The Stag and Hen Weekend

by Mike Gayle

  There was a silence and then Simon stood up. ‘Mate . . . I’m going to tell you something and I want you to listen hard, okay?’

  Phil nodded. ‘Okay.’

  Simon put a hand on each of Phil’s shoulders and stared into his eyes. ‘Stop being an idiot.’

  ‘But—’

  Simon held his hand up in the air. ‘No ifs, no buts, just stop it and stop it now. Helen’s mad about you, any fool can see that, and all that’s going to happen if you go down this road is that you’ll drive yourself mental and ruin a perfectly good weekend away for no reason. Stay clear of Sanne, don’t give Aiden Reid airspace in your head, and stop being an idiot, okay?’

  Even though the problems between them were far from resolved Phil felt relieved to have his best man back on side. He looked at his watch and then at Simon. ‘Hungry?’

  ‘Starving,’ said Simon.

  ‘Chinese or Indian?’

  ‘It’s your weekend, mate,’ said Simon. ‘You choose.’

  It was just after nine as the Bombay Garden’s headwaiter brought over the bill to Phil’s table.

  ‘I’ll take that,’ said Phil, snatching it up. ‘It’ll be my way of apologising to you lot for ruining the day.’

  ‘No you won’t,’ said Simon plucking the bill from between his friend’s fingers. ‘It’s mine and let that be the end of it.’

  Calling the waiter to one side Simon handled the bill while the rest of the table made ready to leave.

  ‘So what’s the plan?’ asked Reuben pushing in his chair. ‘More beer, different location?’

  ‘There was a place we passed last night that looked quite good,’ suggested Spencer. ‘It was a couple of doors down from the bar where his Lordship started binge drinking, can’t remember the name but I’m sure we’ll be able to find it if we keep our eyes open.’

  The boys piled out of the curry house into the street, searching for Spencer’s mystery pub.

  ‘Are you sure you have to take that bag with you everywhere?’ asked Phil as the others broke off leaving him free to talk properly with his dad for the first time that evening. ‘Can’t you just jam a bottle of tablets into your pockets or something?’

  ‘I can’t son,’ replied Patrick. ‘There’s too much of it.’

  ‘You’re all right though?’ asked Phil. ‘You’re not sick are you?’

  ‘I’m fine, son,’ said Patrick. ‘No need to worry about me. I’m indestructible!’

  ‘Even so,’ replied Phil. ‘Promise me that you’ll take it easy tonight, okay?’ We’ve had no major mishaps so far and I’d like to keep it that way.’

  ‘Of course I will,’ said Patrick rolling his eyes in dismay. ‘Not that I need you telling me what to do. I’m a grown man!’

  ‘I know you are,’ said Phil. ‘I’m not trying to tell you what to do, Dad, I just want you to look after yourself.’

  ‘Well, if we’re all doling out the advice,’ countered Patrick, ‘might I suggest that you do the same? Getting into rows with your mates, getting us thrown out of paintballing . . . drinking so much you can barely remember the night before . . . I’d have to go a long way to beat what you’ve been up to this last twenty-fours hours.’

  ‘That’s different, and you know it.’

  ‘Different how, because it’s you and not me? What’s going on with you exactly? I’ve heard bits and pieces but it would be nice if I could hear what the problem is from my own son.’

  ‘Look, Dad,’ said Phil trying and failing to remain patient, ‘can we just drop it? It’s all sorted now, so there’s no point in going over it again is there?’

  ‘So this bloke off the radio isn’t sniffing round your Helen after all?’

  Phil sighed. The boys had obviously been talking and figured out more of the story than he had hoped. ‘No,’ replied Phil, ‘he isn’t . . . well he is sort of but it’s more complicated than that . . .’

  ‘Complicated?’ questioned Patrick. ‘What’s that supposed to mean? Is he after your Helen or not? Because if he is, I don’t care who he is, I’ll sort him out myself.’

