Jam Tops, the Fonz and the Pursuit of Cool

by Kris Lillyman

  When Pippa was a tot, her mum had been a regular on the party scene - heavily into drink, drugs and sex, leaving little Pippa with a string of babysitters whilst she was out partying her life away - sometimes for days on end.

  She’d had numerous boyfriends - and regularly indulged in loud, wild and very explicit sex with them which Pippa couldn’t help but overhear through the paper thin walls of her bedroom.

  Although Pippa had been sexually curious for some time, she actually lost her virginity to a drunken seventeen year old lad who her mum had picked up in the pub one night with the promise of a good time.

  Unfortunately, her mum passed out pissed, prior to the promised passion and the promiscuous Pippa had seized the opportunity to step-in - anxious to find out what all the fuss was about.

  She took the lad’s hand and led him upstairs, telling him that she, too, was seventeen - which she unquestionably looked.

  The lad was so drunk he could barely see her let alone perform, but perform he duly did - very briefly - before vomiting all over the bedclothes and falling into a deep, snore-filled sleep.

  The next morning he had no memory of the night before and neither had Pippa’s mum, yet the deed had been done and Pippa could brag about it to all her friends, relishing the thought of being the centre of attention - at school if not at home.

  A short time later, Pippa’s mum married a well-off Portuguese medallion man who had supplied his nubile new wife with a brown-eyed, dark-skinned baby boy who effortlessly relegated Pippa to third place in her mother’s affections.

  Unsurprising then, that Pippa craved attention, using all the weapons in her well-stocked arsenal to attract it - hence the tight-fitting clothes, pushed-out boobs and the exaggerated wiggle in her walk.

  She was also fairly free and easy when it came to sex and extremely promiscuous which, to a boy like Gordy was nothing short of a result - possibly to be accompanied by a resounding ‘ka-ching!’

  Gordy’s sexual awakening - indeed, his first ever sexual experience (excluding those he’d had with his right hand and a box of Scotties) came two weeks into his relationship with Pippa.

  It was on the way home from school in late September on a beautiful, warm evening. Pippa had rather unusually asked Gordy to walk her home and he, anxious to spend as much time with her as humanly possible, eagerly agreed - completely disregarding the fact that Barb would have his tea ready for him, expecting him home, as she was, at his usual time.

  But Gordy didn’t care - Pippa had requested his company and he was powerless to deny her.

  Half way to Pippa’s house they took a shortcut down a narrow track. On one side of it, behind a brambly hedge, was a row of allotments and on the other side was a high fence blocking access to various back gardens.

  A short way along, Pippa suddenly grabbed Gordy’s hand. “C’mon,” she said, before dragging him through a well-used gap in the brambly hedge. Swiftly, she led him to a small dilapidated shed that stood close by on the other side - presumably used by the green-fingered gardener whose vegetable patch they trampled over en-route.

  “What’s going on?” Asked Gordy, dimly.

  “You’ll see,” Pippa giggled, pulling open the rickety door and pulling him inside.

  The interior smelt fusty and damp. Upon an upturned tea crate was an old kettle and a cracked mug along with several ancient seed catalogues. There was also a stack of dirty magazines; a Knave, a Penthouse, and a Forum, which, to Gordy, all looked extremely well-thumbed (indeed, he would have been more than happy to thumb through them himself if he had not been with Pippa).

  Against the back wall there was a tatty old settee with lumps of yellow wadding poking out.

  “This is my private place,” Pippa said seductively before turning to Gordy and pecking him lightly on his gobsmacked lips. “This is where I always come with my boyfriends when I want to be alone with them.”

  Briefly Gordy wondered exactly how many boyfriends she had actually been alone with but the question was immediately forgotten as Pippa brushed by him, blatantly bashing her big, beautiful bazoombas against his barely beating chest, and pulled the door closed, shutting them both in.

