Oliver Twist reloaded

It’s rare that I manage to arrange a spontaneous meet with someone. I barely dare ask my friends anymore because the probability of success is so low. So when it actually works out, it’s unequivocally a positive surprise. Wednesday night was one of those surprises. I didn’t have any plans but felt like going out, so I texted the one Canadian guy I know. I call him Dean, although that’s not his real name, but there’s a good reason for it (no reference to Dean Moriarty, as my friend is a thoroughly non-Kerouacian character). He didn’t have plans either and we decided to try China Tang at the Dorchester. As a result of my significantly underestimating the time to get there, I arrived 40 minutes late. The Dorchester was already in full Christmas attire, stuffed with heavily hung trees and garlands. Discrete but distinctly cheerful background music filled the dimly lit lobby. The place exudes an inherent plushness, but the decorations gave it an air of surreal abundance, a sugar-coated, florid playground for adults with a possibly dubious underbelly.

After hellos and profuse apologies on my part, Dean and I descended downstairs to the dining room. It’s an odd hybrid between British manor style – heavy oak furniture, velvet, bookshelves – and Chinese signature interiors – porcelain vases, drawings, fans. I imagine that’s what a 1950s colonial club in Hong Kong must have looked like. I enjoyed the atmosphere. The low lights, the chatter, the diverse crowd, the coziness bordering on getting uncomfortably hot. Very welcoming, very accommodating. Dean and I caught up, ordered, caught up some more and stepped out for a cigarette before the main course, passing by another ornate tree on our way out. We had just lit up in front of a side entrance, when three kids on bikes rode by, arguing loudly. One of them got off, walked up to us and said: “I’m dying for a cigarette. I’ve cycled all the way up here from Tooting”. At first, I thought that was pretty funny. Not only the oxymoronic meaning of his statement but also its random logic. There is no sensible connection between cycling a long distance across London and the urge to smoke. At least it wasn’t apparent to me. He kept looking at us defiantly. That’s when I realized that the antilogy wasn’t intended, no, there was none in his mind to begin with. He was dead serious. “I’m not going to hand out cigarettes to minors”, my friend said. “I’m seventeen”, the kid answered and handed me his ID. I’d lie if I pretended that I remember his name. But I did check the date of birth and it was in 1996. I’m no expert for fake British IDs but he looked much younger than that. “We bummed the cigarettes from someone else”, I told him. But he wouldn’t take no for an answer: “Then give me yours!”. I couldn’t believe how ballsy he was. Not in a menacing way, just supremely brash. Probably a smart kid stuck in the wrong part of the city. After rebuffing him a few more times and him telling us that we weren’t allowed to smoke where we were standing, he finally left, not without ranting and raving about the unfairness of it all.

Even though I don’t recall the kid’s name, I’ve decided that it should be Oliver Twist. That may be premature and overly dramatic – but I did have a very strong sense that this kid’s life can go two very different ways from here. Either what appears as harmless juvenile behavior might turn out to be just that. Or it might be the first indication of things going seriously off track. It’s a thin line: brazenness, quick wit and swagger can go a long way, but with very different outcomes depending on the context. And it’s a small aperture: the side entrance of the Dorchester, watching people pass by and running into a reincarnation of Oliver Twist, or not. I guess we’ll never find out.