‘I Am Jimmy’ is my second novel, the one I’m currently working on.
I Am Jimmy
Who we are depends on who we are with.
Jimmy Walker has been called three names by the three most significant relationships in his life. His mother called him Jamie; soft, diminutive, a name that kept a boy small and close. His wife Claire called him Jim; direct, clear-eyed, the name of a man with weight to him. At work, he is Jimmy, a name he accepted by accident, performing daily behind a plaque on an office door. And a palliative care nurse named Grace calls him James; a name nobody has ever used, existing in the gap between all the others, with no history or performance attached yet.
Set over the course of two years in Glasgow's east end, I Am Jimmy is the story of two people whose lives intersect in the corridors of a private hospice and on the streets of Bridgeton. Jimmy is a business advisor who has spent his life identifying risk and staying perfectly still. Grace - Luo Xiuying - is a nurse from Changsha, Hunan, who has spent her life taking risks because survival required it. She has crossed continents, languages and legal systems. He won't book a spontaneous trip to Italy in case the hotel is rubbish. She dreams of Italy as her reward in the next life.
What brings them together is yuanfen, the Chinese concept of an invisible thread that connects people whose lives are meant to intersect. What splits them apart is the same thing. Two people carrying multiple versions of themselves, performing the self the room requires, trying to read each other's maps of the same territory and finding they were drawn in completely different languages.
I Am Jimmy is a philosophical novel about identity, grief, risk and what remains of a person when the witnesses to their former selves are gone.
The first two chapters are below.
Chapter 1
The small, white sign on the office door reads ‘Jimmy Walker - Business Advisor’. Inside the office, behind a desk with a local authority-issued Dell desktop PC and black monitor, sits Jimmy Walker.
Jimmy is in his office, Monday to Friday, every week. Except on Bank Holiday weekends. His clients are referred to him after filling out an enquiry form on the local authority website. They’ve perhaps been told by family and friends that the cupcakes they made for their cousin Julie’s baby shower were amazing, and they should think about setting up a business, a wee side hustle, selling them. Perhaps they believe that, in time, and with the right support, their side hustle could turn into a viable business, providing employment to the local area.
Before meeting Jimmy, his clients hadn’t heard of business plans, but they’ve had 50 likes on a photo of the cupcakes they shared on Instagram. Dotty4223 commented that they looked gorgeous and that her mouth was watering. Dotty4223 tagged HelsBels. Neither of them asked about start-up funding. Health and safety certificates. Competitor analysis. Cost-per-acquisition. Premises. Profit margins.
Jimmy's advice is always free and always impartial. He already has the business plan template on the Dell desktop PC’s hard drive. He has links to online workshops covering marketing, branding, and search engine optimisation. If the client is under 30, he’ll hand them a leaflet about the Prince's Trust. If the client’s business idea is bigger than Jimmy’s remit, he’ll hand them a leaflet about Scottish Enterprise. And, once a week, from March to May, he runs a 2-hour in-person workshop on writing a business plan.
He has a pension. He has savings. His mortgage is almost paid off. He has a wardrobe at home with suits and shirts. He always wears a tie. His grandpa always wore a tie. Jimmy wears his grandpa’s watch. It was the watch that the astronauts wore when they walked on the moon.
Jimmy has a wife, Claire.
Jimmy plays air guitar while listening to Sultans of Swing in the kitchen. Claire laughs and plays air drums. The Saturday morning sunshine reflects off the white cabinet doors and catches the auburn in Jimmy’s hair as his head bobs up and down, eyes locked onto Claire’s. Her long dark hair flies around her face as her head shakes in time with the high hat.
Claire has been in the hospice for three months. She lost her hair almost a year ago.
Claire has cancer. Stage 4.
Chapter 2
The name Jimmy was an accident.
His mum always called him Jamie, so he’d always called himself Jamie. Wee Jamie from Ballieston. Clean, white Reebok trainers, even in the winter. Home before dark. Home before dark before mobile phones. It wasn’t that his mum was overly strict. She was strict, but she just loved him, worried about him.
“Jamie, mind and stay away from the Bell boys!”
His mum didn’t like the Bells. Rough family. The wrong type of boys for Jamie to be playing with. She remembers the dad from school.
Jamie would stay away from the Bell boys.
When Jimmy started his first job, the team leader in the call centre stuck out his hand for Jimmy to shake.
“Good to meet you, I’m Ross. What’s your name, again?”
“Jamie, Jamie Walker. Good to meet you, too.”
“Ok, Jimmy, you’ll be sitting over there.”
And he’d pointed to a long, wide table. Twelve CRT monitors, twelve headsets, twelve keyboards.
“Guys, guys, listen up! This is Jimmy.”
He’d pointed at Jimmy. Eleven pairs of eyes turned to him.
Jimmy. He liked how that sounded. Glaswegian. Older.
Ross put a hand on his shoulder and pointed at a man wearing a headset. He was talking and typing, looking at the screen.
“That’s Greg. You’ll be shadowing him for two weeks, ok? Any questions, just ask him. And any problems, come to me. Sound good?”
Ross. Greg. Jimmy.
He sat beside Greg. Jimmy’s monitor displayed a pale blue screen with the investment company's branding. Two boxes for his login details.
He typed:
jwalker
Then his password.
Greg’s call had finished.
“Hi mate, how you doing? I’m Greg.”
“Oh, hi. I’m, eh, I’m Jimmy. Good to meet you.”
They shook hands.
That evening, his mum was in the kitchen. Jamie was taking his tie off as he locked the flat’s door behind him. The small tape deck next to the toaster was playing Dire Straits.
“So, how was it?”
“Yeah, it was actually really good. Bit of a buzz in the place. Not quite like ‘Wall Street’, but pretty exciting.”
He dropped his tie over the back of the chair at the small kitchen table.
“Aw, that’s so good, Jamie. Haha! You, a stockbroker!”
“Well, not quite a stockbroker, but…”
“Listen…”
She was standing behind him, hands on his shoulders, leaning over him, talking.
“Your wee mum’s proud as Punch. First in the family to go to college, now mixing with the city slickers.”
“Aye, ok, Mum.”
He was smiling.
She’d had a dream that he’d sign for Glasgow Rangers as a striker. Never used to shut up about it. He’d scored the winning goal for the school team when he was eleven. She’d been there, she’d seen him. She’d taken the afternoon off work. He could remember that feeling, swinging his leg at the ball, it hitting his shin, then a defender’s thigh, and it bobbling past the fat goalkeeper. Him turning and running to his teammates, hearing his mum screaming, “Jamie!” from the side of the red ash football pitch.
He’d have played more football with his mates on the red ash pitch, but he always had to keep his trainers clean. And anyway, the Bell boys were usually there.
He can feel her pulling the tie from the back of his chair.
“Jamie, how many times, son? Put this in your wardrobe, please.”