There’s no way I could save enough money to run away. My life is one big unhappy mess.
I told Mum I had a migraine just to get some peace and time to think. My room is the only place I’m ever alone. It’s heaven. I turned Radio Luxembourg up really loud, still trying to work out how I could get out of going to Germany.
‘Turn that damn racket off and put your light out,’ Mum shouted up the stairs. ‘Some migraine!’
She slammed the sitting room door and I turned the radio down, searching for my earphones so I could go on listening without her knowing.
I’d been allowed to pick the colours for my room last time we decorated and I chose purple walls and a purple lampshade which matched my eiderdown. I think it looks really far out. Dad said it made him feel sick. I’m going to miss my room. My sanctuary.
We’ll be moving into two flats in Germany, or so Dad wrote to Mum last week. The Ministry of Defence is converting them so we can use them like a house. I might have to share with Sophia if there aren’t enough bedrooms. That’s not funny.
Scott will forget all about me, I thought, as I listened to The Box Tops playing ‘Cry Like a Baby’.
Just what I felt like doing.
Renza’s Diary
June 6th 1968
The local paper had photos and everything. A big write-up about Narnia’s Children stopping on their way back from a series of gigs to help put out the big wild-fire on the heath near Blackstone airport.
Mum pointed it out to me in the paper and I couldn’t believe it. They were heroes. The fire brigade had been struggling to contain the fire when the band drove past and, seeing how bad it was, drove back to help fight the fire. The reporter said they worked through the night until about 8am alongside the firemen, and took photos of them all covered in smoke. There was another photo of them, too, what the reporter called their ‘publicity stills’ – they’d used in a programme for gigs and TV shows in Jersey. It all seemed too unreal.
I hoped I’d be able to hide the paper away in my bedroom without Mum noticing, just so I could look at Scott’s picture again and again.
I heard the band’s van come back when I was helping Mum to pack.
I pretended not to notice the band were back and Mum didn’t say anything either.
Since leaving school a few days ago I’ve been busy helping get the house ready for the estate agents to inspect and assess for renting out whilst we are away.
Things we’re leaving behind have to go up in the roof and the agents have been told it’s off-limits to the tenants. I hope so, all my ballet and theatre books have gone up there, books I treasure because they were given to me by Mum’s actress friend, Sheila, who made me promise to keep them always. I hate leaving them.
I finished packing my lovely books and washed my hair in the hope that if I saw Scott, I’d look my best for a change. He must think I always look like I’ve been dragged through a hedge backwards because he never sees me with make-up, my hair done, wearing something half decent, unless it’s my school uniform.
‘Get down here this minute,’ Mum shouted.
‘I’m in the bathroom, I can’t,’ I shouted back, putting my hair up in a towel.
‘I know you can hear me – so heed me,’ she yelled angrily. ‘Now!’
I almost fell down the stairs in the rush to find out what it was I’d done wrong this time.
She was standing by the window with a piece of paper in her hand and she was definitely not amused.
‘What may I ask, is this, madam?’ She waved the paper at me.
‘What is it?’ I didn’t have a clue what it was. I reached for it, but she yanked her hand away.
‘I’m asking you.’ She raised the dreaded eyebrow. Not good.
‘And I can’t tell you until you tell me,’ I mumbled, worried sick.
‘I think you know only too well. And I would like to know what exactly is going on, young lady! So, you’d better tell me – now!’
My little sister Lucy stood watching me carefully as I tried hard to think what it might be.
‘Using a small child to run your illicit errands is disgusting,’ Mum hissed as she pointed to Lucy who had a big sneaky grin on her face. She knew I was in for it.
‘Sorry, what errands? What do you mean?’
The dread was crawling over my skin as I wracked my brains.
‘Well, you can tell him the answer is no, my lady.’ Mum thrust the paper into her apron pocket and waited, arms folded.
‘Mum, I haven’t a clue what you’re on about, please tell me?’ I was beginning to feel sick.
‘Casanova and you!’ she yelled at me, and Lucy jumped behind the sofa.
