Sick On You

by Andrew Matheson

  The two of them rattle some keys and fall to their knees in front of the meter. Lou and I look at each other and shrug our shoulders. One of them fingers the lead seal, eyes it suspiciously, and babbles something to his buddy, who looks at us. I say, “What’s the prob?” They stick the key in the lock to release the seal, and another to open the back of the meter. Takes them two whole minutes before it swings open. Amateurs. Lou did it in seconds with a fork.

  The two of them stare inside. They look at each other and then start yammering a mile a minute. One of them reaches inside and takes out the lone shilling that is in there. Lou and I look at each other, wondering how we missed that one. The meter hasn’t been emptied, officially, since we’ve lived here, and I get the impression that these two were expecting considerably more shillings. They were so optimistic that they even carry a canvas bag to put them all in.

  The two of them spring to their feet, bolt out the door and down the stairs. The one word in their babble we were able to make out is “police.”

  The next few minutes are a whirlwind of activity. No discussion is required. We whip all the clothes into two suitcases, toss them out the window along with the frying pan, shoes, books, and the records that have escaped Lou’s bargain-record emporium at Watford station. Next, Lou goes downstairs and stands under the window. I drop our wooden radio into his arms. Good catch. I tear off down the stairs. We gather it all up in our arms and hump it all, glamorous-ragged-refugee style, down Aldenham Road. Two pence in a phone box and we are rescued for the umpteenth time by Brillo.

  Fifteen minutes later, we’re off to a new life in a West Hampstead squat.

  VIII

  In West Hampstead (the ugly sister of the other three Hampsteads), at the end of a narrow, winding thoroughfare officially named Railway Walk but known locally, with good reason, as Dog Shit Lane, in a boarded-up, condemned, two-story shell of a Victorian house, Eunan has found us a squat. Squat we must, so squat we will.

  On the doorstep to greet us when we get there, what else but a dead rat? What’s with the rats? Why are there rats everywhere? Why are they a constant, a motif, a theme in our lives? It is baffling and disgusting. Lou finds a stick and pokes it aside. One knock and Eunan clumps down the stairs and opens the door.

  Inside, we spy bare, splintery, rotting wood floors. Blue, flowery, peeling wallpaper, featuring stinking fungi from floor to ceiling. An all-pervading smell of domestic grease, dust, mildew, and grime assaults the nostrils. First door on the left, over Eunan’s shoulder, out pops a sweet little ancient lady—gray hair in an unruly bun, cardigan buttoned wrong, dusty burgundy housecoat over top, once-pink slippers—who says, “Kettle’s just boiled, boys. Would you like a cup?” We decline, but what a lovely creature.

  Suitcases in hand, shrinking from contact with the walls, we go up the creaking, rotting stairs. Up to a hallway and on to the kitchen. Whatever secrets this kitchen had to tell, whatever memories of familial feasts and warmth the room once held, are long, long gone. It is impossible to conceive of anyone actually having the nerve to bring food into such a disgusting place.

  All that remains to identify this space as a kitchen is a grease-encrusted stove, gas-fired and miraculously still working but all knobs and dials smashed or missing, and a gray sink filled to overflowing with filthy cracked dishes, chipped cups, and mismatched pots without handles, the lot of them covered in an oleaginous mossy-green scum.

  A three-legged table leans drunkenly against a far wall, a garage for the rusted guts of an old Norton motorcycle piled up underneath. Eunan says the electricity and gas are, incredibly, still working. His guitar and amp poke out from under an old blanket in a corner. He says he’s had them cranked up at all hours and the old dear downstairs can’t hear a thing.

  The loo is behind a one-hinged door off the hallway, a nasty, reeking little nook with brown porcelain and overhead chain dangling from a green cistern balanced on a wobbly lead pipe, which is detached from the wall. There is nothing resembling a bathtub.

  A small bedroom at the front overlooks the entrance door and Mill Lane. A large bedroom, again at the front but with a locked door, is apparently occupied by a large hippy who, according to Eunan, goes by the handle of Zlatan the Mysterious. Fair enough. Another big room with a defunct fireplace and a small window overlooking the backyard is up for grabs. Eunan and I nab the big room, Lou wants the small one up front, the better to occasionally shag the girl from Clapham.

