Sweet Sorrow

by David Nicholls

  ‘So come back?’

  ‘I’m sorry, I can’t. I’m not fit for company.’

  ‘It’s not a company, it’s a co-operative!’ A little further. ‘Can I ask, why not?’

  I shrugged. ‘Bit blue, I suppose.’

  ‘And is staying home the answer?’

  ‘No, but neither is coming back.’

  ‘Maybe not. Unless it is.’

  ‘Is it really a disaster?’ I asked.

  ‘Technical issues. Your going hasn’t helped. Think about it, will you?’ We were back at Miles’ car now, the company jostling for the best seats. ‘I miss you. We all miss you.’

  ‘I don’t,’ said Helen.

  ‘Everyone except Helen misses you.’

  ‘The call’s at nine tomorrow,’ said George. ‘Fight rehearsal. In case you change your mind.’

  ‘No pressure,’ said Lucy.

  ‘Some pressure,’ said Alex.

  ‘I’m in the front,’ said Helen. ‘You’re dropping me home, yes?’

  ‘Me too,’ said Colin.

  ‘And me please, Miles,’ said Lucy.

  ‘I’m not a mini-cab,’ said Miles.

  Finally, only Alex and Fran were left. ‘What a lousy intervention that was,’ he said, embracing me then folding himself into the car. ‘See you tomorrow, Mr Algarve.’

  Miles turned the key in the ignition and Bob Marley’s ‘Three Little Birds’ began to play, and while they bickered and groaned and crammed themselves into every corner, Fran kissed me – ‘Tomorrow. Please?’ – and then clambered across their laps.

  I watched the laborious three-point turn, the car low on its axles, and waited for them to drive away. Turning back to the house, I saw Dad in the window. I went inside and closed the door.

  Canada, Malaga, Rimini, Brindisi

  Mum’s shopping bike was not made for hills like this, with its pram wheels and its three gears, each the same, the rattling basket and mudguards threatening to fall off with each turn of the pedals. On the shaded lane that led up to Fawley Manor, it felt like a treadmill, all effort, no discernible forward movement. Arriving late, I dumped the thing behind a marquee that I’d not seen before – a refreshment tent – and followed the sound of shouts and cries, crossing the courtyard and coming out between two great scaffolding structures, raked seating straight out of a high-school movie. I stopped in my tracks.

  In the three days since I’d been here, a small town had appeared, baked to a dusty white by the Italian sun, twisted and tumbling down. The great green lawn had disappeared beneath some rough, pale crumpled surface like the chalky fabric used to make a plaster cast, and on the street, a brawl was taking place with swords, real swords, flashing through the air as the combatants kicked up the dust, watched from above by the rest of the company, all in motion, shouting and stomping. On the walkway, Sam and Grace, our musicians, were thrashing away at snare drum and electrified mandolin. ‘A plague a’ both your houses!’ shouted Alex, laughing bitterly at the stage blood dripping from his hands. ‘They have made worms’ meat of me!’ and I could see the space on stage where I really ought to be.

  ‘Charlie! Oi, Charlie, up here!’ From the top row of the seating unit, Helen beamed down, then Chris and Chris, thumbs up.

  ‘Shhhh!’ said Alina, turning and seeing me. ‘Well, hello stranger!’

  ‘Charlie!’ shouted Ivor. ‘Charlie, my boy!’ On stage the action fell apart, and Alex started clapping with his bloody hands, then George, then the whole company, and then Polly was behind me – ‘I knew it, I knew you’d come back. Didn’t I say?’ and Fran, laughing, and Ivor, bounding up. ‘The prodigal returns. Charlie Lewis,’ he said, pumping me by the hand, ‘we’re all very pleased. Now, let’s get you into costume.’

  I fell back into it, the corny, self-conscious melodrama of putting on a play, all tantrums and surmountable disasters, ‘I can’t do this part’ and ‘the costume’s no good’ and ‘we’ll never be ready in time’. We worked long, long hours, and each hour brought with it another crisis, another explosion. Miles dared to give Alex notes and Alex gave notes back with added venom, and Lucy got carried away in the fight and poked Colin in the ear with her sword, and Polly kept forgetting her lines and Keith kept sneaking off to phone his wife and coming back in tears. Pulleys jammed and props disappeared and a sudden summer wind blew up, tugging at the sheets like sails, causing the scaffolding to sway alarmingly, and George thought he might have flu until Alina forbade it, and the performances were alternately too quiet, too loud, too fast, too slow, too big, too small, and in the gaps in between the crises and explosions we’d loll around, play cards or games of catch, work on our Italian tans, gossip and praise each other, sometimes sincerely, sometimes not. When she could, Fran would come and find me and sometimes we’d find a private place to kiss and talk – really talk – until it was almost like before. Despite the melodrama playing out in rehearsals, things were calmer between us now, the relief that follows a confession I suppose, and we felt so much older and wiser than the children we’d been five days before.

