Read Online The Paperchase by Marcel Theroux - Free Book Online Page A

he would probably have two, three years at most, in which to wend his way back from Puerto Pollença in the gloaming. That was as much of the good life as his body would be able to take.
    ‘Best of luck,’ said Derek. ‘It was nice knowing you – almost.’
    I had to leave early because I had people arriving at nine. I felt miserable slipping away from my colleagues for the last time. Outside the pub it was raining, and I waited under its awning for a couple of minutes. I suppose the alcohol generated a false bonhomie, but looking back at them, flushed and laughing inside the pub, I felt strangely cut off from them. Derek was right; in the time I’d worked there, I hadn’t got close to any of them. I think I just wasn’t that good at making friends.
    *
    I had rented my flat through an agency on a six-month lease to a stockbroker called Platon Bakatin who strode around theplace in his Gucci loafers, chatting in Russian on his mobile phone. He liked it, he said, but wanted me to redecorate and was sniffy about the furniture. I guessed that he wanted something more impressive than my worn-out sofa-bed and kilims. I thought of putting my stuff into storage, but it hardly seemed worth it, so I let a furniture dealer come round and take it all away for about seventy pounds. When he named his price I was initially reluctant. I remembered that Laura and I had bought one of the kilims on holiday in Turkey and I didn’t want to part with it. Then I thought, Fuck it; and helped carry the furniture out to the van.
    Repainted, the empty flat seemed like a stranger’s when I got home to it. It was Platon’s home now, I thought. His new sofa stood in the living room, still wrapped in plastic. There was an unfamiliar echo to my footsteps as I walked around the flat. All that was left of me were my clothes, a few crates of books, lamps, an old computer, my records, and me. And soon, all that would be gone. I felt like I was erasing my presence in the world.
    It was odd how many people I ended up inviting to the party. The list of guests was a long one. There’s a big discrepancy between the number of people you feel obliged to invite to a party, and the number of people you feel able to confide in when the sky falls on your head. At least there is in my case. Perhaps other people have a more healthy ratio between the two. I had invited a big crowd of craps who might or might not turn up. And I had invited my friends. More precisely, I had invited Stevo and Lloyd.
    Stevo came early, full of effusiveness, and with half a bottle of vodka tucked into the pocket of his long smelly coat. He sat himself down on the crackling plastic sofa cover and started rolling a joint. He was crumbling bits of hash on to the tobacco when Lloyd arrived, straight from work, looking rumpled and tired, and collapsed on the seat next to him. ‘Heather sends her apologies,’ said Lloyd.
    ‘What happened? Her broomstick break down again?’ Stevospoke out of the corner of his mouth. He had his lips clamped around the joint while he frisked his pockets for the lighter that lay on the floor in front of him. ‘By the way, Damien, mate, where are the honeys?’
    ‘Did you say “honeys”?’ Lloyd asked him, in a voice that managed to be both weary and incredulous.
    ‘I most definitely did. Damien, where are they? You promised me pretty girls.’
    I opened a bottle of sparkling wine. I had bought thirty-five, so there were just over ten for each of us. The evening had begun to take on the atmosphere of a doomed stag party. ‘Get your laughing gear round that,’ I said halfheartedly, handing them each a glass.
    Stevo was not to be distracted from his theme. ‘Seriously, Damien. Where are they?’
    ‘What the fuck are you talking about, Stevo? Crisp, anyone?’
    Lloyd took a bite of a crisp and said in a thoughtful and deliberate voice: ‘I’ve come to the conclusion that you actually hate women.’
    ‘Who, me?’ I said.
    ‘You probably do as well,