(September 2000)

The flames are invisibly intense in the heat of the summers day, eating through the painting on the dirt and stones in our back yard. Reds burn to green, greens turn to red, white to black as I crouch and watch it. I'm still wearing my clothes for Work, I've just got back and it's about half four in the afternoon. My shirt is crumpled, my tie hanging in the air, dark trousers sticking to my legs after the bike ride home. My last day at work and I'm free again. When I go back inside I can get rid of the scraps of respectability that cling uneasily under my armpits, around my stomach and ankles.

The painting wasn't anything special, too naive for how I'm feeling at the moment, how I've been feeling this past couple of weeks. The weather has been beautiful while I've been stuck inside an office, but there have been weekends, evenings with friends and now I have all that and more to look forward to. My bills are paid, the contract complete and I can relax for a month or two before I have to do it all again. Time to do whatever I want. And this weekend there is plenty to keep me occupied, to fill my thoughts that my free time is just an added bonus, an extension of fun time of real time.

I feel like it's Christmas, but it's June. I feel like when I was a kid at my grandmother's house, who always put her decorations up before we did and I could sit next to the magic lights that flashed off the tinsel and lit the room with the gaudy colours of carnivals. A glorious rainbow to defy the dark days around. It's cold outside, but today that's just a figure of speech. I am happy, expectant, glorious, chill, relaxed, peaceful, I feel like a child again.

There's no pride in being poor, my father said to me. But I've seen that there's no joy in being rich. There has to be a balance somewhere, that's what I'm really searching for, a life where you don't have to worry about money. That's why I paint, I guess, to give my life a frame beyond all that. I enjoy telling people I am an artist and seeing how they react. I enjoy roaming through creation, seeing the sights that others have already mapped and pointed out to us and then wandering off on my own again to see something else, finding something new, exploring and playing in a world blessed with things that are terrifying and beautiful because they only exist in our heads. I don't owe anybody anything, and I don't expect anybody to feel they owe anything to me, except friendship.

I love being a painter because it is all the justification I need, for anything. So am I the kind of artist who would rather paint than even eat, that is spend my last bits of money on a new brush I need rather than a simple loaf of bread? Well I confess that I would rather have the food, but then find a cheaper way of painting. Use mud or something.

I walk into galleries to look at a new exhibition, find out what is supposed to be happening in my art and, usually, I'm disappointed. I mean, there's sometimes a few good pieces, and often there are good ideas, but art nowadays is lazy, little one-line gags that I admit I do sometimes indulge in myself. But I'd never put them in a public gallery like the one here in Leeds, to be presented as the finest in modern art when it's mostly just stale old themes and private innuendoes that mean nothing except to the art world. Maybe it's always been like this. On reflection we only see a very small amount of the stuff from centuries before, the works good enough to demand survival. Seeing crap art can help us understand what it is we actually like and appreciate even more, so it to does have it's place, I suppose. But it's like when I go into a library nowadays, half the time the book I want isn't even listed, or if it is it's on the other side of the city. When these things happen I can get into a foul mood for the rest of the day, cursing the quality of libraries and galleries, supposed grand storage's of knowledge and aesthetics edited by government cuts, unjustly censored somewhere as being too obscure or not obscure in the right way. My requirements for reason and beauty are too weird for a poor local council to take on top of everything else they have to deal with.

Ah, I know what you're thinking. You think that I believe myself some kind of genius, bitter after his exclusion from the clique of artists and critics and knowing that one day I'll be recognised and famous, I was right all along, victorious, condemning in my all-seeing wrath. Or perhaps I've some kind of death fetish, hoping to be praised once I've gone, when my paintings will sell at millions. But I'm not like either of those. I've never even submitted anything to anyone. Only a few friends who are interested ever look at my work, criticise and praise it, but I don't seriously demand that anyone comes and studies it, takes it seriously, though I'm often told that I'm good, I have talent. I'm happy with just that respect of people whom I like, respect for me as I am, a painter.