‘What?’ My throat went dry and I felt dizzy. ‘Who are you on about? I don’t know any Casanova.’
Unless you count the bloke who had stalked me for months ages ago, and he’s not allowed anywhere near me since the police sorted him out.
‘Don’t play dumb with me, you insolent little bitch!’
‘But I don’t know what you’re talking about. And if you don’t tell me, how am I going to know?’ I was so near to tears. I’m sick of this all the time.
‘You and that lout next door! Think I don’t know? Think I am stupid?’
‘Donald Digby?’ I shouted in horror, ‘that idiot and me? Are you nuts?’
The moment I said it I realised my mistake.
Her hand flashed across my face so fast I stumbled back and knocked the coffee table sideways, making all her ornaments fall over with a loud crash. Lucy screamed and ran out of the room and up the stairs.
Not so funny now, Lucy, I thought, as I held my hand to my throbbing face and weeping eye, where her ring had caught.
‘Watch your mouth.’ She picked up the ornaments and examined each one carefully to see if I’d broken any. Apparently not, thankfully.
‘How long has this been going on behind my back?’ she asked, angrily brushing her hands through her newly permed hair.
I tried very hard not to cry in front of her. ‘Mum, apart from going to Youth Club that one time when you made me go with him, I haven’t seen Donald or spoken to him in ages.’
‘Did I mention Donald Digby? Well, did I?’ she snapped. ‘Don’t try to be funny.’
‘Well, who then?’ I sniffed, unable to stop the tears any longer. They streamed down my cheek from my eye, which felt as if it was swelling up to the size of a football.
‘That creature next door, the one with the harem,’ she snorted and took the paper from her pocket again. ‘That long-haired hippy living in the flat – don’t play dumb with me.’
‘I don’t know him, Mum, I’ve never spoken to him and I’ve never met him.’
‘Really? You expect me to believe that when he’s sending you obscene messages and getting little Lucy to bring them? Do you think I came down with the last shower?’
‘It’s true, honestly you can ask him.’
‘Oh, don’t you worry, my lady. I will. He is going to feel the edge of my tongue before long, disgusting creature. Here.’
She thrust the piece of paper at me at last and I slowly opened it.
‘I want you to come out with me. I’ve been dreaming of you every night since I first saw you. You’ve got my messages so will you come out with me, please? We are away for the next week but when I get back I’ll come round and take you out. Promise. Please give Lucy an answer today so I have something to look forward to. You are gorgeous. Love Scott. Xxx’.
I swallowed. My heart skipped several beats with pleasure and I felt all warm and tingly. Then I saw her face. Oh, my goodness. I was in so much trouble. My heart thudded like crazy and I felt faint.
‘I’m going to be sick,’ I yelled, running for the stairs. ‘Leave me alone.’
Amazingly, she did. Well, at least long enough for me to bathe my eye where she’d struck me.
Oh, Scott, I thought, you have no idea what you’ve done…
An hour later Mum stood over me as I replied to Scott�
��s message, dictating what I wrote. When I came downstairs we’d had a blazing row, and eventually I think I’d convinced her I was telling the truth.
Even Jasper defended me for a change, telling her that he knew I hadn’t spoken to or even met Scott because Scott was always moaning about me ignoring him. For once, I could’ve kissed Jasper.
‘Tell him you will consent to go for a walk with him, only, and that he is to come into the chemist’s when I’m on duty and tell me when he’ll be round for you,’ she instructed, as I wrote with shaking hands.
‘Once he’s been out with you and finds out what a boring, uninteresting, nothing person you are, that’ll sort him out, and he won’t want to see you again. He won’t bother you again.’ Then she added, just for good measure, ‘Once will be enough and he’ll stop pestering you.’
I had a horrible feeling she was right.
Jasper took the note round to the flat and I made tea. I called Simon and Crispin when it was ready and wondered if I dared ask to watch Top of the Pops later.
