Lingua Franca Page 6

  ‘Don’t worry,’ Nigel whispers. ‘No one gets murdered at a funeral.’

  We exit to a Bob Dylan song. Kendal slows her pace so that she can join us on the walk. We’re not certain whether to link arms or carry on as we are. Outside, we congregate where we started. It’s raining, which makes sense. We stand on the wet grass and watch the coffin being carried into the vehicle. None of us speak. The good thing is that no one has acknowledged my presence. They know that Eden’s employer has a lot to answer for, but they don’t necessarily know it’s me. They’re not compelled to look at me and protest my existence. This is a good thing – they wouldn’t know what to do with me. I recognise the peroxide-blonde woman who walks towards us.

  ‘You’re his boss!’ One of her teeth is gold. I can tell by the way she snarls. ‘You’ve got some cheek to come here.’ She doesn’t wait for a reply. ‘You’ve got some brass neck. Did you not read the letter?’

  ‘I wanted to pay my respects.’

  ‘Yeah? Then go home.’ She points in the direction of the cemetery gates. ‘Murderer.’

  Nigel and Kendal do their best to avoid looking at me. The peroxide blonde woman walks away. Nigel mutters something – the essence being that he objects to the word murderer. ‘Suppose that was his girlfriend, was it? The sexual health nurse?’

  ‘Nigel. Leave it.’

  There’s a hand on my back, which belongs to Kendal. I don’t want to hang around. I walk towards the gates, exactly as I was told. Kendal follows, but I don’t want to talk about anything. I ignore the clergyman at the gate who offers another leaflet. The rain continues to fall. I unbutton my jacket and place it over my head.

  ‘Come on, Miles’ is all she can say. She follows, on the working assumption that I’ll stop at some point. ‘She’s just upset. The emotions are raw.’ She puts a hand on my shoulder and I politely give it back. ‘Are you okay?’

  ‘I just want to walk.’

  I keep walking, to the point where Kendal doesn’t bother to follow. Darren emerges from the white transit van. I pretend not to notice.

  ‘Mr Miles… Miles? Mr Platting?’

  I keep going. I owe it to myself to keep going. I walk through the part of Stella Artois where everything’s been sponsored by us. The main road is named after a bakery chain and the public square is an IT software developer. The local college is sponsored by a triumvirate of banks. The neighbourhood remains run-down, but with more logos on the buildings. Everything is named after something. The software company are reluctant to be associated with neglect, so they’re contributing towards the cost of a new public realm. The coffee shops collect money to replace the paving slabs. Everyone wants to make it a desirable place to live, which will enhance the visitor experience and brand value.

  It’s probably stupid to be walking unaccompanied by Darren. It only occurs to me that I’m doing something stupid at that moment, when I notice how many drunk, brawling men are slapping car bonnets and shouting in the street. If they hate perfectly reasonable members of the public, it’s difficult to imagine what they might feel towards me. It’s getting dark, which protects me somewhat. The rain is more concerning than the cold – it makes me want to walk faster. I walk fast enough that I don’t have to answer the man who’s beginning to shout in my direction. I put my head down and I keep walking, despite the wind and the rain. I keep walking until I can no longer hear them shout at me. I cross the metal barrier between the normal world and my fairytale kingdom, where nothing bad is allowed to happen. I find comfort in the large detached houses and unnecessarily wide roads. I like the fact there are cameras hidden in the lamp posts and security guards on patrol. I want to get inside and put on my pyjamas. I want to lay out Ptolemy’s dinner, a depressing act, no matter that it’s informed by kindness. I want to close the windows, lock the interior doors and turn on the alarm. The barbed wire and anti-climb paint can do the rest. I want to laugh at something on the television. If a loner laughs in his living room and no one hears, does he make a sound? I have my own philosophical question. In front of me are the headlights of a van. I slow my pace. Someone’s standing in the road, but it’s hard to see under their umbrella. You can see the rain fizzing past in the lamplight. ‘Come on, Dickens. Let’s get you home.’ Kendal lifts the umbrella and shields me from the rain. Somehow, she’s perfectly dry. She lifts out an arm so that I might take it. She walks me down the road, where the last fragments of white picket fence make way for machine-brick and machine-metal. She keeps the umbrella upright. We’re not quite alone. Darren’s at the wheel of the van, which follows some way behind. At the gate to the compound, she offers her gloved hand.

