Beautiful World, Where Are You(16)

Anyway, all this means that during the Bronze Age, a sophisticated syllabic script was developed to represent the Greek language in writing, and then during the collapse you told me about, all that knowledge was completely destroyed. Later writing systems devised to represent Greek bear no relation to Linear B. The people who developed and used them had no idea that Linear B had ever even existed. The unbearable thing is that

when first inscribed, those markings meant something, to the people who wrote and read them, and then for thousands of years they meant nothing, nothing, nothing –

because the link was broken, history had stopped. And then the twentieth century shook the watch and made history happen again. But can’t we do that too, in another way?

I’m sorry that you felt so terrible after running into Aidan the other day. These feelings are no doubt completely normal. But as your best friend, who loves you very much and wishes the best for you in every part of your life, would it be aggravating of me to point out that you weren’t really happy together? I know that he was the one who decided to end things, and I know that must be painful and frustrating. I’m not trying to talk you out of feeling bad. All I’m saying is, I think you know in your heart that it wasn’t a very good relationship. You talked to me several times about wanting to break up and not knowing how. I’m only saying this because I don’t want you to start retroactively believing that Aidan was your soulmate or that you could never be happy without him.

You got into a long relationship in your twenties that didn’t work out. That doesn’t mean God has marked you out for a life of failure and misery. I was in a long relationship in my twenties and that didn’t work out, remember? And Simon and Natalie were together for nearly five years before they broke up. Do you think he’s a failure, or I am? Hm. Well, now that I think of it, maybe all three of us are. But if so, I’d rather be a failure than a success.

No, I never really think about my biological clock. I feel like my fertility will probably continue to haunt me for another decade or so anyway – my mother was forty-two when she had Keith. But I don’t particularly want to have children. I didn’t know you did either. Even in this world? Finding someone to get you pregnant will not be a problem

if so. Like Simon says, you have a fertile look about you. Men love that. Finally: are you still planning to come and see me? I’m forewarning you that I’ll be in Rome next week but likely home again the week after. I have made a friend here whose name is (genuinely) Felix. And if you can believe that, you will also have to believe that he’s coming with me to Rome. No, I cannot explain why, so don’t ask me. It just occurred to me, wouldn’t it be fun to invite him? And it seems to have occurred to him that it would be fun to say yes. I’m sure he thinks I’m a total eccentric, but he also knows he’s on to a good thing because I’m paying for his flights. I want you to meet him! Yet another reason for you to come and visit when I’m home. Will you, please? All my love, always.





7


The same Thursday evening, Eileen attended a poetry reading hosted by the magazine where she worked. The venue was an arts centre in the north city centre. Before the event, Eileen sat behind a little table selling copies of the most recent issue of the magazine, while people milled around in front of her, holding glasses of wine and avoiding eye contact. Occasionally, someone asked her where the bathrooms were, and she gave the directions in the same tone of voice with the same hand gestures each time.

Just before the reading began, an elderly man leaned over the table to tell her she had the ‘eyes of a poet’. Eileen smiled self-effacingly and, perhaps pretending she had not heard him, said she thought the event was about to start inside. Once the reading did begin, she locked her cash box, took a glass of wine from the table at the back and entered the main hall. Twenty or twenty-five people were seated inside, leaving the first two rows entirely empty. The magazine editor was standing at the lectern introducing the first reader. A woman about Eileen’s age, who worked at the venue and whose name was Paula, moved in from the aisle to allow Eileen to sit beside her. Sell many copies?

she whispered. Two, said Eileen. I thought we might snag a third when I saw a little old man approaching, but it turned out he just wanted to compliment my eyes. Paula sniggered. Weekday evening well spent, she said. At least now I know I have nice eyes, said Eileen.

The event featured five poets, loosely grouped together around the theme of ‘crisis’.

Two of them read from work dealing with personal crises, such as loss and illness, while one addressed themes of political extremism. A young man in glasses recited poetry so abstract and prosodic that no relationship to the theme of crisis became clear, while the final reader, a woman in a long black dress, talked for ten minutes about the

difficulties of finding a publisher and only had time to read one poem, which was a rhyming sonnet. Eileen typed a note on her phone reading: the moon in june falls mainly on the spoon. She showed the note to Paula, who smiled vaguely before turning her attention back to the reading. Eileen deleted the note. After the reading, she picked up another glass of wine and went to sit behind the desk again. The elderly man approached her once more and said: You should be up there yourself. Eileen nodded pleasantly. I’m convinced, he said. You have it in you. Mm, said Eileen. He went away without purchasing a magazine.

After the event, Eileen and some of the other organisers and venue staff went for a drink in a nearby bar. Eileen and Paula sat together again, Paula drinking a gin and tonic served in an enormous fishbowl glass with a large piece of grapefruit inside, Eileen drinking whiskey on ice. They were talking about ‘worst break-ups’. Paula was describing the protracted end stage of a two-year-long relationship, during which time both she and her ex-girlfriend kept getting drunk and texting each other, inevitably resulting in ‘either a huge argument or sex’. Eileen swallowed a mouthful of her drink.