by Lee Evans
Anyway, the highly trained athlete took a moment to concentrate on his warm-up. He did this by loudly boasting to his mates that he’d found a big bag of feathers in one of the bedrooms. Then, after he’d concentrated – bam – he snapped into his run across the bedroom before launching himself off the nearest bed, somersaulting into a back-dive past the Woolworths special offer ceiling light. He went into a half-gainer, jack-knifing arse first into the big bag of feathers with a loud bursting noise, a technique known as bursting the big bag of feathers. If done correctly, the bag will explode across the entire room and probably into nearby France. Middle podium, here I come.
So there was Heather, glaring at me as I sat in a pile of feathers and what was left of the bag. She had come running into the bedroom, alerted by the lads’ whoops of encouragement to the superbly conditioned athlete. Now she was standing over me, white feathers floating all around her as if she was in one of those Christmas snow balls you shake. Mind you, the way she was shouting and bawling at me, she looked more like an employee at one of the sheds on a turkey-plucking farm at Christmas time.
Everything seemed to be in slow motion. She stood there, her outstretched hand stabbing the air and pointing over at her moody flatmate who was out cold in bed. Having earlier complained of drunkenness, the flatmate had stumbled off to bed, and here she was, dead to the world. Did I mention that she was sporting a pair of circular glasses and a Hitler moustache that I had helpfully drawn on her face with a tube of toothpaste while she slumbered?
Pure fluke, I thought at the time. If I hadn’t been in there drawing the glasses and Hitler moustache on her face, then I wouldn’t have fortuitously spotted the big bag of feathers or have met Heather. What I find fascinating is that at that moment she didn’t realize the idiot on the floor in front of her would one day be her husband. Strange world, eh?
I obviously wasn’t creating a very good first impression. Well, she didn’t appear too happy to see me, let’s put it that way. After she had stopped shouting, she whipped round and stormed out of the room, slamming the door behind her.
I snapped out of my reverie and, with the enthusiasm of a research monkey pressing a button that would send a banana down a chute, I instantly began tidying up, making sure every single feather was back in the bag. I even removed the toothpaste from her flatmate’s face before she woke up. I was that committed to wowing Heather.
The party continued throughout the night but, unable to find Heather, who seemed to have completely disappeared, I sat around while my mates copped off with a couple of birds. When I asked another party-goer about the girl I’d seen earlier, he told me that she’d had to leave suddenly as her mum had been taken ill.
So my first encounter with the girl who was eventually to become my wife wasn’t exactly impressive. From that first time Heather and I came into contact with each other, I have always had the feeling that I somehow took her by surprise, that I came out of the sun at her in a sort of kamikaze, unexpected attack. I was on her case straight away, a buzzing fly, you might say, who got on her nerves. I feel as if I’ve been something of an irritant ever since. She’s forever saying to me, ‘Go away – you’re annoying me now!’
Seriously, Heather does at times accuse me of behaving in a challenging, irrational, off-the-wall manner. But I get the impression she’s always found that quite exciting for some reason.
I constantly have to defy convention and now when we’re together, if I do something out of the ordinary, like I will, in a public place, she’ll give me the evil look of daggers. Her demeanour will resemble one of those blokes you see on the news holding a club above his head ready to bring it down between the eyes of a baby seal. But at the same time, I can spot a little smile and a sparkle in Heather’s eyes which tell me that, deep down, she finds what I’m doing amusing. It indicates that she would like to be doing it too, but can’t as she’s far too self-conscious, too scared and, unlike me, was brought up in a way too respectable to let go.
That’s how our relationship works on one level. Just as I challenge her shy, rigid, conventional upbringing with my free thinking and take-it-as-it-comes attitude, by contrast she represents the voice of reason in our partnership. She has – and will gloat about it – a far superior, academically gifted brain. I often imagine she’s the equivalent of a laboratory scientist observing a chimp after giving him a colourful toy to play with.
Oh, I almost forgot the most important part. Did I mention that I also find her the sexiest woman on two legs? Admittedly, I’ve never met a woman with three legs, which in my opinion is a little more sexy, but would cost a fortune in Odour Eaters.