  ‘Are you alright?’

  ‘I’m alright.’

  We’re alright. We make eye contact, and both of us seem to decide that’s too much. It’s too much to look at one another in the eye. So we stop doing that. And we say goodnight.

  07. ANTONY AND CLEOPATRA

  If I’m ever going to have a breakdown, the pet shop will be the place. It’s where I’ll drop to the floor and call for Darren. It’s hard to walk around without getting in someone’s way. Everything has been assembled as though it were attic clutter. It’s a world of stacked hamster cages and boring goldfish. There’s a smell, which I attribute to the hamster cage – a sawdust smell. The lizards enjoy life under a light bulb. There’s a dog in a basket but he’s not for sale. The parrot is making a fuss about something. Everything is given a sufficient degree of respect. There are cages in which the gerbils can run around, albeit with little chance of escape. Kendal never once came to the pet shop. She saw it as evidence of my decline. She thinks Ptolemy should be a side-project, not the be-all and end-all.

  Darren helps to hoist the cat food bags onto the counter. The man at the till recognises me as the person who buys the same cat food pellets every month. He’s a tall skinny man whose T-shirts celebrate bands no one likes anymore: Aerosmith, Meatloaf. His hair is long and uncombed, with a bald crown reflecting the light. It’s hard to imagine him in any other context. He belongs in the pet shop. He asks about my cat. I mention that Ptolemy’s getting bullied by next door’s tabby.

  ‘Put some glasses of water outside. Cats don’t like water.’ He talks about animals like a mechanic might talk about a faulty car – he’s more interested in the process of keeping the animal going. ‘Have you got cat insurance yet?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Good. Waste of money.’

  Our conversations are limited in scope, for which I take no responsibility. We haven’t yet come to the understanding that we’re better off saying nothing. He puts everything into a bag, and it’s all very slow. The silence is my chance to talk about non-mechanical things, which might hurry him along.

  ‘I’m going to Barrow-in-Furness next week.’

  ‘Chicken’s popular.’

  I nod. ‘We’re going to rename it Birdseye-in-Furness.’

  He looks lost. I give him some money in exchange for the cat food pellets. Darren stands in the corner, looking into a goldfish tank. He’s getting in the way of customers. I receive each bag at a time and summon Darren, my personal shop assistant. We knock into a birdcage as we exit. I don’t like coming to the pet shop. It’s definitely where I’ll have the breakdown.

  *

  The University of Stella Artois was established following a merger of University Campus Milton Keynes and the University of Bedfordshire. It doesn’t have the credentials of a Cambridge, or a Nickelodeon, but it draws upon a large catchment area, from Swindon to Powerade. It attracts a variety of students – from high achievers destined for university to those learning functional skills. In keeping with the rest of Stella Artois, the vice chancellor and governors had decided to rename the university in accordance with the town’s naming rights. There was no legal obligation for them to do so. It was a decision undertaken for reasons of practicality. How, for instance, can you advertise the institution as the University of Milton Keynes when the town itself has been renamed? There’
s a domino effect, which is deliberate and ingenious. If a town is renamed, the university, schools and libraries feel compelled to join the revolution. This is how it goes.

