The Last Weekend (5 page)

‘Does it hurt?’ I asked.

‘Only when I think of all I’m missing. The rest of the rugby season. And cricket next term. Basically I’m fucked till September.’

‘Then take up something else.’

‘Like what?’

‘I don’t know. One-arm wrestling. Hopscotch. Kick-boxing.’

‘Kick-boxing?’

‘No one will challenge you with that on your leg. You’ll be world champion in no time.’

He looked at me suspiciously, as if I was taunting him,
then laughed and suggested a drink in the union bar. He cut a sorry figure as we made our way there — Pegleg Ollie, with his crutches – but once we sat down he cheered up and insisted on paying for several rounds.

‘Were you at the ethics lecture?’

‘I slept in,’ I said.

‘It wasn’t till two.’

‘Even so.’

‘You missed a treat. It made me realise why I’m studying law.’

‘I wish I knew.’

‘Lawyers are the agents of morality. Their job’s to establish the truth.’

‘Their job’s to represent their client,’ I said. ‘Truth doesn’t come into it. Anyway, there’s no such thing as objective truth.’

A statement of the obvious, I thought, but he seemed shocked by it, and we began to argue, less about law than about deception.

‘If you tell a lie, it’s a lie, even if the person you’re telling believes you,’ he said.

‘No, the only issue is whether you’re
caught
lying.’

‘Exactly: once a man is caught lying, no one believes him any more — that’s why being truthful is important.’

‘So if an ugly woman asks you if you find her beautiful you’ll be honest and say no?’ I said.

‘I’d probably fudge it for fear of hurting her.’

‘You believe in white lies, then.’

‘I might use them for the purposes of social harmony,’ Ollie said, ‘but I don’t believe in them ethically.’

‘What are ethics for if not to create social harmony?’ I said.

‘I give up,’ Ollie laughed. ‘Get us another beer, will you? Here’s a fiver.’

‘I enjoyed that,’ he said, when I brought back the drinks. ‘You’re cleverer than I thought.’
He could be a patronising bastard. But I liked to provoke him and he enjoyed being made to think. Soon our debates became a ritual. Every Thursday I’d get up in time for the ethics lecture and after it we’d head for the student canteen, piling our trays with pizza, milkshakes, fruit and chocolate, and face each other across a table. Abortion, the death penalty, apartheid, capitalism, one-day cricket — Ollie could defend any corner with equal conviction (a skill that has since served him as a barrister), but I’d unsettle him by countering his legal arguments with philosophical ones: what did he mean by ‘good'? what did he mean by ‘reality'? if ‘logical deduction’ was as infallible as he claimed, let him logically deduce man’s purpose on earth. It was a chess match with no pieces, table tennis without a ball. And to me the high spot of the week.

With his sports buddies deserting him, or Ollie finding it too painful to be around them, I soon became his sole companion. We’d go out to the pub or engage in competitive activities, or non-activities, in his room: chess, draughts, whist, Scrabble, even tiddlywinks (if I could persuade him to play for money, so much the better). All games were alike to him, their sole purpose being for one person — Ollie Moore — to win.
You can’t touch me,
he liked to crow. We cannot all be masters, and mostly I was content to come second. But once when he was winning at darts, his triumphalism got to me.

‘There’s more to life than winning,’ I said, as he aimed for double top.

‘That’s rich coming from you,’ he said. ‘You love winning.’

‘Me? I’m just here to keep you company.’

‘So you won’t mind if I sink this and make it five—nil.’

‘Why should I? We’ve not finished yet. It’s best of eleven.’

He laughed and slapped me on the back before throwing the dart home.

Whenever I wonder what Ollie saw in me, it’s his laughter

I remember. At school I’d survived by mimicking the teachers. Busty Mrs Anders, lisping Mr Witchett, hunchbacked Mr Moody - it didn’t take much to send them up, but my classmates seemed to enjoy the parodies. With Ollie, too, I played the court jester. If nothing else, it helped him forget his gammy leg.