  And on the Thursday night at seven p.m., after singing rounds and speaking tongue-twisters, dressed in pale grey and powder blue like stylish ghosts, we all gathered on the lawn behind the stage for Ivor’s final big speech, variations on the theme of pulling together, listening to each other, the necessity of going for it.

  ‘This language, these words’ – this in his religious-experience voice – ‘these are the greatest words you’ll ever speak out loud, by the greatest poet the world has ever known. So relish them. And for goodness’ sake’ – contrived gameshow chuckle – ‘enjoy yourselves!’ There was a group hug. Break a leg! Not literally! We went to wait for our call, the boys and girls, getting ready in separate tents until, at half past seven …

  ‘Beginners to the stage, please! Beginners’ call.’

  I put on the spectacles that transformed me, magically, into Benvolio. On the way, I found Fran pacing, eyes screwed up tight, arms to the side, flicking out her fingers as she muttered to herself.

  ‘Hey,’ I said.

  ‘Hello.’

  ‘Can I talk to you or are you in the zone?’

  ‘Yeah, the completely-shitting-myself zone.’

  ‘Don’t shit yourself.’

  ‘You see! Suddenly everyone’s got notes. Listen …’ On the other side of the set, we could hear the murmur of voices, the bounce of planks on scaffolding.

  ‘Your mum and dad here?’

  ‘Uh-huh. Mum’s coming every night.’

  ‘She’s proud.’

  ‘Weird.’

  ‘Not weird. You’re going to be incredible.’

  ‘Thank you. You too. What do you think of this make-up?’ Her face had a powdery sheen, the tawny brown of old ladies’ tights. ‘Polly did it. I look like a mannequin in Debenhams.’

  ‘But under the lights …’

  ‘Yes, that’s what she said, then she put these two red dots in the corners of my eyes. Makes them look bigger, she said, but it looks like I’ve got a stye, a pair of styes. Conjunctivitis!’

  ‘Stay calm.’

  ‘Look!’ She blotted at her damp forehead with the back of her hand. ‘It’s coming off in clumps. It’s like gravy granules.’

  ‘Okay, beginners please!’ shouted Chris. ‘Beginners to the stage, now!’

  ‘Can I kiss you? Will it spoil your make-up?’

  ‘Sure. No tongue, I pray thee.’

  I kissed her lightly; she held my face and kissed me once again. ‘I’m so glad you came back,’ she said, then pushed me towards the curtained doorway where the others waited.

  The lights dimmed, the audience fell silent, we heard the hum of the electricity surging through the wires and a burning smell like dust on a light bulb. On stage, Lesley and John lounged in the Italian sun, and went into their business, thumbs and fish and maidenheads. ‘We’re off,’ whispered Alex at my side. Part, fools, put up your swords, I muttered, part, fools, put up your swords. There
was a hand on my back: Lucy, grinning. ‘Let’s do this thing!’ she said, and I put my hand on my sword – a sword! I had a sword – and she pushed me out into the light.

  Little Stars

  For a long time, I owned a video cassette of the show. We all had one, a souvenir, handed out to us the day after the last performance, the day on which we all turned up, hung-over and sad, to dismantle the set, and even as we took possession of our VHS, we knew that we’d never watch it. Three hours of amateur dramatics shot from too far away: what torture that would be, as dull and uninvolving as watching the nativity play of a child you’ve never met. ‘An adequate production,’ proclaimed the local Advertiser the following week, ‘with some patchy verse speaking and wildly uneven acting. Frances Fisher makes a toothsome Juliet, and Alex Asante is a charismatic Mercutio, but Romeo lacks charm. Three stars out of five.’

  But to be part of it, that was thrilling, and all the tensions and rivalries were forgotten as we tumbled through this thing, watching each other’s scenes, patting backs as actors returned to the wings like footballers who’d scored a goal – well done, nice work, amazing stuff, big laughs! When it was over, I threw myself into the sweaty hugging and over-praising along with everybody else. We were all amazing, and the audience over-praised us too, cheering and stomping their feet, so that we took far too many curtain calls, with people clattering down the steps and producing their car keys even before we’d left the stage.