  Done deal. We move in.

  Two good things happen. The guy at the Café wants to upgrade us to Saturday nights (about time), effective tout de suite, and also we’ve got a gig coming up, in Mayfair of all places, on May 5. Apparently, some chap in the audience at the Café tried to speak to me but I fobbed him off on Stein. I can’t remember. Turns out he signed us up for something called a “debutante ball”—some weird rite for members of the uppertocracy, I gather.

  The evening of the Mayfair gig, we show up to a huge flash pad with a big ballroom full of horsey babes in a selection of what look like pastel bridal gowns. The men are a penguin parade, all tuxedos and protruding teeth. I’m not sure what this “deb” scene is all about. I think it’s like an auction; the women parade their goods and the men pick which one’s bank account they’d most like to annex. Something like that.

  We set up, doll up, and let ’er rip. The place goes instantly barmy. Punch bowls are sucked dry and it appears these gals and their chinless wonders want to shake it all over. We blast them for an hour without coming up for air. We break for ten minutes and are immediately surrounded by debs, to the obvious chagrin of the tooth boys. The air is full of “I say, I say” and “Would you mind awfully playing a song by the Rolling Stones?” Yeah, don’t worry, sister; we can play any song awfully.

  Just as the next set starts, hundreds of bottles of champagne are lugged in by liveried servants, and within seconds a barrage of corks are blasting off all over the place like antiaircraft guns. Some kind, deluded soul sends a few to us, and I shake one up and spray the dancers in front.

  It is a mad scene and we are thoroughly cranked up, rocking the ball, when through the huge doors stride ten coppers who proceed to walk straight to the stage and make gestures like we should stop playing. No dice, officer. We almost make it to the end of the song, but one enterprising bobby rooting around at the side of the stage finds and yanks the plug. One second of silence then the air is full of braying debs and their consorts making with the “I say, I say” bit and the “What on earth do you think you are doing?” and “Do you know who I am?”

  Turns out there have been a dozen or so complaints about noise from the more sedate elements in the neighborhood. Bit of overkill, though, sending an entire plod platoon. A few of the head penguins sort it out with the coppers, promises are made, and finally they shove off. As soon as they are out of the street we start it up again, louder than before. We rock until half past midnight, with only one more visit from the cops.

  Toward the end of the engagement I wander upstairs in search of a loo. I try door after door to no effect, and then I try a door that opens onto a tableau I have heretofore not encountered in my nineteen years. It is a large room, unlit save for the glow from a fading fire, and there, in the soft light of the dying embers, is a chap splayed, chicken-skin nude (save for black socks and a bowler hat), belly down over a coffee table. This of course, to me, is rather astounding in and of itself, but the truly fascinating aspect, and the one that really grabs my attention, is that he is being mounted and shagged robustly by a Great Dane in striped oven mitts. And when I say a Great Dane I’m not talking Hans Christian Andersen in kitchen couture here. When I say a Great Dane I’m talking a huge, gray, slobbering mutt with oven mitts over his paws, ramming his canine cock into the arse of a toff I am soon to know as Rupert.

  Two other future parliamentarians stand near, fully dressed, sipping champers and commenting on the form, shouting encouragemen
t like “Come on, Rupert, old chap” and “I say, well taken, Rupe.” The dog is commenting too, in between thrusts and while drooling on Rupert’s back. According to him, Rupert likes it “ruff.”

  I don’t linger.

  * * *

  Back at the squat, we’ve got a new routine. We rehearse in the kitchen for hours every day. Consequently, we are getting tighter and tighter. Apparently, the girl in Clapham lanced the boil on Lou’s arse last week. I’ll take his word for it. The last thing I need is visual evidence. That must have been quite the romantic evening. He’s playing better, though.

  I finish the lyrics for the song we started at Cliff’s place. It is called “Chez Maximes” and it is already one of our favorites. We’ll unleash it on the Café crowd on Saturday.

  American Brian is going nowhere. He’s not getting better. He peaked a long time ago, and this Doobie Brothers fixation is pushing me over the edge.

