Chapter5
Sunny
Ithrew my notepad down on the green leather bench of the House of Commons press gallery in disgust. I had arrived way too early for Prime Minister’s Questions. But, like a condemned man shouting at the executioner to bloody get on with it, I just wanted the whole event to be over with. I flopped down onto the bench, sending my notepad somersaulting into the air and onto the floor. The long, padded benches in the House, including the one in the press gallery, had been designed by a useless knobber. Every time you sat down, it sent a wave of air billowing along the length of them. I picked up my notepad and put it on the narrow benchtop desk that reporters had been writing at for nearly two centuries.
The press gallery sits high above the heads of the MPs, up in the rafters with the bats, the cobwebs, and the ghost of Margaret Thatcher. David Cameron, when he was prime minister, once said the Palace of Westminster reminded him of school, which tells you everything you need to know both about him and about what’s wrong with this place. My school had to close the playground because they found asbestos in the sandpit and had no money to remove it. Cameron’s school looked like Hogwarts. There was a stink of privilege on a good two-thirds of the MPs. On the other hand, the leader of the opposition was a single mother from Stockport with a mouth like a dockworker and a right hook to match, so there were at least a few top sorts knocking around who understood real people.
The hum of activity in the House of Commons was starting to grow. Members were finding their places ahead of the prime minister’s arrival. The leader of the opposition had taken her seat. I scanned the government front bench. Bob Wynn-Jones, the energy secretary—very much the man of the hour—was nowhere to be seen. If he was smart, he was making himself scarce. My phone vibrated.
Davinder has renamed your group Otter Rewilding.
Our group chat had been called “The Brent Boys” for months, mostly on account of us all living in the London Borough of Brent. But, also, because one of Petey’s one-night stands had mistaken their exchange of body fluids for a commercial transaction and had left £200 on the bedside table on his way out the door. That led to both Petey and Jumaane seriously considering trying their hands (and the rest of themselves) at sex work. The dots danced on my screen until a message flashed up.
Davinder:Otters of Brent, we must rewild. You are hereby summoned to a boys’ night out this Friday.
The messages began to flow into the chat.
Petey Boy:Gassed for it!!!
Jumaane:Yaaaaaasssssss! Agenda?
Davinder:Drag at the Duncan then Hades for dancing?
Stavros:Can we legally call ourselves otters when Sunny doesn’t have a single hair on his chest and you’ve invited Jumaane, who is bald from the eyebrows down?
Jumaane:Rude.
Davinder:You’re the one with the law degree, Stav. You tell us.
Stavros:Jumanji,I’m concerned you might have violated the Trades Descriptions Act 1968. For legal reasons, exactly how bald is your bussy?
Jumaane:No one likes finding hair in their food, Stavros.
Petey Boy:Mad disagree! A hairy bum is bare peng, Jumanji.
Petey, for some reason unbeknown to any of us, sometimes liked to talk like a London roadman. He grew up in a detached house in middle-class Pinner and worked as a producer at Channel Three, but something short-circuited in his brain when he moved into a share house in Stonebridge. He was like one of those people who woke up from a head injury to find they suddenly drawled their vowels like a heavily intoxicated Texan.
Davinder:This is not merely a social gathering. Our first order of business is finding everyone a husband!
Dav was the only one of the five of us who actuallyhada boyfriend. He had been with Nick, a radio DJ, since the second year of uni. Apparently, this meant he had a lot of time to dedicate to finding boyfriends for the rest of us.
Sunny:Does Nick know you’re looking to upgrade?
Davinder:Not a husband for me, husbands for you loveless saddos.
Stavros:Give Nick my number anyway. Nick is hot.
Petey Boy:Def. Nick is FIT!
Nick:Nick is here, by the way.
I was just typing my own appreciation for the hotness of my best friend’s boyfriend when some absolute knobber plonked themselves down heavily on the bench beside me. The impact sent a burst of air rippling through the leather padding, lifting my bum several inches off the seat. The shock of it loosened my grip on my phone, sending it flying out of my hands. My phone arced through the air and over the carved wooden barrier and went sailing down into the chamber. It was one of those moments where time slowed down, yet I could not react quickly enough to avoid disaster—like those dreams where you’re trying to run but your legs are leaden and you can’t move, even though Piers Morgan is right behind you.
“No, no, no, no,no!” I said, too loudly. I jumped to my feet and looked down in time to see my phone slap hard against the besuited and athletic chest of Vladimir Popov—the government chief whip and a notorious sadomasochist. I was a dead man walking. Popov looked down at my phone, now on the ground. It was in one piece, but that was little comfort. The chief whip’s head turned skywards. His steely gaze locked onto me.
“Sorry!” I mouthed, my hands clutching the sides of my face in a gesture of supplication and apology that suggested if he wanted me to snap my own neck right now, I’d be happy to do so. Popov bent down and picked up my phone. The screen, I noticed, was still unlocked. Popov began scrolling through the messages.
“Oh, that’s not good,” a voice said beside me, as if reading my mind. I turned. In my panic, I hadn’t even checked to see who it was who had just ruined my life. I was greeted by a disobedient mop of dark curls. It was that excitable puppet off the telly. It was Ludo Boche. This overprivileged bellend was haunting my day like the Ghost of Journalism Past. He’d already ruined my morning twice, and now he’d returned to have a crack at my afternoon.
