The Summer Island Festival

by Rachel Burton

  As The Laurels got more and more gigs and Cathy found herself busy all the time, she tried not to think about Storm – she believed that everyone came into your life for a reason and, while she may have had high hopes for Storm Tyler that hadn’t worked out, if it wasn’t for him she would never have met Krystal or Don and she wouldn’t be starting out on the career of her dreams.

  Nothing was heard from Storm for some time. Nobody seemed to know where he had disappeared to after his run-in with the taxi, or what his plans were. Rumour had it that the other members of King Silver were planning their own comeback without him.

  And then, in January, Cathy saw him again. Not in person but on the front cover of the NME – staring back at her from the newsstand outside Krystal’s apartment. She bought a copy without really thinking about it and devoured the interview when she got back home, before she’d even taken her coat off. Storm was back in the recording studio with King Silver. He was thinner, sober and brimming with more ideas than ever before – or so he said. Cathy wondered if it really was possible to change your life around in just four short months.

  She mentally wished him well and tried not to think about him, concentrating on her own career, her own creativity, her relationships with Krystal and Don. She didn’t drink, she didn’t take drugs – she didn’t want to end up like Storm. And she’d come to a gentle peace with herself about her relationship with him. She didn’t regret anything she’d done – she was young and experiences were important – but she was at a point where she thought she could say she’d be happier if she didn’t see him again.

  Until a few weeks later when he knocked on Krystal’s front door.

  ‘I’ve come to see Cathy,’ he said.

  And in that moment everything changed.

  19

  Willow

  By Monday afternoon Willow was starting to feel nervous.

  ‘Are you sure you don’t want to do this yourself?’ she asked.

  ‘You’ll be much better at it than me,’ Cathy replied. ‘As long as you don’t mind.’

  Cathy had asked Willow to present the case for the festival at the planning committee meeting that evening. She thought that the committee were more likely to listen to her because of her professional experience and background.

  ‘But don’t you think that they are more likely to listen to someone who hasn’t been away from the Island for years?’ Willow said. ‘Someone who actually set up the festival in the first place? Perhaps Dad should do it?’

  ‘Oh I don’t think so, Willow. Your father and the council have never really got on. I’ve had to smooth out all sorts of misunderstandings over the years.’

  ‘Is he coming tonight?’

  Cathy shook her head, looking nervous and worried. ‘It’s probably best if he doesn’t.’

  ‘And you’re sure you don’t want to do this?’ Willow asked one last time. ‘You’re sure you want it to be me?’

  ‘Please, Willow.’

  ‘OK, Mum, I’ll do it. But I do need to find something to wear.’

  They searched through Cathy’s closet looking for something suitable and, not for the first time, Willow was grateful that they were the same size.

  ‘Perhaps it’s time you went back to London,’ Cathy said, as she pulled a smart black dress from the back of the closet and handed it to Willow. ‘If only to get yourself some clothes.’

  ‘Let’s get this planning permission out of the way,’ Willow said. ‘If we’re successful tonight I’ll try to get back to London for a few days before the festival starts.’

  When she had lived in London Willow would get up at 5am to go to the gym where she’d do a yoga or Pilates class or work out with her trainer. Her hair was highlighted every four weeks, her nails manicured weekly and her clothes cost an embarrassing amount of money.

  She was still in the habit of waking early but for the last month she’d swapped her gym sessions for walks on the beach. She’d been living out of the small overnight bag she had at the hotel when she had run away and had been wearing her mother’s clothes. The roots of her hair were growing out and she’d cut her nails short because it was easier to play the mandolin that way.

  When she looked at herself in the mirror wearing her mother’s black dress, she liked what she saw. In London Willow had never quite felt enough. No matter how hard she’d tried she was never polished enough for Charlie. Now when she looked at herself she saw Willow. She was softer than the woman who left London.

  And she was happier.

  Willow had changed everything about herself to fit in with Charlie and his family. While Charlie had never asked her outright to do so, she had found herself feeling she needed to, found herself needing to close the huge gap between his monied upbringing and hers on the Island. She hadn’t been averse to changing herself at first. She’d been eager to let go of the Island once and for all. She’d wanted to start again, to be a different Willow. But over the last eighteen months since she first saw Luc on American Stars, she had come to understand that nobody can ever truly let go of the person they used to be.

  As Willow had begun to work that out, something had shifted in her relationship with Charlie, something she’d been trying to ignore. He’d started to criticise her more than he used to, point out when she wasn’t quite polished enough or ask her if she was sure about an outfit she’d chosen. Willow had told herself that he had her best interests at heart, that he wanted her to get promoted again and live the life they’d always planned. It was the reason Willow had given in so easily to the wedding that his mother wanted instead of the quiet Register Office one she would have preferred.

