ve had two letters from Barclaycard threatening to turf me into the bottomless pit of credit-card hell if I don’t cough up. The summons can’t be far away. Jesus, yes, I need it. I stand back from the car and consider my options. They’re limited. I could return to the house, knock on the door and say something like, ‘Hi there, Sandy. Look, I know it’s a bit late and I live several miles from here, but I just happened to be passing and—loved you on Question Time, by the way. Terrific point you made about electoral reform. Anyway, as I was saying, I was just passing and I remembered that thing in the Guardian about the asylum seekers’ centre. Really good that you’re taking a stand. You haven’t got a petition to sign or something?’ Then, when he disappears to find it, I nip into the hall and grab the car keys that just happen to be lying on the table…

      I don’t think so.

      Which leaves only one course of action and I feel my heart race at the prospect.

       Come on, you can do this. How many times have you watched those Police, Camera, You’re Nicked You Recidivist Twat shows and seen cocky little twelve-year-olds do it on CCTV? Piece of piss.

      I glance up and down the street for late-night dog walkers or—far less likely these days—coppers. No one. I’m alone.

      But I can’t do this.