by Jules Wake
Pietro tossed the long hair back over his shoulder with a leonine-shake.
‘It suits me I think. Perhaps I should keep it on when I go home.’ He winked lasciviously. ‘My wife would love it.’
‘Beginners stage left please.’ The tannoy burst into life, punching the muted quiet of the room with a spike of electricity. A sudden hush fell as everyone sobered, ready for that first step on stage. Now on count-down to curtain up, with the precision of a well-drilled army, the make-up team straightened, smoothed and stroked, giving each of their charges a final check to ready them for the vast audience out front, while the wardrobe team, like bridesmaids at a wedding, assessed, tugged and tucked.
Several floors down, two thousand people were taking their expensive red velvet seats in eager anticipation of the evening’s performance. The picture was so clear in my head; the excited hum of chattering voices, the Mexican Wave of up and down bobs as the audience squeezed past each other’s knees and people peering down through their opera glasses at the orchestra in the pit, already seated and tuning up.
As we were about to leave the make-up room, crowding into the corridor to make the journey backstage, Pietro’s hand suddenly shot to his chest. For a horrible moment, I thought he was having a heart attack, until he gave me a sheepish glance and fished out his mobile phone.
‘Pietro!’ I gasped. Mobiles were strictly forbidden backstage as they could interfere with some of the tech stuff. I’d never even seen him with one before.
His face darkened, lines of temper marking his mouth as he homed in on the caller ID.
‘I have to take this,’ he snapped and wheeled back into the empty make-up room, slamming the door.
‘Shit! What do I do?’ I hopped from one foot to the other, glancing from the closed door and back at Jeanie. This was uncharted territory. You don’t argue with a star as big as Pietro but I had to make sure he was in the wings for curtain up. No excuses. No reprieves.
‘Fuck,’ said Jeanie looking at her watch. ‘Go get him,’ whispered Jeanie, shoving me toward the door, looking anxiously at the rest of the actors hovering in the corridor. ‘Be firm. We’ll go on down but make sure you’re right behind us.’
I could clearly hear a tinny voice talking excitedly down the line but not the words. Not that I needed to. Pietro’s face said it all.
‘Porca Miseria!’ The vehement words rattled around the room as he started to pace the floor, Italian expletives exploding from his mouth periodically.
Keeping a panicked eye on my watch, I deliberately walked into his path.
‘Er Pi…’ His eyes flashed furiously at me and he shook his head, putting me in mind of an angry lion – one that would be quite happy to rip my head off there and then.
‘They’d better not print a word! Not one single word you hear me,’ he bellowed. Gone was avuncular grandpa. His anger permeated the room in shock waves. Standing so close, it felt as if I was holding a punch bag while Muhammad Ali practised his right hook.
I could feel sweat beading on my forehead. This was awful. I had to get him down to the wings.
The tinny voice started jabbering again like a rabid Dalek.
‘I don’t care about that!’ Pietro took another turn at the end of the room and stopped – an angry bull about to charge. ‘You stop it. Take out an injunction.’ Menace hissed in his voice.
His gaze came to rest on me, the steel grey eyes glinting and my heart stalled for a minute. Hell, it was The Godfather all over again.
‘You stop it! You’re my agent Max. I don’t want the story getting out.’
He listened and then turned puce. ‘You wouldn’t want your grandchildren to see pictures like that in the paper. Stop it. That’s your job! Do it!’ Pietro snapped the phone shut with a vicious clench of his hand.
‘Merda’, he spat, throwing the phone with such force onto the table that it flew across to the back wall and bounced onto the floor.
The sudden action stirred me. ‘Pietro, I’m sorry but we have to go down. Now.’ I was quite impressed with how calm I managed to sound. Inside, it felt as if there was a bat trying to beat its way out of my chest. I had to get him backstage.
‘Now. You expect me to go on stage now?’ His hand touched his throat and he stood there with his head thrown back.
‘Yes,’ I said, feeling as if I’d stepped off a cliff and desperately hoping I sounded firm. Oh crap, he couldn’t not. Jeanie would kill me. She trusted me to get him there.
