Heaven's Promise (15 page)

No doubt about it, there was a sense of community here a feeling that whatever vibe tribe you hailed from, whatever your colours, it didn't matter. I had never witnessed such camaraderie amongst my generation and I couldn't help but idly wonder what it would take for the lot of us to rise up as one and fight the greyers that be, smashing down all their restrictions and hypocrisy in one great swoop. The problemo with such a scenario is that the English are not a race for change and the only way you'll probably ever get a full blooded revolution is to close the pubs down forever. Now that would cause a rumble. At about four that afternoon, I couldn't help but note an extremely fine gal, in shorts and a t-shirt that loosely covered a pair of breasts that would interest men for years, pass by. As I was checking her out, I felt Indigo whisper into my ear, in a leering voice, ‘Cor, nice pair of tits, eh?' The gal had caught me on the hop and I blushed a little, not something I do everyday.

‘Not to my taste, Indigo,' I lied but my tormenter was not so easily put off. ‘What is then?'

Resisting the obvious reply, which would pertain to her very good self, I checked the field of play and rested my gaze on a Latino type gal, sunbathing in a swimsuit with nothing more than a walkman for a companion.

‘Yeah, not too bad,' Indigo replied, which, I have to say, came as something of a surprise for it is not every day that a gal gives her opinion on another's charms. ‘She's got a good body but my choice would have been... him.'

She discreetly nodded to a long, curly haired white guy, a very unfortunate creation that can best be described as an unfortunate accident between Bob Dylan and Art Garfunkel, sitting in just his shorts, toking on a spliff and lost in a world of his own drug taking.

‘Now that's a bit of alright, don't you think?'

‘You must be joking. He's a class A lonely wanker.'

‘A what?'

‘Myself and a close friend,' I explained, ‘have a theory that everyone in this world is a lonely wanker and life is all about what degree you live at. It's our way of acknowledging Jean Paul Sartre without having to wade through his tedious books.'

‘Oh yes,' Indigo replied. ‘And what degree of lonely wankerdom do you inhabit?'

‘About 30 to 40% I would like to think, and that's a very reasonable level. Certainly less than your Adonis. He's well up in the 90s on the lonely wanker scale, if you ask me.'

‘Really. Watch him for a minute.'

I put the eye on him just as the dreamboat in shorts that I had spotted earlier, returned with two drinks in her hand, one for her and one for... him. He took a swig from the bottle, pulled her down to the ground and there they lay, loving it up all afternoon.

‘I think the lonely wanker just got busy,' laughed Indigo and returned to her book. But I was not to be put off.

‘What you have just witnessed,' I explained, ‘is the Gimp theory in full effect. Developed between myself and Amanda's brother, this is a theory whose main law states unequivocally that the more beautiful the Mary, the uglier the man.'

‘And why is it,' Indigo demanded, ‘that all the best looking Marys, as you call them, go for these types and not hunks such as yourself and your friend?'

‘One, because they have the bottle to approach good looking women because they've got nothing to lose. Two, they have money or a flash motor and three....'

‘Perhaps the women like their characters and love them for themselves,' Indigo interjected, ‘and not all the superficial shit.'

‘Hadn't thought of that one,' I confessed.

‘I'm surprised at that,' she retorted. ‘You don't seem like the kind of guy who would judge a person on the colour of their skin.'

‘Most definitely not, madam.'

‘Then why judge them on the condition of their skin?'

‘Game, set and match to you,' I had to concede but Indigo was not finished and far from it.

‘Women don't see the world the way you men do. You lot, I'm sorry to say, think with your dicks all the time. You do! It's true, I tell you. You ask most men and they'll tell you that the first time they meet a woman one of their first thoughts is, would I sleep with her? True or false?'

‘True-ish.'

‘True or false?' she repeated.

‘More true than false.'

‘It's not completely your fault. Nature demands that you reproduce. Unfortunately, she totally forgot that interferes with your mind power.'

‘James Brown,' I said.

‘What?'

‘James Brown. Godfather of soul. He cut a tune called “Mind Power.” One of his best actually.'

She totally ignored me and carried on.

