A Christmas Gift

by Sue Moorcroft

  She settled down to enjoy the much quieter scene two, carried by Kerry Christmas, Uncle Jones and his gang, who, on performance nights, would be dressed in black suits and trilbies, just in case the audience was in doubt that these were gangsters achieving wealth by stealth.

  Scenes two and three went fairly smoothly, though the Christmas tree proved just as awkward to move on as it had to move off.

  Finally, it was time to applaud the end of the first act. ‘Well done, everybody! That was awesome,’ Georgine called, adding a few whoops for good measure. ‘I think that went brilliantly, don’t you? We’ve earned a nice long break. We overran by ten minutes but each scene change took ten minutes instead of five. We’ve got Saturday and Sunday to refine scene shifting—’

  To her surprise, Oggie walked in and uncharacte‌ristically ignoring the fact that Georgine was speaking, headed straight for Joe and whispered something in his ear.

  Horror swept over Joe’s face, and he and Oggie, looking neither left nor right, marched across the studio and out of the doors.

  ‘Oh-kay.’ Georgine scrabbled to re-establish her train of thought. ‘Why don’t you guys tell us how you think it went?’ This meant all she had to do was nod and make notes while others fed back. It left spare mental capacity for her to wonder what the hell was going on with Joe this time.

  She wasn’t left wondering for long. While all connected with A Very Kerry Christmas had been closeted in the studio theatre, the rest of the college had been set abuzz. Students arrived in the cafeteria whispering, checking phones and making exaggeratedly agog faces. Georgine frowned as she tried to listen in. It was definitely something to do with Joe. Surely these eddies of excitement weren’t still over the members of The Hungry Years turning up on Monday and outing him as JJ Blacker? Her heart gave an uncomfortable thump at the unhappy memory of the chasm it had opened between her and Joe on the very day they’d woken in the same bed.

  Avril and Vix had their heads together over a phone, so Georgine made a beeline for their table without even pausing to collect her lunch. Disregarding good manners, she craned to read over their shoulders. Phrases such as victim of neglect and hunger and deprivation, then member of a gang jumped out at her. And JJ Blacker.

  ‘Oh, no,’ she breathed, plucking the phone from Avril’s grasp and scrolling furiously back to the beginning of the article.

  ‘Help yourself, don’t mind us,’ Vix said, exchanging arched-eyebrow looks with Avril.

  Through numb lips Georgine muttered, ‘Sorry.’

  As she read in horrified silence, Avril said more sympathetically, ‘It’s awful, isn’t it? Talk about from rags to riches. Poor Joe.’

  ‘Or rich Joe,’ put in Vix. ‘Or even Rich Joe.’ She drew a capital R in the air. ‘Did you get the bit that said he owns these premises?’

  Numbly, Georgine passed the phone back. Repelled by the nudging and gossiping that was going on everywhere she looked, she bought a large coffee and an omelette and retired to the currently empty studio theatre to search out the article on her own phone and read it all again. Knowing of his desire to put the past behind him, she could only imagine how Joe must be feeling

  Errol, Keeley and Maddie returned ahead of the students, all obviously discussing the article that had exposed Joe’s past to the world. ‘Poor guy,’ Maddie said, shaking her head. Keeley sighed.

  Errol looked grave. ‘But when the police have to get involved it can’t look good for Acting Instrumental.’

  ‘The police?’ Georgine scrambled to her feet, catching her plate so it spun round and tipped her remaining half omelette onto the floor.

  The students began to trickle back in as Errol muttered, ‘Journalists wanting to come into our grounds, apparently. Not easily dissuaded until a patrol car hove into view.’

  Then Fern came in and handed Georgine Joe’s run-through. ‘Oggie says to tell you no Joe this afternoon.’ Her thin eyebrows waggled up to her hairline.

  ‘Right.’ Georgine took the sheets of paper. The level of noise was rising with every student who arrived. She glanced around and saw the tutors had their heads together too, probably discussing what Joe’s landlord status might mean for the college, and anger bubbled up inside her.

