Charlotte Street (40 page)

And she was out there.

And though I told myself I’d given up, though I’d convinced myself that this particular beginning had already ended, part of me was pleased that now I could decide the ending for myself.

Whether that ending was trying … or whether it was stopping.

At least I was in control.

‘POWER UP! IS POWERING DOWN’ said the Facebook invite. ‘COME AND SAY GOODBYE TO A LEGEND.’

I checked to see who else had been invited. A couple of regulars. Someone I didn’t know but had seen in the shop. Pawel, who didn’t really understand social networking and was yet to figure out how to reply to things. And me.

The plan seemed to be to have a short eulogy in the shop before retiring to the Den for the evening. A typically ambitious night from Dev.

I was sure it’d be fun.

I looked at the RSVP options.

Are you attending? Yes, No, or Maybe
.

And I clicked No.

It wasn’t just that I was ashamed of showing Dev I’d taken a giant step backwards when all we’d really talked about was moving forwards. It was that in some ways, not attending was moving forwards. Because what’s moving forwards if not
not
looking backwards?

This is how confusing things get when you’re trying to convince yourself that all is well. You bend logic to your will.

But anyway. It wasn’t like I hadn’t made an effort with Dev. I’d sent him the golden envelope I’d managed to get from Zoe. He’d loved it. He’d sent me a text with a little kiss on the end. So there was time for me and Dev to get close again.

But first I had to sort myself out.

I would be moving out of Blackstock Road in a month.

I’d found myself a nice little studio flat in Canonbury Square, so small I’d constantly smell of kitchen, but with a desk by the window that filled the place with light. The rent was high, but I reasoned this was good for me. It would force me to work. I couldn’t just rely on supply teaching that way; I’d have to freelance, find ideas, write, maybe even progress.

Zoe was pretty down.
London Now
was finally on its way out.

‘Could be any day,’ she said. ‘They could literally just shut us down at any time they like.’

She’d started making calls already and thought she’d made a few in-roads with a couple of papers, but budgets were tight these days, she said. We’d still spend our evenings cooking together, then finding our way to the Bank of Friendship, and it was there, this night, that she slid an envelope across the table to me.

‘What’s this?’ I said.

My name was still on a few out-of-date PR lists, and every now and again she’d bring home an invitation to interview the star of a bad new musical, or a heavily packaged new pie from Ginsters, and I’d read the release or try the pie, but both would inevitably find the bin. This one, though, was different.

‘Arrived this morning,’ she said. ‘It looked personal, so I didn’t open it. Although that was also what made me
want
to open it.’

It had a stamp, for one thing, rather than the red splotch of a hurried in-house franking machine. And the address was in ink, in a small and spidery hand. I looked at the postmark.

Brighton.

I opened it, and inside was no note, no explanation – just a colourful flyer, with a guitar, and a rainbow, and a soft photo of a girl with a fringe and electric blue eyeliner sitting by the shore.

I was thrilled. And I beamed. She was doing it.

Then, inspired, using the moment, I got home, I opened up the only two boxes I’d yet packed, and I rifled around, pulling out the file I’d hung on to from my last time at St John’s, hoping I hadn’t chucked out the one stapled-together document I actually never thought I’d need again.

Brighton’s Open House & Performer Bar is all Chesterfield sofas and rough wooden tables, red walls and Jim Morrison pop art, and really needs a catchier name.

There’s a student crowd, but locals, too, and on this Thursday night at half-past eight I found myself somewhere near the back of the room and quietly pretended to read a discarded
Argus
.

I hadn’t told Abbey I was coming. I know she’d sent me the flyer, but there was no note, nothing to indicate she wanted me there. I got the sense it was out of politeness. Something to say, look, I’m doing this, I’m trying it, wish me luck, all the best.

I’d stared at the flyer on the train down, played Abbey’s songs on my iPod as the city sun faded into a countryside night. They were beautiful. Not perfect, but they were her. They were fragile, but full of life, so delicate and breakable, but so hopeful, too. I hadn’t been lying when I’d written that review. I was, in fact, I
think
, being more honest than I’d ever been. My gift to Abbey would have been my gift whether I knew her or not, but somehow that had been devalued and lost.

Ha. My ‘gift’. Like five stars from a mildly disgraced half-sacked acting reviews editor was a gift. But those five stars weren’t my gift, not really. I guess my gift was just belief. The only thing I had to give.

