You Must Be Jo King

by Moira Murphy

  Sam looked slightly bewildered.

  I smiled, drank my tea, made my excuses and left them to it.

  Two days later my mother rang to tell me it was all off between her and Sam Pickles. She had asked him if he would mind if best friend Sadie joined them on their date as she and Sadie went everywhere together.

  Sam had said, “Hell’s Bells, Gwen, I didn’t have you down as a lesbian.”

  I’m not sure if this is why my mother has finished with Sam or if she has decided a walk on the wild side is more than she can handle. Perhaps it’s a bit of both.

  21

  PARTY ANIMAL (ORANGUTAN) STYLE

  I looked from my face in the mirror to my hands and feet. I loosened the belt of my dressing gown and looked down at the rest of me then quickly tied it again. “OH-MY-GOD!!” I heard myself screech. How in God’s name had this happened and how was I supposed to go to work looking like this? I fell backwards onto the bed.

  Then through the haze, it dawned. Work! I was supposed to be there! I sat up quickly, too quickly, my head exploded. I took some deep breaths and waited in dire agony for the fall-out from the explosion to settle.

  I had to be dying. This couldn’t possibly be just a hangover. Could it?

  There was no way I could go to work looking and feeling like this. I would have to ring Ian.

  I picked up the phone, pressed the buttons and swayed. I was going to be sick. He answered, somehow I held onto it.

  “Ian, Iss, Jo.” I was slurring my words, “I’m really shorry, but I can’t come to work today. I’ve got – er, terrible shystitis.”

  I realised too late that I should have given that some thought.

  “For fuck’s sake, Jo, you’re ringing now? You should have been here an hour ago. Oh-kay – let’s – seeee.” He was going to make a meal of it. I could tell. Was it possible he’d heard me making party arrangements with Alison?

  “Cystitis this week, kidney infection last week. I might be wrong but shouldn’t that be the other way round? You’re not taking the piss are you, Jo?’ Cos, if you are, I suggest you take a sample of it to the doc’s, have it checked out, then let me know the results. Pronto. Comprehendo. Got that in one, Jo? Good-o.”

  Just how obnoxious was he? He was supposed to be the Human Resources Manager, for God’s sake. Job description: humane, approachable, sympathetic should the situation demand it. Talk about a square peg in a round hole, or is it a round peg in a square hole? Oh, who cares. I’ll ask my mother, she’ll know. If only I’d said I had a migraine or something. Too late now.

  “I’ll give it a couple of daysh’ Ian, and if I’m no better, then that’sh what I’ll do. I’ll be in touch. Bye.”

  I threw down the phone, hung onto my mouth and got to the bathroom just in time. URGHHH!!

  I wiped my eyes and mouth with toilet paper and hung there, my chin resting against the cold ceramic of the toilet bowl while chinks of clarity began opening up.

  Something was making me cringe and I wasn’t convinced it was entirely down to the vomited alcohol. An image was circling somewhere in my brain, something I couldn’t quite get to grips with, something coming and going, waving at me, tantalizing.

  Then suddenly there it was. I was tumbling out of a taxi, punching the air and singing at the top of my voice, ‘Hey, He-y baby, oo-ah’, before waving manically at Siobhan and Sophie who were still in it and who I hadn’t known from a chip in a tea cup three hours previous to that. There I was blowing them kisses and telling them tearfully how much I loved them. Oh-my-god! Please let this have been a dream, ple-eese. I mean I might come across them again sometime.

  Then I was stumbling up the drive, singing ‘I Will Survive’ very loudly and Kev from next door was calling down from his bedroom window, “You and Gloria bloody Gaynor might survive, Jo, but I might not. I have to be up at five for my shift.”

  I’ll have to apologise to Kev – albeit by post, considering the state I’m in.

  I hadn’t wanted to go to Selina’s fortieth anyway. It didn’t seem right having a party on a Sunday night with the kids having to go to school from my mother’s and me with work the next day. I only went to keep Alison company. Nigel had some Lib Dem thing or the other to go to and although Alison had said she could quite easily have persuaded him to go to the party instead of the Lib Dem thing, there was every possibility he might have felt the urge to dance, and she couldn’t risk that, not if that malicious cow Stella was going to there. So, with his overnight bag in his hand and Alison’s pretend regrets in his ears, he was chivvied off and I was recruited instead. And anyway, I reckoned if I was to ‘get a life’ I had to start somewhere.

