Remember My Name

by Abbey Clancy

  The door to the living room opened and my little brother Luke popped his head around the frame.

  ‘What’s up, fart face?’ he said, before rugby tackling me to the floor.

  I kicked him in the head with one bare, muddy foot, and managed to escape from his grip. Luke is eighteen, and already over six-foot tall. He’d inherited some sporty gene that had completely skipped me, and played football, rugby, and took part in swimming contests. He also did mixed martial arts, and had a black belt in being an irritating knob head.

  I staggered upright, not exactly feeling the warm glow of family love I was hoping for, and gave him another kick in the ribs. He made pretend ‘oof’ noises and rolled around on the hallway carpet like he was having a heart attack.

  ‘I’m going for a shower!’ I yelled, loud enough for my mum to hear me. She’d be in the kitchen, elbow deep in potato peel and surrounded by steam. I heard her shout back: ‘Okay, love! Tea will be ready in ten!’

  Leaving Luke in a heap of fake pain, I ran up the stairs, and into the familiar bedroom that had been mine and my sister Becky’s until a year ago, when I’d decided—for some reason I can’t quite remember now—to move out.

  The house was one of those Tardis homes: it looked small on the outside, but it was big on the inside. There were three bedrooms—the biggest was Mum and Dad’s, Luke had the box room, and me and Becky had the medium-sized one. As I closed the door behind me, I felt swamped with relief. Everything here felt so … safe. The smells—plug-in air fresheners, cooking, Dad’s Old Spice—all meant ‘home’ to me.

  Luke had been campaigning to get the bigger room since I’d left and Becky had moved in with her boyfriend Sean. She probably wouldn’t be coming back, as she was three months pregnant with her first baby, but Mum and Dad had kept it just the way it used to be. I climbed up onto the top bunk—that was always hers, and we used to fight like cat and dog over it when we were kids. For some reason I still always felt like I’d scored a win when I managed to lie on it without her attacking me. Childish but true.

  I stared at the ceiling for a few minutes, listening to the voice of Michael Bublé floating up the stairs. My mum Michelle bloody loved Michael Bublé. We’d bought her tickets to see him in concert for her fiftieth, and she practically passed out with excitement. Still, it could be worse. My nan was obsessed with Daniel O’Donnell (‘such a nice young man!’).

  The noises coming from my stomach told me it was time for food, so I dragged myself out of my pit and headed for the bathroom. As I got in the shower, I mentally prepared myself for the torture that was washing in a house that contained both dodgy plumbing and my evil brother Luke. This weird thing happened where if you flushed the downstairs loo, the shower water went freezing cold.

  I stepped under the spray and sure enough, straight away, heard the sound of the flush. I jumped back to avoid the chill factor, waiting a few seconds before I continued. It carried on like this for the whole event, but somehow I managed to wash my hair, clean up, and dress myself in some comfy tracky bottoms and one of my old T-shirts.

  By the time I got downstairs, everyone was ready, sitting around the old dining table at the back of the through lounge.

  ‘You little shit,’ I said, whacking Luke on the head as I walked past him to my chair.

  ‘What do you mean? I just had a floater!’ he said, smirking at me. Like I said, evil.

  My sister Becky was there, and I gave her a quick hug before I sat down. I hadn’t seen her for a week, which in our family was practically reason to file a missing person’s report. She looked a bit peaky, and only had a few slices of chicken breast on her plate, which she was pushing around with her fork. Not exactly glowing, but hopefully, it would get better.

  ‘So,’ said my mum, looking across the table at us all and smiling. ‘The whole clan is here.’

  ‘Better call the paramedics and put them on standby,’ added my dad Phil, pouring gravy over his mash.

  My dad is fifty-two, but looks a lot older—mainly because he lost all his hair when he was in his thirties. It never seemed to bother him, and he calls himself the Bald Eagle to make it all sound a bit more macho. He’s tall—everyone in our family is apart from my mum, who is technically some kind of midget—and carries his beer belly with as much pride as his lack of hair. He calls it his ‘Guinness Six Pack’.

