by Swan, Tarn
20th May ~ Rescue Remedy
If Twinks runs his attachment over my keyboard just once more I'm afraid I'm going to have to kill him and bury him in the garden along with his hoover hose. I wouldn't mind so much if he did it while I wasn't in the process of using it. He claims computer keyboards are germ ridden alien universes full of viral and bacterial possibilities that if left unchecked will erupt and wipe out mankind. I suppose it would make a good scenario for a sci-fi film, not so much a question of things coming from outer space, but rather outer the space between the keys.
Of course his real purpose and motivation isn't hygiene based. It’s a form of latent aggression. He's in one of his lemon-lipped moods and determined to annoy me by means of domestic harassment. If I put a mug down he whips it away to wash even if I haven't finished drinking the contents. He’s accused me of disrupting his cushions, wrinkling his rugs and even shedding more than my fair share of hairs in the bathroom.
In a way I'm happy to see his sour little face and hear his quarrelsome crabby tones as he berates me over nothing at all. It has a nice feeling of us getting back to normal life after my car accident.
It was a horrifying experience. In some ways it was probably worse for him as a witness to the event. He was devastated by it. As he logged it happened on Friday the Thirteenth. On that morning he was as usual going overboard with superstitious hysteria. I ended up losing patience when he tried to coerce me into calling him in sick because he couldn’t find his lucky rabbit foot brooch. In my opinion a rabbit foot made from synthetic fur with crystal claws was unlikely to possess magical properties of protection.
After firmly planting a slap on his backside I hustled him out of the house and into the car. He took the huff and refused to speak to me or kiss me goodbye when I dropped him off at work. The accident happened a matter of moments later.
After dropping off Mr Superstitious I headed for my own place of work. I’d just gotten to the end of the high street and was heading up the hill leading out of the town when I saw a van coming down the hill on the opposite side. In a split second it was no longer on the opposite side of the road. It was on my side and hurtling straight at me. I could all but see the whites of the driver’s eyes. I knew the van was going to hit me. It was a terrifying realisation. I firmly believed my time to die had arrived and I was about to shuffle off this mortal coil, or rather be shunted off it by a clapped out transit van.
The last thing I remember is swinging the steering wheel in an effort to turn the car and avoid being hit head on. Then it was oblivion until I woke up in hospital with a monumental headache and an overwhelming sense of nausea. I'm telling you seat belts and airbags are wonderful things. Don't leave home without them. I wouldn't be here now if I had.
Twinks was by my bedside when I awoke, kidney bowl in hand. He shoved it under my nose, as I was violently sick. It was a week before the headache fully cleared and I got my thoughts working in an acceptable and recognisable order.
Twinks drove the nursing staff up the wall while I was in hospital and me up the wall when I came home. He was over fussy, over protective, over the top and altogether wonderfully supportive and loving in his own inimitable way.
A week or so after the accident he suffered an attack of delayed shock. He woke up in the middle of the night shaking, sweating and crying about how awful it would have been if I’d died before we got to make up from our silly quarrel. He was jittery for days afterwards.
His work colleague Tina recommended a flower-based solution called Rescue Remedy to help soothe his nerves and alleviate his anxiety. He swears by it now and has gotten through several bottles. I think he might be in danger of becoming not only a RR addict, but also a pusher of the stuff, trying to lure others into addiction. I daren't yawn without covering my mouth for fear he drips a few drops onto my tongue. He’s a bit of a menace to be honest. It’s like being stalked by a homeopath, or homopath in his case.
I got off lightly considering I had to be cut free from the wreckage of my car. I couldn't believe my eyes when I later saw the state of it. The accident left me with a break in my lower left shin, which is on the mend after an op to fix it. I also suffered minor fractures to the index and middle fingers on both hands, possibly as a result of gripping the steering wheel for dear life. They're a bit stiff and achy, but useable again. I also had multiple bruises, but the worst thing for me after the concussion was my back, which suffered whiplash and is still paining me.
The driver of the van was also fortunate. He suffered broken ribs, a broken collarbone and a punctured lung. Twinks is all for suing the arse off him. Family and friends had their work cut out preventing him visiting the van driver in hospital to give him a piece of his mind and knowing him a hefty thump with his handbag. As soon as I could speak coherently I warned him to stay well away and allow the incident to be dealt with through proper channels.
The van driver is to be charged with driving an un-roadworthy vehicle. Only one of his tyres met minimum requirements, one of them was almost down to the steel rim according to the police and his brakes were shot. It beats me how anyone can in good conscience get into a vehicle knowing it's a death trap for self as well as others. I imagine he feels pretty bad about the accident. At least I hope he does. He could easily have ended my life that day, the irresponsible sod, and all for the cost of car tyres and brakes.
I'm done for today. My back is aching and I need to move around. I'm babysitting Janet soon. Gill's mum is in hospital having had her bunions done and a surgical ward is no place for a lively twenty-month-old baby. I'm looking forward to it. She’s adorable even if she does leave a trail of devastation in her wake. She's like Dominic, a tiny bundle of destructive energy.
