‘You’re doing nicely,’ the physiotherapist barked after the first week. ‘You’ll only need a couple more treatments. The scar is drying beautifully and, from my examinations, you’re healing well internally. Everything is knitting together perfectly. You’re lucky, you’re young and fit – you’ll make a full recovery. Are the muscles feeling better now? Sit up properly? Stand? Can you walk? Climb stairs?’
‘Yes, thank you. All of those. A bit slow, but I’m almost back to normal.’
‘Good.’ She gave a rare smile. ‘Just don’t go mad. Don’t rush yourself to get better. Don’t do anything too energetic.
Take your time. A few nice bracing walks will do you the power of good. Oh, and I’m sure you were told this at the Churchill, but no sexual intercourse for another six weeks at least.’
Oh! The shame! Again!
I buried my face as I got dressed, cheeks flaming. I wished I could just shrink into nothing and creep away. The physiotherapist didn’t seem to notice my discomfiture as she switched off the heat machine and packed her equipment away. She clearly thought anyone under 21 with spiky hair and heavy eye-make-up was into the Swinging Sixties bed-hopping nonstop. Thank heavens I’d never have to see her again once I’d finished my treatment.
Although, I thought, there was no need for anyone to keep reminding me not to make love – the fact that my stomach looked like someone had run amok with a chainsaw, and I was still wearing knickers bigger than my Nan’s bloomers, was going to make sure I stayed celibate for the rest of my life.
As well as the heat treatment, I’d been walking each day with Mum, or Dad, if he was home, and the dogs, and a couple of times with Vix. The paths were still a bit slippery and I felt like Bambi on ice… my legs were a bit wobbly, but I got stronger each day.
And on January 3rd I’d made a solo trip to the phone box.
I told no one. I wasn’t even sure I’d be brave enough to make the call. I certainly didn’t want Vix and Mum telling me gently that I was wasting my time.
I was sure they’d be able to hear my heart thudding at the end of the road as I closed the telephone box door behind me, piled my stash of sixpences and shillings on the shelf above the phone directory, and wiped my sweaty palms down my baggy black trousers.
I looked at Scott’s Christmas card with the phone number on – not that I needed to, I knew it off by heart, I’d looked at it that many times – and lifted the heavy black Bakelite receiver. It almost slipped from my grasp, my hands were shaking that much, and I closed my eyes and counted to ten to calm myself down a bit.
Oh, but what if Renza answered…? Or what if Scott didn’t really want to talk to me and was being polite in his card…? Or what if Scott answered and Renza was there and he pretended he didn’t know me…? Or…?
I dialled the number.
Three rings, then it connected and I fed money in, my fingers trembling….
‘Hello…?’
‘Hi, babe,’ a male voice said cheerfully, ‘who are you?’
‘Um – Stella… er, can I speak to Scott, please?’
‘Yeah, sure… Stella? Stella? Hey – are you the chick from Salisbury?’
‘No.’
Oh, God. He gave his phone number to millions of girls… I should have listened to my mum and Vix.
He laughed. ‘Good – because she was all over me. I’m Zak, by the way… You’re Stella…? Stella? Stone me! Not the chick from that boys’ school gig with the really cool parents and the sexy friend? The one who’s been in hospital? Are you that Stella? Really? Oh, shit, he’ll go insane!!! Hold on – don’t go away – I’ll get him…’
And he did.
Scott’s voice, after all those weeks of dreaming about him, made me go weak at the knees. At that moment, I knew whatever my mum or Vix or anyone said, I’d do anything – anything at all – to see him again.
Anyway, we talked. And laughed. And talked some more. About everything. Except Renza. Neither of us mentioned Renza. And when my pile of coins had run out, he asked me for the phone box’s number and rang me back and we talked again for over an hour.
And we arranged to meet in Oxford on January 6th – when he said Narnia’s Children had their first couple of gig-free days since New Year so he’d be around, and I’d have had my final heat treatment. I said I’d pop down into the village, look up the train times on the board outside the vicarage – the one that gave up trains and down trains – and ring him straight back from the phone box outside the post office opposite.