  My mum is fifty-one, and tiny. She has dyed-black hair, and looks a bit like an energetic garden gnome. She’s always busy, my mum—with work, with us lot, with her own mum. I swear if she sat still for five minutes we’d all think she was ill. She couldn’t wait for Becky’s baby to arrive, just to give her even more to do.

  ‘So, how are you, Sis?’ I asked Becky, a bit worried about her.

  ‘Fat. Knackered. Puking up all day.’

  Ah. The joys of motherhood.

  Becky shut up after that, but I noticed my mum sneaking glances at her as we ate. She’d been through it all three times, obviously, but she was like Superwoman—she probably just gave birth to us in the middle of doing the laundry and carried right on with a hot wash.

  I was so busy stuffing my face that I didn’t hear when my dad asked me about the ‘gig’. He always called them ‘gigs’. I think it made him feel young and hip.

  ‘Earth to Jessy!’ said Luke, poking me in the side with the prongs of his gravy-covered fork. I yelped and looked at everyone, almost choking on my cabbage.

  ‘You seem a bit distracted, love,’ said Dad. ‘Anything up?’

  ‘What he means is, you look like a mental patient with that cabbage hanging out of your gob,’ said Luke.

  ‘Shut UP, you little fuck!’ I replied, kindly.

  ‘Language!’ said Mum and Dad at exactly the same time. Tea time with the Malones—it was always X-rated, no matter how much they tried. Served them right for having too many kids.

  I debated whether to tell them about Jack Duncan. I needed to talk to someone about it, but I wasn’t sure who. Ruby was distracted with the disgusting Keith. Becky was distracted with her morning sickness. Luke was distracted by being a complete tit.

  I had a sudden flash of yearning for Daniel, the boy who used to live next door. He’d moved away with his family not long after our concert, heading ‘down south’ (which could mean anything from Birmingham to Berkshire) with his parents, who’d inherited a small B&B by the seaside. We’d stayed in touch for a while, but that had faded when he went off to uni—studying something techy I never quite understood. I’d tried to find him since, usually when I was a bit pissed and feeling nostalgic, but he was untraceable—possibly the only twenty-two-year-old on the planet to not be on Facebook.

  New neighbours had moved in, and every time I saw their front door that they’d painted cream, I felt a bit sad about it. So, I had to work with what I had—my family.

  ‘I met this man,’ I said quietly, not sure what their reaction would be, putting down my knife and fork when I realised my hands were shaking. ‘Who works in the music business.’

  ‘Let me guess,’ jumped in Luke straight away, ‘he wanted to take you away from it all? Make you a star? As long as you gave him a blow job first?’

  ‘Luke!’ said Mum, in her don’t-mess-with-me voice. The voice that could make any one of her kids freeze in the middle of whatever they were doing. Sure enough, Luke looked terrified, and suddenly became very interested in his chicken leg.

  Becky was staring at me over the table, frowning. Her skin looked slightly green, as if she was a space alien.

  ‘He does have a point, though, Mum,’ Becky said. ‘Let’s face it, Jessy is so gullible she’d believe anything.’

  I wanted to argue, but I couldn’t. There had been a few … incidents. Like the bloke who claimed to be a talent scout for a modelling agency, and asked me to take my top off as soon as I walked through the door of his studio. Like the ‘audition’ I’d gone to where all the star-struck girls were expected to perform while dressed up as Playboy bunnies. And my personal favourite, the guy
I’d met at a kids’ party who’d booked me to sing at his wife’s fortieth—except the wife hadn’t been there. In fact, nobody had been there, apart from me, him, and a very brassy lady of the night who’d obviously been brought in to join the performance.

  Each time, they’d seemed genuine. Each time, I’d believed them. Mainly because I wanted to—I wanted to be respected, admired, discovered. I wanted to be a star—but unfortunately, the road to stardom was paved with perverts.

  I stayed quiet. It was depressing, really. Even my own family didn’t believe that someone could be genuinely interested in my talent. And they were probably right. I’d be a Disney Princess until I was too old, then I’d have to join an Abba tribute band.

  ‘Well,’ said my mum, realising that an uncomfortable silence had settled over the room, and that I was possibly on the verge of tears. ‘Jessy, you know how much we love you—and nobody knows better than us how hard you’ve worked at this. You’re beautiful, you’re talented, and you deserve a break. We all want that for you, hon. We just want you to be … careful, as well. We don’t want anyone to take advantage.’

