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Unacceptable Language Any similarity to persons living or dead is purely coincidental, apart from Andy, you cunt, there was never a house in St Tropez. Do you realise Greta used a toasted sandwich machine to straighten her hair? As for Sue, she can sod off back to Norwich, all she ever did was whine and moan about her abusive parents: so they hit her with a bath loofah? Jemima was murdered by those toffs, she swears she wasn’t, but I’ve seen her blue and bloated head buried in their books. Gorgeously unclean, the twins are really just one woman called Angela: some evenings she thumbs me like a Holy Bible or Koran or whatever, but mostly lies about stupid things like can-openers or where the treasure is. Saul, what were you thinking? She gained a degree in avoidance addiction: seduce, revel and flee. Jean needs a married man. She’s not like you, Saul. Where’s your backbone, Florence? Being gay, shouldn’t you curb your racism? Perhaps rivers don’t flow like that, perhaps Dominic was right: that baby belonged to nobody, it was a hoax, a hoax in a pram to beguile him into empathy. Empathy? That’s a consumer tool if ever there was a Mecca, which there isn’t, otherwise what are we doing in the supermarket? Meet me in Greenwich village, Delilah, and we’ll recreate the sixties. Burn this bra. Is that right? No, burn this chair. Is that right? What are we supposed to burn again? I arrived for the revolution with my lunchbox. There were sheep. You people promised to be my loud generation. I regret everything. Derek is a contented dentist. 16
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Mystery Tears A poem about hysteria You could order them from China over the Internet. The website showed a grainy picture of Vivien Leigh in Streetcar Named Desire. It was two vials for twenty euros and they were packaged like AA batteries. They first became popular on the young German art scene – thin boys would tap a few drops into their eyes then paint their girlfriends legs akimbo and faces cramped with wisdom, in the style of the Weimar Republic. It was sexy. They weren’t like artificial Hollywood tears, they had a sticky, salty texture and a staggered release system. One minute, you’re sitting at the dinner table eating a perfectly nice steak then you’re crying until you’re sick in a plant-pot. My partner sadly became addicted to Mystery Tears. A thousand pounds went in a week and everything I did provoked despair. She loved the trickling sensation. ‘It’s so romantic,’ she said, ‘and yet I feel nothing.’ She started labelling her stash with names like For Another and Things I Dare Not Tell. She alternated vials, sometimes cried all night. She had bottles sent by special delivery marked Not Enough. A dealer sold her stuff cut with Fairy Liquid, street-name: River of Sorrow. Our flat shook and dampened. I never touched it. Each day she woke up calmer and calmer. 17

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Unacceptable Language

Any similarity to persons living or dead is purely coincidental, apart from Andy, you cunt, there was never a house in St Tropez. Do you realise Greta used a toasted sandwich machine to straighten her hair? As for Sue, she can sod off back to Norwich, all she ever did was whine and moan about her abusive parents: so they hit her with a bath loofah? Jemima was murdered by those toffs, she swears she wasn’t, but I’ve seen her blue and bloated head buried in their books. Gorgeously unclean, the twins are really just one woman called Angela: some evenings she thumbs me like a Holy Bible or Koran or whatever, but mostly lies about stupid things like can-openers or where the treasure is. Saul, what were you thinking? She gained a degree in avoidance addiction: seduce, revel and flee. Jean needs a married man. She’s not like you, Saul. Where’s your backbone, Florence? Being gay, shouldn’t you curb your racism? Perhaps rivers don’t flow like that, perhaps Dominic was right: that baby belonged to nobody, it was a hoax, a hoax in a pram to beguile him into empathy. Empathy? That’s a consumer tool if ever there was a Mecca, which there isn’t, otherwise what are we doing in the supermarket? Meet me in Greenwich village, Delilah, and we’ll recreate the sixties. Burn this bra. Is that right? No, burn this chair. Is that right? What are we supposed to burn again? I arrived for the revolution with my lunchbox. There were sheep. You people promised to be my loud generation. I regret everything. Derek is a contented dentist.

16

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