Not a Star and Otherwise Pandemonium (2 page)

‘Is there something good on?’

Dave didn’t even turn round to look at him.

‘No. Not really,’ I said. ‘We just started watching this film, and now we want to see how it finishes.’

‘I’m going to make myself a sandwich.’

‘OK, son.’

He always comes in from the pub and makes himself a sandwich on football nights, which is why Dave had left the video on the kitchen table. That way, he’d know we’d cottoned on to him without us having to say anything. We didn’t really have a plan after that. I suppose we thought there’d be an argument, and then eventually a chat; but the next thing we heard was the front door slamming.

‘Shit,’ said Dave. ‘Now what?’

‘Where’s he gone, d’you think?’

‘I don’t know, do I?’

‘Supposing he’s left home?’

‘People don’t leave home like that. People don’t say, “I’m going to make myself a sandwich,” and then, bang, they’re gone.’

I didn’t say anything, but from what I could tell, that was exactly what people did. You can watch the local news just about any night of the week and see some mother talking about how her son never even said goodbye. And then there’s a phone number appealing for information.

‘He might have gone round Becca’s, I suppose,’ said Dave.

‘Shall I call her?’

‘No. Give him some time. If we don’t hear from him tomorrow, we’ll call then.’

Becca was Mark’s girlfriend. She had her own place a few streets away, but Mark didn’t usually stay there during the week, because Becca had a flatmate with a boyfriend up North. He usually spends the weekends round there, when they’ve got the place to themselves.

I hadn’t thought about Becca up until now, but once Dave had mentioned her, I couldn’t help it. What…? How…? I had to stop myself, but Dave and I both went quiet at the same time, so I’m sure we were thinking about the same thing.

Just then, we heard the key in the lock, and Mark came in and sat down in the armchair. For a moment all three of us watched the TV.

‘I thought there was something wrong when you said you wanted to see how the film turned out,’ Mark said, and it was only then I realized that we were watching Man United beating a French team.

‘How did you find it?’

‘Karen Glenister put it through the letter-box.’

‘Karen Glenister? What was she doing with it?’

‘Carl saw it round a mate’s house, and borrowed it when he recognized you.’

‘Have you watched it?’

‘I have. Your dad hasn’t.’

‘And I won’t,’ Dave said, as if Mark was trying to persuade him.

‘How do other people cope?’ I said.

‘Which other people?’ Mark asked.

‘Other mothers. Families. I mean, they all have mothers, don’t they, porn stars?’

‘I’m not a porn star,’ said Mark.

‘What are you, then?’ said Dave.

‘I’m not a star, am I? Stars are people like Jenna Jameson and Ron Jeremy.’

‘Who?’

‘They’re porn stars. You wouldn’t know them.’

‘Exactly. So you could be a porn star, for all I know. You might be the most famous porn star in Britain, and I wouldn’t have a clue.’

‘You think Ron Jeremy lives at home with his mum and dad?’

‘He might do! I don’t know who Ron Jeremy is! “Ron Jeremy.” He sounds like exactly the sort of person who lives with his mum and dad.’

I was getting frustrated. I didn’t want to talk about where Ron Jeremy lived. I wanted to talk to my son about what he was doing with his life.

‘How did this start?’ said Dave. ‘How long has it been going on? How many films are there?’

For some reason, it hadn’t occurred to me for a moment that there’d be others.

‘It started…Well. Sort of through Becca.’

‘Becca? She’s a porn star too?’

Mark sighed. ‘Mum. Becca works in a playgroup. You know that.’

‘I don’t know anything any more. I don’t know what she does.’

‘So when we went to their Christmas play last year, you thought that was a set-up, or what? Becca doesn’t know anything about…you know. My other job.’

‘But you just said…’

‘Will you let me talk? You know Becca’s got a flatmate? And this flatmate’s got a boyfriend who lives in Manchester? Well, that’s what he does. He makes porn films.’

‘Oh, well,’ said Dave. ‘That explains everything. You couldn’t really help it, could you? If your girlfriend’s flatmate’s boyfriend makes porn films in Manchester, you pretty much had to help him out. I mean, once you’ve had a call from him…Must be like getting a phone call from the Queen. You can’t say no. And how come Becca doesn’t know anything about it?’

‘Because…You really want to go into this?’

‘Yes. We both do,’ said Dave.

‘It means talking about some pretty embarrassing stuff.’

‘I don’t want to talk about what you do. Just how you got involved. How it happened.’