‘My vocal chords are far too tense. I’m too upset.’ He started towards one of the chairs, every inch the prima donna.
I tentatively touched his arm. ‘Not as upset as the audience, Pietro. Some of them may have waited years to see you. You can’t disappoint them.’
He straightened. Narrowing his eyes, he nodded.
‘Do it for them. Don’t let,’ I nodded to the phone discarded on the floor, ‘them win.’ I held open the door, standing back to let him through before following in his wake. He strode down the corridor, leaving me almost running to keep up. When he stopped suddenly, I cannoned into him. Whirling round, he grabbed my forearms in a tight grip and stared intently.
What now? With my arm clamped in his, I risked an agonised glance at my watch. Four minutes to curtain up.
‘You love your job,’ he fired at me. ‘It’s all you ever wanted to do?’
I nodded, thinking it could all be over if I didn’t take charge of him. He knew how much I loved my job.
Pietro’s hands gentled suddenly, his eyes filled with regret and something else.
‘Like you, this is all I ever wanted to do. My father, a poor man, worked the fields. A farmer. His voice. Bellissimo. He would have been greater than me but he never had the lessons. I needed lessons. The money to pay for the best lessons.’
I nodded, trying to be patient and not let my agitation show – he’d told me this many times before.
His usually flawless English deserted him. ‘Now… in…when a youth, I …’ he stopped and then whispered the rest.
I couldn’t help the gasp of surprise that whistled out next. Bloody hell!
The curtain went up two minutes late. The audience probably didn’t notice but the production crew knew. Backstage there was a noticeably tense atmosphere. Jeanie nodded and mouthed. ‘You OK?’
I held up crossed fingers and shook my head. Vince sidled over and gave me a quick hug.
‘God that was awful,’ I muttered into his ear. ‘Really thought he was going to refuse to go on. He’s really shaken up.’
Vince pulled a sympathetic face.
Thanks to the quick scales practice in the lift that I’d manage to coerce Pietro into doing, his voice settled quickly and soared in the theatre within the second bar. Hopefully the audience would forgive his quavery first few notes.
‘What the fuck do you think you are playing at?’ hissed a furious voice, pressing right up to me in the wings. Alison Kreufeld, Artistic Director and head honcho virtually had steam coming out of her ears.
‘I … I …’
‘That is fucking unforgivable. See me tomorrow. My office.’ With that she turned her back and disappeared through the stage door. When I looked around all the crew were absorbed in looking down at the floor.
Nursing a large G and T, I sat at the kitchen table resting my forehead on the wooden top. What a day. I wanted to cry. Why did scary, super superior Artistic Director, Alison Kreufeld, always manage to catch me doing something stupid or getting something stratospherically wrong? Like the time, in a fit of enthusiasm, I thought I’d impress her by doing a series of hair designs for the corps de ballet in Swan Lake. Only I hadn’t read her briefing notes properly. It was the Matthew Bourne all male production. She dined out on my stupidity for weeks.
And after a day like that I should have known better than to answer the phone. We still had a landline. Only three people used it. Felix’s mum, my mum and my sister.
‘Hello Tilly. It’s Christelle.’ I winced guiltily as I h
eard the carefully enunciated words, spoken as usual in her precise fussy way.
‘Hi, Christelle,’ I did my best to inject some enthusiasm into my tone. ‘How are you? Has your cold gone?’
‘Yes, thank you. It was several weeks ago, you know.’ Had it been that long?
‘Well, sometimes they linger,’ I said, determined to keep the conversation afloat. ‘How’s work? Are you very busy?’
‘Exceptionally. My caseload keeps growing. But I’m getting more and more of the high-profile stuff, which is a good sign.’
Idly, I straightened the photos on the mantelpiece. All of them were of me and Felix in various silly poses, accompanied by assorted friends. It struck me that in all of them, there was always someone else in tow. A day at the beach – Felix and five mates buried up to their necks in sand. Me and Felix and friends at Alton Towers. Felix and I, with three of his mates and their girlfriends, on the day he proposed.
‘It’s been an excellent week in chambers. We won an important case. Got a new clerk. Not terribly bright but I think he’ll get there. You know how it is with these people.’ She spoke, as always, in little staccato sentences.
