complain and they’d have to spend a morning adding a dribble of this and a drip of that until Zac nodded and grinned and proclaimed something along the lines of ‘Turquoise-tastic! Fan-bloody-brilliant! Ultimate ultramarine. Ta.’
Zac’s inspiration comes not from the Sunday Times ‘Style’ section, certainly not from Changing Rooms, not from hip clubs, but really just from his own predilections. Zac is in no pretentious pursuit of retro-psychedelia; nor is his home an arty-farty appraisal of the merits of kitsch. Objectively, elements of his colour schemes are indeed psychedelic and some of his furniture and objects are quintessentially kitsch. But he only chooses what he loves. He doesn’t refer to style magazines. In fact, when he flicked through a copy of Wallpaper at a friend’s house, he thought it so brilliant that he started chuckling because he genuinely assumed that the magazine was a parody on other style magazines. He was quite horrified to learn it was serious. ‘But it’s so far up its own arse,’ he’d reasoned, ‘they might as well call it Toiletpaper.’
Zac doesn’t read about art but he does love to look at it. He didn’t consider trend when he was choosing colour for his walls and furniture for his rooms but he did pay homage to Matisse. Zac simply loves colour for its own sake. He loves the greenness of green, the blueness of blue, and he finds great expanses of solid colour incredibly satisfying. He cannot comprehend how colours can be in and out of fashion. He loves it that he cannot fathom how colour can convey movement, rhythm and mood. It’s a mystery he is content to be awestruck by.
My job’s stressful. The building is grey. I want to come home to energy and a place that – I don’t know – grins. Turquoise and orange have always made me feel positive. Green makes me feel refreshed. What’s all this crap about blue being a ‘cool’ colour – cool in what respect? Cold? Or hip? Pardon? I just find blue relaxing. Swimming-pools and cloudless skies.
Zac goes for things he really likes the look of. He loves things that amuse him. His acid yellow PVC banana beanbag chair is just as comfortable as his black leather Eames lounger. He knew the Eames was almost vulgar in cost but what price ultimate comfort for reading papers or snoozing or chilling out with a beer? The Eames serves much the same purpose as the banana chair but the banana chair was forty pounds. Zac didn’t think it a ‘bargain’, he simply thought ‘funky chair, great colour, really comfortable’, bought it on the spot and took it home on the bus. He doesn’t own a coffee-table so it’s just as well that he doesn’t buy sumptuous coffee-table tomes. Though he loves the feel of his Folio editions of fables and myths, he also devours commercial paperbacks. His book shelves are crammed with them. ‘What’s wrong with Grisham or Herbert?’ he might say. ‘They’re bloody good reads.’ He sometimes rereads Wilbur Smith and he really quite liked Bridget Jones’s Diary. He read it on the tube going to and from work. He was aware that people stared at him. He didn’t care.
It’s always open house at Zac’s. His flat just has a subliminal effect of putting people in a good mood. He doesn’t officially entertain but he has the sort of personality and the type of place that encourage people to pop in. Male friends stop by for a beer or two if they’ve had a crap day at work or a row with a wife or girlfriend. And those very same wives and girlfriends pop in if they’ve walked their feet off perusing Hampstead’s shops. Zac tells them to ‘take a load off’; while he fixes them a juice, they revolve a while in the Eames, or snuggle gratefully into the bizarre banana chair. If their kids have thrown tantrums at the Finchley Road Sainsbury’s, they’re dragged in to let off steam at Uncle Zac’s; scampering around his flat, throwing themselves on to his large low bed, rolling off on to the tufty orange rug by the side, coming back into the living-room to snuggle on Mummy’s lap and gaze at the lava lamp or quietly snigger at the massive painting that’s allegedly of mountains but really looks like a large pair of blue bosoms.
Ah, but have a look inside Zac’s wardrobe. It’s like an archive for Gap. Beige, navy or black. No deviation. Trousers, shirts or pullovers. He owns one suit. It’s currently at the dry-cleaner. It’s navy. He never wears it by choice; only if he must – a meeting with specific clients, a wedding, a funeral. His underwear is unremittingly black and blue.
His kitchen reveals his obsession with gadgets which he affectionately calls ‘toys’. A top-of-the-range fully automatic espresso machine, a sixties-inspired juicer, an impressive if intimidating array of Global kitchen knives, all manner of high-shine stainless-steel utensils hanging from hooks above the granite worktop. His fridge-freezer is, of course, one of those cavernous walk-in American machines that do ice and cold water and can take a whole sucking pig plus the apple. There is no pig inside, just a staggering array of ready-meals. Does this man work for M&S? No? He must have a discount card, then, surely? No? Does he have substantial shares in the company, then? Or is this simply what you’d call brand loyalty? Or is it just plain laziness? No wonder that all his utensils and gadgets look so pristine – they’ve never been used. He has no need of any of them. You do not need a mandolin from Divertimenti to prepare an M&S ready-meal. The only things requiring any chopping are the tomatoes (aesthetically still on the vine) and, of course, the oranges for the juicer (despite the fact that there are cartons of fresh juice, every conceivable variety, in the fridge). His friends’ offspring like the cupboard over there best; it contains the most astonishing variety of biscuits, chocolates and crisps. Have a peek in his kitchen bin – nothing but chocolate wrappers and cartons from his shove-it-in-the-oven-at-190-degrees meals. Zac Holmes hides nothing. He is totally at ease with his likes and dislikes and the choices he’s made.
‘I like figures,’ he said ingenuously on a recent date with a Canadian girl who’s the cousin of one of his friends. ‘I really love getting my teeth into them.’ The Canadian girl was so charmed by his open personality, so taken with his slate-grey eyes, handsome face and naturally athletic physique, that she told him her figure was honed to perfection because she worked out five times a week and could they please get the bill right now, though their main courses had not yet arrived, so he could take her back to her hotel and get his teeth into her figure. Zac obliged. He doesn’t like to disappoint people. And he does love figures. He didn’t let her down back at her hotel. He didn’t get his teeth into her but he certainly employed a fabulous technique of nibbling and sucking.
Zac likes sex very much. He has quite a lot of it. To him, it’s a colourful, fun, recreational activity and he’s rather good at it. He doesn’t mind at all that over the last three years or so sex has not led to deep and meaningful relationships. He’s had two of those during his life. One from his late teens to his early twenties, the other in his late twenties. He’s not now shying away from commitment. And, nearing thirty-five, though he does, of course, have a past, it is one with which he is at peace. If there is any baggage, he certainly doesn’t look on it as a burdensome weight on his shoulders. He hasn’t been in love these past five years. But his life hasn’t lacked for it. He’s loved his last five years, loved the sex he’s had – the quick flings, the threesome, the three-month dalliance, the couple of six-month demi-relationships. He hasn’t met the right girl because he really isn’t looking. Sex wouldn’t be the better for it. Nor does his life want for lack of it. So, being single is neither a problem nor a conscious decision. However, because he’s not on the lookout, he might well not recognize Her.
In all probability he certainly wouldn’t recognize Her if she came dressed as a clown: all stripy tights, mismatched lace-up shoes, a short frilly ra-ra skirt, pigtails sticking out starchily at odd angles. And a face powdered white, eyes delineated with black diamonds and star shapes; a comedy smile; a nose with a very red tip.
But there again, why would an artist like Pip fall for a chartered accountant?
In fact, how would their paths cross anyway?
They crossed the once, at Billy’s party. But by next year, Billy probably won’t want a clown. He’ll want to take a posse to the cinema. Or McDonald’s. Or both.
And
