Phone Read online

  By the same author

  FICTION

  The Quantity Theory of Insanity

  Cock and Bull

  My Idea of Fun

  Grey Area

  Great Apes

  The Sweet Smell of Psychosis

  Tough, Tough Toys for Tough, Tough Boys

  How the Dead Live

  Dorian

  Dr Mukti and Other Tales of Woe

  The Book of Dave

  The Butt

  Liver

  Walking to Hollywood

  Umbrella

  Shark

  NON-FICTION

  Junk Mail

  Sore Sites

  Perfidious Man

  Feeding Frenzy

  Psychogeography (with Ralph Steadman)

  Psycho Too (with Ralph Steadman)

  Phone

  WILL SELF

  Copyright © 2017 by Will Self

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without permission in writing from the publisher, except by a reviewer, who may quote brief passages in a review. Scanning, uploading, and electronic distribution of this book or the facilitation of such without the permission of the publisher is prohibited. Please purchase only authorized electronic editions, and do not participate in or encourage electronic piracy of copyrighted materials. Your support of the author’s rights is appreciated. Any member of educational institutions wishing to photocopy part or all of the work for classroom use, or anthology, should send inquiries to Grove Atlantic, 154 West 14th Street, New York, NY 10011 or [email protected].

  First published in Great Britain in 2017 by Penguin Random House UK

  Published simultaneously in Canada

  Printed in the United States of America

  First Grove Atlantic hardcover edition: January 2018

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication data available for this title.

  ISBN 978-0-8021-2537-8

  eISBN 978-0-8021-8939-4

  Grove Press

  an imprint of Grove Atlantic

  154 West 14th Street

  New York, NY 10011

  Distributed by Publishers Group West

  groveatlantic.com

  18 19 20 21 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

  For Nelly

  These arabesques that mysteriously embody mathematical truths only glimpsed by a very few – how beautiful, how exquisite – no matter that they were the threshing and thrashing of a drowning man.

  – R. D. Laing, The Politics of Experience

  Table of Contents

  Cover

  By the same author

  Title Page

  Copyright

  Dedication

  Epigraph

  Begin Reading

  Back Cover

  …. …. ! and again …. …. ! two groups of four …. …. !

  on it goes …. …. ! insistently persistently …. …. ! not that

  one hears it quite so much nowadays …. …. ! If one does it’s a

  fake – a recording of an old phone …. …. ! done with a lot

  of echo …. …. ! so’s to suggest it’s ringing in a largish, darkish

  hall …. ….! poorly lit by tall, narrow windows …. …. !

  many little stained panes …. …. ! altogether depicting a square-jawed

  medieval knight and his equally mannish lady …. …. !

  sword and spear …. …. ! spindle and distaff …. …. ! two

  groups of four …. …. ! on it goes …. …. ! relentlessly ….

  …. ! Can we make anything mysto-mathematico-significant out

  of this? No, probably …. …. ! not – if it were … . . and

  then … … ! possibly, for the converse would be the six-five special

  coming down the line … … …. and here he comes …. …. !

  right on time – but what time? Mid fifties, I s’pose …. …. ! the

  mid fifties at Redington Road …. …. ! Somewhere on a

  catwalk Sabrina’s forty-two-inch bust is being riveted into her

  brassiere …. …. ! Somewhere in a giant hangar the nacelles

  of Vulcan Bombers are being embroidered with …. …. !

  rivets …. …. ! Wasp-waisted she was – this skyscraper as well

  …. …. ! nipped in the middle — the people with the luxury flats

  on the upper storeys …. …. ! tits, every man-jack of ’em ….

  …. ! Self-satisfied arse I chatted to in the changing room

  yesterday evening, blithering on about his terrific views and

  high-achieving children …. …. ! From the thirty-fifth floor he

  can see all the way to London …. …. ! see them balancing their

  bloody chequebooks …. …. ! He turns away from the picture

  window …. …. ! turns away from his own self-satisfied

  face …. …. ! turns towards his glass-topped coffee table ….

  …. ! his black leatherette sectional sofa …. …. ! his stainless-steel

  hatstand …. …. ! Stainless-steel hatstand! – always ahead

  of the pack, Maurice …. …. ! Remember him coming back

  from Heal’s with one like that during …. …. ! the Malayan

  Emergency …. …. ! Here he comes now, rounding the metallic

  Horn at a steady clip …. …. ! He’s heeling …. …. ! his

  tailored sails flapping in the draught — never dealt with the

  draughts …. …. ! it was a draughty house until the day he

  died …. …. ! Just as well …. …. ! Evacuated Missus Mac’s

  Harpic reek and all our cabbage-water farts …. …. ! Then

  came the wind of change that changed the winds …. …. !

  Poor Maurice …. …. ! didn’t get it – hats were being flung fast

  out of fashion …. …. ! No God, see – no need to cover up your

  third eye …. …. ! he can’t see inside your mind – he isn’t up

  there …. …. ! That one’s up there …. …. ! very flat and shiny

  …. …. ! Spreadable tan and paper-white shirt folded in a Swiss

  papeterie – I know his name: Eamonn Holmes …. …. ! I hate

  that – that I know his name …. …. ! Eamonn Holmes ….

