Stories We Could Tell

by Tony Parsons

  And the clothes. In the Western World they dressed as if they had salvaged some rags from the aftermath of a nuclear holocaust. In the Goldmine they dressed as if they were going to a wedding. In the Western World the clothes were shades of black. Here in the Goldmine their clothes were tight and white, their hair permed and teased, and everyone looked as though they had just had their weekly bath. And then there were the lights.

  The Western World was always in almost complete darkness apart from the bare bulbs above the upstairs bar and the downstairs stage. The Goldmine was constantly alive with streams of piercing sci-fi lasers and twirling disco balls and pulsating strobes. Leon shyly bought a screwdriver and tossed it down, tasting the orange juice at the back of his throat, feeling the kick of the Smirnoff, fascinated by the intricate swirls of colour of the lights above the heaving dance floor, trying to work out when blue would change to red, positive he could work it out if only he watched carefully enough. There was so much colour in here. He had never known there could be so much colour.

  And then there was the music. No bands here. No lads in Lewis Leathers slouching on stage and saying something like, This one’s about pensions. One! Two! Three! Four!’ Here there were records and records only, with the DJ up in his booth, but nothing like the impassive natty dread at the Western World, there to provide mood music between the main events. Here the DJ bossed the night. And the music!

  For some reason Leon had expected the Goldmine to be full of sappy romance and chart pap – but it was more narcissistic than that, more esoteric – all these exhortations to move it, get down on it, make it funky now. It wasn’t like any mainstream music Leon had ever heard. It was harder, tougher, funkier – the DJ proudly boasted of white labels, imports, rare grooves. They were as elitist as any kid at the Western World.

  This wasn’t his kind of place. Not at all. What was the point of the fanzine in his bag? Why was he alive? He dreamed of fighting racism, defeating injustice, changing the world. And in the Goldmine they dreamed only of leaving the world behind. Yet he ordered a second screwdriver, and didn’t want to go.

  Because there was something about the scene – the lack of pretentious bastards on stage, the ever-changing colours of those epileptic Christmas lights, and above all the seamless, endless beat – the sheer mindless joy of the music, the way the records just flowed into each other, like a river of music – that he found hypnotic, and thrilling, and oddly comforting.

  Leon began to sway at the bar, watching the dance floor, wishing he was brave enough to do that. Brave enough to get out there with the well-scrubbed kids in their tight white clothes. Brave enough to dance.

  And then he saw her.

  She was in the middle of the dance floor.

  The most beautiful girl in the world.

  Surrounded by a group of her friends, all of them responding to some new record as if it was the news they had been waiting for. They whooped, they raised their arms above their heads, their dancing stepped up a gear. Someone blew a whistle and it made Leon jump.

  At first the record they were responding to seemed like any other record in the Goldmine. This rolling, tumbling funk punctuated by a waterfall of piano and then a burst of lonely brass started wailing and then, finally, after an age, the voices came in.

  ‘Shame!’ cried the back-up singers, and then this woman with a perfect voice sang, ‘Burning – keep my whole body yearning!’ and then she muttered something that Leon couldn’t quite catch, and then the chorus girls shouted, ‘Shame!’ again and then the singer was saying that her mama just didn’t understand, and the chorus was moaning like love-sick angels – ‘Back in your arms is where I want to be…want to be…’

  Leon had never heard anything quite like it.

  Never heard anything so full of life.

  It made wanting someone, and not getting them, seem like the most important thing in the world. More important than…anything. The real reason we are alive. Leon’s head was spinning.

  He wanted to push through the crowds and talk to the most beautiful girl in the world and say – I get it, I understand, I feel the same way. But his tongue was a hopeless knot, his feet felt like they were in concrete. He knew he could never talk to a girl like that. And Leon dancing seemed about as likely as Leon levitating.

  ‘Oh yeah, baby,’ said the DJ, before this perfect record was even over, ‘Evelyn “Champagne” King there with a little thing called “Shame”…and before we get down and dirty with Heatwave, we have some breaking news…’

  Heads on the dance floor were turning towards the DJ in his booth. Leon kept looking at the most beautiful girl in the world.