I suspect Janet's visit is the reason for his majesty's campaign of domestic tyranny. He’s cross with me for agreeing to baby sit because he wanted us to go out for Sunday lunch. Of course if Dominic were coming over he wouldn’t mind staying in at all. He still has a measure of resistance against embracing love for Janet wholeheartedly. It isn’t done from badness or cruelty. It’s an unconscious emotional reaction rooted in past experiences. He’s fiercely loyal and protective of Dominic and fears I might favour and love Janet more than him, just as his family favoured and loved his sisters more than him. He knows I don’t operate that way.
He’ll be fine once she actually arrives. He can’t resist her smiles and nor can he resist picking her up when she holds out her arms to him. He especially can’t resist helping her play with her dolls and her tiny Ladybird pram. He loves it. She hardly gets a look in when it comes to pushing her dollies around the garden.
28th May ~ John Craven
I usually enjoy bank holidays. They mean a nice long lazy weekend off work, but when you can't do much the novelty of laziness wears thin and if truth be told I'd rather be at work than languishing in the house eating my way through the huge box of wine gums Twinks bought me yesterday morning when he popped out to Tesco for a pint of milk. The irony is he's been complaining about me putting on weight since the accident due to lower activity. He says my love handles have got love handles, and then he goes and buys me sweets. He's exaggerating about my weight gain. I put on a pound or two due to boredom and eating to compensate for being stuck at home. However I'm eating less between meals since returning to work last week. I reckon I'll soon lose what I gained.
I'm looking forward to getting full mobility back. I had an op to fix my fracture, negating the need to be encased in plaster for twelve weeks. Even so I have to be careful. I can't walk far, though the physio exercises are helping build up my strength again. It's lucky I do a desk job and not a manual one. I'm back at the fracture clinic later this week and I reckon I’ll be given the go ahead to start driving again.
Family and friends have been helping with transport and I’m grateful for their kindness and support, but I want to be independent again. I’ve driven since I was seventeen and it feels odd being a passenger instead of the driver. I can’t help
but notice when people do something wrong, or at least do something I wouldn’t do. My mother claims I’m a worse back seat driver than my father used to be. As soon as I get in her car she tells me to keep my lip buttoned and if she wants my advice about how to drive she’ll ask for it.
I’m home alone at the moment. Twinks has gone on a bank holiday charabanc ride to Blackpool with the lads and lasses of the Pink Parrot. He ummed and ahhed a bit about leaving me on my own, but I insisted he went. He's due a bit of fun and besides I didn't fancy being cooped up with someone suffering withdrawal symptoms because of missing a day out with the PP girls. They've all gone dressed up to the nines in high heels, glamorous dresses, wigs, feather boas and feather fans, the full works. I hope the bus driver has breathing apparatus with him because the combined fumes from their perfumes could easily overwhelm him.
Brian tried to persuade me to join the trip saying I'd be fine in a wheelchair and he'd personally push me around and feed me candyfloss and toffee apples. I sensed some desperation in his tone. Keeping control of a busload of assorted boozed up transvestites and drag queens in holiday mood is not something to be undertaken lightly. The inclusion of some of the boys from the leather bar under the leadership of Bear Daddy did nothing to dispel his trepidation, especially as Bear Daddy was the first to cause trouble on last year’s outing. He started a fight in a novelty rock shop when some bloke, showing off in front of his mates, rudely insulted him by sticking a confectionery cock on his forehead. The inference being that Bear Daddy was a dickhead. Well no one calls Bear Daddy a dickhead and gets away with it.
The man much regretted his faux pas when Bear Daddy grabbed him and forced him to give oral, to the confectionery phallus I hasten to add. The resulting rock cock debate spilled out of the shop and onto the street much to the delight of day-trippers who thought some kind of drag carnival was in town. The police were called and all concerned were rounded up. It made the local papers.
I mercilessly declined Brian's offer. I couldn't face a long coach ride followed by a day of frenetic activity spiralling on until at least midnight and beyond, depending on how long it took Brian to round everyone up. What he could do with is a sheep dog trained to herd inebriated drag queens and leather boys.
Brian and Martin have split up. It was Martin’s decision. I don’t think he could cope with a relationship in which he was in many ways a third party. He also found the whole PP scenario difficult to handle. He was acutely ill at ease there, unsure of where and how to fit in. Although I had relatively little contact with him, I rather liked him. He had the same air of vulnerability that Brian had found compelling in Steven. It’s probably what attracted Brian to him in the first place.
Brian says Martin wanted too much from him. He wanted all his time and attention, but on his own terms and own ground. He says Martin wanted him to box up his life, box up Steven and put him away and he couldn’t do it. He refused to pretend Steven had never existed. All the same the split has saddened him.
I think the basic problem is that Brian is afraid to fully commit to a relationship again. He believes he will be reunited with Steven in some after place, but only if he remains loyal to their love. Therefore to love another in this world is to risk losing Steven completely. He’s willing to give affection and share sexual intimacy, but his love remains reserved.
Sometimes the choices we have to make in life don't seem like choices in a positive way. They seem more like having to decide between degrees of pain. I can feel my throat tightening. Talking about Steven always makes me want to cry. I've obviously had too many wine gums and am getting maudlin.