  I had only intended to show my face for an hour or so then come home, take advantage of the peace and quiet with the kids staying at my mother’s and read some Jane Austen. I’d felt the need coming on all week for a fix of good society and pleasant aspects.

  Alison had said she wasn’t going to be late either, she had an early morning train to catch to get to Glasgow for a training meeting.

  The last thing I remember before falling out of the taxi, was head-banging and playing air guitar to Meat Loaf in the middle of the dance floor and Alison pointing to her watch saying she had to go and telling me to be careful with that stuff as it was pretty potent. I remember poo-pooing that advice and saying it was just like pop; then nothing.

  But, at some point after coming home, I’d obviously done this! It must have been after seeing how tanned and glamorous party girl Selina looked after her holiday in Greece, and how untanned and pasty I looked by comparison.

  My knees were hurting. I really had get off this floor, lift my head out of the toilet bowl, yet I couldn’t move.

  I mean, how the hell was I supposed to get on with my life looking like this? Okay, it was more of a PG than an X rated sort of life, but as far as lives go it was mine, and it had to be lived. I needed a miracle. I had to beg, do a deal, do what I always do at times like this: grovel.

  I clasped my hands together across the toilet bowl, closed my eyes and promised God faithfully that I would never miss Mass again and I’d go to confession at least once a month. Although once a month is the norm, in reality it’s far too often and I would just end up inventing sins, but so be it. I might even put my name on the church cleaning rota. But then again, I might not. If I know that sanctimonious old Tilly Magee, with her rubber gloves and can of Mr Sheen, she’d probably push me out of the way and say she’s perfectly capable of doing the cleaning and the flowers herself, thank you. And off she’d go, polishing the pews as if the devil himself were prodding her up the backside. Something I will do though, is buy loads of poppies this year to compensate for raking out and dusting off last year’s one. I was on a guilt trip for ages over that. Oh, and St Anthony definitely isn’t camp. Just my little joke. St Anthony camp! Chances are he’s as butch as anything. As butch, if not butcher than say –Vinnie Jones or Tom Jones or Danny Dyer. I’ll send money for the missionaries in Africa, if they’re still in Africa and I’ll try to like the dog. I’ll be so nice, I’ll be unrecognisable. Please God. Pleeese – I swear I’ll do anything. I’ll try to persuade Josh to join the priesthood and Lucy to be a nun, and if things don’t get any better than this, I’ll join them. Although it’s possible I might not be up to the kneeling.

  I pulled myself up by the toilet cistern, heard a creaking noise as it came away from the wall, swayed my way to the bathroom cabinet, forced down an Alka Seltzer then crawled back to bed.

  Lucy tapped me awake asking if I was okay. She had never before known me to be in bed when she’d come from school and she was worried. I turned to face her, forcing my eyes open and stretching my mouth into a groggy, but hopefully, reassuring smile.

  She stepped back in horror and said, “Urgh! Mam. What’s happened? Urgh!! Should I call the doctor or something? Should I ring for Gran?”r />
  A sleepy, alcoholic reality dawned. I shook my head, and it felt as though it would fall to the floor. With a pathetic stab at feigned cheerfulness, I told her I was fine, she wasn’t to worry, it was only spray tan, it would wear off – eventually.

  Before she flounced out she reminded me in no uncertain terms, that it was Parent’s evening at school tomorrow and if it hadn’t worn off by then, there was no way I would be allowed to meet her teachers looking like that! “And,” she said, as she turned from the door on her way out, “you’ll never get a boyfriend if you go on like that!”

  I leaned over to reach a hand mirror from the dressing table and for a second the earth tilted off its axis. When things stabilised I looked into the mirror. It seemed the more I was sobering up the worse I looked. My face was streaked in varying shades of very dark brown and sludgy orange. The exception was a blurred, whitish ring around my mouth and blurred whitish streaks down my chin which had, I assumed, been caused by being sick before the damn stuff had dried. There was also a track of streaks from each eye where I must have shed tears while being sick.