‘Sure.’ I lied, feeling guilty. I had no more idea about what went on in my sister’s world than she did about mine. She was a legal eagle, a high flyer with straight A’s, a fabulous degree and apparently in the right chambers.
The second hand on my watch ticked its way around the face. Thirty seconds and we’d nearly exhausted our lines. Regret pinched at me. We had so little in common.
‘Maman hasn’t heard from you. It might be a good idea to call her. She won a bridge tournament. And Dad’s put his back out again.’
Resentment replaced regret. I didn’t need her reminding me. Mum was just as capable of calling me. Deliberately being flippant I said, ‘Poor Dad, back to the chiropractor. Must be love, I swear he spends more time with her than with Mum. Not that I…’
‘Tilly!’ Christelle’s voice was sharp with reproof.
‘Only joking,’ I said. My poor sister was a chip off the old block. A sliver of ice.
‘You’d better phone her.’ Christelle’s words were clipped with disapproval. ‘Now, lunch? Can you do Wednesday? One-thirty?’
What would she say if I turned around and said, ‘No, I can’t’? Maybe she’d be secretly relieved. Our lunches were hardly fun, Chardonnay-fuelled, gossip fests.
‘I think so…’ She was so well-organised she probably knew her schedule off by heart, even had appointments entered in her smart phone, whereas I wasn’t even sure where my antiquated brick was now.
‘Let me check. If it isn’t, I’ll let you know.’
‘The usual Café Paul. One-thirty. See you then. Try Tilly, not to be late.’
Familiar Tiggerish thumps made me lift my head as Felix bounded up the stairs to our first-floor flat and then the front door crashed shut as he yelled, ‘Missus, I’m home.’
‘I could murder a beer,’ he said as he burst into the kitchen. Pulling a bottle out of the fridge, he flicked off the top and took a long swallow without breaking a stride. He glanced at my glass. ‘More gin vicar?’ he asked.
‘No, this was a large already,’ I mumbled, toasting him with my half-full tumbler.
He dropped a brief kiss on my head and wriggled out of his favourite RAF style overcoat, tossing it over a chair, heedless when it slipped to the floor. Perching himself on the top of the kitchen counter, his legs swinging and bashing the cupboards, he studied my unhappy face.
I winced. The cupboard was already hanging from its hinges.
‘What’s the matter? You look like you swallowed a pound and shat a penny.’
‘Crap day. Seriously crap. The crappest of the crappiest.’
‘Tell Uncle Felix all about it.’
I shook my head, pulling a face. ‘Urgh, Uncle Felix sounds well creepy. And this is bad.’
‘Do we need Mojitos?’ he asked teasingly.
‘Not this time.’ I sighed and took a slug of gin. ‘I might not be able to afford Mojitos ever again.’
‘That bad.’ He pulled a face of mock horror.
Sometimes Felix just wore you down with his indefatigable refusal to be serious. I gave him a half-hearted smile because I couldn’t not.
‘Been a shocker of a day. Started with a virus. Then I got bollocked by the new IT man and then Pietro missed curtain up. And Alison,’ I twisted my mouth in a bad-medicine taste expression, ‘Kreufeld went ballistic and wants to see me tomorrow.’ I covered my face with my hands, stretching my skin over my cheekbones. ‘I just know she wants to get rid of me. And that freelance woman, Arabella Barnes, is desperate for a job.’
‘Well, she can’t do that because you’re ace and Jeanie and Vince would put syrup of figs in this Arabella bird’s coffee. Although personally I don’t get it.’ He shook his head and jumped to his feet. ‘How do you put up with all that gruesome squawking?’ Clutching his chest and holding out one hand, he launched into a horribly shrill falsetto vaguely reminiscent of Bohemian Rhapsody. ‘Kill me now. I beg of you. Spare me from this awful music.’
In spite of myself I burst out laughing. ‘You are awful. You should come, you might even enjoy it.’
He shook his head like a mutinous toddler.
‘How do you know if you’ve never tried it?’