-Hello Jim, a voice interrupts my meditation on the death of my painting and I look up past the low wall where, in the open gateway, stands Danny Fickety wearing his Work clothes as well. I knew he was coming up this weekend but I didn't expect him here so soon. -What are you doing? he asks.

-I'm burning one of my paintings, I reply, pointing to the ashes that stir in a cooling breeze, creating extra glows and tongues. -I've just finished work, it was my last day today.

-Nice one. Cup of tea, then?

-Yeah.

I give the dying fire a poke with my shiny shoe, go through to the kitchen and Danny follows me in. I put the kettle on, it's small and grey without an automatic switch but I'm usually the only one in the house who drinks tea. I think this is a shame because one of the most enjoyable experiences I indulge in is as simple as getting together with a friend over a cup of tea, a drink so refreshing, soothing and alert that I can't see why more people don't drink it. Maybe it's just the people I mix with.

While I'm cleaning some cups I've found amongst the rubbish of food wrappers and dried up pans and plates Danny goes up to my room to get changed into his Real clothes. I look for a tape, a rave collection I got off a friend and stick it on the portable tape player that belongs to Harry who lives in the house with me.

Danny comes back into the kitchen as I'm fishing the bags out of the tea, with a carton poised in my free hand adding milk in touches to get just the mix I want. I'm not overly fussy with my tea, it's just simple decisions of adding milk or sugar and the strength of the taste, which for me varies depending on how I feel. I stick the cups on the table in front of Danny and go upstairs to change myself, get out of the uniform prison uniform suit. All this while we've been talking, trying to tell each other about as much as we are thinking as we can in the time we have.

-How's the job going? I ask.

-Pretty tedious, it's just driving around for a couple of hours and asking shop owners if they need stocking up on any seeds, which they don't, so I'm usually finished by about twelve.

-O, poor you. It's better than the shit I've had to put up with.

-Yeah, sorry, but you're finished now, I've got another four weeks.

-And then you're going to America to meet up with Liam and spend a month climbing.

-Not until October!

-So you have a summer hanging around on the dole and going out. Quit moaning.

-That's a good portrait of Cathy, it's really good.

-Thanks, I've just finished it. She hasn't even seen it yet. Have you seen Cait?

-I popped round but she's at the Student Union now with the people from her house. So I thought I'd come and see you and get things sorted for tonight.

-Good idea. I spoke to Owen when I got in, he's not doing anything special for tonight but if we drop some money off he'll get us what we need. I've just got to get changed meself, we'll finish this tea and then get off and see him, OK?

-Yeah, sounds fine.

-Fucking suits man. It's all sticky from the ride.

-You cycle to work, yeah?

-Yeah, it's excellent, especially in the rush hour on a day like this, you just weave through all the cars laughing at them all trapped. It's a damn sight quicker on the bike than driving. It's mad.

I go through the open door of my room. It is fairly big, with large windows, a mattress on the floor, gas fire and a couple of tables cluttered with paints and other bits and pieces, but overall I like to keep it looking tidy. I don't like to feel too closed in by the mess that accumulates, I need lots of space. If I look out of my window in one direction I see the sky meet a ridge of trees. The brilliant light seems too harsh on the green woods, the red houses dotted here and there on the hill side and the sandy viaduct where a train occasionally rolls over. They become images of brightness, contrasts of colours within colours, each to me is subtle and brilliant.

-You didn't go out climbing, then?

-No, didn't finish work until three. Haven't had the time. I might go out on Sunday, but I'll have to see how I feel.

-Right.

If I look in the other direction, though, all I can see is metal, concrete and glass industrial estates with empty crowded roads, filled with cars to try and pump life in during the days so that people always seem lost when I see them walking around. Lost or just passing through because the land is dead at night. Behind these buildings are the wrecks of older industries and on the ridge above them looms Armley Gaol. A dark, Victorian prison that interferes on the skyline without the gothic beauty of a Transylvanian castle that it seems to try and imitate. It just broods sadness, viciousness and retribution. I've lived opposite that gaol for nearly a year now, always in its sight. I could say what is expected, talk about the paranoia, the intensity, the sense of the nasty real world just outside, and I have felt all those things towards it. Mostly, though, I've just ignored it.

