by Liam Livings
I said, taking the box from her and putting it on the bed, “There was a lounge, but now it’s two bedrooms. Landlord put in a wall and split it. He said that’s how come our rent can be so cheap.”
“Sounds all heart, does this landlord.” Mum picked a cookery book from the top of the box. “This should make sure you eat more than kebabs and beans on toast.”
“Thanks.”
“I’ve also packed some of our spare kitchen stuff so you have some bits—cheese grater, plates, a saucepan, that sort of thing. Save you having to get it all. Sorry I couldn’t give you nothing else.” She looked at Paul.
Paul said, “It’s very kind of you. Between our parents, we’re here. Even if I didn’t expect to be quite yet…”
Mum clapped her hands. “I’ve left the kitchen-stuff box in the kitchen. Let’s stake our claim on a cupboard and I’ll show you how to whip up a mean macaroni cheese that’ll have you the envy of the rest of the house.”
She took a drag of the cigarette, scanned the room full of boxes on and next to the second-hand unmatching furniture we’d begged, stolen and borrowed from various corners of our lives, having decided to keep the contribution from Paul’s parents for things we couldn’t buy second-hand and for rent, deposit, bills, food and so forth.
“Couple a days and you’ll be right as rain. Proper settled in, the pair of you. Your own place together. I remember when me and your dad first got our own place. Well, I say our own place, it was a bit like this—a room in a big house. And when I say house, I mean a hippy commune, and there was a bit more commune living than we’d first thought, but we soon got used to that, and then moved out to our own flat, when we could afford it. Still, you’ve got all that in front of you now. Good times.” She stared wistfully at the packing boxes and jumbled furniture. “Right, come on. Food!”
We followed her to the kitchen where, using the second-hand cookery book she’d bought us, she showed us how to cook, instructing us to chop, mix and bake, while she perched on the corner of the kitchen table, holding the cookery book in one hand and a cigarette in the other.
A while later, we sat together at the table eating our creation in silence.
Mum was the first to speak. “Have you actually met any of the others who are living here? It’s locks on all the doors, isn’t it? So it’s more like a boarding house than a student house share, or a commune.” She got a faraway look in her eyes, staring out the window, then returned to the macaroni cheese.
Paul said, “We asked, didn’t we? Landlord said it was some couples, sharing like us, lots of single men who he didn’t know what they did all day, and a few women on their own, and one couple with a baby, but they’re a few floors from us, so hopefully, no noise.”
She did the washing-up, despite our protests, stayed for a few hours helping us unpack, wished us goodbye, hugging both of us and kissing our cheeks, and then with a wave and a “Get used to doing the washing-up yourselves, cos I’m not doing it again,” she was gone.
“Fuck,” I said to the quiet kitchen as the noise of people in their rooms all round us gradually became audible.
“Just us two now, babe,” Paul said, with a smile and a wink.
“Have we just made the biggest mistake of our lives? Walking out from free rent, food and washing, to this.” I looked around the room, the grease-stained corners, tiled floor with mysterious marks across it and the yellow-stained work surface we’d had to bleach before using it.
“We’ll be fine. Us two. I know we will.” He looked around the room, then opened a box and started unpacking. “Besides, if we want to go to Ibiza, this is good practice for living together. Imagine flying there and finding out we couldn’t stand each other and couldn’t live together.” He stood at the window, staring at the street below.
I walked up behind him, put my arms round his waist and kissed his neck. “Imagine that.”
He turned to kiss me. “Shall I get a Chinese? Save us cooking.”
“Celebrate getting our own place.”
He nodded. “The next chapter of us. We can eat what we like here with no one nagging us. I think I’m gonna enjoy this.”
“No need to sound so surprised,” I said.
“I’ll be back in a bit. Usual for you?”
I nodded and he was gone.
