“Nothing too serious, I hope?”
Tm not really sure. She’s sort of given me an ultimatum.”
“Oh, Daniel, you’ve not been seeing a fancy woman, have you?”
“No, nothing like that, not apart from you, of course.”
She giggles and her face creases up like a wet paper bag.
“You see, she wants me to get a job.”
“Well, you have a job, don’t you? I mean, you work here.”
“I know, but Alison thinks I should get something a bit better, something more like a career. I am nearly thirty.”
“Tush, you’re no more than a child. Wait until you get to be my age, then you’ll see what life’s made of.”
“Right. I mean, I’m sure you’re right… but anyway she’s only given me until Christmas to sort it out.”
“Well, what about your music? I thought you still played in that little band of yours. I thought that song you played me the other day was rather lovely.”
“Well, see… the thing is she wants to see something concrete. She wants to see something on paper, a record deal or a job one or the other, by the end of the year.”
“Well, that doesn’t seem like very much time to me.”
“I know, but she’s just been given this job in Bruges and…”
“Bruges?”
“It’s in Belgium.”
“My dear boy, I know where it is. I’m not senile, you know.”
“No, of course not, I didn’t mean…”
“In fact my husband and I spent some time in Antwerp before the war. Lovely city, Antwerp. Beautiful cathedral.
“Still,” she says, taking my arm and beckoning me close to hear her secret. “They’re a funny lot, you know… the Belgians.”
“How so, Sheila?”
She looks both ways to check no one’s listening.
“They put mayonnaise on their chips.”
“You hear about all this ridiculousness, Sheila?” says Kostas, coming to join us from the stockroom. “This boy let his girlfriend tell him what’s to do. Have you ever heard such ridiculous thing as this? The girlfriend telling the boyfriend what’s to do?”
“Oh, I don’t know,” says Sheila, picking up a copy of Best of the Best, ‘she sounds like quite a young lady to me.”
“She is,” I say. “That’s the problem.”
“Tsk. You ought to behave like a man, Danny. You wants to tell her what’s to do. A man should be kings of his own castle.”
“Well… it’s more Alison’s castle really. She does pay almost all of the rent.”
Kostas looks faintly disgusted and then Sheila taps me on the hand with her bony finger and gets me off the hook.
“You are still coming to mow my lawn for me on Saturday, aren’t you?”
“Yes, of course I am. We said some time around four, didn’t we?”
“Yes, because my daughter’s visiting with my grandson on Sunday and I’d hate for the lawn to be overgrown. I don’t want her thinking I can’t take care of myself.”
“Don’t worry, Sheila. I’ll definitely be there.”
It’s funny what old people worry about. She can barely afford to clothe herself on her pension but she still wants to make sure she’s got a neat lawn when the grandchildren come round.
“Hi, how was work?”
“Fine,” I say, heading over to the fridge and helping myself to a Snapple. “Kostas made a list of his top-ten Telly Savalas films of all time and that guy from the post office came in to rent House of Whipcord again.”
“That’s nice. I’ve made us something to eat turkey mince chilli OK?”
Alison is starting to freak me out. Ever since she said she was leaving she’s started behaving like the wife in a fifties American sitcom. She’s home by six, she’s tidied the house, and she’s always got something to eat waiting in the oven when I get home. I know, freaky, and the only thing that gives it away is that Alison can’t cook. I mean, she’s brilliant at almost everything else but somehow she’s utterly incapable of following a recipe. When I cook, I follow the recipe like it’s a mathematical formula; when Alison cooks, she’s always convinced the recipe could do with a little improving.
“Well,” I say, taking a butcher’s at the pile of steaming grey matter in the saucepan, ‘that looks… er, lovely, but I thought I’d just grab a burger on the way.”
“On the way where?”
“Rehearsals. I’m supposed to be meeting Vince and Matty at seven.”
“Oh…” she says, digging at the rice with the back of her spoon.
“What? .. . You thought I wasn’t going, didn’t you?”
“Well, I just thought
“That’s it, isn’t it? You thought I wasn’t going to go any more.”
“No, that’s not it at—’ j&
“That’s why you’re being so nice to me, isn’t it, all this cooking and cleaning and… you thought you only had to utter the words and I’d dump the music straight away, just like that, that I wouldn’t even want to give it another chance.”
