The Grand Scheme of Things, page 18
“But then… there was this deplorable part of me that was sort of… relieved. Aaron and I were at our most distant. I couldn’t imagine a baby would have changed that. I would have just become a stay-at-home mother; I was sure of it. I felt guilty for feeling relieved, but I also grieved for what could have been. It’s frankly something I wouldn’t wish on my worst enemy.” She wiped away a tear.
It was only inevitable for her to fall into a depression shortly after that, she told me. Once the shame and the anger subsided, she felt nothing for a long time. She would have felt guilty about feeling nothing if she could even muster up the intensity of an emotion such as guilt.
“Did you… ever tell Aaron?” I asked her, softly rubbing the back of her hand with my thumb.
She looked at me, then away, shaking her head. “I didn’t know how to. I know, it’s awful. We were three years into the marriage, but I felt like he stopped caring about me long before then. So I just didn’t have the heart to. I was too traumatized, quite frankly. I just wanted to forget it had happened and move on. I couldn’t unearth it with someone who put his career before everything. It almost felt like telling my boss, in a way. And… if I’m being honest with myself, I think once I realized I could hide something like that from him, it sort of… just made it easier for me to hide other things, you know. I’m not saying that’s good, but that’s just my shitty excuse.”
The Royal Central School of Speech and Drama ran an eight-week evening course on theater directing. When the fog had lifted from her vision and she could see the possibilities the future held, she decided to sign up for it. Getting any help from Aaron was not an option in her mind; their lives essentially ran parallel to one another. When she told him she had got her first gig, and that it happened to be for that year’s MBG playwright award winner, he was initially supportive, but he remained emotionally distant. She felt cast aside, and it took her back to her twenty-one-year-old self, a past self who struggled to believe that internal approval was the only kind needed. She had the fame, the fortune, the looks, and the acting accolades, but was she enough? Would she ever be? She had what it took. There was just something missing. What was it? Love? Maybe. Maybe that was what it all came back to.
By the time the play’s rehearsals were in full swing, she had completely disassociated from him, and the empty corner of her heart was slowly becoming fully occupied by someone else. Her sex life with Aaron wasn’t nonexistent by that point, but it was a ghost of what it used to be. It was a clinical and bathetic routine. Instead of fireworks, there were party blowers. With you, she told me, there were more than even fireworks; there were little supernovas. Once she was reminded that her body was still capable of harboring such carnal pleasure—that someone was capable of giving her that luxury—it was all she wanted. Of course she felt violent shame at the beginning of your trysts with her, but her taste of unmarred intimacy superseded that shame. So, no, it wasn’t just a production fling; it wasn’t frivolous. It was serious. To make a long story short, everything was fucked.
“A couple of weeks ago we spent a night at the Shard,” she said after finishing off the rest of her wineglass. Her lips were tinted burgundy and some of her mascara had smudged. She looked worn down, but it was impossible not to notice her eyes brighten when you were the subject of conversation. “The view from the top was beautiful. If I could, I’d live the rest of my days up there with him, just watching the sun rise and set over the city.” She smiled softly, propping her chin up with her elbow on the table. At this point it wasn’t just the copious alcohol I’d consumed that was making me nauseous.
“Nahid. You know what I’m about to ask you, right?”
She quickly stripped her smile away, and her head dramatically fell forwards. “Ugh. It’s the dreaded D word, isn’t it,” she murmured. “Why I haven’t done it yet.”
“Exactly that. You know better than to keep living like this.”
“I know that. I obviously will.”
“Oh! It’s obvious, is it?”
“I’m just waiting for the right time. Everything has been such a whirlwind since I picked up Great Belonging. My life went from being in a complete standstill for a year to… all of this. It’s not like I went out of my way to be with Hu—that was entirely unexpected. I told you that before. He was… a complication. A beautiful one, though.”
“I’m literally going to vom, babe. Please stop.”
“Sorry. I also just think I might be stalling the divorce out of spite. I want Aaron to see me do better than him. Maybe it’s like some sort of power play. I can be just as successful as him, if not more. I want him to have to look me in the eye and squirm at my triumph. But I realize all of that means nothing if no matter how close he is to me, he’s still so distant. I’m getting that now.”
“Yes. Right on. Get out of his shadow and get out of his life. End of story.”
By that point, I remembered why I had lured her over to your house in the first place. I checked the time on the kitchen wall clock: it was nearly eleven. I assumed you were still somewhere out there waiting with bated breath for the outcome, and I realized it was now or never. Nahid had bared her absolute all to me in just under two hours. It was enlightening, but also pretty gut-wrenching. My compassion for her had grown tenfold. I admired her now more than ever, which was why it hurt more than anything to do what I was about to do. My heart started palpitating and I straightened my posture, clearing my throat before I spoke up again after a few moments of silence.
“Okay, so. The actual reason I brought you over here was to tell you something about Hu.”
Nahid’s head snapped towards me instantaneously. “Oh God. He’s seeing someone else, isn’t he? You two are actually together, aren’t you?” she near whimpered. “Fuck. Fuck.”
