thought. That’s something else I can still do.
On the way home I walked past one of those big advertising hoardings. “Give or take,” it said in big blue letters. For the first time I noticed the name of the advertiser, their logo printed in the right-hand corner. Letters that were so wide and stylized that they didn’t really look like text. Three cubes with just tiny differences to indicate the separate letters. The first was a very solid crown, and the other two like boxes with lines and dots on them. Only if you looked closely and, like me, had spent a lot of time over the past few days in the company of that acronym could you make out the letters W, R, and D.
I got home just before seven, and had started leafing through the latest catalogue from an IT company when my phone buzzed in my pocket. For some reason I thought it was Maud, but when I answered I heard Roger’s breathless voice at the other end.
“Hi! Have you gotten yours?”
“What?” I said.
“Invoice. Have you gotten yours?”
It sounded almost like he was running. He probably wasn’t, but his way of sighing as he spoke, combined with his general poor fitness, made it sound like he was.
“Hang on,” he said, as if he’d just remembered something he had to do. “There’s someone here…Can you call me back?” He hung up.
Roger had always been very careful with money. Presumably he was worried about being poor or feeling exploited, unless it was just in his genes. And apart from adopting various rituals to save money—the sort all really mean people do, like never leaving tips, taking his own bags to the shops, reusing unfranked stamps and old envelopes, turning the car engine off when he was going downhill, all the usual stuff—he had also gotten into the habit of never making phone calls and waiting for people to call him instead. No matter how urgent it was. If he ever did have to make a call, he made sure he started the conversation, then broke off quickly so the person he had called would have to phone him back.
He answered on the first ring.
“Yes,” I said, lying down on the sofa.
“It’s unbelievable, isn’t it?” Roger panted. “What the hell’s it all about? As if there wasn’t enough shit to deal with already. Now they want even more money. It’s insane. Don’t you think? Completely insane.”
I put both legs up on the armrest. It struck me that I almost always lay down when I talked to him. As if I had a particular posture for conversations with Roger.
“Yes, it is.”
There was a crackling, knocking sound down the line, as if he’d dropped his phone or bumped into something. He never did just one thing at a time. He was always busy doing things that no one else really understood. He had the ability to sound in a hurry even though he didn’t have a job, or anything else he had to do.
“Hello?” he said after a while.
“Yes,” I said.
“I mean, it’s completely unbelievable. Isn’t it? You think this sort of thing only happens to people who are well off. Now I’ve got to get a bank loan and all that crap. I’m going to have to mortgage the boat or something…Are you still there?”
I said I was, as Roger battled on with whatever he was doing. It sounded like he was out in the wind. Were there people in the background? Maybe he’d gone down to the marina to look at his main asset. At first it felt rather reassuring that even Roger was going to have to make some sort of sacrifice. It felt good to have someone I could share my worries with. A man with his attitude to money must be completely beside himself at receiving an invoice like that. It must have hit him like a bomb.
Roger had a very nice sailing boat that he took good care of. It was his passion. He would take me out on it in the summer. In return for a contribution to the cost of the petrol for the engine and as long as I brought food, beer, and so on. We usually ended up floating about in some inlet somewhere. Drinking beer and
On the way home I walked past one of those big advertising hoardings. “Give or take,” it said in big blue letters. For the first time I noticed the name of the advertiser, their logo printed in the right-hand corner. Letters that were so wide and stylized that they didn’t really look like text. Three cubes with just tiny differences to indicate the separate letters. The first was a very solid crown, and the other two like boxes with lines and dots on them. Only if you looked closely and, like me, had spent a lot of time over the past few days in the company of that acronym could you make out the letters W, R, and D.
I got home just before seven, and had started leafing through the latest catalogue from an IT company when my phone buzzed in my pocket. For some reason I thought it was Maud, but when I answered I heard Roger’s breathless voice at the other end.
“Hi! Have you gotten yours?”
“What?” I said.
“Invoice. Have you gotten yours?”
It sounded almost like he was running. He probably wasn’t, but his way of sighing as he spoke, combined with his general poor fitness, made it sound like he was.
“Hang on,” he said, as if he’d just remembered something he had to do. “There’s someone here…Can you call me back?” He hung up.
Roger had always been very careful with money. Presumably he was worried about being poor or feeling exploited, unless it was just in his genes. And apart from adopting various rituals to save money—the sort all really mean people do, like never leaving tips, taking his own bags to the shops, reusing unfranked stamps and old envelopes, turning the car engine off when he was going downhill, all the usual stuff—he had also gotten into the habit of never making phone calls and waiting for people to call him instead. No matter how urgent it was. If he ever did have to make a call, he made sure he started the conversation, then broke off quickly so the person he had called would have to phone him back.
He answered on the first ring.
“Yes,” I said, lying down on the sofa.
“It’s unbelievable, isn’t it?” Roger panted. “What the hell’s it all about? As if there wasn’t enough shit to deal with already. Now they want even more money. It’s insane. Don’t you think? Completely insane.”
I put both legs up on the armrest. It struck me that I almost always lay down when I talked to him. As if I had a particular posture for conversations with Roger.
“Yes, it is.”
There was a crackling, knocking sound down the line, as if he’d dropped his phone or bumped into something. He never did just one thing at a time. He was always busy doing things that no one else really understood. He had the ability to sound in a hurry even though he didn’t have a job, or anything else he had to do.
“Hello?” he said after a while.
“Yes,” I said.
“I mean, it’s completely unbelievable. Isn’t it? You think this sort of thing only happens to people who are well off. Now I’ve got to get a bank loan and all that crap. I’m going to have to mortgage the boat or something…Are you still there?”
I said I was, as Roger battled on with whatever he was doing. It sounded like he was out in the wind. Were there people in the background? Maybe he’d gone down to the marina to look at his main asset. At first it felt rather reassuring that even Roger was going to have to make some sort of sacrifice. It felt good to have someone I could share my worries with. A man with his attitude to money must be completely beside himself at receiving an invoice like that. It must have hit him like a bomb.
Roger had a very nice sailing boat that he took good care of. It was his passion. He would take me out on it in the summer. In return for a contribution to the cost of the petrol for the engine and as long as I brought food, beer, and so on. We usually ended up floating about in some inlet somewhere. Drinking beer and
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