At least once a week a procession of police vehicles, vans, cars, bikes, sail past my window. Loudspeakers and a helicopter overhead stop the traffic, it's usually a rush hour, while sullen faced officers with bullet proof vests and machine guns rested over their chests escort somebody somewhere. But I've no way of finding out who or why.

The portrait of Cathy, a friend who I'll be seeing later, sits in the corner. On the desk nearest to it are sketches and photos filed roughly into piles that I needed and changed as necessary, eyes, mouth, hair, gestures, thoughts, and all that. I can't always paint with her here so I have to do a lot of studies. It taken me a couple of weeks but I'm really happy with it, I thinks it's the best thing I've ever done, even though I was hampered by having to work I did become keener because of it. I'll tell her it's finished tonight.

I look through my rack of paintings but I don't find anything else Danny hasn't seen since the last time he came over that's worth showing. I grab a t-shirt from my basket and my dirty combat trousers, hanging the suit up and changing the shoes that cut into my heels to my more comfortable boots.

-I can understand me having to look smart, but you don't actually see anyone, do you? I didn't know you had to wear a suit. says Dan.

-Of course I do, I reply. We all look the same, act the same, think the same, you know that. If they had a clue what we really do underneath all these chains we'd get the sack. Or maybe we wouldn't. While we're in a suit we're theirs anyway.

-I suppose.

I walk back into the kitchen where Danny has just lit a joint. He takes a sip of his tea and looks at me with a grin.

-Still, we do get away from it, he says.

Now he's himself, Danny is around six foot, well-built but not bulky because of his climbing, which he talks about as much as he can, although that's not much with just me around, shortish blond hair and the looks of a moody French actor. He's wearing a fleece shirt made by his grandmother that is bright blues and reds, battered jeans and heavy black trainers. His hands are constantly weaving to the beat of the music and it's hard not to join in, moving, excited, waiting to go and see the man, get sorted and get out to dance. -He seemed such a nice lad, they'll say, but sometimes you catch a flash of his playful malevolence in his dark blue eyes. Really, it's just joy, beat, high and rising above it all again, he loves it all and that's what is dangerous, he has to deal with the world. He's a cynic who actually cares too much rather than not enough.

-I said I'd meet Cait at Jack and Cathy's, and wait for Liam there. He won't be back from Brid until about eight and then we'll head out.

-Yeah, Liam phoned this morning to make sure everything was all right, he's as keen as ever.

-Great. You know Sasha is coming as well?

-Yeah, Cait told me last night. What's she going to do?

-A half, we had a chat to her and we need two between us all, Cait's doing half and I'm necking the other one.

-Someone's going to have to baby-sit her, I say a little uneasily -It's her first time isn't it?

As the spliff and drinks are finished we get up as one. I jump up the stairs to make sure I have everything I need, my green parka jacket, keys, tapes wallet and other bits and pieces, grab my tobacco and put what I can in my canvas bag and we can get away. Fleeing from Babylon's system as fast as we can, mentally hopping and skipping over hopes and dreams, instant, fulfilling, joyous, awaiting. We have to live within this society, we have to survive in this world, of money and finance and worry and pain, but wherever we can we poke holes through it to bring in beams of the light outside and sunshine to brighten up everyone caught in it's glow. We have to do the shit for others but we are always free somewhere and sometime. They make us part-time slaves, dance us around a bit, but then we can go and do all this and get away with it. It's they who are mad, trust me on this one.

We step out the door, I make sure both locks are turned, you can't be too careful nowadays, and we're back into sunshine that falls on the narrow back street. The ashes of the painting are starting to scatter, we walk past the overfilled plastic bins to where Danny's car is parked. A Peugeot estate on loan from his company, it's red paint glows under the layers of dirt because of the sun. It's nearly solstice, the longest day, when we only have to face five hours of darkness, a brief sleep in the hold and caress of the moon.

