Boys on the Brain

by Jean Ure

  It was really embarrassing, especially as there were a great many German and Japanese tourists eagerly pointing things out to one another and talking in knowledgeable tones about the various exhibits. My only comfort was that Harry had not come with us as he would have been a thousand times worse even than Mum. Who was quite bad enough!

  Some of the exhibits, I must admit, were rather rude, but still I don’t think Mum should have made the remarks that she did. There was one in particular, which I would just die rather than mention to Sean! Waggling Willies is the title I would give it. I mean that is what it was. Mum took one look and went, “Oh! The last Tory cabinet,” which made a man standing nearby give a loud snort of laughter. When I asked Mum what she meant she just smirked and said, “Well, they couldn’t keep their trousers up.”

  Honestly! In an art gallery.

  There was another one that wasn’t rude exactly, as it was very tastefully done, except that I am not sure that very young children could be allowed to watch it.

  This was a film of two men, without any clothes on, sort of wrestling each other (amongst other things). You had to walk in a darkened tunnel to watch it, and I was quite glad that the lights were dim so that no one could see my face, because as usual I lit up like a beacon. This is so puerile of me. The human form is nothing to be ashamed of.

  Actually, it was Mum I was ashamed of. In this loud and scoffing tone of voice she said, “Well! Whatever turns you on.” I could have died. I mean, everyone else, all the Germans and the Japanese, were standing there watching in postures of immense seriousness. All I could hope was that perhaps they might think Mum’s expression had been one of artistic appreciation.

  I do not pretend to have understood everything we saw today but at least I tried, which is more than Mum did. The things on which she poured her scorn are actually quite challenging, as they make you think. You ask yourself, what is it, and why, and what does it mean?

  Harry, when I told him this, said, “And what do you answer yourself?”

  But he was not being serious. He never is.

  I am quite cross with Harry, as a matter of fact. I am cross with both of them. I have come to the conclusion that I live with Philistines.

  When we got home, Harry was already here. He is taking time off to be with Mum and is going to be here the whole week, which ordinarily I wouldn’t mind as I quite like having him about the place, but not if he is going to make fun of me. We never managed to find Sean’s water lily painting on account of Mum having had enough and wanting to come home, but I did find a postcard of it and also bought some other postcards to remind me of our visit. I showed the cards to Harry, mistakenly thinking he would be impressed, but after holding them at all silly angles, both upside down and sideways, and squinting first with one eye and then the other, all he could find to say was, “Call this art?”

  Considerably annoyed I retorted, “What would you call it?”

  Harry said “Me?” and gave one of his coarse guffaws. “I’d call it more like fart!”

  Mum then told him about the waggling willies and Harry said, “Well, stone me! I’ll waggle my willy any time you like.”

  Oh, yes? And who does he think would want to see his saggy old parts?

  Tuesday

  Went round to see Pilch. Found her fretting at herself with a tape measure, saying once again that she is too fat.

  I said, “What’s brought this on? I thought you’d got over all that nonsense.”

  Pilch said, “It’s not nonsense. Look at me!” And she seized great handfuls of her flesh and squeezed. “Ugh! It’s revolting!”

  I said, “It is not revolting, it just happens to be the way that you are made.” Like she has curly hair and freckles and a tip-tilty nose. I said, “It’s what nature has programmed you for.”

  Pilch said, “Well, in that case I am going to deprogramme myself! Starting as of right now!” And she angrily waved away the bar of KitKat that I had brought for her.

  I think it is very sad that someone of Pilch’s intelligence should allow herself to be pressurised into changing the natural shape of her body. But it is no use my saying anything. She actually watched me eat my way through two bars of KitKat. She wasn’t even tempted when I held out the last finger. This is serious! I have never known Pilch not be tempted by a KitKat before. Cheese, of course, will be the real test.

  She asked me, while I was munching, what I did yesterday, and I told her about going to the Tate Modern and Mum’s ridiculous behaviour. I also told her about Harry and his crude scoffing. I said, “He is not at all a cultured kind of person. In fact he is quite coarse,” and I gave her the story of the underpants.