Then the crowd settled as the lights dimmed, and Abbey walked out, eyes down and self-conscious, plugged in her guitar, and started to play.

And I felt so happy, so thrilled, so
full
.

‘I wasn’t sure you’d come,’ said Abbey, afterwards.

‘I wasn’t sure you wanted me here,’ I said.

‘I wasn’t either.’

‘You were brilliant, Abbey. It was—’

‘Jase, I’m sorry about reacting the way I did.’

‘It’s my fault. I messed up. If it’s any consolation, it was one of at least nine things that lost me my job as acting reviews editor. So we’re even. Although you
did
drug my ex-girlfriend’s fiancé and friend, so actually, I think you still owe
me
one because now she’s not talking to me and my wedding invite was revoked.’

She giggled, guiltily.

‘God, I don’t know what I was thinking. Escapism, I suppose. Guess we
are
even.’

‘That’s not what I said. I said you still owed me one. And afterwards, after that gig, I just got excited when I realised that you did have an ambition. You were lying, before, or—’

‘I wasn’t lying,’ she said, rolling her eyes, and I was quick to get this back on track.

‘No, I mean not lying exactly, obviously. Just wrong. Because you clearly did.’

I’d wondered about Abbey, when I first met her. Why was she always following The Kicks about? Or the other bands she seemed to know and trail and traipse after? I’d wondered if maybe she was some kind of groupie, taking senior position among the other girls, because she was ‘with’ the band, knew them to talk to and drink with. But that wasn’t her at all. Now I realised she hung around with those people simply because they were doing what
she
wanted to do. She loved the music, not the band, and she loved the universe of it all. She wanted to watch, quietly, from the side of the stage, as others gave it a shot, because maybe she just wasn’t brave enough to walk out there herself and tell the world what she was thinking.

Yet.

‘You’re doing it,’ I said. ‘Going for it.’

‘Just a few gigs. It’s
hard
to get gigs. But the response has been good. Well, from nearly everyone.’

‘Tough crowds?’

‘The crowds have been good. Polite, anyway. No, I mean Paul.’

‘Puppeteer Paul? What about Puppeteer Paul?’

‘Puppeteer Paul wasn’t quite as keen. Said we had to decide who the creative one was. Says it never works out when there are two people trying to crack the same world.’

‘He’s a
puppeteer
! ’

She broke into a smile, and put her hand to her cheek.

‘Actually, he’d prefer it if you refer to him as a
political
puppeteer.’

‘Where was he tonight, then? The UN? Or did they parachute him into Gaza with a sock and two ping pong balls?’

Her smile fell, but only very slightly, and only for a second.

‘We’re not together any more, Paul and me. If you could say we were
ever
together, I don’t know.’

Oh, God. This was my fault. That review – my little gift – had kickstarted this. The catalyst that enraged a political puppeteer. I should say sorry. I knew that. I should apologise unreservedly for a relationship ruined.

But then I remembered that night at Scala. The disparaging remarks. The cynicism masquerading as wit. The way he seemed to be with her. My childish mental report card (
Yes, Mr and Mrs Anderson, from my notes this term, it appears that Paul is a knob
).

‘Why did you go out with him in the first place, Ab?’ I said, like I was a disappointed older brother, or something.

‘I dunno. Structure? I know he liked his puppets, but he was the most organised person I knew, puppets or not. And I think I thought, well, you need limits, don’t you? You need rules. I feel like I’m just wafting along most of the time, it was nice to feel there was only so far I could waft. Though the thing is … I think I really
like
wafting.’

A pause.

‘People don’t use the word “waft” enough, do they?’ she said.

‘Sod that political puppeteer,’ I said. ‘Sod
all
political puppeteers. May their puppets rise up against them in fury.’

Abbey laughed.

‘Sod him,’ she said.

I raised my glass.

‘To making it happen,’ I said.

‘You’re using that phrase a lot at the moment.’ She smiled.

I blushed. I was.

‘How’s Dev?’ she said, lightly.

‘Haven’t really seen him much,’ I said. ‘I seem to have developed a habit for not seeing people much.’

She tapped the table and took a sip of her drink.

‘When I first met you,’ she said, ‘do you know what I thought?’

I shook my head.

