Sonny had chosen a seat by the window.

He came here to dream.

To this cafe.

He’d found the place a week ago, and told only one or two people about it. It stood in the heart of London’s Soho, resolutely out of time with the tick of fashion. It had dark wooden floors that were uneven in places, and precarious looking beams locked into white plaster ceilings. A crooked staircase with sloping steps lead to another floor where orders could be placed. For tea served in bone china cups, and home-baked apple and nectarine cakes. All of this made it a good place to dream. But there was something else. Something making him soar. The air perhaps, full as it was of the verve that had left the place unmoved by the melodious pull of chrome and sushi fads.

Sonny didn’t have a job.

He dreamt.

He failed to see the attraction of an ethos that required of its subscribers an insane self-effacement, imposing as it did a life sentence filling holes and playing roles in the masterplans of others. He was one half of an artistic duo who, like most other artists, tirelessly showcased what they were made of not because of a vain belief that people might care, but because it pleased them. "Young, gifted and broke" Ben, the other half of the duo, had said once.

Sonny gazed through a pane in the window that had had three concentric circles blown into it, and watched the people passing distort.

He turned away after a moment.

All he needed was here.

He looked round the cafe. It was quiet, empty save for two women in the far corner, sitting near the staircase. Sharply dressed, city slick, hand in hand. Sonny dreamt the air locked onto moments like their’s. That it lay in wait for strands in time that matched its genetic code and then absorbed them. Snapshots and mementos from passions as vital as the spirit that kept the cafe out of step mixed in the air.

He wondered if the cafe wove spells on its clientele and if he was in the grip of one. He picked up his cup of tea and took a long sip. He slowly placed it back on the saucer, and let out a contented sigh. Did the ghosts of impassioned exchanges between past clients take possession of those who frequented the cafe today? He lifted up the teapot and filled his cup until it was one and a half centimetres below the brim, then he added some milk and stirred it in with a teaspoon. He tucked the teaspoon under the saucer. Before he could think further, someone passing, a flash of blue out of the corner of his eye, rocked things.

He turned and looked out of the window, rising out of his seat slightly, and moved his face near to the glass. He could see the back of someone wearing blue. The bell above the door rang. Sonny sat back down on the seat, his composure upset. He picked up his tea and looked at the door over the rim of the cup.

Vic, the man Sonny had been seeing for the past few months, stepped into the cafe. He waved over at Sonny. Sonny took a sip of his tea, and then placed the cup slowly back down on the saucer.

"Hi," Sonny said, standing up, the disconcertion still with him, but fading.

"Hi," Vic said, leaning over the table. "I thought you might be here. I was in the neighbourhood. I realized this was the place you’d mentioned." He kissed Sonny’s cheek.

"What are you doing?" Vic asked as they sat down.

"Just thinking," Sonny said.

"About?" Vic smiled, taking off his jacket.

"Nothing really," Sonny replied, his unease translating into frustration as he felt things start to complicate.

Vic looked at him for a moment. "What? Is it a secret?"

"No, not at all, just..." Sonny shrugged, and forced a smile. "Ok. Well, I was thinking about the cafe, and the air in it, and... can you feel it? The energy..."

Vic looked at him steadily. "Are you waiting for someone?"

"Oh for..." Sonny stopped himself, and looked away, over at the couple by the stairs.

"Sorry, sorry," Vic said. "I’ll go and order something. Where do I go?"

Sonny raised his chin slightly, still looking at the two women by the stairs.

"Do you want anything?" Vic asked, standing up.

Sonny knew he should say something and concede to the peace Vic was trying to make, but part of him welcomed a fight, a means to an end. He shook his head. Vic turned away. Sonny watched him climb the stairs. He tried to carry on dreaming but couldn’t. He felt clumsy and self-conscious, like an adolescent returning to a childhood game.

The bell above the door rang.

Sonny looked over. It was Ben, his neighbour, his friend and business partner of sorts.

"Hello mate," Ben said, walking up to the table, and patting Sonny on the shoulder.

Sonny stared at Ben. "Vic’s here."

"So?"

Sonny didn’t know what to say. "That’s a good question," he said.

"Don’t fret, I won’t be long."

"I don’t mind," Sonny said in a deliberate monotone.

He had nearly stressed the first word of the sentence, but, aware that the nuance of sound would have pinned what he was saying down, he held back, deciding to leave the meaning open. He was unsure of what, if anything, he wanted to say.

"I wanted to talk about our cow soul project," Ben said.

Their latest idea was a take on Damien Hirst, but instead of a cow they’d decided to cut themselves open, figuratively speaking, and bear their souls to whoever wanted to look. The idea was in its fledgling stages. They knew they were going to tape record everything they said to each other over a weekend. They also knew they would type up transcriptions of what they said afterwards. Other than that things were vague.

"I was wondering, do we want it all completely natural?" Ben was saying. "You know, the conversations."