“No, relax. He’s not seeing anyone else, and definitely not me. It’s a little weirder. See, I lied earlier at the flower market. I have written something of substance since leaving uni. Long story short, I also went through a dark time in my life. In the same way you came to the realization that some of us just aren’t taken seriously, I did too. The only difference was… I was too exhausted to fight for myself—to prove everyone wrong. So one day I thought, if you can’t beat them, you might as well join them. And… that’s where Hugo comes into play.”
Nahid looked at me, puzzled. “I’m sorry, I’m not following.”
“I saw a lot of the same qualities in him that you do. His likeable character, his good looks, his charisma, all that. I latched on to it, too. But for different reasons. I latched on to the ease with which he moved through the world. I wanted that for myself, but it was a dream far-fetched. So, let’s just say that if you’ve ever got the impression that Hu’s just way too humble about his playwriting skills, it’s because he can’t afford not to be. He can afford everything else, obviously. Just not arrogance.”
“Eddie. What are you trying to say?”
I took a long exhalation. “The first play I wrote out of uni was pretty interesting. I wanted to reconceptualize the idea of an immigrant and what it means to be one. I wanted to explore questions about national identity because I’ve struggled with mine at times. It’s even more of a mindfuck when I consider the history of colonialism and how I’m inextricably tied to it as someone from a Commonwealth nation. I thought a dystopia would be fitting, because I think that dystopias force you to hold a mirror to society and point out its hypocrisies. So, that’s what I did. I wrote a play. It was originally called The Worthy, but I think you’re more familiar with its current title.”
Her face fell as I spoke. The penny had finally dropped. “Are you trying to say… are you saying that you wrote Great Belonging? Am I hearing that correctly?” she asked me. I nodded, staying silent. I could hear the blood rushing through my ears. “Oh my God,” she whispered.
“He didn’t steal it from me. It was all my idea. I’d tried under my own name and didn’t get anywhere, so this was my desperate ploy, and it worked. So just know that I’m not faking this thing with Hu purely to cover for you two. It’s just more convenient.
“I’m sorry you didn’t know any sooner, but you’re the only other person I’ve told. I need it to stay that way for now. It’ll all come out at some point, but I thought it would be wise to let you in on it, considering… how entangled you are in everything. Considering how much Hu means to you, and how much you mean to him. It’s hard to deny it. It’s definitely thrown things off course; I’ll give you that.”
She stared at the ceiling. “So Hugo’s been lying to me? He’s been lying to everyone?”
“I put him up to it. I wanted to prove a point, and he was willing to help. But then he met you, and it complicated things. Like you said.”
She shook her head, chuckling in shock. “There’s no way this is real. I feel like I’m being pranked. I don’t know what to think.”
“If it’s any consolation, you’ve done an amazing job with the play. You executed it perfectly. I was so scared that it was going to end up in the wrong hands, and all my work would have been for nothing in the end. You’re such a talent, Nahid. You’re going to go far.”
“It did end up in the wrong hands! It’s all a sham. I’m part of a sham.”
“It’s not a sham! It’s real. It’s mine. I’m just not the face of it. And it’s opened the door for you. You got the chance to prove yourself.”
“I can’t really process this right now. I’ll deal with Hu later, trust me. Just know this is the most batshit thing I’ve ever heard.”
“I totally get that. It is.” I nodded. “But I just need to know that you won’t tell anyone else. It took a lot for me to get to the point of telling you.”
“Of course I’m not going to tell anyone else. But you can’t either. Ever. Not now, not in the future. Never.”
“Sorry?” I stared at her.
“I know I’ve made some morally inept choices, and I’m not saying I’m void of any responsibility, but this… this is a whole new level. This is my career we’re talking about. I feel blindsided. I’ll have to hear Hugo’s side of things too, because he has been lying to me, even if it was for you.”
“Hold on. You’ve been lying for him. I’ve been lying for you. Nobody’s innocent here.”
“Exactly. This is all so convoluted. Regardless, nobody can ever find out about this. You can figure out your next steps and I’ll figure out mine, but none of those steps involve telling anyone else. I swear to God, Eddie, I’m not getting swept up in your scheme. This can never get out. You can’t do this to me. I never asked to be a part of this.” She had her arms crossed, looking straight into me.
Fuck, I thought.
Fuck.
Dropping my face into my hands, I sighed. “Fuck.”
xvi The Canvas
June 2018
THE WRITER AND HIS MUSE: HUGO LAWRENCE SMITH TALKS ART, IDENTITY, AND INSPIRATION
The twenty-three-year-old playwright has burst onto the scene with his groundbreaking political dystopia, and he sits down with us for an exclusive exploration of his creativity and sense of self
MARCUS EASENER
Sprightly, he welcomes us into his garden on a warm June afternoon, although there is a noticeable undercurrent of nerves in his body language. This is the first one-on-one sit-down interview he has conducted since the string of showings of Great Belonging at the top of the year, and he has admitted to trying his best to shy away from the intense media scrutiny. His grass is neatly mowed and the framing rosebushes are saturated with color, as is the apple tree at the far end of the yard. “Whenever my mother visits, she does a lot of upkeep out here, even though it’s actually my father’s garden. I really appreciate it; I’ve never been much of a gardener myself. This would be a jungle if it was left up to me.” He chuckles.