  …. ! And again: …. …. ! thick as a chicken – still talking

  ’though his head’s chopped off …. …. ! No-no-no …. …. !

  you must never do a tango with a …. …. ! Native American?

  Inuit … ? No-no-no – doesn’t sound right at all. Loved her, though

  …. …. ! …. …. ! Amelia what’s-her-face, ’specially the little

  helium-squeaky bounce in …. …. ! …. …. ! Esss-ki-mo —

  He’s turning, Maurice – turning back. He’s turning back – one

  highly polished toe flips up the corner of the old Persian rug …

  pashas in profile … birds embroidered into cages … traced their

  outlines with my finger for …. …. ! ages – tracing ’em still. He

  cries: Turn it down, old chap! Before pressing on towards the teak

  console table …. …. ! Oh, no-no-no! Trace the leaf-and-blade

  pattern of the Sanderson’s wallpaper as well – slip my fingernail

  in the crack between the sheets …. …. ! another world in back

  of it – hung on the front of it … that map. Old framed map.

  Curious mixture of the surveyed and the imagined. Real settlements

  – mythical beasts. Little pictograms of villages …. …. !

  each one with a steepled church …. …. ! sitting on a titty

  tumulus, shad
ed in with cross-hatching. The place names written

  in cursive script and full of lifping effs … Fussex … Suffex –

  that sorta thing …. …. ! …. …. ! Here he comes – spry

  he was … as well as … dapper. Spry. Dapper. Another thing that’s

  gone – those words. Maybe gone ’cause he’s … gone – gone with

  him, placed in his tomb to ensure he’ll be spry and dapper for

  all …. …. ! eternity – except that he was cremated …. …. !

  …. …. ! at Golders Green. Whole family burned there – ashes

  scattered on the Heath, mingling promiscuously with those of

  hundreds of other North London Jews who’ve died of …. …. !

  cancer. Here he comes – right hand down … right hand down hard

  … swerving and skidding and skittering right out of fashion …

  But he was what then? …. …. ! In his early fifties p’raps –

  easily young enough to be … my … son. Here he comes and

  snatches up the black give-a-dog-a … … – Hello, Hampstead

  four-five-oh-six, how may I help you? Then a pause – actually,

  more than a pause: a hiatus … Because it was odd, certainly – and

  never stopped being so: that abrupt transition from being in the

  room … being in the very particularity of the hall at Redington

  Road, with the day’s newspapers laid out on the dark, mirror-shiny

  wood next to the telephone … the post fanned out beside them –

  lots of envelopes, since he worked from home as much as from his

  office in Long Acre …. …. ! …. …. ! Mostly manila ones

  with little glassine windows on to a world of …. …. ! …. …. !

  numbers – a world in which Rab Butler solemnly announces,

  We can double the size of the national cake … No doubt a proper

  big cake such as Missus Fitz used to bake, using a full tin of

  Golden Syrup once it came off the ration …. …. ! …. …. !

  real strength from genuine sweetness – none of your asparta– …

  asp– … arse-spurting? None of that stuff anyway – those things

  … Muff-things … stupid little muff-things – pull off the waxed

  paper and half the thing comes with it. Bingo! You’ve halved the

  size of the national cake …. …. ! …. …. ! Bitten lips

  and bruised eyes. Creased collar – painted-on hair … That’s jolly

  serious, the Chancellor of the Exchequer announces from behind

  an ornate silver ink stand: the builders have been freed, so the

  number of new houses will rise year on year …. …. ! …. …. !

  the national cake will double in size, and everyone can have an

  extra slice – Uncle Maurice was never a chap for an extra slice …

  Spry and dapper, neat and quick – his hair lustrous in the multicoloured

  spangles of light tumbling down from the narrow, tall

  stained-glass windows …. …. ! …. …. ! What was that stuff

  he put on his hair … ? I twitted him … unmercifully. Ponged

  as well – not unpleasantly, but a definite aroma, suggestive of

  barbers’ shops: singed-hair-shushing-shortie-grey-nylon-coat-hot-

  crotch-pressed-against-hard-shoulder …. …. ! …. …. ! something

  stiffening in there …. …. ! …. …. ! Will that be all,

  sir? …. …. ! …. …. ! Something for the weekend? …. …. !

  …. …. ! No need for any of that carry-on now – stand up in the

  church, say it out loud. Out loud and proud – that’s what they

  are now: Do you, Maurice Busner, take this hairdresser, Henry

  Tonks, to be your lawful wedded husband? All jizzed-up to lift the

  burlap veil – kiss the cowboy’s chapped lips …. …. ! …. …. !

  when some fascist in a black leather overcoat stands up at the back

  of the church, whips out a gun and let’s all the cotton-pickin’

  faggots have it …. …. ! …. …. ! Times ten tubes at two-and-six

  … under plain wrapper … Extra one-and-eleven on the postal

  order to cover postage … and … packing. Nuctol! That was it –

  Nuctol! Can’t remember my own bloody room number – but I have

  that: Nuctol! A Must for Immaculate Men Who Care for Their

  Hair! The dressing that nourishes and controls the hair! Your

  hair will double in size, along with the national cake …. …. !