Cathy McGowan – I love everything about her and I always look forward to seeing what she’s wearing and how she’s done her hair and make-up. I miss Ready Steady Go! She was fab in that, but she’s great on Top of the Pops – she’s one of their best presenters, and so is Samantha Juste, I love her too. The News came on after Top of the Pops and I cried when I heard Robert Kennedy had been killed, just like his brother JFK. That poor family. In April Martin Luther King was assassinated too. I hope my Aunt Celia is safe living there because it seems to me America is a dangerous place to be, even though I love American groups.
Renza’s Diary
June 14th 1968
He turned round as I came into the sitting-room and smiled the most sunny smile I’ve ever seen in my whole life. It caught my breath and I felt the familiar red blush creep right up my neck to my freshly washed hair.
‘Hello,’ he said.
‘Hello,’ I replied croakily, my throat restricted.
‘Well, this is all very cosy.’ Mother was sitting in her usual chair with a view of the garden path and the main road running alongside it.
Scott and I locked eyes and the world sped away from me so that there was only him and me. Somewhere in the distance I could hear Mum mumbling but it was in a tunnel, miles away from the two of us.
I saw his face properly for the very first time. I saw turquoise blue eyes, and a chiselled jawline in a determined but kind face. He was staring at me as if in shock. Unblinking and intense. He was so totally, totally gorgeous. Scott Walker and Peter Frampton all rolled into one.
He was about six feet tall close up, with broad shoulders and the slimmest tiniest hips in white cords. His shirt was pale blue with small paisley flowers on it – Dad would have something to say about the flowers, not to mention his long hair!
My head was spinning and I felt as if the floor was dropping away from under me.
I tried desperately to come back into the room but I was flying, light and feathery, my heart skipping about like a child on the way to a sweet shop.
‘… so mind what I’ve told you, do you hear me?’ Mother’s voice was starting to penetrate my head. I forced my eyes away from Scott to look at her.
‘Earth to Renza, do you hear me?’ she snapped as she stood up and came over to me, wagging her finger in my face.
‘Yes Mum,’ I mumbled but honestly, I hadn’t a clue what she was waffling on about. I hadn’t heard a word.
Scott continued to stare at me and I started to wonder if I was a disappointment. I had my new blue and white sleeveless polka-dot mini-dress on with the thin belt and the cut-away neckline, not plunging or anything like that, but it might have been a bit low… and I was wearing my pink kitten heels with matching clutch bag and a little make-up – sadly nothing like Cathy McGowan’s – which so far had gone unnoticed by the bloodhound. My auntie Celia, who lives in America, sent me some perfume for my sixteenth birthday and I’d dabbed some behind my ears, on my wrists and a bit in the hollow of my neck, like they tell you to do in Jackie. My almost waist length hair was behaving for once. I’d nearly been sick about four times since I heard the front door go.
‘What have you done to your eye?’ Scott spoke at last and it was the first time I’d really heard his voice. Up until now he’d always been shouting to me. He had a warm voice, very well-spoken. Mother must be pleased about that at least.
‘She walked into a door,’ Mother said, glaring at me. Daring me to say different.
I just nodded.
‘Nasty.’ Scott peered closely at me. ‘Poor you.’
‘Right, you have my permission to go for a walk round the village,’ Mother told Scott pin-pointing him with her brown eyes, one eyebrow raised. ‘Nothing more.’
‘Thanks Mrs Rossi,’ he said gravely, fixing her with steely eyes.
‘No funny business and no showing yourself up in public.’ She jabbed me in the shoulder.
‘She’ll be perfectly safe with me and you’ve no need to worry about anything at all,’ Scott said with a bit of an edge to his voice. He didn’t appear to be frightened by my mother.
‘Hmmm!’ Mother’s head jerked back sceptically. ‘All right, you can take her away now.’
She opened the front door and Scott allowed me to step outside first. Got manners too, I thought, as I wobbled past him, grateful that for once I didn’t have five kids trailing along with me.
Mother watched us all the way to the gate and I could feel her eyes on my back as we walked along past his flat in silence. We must have gone about two hundred yards before he spoke. I’d been wracking my brains for something to say, so when he spoke, I almost cried. I felt so tense and so on the brink of something momentous, I could hardly breathe.