  Impulsively, she marched into the middle of the room and clapped her hands like a school marm. ‘Right!’ she called. ‘Phones away, please, and let’s concentrate—’ She was about to say ‘on the show’ but somehow, ‘On our own business!’ came out of her mouth instead.

  Surprised looks flashed around the room while she waited with folded arms and her deepest frown for phones to be stowed. ‘Well done,’ she said, as if the students were in infant school. Then she remembered herself and collected her manners from wherever she seemed to have left them. She consulted the running order. ‘Band Two on the music stage, please. Kerry Christmas, off stage left. Uncle Jones and gang, off stage right. We don’t have the luxury of correct lighting today so we’ll have to imagine the lights going down to show the audience that it’s late at night. Musical Director, bring the band in, please.’

  And the opportunity for gossip was lost, at least for the moment, as they plunged back into the show.

  At the end of the afternoon the run-through was declared a success. The students went home beaming; Georgine worked through her notes with Errol, Maddie and Keeley.

  At five thirty Acting Instrumental was quiet apart from cleaning staff somewhere nearby. She gathered up her things and broached a winter evening that sparkled with frost beneath the campus lights. She threw her bag in her car, then stood at the open door in thought. A prickly, unsettled feeling had plagued her all afternoon, the kind that comes with the knowledge of a wrong.

  She glanced at the gates from which, apparently, the police had moved journalists. Quiet and calm.

  She took out her phone. No messages. Though she’d been advised by Fern that Joe wouldn’t be around for act two, if someone was reporting to Georgine she had a right to expect direct communication. Matters were complicated, however, by Joe being a volunteer, as well as his owning the very ground she stood upon. And because they’d been to bed together.

  She weighed the phone in her hand.

  A voice came across the freezing air. ‘Everything all right?’

  Georgine turned to find Don, the site supervisor, regarding her quizzically, hair and moustache as silver as the frost. ‘I’m fine.’ She closed the car door. ‘Just deciding what to do.’

  ‘Too much to think of at this time of the year.’ Don began to move off. ‘Me and the missus bought tickets for the Christmas show. Tuesday, I think it is.’

  Automatically, Georgine thanked him for his support. ‘The students have been working really hard so I’m sure you’ll enjoy it.’

  Don waved as he headed for the main building, his breath a cloud in the air.

  Making up her mind, Georgine put away her phone and turned on her heel. When she left the tarmac the grass felt crisp beneath her feet and, carefully mounting the ungritted steps, she was soon standing at the outer door to the upstairs apartments, pressing the button on the entry system. A beeping acknowledged her action. The sound stopped, but nobody spoke via the intercom.

  Did that mean Joe was home but choosing not to respond? She took an uncertain step back. But then the door opened and Joe stood in the light, pale and solemn, and she realised she hadn’t rehearsed what to say.

  For several seconds they gazed at each other. Then Joe stood back to let her down the corridor to his apartment.

  It was much warmer indoors, but Georgine didn’t feel welcome enough to take off her coat. Joe waited silently for her to speak, his hands stuffed in his pockets. She cleared her throat. ‘I just came to check …’ She found she wasn’t sure what she came to check on, but her words seemed sufficient to relax his expression slightly.

  He beckoned her through into the sitting area, throwing himself on the sofa. Reluctant to get too close, Georgine perched on the edge of a chair, unzipping her coat but stil
l not taking it off. ‘I saw the article. It’s horrible. Exactly what you didn’t want.’

  His bitter laugh suggested she didn’t know the half of it. ‘Yeah. Your prediction about the press at the gates came true.’

  ‘But I’m sorry it did.’ She glanced at a pad and pen lying on the coffee table.

  He leant forward and snatched up the pad. ‘I was writing a list. I can’t get over the thought that the story must’ve been leaked by someone who knows me well.’

  ‘Oh! How the story got to be in the Daily Snoop hadn’t even occurred to me.’

  He gave her a sardonic look. ‘You can’t be betrayed by someone who doesn’t know the story, can you? I thought that it might be Billy, our lead singer. He might have done it for the money because he has a certain lifestyle to uphold. Or for revenge because we fell out. Or for publicity for The Hungry Years that doesn’t hurt him. But we’ve been together since college. I just can’t believe he’d do it, and we’ve talked through our difficulties, he came with the rest of the band on Monday … Though I’ve still had the phone in my hand about twenty times, ready to ask him.

