Waiting for Doggo Read Free Page A

and rather special friendships (more common between men than women, in my experience) where two people utterly unlike each other in character and temperament hit it off. I tend to come at life cautiously, grateful for whatever it bestows on me; J attacks it as if it were an assault course, every hurdle and impediment tailored to slow his progress. He has the energy, drive and ambition of ten men, possibly a hundred.
    There’s common ground between us, of course. At Warwick, it was our passion for literature. We blathered on for endless hours about how we would carve out careers for ourselves in publishing. Publishing needed people like us – young minds in tune with the digital revolution that was just starting to shake up the industry. We figured we would have to go our separate ways to begin with, but only in order to learn the ropes. At the first opportunity, we’d set up our own outfit together, build it into a multimillion-pound business and flog it off to the highest bidder.
    Well, we both sold out long before then, J accepting a job offer from McKinsey during our last term at Warwick, and me winning a place at the D&AD Graduate Academy soon after. A management consultant and an ad man: that’s what we’ve become. Talk about derelict dreams.
    I sometimes console myself with the thought that at least I make my living from words, but the truth is, I produce pithy straplines for companies I care next to nothing about. I’m a copywriter, and not a bad one. There are some hideous awards trophies gathering dust in my airing cupboard to prove it. Things were better before Trev (‘Fat Trev’, as he once insisted on being called, though no longer) had his breakdown. He was my art director. We work closely together, copywriters and art directors. It’s a creative partnership, a team of two. We even move jobs together. I knew Trev was a depressive; it’s why he was such good fun to work with. I guess I should have seen it coming, even alerted someone, but the thing is, he was producing his best ever stuff when the proverbial straw broke the camel’s back. He’s okay now. Only okay, mind. The meds have stripped him of everything that once made him him. There are no rough edges left, no highs, no lows, and certainly no laughs, but at least he’s alive. It turned out he was thinking of swallow-diving off the block of flats he lives in near Bermondsey.
    Maybe Clara’s right, maybe I’m cold-hearted, but I can’t help smiling whenever that image comes to mind: Fat Trev swallow-diving. It’s something to do with the comic coupling of bulk and dainty finesse, like that ballet-dancing hippo in Disney’s
Fantasia
, the one prancing around in a diaphanous tutu. I hope that one day I’ll be able to share this thought with Trev and have a good giggle about it. Meanwhile, though, I’m on my own.
    It hasn’t been easy. I’ve been wandering in the wilderness for almost six months now, eating into my savings, fretting about mortgage payments. No one wants a lone copywriter. I’ve still got enough of a name to wangle a meeting or two with the people who were our rivals for those hideous trophies. Mostly, though, they’re just curious to meet me and get the first-hand dirt on Fat Trev.
    Indology might be different. I’ll know soon enough.
     
    ‘Indology?’ scoffs J. ‘What kind of name is that for an ad agency?’
    ‘Not a bad one,’ I counter, defensively.
    We’ve moved on to another bar by now. They’ve gone for a post-apocalyptic look: raw brickwork and rough concrete and industrial steel lamps, which might or might not be the next big thing in interior design.
    ‘They’re small, new, independent.’
    ‘Okay,’ J concedes. ‘I get the Ind—, but the –ology …?’
    ‘It suggests a kind of method, a rigour. Like psychology, theology, sociology—’
    ‘Wankology.’
    ‘Apparently they ran it past the focus group but it got a thumbs-down.’
    J laughs and grips my arm. ‘Sorry. I hope it comes to