The Pretender by David Belbin Page B

the sales that the Greene will give us now.With luck, you’ll find something else in the archives that we can use in number five hundred. And I’ll write to a few of our regulars, ask for a special contribution. I’ll print extra pages, pull half of the review section, whatever’s necessary. But I want it out soon.’ His eyes brightened, and he added, ‘we’ll have a launch party.That’ll show we mean business. It’s years since we had a launch party.’
    Tim came round that evening. I told him about the launch party.
    ‘Tony would like you to read your story. Would you do it?’
    ‘Would I?’ Tim was very excited. He confessed he hadn’t done any work on his novel all year, but the news of impending publication had spurred him into action. ‘I’ve written five thousand words since you appeared last week! I’m usually a slow writer, but I reread what I’d done so far and all of a sudden, it made sense — I know what needs changing, where the book’s going.’
    Tim was fascinated by the LR offices. He was so enthusiastic that I showed him my upstairs quarters, where he spent half an hour digging around in the box room. As he left, Tim offered to help me with the archive work, but I told him that he should spend his free time writing.
    Tim’s friendship affected me greatly. I had found a companion who, while a few years older than me, was still in his twenties. He was the first person I’d met of my own generation who also wanted to be a writer. I felt a little less lonely. I even had another go at my own fiction, although I knew that there was a more pressing need. Tony was counting on me to discover another ‘lost’ story in the archive for the Little Review ’s five hundredth edition.

Twenty-two
    The exam results were posted on a notice board near a lecture theatre I hadn’t been inside since the Autumn term. By the time I found it, there was no crowd, which saved my blushes. I had always been able to coast before. I’d known that I’d done badly, but figured that I would get through and could improve my grades later. It was too late. I’d failed.
    My tutor was in his office. The resigned cordiality with which he let me in suggested that he’d been expecting me. My file was on his desk. The university was run in such a ramshackle, anonymous way that it hadn’t occurred to me until then that I even possessed a file.
    ‘You’ve got no excuses, Mark,’ he said. ‘Your attendance at lectures has been the worst in the year.’
    Nobody had told me how, once the numbers began to fall, lecturers routinely passed round an attendance list. That was what happened when you failed to make friends in your year.
    ‘You’ve missed three out of your twenty tutorials with me and you’ve often come under prepared.’
    There was no denying this.
    ‘You walked out of your most important exam an hour early, having failed to complete the paper. Nobody’s going to be generous in their marking when they hear stories like that.’
    I hung my head. I had thought myself unnoticed, virtually anonymous, but all the time people had been making notes on me. There was no coming back, that was what my tutor was telling me.
    ‘What surprises me,’ the tutor went on, ‘is that you came with such good references. Excellent A level grades. You’re described as loving literature, as having a vocation to be a novelist. Is that what you’ve been doing these last few months, writing a novel?’
    I shook my head. I didn’t have the energy to lie. Anyway, he might ask to see it.
    ‘Your mother’s a librarian, it says here. How’s she going to take this news?’
    In disbelief, I looked at his expression. Was he taking the piss? But why should the University know that my mother had been dead for nearly a year? I hadn’t told them.
    ‘Are you all right, Mark? Pull yourself together, lad.’
    The tutor handed me a tissue because I was blubbing like a baby.
     
    Later I was told that, given my bereavement, I would be