  Pilch listened in wide-eyed silence. At the end she said, “Did you see anything?”

  I said, “What do you mean, did I see anything? I saw his big hairy bum, if that is what you mean.”

  “Oh, you mean he had his back to you,” said Pilch.

  I said, “Yes, and I saw his bum cheeks pobbling up and down every time he tried to get his foot in.”

  “Like this?”

  Pilch jumped up, giggling, and began to mime being Harry.

  “Oops! Ollocks. Oops! Ollocks.”

  I said, “It’s not very funny, Mum having a boyfriend who can’t even manage to get into his own underpants.”

  “I think it is,” giggled Pilch, hopping about on one leg. “Oops! Ollocks. Missed again!”

  I didn’t want to laugh, but I just couldn’t help it. It ended up with us both hopping round the room going oops ollocks.

  We have agreed to meet up tomorrow and go to Dandy’s. Mum’s record might just have come in! As Pilch said, “You wouldn’t want to miss it.”

  I know they have our telephone numbers, but these things can easily be mislaid.

  Wednesday

  Went into Dandy’s but Sean wasn’t there. And to think I spent ages looking through my scanty and meagre wardrobe for something to put on. Not that I believe clothes to be that important, I mean personally I would be quite happy if everybody wore jeans, but until that happens it is a case of having to find the right clothes for the right occasion, which can be somewhat bothersome as well as time-consuming.

  Thought: why can’t we have fur like animals? It would solve all our problems! Bare skin is really not practical.

  Tom was there and I had to listen to a long and dreary conversation between him and Pilch about hang-gliding, as sure enough Pilch has been to the library and found one of her famous books, How To Hang-Glide in a Thousand Easy Lessons, or some such thing. After a while I grew bored and wandered upstairs to look through the records, but it wasn’t such fun doing it on my own, without Sean to talk to, especially as they were all the same ones that I’d looked through last time. So I went back down to the ground floor to find that Tom and Pilch were still at it. Can hang-gliding really be that fascinating???

  I didn’t like to ask where Sean was in case it seemed like I’d only gone there in the hope of seeing him, rather than to look for Mum’s record, but fortunately Tom told me anyway. He said, “Sean’s at the dentist. He’ll be here after lunch.”

  Oh! It is so annoying. I couldn’t go back after lunch as I had faithfully faithfully promised Mum that I would help with the decorating. Harry is doing the ceilings while me and Mum do the walls. Mum bribed me by saying in wistful tones that she really would love the place to look nice for her birthday. If you ask me, that is emotional blackmail! But there was no way I could wriggle out of it, especially after she came with me on Monday. Even if she did embarrass me by her behaviour. I know she doesn’t do it on purpose. Embarrass me, I mean. She just doesn’t know any better.

  Thursday

  Pilch rang up this morning in a bit of a state to tell me that one of her boobs was bigger than the other.

  I said, “How much bigger?”

  Pilch said, “One and a half centimetres” if you took the tape measure up one side and down the other.

  One and a half centimetres didn’t sou
nd like a whole lot to me but she had obviously worked herself into a state about it, thinking it was some kind of hideous deformity that was going to blight her entire existence. I said soothingly that I would go round and look as soon as I’d finished painting the sitting-room wall.

  “How long will that take?” said Pilch.

  I said, “Not long. Don’t worry! They might have grown the same size by the time I’m through.”

  “It’s not funny,” moaned Pilch. “I’m unbalanced!”

  Oh, dear! How she does exaggerate. It’s like the time she pulled on her hooded top back to front and screamed that she’d gone blind. I thought she was joking, but she assured me afterwards that it had been a nasty moment… “Everything suddenly went dark!” She really gets stressed. I think she is prone to be a bit neurotic.

  However, you can’t leave your best friend to suffer agonies so immediately after lunch I went whizzing round to see what I could do.

