Sam wipes the froth from his top lip. ‘A band? I’m not sure …’
‘You’d be a natural frontman.’
‘Would it work with my music, though? My songs are written to be performed as solo acoustics.’
Marcus makes an impatient gesture. ‘You want to play in dumps like this for ever? I promise you, man, you won’t regret it.’ He grins and rubs his finger and thumb together.
This is the first opportunity that’s come Sam’s way in two years, and Marcus is the only person since Cat to properly listen to his music. But still, doubt pulls at him.
‘I don’t know,’ he says. ‘Can I think it over?’
‘Sure,’ Marcus says. ‘Come see me in my office. Here’s my card. Don’t wait too long.’
Three days later, Sam finds the address on Shaftesbury Avenue. The reception is plush, and the girl behind the desk tells him to wait. There are framed gold discs on the walls, photographs of Marcus shaking hands with Malcolm McLaren, Stevie Wonder, Princess Diana. Sam blinks at names of top bands. He didn’t expect this.
When he’s called into the office, Marcus looks up from a wide desk. ‘Sam Sage.’ He opens his arms. ‘My new frontman.’
Sam clears his throat, sinking into the chair opposite. ‘I’m really interested, Marcus, and grateful for the opportunity, only … I need some reassurance that I’d have artistic control.’
‘Obviously there’ll have to be some changes,’ Marcus says impatiently. ‘We’ll be resetting the music for a band – a five-piece probably. But the bigger sound will give your songs more impact.’ He drums his fingers on his desk. ‘Look, you’ll be frontman, and you’ll get writing credits and royalties. We can work out the finer details in the contract.’
It’s not the answer he wanted, but Sam thinks of recent gigs in half-filled pubs where chatter obliterated his singing. If he wants people to hear his music, this is his best chance. After all, it’s his material. If he can work with the right producer, be at the centre, he’ll keep creative control.
He reaches across, offering his hand. Marcus takes it. ‘I’ll have my lawyers draw up the paperwork.’
‘Any thoughts on a name for this new band?’ Sam asks.
‘Something easy to say and easy to remember,’ Marcus says. ‘Could be anything, really. I mean, think of the Beatles. Who would have thought of calling a band after an insect?’ He lights a cigarette. ‘They took inspiration from Buddy Holly’s group, the Crickets. Changed the spelling to incorporate the idea of beat music.’ He grins. ‘Lennon’s idea, obviously.’ The phone on his desk lights up, and he waves a hand at Sam, ‘You’ll be hearing from us.’
There are four of them in the Lambs so far: Sam on vocals and rhythm guitar, Rick on lead guitar, Susie on keyboard and backing vocals and Jonny on bass. They’re just missing a drummer. Marcus has found them a room in Streatham to practise in.
It’s a hot afternoon, and they’re holding auditions for the drummer. They’ve seen four hopefuls already, but none of them is right. Just as Sam’s wondering where the fifth person has got to, the silhouette of a tall man appears in the open doorway.
Sam squints into the sunlight, and puts a hand over his eyes. ‘Can’t see a thing, mate,’ he tells the tall man. ‘Come in,’ he says. ‘Drum kit’s over here.’
As the man steps out of light into shadow, his cloak of invisibility slips away. Sam’s already reaching through space to greet the newcomer with a handshake. Except he’s not a newcomer. Before Sam can retract his hand, George grabs it between both of his.
‘Jack?’ he’s saying, grinning. ‘You’re in this band? I can’t believe it!’ His damp fingers radiate heat. He squeezes, and Sam feels the bones in his hand rotate.
He remembers George standing on the doorstep: I’m your brother. Sam pulls away. ‘How did you find me? What do you want?’
‘I’ve come for the audition.’ George shakes his head. ‘It just said it was for a band … I mean, I didn’t know you were going to be here …’
A bead of sweat trickles down Sam’s spine. ‘Cut the bullshit,’ he snaps.
George’s large, florid face glows; he takes a hanky from his back pocket and wipes his brow. ‘It’s true. I’m a drummer,’ he says slowly.
‘All right then.’ Sam nods towards the Yamaha kit at the back of the room. ‘Prove it.’
George goes across to the drums. He rearranges the seat, concentration creasing his face. He gives the cymbals a couple of hits.