  Friday night, of course, was pure anti-climax. ‘Fart, pools! Put up your swords!’ was Benvolio’s first line and things deteriorated from there. The Saturday matinee was disappointing too, and it seemed to me that being in a play was like hearing your favourite song, then hearing it again, and again until the magic was completely gone. Without the romance of the fading light, the matinee was flat and inept, a walkthrough in front of half-empty seats. There’s no atmosphere in a flaming torch on a warm August afternoon, and to make up for the lack of enchantment we took to declaiming at each other, like tourists shouting ‘Echo!’ into a canyon. ‘That,’ said George, watching Polly’s first Nurse scene from the wings, ‘is some big acting.’

  ‘Acting you can see from space,’ said Alex.

  But it was impossible not to succumb and, bellowing my way through my last big speech, I caught the eye of my sister in the second row, sticking two thumbs up, and saw Mum, eyes fixed on the floor, fingers pressed against her temples as if to dispel a migraine. ‘I hate matinees,’ said Miles, the seasoned pro. ‘It’s like having sex with the big light on,’ said Alex and even the virgins agreed that this was exactly what it was like. When it was over, finishing to polite applause, I trudged out to the refreshment tent and found Mum and Billie, frowns adjusting to smiles as I approached, Mum applauding with two fingers patted against the palm of her hand.

  ‘Well, that was quite something,’ said Mum.

  ‘Why did you come to the matinee? It’s better at night.’

  ‘Better? Surely, no. It was lovely, Charlie. And weren’t you good?’

  ‘You can really sword-fight, brother,’ said Billie. ‘I don’t think I’ve heard you speak so much in years.’

  ‘And didn’t his voice sound nice?’ said Mum. ‘I wish you talked that clearly all the time.’

  ‘Your girlfriend’s good,’ said Billie.

  ‘She was very good,’ said Mum, ‘and quite gorgeous. Talk about punching above your weight!’

  ‘Mum …’ said Billie.

  ‘What is it, your personality?’

  ‘Mum!’

  ‘I’m teasing him, I’m allowed to tease him. She might want to tone the make-up down. That’s my only criticism. Do we get to meet her?’

  ‘No, not today,’ I said. ‘We’ve got to go and run our lines.’

  We’d arranged to meet in the long break between the shows, slipping away after the matinee, cutting through the woods to the gatehouse – where else could we go? It was better now, less ceremonial, a reunion, and afterwards we lay face to face in the cool, dim room.

  ‘I don’t ever want to do anything except this.’

  ‘I think,’ she said, ‘after a while it gets a bit sore.’

  ‘I wouldn’t mind. I’d work through it.’

  ‘I know you would.’ We kissed. ‘Let’s just stay here then,’ she said. ‘Not bother going on tonight.’

  ‘I think they’d notice. You at least.’

  ‘Are you sad?’

  ‘About what?’

  ‘The last night. I always get a bit sad. All that work and it sort of … evaporates. You watch – at the party, it’s all going to get very emotional.’ We curled closer together, like a knot pulled tight. Still, I felt a shudder of unease and longed for reassurance but knew that, just as in a horror film, to express a fear out loud risked bringing it to life. Instead, we talked about the play, how she’d stumbled that afternoon in the scene where she thinks that Romeo, not Tybalt, has been killed.

  ‘I’m meant to think he’s dead, the great love of my life. When I get to that bit, I try to picture it, what I’d do if a person that I really loved was dead, and I’d be screaming, I’d be banging my head against the wall, and instead, in the play I’ve got to say, Can heaven be so envious? It’s a terrible line. What does it even mean?’

  But an idea had fixed in my head. ‘Who do you think of?’

  ‘What?’

  ‘In the scene, when you’re doing your acting.’

  ‘“Doing my acting”?’

  ‘Who do you imagine is dead?’

  She glanced at me, glanced away.

  ‘You.’

  ‘Not Miles?’

  ‘No, not Miles! You.’

  ‘So … you’re thinking about me on stage?’

  ‘Only sometimes.’

  ‘To upset yourself.’

  ‘It does sound weird, put like that.’

  ‘Me, but dead?’

