Jam Tops, the Fonz and the Pursuit of Cool

by Kris Lillyman

  The fact that the object of Pippa’s affection was sixteen and obviously much more worldly wise than Gordy was bad enough, and certainly didn’t bode well for his chances of stealing her away from him, but to add insult to injury, this boyfriend also happened to be easily the coolest person in the whole school. Furthermore, he didn’t have a best friend who insisted on dressing up as a super hero.

  Not only that, but this boyfriend’s name - and this was the killer - was Steve bloody Cool (actually it was just Steve Cool, as far as Gordy knew, this lad didn’t have a middle name - and even if he did, the chances of it being ‘Bloody’ were probably quite remote).

  Gordy couldn’t believe it. How unlucky could he be to have a rival with a name like that. A name which undoubtedly blew all Pippa’s other suitors, Gordy included, completely out of the water. What bastard luck.

  Steve Cool sort of materialised at Poplar Park out of nowhere, midway through term, although Gordy didn’t know from where as no one so lowly as he ever spoke to him. But seeing him for the first time was truly memorable.

  It was in the bus queue, waiting for the School Special, when Steve Cool made his entrance - almost in slo-mo like he was the action hero in a promotional trailer for a Hollywood blockbuster. He was all black quiffed hair and chiselled features.

  Indeed, the mere sight of him made two of the most fanciable girls in school, sixth formers no less, who would normally regard anyone younger as little more than pond life, all but drool with desire.

  Steve bloody Cool. Action Hero. Heartthrob. Total bastard.

  ***

  At Poplar Park, uniforms were compulsory, which, by the very definition of the word, should have made all the pupils look almost identical, dressed as they were in black blazer, black trousers, black shoes, blue jumper, white shirt and a stripy blue tie - unless they were dressed like ‘Bingo’ from the Banana Splits which Trevor was on one particularly memorable mufti day. Anyway, aside from that, uniforms left little room, or so Gordy naively thought, for anyone to look particularly different and even less room for individualism. But he could not have been more wrong.

  Gordy’s blazer was made of some vile crimpolene material with cheap chrome buttons and side vents, his trousers were itchy flannel flares - something along the lines of what his dad wore to work at the bank. His shoes were Air Wear, although the ones aimed at school children, with a criss-cross style pattern on the front, not the other, harder, boot variety that the older lads wore. In short, a parental-wrapped geek like so many of his peers. But not Steve Cool.

  Steve Cool wore a short-collared shirt, a plain black tie with an impossibly small knot, a tight, grey shetland pullover (not regulation blue and most definitely not man-made fibre), peg-leg trousers and - the Pièce de résistance - jam-top shoes - which, to Gordy’s mind, were only the coolest bloody shoes in the whole of Christendom!

  Jam-top shoes (sometimes referred to as just ‘jam shoes’) were black, pointed lace-ups with a white perforated ‘tea-bag’ effect top, which loosely resembled modern day ‘spats’ and made famous by style guru and ‘modfather’ Paul Weller of The Jam. Not exactly revolutionary but cool as it got in Bradley - or at least to Gordy. And unfortunately, as it turned out, to Pippa Wilson. Goddess, sex-kitten, dream date and big chested girlfriend of the coolest guy in school.

  Gordy, on the other hand, was most definitely uncool. Among his peers, Gordy was about average in the looks department. Some of his mates he considered to be truly hideous, whilst others he thought to be much better looking than him and would probably appeal much more to the opposite sex than he would. Even Trevor, who when not hiding his face under a Spider-man mask or a storm trooper helmet (Star Wars not Nazi) was a fairly good-looking lad.

  However, Pippa only had eyes for Steve bloody Cool.

  Gordy was chubby, which his mum and nan assured him was just puppy fat, had a brown basin-style haircut and wore a pair of ugly horn-rimmed specs (although thankfully not the awful National Health types which he absolutely detested). The optician told his mum that the glasses, if he persisted with them, would not be permanent and that eventually his eyesight would rectify itself. A hope which Gordy clung to almost as much as the one which saw him going out with Pippa Wilson.