‘You know him?’ Marcus asks, curiously. ‘Why did he call you Jack?’
‘I changed my name. He’s my half-brother,’ says Sam.
Then any conversation is impossible, as George, his sleeves jammed to his elbows, begins. He starts with a whisper of roll over the snare, leaning low, and then he’s bolt upright and his sticks are moving, his foot pumping, driving a complex beat into a heart-thumping rhythm. His mouth is pursed; his head nods. His huge body has taken on a kind of grace as he stretches over the drums. He tosses his sticks in the air and catches them in one fluid movement to come down on the rack toms with a sound like thunder. When he finishes, head bowed and chest heaving, there’s a moment of ringing silence before the rest of the band applaud.
Marcus says, ‘He hit the shit out of those drums. Why didn’t you tell me about him? We’ve found our missing drummer, right?’
George looks sheepish as the others continue to clap and whistle through their teeth. He takes off his shirt, balling it up to wipe his glistening face, then reaches into his bag and pulls out a clean one.
‘So … I’ve got the gig?’ George asks. They’re walking through an alley, taking a shortcut to the high street.
‘We’re playing Dingwalls in under three weeks,’ Sam says. ‘I won’t find anyone as good as you before that.’
George lights a cigarette and takes a deep drag.
‘I can’t believe it’s a coincidence you’re here,’ Sam says, squinting through the drifting smoke. ‘What do you really want?’
‘I told you,’ George says wearily. ‘I wanted the job. I saw the advert in Melody Maker.’
Sam still feels as though George has somehow tricked him. The shock of seeing him hasn’t left his body. ‘If that’s the case, then we’re stuck with each other,’ he says. ‘Until I can find a drummer to replace you.’
George scratches his scalp roughly. ‘It was traumatic for me too, you know,’ he blurts out. ‘You’re not the only walking wounded.’
‘Look, don’t start. My mother’s married to my father. You shouldn’t even exist.’
‘Yeah, but I do.’ George stops and glares at Sam. ‘So you’d better get used to it.’ He drops the cigarette onto the path, grinding it underfoot.
‘You know, it’s pretty bloody ironic finding out about you,’ Sam says. ‘For as long as I can remember, my father’s gone on about me doing my duty as the only son.’ He scuffs his boot along some loose stones. ‘Turns out that was a bit of a joke.’
‘Our father,’ George corrects.
‘What?’
‘He’s my father too.’
‘Our father.’ Sam scowls. ‘But I don’t suppose you were made to carry the family name like it was the fucking Olympic torch.’
‘I don’t have the family name,’ George says, his voice gruff. ‘Dad never married Mum.’
Sam stares at him. George’s familiarity with his father makes him feel disorientated. He has an overwhelming need to punish this stranger, this big lout standing here cluttering up his life. He curls his lip. ‘Don’t whine about it. You’ve had all the privileges, and none of the crap I’ve had to put up with.’
‘Privileges?’ George snorts. ‘You were the one with peacocks on your lawn, mate. You got to go to a posh boarding school. Then Oxford University, wasn’t it? I’m a bastard, remember? I went to the local state school.’
‘I would have given anything to be at an ordinary school.’
‘God, you’re a spoilt brat.’ George spits the words.
�
�Is this what you really came for?’ Sam rubs his chin, angry and tired. ‘To insult me?’
‘Don’t be ridiculous.’ George prods him in the chest with his finger. ‘You’re the one moaning about having a silver spoon in your mouth.’
‘You came to my house and made my mother cry,’ Sam says. ‘Ruined her birthday. Upset my sister.’ His fingers curl into fists.
‘What, you think my mum hasn’t cried too? You’re a typical upper-class wanker, aren’t you? Poor little rich boy.’
‘At least my mother didn’t throw herself at someone else’s husband,’ Sam says, scrabbling for words to hurt. ‘At least she’s not a … a slut.’
‘Don’t talk about my mother like that!’ George pushes him, the force making him stagger backwards.
Sam recovers his balance and pushes George back. The thud of his palms on George’s chest feels good. All the rage inside – fury with his father, disappointment with his music, the loss of Cat – comes crashing through him, and his fist swings. The impact of knuckle and bone is shocking. His arm jars into his shoulder as his hand makes contact with George’s jaw.