  ‘Cheers Dad. That’s good to know.’ Phil wondered if there was any point confiding in his dad. ‘Look, it’s like this: I met a girl last night who it turns out used to be married to Aiden Reid. Anyway, she seemed to think the reason they split up was because he still had a thing for Helen and I had sort of planned to see her tonight to find out more, but Si talked me out of it.’

  ‘Talked you out of it?’ said Patrick indignantly. ‘Why would you want to be talked out of it? If this woman knows more than you, you should hear what she’s got to say because at least then you’ll be able to make up your own mind.’

  ‘I don’t need my mind to be made up,’ protested Phil. ‘It is made up. Helen’s marrying me next weekend. That’s all there is to it.’

  ‘If that really is all there is to it then why don’t you find out anyway?’ suggested Patrick. ‘Honestly, son, sometimes I think your sister was born with more testosterone than you. Just get in there, find out what you want to know and then act accordingly. That’s the trouble with your generation. Too much thinking and not enough action.’

  Phil wasn’t about to let that comment go unchallenged. ‘Says the man who spent the last two decades of his working life on the dole.’

  ‘But at least I lived the life!’ boasted Patrick. ‘At least I’ve got stories to tell! At least when I’m lying on my deathbed I’ll have no regrets.’

  ‘Well you should have if you’ve got anything close to a conscience,’ retorted Phil.

  ‘Oh, you know I don’t mean all of that,’ said Patrick dismissively. ‘I mean the other stuff. The life stuff. You shouldn’t get trapped in your own head son. If your gut is telling you to talk to this woman and put your mind at rest then that’s what you should do. What have you got to lose?’

  12.

  Armed with the knowledge gleaned from the folded flyer in his pocket that Sanne wouldn’t be coming on stage until ten thirty, Phil continued with the evening as planned. This meant that over the next hour he and the boys roamed Leidesplein drifting from theme bars to real ale pubs in search of good times. Now, they were holed up a bit further out of the neon glare of Leidesplein in a tiny bar sandwiched between a bakery and a travel agent’s.

  ‘You want another?’ asked Simon noticing Phil’s empty glass.

  ‘I can’t,’ Phil replied. ‘I’m off in a sec. Where do you reckon you’ll be around midnight?’

  Simon shook his head and sighed. ‘Are you going where I think you’re going?’ he asked. ‘I thought we agreed it was a bad idea.’

  Phil glanced over at his father who was deep into an anecdote about the time he roadied for Pink Floyd during the first leg of their 1972 European tour. ‘I just changed my mind, that’s all.’

  Simon raised an eyebrow in resignation. ‘Do you want me to come with?’ he asked. ‘Bit of moral support?’

  ‘I’ll be fine,’ he replied. ‘Just tell me where you’ll be at midnight and I’ll meet you there.’

  Simon looked over at the boys and asked the question. Deano and Patrick answered simultaneously. Deano’s suggestion involved a visit to De Wallen while Patrick seemed entirely focused on getting stoned.

  ‘I’m too old to get stoned,’ said Simon, ‘and I don’t want to watch some miserable economic migrant taking off her kit while her dead eyes scream how much she hates me.’ He picked up Reuben’s guidebook and made a decision on behalf of the group. ‘We’ll be in a bar called Hoppe near Spuistraat,’ said Simon. ‘The Dutch drink there apparently so it can’t be that bad.’

  Outside Phil took a moment to get his bearings. Although he had been in Amsterdam for less than thirty-six hours, he was beginning to get a feel for the city and without even referring to the map in his back pocket he took a left and headed towards the bright lights at the end of the road, confident that he would know exactly where to go once he reached it.

  The Yellow Robot, as Phil discovered, was a small subte
rranean club less than a hundred metres away from Amsterdam’s infamous Milkweg club and housed in what according to a sign outside the venue used to be a coffee merchant’s back in the 1800s. Relieved to have found the place with relative ease Phil descended the stairs, paid the entrance fee, and then entered the room where a young man on stage armed only with an acoustic guitar was in the middle of what Phil assumed was an ironic cover of a Kanye West song.