  “Right,” I said, when the bedroom door was safely barricaded against invasion by tweenies. “What exactly is the problem?”

  “I told you!” wailed Pilch. “My right boob is bigger than my left one!”

  Quite honestly they both looked the same size to me, but Pilch insisted on getting out her tape measure and proving irrefutably (a good word!) that there was almost a centimetre and a half difference.

  “It’s not as if anyone would notice,” I said.

  Pilch said, “Not at the moment, maybe! But what if they grow?”

  I told her that they would grow “in proportion” but she refused to be comforted. She kept saying that it was abnormal and that she was a freak and would never be able to go topless sunbathing.

  “Topless sunbathing’s bad for you anyway,” I said.

  Pilch yelled. “That’s not the point! How would you like it if you were a freak?”

  I said, “Well, for all I know I might be. I just don’t go round measuring myself.”

  “Probably because you haven’t got anything to measure,” said Pilch.

  This happens to be true, but I do think it was uncalled for. Pilch, to be fair, was immediately contrite. She said, “Oh, Pilch, I’m sorry! You can’t help being flat chested.”

  I said, “I am not totally flat. I think something may be happening.”

  “Really?” said Pilch, and she walked round, eyeing me critically from every angle. “Well! I don’t think you’ll ever be a Marilyn Monroe,” she said.

  I know that. I take after Mum, who is skinny as a rail.

  Pilch said, however, that I should not despair.

  “There are things you can do. I read in this book… A Hundred Ways to Boost your Bust. There are all these exercises. They probably wouldn’t ever turn you into a D cup -” here she had the nerve to giggle “- but it might give you something to put in a bra!”

  That did it. Loftily I informed her that I was quite happy for my bosom to develop as nature had intended, thank you very much.

  “Oh, well, yes, of course,” gushed Pilch, obviously realising she had offended me with her ill-mannered tittering. “I wasn’t suggesting - I mean! Who cares anyway? It’s not as if - well! I mean! At least,” she said kindly, “you are not lopsided.”

  Generously, in the circumstances - though she had apologised, sort of - I said, “But at least you have a figure.”

  “I’m fat,” said Pilch.

  Of course I told her that she wasn’t, which I don’t think she is, I mean plump is not the same as fat, but she still insisted that she was.

  She said, “I’m fat and I’ve got odd boobs!”

  And then she told me how she’d been looking through this paper that her dad takes and they had a page called Mix ‘n Match where people that want to meet other people (usually members of the opposite sex) send in photographs of themselves and say what sort of person they would like to meet up with.

  “There was this one woman,” said Pilch, “underneath her photograph she’d written that she had huge gravity-defying knockers.”

  “Did she?” I said.

  “Yes! Enormous,” said Pilch. “Out here!” And she made big balloon shapes in front of her.

  I said, “I wonder how she kept them up?”

  “Well, they were gravity-defying,” said Pilch, which brought on a fit of infantile snickering from both of us.

  We ended up standing side by side in front of Pilch’s wardrobe mirror, comparing our shapes. We have never done this before! It was quite instructive. These are the conclusions we came to: I am more elegante, but Pilch is more cuddly. As to which of us is the more sexy, well! We agreed that this would depend on what a person is looking for.

  One man’s meat is another man’s poison.

  Anyway, she seems to have stopped worrying about her boobs being different sizes, so I feel I have fulfilled my duties as a friend.

  We are going to meet in town tomorrow and go to Dandy’s as it is Mum’s birthday on Saturday and this will be my last chance to find her album! If I could find it I would give her the two, and then I could go and look for another one for Christmas!

  I have a horrid feeling I may be developing another spot as I have this great red blodge on my chin. I have smothered it in tea tree oil, which you are supposed to dilute but I didn’t. I thought it might be more effective if I used it full strength. At the moment it is stinging like crazy, but I am not going to touch it! I have made this vow: I WILL NOT PICK. It is purely a matter of willpower.