  Then, she took his hand and placed it purposely on the pert, plump peak of her right boob. Gordy nearly passed out as he felt the firm, heaving mound under his trembling palm. He tentatively squeezed it and it felt even better than he ever imagined it would.

  Suddenly his head was swimming and his trousers felt like they might burst.

  Pippa looked down and perused the prominent protuberance in his four-pleat pegs then smiled at him. “I’ll show you mine if you show me yours,” she said.

  “Bloody Nora!” Was all Gordy could utter as she began to unbutton her blouse.

  ***

  To cut a short and rather messy story even shorter, Gordy entered the shed a boy and emerged a man.

  His first sexual experience had been utterly spectacular - wonderful, marvellous, stupendous - fucking brilliant!

  Even though it had all been something of a disaster and certainly not what he was sure Pippa was accustomed to - who seemingly knew exactly what she was doing.

  She even magically produced a packet of rubber johnnys when the time came for Gordy to slip one on (although he hadn’t got a clue about how to go about it, somehow managing to puncture two - and catapult another across the shed - before Pippa expertly came to his rescue).

  Nevertheless, the following fifteen seconds were, without doubt, the very best of his life. Indeed, he couldn’t wait to do it again - which he duly did ten minutes later - for a slightly longer length of time and with slightly more success.

  Over the next few days Pippa and Gordy visited the shed on numerous occasions and, with the more practice he had, Gordy became more proficient - even though ‘little Gordy’ was still prone to get over excited rather too quickly and make himself ‘sick’ before Pippa was properly satisfied.

  But for Gordy it was as if all his Christmases had come at once and he just couldn’t believe his luck.

  Fantasies really did come true.

  Nothing in his life had ever come close to how he felt when he was with Pippa and everything else paled in comparison; he lost interest in school work, his friends - everything - he just couldn’t think of anything else but the girl of his dreams and how soon he could go back to the tumbledown shed with her that had become their private love nest.

  He had proudly introduced his new girlfriend to Alan and Barb but they had not been particularly enamoured. They thought her beautiful, of course, and Alan was clearly pleased that his son was obviously not a ‘nancy boy’ as he had long feared he might be - indeed, he thought he had done exceptionally well to snare such a ‘looker’. But Pippa was ill at ease with parents and not a natural conversationalist. She came across as shy and surly - as if she had somewhere else better to be and Gordy’s parents couldn’t help but compare her to the much brighter, much chattier and far more wholesome Daisy who they thought was a ‘lovely girl’.

  Alan and Barb took an even dimmer view of their son going out with Pippa when his school work began to suffer. Mr. Cuthel had even telephoned them to voice his concerns about Gordy’s lack of attention in class, his non-existent homework assignments and his apparent disinterest in anything that might improve his education (unaware that Gordy was receiving an education of an entirely different variety in the shed after school).

  All this Alan and Barb attributed to Pippa - not her personally, but Gordy’s clear infatuation of her.

  They had attempted to speak to him about it but Gordy was heedless and it had all blown up into a massive argument resulting in Gordy stomping out of the room and slamming the door - waking up Izzie and scaring the cat shitless.

  His parents’ disapproval served only to drive Gordy further into the arms of Pippa, increasingly consumed by thoughts of how best to please her, feari
ng that if he didn’t, he might somehow fail to pass muster and she would pack him in.

  He became fixated on fashion, almost obsessed with his appearance and trying to be cool, convinced that those were the things that had won Pippa over and certain that they were what was going to help him keep her.

  The money he’d saved in the Summer was quickly spent on more clothes - all very trendy and stylish which did, indeed, impress Pippa and her simpering sirens, at least for a time.

  With Pippa on his arm and wearing his sharp new clobber, Gordy soon achieved ‘coolest kid in school’ status among his peers. Previously this would have meant the absolute world to him - an accolade that would have been simply unimaginable just a few short months before - but now he didn’t even notice as his whole world revolved around Pippa. There was just no room for anything or anyone else.

  Including Daisy which, in time, he would come to bitterly regret.

