Only One Woman

by Christina Jones

  Renza’s Diary

  February 14th 1969 – Valentine’s Day

  Some St. Valentine’s Day this is turning out to be. No card from Scott even though I sent him one with a birthday card included, over a week ago to ensure he got it in time. I’ve been pestering the post sergeant and it’s embarrassing. He’s forgotten me.

  There’s a do in the Mess tonight, a German band is going to be playing and there is a formal dinner with all the big-wigs from the Town Hall and Police invited. I’m babysitting for Mum and Dad and I’ll have a couple of babies from the families opposite to keep an eye on too. What a romantic way to spend the evening; snotty-nosed kids and nappies. Still, it beats listening to yet another oompah band.

  I wonder what Scott is doing – gigging I guess – and somewhere romantic I bet, with lots of girls done-up-to-the-nines gazing adoringly at him on stage. Zak and Joss will be picking off groupies and getting drunk and Mo and Rich will be the sensible ones, keeping everyone organised. I wish I could be with them, having a laugh and a life. Scott has no idea what my life’s like and how much I miss him. I can’t stand the thought of him being so accessible to all that female talent. Who could resist him when I can’t.

  Oh well, time to change another nappy and give the youngest baby his bottle. Good practice Mum says. To hell with that.

  Stella’s Diary

  February 14th 1969 – Valentine’s Day

  Scott’s birthday. And Narnia’s Children surprisingly didn’t have a Valentine’s Day booking. The snow continued to tumble fitfully from the yellow sky. It was bitterly cold, inside the house and out.

  If Scott had received birthday cards – or Valentine cards – from anyone else I had no idea. I knew Renza must have sent him one of each, but he’d been discreet enough not to let me know. It seemed like a pretty dismal birthday to me: no presents, no cards displayed on the mantelpiece, no one getting excited and shouting and kissing and sneaking around with secret gifts like they always did for me at home. The rest of the band did wish him a happy birthday, but it seemed they didn’t do anything special for any of their birthdays, ever.

  However, he loved my card. He seemed genuinely amazed that I’d thought of him, remembered his birthday, secretly made him the card-cum-present. It made him laugh at first, then smile as he noticed each little relevant cartoon or picture. He pulled me to him, and kissed me and said ruefully that I clearly knew him very well indeed and it was the best card he’d ever had and he’d treasure it for ever.

  Or, I thought, at least until Renza moved in.

  We walked into Leighton Buzzard that afternoon, hand-in-hand, sliding on the hard-packed snow, hurling snowballs at one another, laughing.

  We stopped at a small stationer’s shop on the outskirts of the town centre.

  ‘I’ve got to buy a card,’ Scott said, pushing his hair away from his eyes.

  ‘A bit late for Valentine’s Day,’ I grinned at him, ‘but I’ll take a late offering.’

  ‘It’s for Renza’s birthday.’

  ‘Ah.’

  I wondered then if he’d sent her a Valentine’s card. I hoped so.

  We nudged our way inside, between the crowded shelves, and stared at the ranks of cards. I found one with a gorgeous doe-eyed cartoon girl on the front, she had long blonde hair and was dressed in jeans and a striped T-shirt.

  ‘This looks like Renza,’ I waved the card at Scott. ‘So pretty. She’d love it.’

  He shook his head. ‘I can’t send something like that. I want something – well – you know… special.’

  I blinked. Of course he did. He wanted a lovely romantic birthday card for her. She was his fiancée. He loved her. I had absolutely no right to be involved in this.

  I turned away. ‘Ok, look – I’ve got the fan club stuff to post, so I’ll pop into the shop next door and meet you outside.’

  ‘Stella…?’

  ‘It’s ok. Really. Take as long as you need. Find the loveliest card in the world. She deserves it. I’ll go and play in the snow to pass the time.’

  I didn’t. I went into the equally tiny general post office stores next door, posted all the fan club forms, including the ones to Germany, and, remembering something Vix and I had done once for a Valentine’s Day party, bought the most exotic thing I could find – a pineapple. And a small bottle of cochineal. And tried hard not to think about the hearts and flowers and promises of undying love that Scott was choosing for Renza.

