Acid Lullaby (7 page)

Stunned, he watched as the lights in his eyes whirled around the face of the wooden icon. His face. He tried to read the typed card that had been placed next to the carving;

Now, Max remembered the legend of the Soma. The strange deity whose existence was indistinguishable from the liquid that fed the God’s immortality. The Soma created at the churning of the ocean. He had drunk the Soma. He had seen the face of God in his dream.

His face.

He remembered a car plunging into black water: thick muddy water like chocolate milk gagging in his throat. He heard the silent scream of his birth.

Knowledge flowed from memory. He finally recognized the knowledge he had always ignorantly possessed. It had been unlocked. Now he remembered.

Max Fallon did not return to Fogle & Moore until the Wednesday after his confrontation with Crouch and Aldo. His mind had cleared sufficiently for him to understand the urgency of the phone calls he had received from the office: the growing sense of irritation that underpinned the voices on the other end of the line.

He did not feel confident enough to drive: he had still not yet mastered the lights behind his eyes and so had risked the
Underground. Delays on the Jubilee Line meant Max had been forced to change to the Docklands Light Railway. The agonizingly slow progress of the train as it crawled out of Limehouse towards Canary Wharf had encouraged Max to close his eyes. When he opened them again he was in Island Gardens at the southern tip of the Isle of Dogs with Canary Wharf Tower blinking behind him.

Max was relieved to find a taxi outside Island Gardens and eventually arrived at Fogle & Moore shortly after nine. He found the lifts difficult to understand. He rode the crowded lift up and down the hollow spine of the building until he remembered the location of the bond-trading floor. He recognized his office at the far end of the trading pit and walked steadily but uncertainly towards it. Danny Planck caught up with him quickly.

‘Welcome back, Maxy, feeling better?’

Max looked at him, curious and only half-understanding. ‘Migraine,’ he said.

‘It’s all gone tits up this week. Market is saturated. That prick Pippen at Fulton Steel is having a baby about his deal. He wants to launch, I think it’s a bad idea. There’s four jumbo deals in the market already today. We need to postpone but he’s got to hear it from you.’

Max nodded. ‘I need a drink,’ he looked around at the blurred room, ‘someone get me a fucking grapefruit,’ he frowned, ‘grapefruit juice.’

They entered his office and Max fell into his seat.

Planck seemed anxious. ‘So why don’t I get Liz and we’ll call this tosser straight away and put the deal back.’

‘Sounds good,’ Max agreed. He looked out of his window. There was something sitting on the window ledge. It was like a bird but seemed to be carved of stone. It had the face of a gargoyle. It turned its head to look at him. Max blinked and it had gone. Confused, he stood and stared out at the distant brown swirl of east London trying to see where it had gone. In a new corner of his mind he realized why the demons were following him.

‘Hey you!’ said Liz as she re-entered the room with Planck,
‘you feeling better? I’ve been worried. I called you about fifty times.’

Max recognized her. He could still feel her sweating underneath him. Still smell her perfume on his bed sheets. This was Liz. He liked Liz. ‘Migraines,’ he said forcing a smile, ‘bad week.’

Planck leaned over the star-shaped speakerphone and called Andrew Pippen’s number. It immediately connected and rang twice.

‘Treasury,’ snapped the voice at the other end.

‘Andrew, it’s Danny Planck here with Liz Koplinsky from Fogle & Moore.’

‘Right. About time.’

‘I’ve got Max Fallon with me.’

Pippen’s voice lost a little of its edge. ‘Good. Are you feeling better, Max?’

Max started as he realized a small bottle of grapefruit juice had appeared at his elbow. He unscrewed it and took a greedy gulp.

‘Spiffing, Andrew. I understand you are concerned about your deal.’

Pippen spoke with a new urgency. ‘Indeed. In your absence I have been receiving confusing messages from your staff about the viability of Fulton Steel’s bond issue.’

‘Oh dear,’ said Max sagely. He imagined ripping Pippen’s head off. He would secure it with rope and dangle it above his desk.

Planck took over, sensing Fallon was not on top of his game, ‘Andrew, the message has been consistent and it has been clear. We think you are a viable credit but the timing is bad.’