‘I thought, he’s like me.’

‘A small girl who hangs around with bands?’

‘No. A bit broken.’

‘
Bruised
, you said.’

‘But fixable, maybe. I’m trying to fix things, and yes, it’s kind of thanks to your idiotics, so thank you, I guess. And when we were hanging out, it seemed like, more and more, you were, too.’

She clinked my glass.

‘Don’t stop,’ she said.

We sat together for a second, just two mates in a pub. I noticed her guitar again.

‘Listen, I might be able to waft a gig your way, if you’re interested?’

The next morning. Friday
. The day Mrs Woollacombe had been dreading. The one Mr Willis had prepared a short straw for, probably cursing Gary Dodd and Ladbrokes as he did so.

I pulled out the document I’d found in my boxes that night. I’d read it on the train home last night to remind myself, to see if it still stood up, but I’d suddenly found myself furiously rewriting it, reworking it,
renaming
it.

Making It Happen!
it read.
A Mr Priestley Assembly!

The others had all but jumped with glee when I’d said I’d be happy to take that week’s assembly. They tried to give me outs – said supply teachers weren’t expected to pile in with the others, said they could always cancel and just have a study
period instead. But I said no, I’d be grateful for the chance. ‘Be good to connect with the kids!’

Everyone had looked at me like I was mental.

It wasn’t just that they wanted to avoid a ten-minute speech. It wasn’t just that they didn’t fancy the prep, or the angst, or the listless feeling they’d get halfway through when they realised their words were falling on permanently disinterested ears.

‘There’s an inspector in,’ Mrs Woollacombe had told me, finally, as we’d walked towards the hall. ‘They’ll be
inspecting
!’

She made a sorry-I-should-have-mentioned-it face, but I waved it away. I’d been looking forward to this, by and large. The thought excited me. Maybe I need this, I thought. Get back on the horse. Do it properly. Do it right. Inspector or not. And all thanks to Matt.

I glanced up from my little red plastic chair on the stage. Mrs Abercrombie, the new head, was waxing lyrical about the importance of covering textbooks in brown paper, and if you didn’t have brown paper, you could use wallpaper, or just wrapping paper, but ideally brown paper or sticky back plastic. She had been making this point for quite some time. The kids were glassy-eyed, their skin dull, the room just a yawn, early morning hair gel yet to set, a bored sea of tiny ties and scuffed-up Golas. I could see Michael Baxter in the second row, his collar upturned, chewing and snapping his gum, loudly, a ten-pack of fags and a lighter outlined in his too-tight-trousers. Teresa May had snuck her phone in, and little Tony couldn’t stop scratching.

‘… which actually brings us to the theme of today’s assembly,’ said Mrs Abercrombie, suddenly, and I jolted. Michael Baxter noticed and smirked.

‘So, Mr Priestley …?’

I stood.

‘Thanks, Mrs Abercrombie,’ I said, looking out at my audience, my kids, my young minds to mould.

Somewhere, someone burped.

‘Making It Happen,’ I started, and my eyes scanned the room, for someone, anyone, who had about them the look of a Matthew Fowler. Because if I saw one, I would do this, and do it properly, and crucially, I would do it for
them
. ‘How do you “make it happen”? And what does “making it happen” even mean?’

Another burp, this one followed by a giggle.

But I ignored it. Because actually, I had stuff to say.

And so I went for it.

I talked, and I talked, and I talked some more. I made some jokes, and two of them got small laughs, and as I looked around the room, between the bored faces, the glum faces, the distant faces, I saw the odd, all-but-imperceptible pocket of something. Small sparks of interest; the odd head tilt. Maybe only two, three kids. But two, three kids nevertheless.

It felt good. I felt different.

And as I turned the pages, and moved closer to my final point – about dreams, and about how dreams are supposed to be unrealistic, but about how some dreams
can
come true – I felt like I was the inspirational teacher in the closing scenes of a Disney movie. I never once thought I’d have that. I’d never once had it before. This was not my ideal job. I was not overly brilliant at it. But then, I would not be here forever. I knew that, because I intended to be true to my word and Make It Happen, so that out there, in this school hall, I would not disappoint any budding Matthew Fowlers when they watched me do precisely nothing for five more years.
That
was teaching.
Showing
. And that was my plan, vague and small and naive as it was.