***
One night, at the club round the back of King’s Cross station, the manager said, “Have you thought about the Ibiza idea? Slinky Simon says you’re interested. He’ll set it all up. I’ll put in a good word for you too. I know a guy who runs a club out there.”
“We thought about it, but it’s not practical. We can’t just leave everything and fly there for the summer. We’ve got stuff here,” I said, looking at Paul, who nodded.
“Yeah, but that’s all just stuff. Things to stop you going. If you really wanted to go, you’d make it happen and just go. You’re ready for it. I know you are. Feedback we’ve got from the punters here—ticket sales are high on the nights you’re here. I know that’s not just you, we’ve got some other DJs too, but you’re certainly not hindering things.”
“We can’t afford it. We can’t just fly there for a try out. We need to see how things work out here. Besides, there’s this whole orbital party scene Slinky Simon reckons we should check out.”
“Why?”
“Because,” Paul said, “we need to earn our stripes, do our time, do more than just your club before fucking off abroad and expecting to get into one of the big clubs in Ibiza, that’s why.”
The manager shrugged, gestured for us to go in and we got on with our set for the night.
Believe me, we really would get right involved in the orbital party scene. Fields of five to ten thousand people not far from the M25, the exact location kept secret to prevent interruptions from the old bill. You drove to a motorway service station, waited with hundreds of others, listening to a pirate radio station for the exact location. Then you all moved off in convoy and got right on it, in a field in one of the home counties just off the M25. But I’ll come back to that. Trust me, it was wicked.
***
Both to keep in with his parents, and because I’d persuaded him of the value of putting on what was essentially a big party, Paul eventually agreed to organise the next charity event his mother was on the committee for. He’d said he didn’t want to get involved, to have to be responsible for it, because he knew what he was like. “I’ll just bail when I can’t be bothered,” he said.
“You won’t. You’ll do it cos it’s important for your mum. Put your hand up and follow through with the offer of help. It’ll mean so much to her.”
“Sounds a bit serious to me.” Paul frowned.
“More serious than us living together?” I smirked.
“It sounds like a lot of commitment to me.”
“See previous question.”
Paul nodded.
Now, Marilyn was sitting at the table with her head in her hands. “It’s all finished. I am finished. I simply do not know what to do.”
We’d nipped back to his parents to pick up a few things from his old room. We discovered his mother in the dining room. I indicated this was his opportunity to impress her.
At first, Paul shook his head, shrugged and pointed to the door. I insisted, pointing strongly and gently edging backwards to the corner of the room to leave them to have their conversation in some privacy, even though I heard all of it.
I was so proud when, after a few moments, Paul swooped in, asked his mother what the matter was, putting his hand on her shoulder, as I’d instructed him.
She explained, at length, how this current event had been doomed from the start since it had been dumped on her when the previous Women’s Guild chair had resigned in a fit of pique over an argument to do with butter, margarine and Victoria sponges. She didn’t go into details, just left the words hanging there, a very serious look on her face.
“This is the ultimate case of having greatness thrust upon me. And it couldn’
t possibly have gone worse than it’s gone so far. The venue’s contracted, at huge expense. Extortionate, actually. We’ve sold some tickets, but there’s still so many unsold it’s not going to even cover costs. It’s a charity ball, did you get that bit?” She returned to head in hands resting on table.
Quietly, so as not to scare her off, I suppose, Paul said, “What’s the latest thing? It can’t be insurmountable, surely?”
“Darling Louis is no more.” She clutched her hands to the left side of her chest.
“Oh, I am sorry, Mother. What happened? Was it sudden, quick, painless, or expected?” He shook his head and raised his eyes at me above his mother’s perfectly coiffed hair.
“He’s not dead, darling. He’s…I believe the term is done a runner. He’s gone. Disappeared. Left me in the lurch, holding the baby. So to speak.”
“And Louis is?”
