“That’s a rather lovely image. Well. Yes. It’s definitely a challenge. Both medically, and as a growing problem we face as a society.”
“Doesn’t it make you worry about? You know.”
“One’s own future? There are ways to keep the brain healthy.”
“Crosswords.”
“Crosswords can help, yes. But also learning a language, playing an instrument; exercise is important. Do I sound like a public health film?”
“I’m so shit at crosswords. Month after April. Three letters. That’s my level.”
Eggstain smiles. “They’re working on cures as we speak. By the time you and me reach your mother’s age…” He trails off. Shrugs. “What do you do, Daisy?”
“Me? I’m embarrassed to say.”
“Okay. Let me guess.” He strokes his beard comedically. “So, I’m guessing… construction worker.”
She laughs. “Television producer. Well, assistant producer. I’ve just been sacked, actually.”
Eggstain pulls a face. “Sorry.”
“Oh, you needn’t be. It happens all the time. And it’s not like we’re saving lives or anything. Ruining them, more like.”
“Would it be something I’ve seen?”
“God, I hope not! Helicopter Life Exchange.” A pause. “I can tell it means nothing to you. Phew!”
“Have you heard of a TV performer called Chad Butterick?”
“Of course! Everyone has. Massive wanker. I mean, notorious for being difficult to work with. Actually, they all are.”
“There was a horribly loud party at his house last night. We live directly opposite.”
“Which is why you couldn’t sleep!”
“To be honest, it wasn’t just the evil music. I’ve been tired for months. Years, if I think about it. I shouldn’t have told you that! Doctors are supposed to be. You know. God-like.”
“Yes, you are. Well, not you personally. The profession.”
“I’ve just realized something.”
“What?”
He chuckles. “Why my patient called me Neville.”
“Neville Beardie!”
“Her late husband was Neville. It was obvious, actually.”
“Why have you just realized that now?”
“Talking to you! That conversation with your mum about her late husband. Who isn’t late. Merely living in Italy.”
“Anything else I can help you with today, Doctor?”
Eggstain sighs. Thinks about it for a moment. “You’re going to think I’m crazy.”
“Uh-oh.”
“I read something at the weekend I can’t get out of my head.”
“That happened to me when I read you can cure dandruff by washing your hair in wee.”
“Some research, I think at the University of Cincinnati, about how time speeds up when you get older.”
“Yes! Alan Bennett says by the time you get to eighty, breakfast seems to come round every twenty minutes.”
“That’s exactly it. Well, apparently when you’re twenty, in terms of your subjective experience, in terms of what the passage of time feels like to you, you’re already halfway through; even if you make it to eighty. And if you’re forty—and you live until eighty—subjectively, your life is basically seventy-one percent over. Do you find that shocking?”
The broad central plain of Daisy’s face has become a mask of seriousness. “Jesus.”
“You might expect the effect to be diminished in the demented. An upside, perhaps.”
“But, wait. Say you’re forty, right? And it feels like seventy-one percent of your life is over. And there’s just thirty-nine percent left.”
“Twenty-nine.”
“Right! Twenty-nine. But the next day, say you get hit by a bus. And then there’s nothing left. It turns out the seventy-one was completely wrong. The numbers are screwy.”
“I’m not sure about the research methodology. But the being hit by the bus thing is really encouraging! Thanks.”
“How do they even measure all that stuff?”
“I don’t know. I’ll find out for you.”
Daisy glances at her watch. “Shit. Speaking of time, I’m supposed to be at work like an hour ago.”
Eggstain offers a hand across the toast crumbs. “It’s been good to have this conversation.”
“Yeah. Yeah, it has. But my life’s now basically over. And it’s all your fault.”
“Does that thing about urine shampoo really work?”
“You’re not thinking of trying it?”
“I’m curious for a friend.”
The leaving party was something of a non-event. We held it in the hotel bar where Chantal and I usually went for glamourous cocktails; there were eight or ten of us. Craig Lyons made a sort of speech in which he said I wasn’t famous for my timekeeping, or the particular brilliance of my ideas (cheeky fucker) or my skill with the “punters” (his disgusting phrase for the “real people” we ensnared on to our show, as distinct from the “talent,” the high-functioning sociopaths from Planet Celebrity who get paid indecent sums to present it). Nor was I especially gifted on location (just because I set the crew vehicle’s satnav to Rotterdam instead of Rotherham. That could have happened to anyone). And nor was I any great shakes as a B-roll camera operator (shakes being the operative word apparently. And also because my pictures once came out all green. Once! Greenist bastard). But then—the charmless prick actually said “mood change, people”—what I was brilliant at—stand by to puke into your soup—was being Daisy, and that was why everyone loved me.
People were pissed by then, of course, so everyone went Ahhhhhhh, and there’d been a collection, but they couldn’t think what to buy me aside from a smart alarm clock (ha ha fucking ha) so instead they’d got some John Lewis vouchers and it was hoped I’d use them to buy something that would always remind me of Tangent Television.
I was so tempted to say, yeah, thanks very much, I could do with a new toilet seat!
Of course the boss was very nice (although not as funny) about Chantal, who is about a million times smarter than me and already has a new job lined up with Mishkin-woman’s company; a six part series on the “future history” of the internet for BBC 5. Chantal said they were still looking for people, but I told her the scrawny old trout took against me—the way she doubted whether I could even remember the way out of her office!—so I was fairly sure that was a non-starter.
People began drifting off home after the speeches—in the end it was just me