  When we got home – home, hark at me! – it was dark and Scott disappeared into the sitting room to finish writing to Renza so that he could post her card, and I made myself scarce. As Mo wasn’t in the kitchen I went to town with the pineapple, hacking it into slices, then carefully cutting it into bite-sized heart shapes and dunking them in the cochineal and arranging them on a couple of big plates. It was fiddly and time-consuming and took my mind away from Scott and Renza as a couple.

  ‘That looks cool,’ Joss stuck his head into the kitchen. ‘What is it?’

  ‘Valentine’s Day hearts,’ I showed him. ‘It’s a birthday tea present for Scott.’

  Joss’s beautiful wicked-angel face fell. ‘Not for the rest of us?’

  ‘It’s only pineapple soaked in red food colouring. But I’m sure Scott won’t mind sharing. Anyway, Mo’ll be in here soon to cook dinner, won’t he?’

  ‘Doubt it,’ Joss pulled a face. ‘We’ve only got rice left, he says. Until Stephan gives him some more money, we’re going to starve.’

  I stared at him. ‘Really? I wish I’d known, I could have bought some stuff in town. The shops are all shut now.’

  ‘We’ll be ok. Mo says there’ll be some money tomorrow. We can just have rice tonight – and maybe onions.’

  ‘But you can’t not eat!’ I really was my mother’s daughter! ‘Isn’t there a chip shop or something?’

  ‘Nope. Don’t think so. And even if there was, we’re all broke.’

  ‘I’ve got money,’ I said. ‘I’m staying here for nothing – I’ll happily buy you some food.’

  ‘Cool,’ Joss grinned. ‘But you don’t have to do that.’

  ‘I do if we’re all going to starve.’

  ‘But all the shops are shut.’

  ‘I know,’ I said. ‘I’ll buy some basics tomorrow.

  Promise.’

  Rich joined Joss in the doorway and looked at the plates of red pineapple hearts. ‘Oh, pudding! If only we had dinner… However, I have a plan…’

  Two hours later, looking like a bedraggled band of refugees, Narnia’s Children and I, led by Rich, trudged through the snow, sliding unsteadily down the hills in the darkness, hurling snowballs, singing very off-key, to the far side of Leighton Buzzard. The snow, frozen solid, sparkled and danced like a million spangles under the street lights.

  It was extremely pretty, but bone-numbingly cold, and my fun-fur, already saturated from our earlier outing, now looked like a drowned rat.

  ‘Where are we going?’ I asked Scott who was holding my icy hand very tightly as the pavements were now like skating rinks.

  ‘No idea,’ he chuckled in the darkness, ‘but it seems like a pretty groovy way to be spending my birthday even if I do think I’ve got frostbite. It’s been fab so far.’

  And he didn’t even know about the pineapple hearts. I’d taken them upstairs and hidden them in the bedroom. I knew they’d be ok. There was no need for a refrigerator in that house.

  ‘Why aren’t we going in the van?’ I puffed, my breath spiralling into the white night.

  ‘Same reason as we haven’t eaten,’ Mo said. ‘No money. No petrol. Thank goodness we get paid tomorrow.’

  ‘Jam tomorrow,’ I muttered. ‘Like Alice in Wonderland.’

  Eventually, frozen stiff and with Zak and Joss swearing and complaining loudly, we reached a long, low corrugated iron building, with lights spilling out across the frozen wilderness like a welcoming beacon.

  ‘This is it. In we go,’ Rich said through chattering teeth.

 
; In we went. I laughed. Narnia’s Children simply looked stunned.

  It was the Salvation Army.

  And it was delightfully warm and cosy. Various elderly and not-so-elderly, cold, very-wrapped-up people were dotted around as smiley men and women in uniform dished out bowls of soup with hunks of bread, mugs of hot chocolate and plates of biscuits.

  They welcomed Rich like an old friend.

  Zak eyed him suspiciously. ‘You been here before?’

  ‘Once or twice,’ Rich said shortly.

  ‘When you go out at night to get petrol in the van?’ Scott grinned at him.

  Rich nodded just as we were gathered together by a motherly-looking Sally Army lady who ushered us towards the coke stove and started ladling out soup. The regulars stared at us with suspicion. I wasn’t surprised. We looked like a gaggle of long-haired hippie guttersnipes.

  Joss looked around with horror. ‘Oh, very cool,’ he said sarcastically. ‘So bloody rock’n’roll. It’s a bloody soup kitchen.’

