My love, forgive me, but I’d seen you in pain too long
I told you I was strong, that I’d be fine on my own.
I lied, my love, I knew it was wrong,
I couldn’t live without him; I couldn’t leave my bed,
Slowly dying inside, didn’t want to face the day ahead,
It’s hard to believe, right now, that I’ll smile again, someday,
But at least, with friends, I know I’ll find a way,
I forget for an instant each time I wake,
How you’ve left me. It hits me. It’s agony to take,
I feel you around me, the smell on your shirts,
You’re no longer in pain but for me it still hurts,
I see your face in my mind, I cry, but smile.
Please, don’t worry for me.
I couldn’t live without him; I couldn’t leave my bed,
Slowly dying inside, didn’t want to face the day ahead,
It’s hard to believe, right now, that I’ll smile again, someday,
But at least, with friends, I know I’ll find a way,
Through the dark clouds I see the light;
life’s no longer passing me by,
I can’t see you but you’re there, of this I know.
I’m stronger now, my love. That’s no longer a lie,
I’ll speak of you always, you’re with me in all I do,
It’s not easy, it’s true. But I’m living.
Friends are helping me through.
I couldn’t live without him; I couldn’t leave my bed,
Slowly dying inside, didn’t want to face the day ahead,
It’s hard to believe, right now, that I’ll smile again, someday,
But at least, with friends, I know I’ll find a way,
I remember, with fondness, the journey we’ve taken,
Your face in my dreams, won’t stop my heart from breaking,
You’ll always be with me, besides me. I love you,
I can go on, I will go on, despite the pain,
My darling, rest easy. Until I see you again.
Not a whisper was heard as Florence gently closed the lid over the keyboard. There was a shared understanding amongst the onlookers, a realisation and a sense that they’d all just witnessed something very special.
Florence raised her head with a simple smile.
“Bloody hell,” said Ray, eventually breaking the silence. “I think we’ve found our music video!”
.
Chapter Eight
P ostman Sam flexed his prodigious biceps — which had the circumference of a small moon — employing them to handle the weight of yet another box from his van parked outside the coffee shop and hauling it into the small storage area behind the serving counter.
Sam’s progress was closely scrutinised and tracked in detail by the two Bingo Girls, Bella and Stella, sat in the front window. The Bingo Girls were named as such on account of their first mistaken appearance at the Lonely Heart Attack Club — mistaken in that they had, in fact, been looking for the local bingo hall at the time. Despite the initial confusion and erroneous introduction, however, they were now very much stalwart members and strong advocates of the advantages the social aspects of the club had to offer (including romantic, as the pair were the proud recipients of the most dates accepted). They were complete crackpots, the two of them, with the sort of youthful exuberance not commonly seen in pensioners of the octogenarian variety, and so they naturally fit right in. Also, if alcohol were to turn up at any club event, it’d be a fair bet that they’d been the source. As for which one of them was which, Jack had known them for a few years but still couldn’t tell you which one was Bella and which was Stella on account of their ever-changing hair colour. “Like a couple of old chameleons, them two,” remarked Jack each and every time he was called upon to identify who was who and failing miserably at it.
It hadn’t gone unnoticed by Jack that the Bingo Girls weren’t the only ones monitoring Sam’s progress with great interest, especially now that Sam had broken into a light sweat, resulting in his exposed muscles glistening and becoming even more alluring than they were before, apparently. Jack cast Emma a look.
“What?” said Emma in response. “I just wondered what the two girls were tittering about, so I simply followed their line of sight and then my eyes just happened to fall on Sam’s muscles, is all,” she declared, lying hopelessly.
“I couldn’t get a glass of water, could I?” asked Sam of Jack, after he'd set down the final box of his delivery.
“Make it a Diet Coke break!” shouted Bella… or, it could have been Stella? Either way, each of them would have been hoping for a re-enactment of the famous adverts, and this was followed by a raucous belly laugh on both their parts, and which Emma couldn’t help but chuckle along with herself.
