Friends Like These: My Worldwide Quest to Find My Best Childhood Friends, Knock on Their Doors, and Ask Them to Come Out and Play (5 page)

I started to say goodbye, but he’d already hung up.

I put the phone down and sat on the sofa, heavily. It was all too much to take. In the space of a day I had lost both Ian
and Wag for an entire summer. My two pals. Gone. Just like that. With no warning whatsoever. And just when I needed them most.
Just when I needed them to keep me on the straight and narrow. To remind me of who I used to be, before lattes and brunches
and Latvian swearing.

I knew I was being selfish. I knew that, for both of them, there could have been no better news. But their happiness made
me panic all the more. Wag had probably already bought a tour van and a new guitar pick. And Ian—Ian was probably already
at the Chislehurst Arms, making new friends, sneering at “the rat race” and drinking bitters with names like Old Badger Tits
or the Snooty Poodle. He was probably editing the parish newsletter, and writing furious editorials about out-of-town superstores
and proposed bypasses, and going foxhunting in a ludicrous top hat. What a wanker. How
dare
he go foxhunting in a ludicrous top hat?

And then—an irrational and unwelcome thought hit me. What if this was somehow the end of our friendship? What if we were now
destined to grow apart? After all—men who have display cushions can’t be friends with rock stars. And everyone knows once
someone moves out of London you never see them again. They turn into Micky Thomases! This could be the end of an era!

It was not an entirely unfamiliar scenario to me. I’d moved around a lot as a kid. Moved cities, moved schools. Always made
a pact with my then best friends that this wouldn’t change anything, that absence meant nothing, that we’d always hang out.
But we’d never quite been able to stick to that pact. The damage was always done—people make a habit of moving on. Now I was
older, though—living in an era of portable phones and MySpace and YourSpace and electronic messaging services—surely that
would make a difference? We were no longer at the mercy of our parents’ jobs, after all. And it wasn’t as if anyone was disappearing
anywhere, particularly. Provided Wag’s tour was a crushing failure, he’d be back in the winter.
That
was something to hope for. And hey—maybe Ian’s house would burn down!

I got up and mooched around the house. It was all slightly depressing. There was still so much work to do. Boxes to unpack.
Sockets to fix. Walls to paint. I stood and stared, transfixed, at a fruit bowl. I shook my head. How did it come to this?
How did it come to me owning a fruit bowl?

But there… there on the wall. A picture. In a brushed-aluminum frame. Lizzie. My wife. I smiled.

You see? It wasn’t so bad being grown-up. Being grown-up meant I had Lizzie. My one constant. The one reliable thing in my
life.
She’d
be there for me.
She
wasn’t going to join a rock band, or move to Chislehurst. This could be a special summer for us. Our first summer as a married
couple. We could go for walks in the park, or build kites and fly them about a bit. We could borrow a dog. Life would be good.
Life would be
great.
Because I’d be with Lizzie.

And as if to confirm this, I suddenly heard the keys in the door.

Lizzie! She was home! I was disproportionately excited.

“Hello!” I yelled.

“Hello!” she yelled back, before wandering through the door and throwing her keys down on the sofa.

“It’s been a very odd day,” I said, hugging her.

“For me as well,” she said. “Oh. I see you’ve received a massive box.”

“I have,” I said.

“What’s in it?”

I shrugged.

“Handy stuff.”

“It must be quite a lot of handy stuff…”

I smiled, opened a cupboard door and pushed the box in.

And when I turned round, Lizzie was holding something up in the air. She made a little
ta-da!
noise. It was a bottle. A large, green bottle. With a large, white label.

“Champagne?”
I said.

She kissed me on the cheek, and then smiled.

“I have some
excellent
news…”

“I
need three cards,” I told the lady behind the counter the next morning. “Each of them celebratory, but each of them balanced
by a subtle tinge of regret.”

The lady had a think about it.

“That’s quite a specific request,” she said. “Can you be more general?”