  ‘It’s warm and we get fed,’ Mo snapped, clearly a bit rattled. ‘What were you expecting? The Ritz? Stop moaning.’

  ‘This is a whole new experience for me,’ I muttered through numbed lips.

  ‘And me,’ Scott agreed, ‘but still very welcome and another part of a birthday I’m never going to forget.’

  The Salvation Army soldiers were lovely. They chatted to us, seemingly knowing from Rich that the band lived in an unheated house with very little money, and didn’t seem to mind that we weren’t exactly homeless or destitute.

  ‘We help all those who need a friend and a warm meal,’ our motherly-lady said, comfortingly. ‘We don’t ask questions. We never judge. Young or old. And in weather like this we’re simply delighted to be able to help. Now settle yourselves down, eat, drink and get warm.’

  We did. It was fabulous.

  We were much happier, warmer, and fuller and hardly noticed the sub-zero temperatures on the way home. Home! That cold, unwelcoming house was home to me – albeit temporarily. The mood had lifted sky-high.

  I gave Scott the pineapple hearts when we eventually went to bed. Loudly joining in with Stevie Wonder warbling ‘For Once In My Life’ on Luxembourg, we attempted to feed one another with them. It was very messy. And funny.

  Zak hurled the bedroom door open. ‘For Christ’s sake shut-up! Some of us need to sleep – sodding hell! Is that blood on your hands? God – you two are so bloody scary weird… goodnight!’

  The door slammed shut again and I managed not to choke on a piece of pineapple. I grinned at Scott. ‘Happy birthday…’

  Stella’s Diary

  February 20th 1969

  A sad day. I left Leighton Buzzard and went home to Harbury Green. Tomorrow, Narnia’s Children were off on their tour of Scotland. It had stopped snowing a few days earlier but was still very cold, and the snow had frozen in big billowy ruts everywhere. I hoped and prayed they’d get to Scotland safely. And stay safe.

  Scott came with me on the bus as far as Aylesbury. We were supposed to have parted company in Leighton Buzzard, at the bus stop at the bottom of the Heath and Reach hill, but neither of us seemed to be able to say goodbye, so we sat upstairs, at the front, amongst the heavy smokers – even though neither of us did – and watched the bleak countryside vanish through a swirling haze.

  We played a whispered “put a name and life” to our fellow passengers. It got a bit rude and ridiculously funny, and my laughter masked the fact that in a few short moments I’d leave Scott and not know when – or even if – I’d ever see him again.

  ‘I’ll write and let you know when we’re due back from Scotland,’ he whispered against my hair as we clung together at the bus-stop in Aylesbury’s dismal late-afternoon market place. ‘Then you’ll come back, won’t you? Straight away?’

  ‘Yes,’ I nodded sadly, thinking that three weeks without him now was going to be almost impossible to bear. ‘Of course. You go and have a fab time and enjoy Scotland and be superstars everywhere you go.’

  ‘I’m going to miss you.’

  ‘No you won’t,’ I smiled. ‘You won’t give me a second thought – oh, here’s my bus… goodbye…’

  We kissed for the last time then, totally wrapped up in one another, but I was vaguely aware of people watching us, probably thinking we were a living embodiment of all that was wrong with the Youth of Today. The clothes! The hair! The brazen behaviour!

  I jumped on the bus and waved to Scott until he vanished from sight as we turned the corner, then cried all the way home.

  Renza’s Diary

  March 10th 1969

  Two days before my 17th birthday and a letter at last. I’ve received a couple of postcards from Scott and we’ve chatted a few times on the phone in the last month, but apart from Fan Club membership forms coming for us all, courtesy of the band’s new Fan Club Secretary, Stella Deacon, he hasn’t written.

  ‘As you can see by the address, we are in Elgin, Scotland, again and we’re having a great time playing-wise.’ he wrote. ‘We’ve been topping the bill everywhere we’ve played and the audience reactions have been great.’

  Big deal, I thought, as I looked at the birthday card he’d sent me. At least he hadn’t forgotten that. It was a lovely card, and the words nice and he’d signed it ‘All my love,’ with seventeen kisses.

  ‘Thanks for the request on Luxembourg, we all heard it and were totally knocked out. Not just me, but the band were too. Great for publicity and words just can’t express what I felt when I heard it, it was a fantastic feeling, thanks very much.’