  However, in the meantime, he was in love, in lust and blind, deaf and dumb to absolutely everything other than Pippa.

  Yet Pippa was frivolous, flighty and far too fond of flirting to focus fully on just one boy. No matter how much Gordy adored her, no matter how much he tried to please her, pleasure her, pander to her every need, her interest in him eventually waned.

  Soon, their frequent visits to the shed dried up. Then Pippa began to shy away from kissing him and holding his hand, saying that ‘she just didn’t feel like it’.

  Several lunchtimes went by when Pippa said she couldn’t meet up with him, saying that she had to stay in class to finish up a project, or that she wanted to spend some time with the sirens as they had ‘stuff’ to sort out.

  Gordy, of course, believed every word she said, and although he had lots of friends he could hang around with he chose, instead, to wander around the playground like a lost puppy, moping and missing his girlfriend.

  The news that Steve Cool had been loitering around the school field reached Gordy later than everyone else - no one quite wanting to be the one to tell him. When he eventually found out that Pippa wasn’t actually ‘finishing up projects’ or ‘spending time with the sirens’ but rather flirting down the field with her cooler than cool ex-boyfriend, Steve bloody Cool, it felt like he had been kicked in the stomach.

  Surely there was some mistake, some logical explanation?

  But then Gordy discovered that Pippa had been seeing Steve Cool for sometime behind his back - he found evidence in the shed to prove it (namely an empty box of French Ticklers which Gordy had never previously even heard of let alone used).

  When he showed Pippa the offending item and confronted her about it (much against his better judgement as he feared for what her answer might be), she confirmed it. She and Steve bloody Cool were getting back together and Gordy was dumped.

  There were no niceties about it. Pippa just shrugged and said “Yeah, it’s true. I was gonna tell you later anyway - but I’m going back with Steve now, so sorry but we’re finished.”

  Then she strode off back to her sisterhood of sirens, her sorority of sniggering supporters, who were all whispering conspiratorially in the background - clearly all having known what had been going on for sometime.

  Gordy couldn’t believe it; things like this weren’t supposed to happen if you were cool! After all, know one ever finished with The Fonz - not even Pinky Tuscadero - so how could it happen to The Gord (although that nickname had never actually caught on, which was probably for the best).

  Nevertheless, regardless of ‘The Fonzie Factor’, the outcome remained the same; the best, most exciting, most utterly incredible time of Gordy’s young life was over and he was absolutely devastated.

  What the hell was he going to do now?

  Which was when, at long last, after six weeks of virtually ignoring everyone, he finally thought of Daisy.

  But by then it was much too late.

  ***

  Daisy seemed to be in a constant state of flux; one moment she couldn’t stand the sight of Gordy, irrationally infuriated every time he walked by, the next she desperately wanted to talk to him - but that was prohibited by the persistent proximity of the perfectly proportioned Pippa who he was patently potty about.

  As she had feared, now they were back at school, Pippa seemed to be all that Gordy cared about.

  This hurt Daisy dreadfully; he was the closest thing to a best friend she had ever had and they’d had such fun together over the Summer both at Bailey’s Bandstand and away from it. Now though he was little more than a passing ship who drifted by once or twice a day, always en-route to somewhere but never on course for her.

  She was not alone in feeling like this and was aware that all his friends were suffering much the same treatment. The plain and simple fact was that he was besotted by Pippa and could think of nothing else.

  Frazer, of course, had noticed, too, but seemed to take it much more in his stride than Daisy. Very little appeared to get under his skin and he just accepted the situation as it was and took the view that Gordy would come back when things had run their course. He knew Pippa of old and had an inkling that her and Gordy’s romance would not last too long.

  Even though she tried hard not to show it, this cheered Daisy up somewhat - although she knew it wasn’t a very charitable attitude.

  Nevertheless, with or without Gordy life had to go on.

  Daisy and Frazer continued to go out with each other but their relationship never progressed any further than it had on day one. Frazer was content merely to kiss and hold hands and seemed to have no interest in anything beyond that, which suited Daisy just fine.