Heather’s first, brief encounter with me confirmed that evidently I was a witless thick-wit who always seemed to foul everything up. But then I hadn’t introduced myself properly. She hadn’t seen the other side of me yet. That was a lot worse.
To Heather’s white-linen, cosy, ‘normal’, lower-middle-class household where everything was well ordered, I would be considered far down the food chain. A beautiful, well-behaved, sensible, smart girl like Heather was way out of my league. Even armed with a ten-foot barge pole with another barge pole taped on the end, she wouldn’t have usually gone near me. I wouldn’t have fitted the ‘nice-boy’ mould that a pretty girl like her would traditionally go for. Anyway, fate intervened, and our paths would cross again the following week …
Once more by sheer, utter chance, it appeared something was pulling us together. It had been a week of intense mental turmoil for me. My mind was not fully on matters at hand. Let’s be honest, while most people use both sides of their brain, I only use one, so you can imagine how little brain I was operating on.
I carried on as usual, attending art college and seeing my mates at the weekend, but I was only going through the motions. What really occupied me was the beautiful girl I’d seen at the party. Girls weren’t interested in me as a rule, but I had become obsessed. The whole week at college, all I kept either drawing, sketching or painting was feathers, feathers and more feathers, then perhaps a bird, or even some eggs. I wonder what was preoccupying me.
‘What’s-a matter with you, Lee? Everything I ask you to do somehow reverts to birds,’ my perplexed tutor said.
‘Really? I don’t see that at all, Mr Jefferies.’
‘Lee, you sculpted a papier-mâché chicken this morning, and now you’re sticking feathers on that canvas. And you’re also wearing a cardboard beak on your head.’
‘Yes, I see your point. Oh no, I had some eggs at the cafeteria earlier. Blimey, do you think I may have a problem?’
I took my usual bus journey home from college that evening, which allowed me some thinking time. I concluded that I would probably never see her again. Even if I did, I wouldn’t blame her if she didn’t want to talk to a fool like me – not after the impression I’d left her with, anyway. In fact, if I were her, I’d run and hide.
As I stepped off the bus and into the cold early winter wind that swept through the town centre, it was dark. The bus pulled away and I quickly buttoned up my duffel coat, shoved my hands deep into my pockets and headed towards the alleyway at the side of the Chequers pub. Behind that was the hill that would take me to our house. Just then, I heard somebody shout my name.
‘Lee!’
I turned round. It was my friend Spencer from art college. He must have got the earlier bus. I thought about throwing him a casual wave and going on my way. It can’t be urgent, I thought, I’ll see him tomorrow and if there’s anything needs saying, he can say it then. It was cold, and I knew Mum would have a bit of hot tea on the go at our house.
But, alas, I can’t rush away – it’s just not the way I am. If you call my name, I will come. I sometimes hate being like that. So I shuffled towards Spencer, shifting around in my thick coat to try and get warm.
‘All right, Lee, how –’ Just as he began to speak, another bus pulled up at the stop, and annoyingly I found it a struggle to
hear what Spencer was going on about over its engine noise. I shouted to him from under my hood.
‘No, wait, Spen. The bus. I can’t hear!’
I gestured, pointing in frustration towards the bus and …
It was Heather! I couldn’t believe my eyes. I wasn’t sure at first, as she had her face covered with her hands. But perhaps I just knew. Plus, it also may have helped that I hadn’t been able to get her face out of my mind all week. Her features had appeared on other people, as I optimistically imagined every girl I set my eyes on would be her.
Just then the girl on the bus took her hands away from her face, revealing that it really was her, the girl from the party with all the feathers. My heart began pumping so fast and so loud, it drowned out the sound of the bus in my ears. I couldn’t feel the cold any more. It really was her. I watched as she pulled a handkerchief from her sleeve and wiped a smudge of mascara from under her eye. She was crying! Why?
Spencer carried on talking, as I started running towards the bus. ‘Lee, where you going, mate?’
It was too late. The bus had just pulled away.
