Chemical Attraction

Mike Uden

Description

Can true love be found in a bottle?

Ben and Lily couldn’t be more different. He’s flash, brash Bermondsey boy – an advertising man – and she’s a quiet, bookish English teacher from genteel Beckenham. In fact, the only thing they seem to have in common is their mutual dislike of one another – that and their participation as inmates in a clinical trial. Then everything changes. Suddenly, they’re hopelessly, happily in love and blissfully unaware of the strangeness of their new-found feelings. But when Ben begins to wonder about the possible side effects of Pherexosol, the experimental drug they’re both on, and makes the decision to stop taking the pills, their relationship shifts yet again. Only this time, everything’s just a little more complicated and they both have far too much to lose.

Sujets

• General officer
• General
• Romance
• Fiction

Informations

• Publié par: Anthem Press
• Date de parution: 30 juin 2014
• Nombre de lectures: 1
• EAN13: 9781783081752
• Langue: English

Extrait

CHEMICAL ATTRACTION
CHEMICAL ATTRACTION
MIKE UDEN
Chemical Attraction
THAMES RIVER PRESS An imprint of Wimbledon Publishing Company Limited (WPC) Another imprint of WPC is Anthem Press ( www.anthempress.com ) First published in the United Kingdom in 2013 by THAMES RIVER PRESS 75–76 Blackfriars Road London SE1 8HA
www.thamesriverpress.com
© Mike Uden 2014
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced in any form or by any means without written permission of the publisher.
The moral rights of the author have been asserted in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
All the characters and events described in this novel are imaginary and any similarity with real people or events is purely coincidental.
A CIP record for this book is available from the British Library.
ISBN 978-1-78308-165-3
This title is also available as an eBook
To Jan
CHEMICAL ATTRACTION
MIKE UDEN
Ben
I suppose it all started, or perhaps ended, that weekend. The agency bar was rocking. Apparently we’d won some big account or other. Friday, free booze – a winner.
On the way through, Ned (he’s my copywriting partner) and I bid a few high-fives to the other lads – all jeans around their arses and cardigans – necked a couple of Stripes, made for the gent’s, shared a line and returned to the bar. We then tried our luck with a couple of junior execs – upright collars, pointy tits – failed, left and hailed a cab for Soho.
I suppose it was about nine by the time we got to our club, media mostly, a bit wanky: all trilbies and vests. We drank another half dozen beers, staggered to a nearby Thai, ate curry, drank more beer and cabbed it back to Ned’s. More booze, more charlie, add some dope, collapse. Like I said; a real winner.
Saturday started late, with a pain in my head and a ringtone in my ear. Can’t be Monday, can it ?
I groped for the phone: ‘Wake up,’ said Ned, ‘Groundhog night!’
So we pubbed and we partied all over again. Except for one big difference. I managed to cop off with a girl from another agency called Abbie. That was her name, not the agency’s. At least, I think it was. Whatever; she probably can’t remember my name either.
On Sunday, I had a long lie-in, went round to Ned’s, met more friends and repeated the performance. Minus the sex, but plus the vomit. Great weekend.
Monday morning, unsurprisingly, I felt like cold shit: gurgling guts and bubbling bowel. Between toilet visits (both ends) I showered, pulled on a few clothes and made for work.
When I got to the station, pausing for deep breaths on the way, it was well past rush hour and the platform was nearly empty. Thank god.
The train turned up: strobing lights, lurching carriages, and seats of puce and peacock. I felt even worse, if that’s possible. I leaned forward, put my head in my hands and swayed with the train. Worse still. So I took my hands from my head, leaned back and opened my eyes. No better.
There were free newspapers strewn everywhere and, from somewhere down the carriage, an empty can was rolling back and forth, mocking me: roll, stop, pause – back, stop, pause. I closed my eyes again. Nope. Leaned back. Still nope. Eyes open, eyes closed, any position, feel shit.
After about ten nauseous minutes a voice said: Baker Street. This is Baker Street . I stood up, swayed and almost fell over – the train’s fault, not mine. I breathed in and stepped out. As the train left, I just stood there, back to moving carriage, eyes closed. Warm, underground stench.
I stumbled through tunnels, under vicious lights, and found the escalator. Slowly, we rose. At the top, I lurched forward, stuffed my ticket into the slot and the jaws opened. A few steps and I was out. Bright and breezy, noise everywhere. Even worse.
After a short distance I found a bench and sat. Work was only metres away but it might as well have been miles.