Best to move on from wine gum induced emotion. I’ll turn John Craven and host an episode of Newsround starting with the homecoming queens Lulu and Natalie. They turned up at the PP on the night Brian publicly announced Kristy’s death. It was another sad evening in the club annals. There were many who remembered Kristy well, and many who had never crossed his path at all. Life is a sea with many currents that sweep us different ways to the same end.
Some PP patrons paid lip service to his death. I don’t mean in a negative sense, but rather a sincerely felt human empathy for the passing of a life. Some paid more personal respects for a man whose smile, whose touch, whose voice they had once experienced and remembered with affection.
Lulu and Kevin appeared from out of the blue. Lu didn’t even say hello. He touched Twinkles on the arm and they clung to each other, silently sharing their heartfelt grief at the death of a dear friend and mentor. Kevin hadn’t known Kristy, but expressed his condolences and shed a sympathetic tear because like Twinks and Lulu he’s a sensitive soul, when he isn’t in Natalie mode at least.
Lu and Kevin told a tale of disillusionment with life at sea. It was slavery on water. They were floating dogsbodies who spent more time in pinnies clutching feather dusters than they did in a frock wiggling feather boas. The shows were not what they expected and the entertainment manager was a tosspot who didn't recognise talent and glamour when he saw it. They were overworked anonymous cogs in a massive machine. They didn't have a second to themselves plus they had to be polite to people they would have preferred to feed to the sharks.
News of Kristy's death decided Lulu. He was jumping ship. Kevin decided to jump with him and they headed home to the people who love them best. They had arrived back that very evening and come straight from the train station without stopping to put on so much as a dab of lipstick. Lulu claimed and Kev backed him that he had tried to phone and had sent many messages to Twinks and had them ignored. They quarrelled like magpies over it.
It turns out Twinks mobile phone was faulty. I got a flea in my ear. It’s my husbandly duty to make sure his mobile is in full working order at all times. It had never been the same since being put through the washing machine because I was too lackadaisical to check his pockets before bunging his work trews in the wash. I might have guessed I’d get the blame.
After some strife followed by some soul searching my mother and Priscilla got married in a quiet ceremony on the twenty-first of April. Mum wore the elegant ice blue dress she had worn to our Civil Ceremony and the groom wore a tasteful full-length pink satin gown complemented by a pretty pink tulle and crystal headdress. Twinkles took full credit for the success of the outfit having interfered heavily in its conception. He looked stunning alongside my sister Maryann as the bride’s attendants. They were attired in shimmering floor length silver lame dresses. I was less stunningly attired in a borrowed Red Cross wheelchair, having just come out of hospital a couple of days before.
The Registrar, a small timid man with Harry Potter style specs, shook visibly throughout the entire ceremony. I suspect it was the most unusual marriage he'd ever presided over.
The guest list was modest comprising of Brian, Barry, Big Mary, Karen, Paul and Dominic along with my aunt Helen, uncle Ronnie and our Debs. Val and Sandra also attended and though they came and left together there was an air of distance between them. They barely spoke to each other. They’re going through a rough patch. It’s painful to witness. I’m praying they come through it as a couple.
Their crisis isn’t dissimilar to the one Twinks and I went through earlier in the year. Sandy craves a baby. They tried for some time via artificial insemination, but nothing came of it. A medical check revealed Sandy has damaged fallopian tubes as a result of severe salpingitis when she was younger. Val can’t conceive, not even if she wanted to, because she had a hysterectomy several years ago. The whole business has put a strain on their relationship.
Sandy is grief stricken at the prospect of not having a baby. She feels something is missing from her life. Val doesn’t have the same sense of acute loss. She’s sad, but she says having Sandy in her life is fulfilling in itself. She’s hurt that Sandy seems to need more than just her. I understood how Val felt, it didn’t help, but I understood. Putting my arms around her I gave her a huge hug and told her to hang on in there and most of all to talk to Sandy and make Sandy talk to her, beca
use as sure as shit is brown silence would only widen the distance between them.
None of Priscilla's family attended the wedding, not even his daughters. It wasn’t for lack of invitation, but more a lack of courage on their part in accepting it. They feel as yet unable to acknowledge that some people wear their clothes a little differently to everyone else. His daughters would have attended the wedding if their father had agreed to wear male attire and be Eric to a man rather than Priscilla to a woman, but as mum said, it was not for them to lay down conditions, that was her job. Besides, Prissy had lived a secret life long enough on their behalf. They were old enough now to realise their father was still their father regardless of his outer attire. She rather marred this dignified stance by adding they could like it or lump it.
There was a reception after the wedding at mum's house. It was nice. My dad and Gill sent congratulations and a gift, which I thought was kind. So my parents are married again, but not to each other.
If there’s any silver lining to my accident it’s this: I couldn't take part in the jitterbug jamboree Twinks had been priming me for. Oh thank you, God (punches the air) thank you!
The event took place at the beginning of May, at the early bank holiday. I’d let him sweetheart me into agreeing to do something I said I would never, ever do again and be his dance partner in a PP competition. When I say I let him sweetheart me what I actually mean is that I was ensnared by sheer cunning.