  I knock on the door in the hope that Kendal will answer. I don’t like coming to the staff room. They hold me in contempt for the fact I left the profession. Miles Platting, former teacher, traitor to the education world, maker of money and destroyer of worlds. They think my life is more glamorous than it is. I know from Kendal that they ask how Lingua Franca’s doing, but always with a bitter edge, and never with any hope that I might be doing well. They imagine a world of perks – free drinks at the bar, chauffeur-driven cars – and they feel worse about themselves. I open the door and I’m met with half smiles. Someone says, ‘Y’alright, Miles.’ They tend to tolerate my existence based on my relationship to Kendal. She only likes the English Literature teachers, who occupy the furthest desks from the entrance. They have a passion for books and getting drunk. Kendal doesn’t disguise her contempt for the rest. She calls the older ones windbags, and is convinced some of them are sexual predators, if only she had proof. They’re of an age where they don’t like to debate things; they’re just correct, and you better get used to it. They manage to avoid getting sacked due to their superior knowledge of how the teaching inspectors work. One of them – the warthog who teaches history – offers his condolences regarding the death of Eden. I nod, muttering something about it being a sad time for Lingua Franca. Kendal emerges from the kitchen. She smells of strawberry tea. I remove a bottle of wine from the blue plastic bag. ‘You might want to keep it chilled.’

  Kendal says thanks and puts it inside the mini-fridge.

  I reach into the bag and remove Ptolemy’s flea drops. ‘Drip these behind her ears.’

  ‘Behind the ears. Got it.’

  ‘Only once.’

  One of the friendlier women asks about Ptolemy.

  ‘She’s good. But she’s fighting the neighbour’s cat.’

  ‘Oh no.’

  I nod. Kendal looks at me like she’s worried I’m ill. ‘But other than that, she’s good.’

  The friendly teacher mentions how she puts bottles of water on her lawn, which deters any cats from intruding. ‘Cats don’t like water.’

  ‘Indeed.’

  The other teachers turn from their desks, ready to speak. Someone talks about their dog. It descends into a conversation about animals. Kendal frowns and tugs at my sleeve. ‘Have you got half an hour?’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘I’ve got my English language class in a second.’ She passes me a stapled document titled:

  What’s in a name? Is Juliet correct when she says a rose by any other name would smell as sweet?

  There’s a bullet point list of questions for the students to consider.

  ‘How do you fancy a bit of guest speaking?’

  ‘Not today.’

  ‘It will help with their homework.’

  The teachers suddenly prove they have vocal chords. ‘Go on, Miles!’ they say. ‘You’ll love it!’

  I look at Kendal, who does a cartoonish flutter of her eyelashes. ‘Pretty please? I’ll get Ptolemy a present.’

  They look at us like it’s the most exciting thing they’ve ever seen.

  ‘Fine.’ I hold out an arm and she pulls me along. ‘She needs some catnip.’

  The university looks more like an airport, fireproofed with glass and metal. It seems to have been designed on the basis that someone needs to be thwarted; someone who’s desperate to burn it down. On the walk to the classroom, Kendal describes in detail a number of things we need to do, all of which makes me wonder if I shouldn’t have bothered. We need to get a guest pass and we need to photocopy some extra sheets. On the walk, Kendal seems to have developed an instinctive ability to spot any students who aren’t wearing lanyards round their neck. She seems obsessed with identifying wrongdoing: noise and loitering, in particular. It confounds my expectation that her job only take places within classroom hours. Really, she never stops working.

  ‘Where’s your lanyard?’ she points at one student, who reluctantly puts it on. It seems so anti-Kendal – an unfounded respect for authority. ‘If they don’t wear it, everything breaks down,’ she explains. ‘A school is like an organ. If it fails, the body can’t function.’ She can tell I look surprised. She says, ‘You’re like the colon, Miles. Full of shit.’ I give her a gentle shove. We walk to the counter and sign a form, which enables me to receive a guest pass. I quickly put it on, in case she tells me off.

  I follow Kendal into the classroom. Here they are – a class of eighteen-year-olds, in their slogan T-shirts and hoodies. The first thing I notice is that a couple of lads look at one another and snigger. I don’t really know what’s funny. It might be my hair, which even on a good day has a mad professor quality. It might be my unshaven, unkempt, unimpressive beard. I left the house without knowing I’d be teaching a class of teenagers. There is irrefutable evidence that Kendal is a popular tutor. You can see it in the way the students say hello. She starts by talking about a previous assignment, and how the class need to concentrate better. She laments the fact that half the room don’t know what an ellipses is. She introduces the purpose of the next assignment, which is to discuss the meaning of language and why it’s important. She says she’s delighted to welcome a special guest, a specialist in language, as she politely puts it.