  ‘Ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls,’ the DJ said, uncertain of the tone he should adopt, and sounding both solemn and facetious. ‘The King is dead.’ No reaction on the dance floor. ‘That’s right – we just heard that Elvis Presley died tonight.’ The DJ slapped down a record.

  ‘Thought you would like to know,’ said the DJ. ‘That’s the end of this newsflash.’

  They cheered. Leon stared at them in amazement. They were fucking cheering.

  Not all of them. The most beautiful girl in the world and her friends looked puzzled, briefly conferred, as if they were not quite sure who this Elvis Presley person was, as if they had heard the name somewhere but couldn’t quite place him.

  But most of the dancers seemed to think that they owed the news some sort of reaction. And many of them whooped as if their side had scored, or as if one kind of music had just triumphed over another. And all of them started dancing again.

  But by then Leon, emboldened by the speed and a sense of outrage that came naturally to him, was pushing his way across the dance floor and climbing into the DJ’s booth, snatching up the microphone – the DJ took a step back, raising his hands in compliance, letting the madman in the funny hat have it – and then Leon was staring out across the dance floor, trying to find the words. He knew that this was important.

  ‘No – wait – listen,’ Leon said, and the DJ helpfully turned off ‘Boogie Nights’. ‘Testing, testing. Hello? Elvis – right? Respect to Elvis Presley. Elvis is – was – more than the ultimate rock star, right? Elvis is – was – where it all begins.’ His voice was rising, it was coming to him now. ‘Elvis broke down more barriers than anyone in history. Racial barriers, sexual barriers, musical barriers. I mean, the personal is political, right? Elvis – what Elvis Presley did – he dared to see the world in a new way…’

  ‘Right on, baby,’ said the DJ, leaning into the microphone. He smiled at Leon and nodded encouragement. ‘Carry on.’

  ‘Thank you,’ said Leon. ‘Black and white music – it was like apartheid before Elvis.’ He was warming to his theme. ‘Music was like one big fucking South Africa. White radio stations. Black radio stations. Music, all types of music, it was kept in a ghetto. Elvis made all of this possible.’ Leon stared at them helplessly. They were all watching him. Maybe he had gone on too long. Maybe he could have expressed it better. ‘I’m just saying,’ he said, and there was a pleading in his voice now. ‘Don’t cheer his death. Please don’t do that.’ He tugged nervously at the brim of his hat. ‘Forget about cheeseburgers and Las Vegas and, you know, white jump suits, B movies in Hawaii or dressed up as a soldier. Whatever. That’s not it. You have to look at the way things were, and everything he changed. He was a great man. Flawed – yeah. Corny at times – well, all right. But Elvis Presley…he fucking set us free, man.’

  There was a moment of complete stillness and silence. The crowd stared up at Leon, and Leon stared back at them, and nobody knew what to do. Then the DJ snatched his microphone back and Leon felt the air move as he slammed down a 45 like a short-order cook slapping a raw meat patty on a grill.

  ‘Yeah, respect to the King, baby,’ said the DJ, ‘and respect to…’ his voice dropped to a sultry baritone, ‘…the Commodores!’

  Leon thought they would throw him out. There were bouncers at the Goldmine who were far meaner looking th
an any security at the places he was used to, these bouncers who looked like they treated violence as a profession, a calling, but he felt oddly calm about the prospect.

  Leon wasn’t a coward, not where physical violence was concerned. He could never be as afraid of bouncers or the Dagenham Dogs as he was of dancing. Or of talking to a girl he really liked, such as the most beautiful girl in the world. A quick, impersonal beating didn’t scare him as much as the prospect of that incredible girl looking at him with pity.

  But in the shadows of the Goldmine, the bouncers just stared right through him with hooded eyes and folded arms, not moving. One of them – a tough-looking forty-year-old with a silvery quiff – even nodded at Leon. An Elvis fan, he thought.

  The DJ just smiled at Leon, patted him on the back as if he was some kind of floor show, and turned up the volume. The dancers were already lost in the music.