  ‘What’s his name?’ asked Luke, whipping out his iPhone. I told him, almost scared to find out the truth. It would all just be another fairy tale bust to pieces if Jack hadn’t been what he said he was. I tried to stay positive—but sometimes even princesses get down in the dumps.

  We all waited while he Googled him, and looked on as he frowned and swiped over different pages on the screen. Eventually, he looked up and gave us all a big grin.

  ‘Bloody hell,’ he said, ‘looks like she’s hit the jackpot this time, folks. Jack Duncan, Starmaker Records. Thirty-three years old, and one of the rising stars of the music industry. He discovered Vogue—and now he’s interested in our Jessy!’

  Everyone was quiet for a moment, weighing up what he’d said. Considering the fact that it might not all be bullshit after all—that something could finally be happening for me.

  ‘Still,’ added Luke—his confidence back—just to spoil the moment, ‘it doesn’t mean he’s not after a blow job as well …’

  Chapter 4

  My dad gave me a lift home after dinner. Part of me had wanted to stay the night, but I needed to do some thinking. And it was always hard to think with my family around—they were just too noisy, bless ‘em. Everyone had an opinion, and everyone wanted you to listen to it at the same time. Even the lure of sleeping in the top bunk wasn’t quite enough to tempt me.

  So I’d climbed in the back of Dad’s black cab, and we’d lumped and bumped our way across the city centre, which was all lit up and looking gorgeous, milling with glamorous women and tipsy tourists and people of all ages out for a good time.

  We drove past the Albert Dock and up towards my end of town—which was slightly less glamorous, but a bit more affordable for a pair of struggling children’s entertainers. Plus, it was on the same road as a Lidl, which was quite a selling point.

  He pulled up outside the flat, and made his usual joke: ‘That’ll be twelve pounds fifty, please, queen.’

  He’d tried to charge me for lifts since I was twelve, and he never seemed to get tired of the gag. Instead, I climbed out, grabbed hold of my bag, and gave him his usual tip when he wound the window down—a big kiss on the cheek.

  ‘Bye, love!’ he shouted cheerily, waving me goodbye as he stopped traffic in both directions with a very anti-social three-point turn. Cabbies, eh?

  *

  When I walked back into the flat I shared with Ruby, I immediately knew that her boyfriend Keith was round. And I immediately knew they were getting jiggy with it in the bedroom.

  None of that makes me Sherlock Holmes—I could actually hear the headboard banging against the wall, and Ruby screaming her head off as Keith performed his manly duties. Uggh.

  I shuddered, and slammed the living room door as hard as I could to let them know I was home. There was a pause in the headboard banging, a few giggles, and then it started again. Charming.

  Our living room was open plan with our kitchen. And our dining room. And the utility room. In fact, there was just one quite small room, with a couch in front of the TV (one of the old ones with the fat backs), and the cooker and sink and fridge right behind. I was lying about the dining room—there isn’t one. We eat our noodles off trays on our laps, usually while we’re watching crap reality shows and slagging everyone off. It’s a very glitzy lifestyle.

  I threw my bag on the couch and put the kettle on to make a coffee. Opening the fridge, I found that Ruby had not only used the last of the milk, she’d put the empty carton back on the shelf. It sat there, mocking me, next to a piece of mouldy cheese and some eye drops I’d used for conjunctivitis two weeks ago.

  So much for the comforts of home, I thought, deciding that I should have stayed at Mum and Dad’s after all.

  The only other item in there was a bottle of Prosecco—one that Jocelyn’s mum had given us as thanks after the party. And possibly to stop us suing her for emotional trauma. I was amazed that Ruby and Keith hadn’t nabbed it and taken it into their love shack with them, and I grabbed hold of it quickly, just in case they remembered and appeared naked to claim it back.

  I opened the cupboard to get a glass, then remembered they were all in the dishwasher—the dishwasher that had broken last week, and we were still waiting for the landlord to get repaired. I didn’t dare look in there. It’d be like a scene from a sci-fi special, complete with new lifeforms. Instead, I popped the bottle open and retreated to my own room.