“No,” I said. “But I
can
be
even more
specific. One of my requirements is a card for someone who is moving to Chislehurst. Do you have a card for someone who is
moving to Chislehurst?”

She looked around her, at the stock, and put her hands on her hips.

“Well, we have
sympathy
cards,” she said, and we both laughed for a very long time indeed. Probably too long, because the man in the queue behind
me made a grumpy noise and shuffled about a bit.

“But seriously,” I said. “Do you have anything like that?”

She shook her head.

“It’s a niche market,” she explained. “Nobody moves to Chislehurst.”

Lizzie’s excellent news had indeed been excellent. She’d been offered a job. A new job. A job on the publicity team of the
nation’s favorite reality show. The same show she finds herself addicted to whenever it’s on the telly. It was
perfect
for her. She would be
paid
to indulge an obsession. I could only imagine what that must be like. And I was happy for her.

“But it’s going to be tough,” she’d said. “They’d want me at the studio a lot, and it’s all the way out in Borehamwood…”

I had waved these concerns away, like a magnanimous king telling a peasant he could keep an onion.

“… and I’d have to work at weekends, and late nights, too. They’re already talking about me staying in a hotel for a lot of
it…”

I’d tried to wave these concerns away, too, but the wave kind of stopped midway.

“Really?” I’d said. “Well, that’s…”

“I don’t
have
to take it, baby… especially as we’ve just moved, and with Wag and Ian being away…”

“Don’t you worry about Wag and Ian being away. They are both men, following their dreams. They will be back when it all goes
wrong.”

Lizzie had laughed.

“But I worry about you. You’re so tight with those two.”

“I have other friends.”

“Yes, but they’re mainly children you play online at Xbox.”

“Some of them are very mature.”

“Who did I hear you calling a pipsqueak last night?”

“The Bald Assassin. And I called him a nitwit. He always creeps up on me and hits me in the back of the head on Call of Duty.
Anyway, I’ll be fine—I’ll just call someone and hang out.”

“Yeah, you could always call
someone,
but Wag and Ian, well… they
understand
you.”

“What’s not to understand? I am very understandable.”

“I just mean, they
get
you.”

“
You
get me.”

“But I’m going to be away so much…”

“I’ll be fine. I’m nearly
thirty.
”

“That’s what I worry about.”

“I’m not going to be lonely. I’ve got Sky+, an Xbox and broadband.”

“Nerd. There’s always Friends Reunited…”

I’d pulled a face which said “the cheek!” and we’d laughed.

“Look,” she’d said, “I’ll only take the job if—”

“Lizzie. You
have
to take the job. I will be personally offended if you do
not
take the job.”

“Really?”

“Really.”

I’d smiled the smile of a confident and in-control late twenty-something.

But inside, I was thinking,
Oh, bollocks
…

Lizzie started work on the new job almost immediately. A PR buzz was already starting around the new season. Who were the
new contestants? What would happen to them? How would things change? I smiled as I sat on the sofa, reading the excitement
in the
Mirror,
and felt proud that my missus was doing so well. She was involved in something
intriguing.
And
I
was, too. After all, in about twenty minutes,
Street Crime UK
would be on, and there was time to make a toasted sandwich before that.

But then the bell rang. And I remembered. It was eleven o’clock on Tuesday morning. And at eleven o’clock on Tuesday morning,
I would succumb to the inevitable, and become a man.

If this was going to happen, it was going to happen
on my terms.
It was time to seize the day.

“Mr. Wallace?”

“Yes?” I said, proudly, opening the door.

“I’m Paul—you called me about your guttering?”

“Come in!” I said.

So this was it. This was the moment I became a
boss!
I’d chosen Paul out of the Yellow Pages because his advert had said:

To be or not to be!—well, you did ask for a quote!!!

I’ll be honest. Now that I’ve written it down, it seems to have lost a fair amount of its humor. But at the time I remember
thinking it was good that he had displayed a sense of fun about his work, as guttering can be a very serious business. People
have died just thinking about it.