I don’t know what I would have done if I’d got there anyway. If I’d started banging on the window, it would only have further cemented the psychotic image she already had of me. I quickly ran over to Spencer, urgently pointing, desperate to know.
‘Listen, Spen. Do you know that girl there on the bus?’
‘What? Blimey, what’s-a matter with you? You look a bit off, mate.’ As he talked, he casually looked over his shoulder towards the bus as it rolled past us.
‘That girl there, Spen, the one on the bus. Who is she?’
‘Oh yeah, that’s Heather. Heather Nudds.’ He turned back to me, getting annoyed with himself. ‘Bollocks, I’ve forgotten what I was going to say now.’
‘Never mind. Listen, do you know her, Spen?’ By now, I was a bit frantic. ‘Please, mate, help me out here.’
‘All right,’ he huffed. Affronted perhaps by my insistent pleading, he moaned away to himself, ‘I mean all I wanted was to say hello.’
I stopped and stared at the tearful girl on the bus. My heart went out to her. ‘Why would she be crying?’ I asked.
‘What?’ Spencer said. ‘Oh.’ His mood changed and his voice lowered. ‘I think her mum is ill.’ Then something seemed to have occurred to him. He whipped his head round quickly towards me. Tilting it, he narrowed his eyes. It felt like he was scrutinizing me. He seemed curious as to why I wanted to know about the beautiful girl on the bus. He suddenly clicked into talking rapidly like a machine gun.
‘You don’t stand a chance,’ he sneered. ‘She’s way too beautiful for you. Everybody knows she doesn’t go out with anyone. There’s no way she’d give you a second glance. I asked her out once, and she didn’t want to know. You won’t get anything out of her.’
As the bus eventually disappeared, I gave Spencer a friendly tap on the shoulder, telling him I would see him tomorrow, and skipped off down the hill towards home. As I bowled down our street, it felt as if a heavy weight had been lifted from my mind. I was now wearing trampoline shoes and had suddenly grown wings. I could have sworn I floated down our road.
I knew who the girl was now. Heather!
Then, just as quickly, my wings fell off, and I dropped like a stone. It no longer felt like I had trampoline shoes on, and I slowed to a stop outside our house. I was suddenly wearing lead boots.
I felt ashamed. How could I think of my own feelings while that poor girl was in such pain? How could I be so selfish? I raised my head to look at the sky. I watched a low grey cloud drift elegantly over our roof and thought of her on the bus. I mumbled to myself: ‘I’m sorry. Blimey, I don’t half love you.’
‘Thank you, and I love you as well,’ I imagined her replying.
I suddenly jumped, snapping back into the real world.
‘What?’
It was Enid, our next-door neighbour. She gave me a little look, as she waddled past me struggling with a bunch of shopping bags in each hand. She must have heard me.
‘I don’t care,’ I muttered. I rallied myself, pumping up my chest, lifting my shoulders. I straightened my back and said quite loudly: ‘I love that girl, and if I ever see her again, I will tell her so!’
Then, of course, I realized I was kidding myself. ‘Actually, I know I won’t do that, because I’m Lee Evans, and I’m a fool.’
‘You are!’ Enid shouted before disappearing inside and slamming her front door. ‘Who else would talk to themselves like that in the middle of the street?’
She had a point.
24. Fairground Attraction
It would be another few agonizing weeks before I would quite literally smack into Heather again – with such force that I knocked her to the ground. I might have said that landing on top of her would be a very fortunate place to end up, but as we lay there in a crumpled heap on the grass, our faces just inches apart, it was embarrassing rather than erotic. The only thing between us was a crushed see-through plastic cup she’d been holding. Just before the fall, it had held a full half pint of coke, which was now taking the form of a massive patch down the front of her white dress.
After a few seconds on the ground, Heather’s eyes must have focused. I watched as her huge, ebony, saucer-like pupils shrank down into two pinholes as she realized who I was. ‘What the bloody … ? Oh no, I know you, don’t I?’
So how did we wind up on the ground, with Heather furious with me once more?
