A few days later, George and Beverley are seated in their Range Rover, parked in an unobtrusive spot near Ebury Mews. Beverley is holding a copy of When the Stars Align, her debut novel. It arrived in the post just as they were leaving the house and she’d opened the package while George was driving, letting out a cry of delight when she saw the finished book. Reaching across, George takes it from her and turns to the dedication page, smiling when he sees that she has dedicated it to him, with love.
‘Well, this is marvellous,’ he says. ‘Simply marvellous. I’m so proud of you, my darling.’
Beverley feels a rush of love for her husband. He’s been nothing but supportive of her since she declared an interest in writing and, when her book was finished, had agreed not to pull any strings with his industry contacts, so that if success came her way, it would come entirely on her own merit. And it has. A whole new life has opened up to her now.
‘Is that him?’ asks George, looking down the road as a stocky twelve-year-old boy walks slowly towards them, his schoolbag on his back. He seems weighed down by it, as if he already knows that his future is going to be more depressing than his present.
‘That’s him,’ says Beverley, tossing the book on to the back seat without any ceremony. ‘Are we sure about this?’
‘I’m sure if you’re sure.’
‘I’m sure.’
George nods and waits a few extra moments until the child is practically level with them, then opens the door and climbs out.
And at that precise moment, near a taco stand in Mexico, a dog sits on the ground, panting and looking up hopefully, while a twenty-six-year-old man named Kevin Systrom takes a photograph of him, posting it to his brand-new Instagram account, and captioning it:
test
Wednesday
THE WOKESTERS AND THE POOTS
As he slowly drifted back towards consciousness, George emitted a lengthy groan, longing for a return to the erotic dream he’d been enjoying that featured him, Julie Christie and a water lilo. But it was pointless. The next twenty-four hours, he guessed, would be among the most irritating of his life. His mind was already flooding with memories of the evening before and the various humiliations that had been so quickly thrust upon him by a pitiless world.
He rolled over and lay on his back, staring up at the ceiling. It appeared to have been painted recently, for it looked startlingly white. On the bedside table next to him sat the eight-hundred-page biography that he had yet to open, along with his phone, which stood on its charger. His usual practice at this time was to sit up in bed, place both his and Beverley’s pillows behind his back, and then reach for the phone and his glasses to discover whether anything interesting had taken place while he was asleep but, right now, it was the last thing he felt like doing.
In catching up with the news, he had a running order that he stuck to religiously.
First, AP and Reuters, to find out what had happened in the world overnight.
Then, the Guardian, to find out why this would cause all life on earth to end soon.
The Telegraph, to find out why the United Kingdom was alone among nations with the courage and resilience to survive this global catastrophe.
The Times, to find out how much it would cost.
Sky News, to find out what a group of middle-aged men down the pub in Bradford made of it all.
The New York Times, to find out why their journalists had been predicting this for years.
The Mail Online, to find out whether it might interfere with a Love Islander’s holiday plans.
And, finally, Fox News, to find out why none of it was going to happen anyway because it was all a vast left-wing conspiracy dreamed up by a bunch of liberal elites and Hollywood perverts.
Today, however, he was afraid to look at any of these. Going to bed the night before, he knew that the last thing he needed was to have the bloody thing buzzing constantly as friends messaged to say how sorry they were that he was being put through such aggravation, even though he knew they were secretly delighted to see him being publicly shamed, and so he’d switched his phone off entirely.
A knock came on the door and Elizabeth poked her head around.
‘You’re awake, then?’ she said.
‘I am.’
‘Do you want to know what’s been going on since you went to bed?’
‘I do not.’
‘Well, you’re on the front page of all the broadsheets. And the tabloids too. Actually, pretty much every newspaper is leading with you.’
‘And if I’d said that I did want to know what had been going on, would you have left me alone and told me nothing?’
‘It’s better that you know,’ said Elizabeth, glancing around a room that she had rarely entered since childhood. She could remember many happy Decembers searching for presents with her brothers in the wardrobes and under the bed. ‘At least, this way, you’re prepared.’
‘You’re very thoughtful,’ he replied. ‘The Cordelia to my Lear. Now get out.’
She shrugged her shoulders but, to his relief, left. Feeling so much anxiety that he worried he might be about to have a heart attack, he decided that he had no choice but to reach for the instrument of his potential downfall and face whatever monsters lay in store for him. It took about a minute for it to burst into life but, once it did, the texts began to pour in. He scrolled through the names, his thumb swiping up the screen as he scanned them quickly. Various journalists, a few politicians and a bunch of older celebrities all sending messages of support and saying that they didn’t know what all the fuss was about. He’d delete them later. The only one he engaged with was from his producer, Ben Bimbaum, who told him that they needed to talk, and could he be at the BBC at eleven o’clock.
George Cleverley
I’m always at the BBC at eleven o’clock. You could set your watch by me.
He’d barely sent the message when the little dots appeared on the screen to show that Ben was replying. He must have been staring at his screen, contemplating the flatness of the Earth, waiting for George to turn his phone on.
Ben Bimbaum
Great! Looking 4ward to chatz!
‘Oh, for fuck’s sake,’ he grunted.
The ridiculous thing, of course, was that he had been trying to be supportive. He’d always got along well with Aidan, the receptionist at Arlo, Quill, Fitzgerald & Connolly, and it was an incontrovertible fact that he rarely got along well with anyone. Particularly anyone under the age of thirty. And so, when he had learned that Aidan was now Nadia – oh! it was the same word backwards! he just got that! – he had tweeted a note of support, despite how rude he – she – had been to him earlier.
@GeorgeCleverley Much love to Aidan @AQFC as he continues his transition. Brave, authentic & inspiring. #TransRights #TransPride #BraveNewWorld #TotalSupport
The shit had hit the fan almost immediately without him even fully understanding what he’d done wrong. All right, he admitted to himself, he knew what he had supposedly done wrong. He’d called Nadia ‘Aidan’ in his tweet. And used the ‘he’ pronoun. But Christ alive, was that a hanging offence?
The whole commotion hadn’t even been initiated by him, for his initial tweet had originally been liked by a couple of hundred people without any adverse comments at all. It was only when some idiot called @TruthIsASword had tweeted in response that things had started to kick off.