My Secret Lover

street lights,’ says Andy.
    We’re speeding up the M40.
    He’s read in the paper that all the
planets are in a line which won’t happen again for seventy years. So, we’re
driving out of London to look at the sky.
    Even though he’s planned it, it feels
like a really spontaneous thing to do.
    ‘We’ve missed Mercury because it sets
at around seven o’clock, but we should get Venus, Saturn and Jupiter, if we’re
lucky.’
    ‘But it’s still light at seven
o’clock, so you wouldn’t be able to see Mercury anyway,’ I reason.
    ‘Exactly,’ says Andy, taking his eyes
off the road for a second to smile his approval of my logic.
     
    At Thame we turn off the motorway,
and park in a suitably lonely lay-by.
    It is certainly dark in the
countryside.
    And smelly.
    And cold.
    The sky is so starry, hundreds more
stars seem to appear each second as my eyes adjust.
    ‘I think that must be Venus,’ says
Andy, pointing.
    ‘Which?’
    ‘The bright one.’
    ‘That one?’
    ‘No! That one! And that one must be
Saturn.’
    He points again.
    ‘Amazing.’
    When he said we would be able to see
the planets really clearly, I admit I was expecting rings and moons and pretty
colours like the pictures of the planets in the Encyclopedia of Astronomy.
    What we’ve actually got is a few
celestial bodies shining a little bit brighter than the rest.
    I’ve trodden in something squelchy.
    ‘Or it may be the Space Station,’
says Andy.
     
    I had the same feeling of disappointment
the Christmas my dad bought me my Atlas of the Stars and we went out into the
garden together when everyone else was watching Morecambe and Wise.
    I was expecting lines joining the
constellations up.
    ‘Look, three in a row, up there,’
said my dad, trying to help me see the patterns.
    ‘Follow the North Star up. There! No
there! There!’
    In those days, I didn’t know about
pretending. When I finally did spot Orion’s Belt, it was like, great, three
stars in a row, so now can we go in and have a warm mince pie?
    Why is the hunter’s belt so important
anyway? And where’s his head, arms, legs and bow and arrow?
    That before we start on Great and
Little Bears. Doesn’t anyone else find it weird that the alternative name is
the Frying Pan? I can’t think of a single feature bears have in common with
that particular utensil, but at least I can see it does look like one.
     
    It’s not that I don’t like looking at
stars. It’s just that if I’m going to stand around in the dark and chilly
places gazing at the heavens, I’m more inclined to be wondering about infinity,
eternity and the human condition. That sort of thing.
     
    I wonder if Andy 42 can see the
planets lined up where he is?
     
    I am on the panel for Through the
Keyhole. It’s a much nicer house than usual, with a knocked-through
downstairs room, but there’s no furniture. The camera zooms in to close up on a
picture frame on the marble fireplace. It’s the one from the awful photo
session Michelle got me as a birthday present. You get a make-over too. I went
into the studio looking like myself and came out three hours later wearing a
mud pack of foundation and clutching a soft-focus portrait of someone who might
almost have been a relative of mine, but who’d been embalmed with a fixed
simper on her face.
    ‘You should get this chap to do your
wedding photos,’ said my mother, when she saw it.
    ‘Who lives here?’ asks David Frost.
‘And who is the woman in the photo?’
     
    I wake up, shivering because Andy’s
got the duvet round him like a caterpillar in a cocoon.
    I wonder why I keep having such weird
dreams?
     
    * * *
     
    My mouse glides over:
    2 million troops mobilize on Kashmir border
    and:
    Free Jubilee Ring Tone download!
     
    There is one new message in my Inbox.
     
    Dream Home. Find the right house for
you!
     
    I delete immediately.
     
    Click on COMPOSE.
     
    Are you happy? L
     
    Difficult one. I suppose it depends
on how you define happiness. I'm incredibly privileged compared to most people
in the world. But I don't know if it's really possible to be happy given all
the injustice. The worst thing is that it doesn't seem to shock me any more. I
am neither happy, nor sad, nor outraged. It's like, another day, another
famine, another war. Is this just middle age, or is it that I'm so overwhelmed
by the enormity of human suffering I can no longer feel? I don't know. Are you
happy? A
     
    No. You've just made me feel really
depressed.