  Gordy knew though, for Pippa to even consider him, he would have to lose weight and get rid of the glasses, that would be the first thing. The second thing would be to stop being a nerd - which would be very difficult considering that this was his default setting (so maybe he’d just have to suppress it enough so that she wouldn’t notice). The third thing - and this was a biggie - was that he would also, undoubtedly, have to be cool.

  Gordy didn’t even know what ‘being cool’ meant until 1977 when he saw the TV series Happy Days for the first time. He vividly remembered entering the living room holding an overflowing bowl of Sugar Puffs (a little after-school snack before tea), to find his brother sitting there on the settee laughing at his favourite show. Now Kev wasn’t a natural laugher so this was obviously something very special. So Gordy sat down to watch.

  He was unusually late to the Happy Days party (which started airing in the UK in 1976) as normally he knew about all the ‘must see’ TV shows, but somehow this one had passed him by.

  Of course the redoubtable Trevor had seen it but found it all a bit too ‘fluffy’ for his tastes and had switched channels after the first five minutes. Therefore he remained completely oblivious to the coolest character ever to appear on British TV - although the whole concept of cool was simply beyond Trevor anyway.

  However, Gordy’s moment of enlightenment came when ‘The Fonz’ appeared, right there in his front room, in glorious technicolour on their newly rented Ultra TV. Suddenly, with his brother Kev sitting beside him, watching not only The Fonz but Richie, Potsie, Ralph Malph and all of the Arnolds gang, everything changed forever. The word ‘cool’ was born in its modern form (to Gordy at least) and he knew, without doubt, that’s what he wanted to be.

  Being cool would be the one thing that would attract Pippa. Being cool would be the answer to his dreams.

  Nerd, no. Cool, yes. That would be his new mantra.

  ***

  If he ever hoped to stand a chance of being invited to inspect the bountiful contents of Pippa’s fully laden bra then to be cool was the only way.

  The world had embraced The Fonz, now it was going to have to brace itself for The Gord.

  Chapter Two

  As Pippa Wilson and her friends came back down from the school field via the bike sheds after smoking their three cigarettes each at lunchtime - taken from the packet of No.6 that Pippa’s mum had generously given her that morning, they didn’t even notice Daisy Flynn leaning against the wall all by herself. Daisy smiled and held up a hand to wave but as soon as she realised that they were going to blank her, she turned the wave into a rather dramatic hair flattening manoeuvre so as not to look like a complete numpty. It certainly wasn’t a futile gesture because if anybody’s hair did need flattening it was most definitely Daisy’s.

  Daisy’s bright red mop closely resembled the immense afro of Hair Bear in ‘Help!... It’s The Hair Bear Bunch!’ on TV (so much so, that whenever Daisy walked by a certain pack of particularly nasty fifth years they would all sing the theme tune, ‘Help, help, here come the bears! Help, help!’).

  Unfortunately, her hair was the only BIG thing about her. Daisy was stick thin and straight down, just like a boy. She had no hips, no waist to speak of and her chest was very nearly concave. She was fourteen but one of life’s very late developers. On top of all that, she wore blue National Health specs and had a generous sprinkling of freckles. However, beneath the wild hair, behind the ghastly goggles and in between the sprinkling of freckles she was, if anyone cared to look closely enough, a very pretty girl.

  But Daisy was a loner. Not by choice necessarily but she just didn’t have many friends. She had arrived at Poplar Park only a f
ew short weeks ago, halfway through the third year, when most of the other pupils had already had the two previous ones to forge close friendships. Daisy had been brought up in Africa where her parents had worked as missionaries but had returned to the UK in order to give their daughter a ‘normal’ upbringing (even though they, themselves, were about as normal as the ‘Smash’ Martians). Sadly, they had returned a couple of years too late and not only was Daisy now considered an outsider but she was also branded as ‘God Squad’ and therefore a ‘bit of a nutter.’

  If fact, Daisy was not God Squad at all. She couldn’t give a stuff about religion. She wasn’t an atheist exactly, or at least she didn’t think so, but she definitely wasn’t a bible basher either. Unlike her parents who were the archetypical epitome of the ‘Jesus Freak’ - with their brightly coloured hand-knitted cardies and leather sandals.

  Her parents would also always insist on dropping her off at the school gates every morning in their clapped-out, hand-painted VW Camper (brightly decorated with flowers, peace signs and religious slogans like ‘God is love’ and ‘Jesus saves’). They would have probably received less attention if they had turned up driving a huge pink penis and Daisy certainly felt that she couldn’t look more of a knob as she ashamedly climbed out of it each day.