Sam swiftly dispatched the contents (water, not Diet Coke) of the glass handed to him. “Thanks, Jack, much appreciated,” he said. “By the way, I don’t usually ask what I’m delivering, but by the stickers on the boxes, I’m guessing these are…?”
“Yup. You’ve just kindly dropped off one hundred new tablet computers, to be used for Project VIP,” replied Jack, resting his head down over his arms on the countertop. “The only problem is that the charity currently has precisely…” he said, pausing for a sigh before continuing… “absolutely bugger-all for money.”
“Oh dear,” said Sam.
“Exactly,” replied Jack. “So what that means is,” he added, reluctantly lifting his troubled head up again, “I’ve had to write a cheque for ten thousand pounds from my personal account that I pretty much don’t have. Well, I certainly don’t have it now, at least.”
“You couldn’t cancel the order?” asked Sam, but receiving a look of despair in response indicating that this route had been well and truly exhausted. “Well, I don’t think you need to worry too much, Jack. This world record attempt is the talk of the town,” Sam went on, hoping to buoy Jack’s spirits. “So, with all the buzz this creates, hopefully the increased business should get some money for the charity and you can pay yourself back?”
Jack shook his head. “I couldn’t take that money for myself even if I wanted to,” he said with another sigh. “The ongoing costs of the charity aren’t exactly huge, but there’s nothing in the kitty to pay even general business expenses. The rents are due soon, for instance, so I don’t think it’s fair for me to take back what I’ve spent for the tablets when there’s a bloomin’ great black hole in the general finances. It’s a shitstorm, Sam. I’m not going to lie to you.”
“Oh, Sam, I think you’ve dropped something!” shouted either Bella or Stella, interrupting Jack and Sam’s conversation.
“Oh? What’s this?” asked Sam
“You’ve dropped something! Just there!” the other of the Bingo Sisters chimed in, pointing vaguely in Sam’s direction to the floor at his feet.
Sam looked around, here and there, but could see nothing.
“Just there! Can’t you see it?” the first of the sisters called over.
“Best bend down to get a good look, I think!” the second one helpfully suggested.
This, finally, produced the result the Bingo Girls were after, with Sam bending slowly over in order to visually scour the area of the floor about him, raising his bum up into the air in the process.
“Ahhhh,” came the collective reply from the two Bingo Girls, followed closely thereafter by, “Oh my goodness, yes!” from one of them and, “That’s what I’m talking about!” from the other. But Emma, for her part, resisted copping an eyeful this time, puttering around behind the counter and finding something with which to busy herself instead, carefully averting her eyes.
“Oi!” said Jack, like a teacher castigating the class. “If I did this sort of thing to an attractive blonde, then I’d be clapped in irons! Settle down, you frisky buggers, or I’ll get the hosepipe on you two if you’re not careful!”
Sam smiled, giving his bum a gentle wig
gle for the benefit of his admirers before straightening up again and returning his attention to Jack. “So, if there’s no way of getting the stolen money back from the crooked accountant, what’s the plan?” he asked of Jack.
“Money’s all gone. There’s nothing left to recover,” Jack said flatly. “The current plan is that I’m going to find out where my former accountant lives,” he added, fists clenching. “I’m going to wait outside his house,” he went on. “Assuming he’s not already in jail, that is. And, then, I’m going to exhaust myself from swinging a cricket bat in the direction of his kneecaps. That’s the plan.”
“Ah,” said Sam. “Not too bad a plan, I suppose,” he offered to Jack, nodding sympathetically.
“Seriously, though, the police have confirmed the money’s all gone,” Jack continued. “Still, the situation isn’t entirely bad. I mean, the charity does have regular inflows. But they’re just not coming in quick enough to fund the backlog of expenses. I was using the financial reserves to fund things like the purchase of the new bus and Project VIP, among other things, and the money’s just going out quicker than it’s coming in now. Which would have been fine when we had surplus money in the bank account… but now we don’t. The way things are now, though, I’m just not sure we can keep it going and stay on top of the bills. The new bus is going to have to go back to the garage soon unless we can work out a payment plan. I’ve got insurance bills, electricity bills and such, concerned landlords, and god knows what else. You wouldn’t believe how uncharitable people can be towards a charity.”
