The thin, dry smoke of a cigarillo drifted on the breeze. I’d been there half an hour and Paris was no nearer. The smoke twitched my nostrils and gave me a sudden stab of hope.
I turned to see the owner standing by his car, a hand in his pocket, neck bent to look at the pebble he was gently toying with on the tarmac. His car was bright red and with the yellow of Mcdonald’s and the blue of the sky made a perfect primary palette.
“Are you by any chance going down the M20?” I asked as I stepped across the verge tentatively. He looked up from his pebble and flicked a questioning glance. He had a belly that was perfectly round. A slow nonchalant nod followed, as if I’d caught him out and he was too nice to say no.
“I’m not going far though,” he said with a reasonable growl, “Can’t get you to Dover but can take you to Maidstone. It’s about 20 miles from here.”
“Anywhere’s better than here.”
A lift at last. Although in truth it hadn’t solved any of my problems. It was 11:30, which meant I had half an hour to get to Dover to make the ferry. Nevertheless, it was a lift so there was a twitch of a chance. Plus things always feel better when you’re on the move.
He motioned to his cigarillo, communicating with the simple gesture that we’d go when he was finished. I stood awkwardly by the car door, saving my small talk for the journey, as did he. I opened it but then felt too awkward to get in, so I leaned on the frame and pretended I was enjoying the view: the McDonald’s and the motorway and the black-bottomed clouds that floated fast above as if they were chasing the cars.
He flicked his cigarillo and its amber ember arced across the sky, sparking on the pavement. We got in the car, rounded the corner, up the sliproad and into the road.
“Last time I picked up a hitchhiker I kicked him out the car.” Brian had a gruff voice but was warming up to the conversation, “I lit up a fag and he told me to put it out. He told me to put it out! I was like I’m the one doing you a favour here mate…!”
I agreed that was a bit presumptuous of the hitchhiker. You get what you’re given.
“Anyway, sorry my voice is a bit croaky," he said, “I feel shit. I’ve got a horrible cold - I’d be in bed if I could.”
He spluttered a cough and I suddenly became conscious of the closed windows. After his previous story though, I didn’t want to open them and land myself on the side of the M20. I sheepishly tried to breathe as little as possible. I weighed up in my mind if a trip to Maidstone was worth a nasty cold…
Anyway, I didn’t have a choice now so I settled into chatting instead. Telling Brian about my trip to Paris and how I doubted I’d get there now. He agreed.
Brian was going to Maidstone to do maintenance work in a children’s home. It wasn’t something he’d always done. In fact, he’d had several jobs. He told me he used to work for advertising firms, putting together industry magazines. Apparently all industries would have two or three specific magazines though most had none nowadays. Hence the career change.
“I was watching Madmen last night,” he said, following the advertising theme. It’s funny how the slightest prompt gets us onto what we watched last night. “Corrr, great show. And I was watching the scene where they come up with how to name a Kodak slide projector. ‘Wheel’ was too clunky, so Don came up with the name The Carousel. It suddenly made it about nostalgia, about childhood, going round your memories…It was genius!”
I said I’d never seen the show so without much else to contribute asked where I could watch it, following the regular pattern of every conversation about a show you’ve never seen.
“I’ve been watching it on UKTV,” Brian said, which was a marginally more interesting answer than Netflix or Amazon, “You have to put up with all the shitty adverts though,” he continued, “Well I mean, I shouldn’t say ‘shitty adverts’ on a show all about advertising… ”
Advertising during Madmen was probably the best place to do it, I suggested.
“Not if it’s a shit advert,” he replied, “Which they all were.”
Brian also worked for the city council for several years.
“It was interesting work but the attitude of people was ppfff… lazy frankly. And so wasteful.”
He said once he was asked to print fliers to give to people at a tube station during rush hour. The flier alerted them that the speed limit in the area was changing to 20mph. “Why! What good is handing out speed limit fliers at a tube station?” He erupted, “They already commute on the tube. Complete waste of resources!”
It turned out Brian had several gripes with the council. Another was how they’d brought in restricted parking on game days around Charlton Athletic’s stadium despite the local residents voting against it 15-1. The trauma of Chalton’s previous restricted parking problems suddenly resurfaced now. Apparently, they’d brought the same thing in for events at the Millennium Dome. Brian was adamant nobody, nobody, parks in Charlton to go to the Millennium Dome.
He wasn’t done. “Everyone there has a terrible attitude. The red tape…” he shook his head, “For instance, when I was there this old lady, she was useless with tech, you know, barely knew how to use a computer. I had to help her practically open her emails. Anyway, she did something, I don’t know what, and her Mac blew up. Now, I could have gone down to the shop and bought one there and then for £1500. But no. They said we had to go through procurement because it would be cheaper.
“So sure enough they get a new laptop and send us the receipt saying it was £1250. Look we saved you 350 quid. Well no you didn’t… Coz it took fffreeee months to get it and it cost us six grand to outsource all her work. Not to mention the fact she was sitting there doing nothing….JESUS!”
By now Brian was quite worked up but the signs said we were at Maidstone. We came off the motorway and he dropped me in a lorry lay-by near the slip road. I walked back to the roundabout, pressing into the polluted thorns on the verge to avoid the wing mirrors.
It was 12:15. The chances of getting to Paris that night were all but gone. I was also no longer in London so the Eurostar back-up was gone too. I’d made my bed, now I had to lie in it and I can’t say I was that enthusiastic about it. Plus I’d got a cold in the process.
I grimaced and held up my sign to Dover. 10 minutes later a Mercedes swung onto the white lines. A blonde man leant over and opened the door.
I asked where he was going.
“Paris,” he replied.