“No, Danny, that’s not—’
“I mean, I haven’t even had a chance to tell Matty and Vince what you said yet, I haven’t—’
“Listen to me. It’s not like that, I wasn’t expecting you to give up overnight, I just thought that since I’m leaving for Bruges on Monday you might want us to spend a few evenings together. I just wanted to spend some extra time with you before I go.”
I feel so guilty I have two and a half helpings of the turkey mince chilli.
“I spoke to my brother today,” she says, spooning the last of the chilli on to my plate.
“Did you?” I say, picking a piece of gizzard out of my teeth. “How did he seem?”
“Fine. You know, he seems pretty settled in his new flat. I think he’s a bit worried about me going away, though.”
“Yeah, well, that’s no problem, I’ve got loads of free time, I don’t mind checking in on him while you’re away.”
“Would you?”
“Yeah, of course. As long as he promises to let me win a chess game once in a while.”
“No chance,” she says, grinning at me. “You can’t even beat Sheila.”
“Yeah, well, that’s as maybe, but I’m learning, aren’t I? And I killed Matty at draughts in the pub yesterday. He didn’t stand a chance.”
“Thanks, Danny,” she says, reaching over and giving me a kiss, “I’d really appreciate it. I know Rufus would love to see you.”
Alison brings out a Marks and Spencer’s raspberry trifle and I attempt to capitalise on my newly won brownie points by telling her all about my conversation with Sheila.
“I told Sheila about you today,” I say dividing the trifle into two (fairly) even pieces. “I told her that you’d given me an ultimatum.”
“Oh my God, you didn’t. What did she say?”
“She said I ought to wait until I got to be her age then I’d know what was what.”
“Did she say what she thought you should do?”
“Well, urn… not really … I think she thought you were being a bit unreasonable… with the whole six-months thing.”
“Danny, we talked about it. I just don’t want this thing dragging on.”
“So that’s it, then. If I don’t sort myself out by Christmas you’re going to leave me?”
“No, of course I’m not, I told you, I just want us to have made some decisions by then, that’s all.”
I don’t know why I’m pushing her like this. She’s already explained herself a hundred thousand times and she looks like she’s starting to get upset again so I say:
“Sheila said something else about you as well.”
“Really? What did she say?”
“She said you sounded like quite a young lady.”
“Hey, have you seen this?” she says, handing me an article from the North London Herald. “The local health authority have stopped offering IVF treatment to women over thirty-three. It’s awful, isn’t it? Most women don’t decide to have children until they’re in their thirties these days, so they won’t even know they’re infertile until it’s too late.”
“Yeah,” I say, looking at my watch, ‘but they have to draw the line somewhere, don’t they? I mean, it’s harder to get pregnant when you’re in your thirties, isn’t it, so they probably think it’s a waste of money or something.”
Bad answer.
“But what if it was us? What if it was us, Danny, and we found out we couldn’t have any kids? How would we pay for it?”
“It’s not going to happen to us. Look at you, you’re the picture of health.”
“It doesn’t work like that. You can’t just look at a person and know whether they’re going to be able to have children or not. Look at Ruth. You wouldn’t think Ruth would be the one to end up with blocked fallopian tubes, would you? God, she spends more time in the gym than she does at work.”
“Well, no, but I don’t know what you’re worried about, you’re only just thirty, you’ve got years yet, you’ve got buckets of time.”
She walks over to the kitchen and starts doing the washing up.
“See you later then,” I say to the back of her head. “I won’t be too late.”
“Right.”
“No later than ten.”
“OK.”
“We won’t bother going to the pub then.”
“Fine.”
Till come straight home.”
“Whatever. Oh, and don’t forget to tell Vince and Matty about Saturday.”
“What’s happening on Saturday?”
“I told you, I’ve organised a leaving do with some people from work. Ruth and Shelley are coming. We’re going to The Medicine Bar. I told you.”
Great, exactly what I need right now, a night out in a poncy bar with Alison’s friends.
Things left to do before Alison leaves on Monday:
Buy present (something personal that will make her think about me while she’s away).
Get haircut and buy new shirt from Ted Baker (so Alison will spend journey to Bruges thinking how good I looked at leaving party).
Try to lose some of beer gut. Tricky since just consumed two and a half helpings of turkey mince chilli and a whole raspberry trifle.
