I met him at Saint Martins College. I thought it was romantic, like the song. As it turned out, I was much too common for him, but it didn’t matter then.
At the time, he published a magazine. It was very good, with tracing paper and everything! I thought he was a genius, or a spy!
He kept Russian cameras under his bed, sometimes he would disappear! Well, it was very exciting being in love with a spy!
He would send me messages in code:
“I request the company of Miss Razzmattazz on the dancefloor this evening. Wear your dazzle dress and white boots.”
Miss Razzmattazz? I guessed that was me!
He said he liked my style! But, he wore Emo bracelets and smoking jackets. Now he was talking about straight-edge punk. I couldn’t figure him out, maybe that’s why I liked him so much! He taught me lots of things. About Guy Debord, French cigarettes, chick tracts and what it meant to be modern.
He made me a disc of songs. There were lots of bizarre, computerised bleeps and detached loops.
“But I can’t hear your soul,” I imagined! Though actually, I really, really could!
I was listening to Kate Bush . Or sad, indie tunes that always made me happy.
He shook his head.
“That stuff’s so lame,” he deadpanned, in a soft, American drawl.
His mid-West tones sounded cool. I started to think we were in a movie. Not a spy thriller this time, but a road trip.
“You can be Kerouac,”
He just rolled his eyes.
Driving on the highway was best at night. We were wrapped up in intense darkness, heading into the city. Flat stretches of road framed by an unfaltering, jagged mountain edge. We drove in a vintage Mercedes car that belonged to his dad, listening to old Lush songs on the stereo.
“We never had a car,” I tell him, “but my dad drove a van for work once.”
We get pancakes from the trailer girl and sit out on the night-time steps. The trailer girl is wearing an orange apron and her lips are smudged with a dark red gloss. She waits for her tip.
When we get to the bar, the boys are speaking about guns. The hottest girl he ever knew had a gun apparently. She put it in her mouth and let the bullet go off through the roof. I don’t know how I’m gonna beat that.
Later, we drive by Columbine and that school where the kid massacred everyone.
I get the feeling he thinks it’s a bit funny. To be that crazy.
Well, we were very different, Miss Razzmattazz and the spy, but there was great affection in our difference.
I made him a story once, and put it in an empty box. I gave it to him as he got on the plane. It had ribbons and stars and splinters and was full of ideas that weren’t made yet.
“You should go out with a fucking hippy,” he said. It’s his finest line, but maybe the end of the line too. Dressing up, dancefloor, drama, indie beats. It’s like your favourite song has just stopped. It’s the end of the night, but it feels like the end of time. I don’t think we can play it again.