Which I did – eventually, although it was my first longish solo trek – and with my hands shaking and my heart racing (although for completely different reasons this time) – I called him back and he picked the phone up at the first ring. I wondered if he could hear the soppy ear-to-ear grin on my face.
So, we did our Brief Encounter re-enactment three days later.
Seeing him again took my breath away. The long black hair, those amazing turquoise eyes, the sheer beauty of him – the reality was far, far more mind-blowingly incredible than anything I’d conjured up in my wildest dreams.
And yes, I knew what I was doing was wrong, he belonged to someone else, he was engaged to be married and this was a very dangerous game, but again, I knew there was nothing on this earth that would have made me stop meeting him.
We walked away from the railway station, through Oxford, not looking at the glorious golden-stone architecture; oblivious to the cold, north-easterly wind; unaware of the shoppers or tourists or of anything but each other.
People stared at us – because he was simply the most beautiful boy in the world? Or because of my weird clothes and pink and purple sequins? Or just because we were so obviously smitten?
He mesmerised me.
We kept looking at one another and grinning like idiots. It was lovely. We didn’t touch. We walked closely together, his coat sleeve occasionally brushing against my fun-fur arm, and talked and laughed. He made me laugh. A lot.
He told me about being very, very sick with food poisoning in France and how he’d nearly been killed in Stephan’s car – Stephan, I was told, was Narnia’s Children’s manager – when it had skidded on ice after a night out. Neither of these events were remotely funny, but, in retrospect, he made them so. He was a great story-teller.
In return, I repeated and slightly embellished some of the more amusing times in hospital – and especially the discharging myself from the Cottage.
‘It was a bit of a shock, even to me. I just felt so fierce about it,’ I said as we crossed Carfax and headed up the High Street. ‘I’m usually pretty law-abiding. I just couldn’t stay there when I wanted to go home so much.’
He nodded. ‘I think it’s completely understandable, feeling like that. You’ve got a lovely home and great parents. And, once you felt better, you must have wanted to get as far away from hospitals as possible. And you must have been very homesick…’
‘I was, I think.’ I looked at him. ‘Do you get homesick? You must do. Being away from home with the group all the time?’
‘Not really. No, in fact. I don’t really feel as though I have a home. My parents are divorced and both remarried – my mum and stepfather live in Jersey with my very young step-sister – my father and his new, also very young, wife live here on the mainland on the south coast. I don’t really feel as though I belong in either place… although, probably Jersey is the closest thing I have to calling anywhere home. And with the band, we’re always on the move – we never stay anywhere for long.’
I thought that was very sad. I linked my hand through his arm and squeezed it.
He grinned down at me. ‘Thanks. That’s why you’re so lucky – having the home and family that you do. Hey, sorry – I’m not walking too fast for you, am I?’
I shook my head and giggled. ‘No – walking is about the one thing I can do…’
We stopped on Magdalen Bridge and watched the turgid grey river slowly wend its way beneath us towards the stark winter beauty of Chri
st Church Meadow.
I wondered about the home thing. I wondered if Renza was “at home”, wherever that was. I wondered again if Renza was in Jersey or if she travelled about with him. I wondered about when they got married if they’d live in some glitzy rock’n’roll apartment in a trendy part of London. I wondered where she thought he was today.
I didn’t wonder any of this out loud.
We carried on walking and reached The Plain, Oxford’s famous roundabout, linking all the main city routes, with the gothic folly in the middle.
‘Shall we have a cup of tea?’ I said. ‘It’s getting colder than ever – and I could do with a rest.’
‘See,’ Scott looked at me anxiously, ‘I knew all this walking wasn’t good for you. You’re hardly out of hospital… are you ok? And yes, a cup of tea would be great… but where on earth are we going to get one round here?’
‘Follow me,’ I chuckled. ‘And as long as you’re not too fussy.’
Daft! He was bound to be fussy! He was posh!
