Do you ever feel trapped? Like you’re walking around wearing someone else’s life, as if they swapped it like a second-hand coat when you weren’t paying attention? Like it looks the same but doesn’t fit properly?
My throat is tight, dry. Because isn’t that exactly how I feel right now? Sitting in a laundrette, so far away from the life that I should be living. It strikes me now how familiar his words feel. I’ve never met Michael, and yet it feels like I’m hearing from a friend I’ve known all my life, as though he’s here, sitting beside me.
I keep replaying the night we met, how I felt like I already knew you, how I felt the most me that I’ve felt in a long time.
I didn’t say it at the time, but you know when you turned all the vinegar bottles forward facing? I do that too, with my art stuff.
I smile at that. We have so many things in common.
I don’t know why I didn’t say that to you at the time, that I loved how you try to organise the chaos, just like me. Maybe I should use it next time I have a job interview?Hi, I’m Michael, expert bottle organiser.Mind you it’s better than what I said last time…I play a mean hand of dominoes and hate cold baked beans.
I guess what I’m trying to say when I’m not babbling about bloody baked beans, is that sometimes it feels hard to share things about myself. It’s just habit now. Keeping my cards close to my chest. Blokes like me aren’t artists. They graft. They go to the pub, they get married, have kids, live in thesame estate. It’s been the same around here since the turn of the century. Is it wrong to want something more?
I blink fast. I can hear his voice so clearly, almost see dark hair falling over his eyes as he writes… or maybe my mind is just Jon Snowing him – he could be bald for all I know. And given how long ago this was written, he probably is. The rain lashes against the window, headlights lighting up the grey street, puddles being splashed against the now almost empty street outside. The sound of the machines becomes more weighted, louder. The way he writes has got to be genuine; nobody fakes this kind of ache for something more.
Don’t get me wrong, I’ve tried to make a living out of my art. I got a few gigs a while ago, did a few album covers for a local band, Concrete Fingers… They were U2 wannabes, they even had names like The Line, Robbo, you get the gist.
Concrete Fingers. This is something, well, concrete, isn’t it? I reach for my phone to Google them, but in my haste, I realise I’ve left my phone on the bedside cabinet. I’ll look them up when I get back.
They got quite a name around here, but the height of their success was blowing the electrics down the pub during old Billy Martin’s wake. Mam reckons it was a sign from God; I reckon it was a sign that the landlord should stop trying to siphon leccy from the bank next door, but that’s another story.
I laugh, the sound too loud for the empty room. A car horn blasts from outside. I turn and look, surprised at the smile that is stretching across my face in the reflection. He’s funny in a wry, sardonic way. Christ, do I have a type. I shake my head and trynot to get too comfortable while I carry on reading. Despite the storm outside, I feel like I’m cocooned in here, warm, safe, lost in a world away from my own problems.
It wasn’t all bad news though, they got their names in the local rag, along with the album cover so you know, all publicity is good publicity, right? I got a few more local bands asking me to design their covers after that.
Remember the mural we passed, next to the hairdressers? Aye, that was mine too. My best work pretty much covered by posters advertising Smash. Maybe one day in the future, someone will peel off the posters and claim it’s a bona fide work of art. Until then though, it’s For Mash Get Smash. (You get bonus points if you read that with a robotic voice.)
I have no idea what that means but it’s another thing I can check when I get back. My body is humming with questions, the electric purr of the washing machines echoing the rush of excitement that I’ve learnt to trust, the beginnings of a story, history waiting to be unpicked.
The tattoo shop down the road still uses some of my designs from time to time. So if you ever come back to Yorkshire and bump into someone with a tattoo of a name on a scroll, or a bulldog with a rose between his teeth, that’s probably my work. That last one was meant as a joke but turns out there is a market for rose-bearing bulldogs. Who knew? Tim slips me a few bob now and then if he uses one of my designs.
Kate still keeps telling me that my talent is wasted on Trippy Tim and his needles, and that I should go to that art college. But I reckon she’s just blowing smoke up my arse. Lads like me who have seen the pithead from their bedroomwindow since they were a nipper don’t go flouncing off to London art colleges, do they?
I look around the room for a pen and paper; I need to write down everything I can investigate. This letter is a goldmine of clues. I spot a pile of belongings sitting in a cardboard box. Lost property, I figure. I root around and pull out an eyeliner and an old receipt from Tesco. I scan the list and the date, and figure I’m safe to use it – the milk and ham would be a month out of date by now. I sit back down and start compiling a list, adding art college to the bottom. Then return to the letter.
Oh, I tried salad cream with a bag of chips today… You’re not wrong, although I’m not about to ditch tomato sauce just yet.
My hands drop, the edges of the paper resting on my knees.
The spin cycle clatters in time to the ringing in my ears. That’s weird, right? I don’t know anyone else who has salad cream with chippy chips. I shake my head. It’s just a coincidence. Nothing more. Still… I lift the letter and continue reading, ignoring the way goosebumps have just run along my arms.
Let me know how you’re getting on, and if you don’t want to keep getting letters from some random guy then no bother, just fire me your address so I can return the ring. No strings.
Michael.
I don’t know how long I’ve been sitting here, or how many times I’ve read Michael’s words before the list of facts starts tumbling over and over again.
This can’t all be coincidence. But what other explanation is there?
I read his words again. I force myself to be analytical, to take away the emotion, to concentrate on the facts. But the more I do, the more these coincidences start to look like something else entirely.
And know it doesn’t make any logical sense to do what I’m about to do, and the chances of him still living there are slim, but I’m going to do it anyway.
I’m going to write back.
10
MICHAEL