  The song finished, the crowd clapped and Phil looked around. Although there were plenty of tables dotted about, they were all taken and even standing room at the back of the room appeared to be at something of a premium. Phil made his way to the bar and ordered a beer while the Kanye West cover guy announced in English that he was about to play his final song of the night, a ballad, about a girl he’d once spent the night with during the year that he was living in Barcelona. The audience clearly loved both him and his tragic demeanour and applauded him frantically and later (at his encouragement) even joined in with the song’s heartbreaking refrain.

  Although Phil loved talking about hi-fi and hi-fi related equipment because of what he did for a living, he had pretty much given up on modern music only stooping to purchase the occasional must-have CD which he would play for a week before abandoning it in favour of stuff that had long since proved its worth and stood the test of time like early Dylan, the Rolling Stones, Etta James, early Don Cherry or even mid-period Beastie Boys. Hearing the Kanye West cover guy, and more importantly seeing the way the audience reacted to him, made Phil resolve that first thing Monday morning he was going to trawl Amazon in a bid to catch up on everything he’d been missing out on since he’d unofficially decided to allow himself to get old.

  The house lights came up signalling an interval and Phil sipped on a bottled Amstel while a technician came on stage and began setting up for Sanne, carrying off the previous act’s microphone and returning with a new microphone, a stool and a small table on which he placed a bottle of water.

  A short while later the house lights went down for a second time and the stage was plunged into darkness as over the PA came the opening bars to Stevie Wonder’s ‘Isn’t She Lovely?’ One by one the audience got the joke and a wave of anticipation spread over the crowd. They broke into applause as a single spotlight picked out the chair at the centre of the stage and moments later Sanne, wearing a silky blue dress and green shoes walked on to the stage carrying an acoustic guitar.

  Revealing a hitherto unseen sense of comic timing Sanne whispered into the microphone, ‘I am, aren’t I?’ As the Motown soul legend’s vocals began the music faded, she strapped on her guitar and plugged it into the amp at her feet, and sitting down on the stool began her opening song, a passionate ballad sung in English, called (if the song’s chorus was anything to go by) ‘What chance did we have?’

  Some three songs into Sanne’s set, at least three quarters of the men in the room currently captivated by her every sound or movement had fallen in love with her. Sanne had that kind of face, and she sang those kinds of songs and the killer combination stirred something so instinctive within the masculine frame that had there been any princess-abducting dragons or fair maidens in need of rescuing from the clutches of their evil stepmothers, neither the dragons nor stepmothers would have stood a chance.

  Phil wasn’t totally immune from this sensation. While he had appreciated Sanne’s attractiveness from the moment they met, he had persuaded himself it was a theoretical admiration only. He admired her beauty in the same way that some of his customers admired the new stock in the shop even though they had functioning audio kit at home. A thing of beauty, they would reason, was a thing of beauty whether you actually needed it or not. But here on the stage, singing song after song about love and heartbreak, her intense vulnerability added a depth to Sanne that made her beauty far less abstract because her songs revealed a truth that most in the room could never know first-hand: pretty girls got their hearts broken too.

  By the end of her set Phil felt he knew Sanne better than he had previously and as she concluded with a cover of Prince’s ‘Condition of the Heart’ followed by an acoustic rendition of her former band’s biggest hit, ‘Love Times Two’, Phil felt almost as angry with Aiden Reid on her behalf as he did on his own.

  When the house lights rose for the final time, Cat Stevens’ Peace Train began playing over the PA. As he stood staring at the empty stage Phil realised that he hadn’t given much thought to how exactly he was going to get to talk to Sanne. Although it was a small club she hadn’t been in the audience before the gig and there was every chance that she would leave through some unseen side entrance without him knowing. And while it was true he still had her phone number, the conversation he needed to have would be much more likely face to face.

  Finishing off his beer Phil walked up to the technician and asked him if he would mind passing on a message to Sanne. Replying in English the guy refused, informing Phil that he was the fourth guy to have asked in the last ten minutes. He added that even though he personally didn’t think she was ‘all that’ he was pretty sure she wouldn’t be interested.