  ‘My opponent this afternoon is Miles Platting, founder of the Lingua Franca naming rights agency.’ The debate is an important one, she says. We’re here to discuss language and its relationship with human beings. It doesn’t appear to be a joke. I’m engaged in a contest. ‘Miles will be making the case for town branding as a force for good. Lingua Franca, for those who don’t know, is committed to renaming every town in the UK after a corporate sponsor. I’m sure all of you can remember when Listerine was called Loughborough, or when Virgin Media was called Stoke-on-Trent. So please, give a warm Stella Artois welcome to Mr Miles Platting.’

  They applaud, some of them in an ironic, excessive way.

  ‘Thank you, Kendal. Thank you, everyone.’ I spend a moment thanking the college, mostly so I can think about what to say next.

  ‘Sixty seconds,’ Kendal says, putting a sand timer upside down on the table. ‘Please make your opening statement.’

  I smile out of necessity. I decide to make a go of it. ‘Language is of course a fascinating object of study. What we recognise at our company is that language can connect with audiences in ways that little else can.’

  ‘And make lots of money,’ Kendal interjects, to laughter.

  ‘Yes, that too. But we all make money. Some of it in more legitimate ways than others. The premise of our company is perfectly legal, that being: how is it right for a town’s biggest asset – its name – to remain prohibited from working in the interest of its people?’ I mention how I’ll be visiting Barrow-in-Furness in the days ahead. ‘The people in Barrow want jobs, investment, dignity, self-respect… they like tradition, but what use is tradition if there’s no money in your pocket, no food on the table?’

  ‘It’s not a paradigm I recognise,’ Kendal steps in. ‘Thirty seconds.’

  ‘There are twenty-five languages that die every year. That’s two hundred and fifty every decade.’ I point a finger at Kendal. ‘Your way of doing things – to do nothing – is already resulting in grievous loss, every year. At Lingua Franca, we believe in managing language, to exert our will upon it, and in doing so, to revitalise towns for generations to come.’ I almost forget we’re debating in front of a class. It feels like we’re arguing in my living room. I’m not allowed to storm off. Dereliction of duty, and all that. ‘In conclusion, ladies and gents, we reserve the right to name a town – by consent – whatever we so choose.’ I seem to disturb them. I’m dangerous. I’m radioactive. ‘Language needs to work for us. We are its master, not its slave.’

  ‘Stop!’ Kendal lifts the sand timer and puts it upside down again. She looks at m
e as if she were conducting a cross-examination. ‘I’m sorry my opponent holds the English language in such contempt, but let’s take a look at the facts.’ She walks in front of my path. ‘Why do we communicate? Why do we use words? Why not just grunt?’ Some of them laugh. ‘It’s a serious question.’ She allows a silence to enable them to think. ‘Language is about self-expression. It’s about conveying information. It’s about poetry. But it’s also about who we are, our history, our home… our sense of being alive!’ They all seem to listen and nod at the appropriate moments. Kendal’s one of them, in her heart. She hates authority and loves people. ‘The name of your town means something. It’s almost sacred.’

  ‘Thirty seconds,’ I mumble.

  ‘Next week my opponent will be visiting a fine town, Barrow-in-Furness. A town built on industry and hard work. With one stroke of a pen, Miles will undo hundreds of years of history and leave a community a few hundred grand better off. But in spirit, at least, they will be much, much poorer. I don’t want to live in this kind of world! I don’t want to live in a fabric softener.’ They laugh, and she sips from her strawberry tea. ‘So what’s in a name?’ She points to the whiteboard. ‘Would a rose by any other name smell as sweet?’ This is the part of the job she enjoys. Kendal is analytical about everything. She could deconstruct the meaning behind a bowl of cornflakes. She’s been given carte blanche to develop a course in her own indomitable way. They study the evolution of language, how language is constructed, contemporary discourse, phonetics, and how language is connected to thought and meaning. ‘I’ll let you guys decide. But at the very least, the discerning among you will understand that language is precious and at great risk from people like Miles Platting.’

  ‘Stop.’ The sand timer has finished.