The White Block 3

Continued from http://www.abctales.com/story/60253

The coffee bar in the base of their building was buzzing with young,
stylish creatives, from the other companies and organisation that
shared the building. Martin recognised some of them from various
parties and bars. With hair and clothes just so, walking with a studied
and practiced sense of relaxed purpose, for the first time they struck
Martin as dainty and fussy, himself and Josh included. There was
something forced in the attempt to stay young, to escape from the
gravity of maturity.

"Do you know what this building used to be?" said Josh, carrying their
froth topped coffees to the long sofa they had chosen to sit on. "I was
talking to one of the old guys that does the maintenance, and he said
that it used to be a carpet factory. All of this place, all one
business. You wouldn't believe it would you?"

Martin didn't know what he believed. Something about the colourful
prints that covered the walls and the brushed chrome that carried
through the building on doors, rails and sills made him feel off
balance.

"Now," said Josh turning to face him, propping up his head at angle,
elbow on the back of the sofa. "What's wrong? I can see that you're not
concentrating at work. So can everyone else, but they haven't realised
it yet. They're probably so used to you earning all the accolades that
they're wondering whether they've done something wrong. I've been
watching you," he gave a little smile and looked directly into Martin's
eyes, "more than usual."

Ordinarily Martin would have been angry to be questioned in such a
direct way, would have resented the manoeuvring of office
politic.

"Is it that noticeable?"

"Is it that noticeable? You've done nothing for about two weeks. You
come in with a face like thunder, you sit and stare out of the window,
then you go home about three hours early."

Josh was right. Nothing in his head was where it should be, like a desk
that someone had rearranged in the middle of the night. As soon as he
sat down, he wanted to be up again, to be out of the office, to be
somewhere else.

Sipping from the coffee that seemed so flavoured that it filled his
mouth uncomfortably to bursting, he told Josh about the dreams, about
being lost in his own home, about how unfamiliar Stella seemed. Josh
nodded, looking him in the eye. Wary of giving too much away he gave
the bare bones of the dreams, leaving out the context, leaving out
Newcastle altogether.

"I just don't know what's wrong with me. It's like all of this comfort,
all of?" He gestured around the room at the design classic chairs and
leather sofas, the asymmetrical haircuts and trainers, the mobile
phones and ipods. "All of this has turned round to bite me. Didn't you
ever really, really believe in someone, really believe they were going
to see you were all right, then find out that they didn't care? That
there was nothing there, like they were just a hollow shell, like it
was only you that was making them real? That's what this is like. I
thought that if I believed in it all enough, if I worked at it hard
enough, it would look after me and make me happy."

Josh put up his hand, laughing. "You're talking to a gay man here. If I
had a pound for all of the times I've trusted a man and been let down
and felt a fool, I wouldn't be talking to you now, I'd be on a yacht
somewhere, bronzing myself."

When he saw that Martin wasn't laughing he stopped abruptly, resting
his head at an angle again as he continued.

"It's like I'm waking up, like I've been sleepwalking. Everything feels
like a film set, all of the heavy things are hollow inside and light as
air. I'm?" He paused, swallowing hard, uncertain again of what he
wanted to say.

"You're burnt out. I've seen it all before, Martin. I really have.
You've hit a plateau. You've spent years driving along, faster and
faster, and now you've come to rest. It happens to us all. It's burn
out, it happens to the best of us. It comes with the territory."

Martin wanted to believe him, but it wasn't that at all, but he knew
that there was no telling Josh, with his sage-like nods and
authoritative proclamations.

"Don't you ever get the feeling that there's another world, that we
live in a world that's cut off?"

The words sounded odd and strangled in his throat, uncertain that they
should come out. He knew that Josh wouldn't understand, because he
didn't understand himself, but he wanted him to and so he
continued.

"We think it's the world, but it isn't, it's tiny." He gestured around
the room again. "We weren't born here. There was somewhere before this,
somewhere we belonged to, or belonged in. This is just false. It
doesn't mean anything. It could close tomorrow and what would be lost?
When it was a carpet factory, it meant something. People lived out
their lives around it. Now it's just this, a set with no weight at
all."

Josh continued looking him in the eye and he was aware that he would be
able to see the tears that were hotly pricking his eyelids. He suddenly
felt vulnerable to Josh, vulnerable to this world, vulnerable to the
dreams as if he had only just become aware of something in the
undergrowth that had been stalking him for years.

"Martin, I worked all of my life to get here and so did you. God, I
grew up in a small town, always looking down the train tracks waiting
until I was old enough to get on the train and never have to come back.
I couldn't wait to make my life around me, to make sure that everything
fitted me perfectly. I've not managed it yet, but I can't wait until I
only have the things in my life that I want to have. You're the
same."

The white block on the hill was there, solid and permanent, as if it
had grown from the hillside. It would still be there when he died, a
part of the landscape. It had shaped him, made him, fitted around him.
His family were still there, indivisible from their environment,
fitting themselves to their lives. He had escaped, but at a cost of
which he hadn't been aware.

"The dreams make me feel disassociated, unreal. Nothing connects;
everything feels like a jumble, like I've never really looked properly.
I thought it was all smooth, but it's all cracks. I'm not really
expressing this properly, but the dreams seem so real. I can taste the
air, I can feel the wind. I'm there and it's just so, so permanent. It
feels so? so right. It's where I grew up and now, now I want it back.
It's almost like I'm homesick."

"We're all susceptible to nostalgia. Sometimes I look back and wish for
the days before I came out and my parents didn't see everything I did
as being a statement of my gayness. You don't want to go back. You're
tired. It must have been shit or you wouldn't be here, wouldn't have
had a reason to leave."

Josh put his hand on Martin's shoulder and squeezed it. "What you need
to do is unwind. You can only wind yourself up for so long before you
snap. I tell you what, come to the party that we're having. No work
people. I've got some friends who put on parties in different places
and we're having one on Saturday night. I'll print you and Stella out
an invite. It's very," Josh leaned closer to him until Martin could
smell the wax in his hair and the coffee on his breath, "Very
exclusive."

He'd heard stories about Josh's parties, read about them in the stylish
magazines that were artfully stacked around their house. They were the
opposite of the dreams, gossamer light bubbles of light and sound that
burst almost as they formed. In all the time that he'd worked with Josh
he'd never had an invite.

"You'll enjoy it. It'll be wild."

Josh left, smiling the beatific smile of a blameless saint convinced of
his goodness, weaving through the well dress people taking a break from
earning the money that made them well dressed, leaving Martin with his
coffee half drunk and still hot.

He sat for a long time, conscious of the fact that he'd made an error.
Even if Josh's concern had been genuine, he would not be able to resist
capitalising on his gain. While giving the impression of a team, the
office was in fact a collection of disparate individuals, all
constantly jostling for position.

When he got back into the office, an envelope with the invitations was
on his desk. Unintentionally, he caught Josh's eye and saw only
coldness.