Step Back in Time

by Ali McNamara

  Three

  ‘So here we are,’ Harry says, as we arrive outside a large building in Manchester Square. ‘Time to face the music again.’

  It had been the strangest journey across London with Harry. When we walked back down the King’s Road the cars moving slowly along the street all appeared to be classic vehicles, the type my father would frequently stop to admire if we were out somewhere. And when we got on the tube, it was like we’d stepped into an old black and white TV show; the clothes the people were wearing looked very peculiar – retro, I guess you’d call them, all the men in smart suits, either cheap or expensive, all the women in warm coats with knee-length pencil-skirted or pleated suits, most of them wearing swept-up beehives or headbands and flicky hairdos and gloves, looking like photographs I’ve seen of Jackie Kennedy. What no one was wearing was casual clothes. A lot of the men wore hats, bowlers and – what did they call them? Fedoras! A few less smartphones were being tapped on – no, cancel that. There weren’t any phones at all.

  ‘Are you sure you’re OK?’ Harry kept asking me as I stared around me in complete bewilderment during our journey. How could something so familiar, that I use on a daily basis, suddenly become so unsettling? I’d travelled these tube lines hundreds of times before, but I’d never experienced a journey like this.

  ‘Uhuh,’ I answered. Or sometimes I’d just nod. What was happening here? Had I really gone back in time fifty years to 1963 like George had said? No, that just wasn’t possible. But how could I explain what was happening around me right now – the people, the cars, the shop windows we’d passed all appearing to be selling retro goods? There was that word again – retro. Maybe this wasn’t retro; maybe these were current up-to-date goods, clothes and cars I was seeing in front of me. Maybe I really was the one who was from another time, not them.

  Now, as Harry and I stand outside the building that we both apparently work in, I begin to panic. If George is right and by some weird twist I have managed to travel back in time, how am I going to cope? I don’t know anything about the sixties, about how you behave or what you do. I was born in 1983. What do I know, of… of mini skirts and beehive hairdos? I look down at my legs. But I’m not wearing a mini skirt, am I? I’m wearing this incredibly tight red thing that comes down to my knees. It may be tight, but thank goodness I’ve not got my legs out on show. Actually I hadn’t seen any of the super short skirts so synonymous with the sixties since I’d arrived. Was I too early for the mini skirt to even have been invented? Exactly my point – I knew nothing about this era!

  ‘Sure you’re OK to go back?’ Harry asks, looking me up and down. ‘Only I’ve never known you to be this quiet before – and you’re shaking.’

  He’s right. My knees are virtually knocking together in fright at what awaits me through those big glass doors. He reaches out his hands and rests them gently on my arms. I think for a split second he’s going to hug me. But he just looks down into my eyes.

  ‘You don’t have to go in, you know?’

  Harry’s touch is strangely comforting, and I feel my legs steady. ‘Yes… I’m sure I’ll be fine.’ What choice do I have? I have nowhere else to go.

  ‘Good.’ Harry smiles at me, and then, as if he’s only just realised where his hands are, he whips them away from my body and stuffs them back in to his pockets, his cheeks flushing a little. ‘Right, no time like the present then, let’s get you back to work.’

  As we enter the building together I notice a plaque on the wall outside that reads EMI House, and I find myself in a large reception area filled with a magnificent desk, and behind that an impressive swivel chair. Opposite this are two red velvet chaise longues, and an enormous aspidistra plant in a wonderful brass pot. As I try to follow Harry on through the reception area and through some more glass doors, he turns around.

  ‘Where are you going? Hadn’t you better stay here and see what you’ve missed while you’ve been away? I’ll let them know upstairs what’s happened in case there’s any trouble about you being away from your desk for so long – we’re both late back from our lunch hours. But I’m sure a slight misdemeanour with an Austin-Healey will count as as good an excuse as any to take a long lunch break.’

  ‘Yes, I’ll do that.’ I swivel round to look at the large desk. So, I must be the receptionist here. ‘And thank you,’ I say, turning back to look at Harry. ‘For bringing me back and… everything, today.’

  ‘No problem,’ Harry says. ‘I’ll pop down later if I can get away and check on you.’ He pauses for a moment as if he’s considering something. ‘A gang of us were thinking of going out tonight, to catch a few bands at a local club, if you think you might feel up to it?’