George’s head whips back. The blow, satisfying for a second, leaves Sam’s knuckles smarting, and a taste of remorse in his mouth. But there’s no time to apologise, because George is already charging at him with a roar, rugby-tackling him around the waist, skull thumping into Sam’s solar plexus.
They’re on the ground, pummelling at each other. George is stronger, bigger, heavier. He pins Sam down and sits astride his chest, a weight cutting off his breath, shouting into his face, spit spraying. ‘Apologise. You bastard.’
But Sam no longer has any intention of apologising. He’s powered by adrenalin, a red rage making him almost elated. He writhes out of George’s grasp, twisting his hips to the side. George flails back, and scrambles clumsily to his feet. Sam hasn’t time to get up off the ground before George comes back at him with furious intent, eyes glittering; instinctively, Sam covers his head and sticks out a foot. He feels a jolt as it catches George’s ankle, hears the thump of George going down, the vibration trembling through the ground. When he looks up, George lies still as a fallen tree.
Sam gets onto all fours, touching his swollen lip with his tongue, tasting blood. He spits onto the ground and staggers up, breath tearing out of him. ‘Fuck,’ he pants. ‘It’s over. Get up.’ He holds out his hand to George. But George doesn’t move. He’s sprawled face down.
‘George? Come on. This isn’t funny.’ Sam kneels and prods his shoulder. George is still motionless. With a shudder of fear, Sam rolls him over. He gasps. Blood gushes from a gash across George’s forehead. The left side of his face is obliterated, smeared in sticky red. ‘My God! George? Talk to me. Can you move?’
George groans and sits up slowly, clutching his face. Bright blood seeps through his trembling fingers.
‘We need to stop the bleeding.’ Sam roots around in George’s bag and pulls out his rolled-up shirt. Bunching it, he dabs at the blood. His efforts reveal a jagged tear that runs across George’s eyebrow and through his left eyelid. He sees a glimpse of white – bone or muscle – and his stomach turns.
George moans. ‘I can’t see …’
‘Okay, mate.’ Sam tries to keep his voice steady. ‘You’re going to be fine. We need to get you to hospital.’ He looks around at the empty alley. He can hear a rush of tyres coming from the high street up ahead. Black cab, he thinks. Or he’ll flag down a passing motorist.
Sam waits all night in a hospital corridor, slumped on a chair with George’s bag clutched to his chest. George had an emergency operation shortly after they came in. ‘You should go home,’ a nurse tells him. ‘You won’t be able to see him until tomorrow.’ But Sam refuses to go anywhere; not until he knows that George is all right. He sits cradling his right fist. It throbs, blue-green, a reminder of the blow he struck. It’s his fault, he thinks. He started it.
It’s late morning when he finds George’s ward. A small group of people stand around his bedside, one of them with a clipboard. A man in a white coat, who appears to be in charge, is talking to George; when Sam gets to the bed, the doctor glances up with a tired expression, and gives a small distracted nod before turning away, the group hurrying to follow him. Sam watches the retreating figure with his entourage trailing behind. There was something about the doctor’s face, with its round glasses, its pleasant, boyish features. Sam has an odd feeling that he’s seen him before, somewhere else: in another life, it feels like.
‘That was my surgeon,’ George says. ‘Saved my eye. He says I’m going to have a spectacular scar.’ A bandage obscures the left side of his face. His usually ruddy skin is greyish, and there’s a bruise on his chin. He smiles weakly.
‘I’m sorry,’ Sam says. ‘Fuck. I’m so sorry.’
‘It was an accident,’ George says. His gaze falls on Sam’s split lip and colourful right hand. ‘Bet that hurts.’
‘Yeah. Like hell.’ Sam grins.
‘Remind me to teach you how to throw a proper punch,’ George says.
Sam raises one eyebrow. ‘If that wasn’t a proper punch, then what’s that big black mark on your chin?’
George laughs and then winces, putting a tentative hand up to the bandage.
Sam holds up the plastic bag he’s carrying, ‘A few things from the shop.’ He puts a collection of fruit, copies of music magazines and a bunch of flowers on the bedside table.
‘You two have been in the wars,’ a nurse says as she checks George’s temperature. ‘I’ll pop these in a vase, shall I?’