“The party planner for the Women’s Guild. Well the previous chair who’d been in charge, pre-Victoria-Sponge-Gate, had contracted Louis to lead on all the little details, pulling it all together. And now, he’s gone and I’m in charge. It is, as they say, all on my head.” She shook her head, and my immediate thought was heavy is the head that wears the crown, but I said nothing.
Marilyn turned to her son. “Did you want something, darling? What brings you here? I’m rather busy, can’t you see?” She gestured dramatically to the piles of paperwork on the table.
“Getting a few bits. Post, mainly. Look. I want to help.”
“Me?”
“Yes, Mother, you.”
“Why would you want to help put on a Women’s Guild charity ball? You’ve never shown the slightest bit of interest before, and here you are, at my hour of need, and you’re some sort of knight in shining armour. Or some such metaphor. I’ve told you I can’t up your allowance, Father simply won’t allow it. And I gave you the deposit for your little flat escapade, so you’ll just have to manage where that’s concerned, I’m afraid.”
“I want some practice at organising events, parties.”
Marilyn sighed. “Why on earth would you want that?”
“I don’t want to work in the record shop for ever. I’m doing this DJing with Tom. Together with his music, and my party skills, we make a good team. I do the music too, of course. Anyway.”
“Oh.” Her eyes widened in surprise.
“So, can I help?” He pointed to the piles of paperwork on the table.
“I was just about to call the venue and cancel it. I simply do not know where to start with the rest of it. It’s not so much the money, I have plenty. I can pay back the Guild for any losses. No, it’s the shame. The shame of it all. Of it being a failure on my watch. Louis has up and left. All I’ve got is a few phone numbers and the contract from the venue.” She pushed the papers away from her. “It’s giving me one of my heads as I sit here.”
“When is it?”
She checked her watch. “A fortnight Saturday.” She moved to stand.
Paul gently pushed her from the chair and took his position in the driving seat. “Can I use this?” He held the cordless house phone.
Marilyn waved, nodded and walked to the cupboard to retrieve some cups. “Where is that woman? She’s meant to be here, ready if I want coffee. Honestly, what’s the point in having a maid if you have to do it all yourself?” And she was gone, charging towards the kitchen in search of the maid.
I edged forwards into the room, surveyed the folders and envelopes and papers in front of Paul. “Is it really that bad?”
“It’s a right mess, but no one’s going to die. It’ll be fine. This near the date, they’ll be past the refund point in the venue contract. So, may as well plough on and sell those tickets.”
I kissed his forehead. “Listen to you, talking like an event planner already.” I allowed myself a little clap, noticed Paul was dialling a number, and indicated I’d leave him to it, see him back home later.
As I reached the front door, I caught him saying, “Minimum contracted numbers, please? And what AV equipment has been organised?” I smiled to myself and closed the door quietly.
***
I’d never seen Paul so focused on anything as he was on making the charity ball a success. He was up before I left for work, slaving over our hot telephone, ticking things off his master list, then, at the end of the day, he’d tell me how he’d gone to the printers to print flyers and posted them by hand through the houses of his mother’s Women’s Guild members for them to share with others who they thought would be interested in attending.
Over dinner one night, he said, “We’ve sold out. I have a waiting list now. Did I tell you that? I forget what I’ve told you and what I haven’t.”
“I’d have remembered that.”
“It needed a good theme. It was a bit all over the place before. Bless Louis, but he’d only really done the basics, very poor party planning, I feel. OK, so he’d booked the venue, arranged for a DJ and done a bit of promotion with the people who were always going to come anyway. But when I asked the hotel about the decorations, they were blank. Nothing. Slack Louis.”
“What’s the theme?”
“I thought about this for a long time. Thinking of the age group of people who’re going, my parents’ age basically, I thought something from the sixties would be fun. But then I thought…should I do the seventies instead?”
I started to say something, but Paul continued, really getting into his flow now. “If they’re all roughly Mother and Father’s age, they were our age, early twenties, twenty years ago, they were us in 1973. And who doesn’t want to relive their early twenties? In the sixties, most of them would have been young teenagers. And those who are a bit older would still probably remember the seventies fondly. Also, I thought a sixties night was a bit, been done to death, you know?”