  He went on to apologise for not sending a Valentine’s Day card – it being his birthday, he said he never sends cards to anyone, and didn’t even think of me.

  Well, thanks for nothing. I loved that bit.

  ‘Don’t get me wrong, I do care, and I do love you very much. I didn’t send anyone else a card either.’ He wrote in his spidery hand. ‘I’m sorry if I seemed off when you came over to stay. I was just going through a bad time, feeling so tired and shattered. Please forgive me. Remembering the way we were together before you went to Germany, emotionally, when we got very close to making love and how it felt, I’m sorry about how it was when you came to Leighton Buzzard, and how it should have been.’ He wrote as I cried. ‘Anyway, next time I won’t have any excuse. Even though I was tired I should have been more loving towards you. I’m sorry.’

  I read on and cried some more. Next time? Would there be a next time I wondered.

  He went on to describe the Guest House they were staying in and the lady who ran it, who made them flasks of tea to take up to bed in the middle of the night when they got in. They’ve been gigging in somewhere called Wick and another place called Buckie, as well as Elgin and Aberdeen, where there was a circular ballroom; as they played on stage the audience lined the walls walking round and round watching them, which he said was really weird.

  Wick was like being on the moon, apparently, with nothing for miles. They even drove over very high mountains in the snow, ending up near lochs where American submarines were moored, and they were chased away by American Military Police just for driving in the area.

  The record is now supposed to be coming out this week, on the President label for Creole Records, and the plugger from President who made The Equals record a hit is raving about it and is going all out to push it.

  Scott ended with declarations of undying love and how much he missed me. I just feel confused, thrilled, happy, miserable and desolate. He’s messing with my head big time. And my heart.

  I’ve been working at the base for about a month and it’s horrid. I’ve cried every day because I hate it so much. No one speaks English in my office and apart from Frau Neuhaus and Frau Keppler, who are so old it’s unreal, there’s only one other female, called Hannah, who is a bit older than me. The rest are old German men, about ten of them, and they do nothing but drink and smoke and try and make me look at disgustingly rude photos of naked women and men doing stuf
f, and sometimes not just with men and women! Dad would go mental if I’d told him. They’ve got photos on the backs of cupboard doors that would make your hair stand on end.

  We start work at 7am – seriously, half way through the night! I walk to the base every morning, and the same German policeman has caught me, each time, crossing the road before the little sign tells me I can. But I stand for ages and nothing comes, if I didn’t cross I’d be late. He always hides behind the wall and when I think it’s clear, getting half way across the road, he steps out and starts ‘Guten morgen Fraulein…’ and tells me off, threatening to fine me about 20 Marks. So funny, I don’t think! I just played dumb. So far it’s working. I only earn 9 Marks a week, so how could I pay the fine? Mum has most of my money anyway, the rest I’m saving for visits home and my food and clothes.

  The office work is weird. I spend all my time typing endless forms and work sheets for engineering repairs, reconditioning and stripping down of engines, tanks and scout cars for the British Army on the Rhine. I’m becoming an expert on guns and shell sizes, plus we cover all aspects of leave, sick leave and the usual personnel stuff for the German civilian staff. Squaddies, delivering vehicles for repair and collecting them afterwards, come into the office and I do their paperwork. Some of them are about the same age as me, it’s really embarrassing and not just for me, they blush as badly as I do when we do the paperwork together. I’ve got to do everything in English and in German, but as I know very little German it’s a painful affair. The men yell at me all the time as if shouting’s going to make me understand what they want me to do. There’s a woman, Fraulein Carpentier, who’s seven feet tall, seriously, and has a deep voice. She’s in charge and keeps telling me, in German, what she wants me to type or do, which is nuts. I don’t understand German, especially technical stuff. They’re all losing their cool with me. I can’t take much more of it.

  Not only that, but they start on the vodka and schnapps at 7am when the hot bread roll man comes with breakfast: raw minced pork and onion with pepper on hot bread rolls. It’s called Mette, and it’s gross. They have a fridge in the office where they keep their drinks and cream cakes. Every afternoon we have glasses of wine with strawberries in the bottom and if it’s someone’s birthday we have huge cream cakes. I am sent to the nearby dairy to buy more cream which they pile on top of the cream cakes, all washed down with wine.