  …. …. ! In two-and-six tubes and three-and-six jars … Total

  swizz – prob’ly made up from a job-lot of wholesale hair cream

  … portioned out in a Billericay bike shed or a Grays Thurrock

  garage …. …. ! …. …. ! Utter, utter, swizz: but he swore by

  it – Remember him dying on the medical ward at Heath … Very

  brave – I shan’t be …. …. ! …. …. ! easy way out – here

  and happy, then there and … nothing. Not poor old Fred – not

  that. Very brave – bore everything without a murmur so long as

  he’d his Nuctol …. …. ! …. …. ! Will you be a dear chap

  and fetch me my Nuctol from that cabinet-thingie … ? Last thing

  I did for him – my father … Who was he, my father? Always

  wondered that – worried at it: Grrr … Grrr … Grrr … side to

  side … up and down … Grrr … Grrr … Grrr … bit of meat –

  bit of gristle …. …. ! …. …. ! The gristly truth – caught there,

  between my teeth and swollen gums: Maurice – Maurice was

  my father – not biologically but in every other way – and my

  father was one of the Immaculate Men Who Care for Their

  Hair …. …. ! …. …. ! Had to be a euphemism – or, more

  properly, a sign. Later on … seventies, I s’pose … it was other

  things: a pierced ear, or a spotty handkerchief in your back pocket.

  But back then it was all just that little bit … subtler – you’d

  to reach out through the postwar fog …. …. ! …. …. ! feel

  tentatively for the touch of another Immaculate Man … Spies they

  were – agents from Ganymede. All part of the same frigid conflict

  – until they touched and it caught fire …. …. ! …. …. !

  One second you were reading the carefully worded advertisement

  in Reynold’s News, the next you were in a bedsitting room in

  Hainault, naked on a cold and quilted bedspread … One sec’ you

  were in the hall at Redington Road …. …. ! …. …. ! the

  next you were in a velvety void with a stranger’s lips nibbling at

  your ear – while your tongue tasted wax as it wriggled around the

  alien whorls …. …. ! …. …. ! No-no-no, oh dear, no – if

  you do you’ll get a breeze-up, and you’ll end up with a freeze-up!

  The bewilderingly intimate oddity of a call on a private line in

  an era when it was still Mister Busner and Missus Mac – even

  after she’d been mopping up after him for a decade …. …. !

  …. …. ! Suddenly, here he is: in the fuzzy darkness … and

  I’m in there with him. On the radio the other day some dis–embodied

  voice said, Virtual reality is where you go to when you

  make a phone call …. …. ! …. …. ! Where you go to

  now, p’raps – but then? There was nothing either virtual or actual

  about it at all – only invisible mouths and immaterial ears tangoing

  together in a numb clinch, no-no-no …. …. ! …. …. !

  Hampstead four-five-oh-six, he says again – and that being the

 
; way of things then, and the necessary being right to hand, he gets

  out a cigarette from the split-bamboo box and lights it with one of

  the job lot of Dunhill gold lighters he bought from Bramlow’s in

  Camden Town when it went under … fifty-two, was it, or possibly

  fifty-one? …. …. ! …. …. ! And whoever was on the other

  end of the line prob’ly lit up, too – way of it then …. …. !

  …. …. ! Old Kay-sixes still about – interior surfaces were

  Bakelite-faced plywood … there was an ashtray-cum-pipe-rack,

  and a prominent hook at groin-level for your um-ber-ella …

  Umbrellas! Umbrellas for men … Men’s umbrella, lady … Mend

  by hand, lady … Umbrellas to mend … Toodle-uma, luma-luma

  … Toodle-uma, luma-luma … Toodle aye-ay … Any umbrellas –

  any umbrellas to mend today …. …. ! …. …. ! People,

  I recall, used to pride themselves on all the phone numbers they

  could remember – not any more, no need for that carry-on. Used

  to say, Ooh, I can remember the phone number of every house

  I’ve ever lived in …. …. ! …. …. ! a mnemonic exercise

  that, finger-in-dial, connected them to the world. Still, it was

  understandable, given telephone directories steadily grew fatter by

  the year …. …. ! …. …. ! The ones at Redington Road

  were kept shelved in the console table, behind glass – big fat paperback

  books that made for dull reading …. …. ! …. …. !

  plot-wise – although if you sat and scanned the columns of minute

  print they could be really rather frightening …. …. ! …. …. !

  All those people – all those Busners. Despite being orphaned,

  Henry and I soon came to realise we were part of a wider

  Busner community spread throughout Greater London …. …. !

  …. …. ! most of ’em immediate relatives, but some – those

  bedevilling Ponders End Busners, for example – were quite

  unknown to us …. …. ! …. …. ! Then there was that junior

  registrar at Saint Mungo’s – O’Shaughnessy? Said his name

  was far less common than my own – and they were Lords of

  Tara, or some other hazy Celtic Twilight nonsense. Got a bit

  aerated – drink had, I believe, been taken …. …. ! …. …. !