  It was only small, but I’d done my best with it. I’d repainted the crappy box-built furniture in a pretty pastel shade of light green, and the walls were plain and white to make it feel bigger. There wasn’t space for much, but I had a wardrobe, a dresser filled with all my make-up and hair stuff, the mirror spotted with Blu-tacked photos of friends and family. One of Mum and Dad, outside the Michael Bublé concert. One of Luke when he was six and still cute. One of me and Daniel, the night of the school concert … which seemed about a million years ago.

  My queen-sized bed was decorated with fairy lights draped around the wrought-iron headboard that made it look like there was a party going on when they were illuminated. Not that it had seen much action recently, I thought, not since Evan, and, despite having a couple of hot flushes when I was crushed up against Jack earlier that day, I intended to keep it that way. Life was simpler without men in it, even if a bed was a lot less fun without a man in it.

  I pulled off my clothes, suddenly exhausted, and climbed under the duvet naked. My mum had washed all my bedding for me the day before (like I said, she never stops), and the smell of the fabric softener she’d always used wafted into my nostrils in a way that comforted me far more than the few mouthfuls of chilled booze I’d just swallowed.

  Still, I decided to persevere and see just how comforting a whole bottle of Prosecco could be … I thought I deserved it after the day I’d had. And maybe it would give me some inspiration; help me answer a few of the dilemmas I was facing.

  I had some decisions to make. On the one hand, the chance to work with Jack Duncan—the chance to be part of Starmaker—was a dream come true. I had a work ethic as well-developed as my mum’s when it came to my music, although I lagged behind a bit on the hoovering front.

  I was willing to work—to slog my guts out, in fact. I’d always wanted to be a singer—I’d never entirely given up, no matter how many knock-backs I’d had. No matter how many people had told me I wasn’t quite right: not blonde enough, not cute enough, not sexy enough, not … something enough. All those auditions and meetings that ended in the same conversation: ‘You have a strong voice, but we’re looking for XXX’—and then it was just a matter of filling in the blanks. They were looking for someone older. Or younger. Or Korean. Or, on one occasion, someone fatter—they were going for a plus-sized girl-group vibe. There was always something missing, something not right.

  Jack Duncan hadn’t said I wasn’t right, though. He�
��d said I was fresh, and talented, and authentic, which I knew from watching The X Factor was a good thing. He wanted me to come to London, to meet his mysterious music-biz friend Simon (my heart wished for Cowell, but my head said don’t be so gullible). He was offering me the chance I’d been waiting for—and if it worked out, not only could I be a success, but I could share that success with my family. Pay off their mortgage. Send my mum and dad on that cruise they were always talking about. Make sure that Becky’s baby wanted for nothing. Get Luke a personality transplant.

  It wouldn’t just change my life—it would change theirs as well.

  But on the other hand—although both my hands were a bit shaky now as I was halfway through that bottle of Prosecco, chugging from the bottle like the pure class I was—I’d have to go to London. I’d have to leave my friends, my home, my family. I loved the bones of my family, and I’d only ever been away from them for a few weeks at a time for shameful holidays to Malia and Ibiza. If I was gone for too long I’d miss Becky’s baby being born, wouldn’t be around to welcome the next generation of Malones set to terrorise the world.

  I’d have to leave Ruby, and my other friends, most of whom I’d known since I was a little kid. I’d have to leave Liverpool—a place I’d never dreamed of escaping from.

  I’d have to leave my flat. My bed. My Lidl … how could I ever leave my Lidl, I thought, as I felt my eyelids droop shut and found just about enough conscious thought to put the bottle down before I crashed out into snoozeland. Once I was there, I was plunged into a very nice dream involving Jack Duncan, an igloo, a roaring log fire (I wasn’t sure how that would work in an igloo, but hey, it was dream so I was going with the flow), and bearskin blankets that smelled of my mum’s fabric softener …

  ‘Jess!’ Jack shouted, shaking me by the shoulders. I rolled over on the bearskins, sniffing the fragrance, and sighing.

  He shook me again—a bit harder this time—and I decided I might go off him. Shaking a girl like this wasn’t very romantic.