ONE DAY(99)

Once upon a time he had wondered what happened to all the old people in the TV industry, and now he had his answer. Trainee editors and cameramen were twenty-four, twenty-five, and he had no experience as a producer. Mayhem TV plc, his very own independent company, had become less a business, more an alibi for his inactivity. At the end of the tax year it was formally wound down to avoid accounting costs, and twenty reams of optimistically headed paper were shamefully consigned to the attic. The only bright spot came from spending time with Emma again, sneaking off to the movies when he should have been learning to grout with Jerzy and Lech. But that melancholy feeling, stepping out of a cinema into sunlight on a Tuesday afternoon, had become unbearable. What about his vow of perfect fatherhood? He had responsibilities now. In early June he finally cracked, went to see Callum O’Neill and was initiated into the Natural Stuff family.

And so this St Swithin’s Day finds Dexter Mayhew in an oatmeal-coloured short-sleeve shirt and mushroom-coloured tie, supervising delivery of the vast daily supply of rocket to the new Victoria Station branch. He counts the boxes of the green stuff while the driver stands by with a clipboard, staring openly, and instinctively Dexter knows what’s coming next.

‘Didn’t you used to be on telly?’

And there it is . . .

‘Back in the mists of time,’ he replies, light-heartedly.

‘What was it called? largin’ it or something.’

Don’t look up.

‘That was one of them. So do I sign this receipt or what?’

‘And you used to go out with Suki Meadows.’

Smile, smile, smile.

‘Like I said it was a long, long time ago. One box, two, three—’

‘She’s everywhere these days, isn’t she?’

‘Six, seven, eight—’

‘She’s gorgeous.’

‘She’s very nice. Nine, ten.’

‘What was that like then, going out with her?’

‘Loud.’

‘So – whatever happened to you?’

‘Life. Life happened.’ He takes the clipboard from him. ‘I sign here, yes?’

‘That’s right. You sign there.’

Dexter autographs the invoice and places his hand into the top box, taking a handful of rocket and tasting it for freshness. ‘Rocket – the iceberg lettuce de nos jours’ Callum is fond of saying, but Dexter finds it bitter.

The real head-offices of Natural Stuff are in a warehouse in Clerkenwell, fresh and clean and modern, with juicers and bean-bags, unisex toilets, high-speed internet and pinball machines; immense, Warholesque canvases of cows, chickens and crayfish hang on the walls. Part workplace, part teenager’s bedroom, the architects had labelled it not an office, but a ‘dreamspace’ in Helvetica, lower case. But before Dexter is allowed into the dreamspace, he has to learn the ropes. Cal is very keen that all his executives get their hands dirty, so Dexter is on a month-long trainee placement, working as the shadow manager of the latest outpost of the empire. In the last three weeks he has cleaned out the juicers, worn a hairnet to make the sandwiches, ground the coffee, served the customers and, to his surprise, it has been okay. This, after all, is what it’s all about; business is people, as Callum likes to say.

The worst thing about it is the recognition, that flickering look of pity that passes over the customer’s face when they see an ex-TV presenter serving up soup. The ones in their mid-thirties, his contemporaries, they’re the worst. To have had fame, even very minor fame, and to have lost it, got older and maybe put on a little weight is a kind of living death, and they stare at Dexter behind the cash register as one might stare at a prisoner on a chain-gang. ‘You seem smaller in real life,’ they sometimes say, and it’s true, he does feel smaller now. ‘But it’s okay,’ he wants to say, ladling out the Goan-style lentil soup. ‘It’s fine. I’m at peace. I like it here, and it’s only temporary. I’m learning a new business, I’m providing for my family. Would you like some bread to go with that? Wholemeal or multigrain?’

The morning shift at Natural Stuff lasts from 6.30 a.m. to 4.30 p.m., and after cashing up, he joins the Saturday shoppers on the train to Richmond. Then there’s a boring twenty-minute walk back to the terrace of Victorian houses that are all much, much bigger on the inside than they appear on the outside, until he is home at The House of Colic. As he walks up the garden path (he has a garden path – how did that happen?), he sees Jerzy and Lech closing the front door, and he assumes the matey tone and mild cockney accent that is mandatory when talking to builders, even Polish ones.

‘Cze??! Jak si? masz?’

‘Good evening, Dexter,’ says Lech, indulgently.

‘Mrs Mayhew, she is home?’ You have to change the words round like this; it’s the law.

‘Yes, she’s home.’

He lowers his voice. ‘Today, how are they?’

‘A little . . . tired, I think.’

Dexter frowns and sucks in his breath jokily. ‘So – should I worry?’

‘A little, perhaps.’

‘Here.’ Dexter reaches into his inside pocket, and hands them two contraband Natural Stuff Honey-Date-Oat Bars. ‘Stolen property. Do not tell anyone, yes?’

‘Okay, Dexter.’

‘Do widzenia.’ He steps up to the front door and takes out his key, knowing there’s a good chance that somewhere in the house someone will be crying. Sometimes it seems as if they have a rota.