  ‘Er…’ Oh dear, what am I supposed to say? I don’t know my relationship status in the sixties. I glance down at my left hand; I don’t see any rings, so assume all is well.

  ‘You can bring that kooky flatmate of yours if you like?’ Harry suggests, as if this might swing it.

  I have a flatmate? ‘Yes, OK then, that sounds… groovy,’ I say, hoping this might be the right lingo to use.

  Harry winces at my terminology, but he looks pleased. ‘Yeah, I’m sure it will be that, and hopefully much more. So I’ll catch you after work to arrange details? Better be getting back myself. See you later.’

  ‘Yes.’ I give a casual wave, then hastily drop my hand again as he hurries off. ‘You do that.’ What the hell was groovy all about, Jo-Jo? I ask myself as I cringe at my choice of word. But I haven’t got time to worry about that because people are beginning to find their way into the reception area, and my phone is already ringing on the desk.

  Luckily the people who stop by reception in the next few minutes all have appointments, so I ask them to wait on the chaise longues while I try and figure out how I contact the office of the person they’re waiting to see. I breathe a sigh of relief when I see a list of names on a clipboard followed by office extension numbers. Now, how do I work the phone? Oh God, where is the phone?

  I stare around me but I can’t see anything that will put me in touch with any of the many offices that I’m sure must be in this huge building. I begin to move papers and files around on the desk frantically in the hope that it will magically reveal itself to me.

  ‘Maybe you should use the headset?’ one of my ‘appointments’ suggests helpfully. It’s the well-spoken man in the suit – a Mr Epstein, who came in asking for a Mr Maxwell. ‘First day, is it?’ he asks, smiling.

  I nod gratefully, and look around for a headset.

  ‘We all have to start somewhere.’ He gets up and comes over to the desk while I grope about looking under more papers and books for a pair of headphones now. Jeez, they could be anywhere, I think, looking for something akin to the white set I plug into my iPhone. ‘Would these be they?’ he asks, holding up a huge hideous grey headset with a small microphone attached.

  ‘Yes, I guess they would be. Thank you so much,’ I say as I place them on my head. Now what happens if I press this button here? I wonder, looking at a console of buttons, switches, and numbers in front of me.

  ‘Yes?’ a voice booms in my ear.

  ‘Mr Maxwell?’ I ask hopefully.

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘This is…’ What’s my name, what’s my name? Ah, it’s still Jo-Jo, calm down, that much hasn’t changed. ‘This is Jo-Jo on reception. I have a Mr Epstein waiting to see you.’

  ‘He’s waiting?’ the voice booms again. ‘How long has he been waiting? I told you to inform me the minute he arrived, girl! I’ll be down to meet him in a moment.’

  The line goes dead and he’s gone.

  ‘Mr Maxwell will be with you shortly,’ I announce in my best secretarial voice.

  ‘That’s absolutely fine,’ Mr Epstein says, smiling at me again. ‘You’re doing a great job. Nothing like throwing you in at the deep end, eh?’

  You have no idea! Now for the next appointment…

  I successfully match up an extremely glamorous woman wearing a red
and black suit with matching pillar-box hat and veil with her appointment in accounts. And sit back and take a deep breath for a few seconds.

  Suddenly, a large, red-looking man in an ill-fitting grey suit bursts through the interior glass doors. What little hair he still retains is grey to match the suit, and he appears quite out of breath at what I expect is a fairly short journey from his office.

  ‘Brian!’ he bellows jovially at my office helper. ‘How are you?’

  ‘I’m good thank you, Walter, and yourself?’

  ‘Excellent, excellent. I’m so sorry if this incompetent girl kept you waiting.’ He glares at me.

  ‘Not at all, Walter. She was utterly charming company.’

  Walter eyes me as though he finds this hard to believe. ‘Well, do come through to my office – my personal secretary will look after you now.’

  They disappear through the double swing doors.

  ‘Arse,’ comments Mimi, the woman in red.

  ‘Is he?’ I enquire politely, while trying to fathom out what I’m supposed to be doing next. Lights and buttons are beginning to flash on the console in front of me like an electronic game of Battleships, and I’m afraid that if I don’t do something with them, the ship we’re in might explode in a few moments and sink without a trace.