“What about additional fundraising?” asked Sam, trying to throw a positive slant on things.
“Aww, there’s already too many charities vying for what little generosity there is out there,” bemoaned Jack. “All we can do is keep plugging away, and we just have to remain upbeat and optimistic.”
“What about your grandad and his friend Ray?” asked Sam. “I heard they were up to something big, as they described it. They were quite excited.”
Jack laughed, but not in an unkind sort of way. “Grandad and Ray?” he said, smiling fondly at the thought of them. “You mean Simon Cowell and Pete Waterman? Yeah, they’ve organised some sort of karaoke evening to raise funds, by all accounts. I don’t expect it to take in an awful lot of dosh,” Jack told Sam. “Still, it’s nice that they’re trying to do something, and I do appreciate their efforts of course.”
“Ah, I see,” Sam replied.
“Anyway, I need to get on and unpack those tablets. Don’t forget to flex something on the way out for that lot,” Jack said, glancing over at Sam’s aged admirers, and then slapping Sam on the arm — which was a mistake, as it turned out, and could easily have resulted in broken bones in Jack’s fingers because of the sheer density of Sam’s muscles.
“Will do,” said Sam, with a chuckle. “And, honestly, if there’s anything I can do, Jack, as far as you and Emma and the charity, you only need to ask, yeah?” he said.
“I know, mate. Thank you,” Jack answered. “For now, though, if you could see your way clear to delivering our bills elsewhere for a few weeks, then that would definitely be a great help!”
“Piss off!” said Jack in disbelief, before immediately slapping his hand against his mouth by way of an apology. “Sorry about that, Susan. But you’re sure? I mean… really sure?”
Susan twisted her blue biro pen around, twirling up a strand of her mousy brown hair like spaghetti on a fork, a glint in her eye. “See for yourself,” she said, sliding her chair back and inviting Jack to walk around to her side of the desk. Jack did as instructed, but as he wasn’t the office type, the spreadsheet on display on the computer screen in front of him was like some sort of unbreakable wartime code requiring an Alan Turing-like skill level to unravel. His eyes darted over the screen, and he said “mmm-hmm, mmm-hmm” like he knew what he was looking at when it was very clear that he didn’t. His finger hovered near to the screen, in search of what it was, precisely, that he was meant to be looking at.
“Here,” said Susan, gripping Jack’s finger and directing it towards the one particular section of the screen he should be paying attention to. “There you go, Jack. Just there.”
“I can’t believe this,” said Jack, finally locating the relevant bit of information, and a smile emerging. It was a smile that’d been absent for at least a week or more. “That’s not a mistake?” he asked.
“Nope, no mistake! One thousand nine hundred and twenty-six people have signed up for this new world record attempt at present. Honestly, the phone hasn’t stopped ringing since the adverts went out,” Susan told him. “Ah. And right on cue,” she added, as the phone rang once more and yet again. “Can you grab that phone, Julie? I’m sure that’s going to be someone else signing up,” she called over to her assistant. Susan then returned her attention to Jack. “We’ve had schools signing their children up, old folk’s homes, office workers, you name it,” she informed him. “It’s just gone crazy, Jack. I’d have to say you’ve captured the public’s imagination with this event, truly you have.”
“Blimey, I’m starting to wish I had actually said we’d charge an admission fee, in view of our present financial situation,” observed Jack in reply, only half-joking, and reflecting on his previous decision to make this a free-to-all event.
“Hmm. You might not have had so many people sign up that way, though, yes?” suggested Susan. “Besides, the more people there on the day and the fuller the collection buckets will be. And, because there’s so many people coming, we’ve been able to charge more to the food and drink concession. Plus, we’ve had several large corporates eager to contribute to the fundraising in return for a little mention, as well.”