"What?" Sonny said, looking towards the stairs.

"Do we..."

"No, of course not," Sonny said, leaning back in his chair and looking up at Ben, "That would be hideously mundane."

"So they’re going to be part of a...cohesive whole... be pre-meditated... stylized."

"No, well, just a bit tongue in cheek, not fake," Sonny glanced over at the staircase again. He could see Vic’s shoes through the slat at the top of the staircase. "It can be spontaneous. Just... we’ll be on our toes."

"Right," Ben nodded. "I have these." He pulled out five playing cards from his jacket pocket.

"What?"

"I’ve written the name of a county on each of them." He fanned the cards and held them towards Sonny, face down. "Wherever you pick, we’ll do the recordings."

Sonny looked at the cards, then at Ben, and broke into a smile, accepting that the situation, despite its innocence, was unsalvageable.

"They’re all queens," Ben said.

Sonny smiled and picked a card.

Before he turned it over Vic appeared beside the table. He looked at Sonny, and then sat down without speaking.

"Why don’t you take a seat, Ben," Sonny said, taking a breath, about to sigh. He stopped himself, not wanting to unbalance things further. He laid the card face down on the table, and turned to Vic. "Ben was just passing. Like you were. We were talking about an idea we’ve been working on. We can tell you about it if you like. Tell us what you think."

Vic shifted his chair to the side to make space for Ben.

Ben looked at Sonny for a second, then Vic. "Ok. I won’t stay long though. I have this... thing to do."

Ben sat down, and a silence threatened to unfold.

Vic leant forward in his chair and took his jacket off.

"Nice coat," Ben said, nodding at Vic. "I’ve got one a bit like that."

"Nice weather we’re having too, isn’t it?" Vic said, rolling his eyes.

For the remainder of the week Sonny made excuses, and avoided Vic easily.

In the time they’d been together Sonny had made it clear, without ever being vulgar enough to say it, that demands made of him which encroached on his and Ben’s work would sour things between Vic and him. Vic’s acceptance of this, Sonny thought, was the reason for the relationship’s longevity. That and a half-serious bet he’d made with Ben that he could sustain a relationship beyond a week.

Sonny told Vic he had to prepare for the weekend away with Ben. That conversations had to be roughed out, made into parts of a cohesive whole. And Vic conceded, even agreed not to see Sonny at all before he left.

"It’s like," Ben started, dipping his chin slightly, so the microphone clipped to the neck of his jumper would pick up what he was saying.

Sonny turned towards him, hands down in his coat pockets for warmth.

"Say... an orchestra," Ben continued, shivering, inspired. "And you’re playing your... whatever... instrument a couple of beats behind everyone else."

Sonny listened, shivered too.

"Or ahead," Ben said.

The air was cold because it was winter. It had snowed. Six inches or so because it was Cumbria. In a field to their left two adults and a child played with a sledge. It was this sight that had prompted Ben to say what he was saying.

"Do you remember going sledging when you were a kid?"

Sonny nodded. Ben looked at him, eyes widening slightly. "Yes," Sonny leant towards the microphone he had clipped to his collar.

"They will as well," Ben looked at the family in the field, his gloved hands on the dry stone wall he stood beside. "The adults in that field, the parents of that kid’ll remember, and now they’ll be feeling like they’re part of an arrangement... like music."

"Why are you saying this?" Sonny asked, aware that the sudden inscrutable fear making him say this would be read by Ben and others, when they read it later, as irony.

Ben smiled.

They walked a few steps without speaking, .

Sonny noticed the stillness their words had bitten at. How it came from the sky and the hills. And how the sounds of ice and snow underfoot were softer than their words had been, and not enough to push it back. Sonny stopped walking, and felt the stillness close in until it was on his face. He inhaled it.

"You get to make something new," Ben said at last, looking over his shoulder. "Come on. Keep up."

Sonny turned what Ben had said over. Thought about how it made the sky wait, white and empty. He was reminded of the cafe, and how he’d felt there. His feelings now were related. Was it expectance he’d felt in the cafe? The prospect of being lifted out of the humdrum and afforded opportunities to forge a wholly original path had begun to dawn on him without him knowing. It had been left to Ben to pinpoint.

"I’m hungry," he said, catching up with Ben.

Ben looked at Sonny, a smile breaking, head shaking.

"That was really great you know, on the walk," Ben said to Sonny.

It was the following evening. They were back in London, on the tube heading north.

"Which bit?"

"I’m hungry,"

"Not crafted, obvious, wanky?" Sonny said.

"No, not at all and... are we here? We’re here." Ben stopped the tape and handed the Dictaphone to Sonny. "There."

"Perfection," Sonny said, taking the machine.

"I’m fucking exhausted," Ben said, and leant his head against the glass partition beside him, closing his eyes.

Sonny wrinkled his nose at the words.