He pulled a face. ‘That’s what mothers say when they want kids to eat green stuff, like broccoli or cabbage or Brussels sprouts. If I ever have children, they can live on jelly and ice-cream if they want.’
‘They’ll get malnutrition,’ I giggled.
‘Yeah but they’ll be the happiest kids on the block.’ He took a long swallow of beer, almost downing the whole bottle in one and then smacked it down on the table.
‘So, what have you done?’
I told him about the Santa baby image because quite frankly that seemed the least of my problems.
‘Oh missus. You big numpty!’ He jumped up, oblivious to the cupboard door which dropped another inch, and then gave me a fleeting hug before whirling over to the fridge to help himself to another beer. ‘I wouldn’t worry about it,’ he grinned.
‘People get those virus things all the time. It’s no big deal. That’s what you have virus protection for. It’ll be fine. I think half the time, the IT bods just use the fear of a possible virus to frighten people, so that you think you need them.’
‘Well we’ve got a new one. An IT Director. He’s a bit of a stiff. He caught me yanking the plug out of the computer.’
‘Director eh? Big title. I’m sure he’s got more important things to do than worry about that. Next.’
I closed my eyes, remembering the flutters of panic when I thought I might not get Pietro to go on stage. ‘Much worse … the absolute worst. Pietro delayed curtain up.’
‘Blimey.’ Even Felix knew how serious that was. He squeezed my arm with an immediate show of understanding. Felix really did get how important my job was to me.
‘It wasn’t even my fault but AK immediately assumed it was. She didn’t even give me a chance to explain that Pietro got a call and the press … He’s being blackmailed.’
‘Ooooo what’s he done? Been caught in a compromising position with a rent boy in the box office?’
‘Felix! Don’t be so horrible.’
‘What’s he done then? Something worse?’ His keen-eyed curiosity had me hesitating for a second, I could almost hear him smacking his lips in anticipation.
I sighed. ‘He was so upset. When he was younger, his family didn’t have the money to pay for singing lessons. He got a part in a porn film to earn the money.’
‘I can’t wait to tell Kevin that one.’
‘Felix! You can’t tell anyone.’
‘Just joking. So, what’s happened?’
‘Pietro’s sleaze-ball of an ex-brother-in-law has threatened to contact the press unless Pietro is nice to him. Shorthand for give him a big hand out.’
‘Can you imagine it? If the press
get wind the film will be all over the internet. At the moment if he can keep a lid on it, it’s unlikely anyone will track it down.’
‘Blimey. What a boy.’
I shook my head and sighed. Poor Pietro. ‘He told me a bit about it, sounded quite racy. Very Lady Chatterley. Apparently, he played the young gardener seduced by the Contessa. Pietro said it was called Il Gardiniere.’
‘Doing her lady’s garden for her,’ giggled Felix. ‘Classic. Go Pietro. Someone would pay good money for pictures.’
‘Felix, you shouldn’t say that.’ I shook my head. ‘It’s not funny. I feel so sorry for him. You didn’t see how upset he was. He almost couldn’t go on.’
‘You’re too soft. He’ll get over it,’ dismissed Felix. ‘No such thing as bad publicity.’
To: Wig, Hair, and Make-Up Team
From: Director of IT
All members of staff are reminded that under no circumstances should attachments from unauthorised sources be opened or any unapproved material downloaded.
M Walker
Director of IT
London Metropolitan Opera Company
Chapter 3
Dreams of heart-shaped doodlebugs, reducing London to rubble, while AK handed me an Air Warden’s helmet, filled my head all night leaving me feeling blurry around the edges by morning. Stuffing my corkscrew curls into a hasty ponytail, I secured it with a silk paisley scarf pinched from the wardrobe department and glared at my anaemic reflection before poking unhappily at the bags under my eyes. All the tricks of the trade weren’t going to be able to disguise those babies.
I shot the computer in the workroom a quick look. I was staying clear of that thing today. Vince, who was just arriving, smiled as he caught me.
‘Morning our Tilly. Want me to check your emails for you, lovie?’
‘Don’t. I’m jinxed. I’m not touching it again unless I absolutely have to.’