  I got shakily out of bed and groped my way downstairs. Josh pointed and laughed fit to burst. He kept jumping out at me from behind things, saying, “Have you ever been tangoed, missus?” until I felt the need to throttle him.

  The dog barked. She thought I was a stranger. Then she ran under the table and wouldn’t come out.

  I heated up some beans for the children, threw some Winalot in the direction of the dog’s bowl, then went back to bed.

  Then as day two dawned, with it came a miracle! While cursing the dog for pulling out the contents of the bathroom bin there it was, one of the cans I’d used, and there, akin to the miracle of Lazarus risen from the dead, rising up at me from the back of the said spray can, was a helpline number. A helpline number! Oh Glory Be! My prayers had been answered. THANK-YOU-GOD. You won’t regret this. When I’m fit to be seen, I’ll be out there buying dozens of Big Issues. OH YES!!

  I grabbed the dog and kissed her before she ran for cover back under the table. Then I stood on the front doorstep and waved the children off to school with joy in my heart. Lucy begged me to go back into the house. I tweaked her hair playfully. I was not to be fazed.

  I stashed the breakfast dishes in the sink, they could wait. Prioritising was the name of the game today and I had a helpline number to ring.

  I rang and it answered.

  –This is the helpline number for Take-a-Tick-and-Tan. Your call may be recorded for training purposes. Please continue to hold and you will be connected to your personal advisor as soon as one becomes available. –

  I held the phone at arm’s length. Paul McCartney and Stevie Wonder warbling their way through Ebony and Ivory was more than a person with the remains of a hangover could be expected to endure. Even a person without the remains of a hangover, come to think of it.

  But then, after what seemed like an eternity, my personal advisor became available, sounding as chirpy as the proverbial budgie on speed.

  “Hello there, how can I help you today?”

  “Oh, hello. Erm… well, I used your product and the result isn’t quite what I was expecting. I wonder if you could suggest something I could use to like… tone things down a bit… quite a bit actually… get back to normal really?”

  “To whom am I speaking?”

  “It’s Joanne Charlton.”

  “Hi Joanne, I’m Sonia, but please feel free to call me Sonn. Now what seems to be the problem?”

  “Well, like I said, er, Sonn, I wonder if there is something I can use to… you know… tone things down a bit… a lot?”

  “Okay, Joanne, let’s start from the beginning, shall we. Did you read and follow the instructions included in the pack? Did you depilate? Did you exfoliate and moisturise?”

  “Erm.”

  “Erm doesn’t sound very convincing, Joanne. We know a lot of people take the easy route and cut out the important bits. Oh, can’t be bothered with all of that, they say. Then when the product hasn’t worked satisfactorily, of course it’s never their fault. Yet it always is. As my nan Molly, would say, why spoil the ship for two penneth of tar because if a job’s worth doing, it’s worth doing well. Can I ask you, Joanne, what number is on the container you used?”

  Number? I twiddled the can. “Er – number six.”

  “Number six is for Afro Caribbean complexions. Are you Afro Caribbean Joanne?”

  “N-No.”

  “What then?”

  “Well, just ordinary really. A bit pale, a few freckles.”

  “And you used number SIX. WHY?”

  “I don’t know. I didn’t check. I just picked it up in Beautiful Bargains. They had it on offer – two for one – they must have wanted rid of it – there can’t be much demand for spray tan for dark skinned people, can there?”

  “Admittedly, it’s not one of our best sellers, but some dark skinned people can, unfortunately, be susceptible to disorders of skin pigmentation and find our products helpful. Just out of curiosity, did you use both of the containers you purchased?

  “Yes.”

  “Oh, poor you. Now, let’s think positively. Where do we go from here? You didn’t follow any of the preliminary procedures, you used the strongest colourant and you used both containers…”

  “The thing is, Sonn, I’ve still got a splitting headache from a really bad hangover, so if you wouldn’t mind…”

  “A hangover, Joanne! Please don’t tell me you used the product while under the influence of alcohol.”