  We’ve got a gig at Flicka, which, according to Stein, is a club at the bottom of Regent Street on an alley off Piccadilly. They put up a fantastic poster calling us a “Great Five-piece Band.” It’s a glitter-ball disco palace with an older crowd and all they want is nonstop American crap funk junk. What are we doing here?

  There is an audible gasp from these cadavers as we hit the stage and an inaudible cry of disbelief when we hit ’em between the ears with the first two chords of “Melinda Lee.” No sooner does the song end to desultory applause and a tidal wave of boos than the manager runs up and tells us to turn it down. “Sorry, pal, can’t do that. One, two, three, four . . .” and away we go again.

  This time a few people get up on the dance floor and begin gyrating, including, to humorous effect, American Brian’s old man. Eunan plays like rubbish, Brian’s worse. The manager and a few heavies force the issue and bring the show to a premature close. Then they stiff us for the money. Lovely night. So much for the “Great Five-piece Band” they gloated about on the poster.

  Day after day in Squatville, the three of us have nothing but rice to eat. Twice a day we eat a bowl of rice. Some days are better than others; the days when I manage to nick a tin of beans or something else to throw in the pan. If I get out of here alive I’ll never eat rice again.

  I come up with a great idea to remedy the Eunan name situation. It hits me as Lou and I walk down Dog Shit Lane. I run it by Lou and he likes it. We bring the idea to Eunan and he goes for it. Simple solution, just use his last name. That’s it, that’s all. From this day forth he’s known as Brady.

  IX

  There is only one club in London we now want to play: the Speakeasy. Everybody who is anybody in the music biz goes to the Speak. If we can play there we’ll get a record deal. Simple as that. We just know it. Same way we know David Cassidy is four feet eight inches tall. We just know it.

  On May 26 Stein and I climb the stairs above the Speakeasy on Margaret Street, intent on meeting Laurie O’Leary. He’s the boss of the Speak and, as far as we can gather, Mr. O’Leary is well connected in general. Maybe he’ll manage us. We just want to get going, slip our machine, currently idling in neutral, into gear.

  We arrive unannounced, as is our custom, having learned that attempting to arrange meetings or appointments never works. Nobody ever wants to see us. Nobody ever says, “Yeah, come on in and see us, boys. What can we do for you?” No, we always have to ambush them, and so far even that is not working.

  Up the creaking wooden stairs we go, until we arrive at a small, cluttered outer office manned by a pretty blondish secretary. She heard us coming for a while, squeaking up the stairs. She is ready. What she thinks of us, who knows? We are in über Hollywood Brats regalia: full makeup and Fourth Reich foppery.

  She goes into gatekeeper mode, but we mix a gallon of insistence with a thimbleful of charm and soon there comes a barked command from the inner office to enter. Enter we do, to find an obviously busy but accommodating man who stands up, shakes our paws, and tells his secretary to hold all calls. We start yapping a mile a minute while he sits back and listens intently. This is highly unusual for us. The guy is really listening and at various points asking pertinent questions. Such as, do we have a tape? Nope, we don’t.

  Finally, he interrupts our torrent of self-praise and says he isn’t interested in managing anybody, since he has just signed something called the Heavy Metal Kids, but if we tell him where we’re playing next, he’ll have someone pop down to see us. If we pass muster we get to play the Speak. Wow. We’re playing the Café on Saturday so we tell O’Leary the where and the when, and two minutes later we’re clattering back down the stairs.

  Reaching street level, we try to be cool, contain ourselves, but we are bursting inside and just barely make it around the corner before we start grabbing each other by the lapels, yelling and whooping. This is it and we know it. This is the biggest connection so far. We know a turning point when we see one, a pivotal moment after which all is changed. All we have to do is slay whoever the mystery man is on Saturday night at the Café des Artistes.

  We have just enough coin for coffee so we head to a little place not far from Oxford Circus. It is a basement café, and whenever Stein and I are out scuffling and scratching for the Brats we usually wash up here to lick our wounds or celebrate our minuscule victories. We sit for an hour or so nursing one cup and a refill each, honing the set list for Saturday night.

