by A. J. Crofts
‘I would like to thank my mum and dad,’ I said, feeling the tears prickle up and my throat constrict. ‘And my brothers and sisters, and Dora and Gerry and Luke and everyone at The Towers who made me feel so welcome.’
I paused for breath and the music started again. Thank God. More helpful hands guided me back down off the stage as the cameras moved on to the next announcer and the next potential recipients. I hurried back to my seat and the comfort of Gerry’s arm as I snuggled in close to him and stared hard at the stage, as if I was taking in what was happening to anyone else at that moment, waiting for my heart to stop thumping quite so fast.
After the show a group of us went down to Joe Allen’s in Covent Garden for a meal. It was like one huge party, with everyone coming up to me, offering congratulations and saying how much they liked the dress (my main worry was getting relish from my burger down it). Someone had a mobile television, which showed the evening news with the crowds breaking through the barriers and then film of me accepting the award. It was obvious from the news clips that the incident had been triggered by the media all surging towards Gerry and me at once, pressured by the people behind them who were trying to take a look. The dress looked great on the cameras, although I thought my make-up made me look a bit like a startled panda bear, but that was OK – quite a sexy look, really.
By the time we stumbled out of Joe Allen’s the morning papers were hitting the streets and someone found us a complete set. I was on the front page of every single one, even the Financial Times. The tabloids had majored in on Gerry, ‘the new man in my life’, and one or two of them had found pictures of Luke looking sad and alone in their files and printed them alongside the Bafta shots, giving the impression that he was broken-hearted. Bastards!
The producers had booked a suite at the Savoy and we all staggered over there for more cocktails and were still there when it was time for breakfast. It was just like being in the movies, a dream sequence. By the time Gerry and I got home I was buzzing from a mixture of excitement, caffeine and exhaustion. There was another crowd of photographers waiting outside the house, hoping to see me falling over drunk, probably, but I managed to disappoint them on that one, compensating with a cheery wave of the award.
‘Over here, Gerry!’
‘Give her a hug, Gerry!’
‘A kiss for the cameras!’
‘How long have you been together?’
‘Any chance of wedding bells?’
We closed the door on them.
‘How much longer do you think you can go on living here?’ Gerry asked, slumping on to the sofa. ‘If you’re going to become a mega-star you are going to need somewhere a bit more secure than this. You’ll also need to invest all the money that’s going to come pouring in.’
‘It won’t last,’ I said, kicking off my shoes and lying down beside him. ‘It’ll be someone else’s turn next year and they will all have moved to another doorstep. It’s not a problem.’
‘You still need to talk to Dora about it.’
The night seemed unfinished in some way, as if there was a gap, something I needed to do. I realised that I wanted to make my peace with Dad. I knew he would be up by now, and he would have seen a paper because that was always the first thing he did in the morning. He would probably have caught the television news before leaving home as well. I dialled his mobile number for the first time since leaving home. I knew there was a chance he wouldn’t pick up when he saw it was me, but there was also a chance he would have removed my number from his address book the day he decided to have no more to do with me, and so wouldn’t know who was calling.
‘Yes?’ he answered and my heart jumped.
‘Hi, Dad, it’s Steffi. How are you?’
‘What do you want?’
‘I just wanted to say hi, and maybe arrange to come round and see you. What do you think?’
‘I think you’ve got the fancy life you always wanted now. You don’t need to be bothering us for anything again. Just leave us all alone.’
The line went dead.
Chapter Nineteen
Dora agreed with Gerry about the house. ‘I’d been thinking the same thing myself,’ she said when I mentioned it. ‘You need somewhere more secure. You probably need to be in the country.’
‘I’m not really a country person,’ I said doubtfully.
My only experience so far had been with Luke’s family, but I couldn’t actually imagine living like that on my own. Even though they had been in the country they had been like a little community themselves, not stuck out all alone in the middle of nowhere.
‘Well, maybe not the real country,’ she said. ‘A nice suburban house in its own grounds would be good. I’ll work out what you can afford and come up with a few places for you to see. There are people who specialise in finding houses for celebrities. They know all about security.’
‘Jesus, Dora, are you sure I need all that?’
‘You saw what happened at the Baftas,’ she said. ‘Things get out of control very easily. And last time it was just Pete waving a gun about. Next time it might be a real nutter.’
‘Are you deliberately trying to freak me out?’
‘No,’ she laughed. ‘Of course not. But you’ve got to start thinking about these things. And anyway, you want to be able to keep the photographers out a bit.’
Dad’s words – ‘You’ve got the fancy life you always wanted now’ – kept echoing around in my head. I didn’t want people thinking I was putting on airs and graces, pretending I was some sort of Lady of the Manor or something. All that had happened was I’d got a job in a soap opera and released a gimmicky pop record, I hadn’t married the Prince of fucking Wales.