  ‘Could it be Mum?’ he went on. ‘That doesn’t fit with the content of the article. Mum’s cousin who lives with her? Why would she bite the hand that feeds, or at least houses, her? Garrit doesn’t know about the band, I’m pretty sure. It has to be someone who knows me past and present, or I’d think it was one of the students. Oggie or Chrissy? No way.’ He tossed the pad back on the table. It bounced off an empty coffee cup, altering its trajectory. And it landed at Georgine’s feet.

  She picked it up to return it.

  And that’s when she saw her own name. Georgine. Suddenly got money. Pissed with me about the band. Stupefied, she stared at the sprawling, loopy writing. She was on his list! When she eventually lifted her gaze she saw dismay written all over his face. ‘You suspect me?’ she asked blankly.

  His head tipped wearily. ‘I don’t want to but, frankly, I had to consider it. The day after you had your hands and mouth on me you cut me dead for choosing not to confide in you, without even asking my reasons.’

  Stung, she tossed the pad back across the table. ‘I didn’t – still don’t – understand why you’d hide it.’

  ‘Because I deal with things my own way,’ he snapped. ‘You didn’t tell me about what happened with your dad’s company until it was forced on you, but I didn’t take it as a personal insult.’

  ‘But that was something I was ashamed of! It’s different.’

  Again, the bitter laugh. ‘How come you get to set the benchmark of what has to be shared before a couple sleep together?’

  Georgine climbed to her feet. ‘How come you do?’

  That at least gave him pause. Surprise gleamed in his eyes. ‘Fair point,’ he acknowledged.

  She glanced again at his pad. ‘What makes you think I have money?’

  ‘I came to speak to you yesterday and you were on the phone, telling your ex about it. I made myself scarce when I realised I was eavesdropping.’

  She felt her cheeks heat up. ‘My grandmother gave me some money. I’ve used it to pay off the bills.’

  ‘Right.’ He screwed his eyes up and rubbed them. ‘Sorry.’

  ‘No problem,’ she said stiffly, and left without saying goodbye. As she all but ran to her car, she shivered, but not entirely with cold. Joe had been so bleak. And some of that unhappiness had come from disappointment in her.

  She unlocked the car and jumped in, starting up the engine, letting the blowers slowly clear the frost on the windscreen. It did nothing for the chunk of ice that had settled in her gut, though.

  Until now she’d been pretty confident it was Joe in the wrong for keeping from her something she saw as important. But now … well, he was right about one thing. She’d never asked for his reasons.

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  Joe rose early on Friday, focused on Saturday’s get-in at the Raised Curtain, which was going to be crazy. Today every prop, costume, instrument and lead had to be assembled ready to be driven to the theatre in the morning, or consigned to the appropriate student.

  Georgine was on his mind too, and had been all night. He’d never expected her to see his list and he’d only added her name when he’d been beating up his brain to consider every possibility, no matter how unlikely. Now he was ashamed of the way he’d talked to her and couldn’t stop reliving the shock and hurt he’d seen in her face.

  Maybe he’d be left alone by the outside world today to pick up the threads of the peaceful existence he’d enjoyed since early November and he could apologise to Georgine. There was her car in the car park as he hurried through a wind with an arctic edge to it.

  He was frustrated in his plan to head straight for her room, however, by Oggie catching him in the foyer. ‘Got a minute, Joe?’ He turned and headed to his room without giving Joe much chance to object.

  Joe found himself tutting like a thwarted kid. ‘Busy day,’ he pointed out from just inside Oggie’s door.

  ‘Must be if you can’t even sit down.’ Oggie busied himself at his coffee machine.

  Faced with playing things Oggie’s way or walking out on the conversation, Joe dragged off his coat and flopped into a chair while Oggie made two cups of coffee and placed one on Joe’s side of the desk.

  Oggie’s eyes twinkled as he took his own seat as if Joe’s petulance amused him. ‘So. Fill me in on your intentions.’