“Are you that bloke off the telly?” said Paul, and I said yes and smiled. I’d thought perhaps he was going to say he liked
my stuff, but he just scowled at me and said, “Right.”

“The guttering’s round here,” I said, hoping my intricate knowledge of where the guttering was would impress him. “It’s on
the outside of the house.”

“Right—let’s have a look at her.”

Shit. I should have referred to the guttering as female. Why did I call it “it”? Why didn’t I call her “her”? I was failing
already.

“Yep,” I said, pointing at it. “That’s her. That’s… our lady.”

“Oooof,” said Paul, shaking his head. “I can tell already, she’s in a bit of a state.”

Now, I knew from hours of watching
House of Horrors
and
Rogue Traders
that this was
exactly
what men like Paul were
supposed
to say. But I was under pressure, and all I could manage was, “Is she? That’s sad.”

“Let me get my ladder,” said Paul, and, because I was the boss, I did.

Forty minutes and a cup of tea later and Paul was off. He’d be back on Monday, he said, and so long as I paid 80 percent of
the money up front it’d all be sorted out quickly and easily. I’d done as he’d asked, and looked forward to seeing him then.

“Can I leave my ladder here?” he said.

“Don’t you worry,” I said, “I’ll take care of the little lady.”

And he’d looked at me a bit oddly.

I felt like I’d really achieved something, and walked back through the house, wondering if that was enough work to justify
knocking off for the day. After all, I’d made someone a cup of tea
and
patronized a ladder.

I flicked on the telly.
Street Crime UK
was halfway through. A policeman was telling a youth to get off a wall. A caption told me this had happened in Birmingham
in 2003. Somehow, this made things less exciting. Knowing that several years before, a policeman many miles away had asked
a child to get off a wall wasn’t really something I felt I could relay to strangers in an interesting manner. And so I switched
the telly off and wandered around the house.

There was still much to do, DIY-wise. Sockets needed replacing. Walls needed plastering. The toilet needed a new seat. I stood
and looked at it all for a bit. I whistled through my teeth like I’d seen builders do, and then scratched my head, because
I’d once seen a bloke on a painting show do this, and it had seemed pretty cool.

I sighed, and realized I could either whistle while staring at a toilet, or do what Lizzie had said—and
call
someone.

I reached for my phone and texted Wag.

Hey. A farewell drink?

And then I texted Ian.

Hey. A farewell drink?

And then I stared at the toilet again. It did nothing of interest. It just sat there. And I just stood there.

A few moments later, my phone beep-beeped. It was Wag.

Hey! Can’t! At the American Embassy getting visas! Rock on!

I nodded, solemnly. He’d be off soon. I looked at the toilet again.

A minute passed.

My phone beep-beeped. It was Ian.

Sorry, Dan—sorting out removal dates. Chislehurst here I come!

I sighed. This wasn’t fair. Everyone was doing something incredibly exciting. Or moving to Chislehurst. And what was
I
doing? I was whistling at toilets or watching kids up walls. My friends were moving on without me. Getting on without me.
Doing things without me. I was reduced to thinking about sockets and wiring and wallpaper.

But I knew how to cope with it. I would simply get on with things. I resolved to sort out the sockets.

“Damn you, the Bald Assassin! DAMN YOU!”

It was half an hour later and the Bald Assassin was beating me at Call of Duty. I’d been hiding by a window with my sniper
scope trained on the window I was certain
he
was hiding behind, when he snuck into my secret lair and bashed me on the back of the head with his rifle butt. He was always
sneaking into my secret lairs and bashing me on the back of the head with his rifle butt. It was the most annoying maneuver
he could possibly pull off. It showed that while
I
needed guns and grenades and binoculars and little maps, all
he
needed was a small piece of wood. And it didn’t matter where I hid, either. Behind walls. Under tables. On roofs. In bushes.
Somehow, the Bald Assassin knew my every move.