  ‘Not just dead. I think happy stuff about you too.’ Perhaps I smiled. ‘Don’t get cocky,’ she said, ‘or I’ll start thinking about someone different.’

  ‘When else?’

  ‘Can we change the subject?’

  ‘Okay. But when else do you think about me, when you’re saying the lines?’

  ‘I’m not going to tell you! You’ll have to watch and see.’ We kissed, then to move on, she added, ‘Monday, you can take me out for that famous coffee. I’ve got a while until college.’

  ‘I think we’re a bit past the coffee stage now, don’t you?’

  ‘We can still do it. We’ve still got things to talk about, haven’t we? More if anything. Nothing’s changed, not changed in a bad way. Still love you.’

  ‘You too.’

  ‘Well, then we’re fine.’ We kissed and in a gesture out of a film, she reached for her watch, her arm far behind her, her neck elongated, her fingers patting on the floor, and in that moment, that gesture, I don’t think I could have loved her more.

  ‘Christ, the time – we’ve got to go. Are you ready? Last time ever?’

  But back in the dressing rooms, all anyone talked about was the party. Ivor had insisted soft drinks only, that it was perfectly possible to have fun with soft drinks, and so before curtain-up we gathered in the boys’ dressing room to itemise our stash, drawn from the dregs of the drinks cabinet – limoncello, cooking sherry, curdled advocaat, sparkling red wine – concealing the bottles and containers in shrubs and hedges around the gardens like squirrels hiding nuts for winter. At seven p.m. we warmed up, sang songs, group hugged, Ivor made another of his impassioned speeches – we were to go for it – and we began.

  There were many parents there that night, the famous parents whose faults and failings we’d itemised in all those intense conversations, and during Friar Laurence’s speech, we peered into the audience from the wings to point them out.

  ‘There they are! Front row!’ whispered Alex. ‘I told them not to go in the front row.’

  ‘They’re proud!’ said Fran.

  ‘They’re bored,�
� said Alex. ‘Look at my father, trying to read his programme.’ Beside him sat my father, leaning forward, chin cupped in his hands. I stood and watched him all the way through Fran’s ‘fiery-footed steeds’, his head bopping just a little, at the jazz of the words I imagined, and I watched him as we waited for everyone’s favourite line.

  ‘Here it comes,’ said Helen.

  On stage, Fran stood in a cone of light.

  ‘Give me my Romeo,’ she said, ‘and when I shall die, take him and cut him out in little stars/And he will make the face of heaven so fine/That all the world will be in love with night.’

  I watched Dad grin at this, eyes widening at each twist on the idea – to be cut out in little stars, imagine – and I felt as if I was in possession of a great secret.

  I did my thing too, trudging through it workman-like, said my last line – ‘This is the truth, or let Benvolio die!’ – and left the stage, with nothing left to do but fill an empty space in the final scene. In the meantime, we gathered in the wings and watched whatever scenes we could. ‘Aren’t they good?’ whispered Alex during Paris and Juliet’s humiliating courtship, and I wondered who else could see the pain of George’s kiss on Fran’s cheek, the awful knowledge that he isn’t loved but goes on loving just the same.

  And then everything seemed to accelerate, and Paris and Romeo were fighting, and Paris was dead – Oh, I am slain! – and Romeo was drinking poison – O true Apothecary, thy drugs are quick! – a line that had always made us giggle, but not tonight because, oh God, now Juliet was waking up and looking at his corpse with this terrible, blank stare. The dagger in her hand had a retractable blade. We’d all played with it, our favourite toy, and surely the audience could see the artifice of it, how ridiculous it was. Oh, happy dagger! – you could hear the spring rattle in the hilt. But when I sought out my father in the front row I could see his hands clapped to his face, pulling down on his cheeks, eyes glinting at the awful bitter tragedy of it all.

  Time for our last entrance, Chris handing us our flaming torches so that we could stand and soberly confront the repercussions of our feud. The long, prosaic scenes after Juliet’s death had always seemed fantastically dull to me, but this was the last night and, following Ivor’s instructions to ‘go for it’, Polly’s Nurse was practically hyperventilating with grief. We sang the minor-key madrigal we’d been taught, the Capulets embracing the Montagues, Montagues, Capulets. The dead bodies were carried aloft, Miles’ handsome, sweaty head dangling over my shoulder as we processed through the audience. Look them in the eye, Ivor had told us, because this play was still incredibly relevant to audiences today, even if we’d be hard pressed to explain exactly why.