Sam sits next to the bed. Glimpsing the parts of George’s face not obscured by bandage, it’s impossible not to notice details that remind Sam of himself and his sisters. They share the same oval eyes, heavy lids making a wide space between eyelash and eyebrow. There’s a familiarity when George speaks, the way he shows his top teeth when he smiles. This hulking man with the body of a wrestler and his shock of red hair – this stranger – shares blood with Sam, fifty per cent of his DNA. And he shares the same pain of betrayal.
Sam feels a prickle of shame. Mattie’s always telling him he’s too hot-headed. He sighs. ‘Look, I’m sorry about the things I said.’ He rubs his temples. ‘I’ve been taking it out on you. And none of it is your fault.’
‘It’s all right.’ George looks embarrassed. ‘I get it. I turned up on your doorstep and wrecked your life.’
‘No,’ Sam corrects him. ‘You didn’t wreck it. Our father did.’ He clasps his hands together. ‘But we’re not going to let him ruin things for us, right? I’m glad you showed up for the audition. Glad you can be part of the Lambs.’ And as he says the words, he realises that he means them.
George beams. ‘I always wanted an older brother.’
His happiness is infectious. Sam grins. There’s strength and solidarity in having a brother; it promises a different kind of friendship and warmth from the kind he already shares with his sisters. He nods his head. ‘Brothers. Odd. But true.’
‘I expect you wanted one really,’ George is saying. ‘You just didn’t know it.’
‘Nope. Never occurred to me. Had my hands full with two sisters.’ Sam laughs. ‘Well, now they’re your sisters as well – I’m not outnumbered any more. They’re strong characters, I warn you.’ He puts his hand on George’s arm. ‘Welcome to the family.’
Both men blink furiously, then look away as the nurse reappears with the flowers arranged in a vase. ‘There,’ she says. ‘Don’t they look nice?’
It’s only later, when Sam’s back in Brixton, that he remembers where he’s seen George’s surgeon before. The realisation makes him gasp. He sits down heavily on the ramshackle sofa, reliving a stormy day in Atlantic City, a funeral in a graveyard. He can smell the soft green of the rain, the muskiness of the yew tree. He watched Cat and the man speaking in hushed voices between the gravestones. A man in round glasses who’d just lost his wife. He doesn’t remember Cat saying he was English. But George’s surgeon was the same
person, Sam is sure of it. What are the chances? he thinks. The coincidence opens a sudden temptation to hope – because if he can brush past the same stranger twice in his life, in different places, under different circumstances, then maybe he could bump into Cat again.
He gets up, angry with himself. Jesus! Anyone would think it was him who’d got the head injury. Her silence all those months ago was a clear message. He mustn’t turn into one of those pathetic people who only want what they can’t have.
TWENTY-FIVE
Cat, October 1985
The roller rink is loud with pop music, clattering wheels and the crash of skaters as they stop themselves by slamming into the side. I watch beginners tumble onto their bottoms with a shout. It looks painful. And fun.
Leo and I step tentatively onto the busy rink. Immediately my knees and ankles slide away from me. Leo, his face pinched with anxiety, is hanging onto the side with white knuckles, but Grace pushes off into the centre, arms out to balance, a grin on her face.
‘Come on, Daddy!’ She staggers, but regains her balance.
Leo looks at me, hooks his glasses up his nose with one finger, and shrugs. ‘Right. I’m going for it. Pray for me.’
And he’s off, tottering and slipping through the whirl of skaters towards his daughter. He’s doing this for Grace, her single wish for her eighth birthday treat. She’s grown in the last few months; her legs, once sturdy and plump, are now thin, with out-of-proportion knobbly knees.
I take a breath and let myself slide forward. Holy shit, I’m skating! Someone rushes past me at speed, and I wobble, windmilling my arms. But I remain upright, reaching the other two with a laugh of triumph.
Grace is holding her father’s hand, and she grabs mine so that she’s between us. We giggle and flounder and nearly fall, but somehow our little chain of three remains upright. Madonna is entreating us to get ‘Into the Groove’. I’m seduced by the repetitive circles we’re making together. Round and round we go with the thumping disco beat and skaters whizzing past. And it occurs to me, anyone looking at us would presume we’re a happy family.
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