He followed me anyway. And laughed.
‘Seriously?’
‘Yep,’ I nodded, walking into the narrow, scrubby gap between two long-established shops and along an untidy gravel path, heading towards the long rather dilapidated building. ‘It used to be The British Restaurant in the war – they had them in every town – you know, government funded, providing basic hot cooked meals, so that everyone got something decent to eat while rationing was on… the council took it over a few years back. It’s the cheapest place in Oxford. And the warmest.’
It was. Inside, we were surrounded by other people, mostly old age pensioners who’d also come in from the cold, and who beamed at us kindly and whispered “ah, bless…” “love ‘em…” and “oooh look – hippies”.
Trying not to laugh, we queued at the counter and bought dark brown tea in thick white china cups, and toasted currant buns. The transistor radio on the counter was playing The Foundations’ ‘Build Me Up Buttercup’.
Finding a secluded corner, we sat opposite one another on trestles at a long wooden table – like a works canteen.
Again, nothing and no one else existed. Just us.
I leaned my elbows on the table. ‘When are you playing again?’
‘Tomorrow night. The California Ballroom in Dunstable – practically next door to Leighton Buzzard. We’re supporting Doc Holliday and the Cards.
‘Wow. Impressive.’
Scott shrugged. ‘We share the same management. Stephan has pulled strings. As usual. He’s an ace string-puller. We’ve got a few more local-ish gigs – then we’re off to Scotland for a while at the end of February, staying in B&Bs while we’re on the road. And it looks as though we’ve got a longish German residency in a club in either Frankfurt or Kaiserslautern, or both, in April. If that comes off, according to Stephan, we’re being put up in a swish hotel, which should be ok.’
I stared into my tea cup. He was telling me that he wasn’t going to be around. That he and Renza were going to be on the road, playing venues I’d never seen or heard of. Staying in exotic locations, in hotels. He was telling me that this, today, was all there was going to be. All there could be.
I sighed. ‘It sounds really exciting. In April I’ll be back at work… processing claims forms. It’s hardly the same.’
‘But before that? You don’t have to go back to work?’
‘No. I’m signed off for three months – on full pay, luckily. I’ve got various out-patients appointments at both the Radcliffe and the Churchill, but no – apart from those, I’m as free as a bird until April.’ I looked at my watch. ‘Oh, the time has flown! Do you have to catch the train or bus or something to get back to Leighton Buzzard? Should we be heading back now?’
‘Not yet, no.’ He smiled slowly. ‘I’m not going back to Leighton Buzzard tonight – I’m going to catch the Paddington train and stay with Stephan in London overnight. I have some things to sort out.’
‘Ok,’ I smiled. ‘We can walk back to the station together then.’
It was all I was going to have. I’d cling on to every minute with him.
‘Sounds cool. Look, I need to ask you something. Oh, don’t look like that – it’s not personal – it’s to do with the band. With Narnia’s Children.’
‘Oh. Of course. The interview.’ Clearly this was the whole point of today’s meeting – I should have guessed. ‘Well, I’m sure I could send you the questions and you could post the answers back to me and -’
He laughed. ‘It’s nothing to do with the interview, actually. Although, that would be fab if you could tie that in with the record’s release.’
‘Record?’
‘We recorded it some time back. It’s called “Livin’ With You”. It was written by the guys who write for Dave Dee and The Herd and loads of others. Zak and I have written the B side though.’
A record. I was very, very impressed but tried not to show it. Narnia’s Children were no small-time outfit. They were recording stars. Big time. I pushed crumbs around my plate and hoped I didn’t look like a besotted fan. I’d been warned off. Told where I stood. This was clearly a business meeting after all.
‘Really? That’s cool. Do you write a lot of your own stuff?’
‘Loads. We used to play all original music at our gigs but we soon worked out that to get the crowd going, people really want to hear familiar tunes – so we might put one or two of our own songs into a set, but mostly we keep to the tried and tested – rock, west coast pop, close harmonies, chart stuff…like The Beach Boys and The Beatles and The Hollies.’