  Leon self-consciously started from the booth, feeling awkward and clumsy and tight in the presence of all those habitual dancers, all those loose-limbed groovers getting down with the Commodores. He was depressed about the death of Elvis, and felt like his words were useless and inadequate.

  Nobody knows what I’m talking about, he thought, and then he stumbled badly on the bottom step of the DJ booth and pitched forward like someone trying a reckless new dance move.

  Leon was getting up off his knees and looking around for his hat when he was aware that someone was standing over him. It was the most beautiful girl in the world.

  A journalist is at home everywhere, Leon thought, as she took his hand. At home everywhere. Remember that, Leon.

  ‘Like the hair,’ she said, the sound of the suburbs in her voice. ‘Autumn Gold?’

  Terry loved speed because it helped him to think clearly.

  The cold white conviction of the drug helped him to stay focused, to deal with the job at hand, to forget about all the things that didn’t matter.

  That’s why on the short journey across the West End he was able to pretty much ignore Christas hand resting on the top of his thigh, to shut out the mindless babble of Dag’s manager in the front seat, and let the crowds beyond the car window just melt away. The speed helped him to give his complete attention to Misty, and what he was going to say to her when they got there. Oh yes.

  The car pulled up in front of the Hotel Blanc, and Terry felt Christa’s fingernails increasing their pressure. He looked at her as if for the first time and she smiled at him with her smooth, practised smile, and the funny thing was, he really liked her face, he had liked it from the moment he first saw her in Berlin.

  He liked the red slash of her mouth, the pale skin, the unearthly, un-English whiteness of her teeth. The way she dressed more formally than what he was used to – like a businesswoman, he thought. All that was good. But he already had a girl, and he needed to find her.

  Christa said his name but the door was open and he was already gone, out of the car and into the hotel, which he knew well from interviewing various longhairs from Los Angeles in his early days at The Paper, before he could pick and choose who he talked to, who he wrote about, but he still came here from time to time, most recently to interview a steady stream of shorthair musicians from New York. American groups at the Hotel Blanc was one of the things that never changed. The first thing he saw was Brainiac being ejected by a uniformed doorman.

  “It is imperative that I speak to Mr Dag Wood immediately,’ he was saying. ‘Terry! Tell them!’

  Terry was already at the staircase where Dag’s rhythm section, the two brothers, were lazily ascending with a couple of girls from the Western World. The girls had seemed fashionably undomesticated in the gloaming of the club, all torn stockings and hair stiff and spiked with Vaseline, blinking out at the world from big black Chi-Chi and An-An circles. Under the harsh lights of the hotel lobby they looked like dumpy vampires, or overgrown children on Halloween. But Terry knew there was no man less choosy than a musician on the road.

  The drummer brother, the dumber brother, all bulging tattooed biceps in his sleeveless vest, held out a meaty arm, hailing Terry like a long-lost friend. Terry wished he would stop doing that. It was really starting to get on his nerves. He walked past the drummer, and carried on up the stairs, two at a time, past the bass-playing brother, who he had actually liked, who he had spent time with in Berlin, who he had thought was some kind of friend. Terry was starting to learn that you could never really be friends with these people.

  There was a door open at the top of the stairs, a party going on inside, and a waiter was trying to get a signature for a tray of drinks. He held out the pen to Terry as he approached and Terry scribbled on the chit, gave the waiter back his pen and entered the room without breaking his stride.

  The room was full of people. Some of them he knew. The rest of Dag’s band. Faces from the Western World. Other musicians who must have been lodging at the Blanc. Somebody that Terry had seen dealing little blue pills in the toilets at the Roundhouse. And then there was a familiar face at last. Billy Blitzen was sprawled on the sofa, short, dapper, hair everywhere, his immaculate waistcoat unbuttoned, smoking a joint the size of a Mr Whippy cornet.

  ‘I thought you had a gig tonight,’ Terry said. ‘I thought Warwick Hunt was coming down for your second set. I thought it was your big break and I was going to do a review.’

  Billy looked insulted. There’s plenty of time. Who are you? My mother?’