Buy champagne for last night.
Cancel that. Champagne might look like I’m celebrating her going.
Buy bottle of that expensive Sancerre that she likes instead.
Buy ingredients for romantic dinner for two. Maybe try making that duck pancake thing again.
Cancel that. Last time tried to make duck pancake thing it was a disaster on account of leaving the giblets in. Buy MS duck a 1’orange instead.
Go to rehearsal.
Play set.
Find way of telling Vince and Matty that we’ve only got six months left to become household names.
Vince and Matty are waiting for me outside the rehearsal room when I finally turn up.
“What are you doing outside?”
“Never mind that. Where have you been? We’ve been trying to get hold of you at the shop.”
“I popped home first. Alison cooked. What could I do? I had to stay and eat it.” Vince nods sympathetically and Matty asks me if I want a bite of his doner kebab. They both have limited experience of Alison’s cooking including her famous pilchard and sweet corn curry so they immediately assume I’m still hungry.
“So anyway, the rehearsal’s off,” says Vince. “There’s been a power cut. Some plank went and overloaded the circuits.”
“Shit. So what shall we do?” I say through a small mouthful of Matty’s kebab.
“Not much we can do, I suppose. Reckon we should just go next door for a couple of jars and see if they have any luck fixing it in the next hour or so.”
Fat chance. Vince knows full well it’ll be one excuse after another until at least the beginning of next week:
“Sorry, mate, the PA’s blown up now.”
“Sorry, mate, the rats have gnawed through the wires again.”
“Sorry, mate, I know I said I’d have it done by Monday but our in-house engineer is laid up with a nasty dose of athlete’s foot, smells to high heaven… yeah, even if he does keep his trainers on. We’ll definitely have it done by the weekend, though. No problem.”
For ‘in-house engineer’ read local spliff dealer with an HND
in household electronics. For ‘athlete’s foot’ read… well, athlete’s foot. For ‘done by the weekend’ read some time before August
2004.
It’s a pity: a dose of hardcore rehearsal-room tinnitus is exactly what I need to take my mind off things.
I can still remember the first rehearsal room I ever went into. It was part of a desolate industrial estate somewhere off the Mile End Road, and I remember that you had to trek across half a mile of waste ground and ride up five floors in an open-sided lift before you reached the practice rooms. It was called Broken Lives.
I was shitting myself. I’d finally plucked up the courage to phone one of the “Guitarist Wanted’ ads in the back of the Melody Maker and I was on my way to audition for a band called Code Red. Vince was the lead singer. He’d written the ad himself:
BAND WITH RECORD COMPANY INTEREST SEEKS
SHIT HOT GUITARIST WITH OWN GEAR.
INFLUENCES: DEVO, DYLAN, THE DOORS AND DEXY’S
(He was very keen on bands beginning with the letter D.)
ABSOLUTELY NO TIME WASTERS.
(WE MEAN IT MAN.)
EAST LONDON.
Melody Maker comes out on a Wednesday but I didn’t summon up the nerve to call Vince until the following Sunday afternoon. His first words to me were:
“What kind of a wank-stained pillock phones up in the middle of the football… West Ham are two nil up, for fuck’s sake.”
I swallowed hard and told him I was calling about his ad.
“Oh… really?” he said, sounding somewhat surprised. “Right then, where you from?”
“Woodford,” I said, wondering if he knew where it was.
“Oh yeah, I know it, me and the lads are up Leytonstone way. We’ve got our own squat.”
“Cool,” I said, wondering if this would be a good time to mention that I still lived with my mum. “Sounds nice.”
“So… what kind of guitar d’you play?”
“Em … a Squire.”
“Hmmmmn.”
“It’s got its own hard case,” I added, hoping that this might help chivvy things along.
“Well, what amp you got?”
“A Peavy, fifteen watt… it’s more of a practice amp really.”
He didn’t sound too convinced.
“So, who are your influences, then?”
I wanted to say The Smiths and New Order but I decided to plump for a couple of the bands that Vince had mentioned in his ad.
“Well, Devo, I like Devo and, er… yeah, I really like Dexy’s Midnight Runners. They’re practically my favourite band of all time.”
Bingo.
It turned out that the band were holding auditions on Tuesday night and Vince asked me if I wanted to come along.