The Importance of Being Seven (6 page)

Pat had lived for the last year or so in a student flat on the top floor of a Warrender Park tenement. Her room overlooked the Meadows,
and for this reason was the most sought-after bedroom in the flat. But it was not just the view that made it so attractive; it was the shape, which was perfectly circular, determined by the fact that the room nestled below one of the conical roof-towers gracing that eccentric piece of skyline. To live in a circular room, Pat felt, made one rather more interesting; after all, few of us knew people who lived in circular rooms, and there could be little doubt that the room in which one lived defined one in the eyes of others – to an extent.

The small community in which Pat lived – the four students who shared the flat in Warrender Park Terrace – had every bit as much a pecking order as any group of people will inevitably have. It was not a formally constituted pecking order – only a society with a fixed order of precedence will have such a thing formally laid out, and in no society will the official order of precedence represent the real order. So while Scotland has an order of precedence, it is never enforced and people may walk through doors in front of others who really should be allowed to go through the door before them. That, of course, is how things should be; who would wish to live in a society in which the order of walking through doors was something that anybody cared about? The important thing is that traffic through doors should flow freely, and that there should not be awkward moments when people hesitate, politely ushering another before them, who demurs, and invites the other to go before. Such a situation can result in small knots of people building up in front of a door, with very little through traffic.

The answer, of course, is a system based on common courtesy and consideration, mixed with a measure of sheer practicality. In general, women should be invited to precede men, not because this in any way endorses chivalric notions that many may now find awkward or even condescending, but because it provides a totally arbitrary rule that at least minimises the chances of congestion. It may be viewed, then, in the same light as the rule that states one should drive on the left of the road rather than the right. There is no real reason for that: countries in which people drive on the right are in no way different from those where people drive on the left, or, if they are – and they may be – then that is for historical reasons quite unconnected with driving on the left or the right. So the fact that historically women have been invited to go through doors before men provides a basis for a contemporary rule that this should continue to be done.

Unless, of course, the man reaches the door first; in which case he should go through naturally, rather than wait until the woman catches up with him. An exception to this simple, practical rule would be where the person reaching the door first wants to show particular consideration to the other; in such a case the first person should yield to the second person, ushering him or her in with an appropriate gesture. This makes the second person feel better about himself or herself, in that he or she has been shown by the first person to be somebody the first person particularly respects. For this reason, it is a good general rule to allow everybody to go through the door before you. People who do this are usually much appreciated for their manners, but may not get very far in life, owing, perhaps, to the number of doors through which they do not ever pass.

People with obvious infirmities should be allowed to pass through a door before those who are hale; under no circumstances should they be pushed if they take a longer time than usual to pass through the door. Very aged people, those approaching a hundred years of age, should also be allowed through first on the simple,
compassionate grounds that there will not be many doors left for them to pass through.

Such rules, of course, have no currency in student flats, such as that occupied by Pat, even if there be a pecking order. This order – in that flat at least – was based on a combination of who was there first and who was prepared to shoulder the administrative burdens of living in the flat. On both counts, Pat trumped the others. She had been the one to find the flat and sign the lease; she was the one who paid the electricity bills; she was the one who tidied the fridge and apologised to neighbours for the noise after a rowdy party. In return, her right to occupy the circular bedroom and enjoy its superior view was unquestioned.

None of the other occupants of the flat knew one another before they started to share, which was not surprising, as they had very little in common. But random groups of people with little common ground may work very well – and this was the case here. So Pat found herself getting on very well with Anton, a Dutch student of economics; with Tommy, a young man from Dundee who was studying electronic engineering; and with Lizzie, a medical student from Inverness. And they all got on equally well with one another, making for a very contented community.

‘I really like living here,’ Lizzie once remarked to Pat as they sat together in the kitchen waiting for the kettle to boil. ‘I hated my last place. I really did.’

‘I like it too,’ said Pat. ‘The guys are fine, aren’t they?’

Lizzie hesitated. Then she said: ‘Yes, the guys are fine. Most of the time. I like them. Yes …’

Pat had picked up the hesitation. ‘But?’

‘Anton,’ said Lizzie, lowering her voice. ‘Have you noticed something?’

Pat thought for a moment. What had she noticed about Anton? There was nothing unusual about him, was there? He had quite a pleasant face – he was rather good-looking, in fact; he spent a lot of time in the library; he watched European football on a small television set he had in his room. That was about everything, as far as she could make out.

‘I think he’s hiding something,’ said Lizzie.

‘Hiding something? In the flat?’

‘No, I don’t mean that. Hiding something about himself.’

Pat shrugged. Most of us had something that we hid about ourselves. Her father had told her that. ‘Everybody,’ he said. ‘Everybody has a secret, my dear. Even if only one.’

If Pat’s life was serene, it was possibly because she was currently unaffected by what one of her teachers at Watson’s had once described as boy trouble. Boy trouble for girls started at about the age of fifteen, which was roughly the time that the male equivalent, girl trouble, began for boys. It lasted usually for about six years, when it transformed itself into man trouble, for many women a much more serious and intractable problem.