  ‘And I thought you didn’t even like Dag Wood,’ Terry said, scanning the room. No sign of her. Where the fuck was she? ‘I thought you said he was an arsehole.’ Terry’s face twisted with a parody of transatlantic vowels. ‘An asshole.’

  Billy sucked on his Mr Whippy spliff, and didn’t need to explain a thing. That’s one thing I’ve learned about these New Yorkers, Terry thought. They follow the drugs. And then he saw Misty.

  On the far side of the room, she came out of what had to be the bathroom followed by Dag Wood. Then she was leaning against a wall and Dag was standing in front of her, his hands resting on the wall either side of her head, almost pinning her there. Terry flew across the crowded room.

  ‘Hey, man,’ Dag said to Terry, slowly removing his hands, as if it was no big deal. ‘What kept you?’

  Terry stared at Dag, then at Misty. He realised he didn’t know what to say. He didn’t know what to do. He didn’t know what was happening. All he knew was that he didn’t like it, and his confidence was ebbing away with the kick of the sulphate.

  ‘Is that my JD and coke over there?’ said Dag, as smooth as a Foreign Office diplomat. ‘Finally.’

  A big cheesy smile and then he was gone, and Terry was alone with his girl again, alone with her in that rented room, and he waited for her to say something.

  ‘What?’ she said.

  All wide-eyed and innocent.

  Terry was speechless. ‘What?’ he said. ‘What?’

  ‘Yeah – what?’ A bit of a fishwife tone creeping in now.

  ‘Why’d you run off like that?’ he said, more hurt than angry. ‘What’s going on? I mean – fucking hell, Misty!’

  Misty examined her fingernails. ‘I didn’t run anywhere.’ She sighed as if he was her bloody father. ‘Chill out, will you? Please, Terry,’

  ‘Chill out?’ he said, suddenly agitated. ‘Chill out? How can I chill out? What’s wrong with you tonight?’

  Her hands clawed at the air, grasping at nothing, trying to find the words. As if the way he was drove her insane. It scared him. This was even worse than he’d thought.

  ‘Nothing,’ she said. ‘Everything.’

  ‘I want to know what’s happening here.’ Trying to keep calm now. Wanting to understand, to make it right. To get things back to where they had been only hours ago. Trying to avoid sounding like one of those men that Germaine Greer had warned her about. ‘I just want to know…’

  He struggled to express what he wanted to know. What had happened to the girl who had met him at the airport? And was it all over between them? A
nd was she going to fuck Dag Wood? Yes, he wanted to know all of these things. But a part of him would prefer not to know.

  And he wondered how he was meant to deal with the changes in his life. It was less than a year ago that he had lived in a world where you could get your head caved in for looking at someone’s girlfriend the wrong way. For just looking. But now he was somewhere else, some weird place where you were meant to chill out and be cool and take it easy when someone was trying to actually fuck your girlfriend.

  ‘You can’t steal a woman,’ Misty said, reading his mind, making him start with surprise. ‘Don’t you know that yet? Haven’t you learned anything? You can’t steal a woman. A woman is not a wallet. You know what your trouble is, Terry?’

  Now she was making him tired. ‘Why don’t you tell me?’

  ‘All right then – you don’t want a strong, independent woman. You want the girl next door.’

  He almost took a step back. ‘What’s wrong with the girl next door?’

  Misty laughed in his face. ‘She’s a boring little cow.’

  He thought of his ex-girlfriend, the girl from the gin factory. Sally. The one he had left behind with his old life. He missed her tonight. He knew Sally wouldn’t be a sucker for Dag Wood. Sally liked Elton John. Especially Goodbye Yellow Brick Road.

  ‘There’s nothing wrong with the girl next door,’ he said.

  She shook her head, examined her nails. ‘You don’t want me to have a career,’ she said. ‘You can’t handle it.’

  It was his turn to laugh. ‘This is a career? Some old rock star jumping on your bones? That’s your idea of a career?’

  She almost snarled at him. ‘You don’t think Dag might be interested in my work? Did that even cross your mind? That he might want to look at my portfolio?’