  Phil tried to explained that he actually knew Sanne, and that all he wanted was to say hello, but the guy still refused, so then Phil pulled out a fifty Euro note and said, ‘Look, just tell her that English Phil from the Van Gogh Museum is here and wants to talk and the money’s yours.’

  Shrugging, the guy held out his hand for the money up front. Reasoning he wasn’t in much of a position to bargain Phil handed over the cash.

  ‘English Phil from the museum?’ said the technician, swiftly tucking the money into the front pocket of his jeans.

  ‘No,’ corrected Phil. ‘English Phil from the Van Gogh Museum.’

  Offering Phil a ‘whatever’ shrug the technician jumped on stage and disappeared behind the curtains at the wings. A number of moments passed and just as he was giving up all hope the technician returned with Sanne in tow and from his position at the side of the stage pointed out Phil. Phil waved and she waved back and began walking over to him.

  ‘What are you doing here?’ she asked, crouching down. ‘I never imagined that you’d really come when you had so much of that oh-so-important drinking to do!’

  ‘Yeah . . . well . . .’ he said, trying to pluck up the courage he needed. ‘Some things are important.’ He took a deep breath and just came out with it: ‘I need to talk to you. Quite urgently, actually.’

  ‘Urgently?’ Sanne looked confused and understandably so, thought Phil, considering that they barely knew each other. ‘Why urgently?’

  ‘Maybe urgent is the wrong word,’ corrected Phil. ‘Maybe complicated would be better. I promise it shouldn’t take more than a few minutes.’

  ‘I’m not sure I can spare the time,’ she replied. ‘I promised some friends I’d catch up with them later tonight.’ She remembered her earlier white lie. ‘And this time these friends are real.’

  ‘Look,’ replied Phil, ‘I can see I’m making you nervous and that’s the last thing I want. Let’s just have a quick drink here, I’ll explain and you can be off with your friends before you know it.’

  Sanne considered his proposition carefully. ‘You’re not a weirdo are you? You didn’t seem like one when I first met you but it’s hard to tell sometimes!’

  ‘Listen,’ he replied, ‘by the time I’ve told you what I need to say you’ll definitely think I’m odd but not weird, I promise you.’

  Sanne nodded as if to say she had concluded her extensive ‘weirdo’ detection tests and was analysing the results. ‘I can’t imagine that you’re any weirder than some of the guys who used to follow the band back in the day. Just wait there while I get the promoter to look after my things and we’ll go somewhere quieter.’

  Sanne turned to walk off stage but then a couple of guys who had been lingering behind Phil clearly trying to overhear their conversation called her over, waving their pens in the air. The look of reverence on their faces as Sanne scribbled her name on the CD cove
rs they had brought along with them was striking, and as soon as she was done they tried to engage her in conversation and when that failed they pulled out their digital cameras and practically begged for a photo session.

  When Sanne finally got away Phil was left trading stares with Sanne’s fans who were clearly wondering who was the guy in the black suit and tie. Keen to make himself less conspicuous, Phil’s eyes fell on Sanne’s merchandise stall, which had previously been hidden from view by the audience.

  There were a number of CDs, badges, three T-shirts with different designs and a DVD of a recent live show. Phil picked up two CDs one of which was an official looking release called Late night lullabies and another that had a deliberately amateurish cover that was entitled Home Demos 2. Phil pulled out some money and handed it to the girl who was manning the stall. She carefully wrapped the CDs in a brown paper bag and handed them back as though acknowledging how fastidious Sanne’s fans could be about packaging. Phil dropped them into his jacket pocket and returned to the stage to wait for Sanne.

  He didn’t have to wait long. Within a few minutes she appeared at the side of the stage wearing a denim jacket and, much to the annoyance of the small group of fans who had been staring daggers at him, beckoned him over. Phil followed her as she led him through the semi-darkness of the backstage area down some stairs, along a corridor and out through a fire door into the bustling side street.

  Sanne walked as if she had a destination in mind and Phil offered no opposition.

  ‘You were amazing tonight,’ said Phil as they walked past a couple of shops selling everything from books to designer chairs. ‘Really impressive.’