Dora wasn’t letting the grass grow on this one and the next weekend she arranged for this poncey estate agent to pick Gerry and me up in his shiny BMW and cart us off around a few properties in Surrey. I have to say, it did not feel right. I was a bit nervous about Gerry at this stage; it was nice to have him there for company, but I didn’t want him getting the idea that we were settling down as a couple because I was pretty sure he was not the man I was going to be spending the rest of my life with. The fact that pictures of Luke would come into my mind whenever Gerry and I had sex was a pretty good clue in that department. Not that there weren’t moments when the thought of settling down comfortably with a man who was easily my best friend didn’t hold a lot of appeal. Should I, I would wonder in moments of self-doubt, be grateful for what I was being offered and stop wishing for the impossible? How does that song go? Something about how if you can’t be with the one you love, then you should love the one you are with. Was I in danger of ending up sad and alone like Maggie?
I was a bit shocked when Dora told me I had a million and a half to spend. ‘A million and a half?’ I shouted. ‘That’s a fucking fortune!’
‘I got you a good deal on “Summer Wine”,’ she said modestly. ‘And the advertising deals have been mounting up. On the strength of your Bafta-night triumph I can rope OK! in for at least another quarter of a million if they get first photographic rights, maybe even double that. And you can get a good mortgage against your salary now. It would be better to have the money in bricks and mortar. If we invest it in anything else you end up paying tax on the interest …’
‘Stop!’ I held up my hand. ‘You’re doing my head in. Just tell me what to do.’
‘Go buy a house.’
I was even more shocked, however, when the estate agent, who was called Nigel or something, told me, ‘A million and a half doesn’t buy you much in this area.’
‘You should see the area I come from, mate,’ I said and from then on he obviously had me down as being a bit chippy, which I suppose I was. Don’t get me wrong: they were very nice houses. If I’d been planning to move in with a husband and Land Rover and four kids, and buy some ponies and maybe a Labrador or two, they would have been very suitable. But it was hard to see what one woman was going to do with three or four ‘ensuite’ bathrooms an
d God knows how many ‘integral’ garages. We saw glittering kitchens, gleaming bathrooms, laundry rooms and linen cupboards until our heads span. We enjoyed ‘panoramic views’ over ‘sweeping lawns’ and crunched across a lot of weedless gravel. One of them even had a ‘gift-wrapping room’. I was beginning to feel deeply nostalgic for the squat with its dark and seedy cosiness.
The estate agent made a point of showing us how high the walls were, how electric the gates were and how many different parts of the grounds could be watched through cameras. There was no chance poor old Pete was going to be able to sneak in unobserved to any of these places. I could see Gerry was getting as depressed as I was at the whole thing.
‘If I move to one of those places I’ll feel completely isolated from everyday life,’ I moaned once we were back home. ‘It would be like being marooned on a luxurious desert island. I’d be drinking myself to death within a week.’
‘Welcome to leafy Celebsville,’ Gerry said, with a grin.
The next day the papers were full of stories about how Gerry and I were house hunting together for a ‘love nest’. Nigel, or whatever his name was, must have snitched on us two seconds after waving goodbye. Gerry pretended not to notice the stories and so I didn’t say anything, but it was bloody embarrassing.
‘I think it might be better to buy a flat in London for the moment,’ I told Dora. ‘I don’t think I’m ready to be quite that grown up.’
‘OK. There’s lots of good investment properties in Docklands. Fancy that?’
The next weekend we were escorted round a succession of river views in converted warehouses and I was so grateful not to be moving to Surrey that I just plumped for a pimped-up penthouse where one of the bedrooms had been converted into a little private cinema. Dora had bought it for me by the end of the week.
My first night there was pretty much ruined by someone giving me a copy of Hello! with a photo spread of Luke and some bimbo model I’d never heard of. So much for him pining away without me, the bastard! They were draped all over each other in some swanky country house hotel and I was shocked by just how acute the pain was as I looked at them. I wasn’t sure how I was going to be able to cope if I went on feeling like that for much longer. At the same time a nasty little voice in my head was nagging away that I was just kidding myself, Luke had moved on and it was pointless holding on to any fantasies about him turning up on the doorstep and begging for a second chance.
I rang Gerry and told him I wasn’t feeling well so wanted to be alone, and then sat up late in my new posh penthouse, drinking red wine and smoking a joint, watching the lights reflecting on the water, playing Roberta Flack through the perfect sound system and feeling really sorry for myself. Pretty pathetic, eh?
Once Quentin heard that I’d offered to take part in Maggie’s make-over documentary he couldn’t do enough to help and a few weeks later I found myself being whisked off to a boutique hotel in Kensington. I seemed to spend a large part of my life staring at the backs of drivers’ necks, being whisked from one place to another. I thought it might be a good idea to learn to drive, but when would I find the time? And how vulnerable would I feel in a car on my own? Supposing I had a scrape or something in a busy street and had to get out and swap addresses? Imagine how embarrassing that would be. I never want to complain about being famous, but sometimes it would be nice just to do the same things as everyone else.
I was ushered into a suite by a really hyper presenter, under the all-too-familiar, silent gaze of a camera. It was the first show of the series and this girl was obviously hoping it was going to make her reputation, turn her into the new Davina McCall or Fearne Cotton or something. Turned out she was another of Quentin’s clients. Surprise, surprise!