On all our outings, it was Ollie who paid. I would protest, before we went, that I couldn’t afford whatever it was (a film, a gig, the pub), and he would tell me not to worry, he’d foot the bill. I told him I felt bad about it, and privately I was resentful: whereas I watched my pennies but got into debt, Ollie spent freely but still had money left over. Though the beneficiary of his largesse, I hated the system that made it possible. When we debated politics, I used to argue for the abolition of inherited wealth.

‘I suppose you’re a socialist,’ he said.

‘And proud of it.’

‘You want to clobber the rich.’

‘No, liberate the poor.’

‘Socialism is envy rationalised,’ he said.

In retrospect, it all sounds pretty trite. But Ollie was a couple of years older than me and seemed to
know
stuff, exuding an authority which his height and build — he was six foot three, and lean — perfectly matched. The word ‘military’ came to mind. I attributed that to boarding school, but during one late-night conversation he revealed that he’d spent a year at Sandhurst, training to be an officer cadet. (He told me about it in confidence, perhaps fearing his fellow students would denounce him as a fascist if they found out.) At some level he’d always known that the army wasn’t for him, he said. But he felt he owed it to his father, who’d been an officer during the war, to give it a go, and he stuck it out as long as he could. The fact that his father was dead only increased his filial piety. He had died in a tragic accident, Ollie said, adding
(his jaw quivering as he spoke) that if ever I met his mother I must be sure not to mention it in front of her. How crass did he think I was? ‘Just because I’m working class doesn’t make me an idiot,’ I was tempted to protest. But I kept my lip buttoned. In truth, I envied him the drama of having a father who’d died tragically rather than one, like mine, who never moved from his chair in front of the television. I also envied him having a mother who indulged him, rather than one whose mission was to stop her son from getting above himself. It seemed that Ollie had done well out of losing a parent, better than I’d done from hanging on to both of mine.

(I’m sorry to sound mean about my mum and dad. But if you had them as parents, you’d understand.)

In the May of my first year at university I began looking for somewhere to live from September, when I would no longer have a room on campus. Ollie, ahead of the game, had made plans to move in with three of his rugby friends. But in the event those plans fell through and we went to see a house together — a three-storey, five-bedroom slum which we signed the tenancy for, along with three Japanese postgraduates who had responded to the same advert. I was frankly surprised to find myself in the position of Ollie’s housemate and best friend. But at the end of an otherwise unhappy first year I took comfort from it. He had the edge on me in almost every way and that’s what made our friendship work. Prole and Nob, Little and Large, Tortoise and Hare. We were the ideal couple.

Ollie was out to greet us even before I’d parked the car. He looked leaner than when I’d last seen him.
Too
lean, with that stringiness characteristic of long-distance runners, the hollow cheeks, matchstick legs and wafer stomach. I wondered if he might be ill, but he came at us so swiftly through the heat, like a greyhound out of its trap, I set the thought aside. Hopping
from foot to foot, he semaphored for me to reverse into a space by the barn. I’d never seen a man look so impatient. Though Rufus was the one yelping as the engine cut, it might have been Ollie.

‘You took your time,’ he said, opening Em’s door.

‘Sorry, awful traffic,’ she said, accepting his kiss.

‘We were starting to think you’d never get here.’

‘Wherever here is,’ I said, climbing out. ‘If it weren’t for your directions we’d still be driving round.’

We shook hands, then — as if a handshake were too stiff — held each other closer for a moment, eyeball to eyeball, his hand on my upper arm, mine on his right elbow.

‘How are you?’ he said.

‘Grand,’ I said, ‘apart from the journey.’

‘Come on, you must be hungry.’

It was Ollie who looked hungry. He reminded me of a photo I’d once seen, of some artist riddled with angst or tuberculosis. Middle-aged barristers aren’t meant to look that way.

‘I hope you didn’t wait for us,’ Em said.