I hadn’t really thought about it in any detail, but impressed by Paul’s flow, I just nodded. “Has she asked how it’s coming on?”
“Who?”
“The Queen of Sheba! Your mother, who’d you think?”
“When I’ve been working from their place, she’s made a big show of making herself a drink—which she never does, as you know—and occasionally asking how ticket sales are going, and did I want a hand with the decorations for the theme?”
“Did you get a ‘well done’, or a ‘thank you’?” I knew the answer but hoped I’d be wrong.
“Not yet. Early days. Father couldn’t stop talking about how I’d found my metier when I stayed for dinner last week after working there that afternoon. He was beaming. And Father doesn’t beam, at least, not about me.”
“Great. All sounds like you’ve got it under control. Any problems?”
“Daily, hourly, by the minute some days. But you know what I found out? I’m a really practical person. Despite the best efforts of my parents to insulate me from the realities of life through throwing money at everything, I’m actually not too bad at, you know, solving problems.”
“And modest too.”
“Piss off. Oh, shit, do your parents want a ticket? They’re about that age, aren’t they? Weren’t they hippies or something, a commune your mum said.”
“Bless, you’re very sweet, but Mum would think you’d got the seventies all wrong. I’m sure your version of that decade wouldn’t be particularly close to her experience. How much are tickets again?”
“Seventy-five pounds.”
“Per table?”
“Per person.”
I shook my head. “I’m not gonna mention it to her. If she finds out your parents are there, she’ll feel the need to come and won’t accept free or cheap tickets, not if it’s for charity. Best we steer well clear of the whole topic.” I paused. “Awkward.”
“A bit. Best we don’t tell your parents then, eh?”
I nodded.
CHAPTER 7
ON THE NIGHT of the ball, Paul had to squeeze extra tables into the hotel’s biggest room as his mother told him there were two groups of Women�
�s Guild people who hadn’t paid but couldn’t not attend, so he would have to find space.
Paul said he’d wanted to tell her to get stuffed, but since it was all for charity and he could add a bit more onto the price for last-minute additions, he just thought of the children’s charity, and the money, revisited his table plan and begged the venue manager to squeeze them in.
I stood at the door of the full-height hotel ballroom, hiding behind one of the psychedelic patterned curtains Paul had installed, watching the guests tuck into their prawn cocktails in stemmed dishes. The theme was Fabulous Seventies, and the words, two feet high in purple sparkles, were in an arch above the stage. The tables were covered in a variety of bright, brown, flowery and geometric patterned tablecloths Paul had picked up from charity shops when he’d discovered no out-of-the-box seventies-themed decorations were available at a budget he could afford.
On the stage, an ABBA tribute band, white jumpsuited up, long brown wigs on the men and a blonde and a brown wig on the women, played quietly—everyone’s favourite songs. I remembered Paul’s anguish about the band, whether to go with something more cool, more rock, like Yes, or Roxy Music, but with my simple question of, “When you think seventies, which band comes into your mind?” he’d said, “Abba,” and I’d said, “I rest my case.”
The guests had made an effort with their outfits: bright kaftans, flared trousers, kipper ties and shirts with collars you could go gliding in.
Paul appeared next to me. “You eating? There’s a seat for you there.” He pointed to a table near the front where his parents were both talking loudly to the others.
“Thanks, but I just wanted to see the results of all your hard work. After hearing you talk about nothing else for the last two weeks, it’s amazing now it’s all come together.”
“Wicked.”
“It’s definitely that.”
“Come on, stay and eat. Promise my parents won’t be too bad. They’re both pissed. They had two of the cocktails at the one-cocktail-each reception before the food even arrived. Bjorn from the ABBA tribute band told me earlier one of the women was getting a bit lairy. Of course it was Mother.”