Pippen was beginning to sound angry. ‘I want to launch today. Otherwise I’ll offer the deal to Deutsche Bank.’

Max had heard enough. The blood from Pippen’s ragged neck was splattering on his blotter. ‘Andrew, you appreciate straight talking and I respect that. Here’s what we’re going to do. We are going to launch this baby today.’

Planck was shaking his head and desperately making gestures at Fallon to stop.

‘This morning, in fact,’ Max continued. ‘We will buy back unsold bonds and make the market liquid. We’ll launch in twenty minutes.’ Fallon pressed the cancel button on the phone.

‘Max, what are you doing?’ Planck was horrified. ‘You’ve committed us to a deal that can’t work!’

‘Don’t be such a faggot,’ Max snarled. ‘It’s my responsibility. Get on with it.’

‘Your responsibility,’ Planck reiterated, pointing at him. ‘I hope you heard that, Liz.’

‘I am a director. I get paid to take responsibility,’ Max proclaimed. ‘There are leaders and followers. There are gods and mortals. I’ve been carrying you for too long. Go and earn your bonus for once.’

Danny Planck stormed out of the office in disgust. Liz looked in shock at Fallon. ‘Maxy, maybe you should be at home. You don’t look well.’

‘Something’s happened.’ He frowned trying to remember the strange floating faces, the voices, the pain. ‘That guy you dated.’

‘Crouch?’

‘Him.’ Max could see Crouch in his mind’s eye, standing over him, saying something.

‘What about him?’

Max suddenly lost his train of thought. For a split second he saw Liz Koplinsky on her back giving birth to his baby. She was screaming. Screaming.

‘Max?’

He was back in his office. Liz stood in front of him. Fallon rubbed his eyes.

‘Just leave me alone.’

The Fulton Steel Euro bond issue was launched at 11a.m. that morning. The price collapsed in the aftermarket. Fogle & Moore Investments lost approximately half a million pounds in twenty minutes trying to support the issue. And it kept getting worse.

As the mess unfolded on the financial news screens, and tumult grew on the trading floor, Danny Planck picked up his
phone and called Richard Moore, the company’s Chief Executive.

In the midst of the chaos, its chief architect disappeared.

In a different part of the building, Simon Crouch handed in his resignation to Susan Joyce, the head of personnel.

‘I must say, Simon,’ she commented, ‘this is rather unexpected.’

‘It’s a two-month notice period,’ he said, ‘I’m happy to work it all.’

‘That probably won’t be necessary. Perhaps you could stay until you’ve done a handover.’

‘Whatever.’ He couldn’t believe he was leaving: five years of grief, commuting and stress up the spout because of some girl.

‘Can I ask you why you are leaving?’ asked Joyce who was overheating slightly in her pink woollen suit. ‘You always seemed to be Fogle & Moore through and through. Your assessments have all been exemplary.’

Crouch wondered whether he should be honest: whether he should tell Joyce that he had got himself stupidly involved with a woman at work, that she had shat all over him, that he had dropped acid into Max Fallon’s drink then kicked the incapacitated wanker into a bloody mess.

‘Personal reasons,’ he said simply, ‘no reflection on the company. I’ve had some happy times here.’

‘Do you have another job lined up?’ Joyce was discreetly making notes. Crouch knew the score – her next question would be ‘And how much are they paying?’ Personnel always liked to be on the money.

‘No, I don’t. I’m going to take a break for a few months. Maybe travel. I’ve been doing this job since college and I reckon I owe myself a breather. I’m thinking of going to Thailand. You know, see some temples. Sit on the beach. Take stock of things.’

‘Very brave of you,’ Joyce observed, closing her file. ‘It’s hard, isn’t it. The pressures we all work under now. Sometimes, the courageous thing to do is to say “enough is enough”.’

Max Fallon returned to the office at ten the following morning. After the launch of the Fulton Steel issue, he had returned to the British Museum and assimilated as much information as he could about the Soma legend. He had purchased a couple of relevant books in the museum shop and then walked down to Charing Cross Road where he eventually bought a copy of the Rig-Veda. He spent the evening in his Chelsea apartment trying to understand the strange text and relate it to his experiences. The whispering had kept him awake.