‘This is ace,’ he said huskily, staring straight ahead.
‘That’s nice,’ I said like a complete idiot, my voice shaking so badly I wondered if he noticed.
We turned to walk up Farm Close, Scott on the outside nearest the road. He put his hand in the small of my back as we crossed the road and I jumped as the bolt of lightning shot through me. I stole a glance at him and he was grinning.
Frantically I tried to think of something to say, something witty, sophisticated and intelligent, but I found myself incapable of coherent thought. My mind was devoid of anything except the awareness and presence of the boy walking close to me. My breathing was shallow and I just knew my voice would come out in a squeak. I cleared my throat as quietly as I could.
‘Your mum is a bit much,’ he said finally. ‘I had the Spanish Inquisition while waiting for you.’
‘What do you mean?’ I had a good idea but I thought I’d better ask.
‘Wanted to know what my father does for a living, what my mother does, how many brothers and sisters I have, if I am a Catholic – I take it you must be – where I went to school, how do I make any money, and when am I going to get a proper job? I even had to tell her my age – I’m 18 by the way – and I know how old you are.’
He laughed, a lovely throaty, sexy knee-weakening laugh.
‘Sorry. I’m so sorry,’ I muttered, feeling deeply ashamed at her behaviour. At least he wasn’t too old for me, I thought, relieved.
‘No problem. I gave her the low-down and no doubt she’s suitably shocked.’ He chuckled as we turned up towards Strawberry Way where the rows of small Victorian houses gave way to the grand houses of the local aristocracy, with their sweeping tree-lined driveways and beautifully tended grounds.
‘Wow, my father would think he’d died and gone to heaven if he could handle these if they came on the market.’ He whistled and stopped to take in the huge white gabled house where my school friend, Bernadette Dunlop, lived.
‘What does your father do then?’ I asked, feeling a bit like my mother: nosey.
‘He owns an auctioneers and estate agency in Brighton.’
Mother couldn’t find fault with that, I thought, she would approve of a business man.
�
�You said she’d be shocked, why?’ I was beginning to relax a little now that we were having a proper conversation.
We continued to walk up Strawberry Way, Scott stopping now and again to admire the houses and the grounds, as a particular one caught his eye.
‘Yeah, I thought I’d fill her in on my life-story to save her giving me the third degree later. She seemed satisfied.’
He laughed again. He’d certainly got my mother summed up.
‘Oh, I’m so sorry, she’s a bit direct I’m afraid.’ Understatement. I could imagine what she’d been like. So embarrassing. ‘What did you tell her?’
‘I live in Jersey with my mother and her second husband and their daughter. My dad has just remarried and has a young wife. He owns his own business and I haven’t seen him in years. I have a brother who sometimes lives with my mother and sometimes with my father. My step-father has his own business in Jersey. That’s it really.’ He was watching me closely, those turquoise eyes boring into me. ‘Oh, and my parents divorced when I was twelve, so obviously we’re not Catholics.’
‘Oh!’ was all I could say. I wondered what Mum had made of it.
‘I know lots about you.’ He laughed. ‘Your brother Jasper is a mine of information and very keen to tell me all about you and your family.’
He brushed his thick black hair from his eyes and turned towards me, slowing his pace.
‘Oh.’ I managed again.
His eyes had an almost hypnotic effect on me and I just stopped and gazed into them as he stepped towards me. The air around me was stifling; I couldn’t breathe.
We stood looking into each other’s eyes. My throat was dry and my chest was struggling to cope with the blood pumping through my veins, thudding in my ears like a drum solo by Keith Moon of The Who.
‘So, here we are then,’ he said gruffly, not taking his eyes from mine.
‘Yes.’ I think I said it out loud, but my mouth felt as it if had gone on holiday leaving my brain in a vacuum.
‘So, what are we going to do?’ he asked, licking his lips. His eyes had a twinkle in them as if he knew a really funny joke.
Only One Woman Page 3