‘It’s only salad. Daisy’s inside somewhere. I’ll show you round. The barn used to be a coffin-maker’s.’

We’d been expecting something posh, and the grass-seamed drive between iron railings had promised as much. But Flaxfield Grange was a serious disappointment. ‘A converted eighteenth-century farmhouse,’ Ollie called it as he led us through the back door, but unconverted outhouse looked nearer the mark. A wood-panelled corridor led past a cramped dining room, dingy snug and gloom-lined study; the three rooms must once have been loose boxes or cow stalls, I decided. Beyond them lay the kitchen, with broken floor tiles. The contents dated from the forties or fifties (no dishwasher or microwave), which would have been sweetly nostalgic had the chunky wall cupboards been less lopsided and the whitewashed walls less
flaky from damp. From the kitchen we turned right, under a thick stone lintel, into the living room. The rafters and crossbeams suggested a hayloft, and Ollie clearly expected us to admire it. But the conversion had sacrificed the charm of the original without putting comfort in its place. The old brick floor beneath the tasselled carpet reeked of earth mould and the beams were noosed with spiders’ webs. Along the mantelpiece were three dusty photographs (a woman in a hat and two boys in school uniform) interspersed with porcelain dolls: the glazed expressions of the humans in their frames made the dolls look animated. The dolls and photos were reflected in the yellowing mirror behind, scarred and mottled with skin disease. Strangest of all was the display over the fireplace: a pair of swords X-ed below a mounted badger head, like a skull and crossbones.

‘So what do you think?’ Ollie said.

‘What do you think they think?’ Daisy said, stepping through the French windows behind us. ‘They’re trying to be polite.’

It’s always a shock to be reminded how short Daisy is, five foot two at most. In my memory I obliterate this, as though the space she occupies in my head makes her physically large as well. But the real shock was her hair, which she’d grown again: it was almost as long as when I first knew her, falling halfway down her back.

She kissed Em first, then me. Her pebble-blue eyes were less implausibly bright these days but she smelled of almonds, the same as ever.

‘Well,
we
like it,’ Ollie said, gesturing towards the high ceiling.

‘Ollie likes it,’ Daisy said.

‘No television. No phone. No DVD player or hi-fi system. It’s wonderful.’

‘It’s a nightmare,’ Daisy said. ‘We have to drive to the main road to get reception on our mobiles. I’m amazed there’s even electricity.’

‘Who needs mod cons? We’re on holiday.’

‘Yeah, on holiday in a hovel. Come outside while Ollie gets the drinks.’

As we followed Daisy, I wondered if Em was thinking what I was thinking: that we’d only been asked because they were too embarrassed to ask their posher friends.

The garden was a slight improvement on the house. The French windows gave out onto a terrace laid with stable bricks and, beyond, a round pond, palisaded with irises, a stone man fishing in the middle. The lawn was a decent size and, knowing Ollie, I half expected to see croquet hoops or a badminton net. But the grass was too rough and tussocky for games. And the eucalyptus tree at the far edge had shed its leaves, which crackled like tinfoil under our feet. We crossed into the orchard – apple and pear trees with lichened trunks, and raspberry bushes overwhelmed by bindweed. Beyond the orchard lay a stubbly cornfield, with bright yellow bales like giant cotton reels strewn round its edges. A solitary tree stood in the middle, bare limbs thrust out in shock. We stayed there for a minute in the heat, leaning on the fence and sucking straws, like farmers surveying their harvest.

‘There’s shade over here,’ Daisy said, leading us to a metal table, chairs and parasol set out below a high brick wall — the north side of the house. Above us, the orange pantiles had slipped from their batons, exposing black felt.

‘You poor darlings, you look exhausted,’ Daisy said, as we sat down.

‘Terrible journey,’ Em said.

‘Let’s not talk about it,’ I said, brusquely. To hear Daisy
poor darling
us got up my nose. I wouldn’t care but her background’s
no different from mine. In the old days she used to call me ‘love’ and ‘chuck'.