‘And if we're going to get on then you're going have to stretch your brains a bit further than just your trousers, if you get my meaning.'

Such direct words and attitude, I have to tell, I really dig in women, and the warmth I had instantly felt for Indigo that morning when we met, now turned to hot.

The obvious retort to all her theories was to go personal and ask her if that's what she figured about me, I mean, the thought of sleeping with her was uppermost in my mind when we met. But it's best, on certain occasions, not to say a thing, for some matters are best left unsaid, and that very silence can say more than words ever can.

As the sun started to disappear and the air dropped to cold, we agreed to collect up our things and make our way to the tube.

Picking our way through the crowd, it was one of those crucial moments when you both know you're going to go your separate ways and if one of you doesn't make a move, you might be lost to each other forever.

Deep breath then, and, ‘Indigo, I've really enjoyed your company today. Is it cool to call you sometime?'

‘I was going to ask you exactly the same thing,' she replied, and, people, my heart hit that bass line we all know, boom-boom-boom, so loudly that I thought everyone in a ten mile radius would hear it.

Indigo and I wandered off to the tube, her to go eastside, me over to Westward Ho to meet up with the Brother P. as we were going to check, for the second time, Spike's ‘Do The Right Thing,' and so, after exchanging numbers, I made my way to the cinema in an excited, dreamy daze. Truth to say, I could hardly concentrate on the images that flickered in front of me because everytime I looked up at the screen all I could see was Indigo. Later on, at Bar Italia, (Papa's is closed on a Sunday), Brother P. tried to engage me on the film's merits, but it was all to no avail. My solar system could only revolve around one thing.

‘P., this is the one, I'm telling you. This gal is fly.'

‘Yeah? You back on those pills?'

‘Easy, you know I've knocked them on the head.'

‘I've seen her around with Amanda. Yes is all I can say.'

‘Do you think I should phone her or let her phone me? I don't want to appear too eager.'

Brother P. let off a small grin.

‘The bells will ring,' he said, ‘the bells will ring.'

Indeed they did and a week later, over at my yard, we fell into each other and it went off with such passion and care that it was like we were made for each other from day one.

Afterwards, we lay on the bed listening to Lee Morgan's ‘Search For The New Land,' and, as a wind so gentle and cooling that it must have been the breath of Isis herself softly blew over us, tears unexpectedly started to fall down Indigo's cheek.

I pulled her close and kissed them away. ‘What's up, baby?'

‘I don't want this to be a one off,' she gently confessed, ‘I've made mistakes in the past that I couldn't stand again.'

I pulled her even closer and Indigo told me of her l a st encounter, how she had kept this guy at bay for months until she was convinced he was cool but serious. They made it and two days later, Indigo called him and a gal answered the phone.

‘Might have been his sister or someone,' I pointed out.

‘Sisters don't tell their brother's girlfriend to leave their husband alone, or die,' she simply said.

‘Indigo, it's alright, there are no sisters in my life. Believe that.' Checking it now I see that Indigo developed an honesty between us that I had no idea could exist between guy and gal. Indigo knew about men but, unlike others, she didn't pretend it was otherwise. She encouraged me to tell her of gals I had a passing fancy for and she did the same on the guy front. Sometimes, we would sit on a park bench and watch the passer bys, commentating on their appeal or if we were travelling by tube to some destination we would exchange secret nods and winks at certain, unsuspecting individuals.

In our little games, for Indigo was straight on one point and that was if I wanted to go with another, then cool but don't come back to her space, we killed that terrible suspicion which can poison the lover's link. That is, she made me see the pitfall of trying to cover up aspects of your real character that you think the other will dislike, a trap which we all fall into.

‘Everyone looks at other people,' she once told me, ‘so just because I'm with you doesn't mean that is going to stop. Not that I'll do anything about it but it's a part of me. The same goes for you.'

I fell in even deeper into her world. I don't know if you've ever fallen in love, but I hope you have because it is truly one of life's best highs. For weeks on end nothing, but absolutely nothing, matters except the person you want to be with.