“That’s great! And brilliant work!” said Jack. “You’re coming on the day, by the way?” he asked.
Susan had a dreamy, faraway look for a moment, and then replied, “Jack, I’ve been trying to get my husband to try ballroom dancing for years. I’ve managed to rope him in for the world record attempt, and we’ve even been for a couple of lessons so that we don’t show ourselves up. And he absolutely loves it now! So, yes. And in fact everyone in the office here is coming. We’re all on board. It’s such a great idea, I think, and hopefully we can claim another world record for the Isle of Man in the process!”
“And a world record those little bastards can’t steal back from us like they did before,” said Jack, grumbling to himself, and in reference to those little bastards that’d stolen the last record away from him like before.
“What’s that?” replied Susan, unable to quite hear what Jack was saying, and also unaware of Jack’s persistent comical grudge held against what he considered to be those most evil, vindictive, record-stealing hellspawn.
Overall, Jack was rather unassuming about what the charity and all those involved had achieved to date. But for many, Jack and the gang had become role models of sorts. Bastions of the community, defending the public good, if you will. In fact, such was the success and popularity of the previous events they’d organised, including the Bloomin’ Wall endeavour, that the Douglas Town Council had kindly offered their support and help in coordinating the latest world record attempt. Susan, as it should happen, had volunteered and been assigned to assist, and turned out to be the perfect partner on account of her infectious enthusiasm and desire to make this event happen. The kind offer of assistance was a major weight removed from Jack and Emma’s shoulders as they’d both seen previously, first-hand, just how much time and effort are required to organise something of such magnitude. Of course, Jack and Emma also had four businesses to run, a new family to manage, and also had to deal with the resulting aftermath caused by the actions of the thieving accountant as well. With the current financial worries that the charity was facing, Jack would have likely delayed or possibly even cancelled the world record attempt without this welcome additional resource, such was his depressed state about the current situation. So, again, the assistance of the council was much appreciated, and
the current news about those who’d already signed up was a welcome tonic and for the first time in a little while he had a spring in his step and a sense of optimism.
“Will you keep me up to date with numbers?” asked Jack, dancing to the front door of the office and taking hold of an imaginary dance partner. “Great work, by the way,” he added, with a deft change of direction, spinning on his heels, to face the ladies in the office.
It was only a short walk from the council office Jack had just visited back to their coffee shop, but the notion of a detour suddenly took hold of him. Emma was looking after things at work, ably assisted by his mum, and with special help from Lucas who was rather adept at buffing the linoleum to a nice shine while scuttling across the floor in his cotton onesie outfit. It’d been tough for Jack of late. He was part of a team of people he held in great esteem, and no matter how much Emma provided assurance, he couldn’t shake the overwhelming sense of guilt. It wasn’t his fault, of course, in that he couldn’t possibly have known he’d picked an absolute scumbag for an accountant, but this didn’t help ease his knotted stomach and to a certain extent he also felt a sense of shame. Shame that his actions and foolhardy recruitment decisions could eventually result in all their hard work coming crashing down around them. And so he needed some time to reflect, he realised. And a stroll along Douglas Promenade on a blustery day, he decided, would most certainly be able to do just that.
At the centre of Jack’s life were Emma and his son Lucas, the two people he adored most. Then, there were also all the people that’d become part of his extended family by virtue of their membership in the club. And, of course, there was Grandad and Ray. They were a special bunch of people, the lot of them. An intertwining fabric and a circle of people that cared for each other, supported each other, and were simply just there for each other, no matter what. But Jack was losing sleep worrying about the group of them, running over in his mind what the impact on them all would be if the charity was forced to close and all of the clubs shut down. The thought of losing his business was also sickening, of course, but paled in comparison to having to tell everyone that the club was coming to an end. Jack and Emma could always come up with another plan for the club, another venue or whatever. It just wouldn’t be the same, and that’s what played heavily on Jack’s mind. Life was good, or at least had been until recently, and Jack was distraught, worried that he’d destroyed it all.
The Lonely Heart Attack Club - Project VIP Page 15