When he eventually arrived on the trading floor, Richard Moore was waiting in his office. Moore was immaculately attired in a navy pinstripe and scarlet tie. His neat white hair exaggerated the hard lines of his face. As Max entered the room, he realized he had forgotten to shave.

‘What’s going on, Max?’ he asked. Moore didn’t mince words.

‘Sorry I’m a bit late, Richard. Bloody migraines.’

Moore looked surprised. He knew the trading floor was a rough environment but he did not expect his senior managers to swear at him. However, he had more important issues to discuss.

‘What happened yesterday, Max? Fulton Steel was a disaster. A first year graduate wouldn’t have made the mistakes that you did. We lost best part of a million quid by the close of trade.’

‘Ouch,’ Max giggled.

‘I don’t find it funny. That money is coming out of the bonus pool. We all have to pay for it.’ Moore studied Max’s dishevelled appearance. ‘Look at the state of yourself, man! You haven’t shaved, your suit jacket doesn’t even match your trousers.’

‘I’ll wear whatever I like. It’s my trading floor.’ He leaned towards Moore conspiratorially. ‘Promise you won’t say anything, but I am becoming a god. I swear. Even my dick is getting bigger.’

Moore had seen enough. Danny Planck’s assessment had been correct. ‘Max, I want you to listen to me very carefully.
You are going to come upstairs with me to personnel. I have a strong suspicion that you have been taking drugs. That is not permissible on a trading floor as you will know from your contract of employment. Personnel will organize for you to take a drug test in the company medical room: a blood test and a urine sample. Do you understand what I am saying to you?’

Max nodded. ‘You’re coming through loud and clear, Dickie!’

Moore escorted Fallon off the trading floor. In the lift lobby, Simon Crouch hurriedly brushed past the two men. Fallon recognised the face and for a split second saw fear in Crouch’s evasive eyes.

Memory became knowledge.

Max Fallon was suspended from work pending the results of his blood and urine tests. Two days later, once Richard Moore had received the analysis from the company doctor, he sent Max a brief letter that explained Fogle & Moore’s uncompromising stance on drug abuse and that Max had been fired.

Max read the letter whilst sitting naked on the floor of his Chelsea flat. He had fully expected to be fired but the attached copy of his blood and urine test results made fascinating reading:

He tried to rationalize the information in front of him. The Soma was indistinguishable from the elixir of immortality. He had become the Soma after absorbing these chemicals. He had been on an extraordinary odyssey under oceans, through the clouds and beheld the Godhead. They had put something
in his drink: something that had turned him into a god. The journey had been brilliant and spectacular and yet he was struggling: struggling to forge a true understanding of what he was about to become. He wanted to go back. His mother had been waiting for him at the top of the mountain: he wanted to see her again.

He consulted the books he had purchased at the British Museum. He found reading them difficult. He spent hours highlighting pages then had no recollection of what he had read. Max Fallon tried desperately to concentrate. He had to discover the essence of what he was becoming. He had to recreate the essence of the Soma.

He reread the results of his drug test:
‘Mescaline,
Muscimol
…
dosage
between
200–400mg
based
on
analysis
…
com
bination
of
stimulants
from
organic
and
derivative
…’

Max paused.
‘Muscimol’
. A faint flicker of electricity sparkled across his exhausted brain like a firework illuminating wasteland. He had made a connection. He opened one of the books he had bought on the Soma legend and eventually found the section he had been looking for. He had underlined it. However, he had underlined the entire book.

Max decided it would help his concentration if he read aloud:

‘Certain twentieth century studies, particularly Wasson’s “Soma the Divine Mushroom of Immortality” have associated the Hindu plant deity Soma with the psychoactive mushroom Amanita Muscaria. There is evidence in the Rig-Veda that these mushrooms were used as part of religious services in ancient Hindu culture. It is believed that the hallucinogenic effects of their constituent chemicals including muscimol allowed the taker to experience vivid religious visions.’