  ‘Walter Maxwell is, yes. Can’t bear him myself. But Brian is lovely.’

  I nod, and flick one of the switches under a lit-up red button. ‘Yes, he seems like a nice guy.’

  ‘Very influential guy.’

  ‘Really?’ I ask Mimi, but quickly realise I’m also now talking to someone on the telephone as they begin babbling into my headphones, so I hurriedly flick the switch back over.

  Mimi looks surprised. ‘You are new to this, aren’t you? Good afternoon, Allan!’

  Allan from accounts escorts Mimi through the double doors. Now I come to think of it, that man’s name does seem a tad familiar… Wait, it couldn’t be the same Brian Epstein, could it? The Brian Epstein who was manager of the Beatles for so many years, and even called the fifth Beatle by some?

  But I’m distracted by this thought by all these damn lights that keep flashing at me. It’s like being in the cockpit of an aeroplane when you don’t know how to fly. So I slip my headphones off again. I look back towards the doors everyone keeps disappearing through to see if I can still see anyone, but all I hear is ‘Psst!’ and a young girl’s head suddenly pokes around the door. ‘Yo, Jo-Jo, I haven’t got long – if old bossy britches upstairs catches me away from me desk I’ll be for the high jump.’

  She looks either side of her again, and then allows the rest of her petite body to appear around the door.

  ‘Ellie!’ I exclaim, suddenly recognising the figure standing in front of me now wearing a lime green shift dress.

  ‘Don’t shout me name, you daft banana, or they’ll all know I’m down here.’

  ‘But – but what are you doing here? And – and look at your hair!’

  ‘Do you like it?’ Ellie asks, patting at her platinum blonde hair piled up in a huge beehive on top of her little head. ‘I had it done in me lunch break at that salon down the road. Cost me an arm and a leg, mind, but I really think it’s worth it.’

  ‘It… it looks fab.’

  ‘Doesn’t it?’ Ellie admires herself in the glass of the door. ‘Anyways, what am I doing here? I’ll tell you what I’m doing here, Jo-Jo, I’ve got some goss for you!’

  ‘Goss?’

  ‘Yeah, and I mean real good juicy goss this time, not like that nonsense about Dave and Cynthia from accounts. Apparently it was her husband’s baby after all and —’

  ‘Ellie, you said you didn’t have long?’ I interrupt. My Ellie is just like this, always easily distracted, and always full of the latest gossip.

  ‘Sorry, right. Well, I was typing up this letter for ’im upstairs and he says it’s to go around to all the staff at the end of the day before they leave. How I’m supposed to get it out to everyone, I don’t know. What does he think I am, some sort of whirlwind? Does he know how many floors and offices there are in this building?’

  ‘Ellie, the letter?’ I prompt.

  ‘Oh yeah. Well, you’ll never guess what was in it…’ She looks at me expectantly.

  ‘No, I won’t. Perhaps you’d better just tell me to save time.’

  Ellie looks a little disappointed. ‘I suppose. Well…’ She sidles over to my desk. ‘It’s only a competition to meet the bloody Beatles!’

  ‘And?’

  Ellie looks at me as though I’ve just turned down the offer of a million pounds. ‘Did you hear what I just said. I said it’s a competition to —’

  ‘Meet the Beatles, yes, I got that. How?’

  ‘Apparently the bigwigs are going to choose an employee of the month, and they get to go to a fancy pants reception where the Beatles are receiving some plaque or other.’

  ‘I take it you are referring to the cocktail party and luncheon on the eighteenth, Ellie, where the Beatles are to be presented with silver discs?’ A tall, elegant lady in a beige skirt suit and white frilly blouse now stands behind Ellie with her arms folded.

  Ellie jumps in her pink platform boots.

  ‘Yes, of course, Miss Fields. Sorry, I was just —’

  ‘I know what you were just doing, Ellie – gossiping as usual. Now along with you, back to your desk upstairs. You’ve plenty of time to talk with Jo-Jo later when the two of you get home.’

  So Ellie is my flatmate? Actually the thought of that is quite comforting.