I throw my coat onto the back seat, keep my bag with me, the engine is ignited, stereo turned up, seatbelts on and we're moving in a three point turn to get us over to Owen's house. The area looks exactly like you'd imagine a Northern city to look, all terraced brick and back to backs with irregular streets sprawled over the sides of hills. The buildings are too brown, the sky is too hazy, appearing a pale sickly blue until the brightness and heat of the air turns orange in the evenings with thin and flat clouds stretched by the winds. Rows of shops, newsagents, second-hand furniture sellers, convenience stores, a laundrette on the corner, people sitting on their steps under washing hung high over the road, the flash of a can of beer, colours of posters for concerts and albums, summer clothes loose over walkers on the pavement, garbage in the street, on a summer's day it all becomes beautiful.

I direct Danny through the maze of roads casually, neither of us is physically in a hurry. We pull into a little dead-end and get out. I walk to Owen's door and push the doorbell, which is loud enough to be heard over the techno that is playing inside. Chris, a friend from when I was at school, opens the door and, as usual, utters a surprised -Hello, man.

-Awright, how you doing?

Danny comes in with me, stepping into the kitchen out of the tiny hallway so that Chris can close the door. He's wearing a black t-shirt with hundreds of fluorescent green ganja leaves on it, his hair is down to his shoulders, well-kept and a dark auburn. He's one of few people I know who I'd call a hippy, extremely inoffensive, easy to get on with and a good quiet attitude to life.

Scattered around the front room on the various sofas and cushions, focused on the game being played on the TV console are various bodies; Matthew, Lindsay, someone I've never seen before who nods hello anyway and the man himself, Owen. He's on the floor hunched over a book skinning up, he looks up and says hello, his face drawn and long, with blond hair tied and well down his back. The walls are decorated with fractal patterned leaflets and an assortment of band posters. The state-of-the-art stereo is blasting out techno that probably pisses off the neighbours a great deal.

-We've come to sort out some business, that OK?

-Yeah, sure. What do you want?

I look at Danny and frown, -You need two, right, one for me and then there's Liam and Jo. I've got about twenty quid on me can you afford to cover the rest? I laugh realising that we hadn't thought about the money before getting here.

-No problem.

-Great. I turn back to Owen making the calculation again, slowly, -Can you get us four tablets and a wrap of whizz?

-That shouldn't be a problem, I've got to get a couple of bits for myself anyway.

-And we'll give you the money now, yeah?

I take what Dan offers and put it with what I've gotten out of my wallet, passing it over to Owen.

-They'll be good E's though? asks Danny.

-Doves, I think, says Owen. -Should be the same batch as I had last Monday.

I look at Danny and nod.

-I'll get base whizz as well, uncut so it might be a little under a gram but it's fucking excellent.

-Great.

-Do you want any hash? Owen continues. I look at Danny,

-I think we'll probably need some but can we get that later? I've got enough left for now. he says.

-Fine, yeah.

We have a chat with Matt and Chris about what's going on tonight. Lindsay, a geordie with long black hair stays fairly quiet as usual, Chris goes to the kitchen to start cooking. Matthew looks fairly smart but casual, with a Brando style smile and frown. We were going to go to a club but because it's some kind of anniversary it's going to cost fifteen pounds just to get in so we're looking for options. There's mention of an open air rave, but nobody seems quite sure where. Still, Liam should be able to sort us out with somewhere to go, and we're going to be too late starting for the club anyway which opens early. I tell them I've finished work and they are always surprised to find out just how vocal and vitriolic I am against it all. We get up to move on and Owen says he'll give us a call about seven or eight o'clock when the stuff arrives, and I remember I'll be at Jack and Cathy's, so I have to write down their phone number for him. Danny wants to get off and meet Cait, I can sense his impatience, letting it carry me out of the door and up to the car, but he knows he's got all the time in the world, really.

Back in the car we start moving again, as though we'd never stopped, it's all we want to do, just drive against the static of work. I remember this guy I met when I was hitching once, he was having to put himself in debt to get a PSV licence but to him it was worth it so that whenever he worked he could be on the move. The tension damming crumbles, all the pieces are in place and we just have to wait for them to begin to fall.

To the second part of this story