I woke from the vivid dream and walked down the stairs for a leak. To the left, Barry’s room, where a girl is on his sofa and he’s on the floor, rolling a joint. I hear the end of a sentence. The girl had been talking about shoes.

‘Oh, so you work in the shoe shine business,’ said Barry, absently.
‘No! I work in a health club.’
‘Oh,’ said Barry, bemused.

Portishead was playing the same song over and over somewhere, maybe from Anna’s room, who greeted me in the kitchen with an Australian ‘Hello’.

Later, I couldn’t get to sleep due to the sound of traffic outside. Traffic never sleeps. I just want to be somewhere where I don’t have to hear traffic all the time.

My dream had been vivid and one of the only ones in recent memory that I have remembered. I was buying cigarettes from two Eastern European criminals. I said I wanted Chesterfields and they handed me a packet of Lights. I said I didn’t want them and saw right in front of me a carton of regular Chesterfields. The packs were smaller than the Lights, for some reason, and when I enquired about the price, one of the criminals was stumped for a price to offer me, but eventually settled on £5. I checked my pockets and had no money, of course, so they come back with me to my loft apartment. I went looking for some money but have none at home either, so they suggest I give them my telephone number, which I don’t know off by heart, so I check in my wallet for the number, which I’m sure I’d written down somewhere. Just then Martin Sheen pops in, and I remember we’re late for an engagement. He tells me to hurry up and eventually I find my phone number and give it to the criminals who then leave.

Me and Marty arrive at what seems like a premiere for a film, but isn’t. In the corner an old friend, Duncan, is having a birthday party, which I didn’t know about, but he seems to think I’d turned up for. People notice Martin Sheen and Duncan exclaims, excited and loud enough for the whole room to hear, ‘Martin Sheen!’ and some people look around, and there’s a small ripple of clapping and Marty shyly stands up, looks around smiling for a bit, and sits back down again. Then Duncan says, as if to justify me turning up with a famous actor, ‘Barnaby’s always doing something with home videos and films’, in a slightly bitter voice, almost under his breath.

I didn’t sleep well and the next day at work five people – Richard, Neil, Marian, Sabrina and Kevin – were made redundant, and Nick was fired, for arguing with Bryan the boss, then calling him a ‘fat cunt’ under his breath. Bryan left envelopes on the five people’s desks, with their fate sealed inside it, just before he left to go on holiday for two weeks.

I felt so tired and bored that day, annoyed at every noise and person, bored with people and work, I just wanted to do something different.

(Brixton, 2001)