  She was extremely fond of Frazer but not in a romantic way although being with him, at least for the present, seemed to make life at school that little bit easier - even though she felt dreadfully guilty about leading him on or that she might just be using him. Somehow though, she suspected that Frazer wouldn’t particularly care.

  Indeed, all he did seem to care about was punk rock music and how to mould his Mohican into murderous multi-coloured spikes (with copious amounts of Super Glue which Daisy had serious misgivings about). But their combined interest in music gave them a common ground and they had lots of long conversations about bands and albums and various gigs they would like to go to. Frazer was staggered by the breadth of Daisy’s musical knowledge and found her absolutely fascinating - in fact she even told him about records he should buy which she thought he might like - and most of the time he did.

  Daisy had not told Frazer, nor anyone else for that matter, about Africa. She didn’t know why - maybe she was in denial about The Nile - or whatever other God forsaken place in that vast continent her parents had decided to up sticks and move to in order to preach ‘The Word of The Lord.’

  She intended to tell Frazer, of course, but not until absolutely necessary - perhaps when the house was sold - which, Daisy hoped, would take some time.

  But sadly it didn’t.

  Surprisingly, Glynn and Lynn’s super trippy, psychedelic, semi sold in just two short weeks, much to their delight and Daisy’s dismay.

  Suddenly it was all very real and their departure was imminent. In less than a month the Flynn family would be catching a plane to Tanzania where Glynn and Lynn were set to resume their work as missionaries.

  Daisy was frantic; she didn’t want to go, didn’t want to leave all her new friends or her cool, trendy, popular new life in Bradley but she had no choice.

  Finally she plucked up the courage to tell Frazer who took the news well enough - he always knew they were not destined to be together; that their relationship was only little more than platonic but he was sorry nonetheless. Although the truth of it was that his life would continue well enough without her even though he wasn’t particularly ready for it to.

  Certainly he’d miss her and he did wish that she wasn’t going but beyond that Frazer wasn’t sufficiently equipped emotionally
to offer any more than that.

  He did, however, promise to keep the news to himself.

  Daisy dearly wished that she and Gordy were on better terms so she could discuss things with him but she was still so damned mad at him and he was blind to everything else but Pippa.

  To make matters worse, Daisy had spotted Steve Cool hanging around the gate at the far end of the school field several times - often with Pippa which she was sure Gordy wouldn’t be pleased about and knowing, as his friend, she should really warn him about - but her pride or stubborn pigheadedness, as it turned out, prevented her from doing so.

  Furthermore, Daisy had even caught Steve Cool wolfishly eyeing her, herself, on more than one occasion - but only when Frazer and Pippa were nowhere to be seen as Daisy guessed he’d have no wish for a repeat performance of the roller-disco debacle.

  Steve Cool had some nerve to look at her in such a way, especially after what he had said to her, but it was as if he didn’t recognise her as the same girl he’d insulted at the roller-disco after plucking the bobble hat from her head - indeed, on one occasion, he even had the audacity to wolf-whistle her.

  Daisy felt immediately affronted, but afterwards, at home, in the privacy of her own bedroom, she felt a huge surge of triumph - Steve Cool had finally noticed her for all the right reasons. And it felt good.

  What was it about boys? Why were they so incredibly infuriating one moment and then so bloody irresistible the next?

  Frazer, Steve, Gordy - Daisy’s head was just one big whirl of confusion - maybe her leaving for Africa was for the best after all.

  Although, in truth, she could think of nothing worse.

  Nevertheless, on the Friday before half-term, Daisy completed her last day at Poplar Park school. The next day she would be boarding a plane bound for Tanzania - away from Frazer, from Steve Cool and, most distressingly, away from Gordy Brewer.

  Daisy and Frazer said their last goodbyes after school, outside the gates. Daisy gave him a simple peck on the lips and said, “See you again sometime, maybe.”