  We split up soon after. Mercifully, no drama encountered slinking onto the Tube at Oxford Circus or jumping the turnstiles at West Hampstead. A short run through traffic and on to the relative calm of Dog Shit Lane, head north on Sumatra, pop into Delhi Convenient to buy some Rolos and swipe a tin of salmon, then on to 11 Mill Lane.

  Up the stairs, and I catch a rare glimpse of Zlatan the Mysterious: tall, skinny, hunched over, with hair way down his back and all over his face, under his nose and whatnot. He lives in the large front room with the bay windows he has completely covered with taped-on pages from Time Out. He’s a furtive sort, with a permanently unfocused look in his eye. He doesn’t have much truck with us, nor we with him, which suits both parties to a T. We never see him about the place and generally forget that he even exists. He never complains about us rehearsing in the kitchen at all hours, not that it would do him much good, but still, it’s nice.

  Zlatan invites us into his room one night and, bored stiff as usual, we accept and traipse in. The streetlight outside shines through the yellowed Time Out pages, giving a jaundiced light to a room completely hung with ornamental Eastern carpets and swaths of that cheesy Indian fabric with shiny bits sewn on the ends. Sequins, you know? Whatever.

  The floor is covered in even more dusty ruggery. Joss sticks are stuck everywhere, jossing away like mad, making the room cloudy with that nauseatingly sweet fug that hippies can’t seem to breathe without. The ghastly, tinny ricochet of sitar music bleats from two big speakers. Zlatan is dressed in a mauve kaftan. There’s a theme here.

  He has recently returned from Nepal or Afghanistan or some other utterly repellent outpost and has with him a souvenir slab of hashish. Said slab, he tells us, has been smuggled across various borders taped to his inner thigh. I suppose in the frazzled recesses of his hippy brain he thinks this intensely unsavory detail will render the drugs even more enticing. It doesn’t.

  He finally asks, would we like to buy some? Tree, wrong, barking, mate. Zlatan’s hospitality evaporates.

  Soon after, back in our room, we concoct a plan. Not much of a plan, really. It goes like this: Zlatan the Mysterious leaves premises, Lou picks lock, we locate stash and break off chunk he’s bound not to notice, Lou locks place back up. We smoke stash. Flawless.

  We drink tea and wait, listening intently for the sound of Zlatan buggering off. At midnight Brady, having to work the next morning in the wig factory, peels off his reeking socks and climbs into bed. Lou and I wait until three in the morning and then we also conk out.

  Next day, noonish, Lou
creeps along the creaking hallway and places lughole to door. He reports sitar, tablas, and shuffling about. So we wait some more. We drink tea and play Crazy Eights throughout the afternoon and into the evening. Brady arrives home from his wig gig and joins the vigil. Lou boils up a pan of rice and stirs in a delicious tin of recently swiped cocktail wieners.

  Finally, mid-evening, we hear Zlatan’s door open and shut, followed by the rattle of skeleton key in lock. Then the sound of sandals shuffling past our door, down the stairs, and out into the London night. We dash to Lou’s wee room at the front of the house and twitch the blanket he has nailed over the window. There goes Zlatan the Mysterious, trekking off past the streetlamps, loon pants flapping like pavement sails around the masts of his bare bony shins.

  We spring into action. First step, run downstairs and prop a chair under the doorknob to stall the Mysterious one, should he unexpectedly return mid-heist. Next, Brady is stationed at Lou’s window to watch out for same. Then I scan the outline of Zlatan’s door for taped-on hairs or any other low trickery meant to discern uninvited entry. Lou gets out his tool kit of bent wire, hairpins, a nail, and a knife.

  Lou drops to his knees and applies gentle, experienced fingers to Zlatan’s knob. For a safecracker of his expertise the lock proves no challenge whatsoever, and within thirty seconds we’re in.

  If the lock provided no test whatsoever, we could have sent Ray Charles in to search for the stash. No Sherlockian sleuthing required, no ransacking. There it is in the middle of the muddle on a small table, sitting unwrapped on a Santana album. Oye como va.