Nick Hornby - High Fidelity

High Fidelity
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Page 76 of 112
6/20/2006
“Watch it another time, then.”
“Oh, yeah. I’ve got so much money I can give two pounds to the bloke in the video shop every night.”
“I’m not asking you to do it every night. I’m … Look, I’ll give you the two quid, all right”
“I dunno. Are you sure”
I’m sure, and there we have it. Dan Maskell and Steve Butler. They don’t know each other, they won’t
like each other, and they have nothing in common apart from a slight overlap in their record collections
(Dan’s not very interested in black music, Steve’s not very interested in white music, they both have a
few jazz albums). And Dan’s expecting to see Marie, but Marie’s not expecting to see Dan, nor does she
even know of his existence. Should be a cracking night out.
Marie’s got a phone now, and Barry has her number, and she’s happy that I called, and more than
happy to come out for a drink, and if she knew it was my birthday she’d probably explode with joy, but
for some reason I decide not to tell her. I don’t have to sell the evening to her, which is just as well,
because I don’t think I’d be able to give it away. She’s got to do something else first, however, so
there’s an agonizing hour or so alone with Steve and Dan. I talk to Dan about rock music, while Steve
stares at somebody getting lucky on the fruit machine, and I talk to Steve about soul music, while Dan
does that trick with a beer mat which only the truly irritating person knows. And then we all talk about
jazz, and then there’s some pretty desultory what-do-you-do kind of stuff, and then we run out of petrol
altogether, and we all watch the guy who’s getting lucky on the fruit machine.
Marie and T-Bone and a very blond, very glamorous, and very young woman, also American, finally
turn up around quarter to ten, so there’s only forty-five minutes of drinking time left. I ask them what
they want to drink, but Marie doesn’t know, and comes up to the bar with me to have a look at what
they’ve got.
“I see what you mean about T-Bone’s sex life,” I say as we’re waiting.
She raises her eyes to the ceiling. “Isn’t she something else And you know what That’s the ugliest
woman he’s ever dated.”
“I’m glad you could come.”
“The pleasure is ours. Who are those guys”
“Dan and Steve. I’ve known them for years. They’re a bit dull, I’m afraid, but I have to see them
sometimes.”
“Duck noires, right”
“Sorry”
“I call ’em duck noires. Sort of a mixture of lame duck and bête noire. People you don’t want to see
but kinda feel you should.”
Duck noires. Bang on. And I had to fucking beg mine, pay mine, to come out for a drink on my
birthday.
I never think these things through, ever. “Happy birthday, Rob,” says Steve when I put his drink down
in front of him. Marie attempts to give me a look, of surprise, I would guess, but also of deepest
sympathy and bottomless understanding, but I won’t return it.
It’s a pretty bad evening. When I was a kid, my granny used to spend Boxing Day afternoon with a
friend’s granny; my mum and dad would drink with Adrian’s mum and dad, and I’d play with Adrian,
and the two old codgers would sit in front of the TV exchanging pleasantries. The catch was that they
were both deaf, but it didn’t really matter: they were happy enough with their version of a conversation,
which had the same gaps and nods and smiles as everyone else’s conversation, but none of the
connections. I haven’t thought about that for years, but I remember it tonight.
Steve annoys me throughout: he has this trick of waiting until the conversation is in full flow, and then
muttering something in my ear when I’m attempting either to talk or to listen to somebody else. So I can
either ignore him and appear rude, or answer him, involve everyone else in what I’m saying, and change
their direction entirely. And once he’s got everyone talking about soul, or Star Trek (he goes to
conventions and things), or great bitters of the north of England (he goes to conventions and things),
subjects nobody else knows anything about, we go through the whole process all over again. Dan yawns