Fact is, when love hits you and hits you hard, it's like entering an altered state where your world and everything in it, is turned gloriously upside down. In your mind's eye all you can fix on is that person alone, and nothing else, at the time, matters. Your every thought is coloured by love, and all your normal runnings, literally fall by the wayside. You know how much my work means to me, yet if it meant having to miss a night at The Unity to be with Indigo, then there was no choice whatsoever, I would be there by her side.

When, on the nights, she was at one of her study classes and then off to home alone, I would shape my hours around her, making tapes up with music such as Marvin's ‘I Want You' or Roy Ayers's ‘You Send Me,' all the time marvelling at my own sentimentality but always safe in the knowledge that Indigo would accept these gifts with a warmth that ignited my heart. I even tried to write her a couple of poems but when I read them out to Brother P. over the phone his initial silence, followed by a ‘Yeah, that's... nice,' was all the criticism I needed. I binned them. Living in this delicious haze, I savoured every moment as I forgot the world until, as it had to, it came crashing back in one night when Indigo and I were at my yard, checking out a film I insisted she see, this being a mad Harvey Keitel flick entitled, ‘Fingers.'

In the flick, Keitel is a classical pianist with a Mafia man for a dad, and a penchant for walking around New York with his ghettoblaster playing at the highest decibel possible. It had just got to the point where he really coats a guy off in the restaurant for asking him to please turn the music down, (‘Turn it down? Don't you know who this is? This is fucking Frankie Valli and The Four Seasons, mutha...') when the phone rang. ‘Yep.'

‘I got the money. Thanks. Now when are you going to see Kimberley?'

I froze in space and time for, truth be told, I had kept back, from day one, news of the Sandra business from Indigo, scared it might frighten her away. I mean, to have a kiddiwink on your CV is hardly the best way to impress someone, and even though we had established an honesty vibe, I had compounded matters even further, by telling Indigo, when the subject arose, that I had no time or space for bambinos. Luckily, Indigo did not dig clubs so she never accompanied me to The Unity where, no doubt, someone would have informed her of my run in with Sandra, and as she also moved in an entirely different circle of people to me, my runnings were not publicly known. I kept meaning to make amends for this re-arrangement of the facts but, somehow, tomorrow never comes, and so I never parlared on the matter again, prefering instead to spend our nights together rubbing cocoa creme into Indigo's rich body whilst Jazzie B.'s beats and melodies played in the background.

‘Soon,' I said, ‘soon.' Indigo glanced over at me.

‘It'll be her birthday in a couple of months. You know that, don't you?'

‘Yep.'

‘So?'

I felt a flush come to my face and prayed that Indigo could not hear her voice or my fumbling words.

‘Yeah, we'll do something.'

‘Really?'

‘Yeah, it'll be cool. Look, I've got to go.'

‘Ain't that a surprise.'

‘Sorry, but I do. We'll talk soon.'

‘Thanks for the offer.'

‘I'll call next week.'

‘Yeah and the Pope's a protestant.'

The phone went dead and I swallowed hard. ‘Who was that?' Indigo asked.

‘Jill from the club. She wanted to know if I'd DJ at some party they're having.'

‘Oh,' replied Indigo and went back to the film which by now had no interest for me whatsoever. I knew I would have to come clean soon but I didn't want to upset the idyllic time we were sharing, for the fact of the matter was that, Sandra aside, everything was coming my way. I had my girl, who gave me the strength of a gospel choir going full tilt, and I had my spot at The Unity Club, which on the nights I spun there, would be rammed with faces and characters of intrigue and interest, the summer sun making them even more agreeable to raving the night away and the spirit of the time bringing each and every one closer together.

Take for instance, Jasmine, an Anglo Indian gal with her dark flashing eyes, petite figure and jet black shining hair. Jasmine was a ball of energy, never able to fully relax but always on the move, and forever bringing back the conversation round to sex, a trait that always ensured that, loitering in her radius, there would be two or three guys, hoping to cash in and get busy with her. Naturally, it took them some time to realise that despite all her bluster, it was not the casual she was after but the very opposite, and so when they approached her with various offers, they were always slightly shocked when they got a kickback.