  ‘Yes, Miss Fields,’ Ellie says, turning towards the door. ‘Although I don’t know what time that’ll be after I get all these bloomin’ letters out to everyone,’ she grumbles to herself.

  ‘What did you say then?’ Miss Fields asks. ‘Something you’d like to share?’

  Ellie turns back towards us. ‘I said I don’t know what time I’ll get home after I’ve delivered all these competition letters today. Does him upstairs have any idea how many people there are working here? How am I expected to make sure they all get a letter before home time?’

  The joys of email, I think, as I watch Miss Fields cast a stern eye over Ellie. If only they knew what was to come…

  ‘That is for you to work out, Eleanor. Sir Joseph will be expecting it of you and you know how he hates to be let down.’

  ‘You could stand at the door as everyone leaves at the end of the day and hand them one then,’ I suggest quickly. I’m kind of banking on the notion that everyone leaves at roughly the same time here. I can’t imagine ‘flexi-hours’ have been invented yet.

  ‘Yes, I could do that, couldn’t I?’ Ellie says, brightening.

  ‘That’s a very good idea, Jo-Jo,’ Miss Fields says, casting her beady eye in my direction now. ‘Very astute.’

  ‘Thank you.’

  ‘Quick then, girl, back to work,’ she says to Ellie. ‘Get those letters typed and printed out, so you’re ready later. And I’m sure the rest of the girls in the typing pool will help you if you ask them nicely.’

  ‘Yes, Miss Fields.’ Thank you. Ellie mouths at me as she disappears out of the door.

  ‘Your quick thinking has been noted, Jo-Jo,’ Miss Fields says, smiling at me.

  ‘It has?’

  ‘In view of the competition.’

  ‘Yes, of course, the competition.’ I nod. ‘Thank you.’

  ‘Now back to work. There seem to be several lights flashing on your switchboard that need attending to.’

  I look down at my desk and my switchboard is lit up like a Hollywood make-up mirror. ‘Yes, I’ll get right on it.’

  It hasn’t taken me long amongst all the chaos to figure out that I’m working for EMI, which was, until a few years ago – my years ago! – one of the biggest music companies in the world. I’m not too sure how big they are in the sixties, but the offices I’m in now are huge, and the amount of guests in and out of reception during one afternoon is exhausting, because I need to find out where they’re goi
ng and who they’re meeting with and be nice to them at all times. However, once I get the hang of the switchboard I manage to calm down a bit and sort out all the calls, get most of them through to the correct offices, and I even manage to make some visitors cups of tea and coffee while they’re waiting, although it pains me to provide them with such awful-tasting instant coffee.

  I have to tip mine in the aspidistra plant when I get the time to make myself a quick cup, it’s that bad. I just hope it doesn’t wilt. The plant, that is. Where’s a Starbucks when you need one?

  At last five o’clock comes and it’s time to go home. I’ve just got myself fairly comfortable with the workings of a sixties office, so changing scenery now is suddenly very unnerving again. I hover in reception with Ellie, on the premise that I’m helping her to hand out the letters. What else can I do? I don’t know my way home!

  ‘How are you?’ Harry asks as he passes us and collects his letter. ‘Feeling better?’

  ‘Much better now, thanks. A bit less dazed than earlier.’

  ‘Good. Good. So will you and Ellie be able to make it along to the club tonight?’

  I look over at Ellie who’s listening keenly to every word we’re saying, even though she’s pretending not to. She nods frantically at me.

  ‘Yes, yes, that would be lovely, thanks.’

  Harry looks pleased. ‘It’s the World’s End pub on the King’s Road, do you know it?’

  I just walked past it today… The 2013 version. It couldn’t be that different, could it?

  ‘I know where it is,’ I answer truthfully.

  ‘Excellent, then we’ll see you there, about eight-ish?’

  ‘Yes, eight, fab!’

  Harry, looking pleased, leaves the building reading his letter, along with all the other employees, and as they exit we can hear their cries of excitement wafting back through the door.

  ‘Jo-Jo’s got a da-ate! Jo-Jo’s got a da-ate!’ Ellie sings in my face.

  ‘No I haven’t! We’re just meeting him and some mates to listen to some bands. How is that a date?’