Fierce (10 page)

People would carry dogs under their arms with little designer outfits on with matching collars. I couldn’t believe they had shops that actually specialised in doggy clothes. I’d never seen anything like it. My mum used to take us
to the Beverly Center, which is a massive shopping mall on about eight different levels on the edge of West Hollywood and Beverly Hills. I’d never been to such a huge place. Inside were Macy’s and Bloomingdale’s, which are well-known department stores in America. There were shops that I’d never heard of like Banana Republic, which sounded like a political fruit.

The sun was always shining in LA so my mum bought a convertible car. Uncle Tony would drive us everywhere. My dad can’t drive. Well, he can, but he hasn’t passed his test. He always used to drive around Welders when we lived there.

When we first moved to LA it was all fun, fun, fun times. Uncle Tony would drive me, Jack and Dad along Sunset Boulevard. Dad and I used to sit in the back and Jack would be in the front. My dad would chuck stink bombs through the doors of the shops. They’d roll in and land at the feet of the women buying their designer clothes. They’d look down and pull the funniest faces or run out. We’d be sitting in the car pissing ourselves laughing. Or Jack would have a squirt gun hidden by his feet. My dad would be looking for people to squirt and then he’d shout: ‘Now, Jack! Now, Jack.’ Jack would whip out his gun and squirt some innocent woman out shopping.

Living in LA was cool. But some crazy shit was also starting to happen too, which is just typical of my family. One day Jack, Mum, Aimee and I were eating at a deli in Beverly Hills. This man started calling my mum a ‘nigger fucker’. He was standing about a couple of yards away from us in the LA sunshine screaming, ‘You’re a nigger fucker.’ Everyone was stopping and watching us. It was really embarrassing.

Aimee turned to Mum and said, ‘Why is Tony Curtis calling you a nigger fucker, Mum?’ The man in question really looked like the Hollywood actor Tony Curtis, who was a friend of Mum’s.

I was too busy thinking, ‘Oh my God. That is the most disgusting thing I have ever heard anyone say. How can they say that? How can they use the N word?’

My mum just grabbed us all and hurried us along into a shop. When we got back to the hotel Mum was forced to admit that it was her father, Don Arden, who had been calling her those nasty words.

We had a grandfather. Mum had always told us that our grandparents were dead. Whenever I would ask her what they were like or what they did, she would just brush it off and change the subject. Most of the time she said they weren’t alive any more. We believed her. Why wouldn’t we? It’s so strange how unaffected I was and still am about my mum’s father. Jack and I really didn’t care. It didn’t mean anything to us. The most shocking thing to me and Jack was the language that had come out of his mouth.

Back at the hotel, my mum asked us if we wanted to meet our grandfather. I thought, I’ve not had him in my life for fourteen years, I don’t know a lot about him apart from the bad stuff, and I know that there must have been a very good reason for my mum to want to keep him away from us. So I thought, I’ll leave it at that.

I did meet him once. He came over for food at our house. I never called him ‘Grandad’. I hardly spoke to him. I didn’t give a shit – he was just some old man.

Years later, Mum made her peace and paid for him to be put into a care home in LA after he became too ill to look after himself.

When he died in 2008 I didn’t feel anything except confusion, because I didn’t expect my mum to be so upset. It hit her hard. I think it made her realise that it’s not always worth shutting people out of your life for so long over arguments in the past.

I
WAS
fourteen and I’d not started my period. I wasn’t bothered. I didn’t care. I didn’t want to get my period. I just didn’t want to have blood coming out of my vagina once a month. By this point we’d moved out of the Beverly Hills Hotel and into 906 North Beverly Drive.

It was a detached house behind big black gates with a balcony at the front. I wouldn’t say it was one of those massive, massive houses, but it was cool. It wasn’t far from school and all the places we liked to hang out.

One night, at around 9 p.m. I was sitting in my bedroom when I started to get the most God-awful stomach ache.

I walked across the hallway from my bedroom and into my parents’ room to tell my mum. She was sitting on the edge of her bed and she said, ‘Kelly, you’re just making it up because you don’t want to go to school tomorrow.’

I was pleading, ‘No, Mum. My stomach really does hurt.’

But she replied in her deep I’m-not-taking-any-shit voice, ‘Kelly, go to bed. If you don’t go to bed, that’s it!’

I was like, ‘All right. Calm down. Whatever.’

I woke up the next morning and went for my morning wee in the en suite bathroom. I’m not joking, I looked down into my knickers and thought I had shat myself in my sleep. I went running into Mum’s room crying and screaming. She told me to calm down and said she would come with me to the toilet to try and sort it out. She took one look and said, ‘No, you idiot, you’ve got your period. You’re a woman now.’

I looked at her, sat on the floor, and started crying again. I couldn’t stop. I thought, ‘So what to being a woman if this is what happens.’

I stood up, grabbed my mum’s hands and said, ‘Don’t you dare tell anyone. You must not tell anyone. Promise me you won’t tell?’ My mum showed me what I had to do with the sanitary towels and I stood there next to her in the bathroom shuddering and saying, ‘Oh, Mum. Please shut up. This is so gross.’

The only good thing about getting my period was that Mum did let me have the day off. Not all of my friends were allowed to have the day off. My mum felt sorry for me because I couldn’t stop crying.

About an hour later, I walked to my mum’s room to ask another question about sanitary towels and my dad was standing at the doorway.

He greeted me with, ‘Oh, my little girl is a woman now.’

To say I was mortified is an understatement. I just flopped on my parents’ bed and cried. It wasn’t because I was thinking, ‘Oh the joy of being a woman.’ It was more like, ‘Mum, I can’t believe you told Dad. You arsehole.’

B
EING
so close to my brother Jack and also spending my childhood on the road with a bunch of guys meant I'd not really explored my feminine side as much as other girls my age. Getting my period made me think for the first time – but not in a cheesy way – ‘Yeah, I'm a woman.'

Spending my teenage years in Los Angeles could be absolute agony at times. I was surrounded by all these gorgeous people who were constantly obsessed with their appearance. LA is about one thing only: perfection. Your face has to look incredible and your make-up immaculate. You're frowned upon if you're not near-to-death skinny and carrying the latest designer handbag.

There are places everywhere geared for plucking, preening, plumping … Everyone spends shit-loads on their appearance, from the average Joe to the top Hollywood stars. I refuse to buy into the
idea that everyone has to look perfect. I really do. Who wants to look like everyone else? Everyone should strive to be an individual, not some Barbie doll clone.

At fourteen I started to get spots. Generally, I had good skin, but when I did get a spot it would be a really visible ‘Hi, thanks for coming to join me on my face' type of spot. Everyone could see it. Forget the cover-up; this baby was going nowhere. I have pale skin too. A spot would always stand out like a big red traffic cone on my face. When it happened, all the boys at school would call me spotty. It was miserable. I'd turned fourteen in the October and by the New Year I'd had enough of people calling me spotty, even though I wasn't the only one who was called names. All the kids in my class were getting spots at some point.