‘It still means saying things you might not want to talk about.’

‘We know everything,’ said Dave. ‘Your mum’s seen the film, remember.’

‘Yeah, well. Seeing isn’t the same as talking. We could just leave it at that, and never mention it again.’

‘How could we not mention it again?’ I said. ‘How could we sit here night after night eating our tea, with all that going on?’

‘Not much goes on, most of the time,’ said Mark. ‘Most of the time, I’m not making porn films.’

‘How did it happen?’ said Dave.

‘You’ve seen the film, Mum,’ said Mark. ‘So you know…’ He stopped. ‘Oh, bloody hell. I can’t talk about this to you two. I’ve spent the last whatever it is, ten years, not talking to you about this.’

‘I’ve seen it,’ I said. ‘I’ve seen the film, and I’ve seen…I’ve seen why they’d want you in it.’

‘OK,’ said Mark. ‘Right. Good.’

He stopped again. We’ve never had problems talking, in our family. Usually everyone’s talking at once, so these pauses and silences were something new for us. Obviously we’ve been talking about the wrong things all these years. It’s easy to talk about nothing much.

‘Becca,’ said Dave, as if Mark had lost his thread.

‘Becca,’ said Mark. ‘When we first started going out, she had a chat with Rache. Her flatmate.’

‘What sort of chat?’

‘A whatever. A girly chat, sort of thing. About me. And my problem. Which had sort of become her problem too, if you catch my drift.’

‘Oh.’

‘And Rache passed the information on. To her boyfriend. And he phoned me. And we went on from there. And Becca never knew nothing about it.’

‘You’ve never told her?’

‘Course not. You know Becca, Mum. She wouldn’t understand.’

‘And what happens if she finds out?’

‘I’ll be looking for a new girlfriend, I should think.’

He liked Becca, but I knew he wasn’t going to end up with her, and so did he. They were already at that point where it was so comfortable that Mark was becoming uncomfortable, and there was definitely an element of Russian roulette in this. If the decision to split were taken out of his hands, he’d have been grateful.

‘Hold on, hold on. Rewind,’ said Dave. ‘You went on from there.’

‘Yeah.’

‘But
why
did you go on from there?’

‘Why?’ Mark repeated the question as if Dave were weird for asking it.

‘Yeah. Why?’

Mark shrugged. ‘A bit of extra cash, obviously…And I was interested. Plus, I dunno. This probably sounds mad, but, I mean…I haven’t really got another, like, talent, have I? I watch all these people, like Beckham and all them. And they’re entitled to make money out of what they’re born with. Up until I met Robbie, Rache’s boyfriend, it had never done anything for me. And I thought, What’s the difference? What’s the difference between, I don’t know, having a…Having what I’ve got and, and being able to play the piano?’

‘What’s the difference?’ said Dave. ‘You can’t see what the difference is?’

‘No,’ said Mark. ‘Tell me.’

‘Having a big thing isn’t a talent, is it? Playing the piano is hard. I mean, what you’ve got doesn’t…you know. It’s not
hard
. It doesn’t give people
pleasure
.’

Mark and I stared at the carpet. I was trying not to laugh. Everything sounded like a Benny Hill joke. Eventually Dave caught on, and it didn’t make anything better. It could have been one of those moments that you see on TV, when everyone starts to laugh together, and the problem no longer seems as big as it did. But Dave just lost his rag.

‘It’s not fucking funny.’

‘No one’s laughing,’ I said.

‘You were trying not to.’

‘I don’t know what more we can do than not laugh at something you don’t think is funny.’

‘But you still saw the joke. I can’t see the joke. My son is a porn star. Where’s the joke in that?’

‘I’m not a porn…’

‘Whatever. You’re a freak, Mark. Being a freak isn’t the same thing as having a talent.’

Dave was angry, but there’s still no excuse, is there? You can’t call your own kid a freak and expect him to take it on the chin.

‘You know it’s wotsit, don’t you?’ said Mark. ‘Hereditary?’

He knew what he was doing. He must have guessed years ago that he and Dave didn’t share the same problem, otherwise it would have come up by now. (Oh, for God’s sake…) People say that when men argue, what they’re arguing about, underneath it all is, Who’s got the biggest? And here were my two men, my husband and my son, arguing about exactly that–except there was no argument. I’m probably the only person in the world who’s seen both of them, and there was no need for a tape measure, if you know what I mean. Mark won, hands down. (Is that dirty, ‘Hands down’? It sounds dirty, doesn’t it? But I don’t know what it would mean.)