In the early eighties, the economic crisis was affecting most of the country. The local council in Billericay thought it a good idea to promote local business by staging a concert in a huge field at the end of the town called Sun Corner. There was a fair there, with side stalls and a disco that would start up later in the evening.
I’d made up my mind not to go, even though it was the talk of the town. Nothing like this had ever happened in Billericay before and everyone was really excited, but I needed to finish some college work. My mates had been calling, asking me to come out, but I was in no mood to go anywhere.
I’d endured months with no money. It didn’t make it any easier that my brother Wayne, who was now working as a hod-carrier, would every Friday sneak up behind me and taunt me by waving in my face the wad of money he had earned that week. He thought I would find it funny, but I was just feeling sorry for myself.
I had to make art college work, as I’d failed at everything else. If I flunked art school, there were few other prospects for me. It was at a time when if you went for any interview, there would a line of at least a hundred people also wanting the job. Perhaps they should have advertised for crowd-control operatives.
If I didn’t have a piece of paper with at least some semblance of a qualification on it, then I might as well have found the nearest scrap heap and jumped on top of it. Plus, at home I was made to feel as though I was lucky being able to do something that I loved.
Dad didn’t add to my confidence as he thought I was a bit of a drop-out. I think, if he’d had his way, I would have been working down the pit at the coalface like Granddad, who shortly after retiring coughed his way full pelt into an early grave, God rest his soul. I think Gran only buried him because she couldn’t stand the noise. I had to prove to Dad that I could make something of myself, even if it might be with a pencil rather than a pick-axe.
Despite all that, I’d managed to get a summer job in Scarborough, the North Yorkshire seaside town. After days of pacing our hallway looking at the phone, I’d plucked up enough courage to call Scott, who owned the Bell pub. I’d helped him by doing odd jobs around his pub a few years back when Dad was doing a summer season there, and he told me if I ever needed a job, there would be one at his pub.
So I’d called him up and he’d said, like a jolly game show host, ‘Come on down!’ Now it would be only a matter of days before I was in Scarborough. I was very glad. I was seventeen, and my loans had
already grown so big, they had me round the neck and in a very nasty armlock, frog-marching me towards the debtors’ prison.
In spite of having less money than a Robert Maxwell pension fund, I was persuaded to go to the fair by a couple of my mates. Their tactic was simple: they refused to leave our front step unless I came out. I’d been working hard, so perhaps I did need a couple of hours off. Plus, they told me there was the prospect of winning a goldfish, and that was a challenge I couldn’t refuse.
It was my last dart. If I got this one in, I would win untold riches – well, the aforementioned goldfish, anyway. I was shaking and the dart was slippery from the sweat between my fingers as I took aim at the dartboard. It’s not easy to concentrate while being egged on by two mates and about sixty goldfish, all of them peering out from clear plastic bags full of water hanging up around the stand like baubles on a Christmas tree. You could see the poor things crossing their fins, urging me to save them from their little watery penitentiary. If I could save one poor limbless aquatic creature from this polythene Abu Ghraib Prison, I would.
I threw the dart and we all watched its flight through the air: me, my two mates and all the fish, wide-eyed with optimism, mouths agape. I think I even saw a fish take a large gulp of water to calm its nerves.
Thump! In it went, right in the red. Yes! I would now be the proud father of a goldfish. I was going to be a dad! I decided on the smallest one, as I took that to be the youngest. That way, I would save more of the fish’s life. As the stall owner handed over the fish with a look of disdain, I announced to the world that, ‘Thou, o gold fish, shall from this day forth be known as … Torpedo. Or Torp, for short.’ Well, I wasn’t going it call it ‘Pedo’, was I?
I decided on a little celebratory fish dance rather like a dolphin when it rides along on its tail out of the water. That trick always reminds me of how Mum and Dad used to look every time the cheap carpet at our Bristol flat rode up and a large speed bump would appear spanning the entire length of the lounge. To flatten it, Mum would do a sort of Michael Jackson moonwalk across the carpet but with both feet together. I don’t think Jacko was in danger of losing his crown as the King of Pop.
