Since one of the computers had completed its scan and was usable I began working on a list of events that Mike had been invited to indicating whether or not we needed to RSVP. It was evident from the stack of cards that he was no longer a member of London's social A-list after his acrimonious separation from Tania but he had been invited to some interesting openings and a number of product launch parties . I printed off the list and clipped it to a folder that I had put all the invitations into. I opened an Excel file because math isn't my strong point and created a list of all the bills that needed paying and clipped that to a much fuller folder where I had placed the invoices, final demands and out right threats.
I took the folders and went looking for Mike. His bedroom was at the end of the corridor. I could here the TV blaring but I wasn’t sure if he was in there or if I wanted to go in to check. I went up to the 1st floor and made a coffee which I drank black noting down on a piece of paper that I needed to buy a pint of milk. Mike appeared at the top of the stairs and marched into the large reception room. He was talking loudly into a cell phone switched to speaker phone while holding it as though it was a police radio. The conversation went on for a while as he marched back and forth across the carpet loud conversation doppling as he came nearer the kitchen when he would glance at me in the manner of someone who was wondering why I was sitting in his kitchen drinking his coffee on his dime. I looked back at him in my best ‘I am patiently waiting for a moment of your time’ way which I probably can’t do awfully well. He went out of sight on his final march across the room.
Suddenly a loud voice blared out of the kitchen phone ‘ CAN YOU COME INTO THE LIVING ROOM PLEASE’ it took me a moment to realise what was going on. The multi line kitchen telephone appeared to have a tannoy facility. As I was trying to figure out what kind of an idiot would use such a facility to contact someone sitting 15 yards away from them the voice blared out again even louder ‘ CAN YOU COME INTO THE LIVING ROOM PLEASE’
I resisted the urge to run through to him like a collie dog and instead picked up my folders and slowly walked over to where he had sprawled himself on one of the large sofa’s. For a moment he looked at me like he had never seen me before in his life and then he came back into focus and told me to sit down. He was still not fully dressed but he had managed to shower and pull on fresh boxers and a perfect white shirt fresh from the cleaning service, (the cleaning service that wanted £367.55).
I sat down beside him and waited for him to speak – he didn’t. ‘Would you like the good news or the bad news?’ I asked laughing a little nervously ‘What do you mean?’ he said laughing not at all. I remembered that as much as I don’t mind Americans their sense of humour can be unreliable.
'Well I have been opening the mail and you have a pile of invitations and some bills to pay.' He asked to see the invites first and flicked through the selection of gallery openings, artists dinners and parties. He didn’t look especially impressed with the catch. 'You can show these to Natalie (the new girlfriend) when she arrives tomorrow see which ones she wants to attend and check that she is included as a guest on the dinner party ones.'
You have rather a lot of bills to pay I said. He looked at first confused and then annoyed, as I had feared ‘I thought Olympia had been taking care of that’. ‘Apparently not’ I replied handing him the folder and list.
The temperature in the reception room chilled as he scanned the list. I practiced my proffesional demeanour while Mike looked ready to explode.
‘How the hell have we managed to spend $250,000? ‘ he raged. He emphasised the word ‘we’ as though the pile of invoices was something to do with me and inexpertly converted the total from GBP into USD so he could shout a larger number for maximum effect. I handed him the folder so he could examine the evidence. Working through the five stages of grief as I manoeuvred myself out of arms reach on the sofa he finally said
‘We need to call Ben’