  Friday

  Pulled out the whole of my wardrobe and fell into a state of total despair. I have absolutely nothing that is worth wearing! Ended up - as usual - putting on a pair of jeans. Over the top I wore my red bomber jacket with (fake!) fur collar, an outfit that always makes me feel butch, so to counteract the butchness I nipped into Mum’s room and snitched a snazzy hat that she has, high-crowned with a floppy brim.

  Mum, fortunately, was out shopping with Harry. Not that she would have minded me wearing her hat but I just didn’t want any of her embarrassing remarks. “Oh yes, and who are you going to meet? The Queen?” That kind of stuff. It curls me up! I could hardly say that I was attempting to look half-way decent in the hope that Sean would keep a watch out for her album for her Christmas present. I mean, it would defeat the whole object of the exercise. It is supposed to be a secret!

  Pilch was bad enough. “Oh! Groovy!” she said, casting an eye over Mum’s hat. She could talk! I noticed that she was wearing make-up, which is a thing she normally never bothers with. It made me immediately wish that I had done the same, as my chin when I woke up this morning was glowing bright red like a beacon. Felt very self-conscious about it, though Pilch assured me it wasn’t anywhere near as bad as I thought. All very well for her! But I know she meant well.

  Went into Dandy’s and Sean was there! He said that Mum’s record had still not come in, but he suggested we went upstairs anyway, as it was, quite coincidentally, almost time for his break.

  Tom had just had his, so Pilch stayed on the ground floor while Sean and I went up to the fourth, where he bought me a Coke and we shared a packet of crisps. He told me about his visit to the dentist and in return I told him about my visit to the Tate Modern and how Mum had embarrassed me.

  To my relief Sean said that his mum is just the same, and his dad as well. He said his dad is a football fanatic and thinks that art is poncy.

  “So does Harry,” I said; and I told him about more like fart than art, which made him laugh.

  “But Mum was really terrible,” I said. “I just wanted to dig a hole and bury myself!”

  And then, before I knew it, I found myself telling him about the Waggling Willies. Not that I actually said waggling willies. I wasn’t brave enough for that! What I actually said was “She kept making fun of everything, you know? Like that one that was like the last Tory Cabinet?”

  Sean looked puzzled and said, “Last Tory Cabinet?”

  “Couldn’t keep their trousers up,” I said. “Let everything hang out?”

&
nbsp; And then he got it. He said, “Oh! That one!” and made these little waggling motions with a finger, so that I giggled and choked myself and got all hot and red and thought, “Why do I say these things if I am not mature enough to do so without blushing?

  Pathetic! I am just pathetic.

  We had come to the end of Sean’s break and were about to go back downstairs when he suddenly said, “If you’re not doing anything tomorrow night, I suppose you wouldn’t like to come to a party? If you’re not doing anything, that is.”

  I gulped, and went furiously red for the second time, and immediately stammered that unfortunately I couldn’t as it was Mum’s birthday and we were going out for a meal, which made Sean also go pink as probably he thought I was simply making an excuse. He muttered, “Not to worry, I just thought I’d ask.” So then I felt dreadful because it is bad enough embarrassing yourself without embarrassing someone else as well.

  As we made our way downstairs Sean told me how the party was being held in the shop and was to celebrate Dandy’s quarter centenary. It was only then that I noticed the balloons, and the streamers, and the spray-canned message on one of the mirrors: 25 YEARS OLD ON SATURDAY! Sometimes I think that I am not very observant.

  I said, “I would have loved to come! Honestly!”

  Sean said that he should have asked me sooner, though even if he had it would still have been Mum’s birthday.

  Feeling glum and inadequate I went to collect Pilch, who was sprawled across the counter talking to Tom.

  “Are you coming?” I said.

  “Yes, I suppose so.” She peeled herself away.

  “See you tomorrow,” said Tom.

  “Tomorrow?” I said, as we got outside. “Are we coming in again tomorrow?”

  “The party,” said Pilch. “Didn’t Sean ask you?”

  “You mean, you’re going?” I said.

  Pilch said yes, she was.

  “But we don’t go to parties!” I said.