  Nevertheless, once she had worked up the courage and was actually out of the ‘Bible-bus’ (as the wags in the schoolyard had christened it), her parents could be heard shouting loud encouragement to their darling daughter from the school gates. Normally something along the lines of, ‘Have a lovely day, sweetie - may God be with you!’ (which could only have sounded marginally more embarrassing had they shouted ‘May The Force be with you!’) at the top of their very Christian voices - usually when Daisy was at least halfway across the playground and hoping like hell that just for bloody once they would not do it and allow her the chance of entering the school cloakroom without a face the colour of a ripe tomato for the first time ever. But, alas, it seemed never to be.

  In the afternoons, at home time, her parents would stand waving by the school gates like a pair of mad fools - Her dad, all beads and loon pants, with shoulder length hair and a thick bushy beard - looking like the twin brother of Roy Wood from ‘Wizard’ and her mum, dressed head to foot in a psychedelic kaftan with bum length, dead straight, bright ginger hair that was parted perfectly down the middle and held in place by a thin beaded headband.

  Daisy loved them dearly but just wished that they didn’t look and act like such a pair of gormless twats.

  School was hard enough and her ever-so-kind, ever-so-caring and extremely loving parents were just making it a flaming nightmare!

  On top of all that, Daisy’s flower-power, peace loving, God bothering parents didn’t even own a TV! Try admitting that little nugget of highly controversial information at school and you’ll only have to wait mere seconds before the ‘Christ, what a weirdo!’ bomb goes off. It’s a sure way to ostracise yourself from the rest of the class (including the teacher).

  Daisy knew this because it had already happened. This shameful piece of intelligence wasn’t something she gave up easily but when you start asking ‘What’s a Scooby Doo?’ or ‘Why is Peter Blue?’ It becomes fairly obvious that you’re either A) a complete moron or B) don’t own a telly.

  God only knows what would happen if Daisy’s school mates found out how she and her parents actually spent most evenings.

  Daisy’s dad would play the guitar with her mum accompanying him on the tambourine whilst singing such timeless gospel classics as ‘Michael Row The Boat Ashore (Hallelujah)’ and ‘Kumbaya’ with Daisy being cheerfully coaxed into joining them - which she frequently and unavoidably did. However, she would rather have run down the street naked - or at least she would have if she’d had some boobs! Even singing Kumbaya with a couple of deluded nutters was preferable to showing the world what she completely lacked in the chest department. Just.

  Daisy spent a great deal of time worrying about her chest and wondering when, if ever, it would appear. Would she always be the human equivalent of the Salt Lake Flats or would she eventually develop a majestic mountain range to rival the topographical wonders of Pippa Wilson’s all natural terrain?

  At present she seriously doubted it.

  Daisy’s parents seemed to lack all sense of vanity - as their seriously dodgy clothing choices would easily attest. Sadly, however, Daisy did not.

  This fact seemed to be in complete contrast to how Daisy appeared, with her ‘Hair Bear’ afro and ugly blue specs but the simple truth was that she hated the way she looked and would have done almost anything to change it.

  Indeed, Daisy would have cheerfully sold her granny if, in return, she could even slightly resemble Pippa Wilson whom she thought to be the most beautiful girl in the world.

  What is more, Daisy would have gladly raffled off all the members of her granny’s sewing circle for the chance of just one kiss from Steve Cool who she had loved from afar since the very first time she had set eyes on him.

  But nobody knew. It was her secret and she would never let on for fear of the ridicule it would surely bring.

  Also, if Steve Cool found out she would just die.

  Nevertheless, regardless of whether or not she would sell her granny, Daisy was actually a very nice, very sweet girl who wouldn’t hurt a fly - but she really did wish she was much less of a specky ginger and had at least something that warranted the need for a training bra!

  Then maybe, just maybe, Steve Cool would look her way (and not just to sing the opening bars of ‘Help!... It’s The Hair Bear Bunch!) whenever she walked by.