Pat had experienced her fair share of man trouble in the past. First there had been Bruce, the narcissistic surveyor with whom she had shared a flat in Scotland Street. He had at first infuriated her, and then she had found herself being strangely drawn to him. Fortunately she had wrenched herself free – just in time – as some moths manage to escape the candle flame at the very last moment. Then there had been Matthew, for whom she had felt considerable fondness, but with whom she felt ultimately there was just insufficient chemistry to make it work. Poor Matthew, with his distressed-oatmeal sweater and his Macgregor tartan boxer shorts. She still thought that those were a bit of a cheek, given that Matthew had nothing to do with the Clan Macgregor; but she had bitten her tongue on that, as Matthew seemed to have so little in his life, and one should not begrudge somebody like that a bit of colour, even if only in their boxer shorts.

Matthew had gone off to get married, which had pleased Pat. She wanted him to be happy, and she thought that Elspeth Harmony was ideal for him. She could sort out the distressed-oatmeal issue;
she could try to make the flat in India Street a little bit more exciting. There was a lot for her to do. But the important thing for Pat was that Matthew was happy. She had seen him once or twice in town, and he had invited her to drop in on the gallery some day. She had not done that yet, but would do so, she thought, when she was next down in that part of the town. She also wanted to see Big Lou, of course, whom she liked a great deal, and Angus Lordie; and Domenica Macdonald, who had been so kind and supportive to her when she lived next door in Scotland Street. Yes, she would go back at some point and see all these people again.

After Matthew there had been a year without a boyfriend, which had suited her. Then she had met a fellow student at a party and had rather absent-mindedly accepted his invitation to go out for a meal and see a film the following Saturday. He was called Andrew, and he came from Ayrshire, where his parents ran a hotel, the Green Hotel. ‘It’s not green,’ he explained. ‘It’s a reference to a golf green. In case you’re wondering.’

The comment was made in a flat, literal tone; Andrew spoke with the air of one who had explained things many times.

‘I wasn’t, actually,’ said Pat.

‘Well, some people do,’ Andrew explained. ‘You’d be astonished at how many people are surprised to find that our hotel isn’t painted green. They say things like, “We were looking for a green building, not a white one.” You really would be astonished.’

Pat was not sure what to say.

‘And then there are people,’ Andrew continued, ‘who think that we’re called the Green Hotel because we’re green in the sense of being environmentally friendly. But we’re not.’

Pat made a face of mock disapproval, making Andrew laugh. ‘Oh, don’t get the wrong idea. We’re very conscious of environmental issues. We recycle like mad. Glass. Paper. Everything. It’s just that our name is nothing to do with that.’

Having accepted Andrew’s invitation to dinner, she began to wish that she had not. She toyed with the idea of calling it off, and already had an excuse lined up when he called her on the phone to confirm the arrangement. They could go to the Dominion
Cinema, he said, and there was a Nepalese restaurant almost opposite, on Morningside Road. ‘I’m really looking forward to it,’ he said. ‘I love Nepalese food. I love Indian food too, of course. And Thai.’ He paused, before adding, ‘And Chinese.’

She did not have the heart to cancel. ‘Tell him you can’t go out because you have to wash your hair,’ counselled Lizzie. ‘It’s such an outrageous excuse that even the dimmest boy gets the message. Or you can give an even stronger message by saying that you can’t go out because your friend has to wash her hair.’

‘I can’t do that,’ said Pat. ‘I couldn’t keep a straight face. And he’s sweet enough, I suppose, in a funny sort of way …’

‘Sweet? Be careful, Pat. Lots of boys are sweet. Sweet but boring.’

Pat sighed. ‘I know, I know. But if you say that you’ll go out with somebody you can’t just …’

Lizzie cut her short. ‘Can’t suddenly remember that you have to wash your hair? Of course you can. You have to, Pat. Otherwise you just make it worse. It’s far more difficult to get out of something after you’ve got further in. So don’t go there in the first place.’

Pat knew that what Lizzie said was true, but she could not bring herself to phone Andrew and tell him a blatant lie. So when the time came she went off with him to the Dominion Cinema and went for a Nepalese meal afterwards. Andrew talked a lot about Ayrshire and about the things that had happened in his parents’ hotel. One of the guests had flooded a bathroom once and another had caused a small fire by trying to iron something on top of the bed.

‘People do really stupid things,’ he said. ‘You wouldn’t believe it, Pat. They can be really stupid.’

Pat agreed.

‘And then there was another guest who left his dog in the room. We went in and found the dog sleeping on a chair.’

‘Did you give the dog back?’

‘No. The problem was that this guy had given a false name and address. He had dumped the dog on us. Can you believe that?’

The conversation continued in this vein until the end of the meal.

‘I must get back,’ said Pat, looking at her watch. ‘I have to …’ She paused, and then it came to her. ‘I have to wash my hair.’

‘You’ve got really nice hair,’ said Andrew. ‘Can I come and wash it for you?’