‘Yeah? Well, you don’t get it from me. Mine’s normal. Isn’t it, Lynn?’

‘Normal? Is that what you call it?’

It was just a little joke, an attempt to jolly everyone along. On a normal evening, no one would have taken offence, but this wasn’t a normal evening, and offence was taken. I wasn’t even thinking about the size thing. I’d forgotten for a split second what wasn’t normal, so I didn’t mean to suggest that Dave’s was small. (It’s not. It’s…Well, it’s normal.) I just meant that it wasn’t, I don’t know, curved, or covered in green and yellow spots, or it could talk. That sort of abnormal. Jokey abnormal, not opposite-of-Mark’s abnormal. If I’d thought it through, I wouldn’t have said anything; if I’d thought it through, I wouldn’t have found myself lying in bed at one in the morning talking to Dave about an affair I had twenty-five years ago.

‘You know that thing with Steve?’

‘No.’

‘Steve. Steve Laird. You know.’

‘Oh. Yeah.’

It wasn’t as though I was playing dumb, because I don’t think I’ve heard his name since we got married. But even so, it wasn’t like he appeared in the middle of our bed that night completely out of nowhere. I can’t explain it, but when Dave brought Steve up, it sort of made sense. There was sex in the air that night, and it wasn’t safe sex, if you know what I mean–it wasn’t the comfortable, enjoyable sex that Dave and I have, the sort of sex you don’t even have to think about. The sex we’d been breathing was a dark, scary sex, and it was as if Dave had converted it into the only thing he had to hand.

‘Was that what it was about?’ he asked me.

‘What?’

‘That.’

‘What’s that?’

‘You know.’

‘No.’

‘That. Normal. Not normal.’

‘Are you asking me whether your penis is too small? Or whether Steve had a bigger one than you?’

‘Shut up.’

‘OK. I will.’

I listened to him breathing in the dark, and I knew we weren’t finished. It wasn’t much of an affair, really. I wasn’t married, for a start, although Dave and I were living together, and we were unofficially engaged. I only slept with Steve two or three times, and the sex wasn’t anything much. It certainly wasn’t the point, although what the point was I don’t exactly remember now. Something to do with feeling I was in a rut? And I know that Dave was in two minds about everything, and he had a flirtation going with this girl at work which he said never went anywhere, although I was never quite sure…

‘Yeah,’ he said, like about five minutes later.

‘Yeah what?’

‘Yeah, that’s what I’m asking.’

‘Of course it wasn’t about that. You know it wasn’t.’

‘Right.’

‘And I can’t answer the other question. Not because the answer would upset you, but because I can’t remember. You know it doesn’t matter, don’t you?’

‘Yeah. Well, I know that’s what you’re supposed to say, anyway.’

‘It’s the truth. It’s like, I don’t know. It wouldn’t have mattered if he was taller than you or not.’

‘It would have mattered if I’d been five foot and he’d been six foot.’

‘Yeah. But. Five foot is pretty small. You’re not small like that, are you?’

‘Oh, so what am I small like?’

‘You’re not small. For Christ’s sake, Dave. You’re smaller than your son. But I’ve seen your son, and believe me, you wouldn’t want to be like him. Neither would I want you to be like him. Oh, and Steve wasn’t like him, either.’

‘You just said you couldn’t remember.’

‘You think I wouldn’t remember something like that? Blimey. If he’d been like Mark, I’d have had to talk to one of those therapists people see after disasters.’

‘I’m sorry,’ said Dave. I love Dave for loads of reasons, and one of them is that he always knows when he’s making a berk of himself. ‘It’s been a weird evening, though, hasn’t it?’

I laughed. ‘You could say that, yes.’

‘What are we going to do?’

‘I’m not sure we can do anything. It’s his life. There are worse things to worry about.’

‘Are there?’

‘Yeah. Course. Drugs. Violence. All that stuff.’

‘Porn’s like drugs, though, isn’t it? I mean, they’re both a menace to society,’ Dave said.

‘Put it this way. All those nights we’ve lain here listening for him to come home late at night…You worry about whether he’s been stabbed, or whether he’s been taking crack, or whether he’s driving home pissed. But have you ever stayed awake worrying he’s been making a porno film?’

‘No. But that’s because I never thought of it before.’

‘Yeah, and why didn’t you think of it?’