  Daisy would spend many a happy hour practicing her newly married signature, writing it out time after time in the blank pages of her school exercise books. ‘Mrs Daisy Cool’, ‘Daisy Cool esq’, ‘D. Cool’ and possibly the best one of all, ‘Mrs Steve Cool.’

  How utterly dreamy.

  Of course, that’s exactly what these were; daydreams. Because Steve Cool didn’t even know she existed. Well, technically he did because of A) her striking and now infamous resemblance to Hair Bear B) her unmissable arrival each morning in the ‘Bible-bus’ and C) because of possibly the most embarrassing moment of her life which she had tried, and sadly failed, to obliterate from memory.

  It had become indelibly imprinted in her brain as ‘The Door-to-door Debacle’.

  Shortly after their return from Africa Glynn and Lynn Flynn (yes, really - although soon to be known throughout the neighbourhood as the ‘Mad Missionaries’ or alternatively ‘The Hair Bear Bunch’) took it upon themselves to spread the word of The Lord among the Godless folk of Bradley. All well and good you might think, each to their own and all that, but they also chose to take along their painfully shy, excruciatingly embarrassed daughter, Daisy.

  Now a doorstep visit by the Flynn’s didn’t just include their brand of homemade evangelism; a little gentle prodding toward the Road to Redemption and a short Q & A about ‘What God means to you’, but also, and by far the more memorable (for all the wrong reasons) a short musical rendition of George Harrison’s ‘My Sweet Lord’ (seemingly ignorant to the fact that it was a praise song to the Hindu god Krishna) with Glynn singing and playing the guitar, Lynn on harmonies and the tambourine and Daisy, very reluctantly, keeping time with the kazoo. She was also required to sing along with the chorus.

  One particular Sunday lunchtime, when most people with any sense were sitting down to a full roast with all the trimmings, The Mad Missionaries decided to go-a-calling, complete with guitar, tambourine, kazoo and heavily afroed daughter. After choosing, and failing to impress, nearly all the households in the designated area, they finally arrived at Number 42 Carter Avenue. The home of one Steven David Cool and his tattoo emblazoned, incomprehensibly Glaswegian father, who, they were soon to discover, liked to have a ‘wee dram’ on a Sunday afternoon and was prone to get a bit punchy when a ‘hairy bunch of hipp
ies’ interrupted him.

  But did this stop Glynn and Lynn Flynn? Did it buggery. From the opening notes of ‘My Sweet Lord’ it did not bode well - with Mr. Cool looking anything but. However, at this point, Daisy had no idea to whose home they had come-a-calling and was trying to look anywhere other than at the angry drunken Scotsman with the pictorial history of his misspent youth depicted (rather badly, Daisy thought) in Indian ink on his meaty forearms and bulging biceps for fear of being on the wrong end of a Glasgow kiss.

  To his credit however, Glynn, in his brightly coloured paisley shirt, voluminous flairs and sandals looked completely unfazed. Or at least he did until The Abominable Scotsman snatched his guitar and smashed it against the door frame with a musical twang (in the key of ‘totally fucked’).

  From then on, things rapidly went from bad to worse as Mr. Cool (or, as he should have been called, Mr. Angry - or more likely, Mr. Pissed or possibly even Mr. Quite-a-bit-of-both), clamped hold of Glynn’s throat and refused to let go. Daisy’s dad looked like a confused child - albeit a very hairy one wearing an abundance of beads - who sounded like someone was playing the maracas as he was shaken like a proverbial rag-doll, his sandalled feet dangling as he hung helplessly in the Glaswegian’s gargantuan grip.

  But then it happened. Harps started playing, a choir of angels started singing and a golden ray of sunlight shone down from the heavens (or maybe none of that happened but it’s how Daisy chose to remember it, if ever she had the misfortune to remember the day at all) as Steve Cool suddenly appeared from inside the house.

  Moments before he appeared, Daisy was wrestling with what was worse; her acute embarrassment at being party to the doorstep sing-song (which she already knew, from visiting every other house in the street, would be the talk of the school on Monday morning), or her father’s imminent death at the hands of a Glaswegian gorilla. But all of that was temporarily forgotten when her teenage idol, with his quiffed black hair, tight white, cap-sleeved T-shirt and faded blue jeans took hold of his father’s tree-trunk of an arm and said, “Just leave it, Dad, they’re not worth it”.