I grinned. ‘Mmm. I noticed. So, when’s your record coming out?’ Was that the right term? ‘Er – being released?’
He shrugged. ‘The release date keeps being delayed. I think it’ll be out in May – but we’re clearly the last to know.’
‘It would certainly make sense for publicity if I did the interview to tie in with that – and the magazines need a six week lead time, so – if I interviewed you sometime in March…?’
‘Sounds perfect. OK, we’ll go for that. No, but what I really wanted to ask you – and please say no if you don’t want to – but would you be our fan club secretary?’
I wanted to laugh. I honestly wanted to laugh. He was asking me to be part of the Narnia’s Children team? A small bit player, but still involved with the band. Could I do that? Stand on the side-lines being efficient and watch him with Renza?
Of course I damn well could! It would be better than nothing. I knew I should say no…
I clattered my spoon in my thick, white saucer. ‘What? Me? Why?’
‘Because you’re a writer, and clever, and because we’re getting a lot of fan letters sent mainly to Stephan at the moment and we need someone to do it and help us build up and maintain a fan base – and if it’s you then it means I’ll be able to see you again.’
I blinked and swallowed. Had he really said that? Did he really mean it? And what about Renza…? I stared at him. I was sure he could hear my heart thundering somewhere beneath the fun fur.
He leaned across the table. ‘Hopefully the fan club stuff wouldn’t take up very much time. You’d still be able to do your short stories and interviews. Stephan will pay all the expenses if you invoice him. We’d just need you to set-up and send out membership forms and then answer all our fan letters – we’d have to give them your address so they all come straight to you, if that’s ok – oh, and send out a newsletter every month – with photos and things… but if you don’t want to…’
I didn’t even try to play it cool. ‘Of course I want to. I’d love to. I’ll get it sorted out as soon as I go home. I’ve got a friend who’s just set up his own printing business… he’ll really welcome the work. I can get headed notepaper – with the Narnia’s Children logo at the top… and he can print copies of the monthly newsletter and – wow! Yes…’
We grinned at one another.
‘And the other thing…’ he reached across the scruffy, scrubbed table a
nd held my hand… it was like an electric shock. He took a deep breath. ‘While you’re signed off sick, come and stay in Leighton Buzzard. With me. Please.’
Renza’s Diary
January 20th 1969
I don’t know what to think anymore. I’ve been back in Germany for almost two weeks now and apart from a quick phone call – which I made – I haven’t had a letter or any word from Scott.
My trip home to see him, which was going to be so wonderful, was a disaster. I can’t stop thinking about it
Bob James was as good as his word and was kind enough to give me a lift with him to Ostend, on the 5th of January where we got the overnight ferry to Dover. Scott arranged for Rich to pick me up from Victoria Station when I got off the boat train from Dover on the 6th of January. My aunt and uncle seemed happy to cover for me, otherwise Mum would never have let me go. Bob would meet me off the boat train in Dover, on the 9th for the return journey with him on the day ferry.
I should have known right away it would all go wrong. First no one was at the station when I arrived, cold and wet because the ferry had got caught in a force 9 gale in the channel, and everyone was so sick, even the crew. Bob and I spent the whole night sitting up the top of the boat trying to get away from the smell and sight of vomit. Plus the boat seemed less rocky up there, but with the wind and rain we got drenched to the skin.
Eventually Rich turned up and said the band had been gigging non-stop since France, where they’d had a great time. Spending New Year’s Eve in Paris with all the cars honking at midnight and people dancing in the streets was a blast he said, but Toulouse was hell. The van broke down and they were put up in a posh hotel by the local police and had to wait for Stephan to fly out and pay for it all. Meantime they all got food poisoning and had been really ill.
Rich told me Scott was nearly killed when Stephan’s Rover skidded on ice in Leighton Buzzard when coming back from a late night out together. He seemed surprised I knew none of this and raised his eyebrows when I said Scott had not been in touch that much since early December.
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