someone checked it for fingerprints? Prison. It took very little for Stephen to become convinced that he was going to prison. He pictured himself in prison uniform, a long period in remand, a distressing visit from his ex-wife, being sucked into the seedy world of smack, getting shivved in the communal showers….
Of course, he was being paranoid. No one goes to prison for stealing Best Actor awards. Best just to keep hold of the thing, pick a moment, sometime when the heat had died down, and smuggle it into the theater, and leave it at the stage door. Maybe with an anonymous apology, composed of letters cut from old newspapers. In the meantime he decided to wrap the head in a blanket, and stash it at the back of the wardrobe, along with his complimentary DVD of
Sammy the Squirrel Sings Favorite Nursery Rhymes
.
With a sudden surge of shame, he realized that he was going to be late picking up his daughter. Quickly pulling on his coat, he plunged his hands in his pockets to check for the keys, and immediately squealed and yanked them out again. The insides were warm and wet, and appeared to be full of some kind of soft matter. It was like plunging his hand into guts, but he took a deep breath, gingerly reaching in again, and pulled out a moist, disintegrating burgundy napkin, full of mashed-up canapés—miniature quiches, cocktail sausages tacky with mustard and honey, something that may once have been a devil-on-horseback, now dismounted. The buffet. He’d accidentally stolen the buffet. Had anyone seen him stealing the buffet? Had Nora? A BAFTA, the buffet, what else might he have stolen?
Cash?
He reached into his pocket again, and felt something made from hard plastic that seemed to bend as he squeezed. He pulled his hand out slowly. A six-inch pose-able figurine of Han Solo, in his costume from
The Empire Strikes Back,
daubed in what looked like satay sauce. A BAFTA, the buffet, a
Star Wars
figurine; for the first time he understood the full meaning of the phrase “toe-curling.” He could feel them straining against his scuffed sneakers. He shook his head, opened his eyes wide.
I must put last night behind me.
I must not let Sophie down.
I must concentrate.
I must be at my best for Sophie.
My aim and objective is to show Sophie and Alison that I am a good, responsible, loving, successful father.
As quickly as possible, he stuffed the stolen buffet deep into the bin, washed his hands, splashed his face, shaved, all the time feeling his brain, bruised and sore, rolling around in his head like an orange in a shoe box. He changed his clothes to something clean and smart, an ironed shirt, sensible trousers, a proper jacket, proper shoes. He swallowed two aspirins, gargled with TCP to fend off the tonsillitis, put his coat back on and stepped out into the street, hopefully to some degree a new man.
Harrison Ford and the Breakfast Room of Doom
S hortly after the birth of his daughter, Stephen had indulged in the orgy of solemn philosophical speculation that inevitably accompanies new fatherhood.
What,
he worried,
will happen to my family if I’m not around to look after them? How will they manage if I’m not always there?
Now, seven years later, he had his answer.
They were actually managing fantastically well.
Sophie now lived with Alison and her new husband, Colin, an investment banker, in a comfortable Victorian house conveniently near Barnes Common. The house, or home, had five bedrooms, a large garden with a gazebo and a modernist water feature and two shiny new cars in the front drive. Detached, red brick, with large sash windows and a smoking chimney, it was the kind of house a child would draw; after all, how do you draw a bedsit?
Standing at the door, Stephen glanced down to his left at the neat row of green wellies by the doormat, arranged in descending order of size, like the Three Bears. He rang the doorbell, and tried not to feel like a salesman.
The door was opened, as he knew it would be, by
Of course, he was being paranoid. No one goes to prison for stealing Best Actor awards. Best just to keep hold of the thing, pick a moment, sometime when the heat had died down, and smuggle it into the theater, and leave it at the stage door. Maybe with an anonymous apology, composed of letters cut from old newspapers. In the meantime he decided to wrap the head in a blanket, and stash it at the back of the wardrobe, along with his complimentary DVD of
Sammy the Squirrel Sings Favorite Nursery Rhymes
.
With a sudden surge of shame, he realized that he was going to be late picking up his daughter. Quickly pulling on his coat, he plunged his hands in his pockets to check for the keys, and immediately squealed and yanked them out again. The insides were warm and wet, and appeared to be full of some kind of soft matter. It was like plunging his hand into guts, but he took a deep breath, gingerly reaching in again, and pulled out a moist, disintegrating burgundy napkin, full of mashed-up canapés—miniature quiches, cocktail sausages tacky with mustard and honey, something that may once have been a devil-on-horseback, now dismounted. The buffet. He’d accidentally stolen the buffet. Had anyone seen him stealing the buffet? Had Nora? A BAFTA, the buffet, what else might he have stolen?
Cash?
He reached into his pocket again, and felt something made from hard plastic that seemed to bend as he squeezed. He pulled his hand out slowly. A six-inch pose-able figurine of Han Solo, in his costume from
The Empire Strikes Back,
daubed in what looked like satay sauce. A BAFTA, the buffet, a
Star Wars
figurine; for the first time he understood the full meaning of the phrase “toe-curling.” He could feel them straining against his scuffed sneakers. He shook his head, opened his eyes wide.
I must put last night behind me.
I must not let Sophie down.
I must concentrate.
I must be at my best for Sophie.
My aim and objective is to show Sophie and Alison that I am a good, responsible, loving, successful father.
As quickly as possible, he stuffed the stolen buffet deep into the bin, washed his hands, splashed his face, shaved, all the time feeling his brain, bruised and sore, rolling around in his head like an orange in a shoe box. He changed his clothes to something clean and smart, an ironed shirt, sensible trousers, a proper jacket, proper shoes. He swallowed two aspirins, gargled with TCP to fend off the tonsillitis, put his coat back on and stepped out into the street, hopefully to some degree a new man.
Harrison Ford and the Breakfast Room of Doom
S hortly after the birth of his daughter, Stephen had indulged in the orgy of solemn philosophical speculation that inevitably accompanies new fatherhood.
What,
he worried,
will happen to my family if I’m not around to look after them? How will they manage if I’m not always there?
Now, seven years later, he had his answer.
They were actually managing fantastically well.
Sophie now lived with Alison and her new husband, Colin, an investment banker, in a comfortable Victorian house conveniently near Barnes Common. The house, or home, had five bedrooms, a large garden with a gazebo and a modernist water feature and two shiny new cars in the front drive. Detached, red brick, with large sash windows and a smoking chimney, it was the kind of house a child would draw; after all, how do you draw a bedsit?
Standing at the door, Stephen glanced down to his left at the neat row of green wellies by the doormat, arranged in descending order of size, like the Three Bears. He rang the doorbell, and tried not to feel like a salesman.
The door was opened, as he knew it would be, by
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