Ben dosed for the rest of the journey. Sonny woke him at Finsbury Park and they both got on the bus that would take them to their bedsits in Stoke Newington.

During the bus journey they divided the tapes of what they’d said between them. Ben was to type up the first part of the weekend, and Sonny the latter.

Their bedsits faced each other on a road off Stoke Newington High Street. They had met one morning, stepping from their front doors, hungover and overfriendly. They stood in the middle of that road now, deciding whether to meet before or after they finished the transcription.

"Before?" Sonny said.

"After?" Ben said at the same time.

Much later, Ben slept, and over the road Sonny listened to the recording of their weekend. His room seemed cave-like, the weak glow from the computer screen sallowed his face and hands, and put a soft dent in the darkness. The volume was high on the Dictaphone so he could hear what was said over the clatter of keys as he typed. It must have been about eleven, eleven thirty Saturday night on the tape. He and Ben were in their beds. The conversation was winding down.

S: you know the guy I’m seeing.

B: uh huh...

The telephone in Sonny’s room began to ring. He ignored it, and continued to type. The answer machine came on.

S: don’t say his name. that would be kind of...um... unkind... i don’t think i like him.

"Hi Sonny, are you back yet? It’s Vic..."

B: who, vic?

S: ben...

B: how long’s it been now?

S: three months... long...

Sonny blinked back a pressure that was starting to build in his head.

B: umm... was he the bet?

pause. two seconds.

S: usually I get... bored sooner.

"Pick up the phone if you’re there... pick up... hope you... hope it went well..."

B: so was he different?

pause. two seconds.

S: i think it ended over two months ago... (laughter).

"I... missed you..."

B: (laughter)... you did it all for the ten quid i bet you... there’s a name for people like you.

S: don’t... (laughter) it’s not funny. i wanted it to work.

pause. two seconds.

S: what if i can’t sustain relationships?

B: that’s a sign of alcoholism apparently...

S: i’m a whore with an alcohol problem... (laughter)... is that what you’re saying... nice.

B: a cheap whore... ten pounds for three months... and an alchi. how much do you drink?

S: hardly anything.

B: more than you charge then.

laughter.

pause. five seconds.

S: what if i’m... i’ve forgotten what i was saying... oh... dysfunctional.

"hope you... hopefully I’ll see you tomorrow...

B: what put you off?

"hope you behaved... ha ha."

S: his looks... i just... you know... i don’t know... he was ugly. (laughter)

pause. four seconds.

B: you’re not dysfunctional, or alcoholic... just really shallow.

S: oh...

B: that’s okay.

"I’ll call you...

S: no... he really was unattractive. i think i have a problem.

B: yeah, low self-esteem.

S: not at all. i just drink too much when i’m out.

B: (laughter)

S: it’s been three months though. what if i actually like him...

"Or you can call me... whatever."

B: you’re not...

Sonny stopped typing. Giddy sound was surging in his ears, senseless and dense like talk hammered flat. He inhaled slowly. The tape continued to run. He listened for further words, his fingers hovering over the computer keyboard. Nothing. He exhaled and stood up, then moved towards the phone.

"See you..."

"Hello," Sonny picked up the phone.

"Hi," Vic said, unsteady at first. "You are there. How are you? How was it?"

"I’m fine. Yeah, it was good, a real success, I think."

"Where’s Ben now?"

"With his girlfriend, I think. I don’t know. Why?"

"Nothing."

"Look, I think we need to talk."

"We do?"

"I like you a lot, but... I don’t want to be in a relationship with you... at all... not with anyone," the noise in his head duly thinned. "I think it’s me. I’m not cut out for them. I need space... lots of it... constantly."

"Okay."

"I mean, we can still be friends... go for a drink sometime," Sonny trailed off.

"You can ring me, I won’t ring you," Vic said.

"Fair enough," Sonny said, thrown, then softly. "See you."

"Bye."

Vic hung up before Sonny. There was a moment of doubt. Then Sonny noticed the stillness, how the noise in his head had gone. He could think. He remembered the resistance he’d put up when he had uttered the words ‘I don’t mind’ to Ben in the cafe, and decided this was the key to why he’d had to end things with Vic. He didn’t like limits, and Vic was limiting. With him Sonny was defined. Without him there were still possibilities. He looked at the flashing light on the answer machine for a moment, then returned to his desk and pressed rewind on the Dictaphone. He found the place he’d got to, and began to type.

pause. four minutes.

light snores.

No more words came.

So distant was the hour from when Sonny was ordinarily awake a sense of unreality lulled him. He was dreaming again, sure that the time of night might geld whatever he did now, make it impotent, and incapable of impinging on the life he lead in the hours of daylight.

He reached over and pressed rewind. He kept his finger down for a second or two then raised it and let the tape play.

The feelings he had experienced in the cafe and on the hillside stirred with new clarity to the sounds of Ben sleeping, and awoke a mute dread in him.