Back under the scrutiny of the camera, I found myself getting infected with her excitement and actually felt quite nervous about the impending meeting as they built up the tension. Whatever was filmed in this hotel suite was going to be presented to the watching world as my reunion with the mother who had abandoned me at birth. I would have felt a lot better if I’d had a scriptwriter and a director on hand to help me through the scene. What if I got it wrong and came across as bitter and twisted? What if Maggie got it wrong and came across as a cold-hearted bitch? Quentin had assured me I didn’t need to worry, that he would be able to veto anything I didn’t like before it went out, but I didn’t trust him an inch. His job was to create as big a media stir as possible for Maggie and to get as many people as possible watching the show. I did some deep breathing to try to slow down my racing heart, but it wasn’t working.
The presenter was really throwing her all into building the suspense for the great unveiling of their masterpiece and most of what she was saying was flying past me as I grinned and mugged inanely for the camera. Then the door to the bedroom opened and Maggie made her entrance.
Actually, I hardly had to fake my reaction at all, because she really did look stunning. Her face had healed and a make-up artist had done a brilliant job of making her look ten years younger. The teeth now looked like they belonged and someone had done something amazing with her hair, taking it back to blonde and cutting it into a fluffy, boyish style. They had dressed her in a silk top and narrow jeans that showed off her legs and the effect was pretty stunning. She looked very apprehensive and I genuinely wanted to reassure her as I put my arms around her. It didn’t feel like being with my mother, but I did feel a strange surge of affection for her. I actually felt happy for her that she looked so great. That was the moment we both lost control. I think she started crying first, and her tears set me off. I must have been bottling up a lot of stuff, and Christ knows how many emotional boxes she’d stacked away in her life, because we both really let rip. It was television gold.
There was so much sobbing going on, the presenter actually forgot to stay upbeat and joined in the group hug. I was so moved and absorbed in what was going on between us I didn’t notice the photographer moving carefully around behind the cameraman.
I have to say, Quentin James may be some kind of slimeball, but he sure knows how to gauge the mood of the public and milk it for all its worth. By the end of the day, ‘stolen’ snatches of the film were up on the Internet and being talked about on every sofa in every television studio in the land. The photographs of the reunion swamped the tabloids and magazines. The show was guaranteed a big audience and Maggie had got her showcase for the big time.
Whereas the media had been pretty vile and judgemental towards her up till then, angry with her for dumping her baby, they now suddenly changed their tack. I suppose they thought that, if I could forgive her, so should they. She was the prodigal mother returning to the fold, giving them endless amounts of material to write and moralise about – and they did.
But Quentin had one more trick up his sleeve. As a final scene for the programme he had arranged for her to perform some songs at Madame Jo-Jo’s, a sometime gay and drag club just round the corner from Raymond’s Revue Bar in Soho, where she had met Dad. He filled the place with celebrities and music-business contacts and asked me to go along. Gerry thought it would be a laugh and agreed to come with me. I have to say, they did Maggie proud. The lights were low, there was champagne on the tables and it was all very Marlene Dietrich and Cabaret. Maggie swished out in a really slinky Gucci dress and I actually felt the hairs rising on the back of my neck. Once in the spotlight, the old girl really did have some charisma. She did a few standards like Carly Simon’s ‘You’re So Vain’ and Peter Sarstedt’s ‘Where Do You Go To My Lovely?’. Then she finished with that Elkie Brooks song ‘Pearl’s A Singer’. Pearl was a nightclub singer doomed never to make the big time, but still clinging to dreams of a stardom that will never materialise. It seemed to evoke exactly what Maggie’s life must have been like. She delivered it perfectly.
I looked around the room as she growled through the song with her smoky, gin-soaked voice and everyone was staring, rapt, not wanting to miss a second. For that moment she was a star. I knew she was complet
ely content, because we had talked about moments like that, moments when everyone is watching you, listening to you, taking notice of you, loving you. Moments that can never last for long.
Chapter Twenty
‘Does Luke have a grandfather called Robert?’ Dora asked one morning as we had coffee in the penthouse and my heart missed a beat just at the sound of Luke’s name. Was it ever going to stop doing that?
‘Possibly. He has a grandfather, but everyone called him Grandpa when I was there.’
‘Well, he sent you an email, care of me.’
‘Grandpa did?’
I took the email from her and read it. It was an invitation to lunch from ‘Robert Lewis (Luke’s granddad)’.
‘Posh lunch venue,’ Dora said as I read it. ‘Old-fashioned gentleman’s club, better wear a frock. Want me to accept for you?’
‘Sure, why not?’
Now my heart was really thumping, like I’d drunk six espressos on the trot. It was great to hear from the old boy, because I had liked him a lot, but it was really great to hear from anyone who had anything to do with Luke. I had tried as hard as I knew how to put him out of my mind. Gerry was so sweet to me, and such a good man, but I just couldn’t shake Luke out of my thoughts. Hearing from his grandpa felt like hearing from my own family, like a call from home.