The Fullfillment* Centre 6 end of chapter 1

I had made this decision to go back to the North for a couple of reasons, first and foremost I thought I needed to do less writing reading and talking all of which it seemed had amounted to nothing, and commit to something more practical. I opened up my google chromebook, looked at the Lancaster Project again and my imagination ran ahead of me, this was the seed from which a whole new world would bloom, if not this what?

It wasn’t true that I had nothing, I had an analysis, I wasn’t thick I just hadn’t been smart.

That analysis said: feudalism was overtaken by capitalism by changes in the mode of production, by changes in social relations and here were people trying to do something similar, the co-operative, no bosses and workers, everyone on an equal footing, an end to alienation an end to exploitation it was in germinal form, but there it was.

The front door slammed, Chris, back up the stairs in a hurry, back from one of his post work trips darting around the charity shops of south east London looking for books and dvds, back from scouring the libraries he spent most of his free time in now he had stopped drinking, now all of his peers had kids and were staying at home.

 We had a tense relationship, I saw too much of myself in him, but he lacked my anger, the only thing perhaps at root that kept me going. He had talked himself out of wanting certain things I still needed, love, primarily, success, a bit of praise and acclaim that gave me a toehold in the world. He really was happiest in the comfortable squalor and slow despair of his room, piled up with unread books and unwatched films. His little empire wher he lay dreaming of the epic work he might still achieve, every book, film, play he attended, lecture he struggled through another brick in the great edifice he would use to finally launch himself into the world.

And yet it never began, the launchpad was never higher enough, the understanding never complete enough, and it never would be. Round and round in an endless exhausting circle of displacement. I at least, I told myself, had not only started but had finished things.

I was too patronising and critical for him not to resent me, but he had no-one else really, and now my own relationship had foundered neither had I and dependency brought out the worst in me.

He came into the kitchen, a couple of carrier bags all stuffed with his latest haul of two quid treasures, the loaves of bread and chunks of cheese he subsisted on, and in his usual nervous manner said: I’ll come.

You’re certain? You’re not going to change your mind in 5 minutes. You are not going to back out at the last minute?

He looked offended. No.

Because it wouldn't be uncharacteristic. I said dryly

I have said it, he said. I’ll do it.

Alright, I said, adopted a sceptical expression, trying to look resolute and indifferent, the stronger personality, but the truth was I was anxious and fearful too and needed him, perhaps more really than he needed me.