  ‘Today?’ Joe picked up the coffee cup and inhaled the fragrant steam.

  ‘For the near future,’ Oggie suggested.

  ‘Today: assembling everything for the weekend’s get-in, dress rehearsal and show. Weekend: get-in and tech rehearsal. Monday: dress rehearsal—’

  ‘In short, you’re going to stick it out here until the show’s over. And then?’

  Joe sniffed the coffee. ‘I don’t know,’ he admitted honestly.

  ‘OK.’ Oggie warmed his hands around his coffee cup, frowning. ‘Despite you being the owner of these premises, my first duty is to this educational institution, its students and staff.’

  ‘Yeah.’ Joe drank a little more coffee. It was strong with not much sugar, just as he liked it, yet it was turning to ashes on his tongue. ‘Want me to leave?’ He managed to sound as if it was no big deal but, inside, his stomach had turned to stone.

  Oggie pursed his lips. ‘I wonder if the decision will make itself?’

  Joe saw the compassion in his friend’s eyes and his stone stomach began to sink. Oggie was warning him.

  Joe had to drink again before he could reply. ‘I won’t do anything to harm Acting Instrumental.’ At the idea that he, who’d helped bring life to this pocket-sized further education college, might unwittingly bring it trouble dimmed his enthusiasm for the day. He rose. ‘Let’s see how things pan out. I’ll keep as low a profile as possible. If it doesn’t look as if it’s working …’ What? He wasn’t sure.

  Oggie gave a nod, but sweetened it with a smile. ‘Thank you.’

  When Joe finally reached Georgine’s room, it was empty. He toured the props and costumes rooms and saw signs of recent activity in open boxes, so headed for the big rehearsal room where all was to be assembled. There he found her with a fist full of lists.

  ‘Hey,’ he said, stepping into the room, cavernous without its usual complement of students.

  She regarded him warily. ‘I wasn’t sure if I’d see you today.’ She didn’t smile.

  He threw his coat on a chair. ‘I thought you’d appreciate another pair of hands.’

  ‘Yes.’ But she hesitated. ‘On the other hand, you’ve already broken the back of this job by packing and labelling the boxes ready to be checked today, so if you want personal time …’

  ‘I’ve never wanted it less. But if you don’t feel you can work with me …’

  Her eyebrow quirked. ‘As if I’d be so wussy. If you could bring prop boxes one to six through, that would be great.’

  ‘Right.’ He glanced around the room just to
double-check they were alone. ‘After I apologise. I was out of order last night and unnecessarily rude. I don’t want things to be any more difficult between us than they have to be.’

  She regarded him levelly. ‘Thank you. There’s lots to do, so let’s get going.’

  He refused to be dismissed. ‘I’m sorry you found it disconcerting not to know about The Hungry Years. In fact, perhaps if I’d been less secretive the impact of the past few days would have been less awful.’ He recounted his conversation with Oggie. ‘JJ Blacker’s in danger of spoiling things for Joe Blackthorn, yet I’m both people.’

  She smiled faintly. ‘I suppose that once you’ve been Superman you’re never a hundred per cent Clark Kent.’

  He moved closer, letting his voice drop. ‘Clark Kent had it easy. Everybody seemed to understand that he must have his reasons for keeping his other identity separate.’ Then, before he gave in to a sudden compulsion to plead for her understanding, he left for the props room to collect boxes.

  They worked steadily all morning, with students and staff helping out or popping in to collect a slip that would remind them what they’d signed up to bring in the way of instruments or clothes. There was a lot of laughter, a definite buzz, and Joe began to relax and enjoy it, especially when not a single person asked him a question about being a rock star. But then, over lunch in the noisy cafeteria, he checked his phone to find a text from his mother.

  Debs: Garrit came to the door!!! He thinks I have dosh, now he knows who you are. He says he’s coming back this afternoon ‘to remind me’ to get money for him. :-(

  ‘Shit!’ Joe shoved his chair back and many eyes, including Georgine’s, swivelled his way. Not wanting to draw attention to yet something else going wrong he looked at her and gestured with his head in the direction of the exit. Georgine caught up with him in the corridor.