  “Ermmm…”

  “As my Nan Molly always says, Joanne, when drink is in, wit is out. So, to re-iterate again. Preliminary procedures were not followed, two containers of the strongest colourant were used and it was applied under the influence of alcohol. As this is a free phone number, Joanne, perhaps you wouldn’t mind holding while I have a word with a colleague to see if we can come up with any suggestions for you. Fingers crossed then.”

  “Er, Sonn…”

  Too late, Sonn had gone. I didn’t want suggestions, I wanted another damned miracle. Bet they’re having a right laugh – She WHAT? Used number SIX! Two containers! A bit pale, a few freckles. Oh-my-God, What an Idiot!

  Yes, yes, ha bloody ha. Sometimes I think I’m living a parallel life to Forrest Gump. My head was pounding. I nearly hung up, but curiosity, the sort born of sheer desperation, kept me hanging on.

  “Are you still there, Joanne? Thank you for holding, your call is important to us. Well, I’ve spoken to my colleague and we think a good alternative would be camouflage. The Army and Navy stores have an excellent range of all-in-one camouflage suits and worn with a wide metallic belt and plenty of gold-coloured chunky jewellery, the look can be very cutting edge. I’ve seen pictures of both Katie Price and Sienna Miller carrying this look off to perfection when worn with Ugg Boots. And let’s face it, Joanne, with the war in the Middle East, it could also be considered patriotic, a tribute to the troops, that sort of thing.”

  I said, “Ugg boots, Sonn? It’s the beginning of June!”

  “Joanne,” she chirped, “high fashion is seasonless. And what better time to have used a high colourant spray tan than now, when big, and when I say big, I mean humungous, shades are in. Look no further than the ‘Oliver Pope’ range and you will see, Joanne, that, with a bit of ingenuity, all is not lost.”

  Well why did I feel like a burst balloon then? Limp and deflated with nowhere to go but the bin. We had something in common Sonn and me, we were both clutching at straws. Crumbling ones. But because I had the feeling Sonn was genuinely programmed to try to help, I said – and I wasn’t trying to be sarcastic or anything, I just somehow took on her chirpy voice - “Thank you, Sonn, you’ve been an inspiration. I’ll find the nearest Army and Navy Store, and as I don’t want to frighten passing
children or dogs, because after all, Halloween is a long way off yet, I’ll pull a balaclava over my head, the sort with eye holes as favoured by the SAS and bank robbers, and who knows, I might even set a whole new fashion trend. Bye Sonn, thanks again, you have a nice day now.” And I put the phone down. So much for bloody miracles.

  For two days I’ve rubbed and scrubbed and just about managed to keep a layer of skin on, but it’s still streaky and sludgy and I’m still a mess. But, there’s nothing else for it, I have to go to work and face the music or else Ian will demand a hospital report.

  I had to cover up, cover my legs. I searched through my wardrobe. Trousers were allowed in the office, as long as they were smart but I was a jeans girl and the only smart trousers I had were black, part of a suit, and it was a beautiful sunny day, but they’d have to do. Something with long sleeves and a high neck was next. I could only come up with a black polo neck. I tried to cover my face with tan coloured make-up, but it didn’t work, so I rubbed it off and used a very pale powder instead. It was debatable as to whether that was an improvement, but as miracles were no longer an option, I decided to go with it. I normally tied my hair back for the office, but today, needing all the help I could get, I used the straighteners and pulled it down at the sides, like curtains, it would be something to hide behind. Then out came the new, humungous sun glasses which I had ordered on next day delivery from the NEXT catalogue, and which I knew I would be pushing my luck wearing in the office, but that applied to people who had a choice.

  Helen, the receptionist, was busy on the phone, so I sneaked past, keeping my head well down and letting my hair fall over my face. A bit pointless really, as I was pretty much unrecognizable anyway. I tip-toed into the office. Ian was on the phone. The conversation went something like:

  “He’s done what? A full consignment? One friggin hundred? Why do we employ these morons? What a shower of shit! Did he not realise that if glass was falling out of the packaging it was a knockin’ bet the table tops, being glass, would be smashed? Yet he still signed for them!? Well, that’s it. No more chances. He’s had a verbal and a written now it’s out the friggin’ door. Send him up. Oh, and if he gives you any crap like, ‘what gives him the right to sack me?’ Tell him, why does a dog lick its balls? BECAUSE IT CAN.”