I start our conversation by further probing his relationship with his mother, which is evidently one of importance based on his mention of her before we’ve even sat down. His self-effacing smile morphs into a confident grin as he dotes on her. Penelope Smith-Murray spent twenty years teaching English literature at Magdalen College, Oxford, before her retirement in 2013. It is safe to assume that her connection with the discipline must have rubbed off on her son.
“There was always a part of me that I felt I was suppressing. Maybe ‘suppressing’ isn’t the right choice of word, actually—I’m aware that I had the freedom to delve into something more creative. But in that freedom, I felt confined. With law there is room for interpretation, but the ultimate goal is to seek truth. Whether it be my truth or yours. It’s formulaic in that way. Art isn’t formulaic at all. There is technique and there are general rules, but that doesn’t mean people see it all the same. It’s the ultimate Rorschach test. I guess I was afraid to have my imagination tested for such a long time. I took what I thought was the easy way out, but in the process, I locked my dreams in.”
I’m absorbed by Smith’s earnest portrayal of his internal battle, and I note his posture as he speaks—initially sitting forwards, elbows resting on knees as he looks down. Then, as he continues, he loosens up, straightening his posture and making more eye contact. He mentions how his love for theater doesn’t end with the pen but extends to the stage. He plans to start acting once he has completed the training for it. “This experience has not only opened up my eyes to the boundlessness of my imagination, but watching the amazing actors who helped to bring my dream to light has encouraged me to want to do that for someone else. The fluidity that comes with being able to bend emotion at will and captivate an audience is something that fascinates me. I admit that I regret not delving into this at a younger age, but I know that regret should be a fuel and not a blockage. I’ll appreciate what I have and I will make the most of it.”
We start to tread into deeper discussions of Great Belonging, the play that put him on the map. He tells me he came up with the concept of families ruptured by a draconian law that aims to uphold, in his words, the “myth of meritocracy,” after a conversation with partner and BABBLE magazine editor Eddie Moruakgomo. “I think I just wanted to pose the question as to what actually makes someone British. In the play, the postcolonial island, Taniba, is a representation of a good chunk of the planet that was once under our rule. I say ‘our’ not to take full responsibility, but to acknowledge that when we take pride in our country, we have to do that with full awareness of the warts and all that make Great Britain so… great. Taniba has been independent for a couple of decades, but just by association, Britain is the primary destination for many of the citizens when there are economic and environmental hardships. Are they entitled to that?” he asks rhetorically. “Once the National Sweeps become a part of the system, are the Brits entitled to flee to these distant nations that were technically once theirs? It’s a case of raising the question, but not the assumption of a clear-cut answer.
“People are so quick to point out differences between one another. We’re quick to categorize, to say who belongs where, and rationalize these beliefs to the nth degree. If we’re honest with ourselves, we realize that we’ve never stuck to our own rationalizations. Colonization is a glaring manifestation of that. Ultimately, we’re so much more alike than we’d like to think,” he continues, his initial reticence replaced with a more impassioned flow of words. He lands on an interesting analogy.
“Think of it this way: my surname is one of the most prevalent names in the English-speaking world. It started off as occupational—you know, a job label. Then it became so commonly used that it eventually had nothing to do with occupation but everything to do with social mobility. It’s one of the most common names about, I’m aware of that, but it’s not often we ask ourselves why. Its utilization basically ensured a safe blending into the populace. Germans switched out ‘Schmidt’ to avoid discrimination during the world wars. Polish people did the same with the equivalent ‘Kowalski.’
“I don’t mean to give you a history lesson. I just wanted to make a point: my partner, Eddie—her surname is also occupational. It means ‘cattle farmer’ or ‘herdsman’ in her native language. The roots of our names are the same—they’re occupational. They represent social mobility. If I’m a blacksmith, she’s a farmer. Obviously we’re neither of those things, but we are people trying to earn a living; that’s the point. I feel like that’s lost on a lot of us sometimes, and that’s what I try to remind people with Great Belonging. No matter where we are, we’re all trying to survive. Whether we’re able to or not is not entirely up to us. Sometimes it’s a case of being born in England, or Poland, or… ‘Taniba,’ ” he says, pulling up air quotes. “That’s the thing. That’s our fate.”
Although it is clear that Smith is smitten with Moruakgomo, he shies away from the personal details of his newfound relationship with her, instead emphasizing the value her worldview has brought into his life and art. He praises the Kingston drama graduate on her artistic ability, insisting on her right to one day expose her work at her own time. “I don’t want to speak for her. But I can assure you that her work I’ve had the pleasure of reading blows mine out of the water. I’m not even being humble—it’s just the truth. She’s phenomenal. She’s my muse, in a lot of ways, although I think I’ve reached my peak in her presence. I’ll happily switch to acting and never turn back, just to spare me the comparison. Who knows, I could be the lead in her debut. She can call the shots and I’ll just put on my best show.” He smiles.