I must have dozed off because when I opened my eyes I was lying across the bench, my mouth was dry and saliva had dribbled down my shirt. I straightened myself up and yawned. A passerby gave me a look, probably thought I was some kind of pisshead.
By the time I’d dragged myself through the agency’s doors it was gone twelve-thirty. Some of the perkier types were already on their way out for lunch.
‘Ah, Ben, you’re wanted in Tiny’s office,’ said Trudy, our glammed-up receptionist.
This seemed a little odd. Creative Director, is Tiny. My boss. He didn’t normally do Monday morning meetings. Then again it wasn’t morning, I suppose. I could’ve done without it, though. Oh well, probably nothing too heavy.
I took the silent lift to the fifth floor with a couple of blokes from finance. I only half knew them. In a small lift, when you’re next to people you wouldn’t normally speak to, it’s difficult to know where to look. Especially if you smell of sick. So I looked down at my trainers. They were odd.
Seventh floor. I got out, walked down the carpeted corridor and pushed through the doors. Sadie was there. She’s the girl who protects Tiny.
‘Ah, Ben,’ she said, in the same, slightly worrying tone as the receptionist. ‘Take a seat.’
I slumped down and looked towards Tiny’s door. It was closed. Abnormal.
Then Petronella walked in. She’s HR. She went straight past Sadie, straight past me and straight into Tiny’s. And closed the door again. Then a couple of blokes in suits did the same thing. Who the fuck are they?
Closed doors. What’s with these closed doors?
I leafed through an old Campaign but it made me feel sick again, so I slung it back, slumped back and closed my eyes.
I must have started to doze because I was suddenly jolted awake by the phone on Sadie’s desk.
She picked it up, looked towards me and, Apprentice -style, said: ‘Tiny will see you now.’
So I pushed myself up and made for the door. I’m not really accustomed to closed doors, so even though I’d been told I could enter, I paused.
‘Come in,’ said Tiny’s voice from within.
So I went in. On the far side of his table, seated to his left, were Petronella and the two unknown suits.
‘These are company solicitors,’ said Tiny, telling me their now-forgotten names. ‘Oh,’ he added, ‘and you know Petronella, don’t you. Please take a seat.’
‘Hi,’ is all I said, pulling up a chair.
I can’t imagine what they thought of me, but I didn’t greatly care. Creatives are supposed to be scruffy, aren’t they?
‘Ben,’ he said, perhaps a little patronizingly. ‘You’re aware that we had a pitch this morning – for KemiKlene, I mean?’
Actually, I’d completely forgotten. Frankly, I couldn’t have pitched a fucking tent, let alone a campaign.
Then it all slowly came back to me. That Friday, before the piss-ups and the partying, Ned and I had been working on a new spot for TrueLoo. TrueLoo is KemiKlene’s new wonder toilet cleaner, by the way. We were trying to come up with a decent idea and getting absolutely nowhere. I do remember Ned asking me why we had to make a big deal about the germs under the rim – the ones you can’t see. In Ned’s opinion, if you can’t see them, how the fuck would you know it’s worked? Fair enough, I suppose.
But I told him that that was the whole point. You had to squirt and squirt as if your life depended on it, that way we sell more. Ned said it’s immoral. I replied: it’s advertising.
So given KemiKlene were unlikely to accept something along the lines of TrueLoo. It might not work , or TrueLoo. It’s immoral , we’d failed to come up with fuck all.
So off to the bar we’d gone.
‘All the other teams came up with stuff,’ snapped Tiny. ‘Why didn’t you?’
I couldn’t think of an answer. In fact, I couldn’t think of anything. Except my bowels.
Then, slowly and smugly, he listed the stuff the other teams had done: the PowerPoints; the storyboards; the spreadsheets. He said everyone had worked round the clock – that all four teams had produced ‘bloody good pitches’. Except us.
‘So what was your idea?’ he asked.
My mind was blank. I wondered if Ned would have been given a similar bollocking, but I doubted it. Okay, he’d probably get a grilling, but no more. You see, he wouldn’t have been über late for a start. And more importantly, his face fits. Mine didn’t. I had history too. I was already on a yellow card for insulting the Bendy Burger clients. That’s the agency’s second biggest account – to KemiKlene.
Sweating, head pounding, I needed to come up with an idea. Pronto. I remembered the plastic aerosols that we’d stuck on our office desk. We’d used them as goal posts. You know, lobbing bits of paper at them – crumpled up scripts and stuff. We’d already downed a few lagers. And from memory – very, very vague memory – the packs were Lemon Fresh and Original Blue.
An idea hit me.
‘Blue,’ I mumbled, looking down at my fingers.
I looked up. They were all looking back at me. Four monkeys. All equally confused.
‘Blue,’ I repeated.
‘Blue?’ replied Tiny. ‘What about blue?’