  When she looked at herself in the mirror, she felt more confident than she had in years, as though the quiet energy of the Island was beginning to restore her to the person she used to be. And it gave her the confidence to ask her mother a question she’d been trying to ask since she’d listened to the tape with Luc the week before.

  ‘Mum, do you remember Storm Tyler and King Silver.’

  Cathy was standing with her back to Willow so Willow couldn’t see her reaction. She didn’t reply for a moment.

  ‘That’s a name I haven’t heard in a while,’ Cathy said turning around, her face falsely merry.

  ‘Do you know what happened to him?’ Willow asked.

  ‘No idea,’ Cathy replied almost too quickly.

  ‘Did the Laurels ever play with him? Or with King Silver?’

  Cathy shrugged. ‘Oh I think we might have shared festival billing once or twice,’ she said. ‘Where’s this coming from?’

  For a moment Willow thought about telling her mother everything, about finding the tape and listening to it with Luc, about the idea she’d had that just might save the festival. But she couldn’t, not now – there wasn’t time.

  ‘Oh just something Luc and I were talking about,’ she said instead.

  ‘Well we’d better get going then,’ Cathy said.

  The snippet of conversation they’d managed to have about Storm Tyler had been enough though, because Willow knew her mother, knew her reticence to talk about the past and knew she probably wouldn’t get much more out of her even if she had told her about the tape. But the look on her mother’s face when she tried to shrug off the question, coupled with Cathy’s voice on the recording, was all Willow needed to confirm her suspicions and put her plan in place.

  *

  The planning committee was made up almost entirely of faces Willow recognised from her childhood – if they weren’t people who had been councillors for time eternal, they were people like Roger who she used to go to school with and who had never moved away. With the exception of Roger, everyone smiled warmly at both Willow and Cathy, which had to be a good sign.

  It was stifling inside the council chamber and, as the committee discussed the facts of the matter, Willow found herself struggling to stay focused, her mind constantly drifting back to the tape in her bedroom drawer and the look on Luc’s face as they’d listened to it. Wh
en she heard her name called she knew that it was her turn to stand up and present her case.

  ‘With respect,’ Roger said as Willow finished her well-rehearsed speech. ‘You haven’t set foot on the Island for…’ he paused to consult his notes, even though he must know how that sentence finished ‘…eight years.’ He smiled at Willow like a snake. ‘How do you know how we operate here these days?’

  Willow had tried to be professional and speak without passion or emotion just as she had to do in her job, but she could see it wasn’t working. Even some of the councillors who had greeted her so warmly earlier on were nodding in agreement with Roger. She knew she had to do something. Her mother needed this festival and Willow couldn’t let her down. As Willow caught Cathy’s eye, she saw a look of desperation on her mother’s face.

  ‘Why should we continue with this smaller festival?’ Roger went on. ‘Surely it’s had its day. We have a much larger festival on the Island now.’ He looked at Willow venomously. Was Luc right? Was this really some sort of revenge because Roger had been in love with her at school and she’d ignored him? Whatever his reasons, she knew she couldn’t let him win.

  She tried to think about all the things she used to love about the festival, why her mum set it up in the first place, the trade it brought to Seaview.

  This festival meant so much to so many people. On Thursday night in the studio, when Luc had called her Lil, everything about who Willow used to be had come flooding back and for the first time in as long as she could remember she didn’t hate that person, and she didn’t hate the Island or the memories that she and Luc shared.

  She regretted walking away, more than ever before.

  The festival had to go ahead, not just because it would break her mother’s heart if it didn’t and not just because Luc was here to headline the final night on the beach. It needed to go ahead because she wanted to be there. Willow wanted to be at the Seaview Folk Festival for the first time in nearly a decade to see what it had to tell her about herself.

  ‘The Seaview Folk Festival is nothing like the Isle of Wight Festival,’ she began. ‘It’s something much more local, more personal, something specifically for the people of Seaview.’ She paused to look around. All eyes except Roger’s were on her.

  ‘There are lots of reasons why the festival is good for Seaview,’ she continued. ‘It brings trade to local businesses and brings money into this little bit of the Island that isn’t as well known.’

  ‘It also brings riff-raff,’ Roger interrupted, but Willow could see that he’d lost the other councillors’ attention now. ‘And the main festival brings plenty of money into Seaview.’

  ‘Agreed,’ Willow replied, trying to stay calm. ‘But the main festival brings people to the Island for a week in June. Our festival makes them stay around.’ She thought of Rocco Beezon ordering ukuleles and staying in his expensive apartment and she was sure that The Music Shop wasn’t the only store he’d been spending money in.

  ‘The Folk Festival is a major boost to our little part of the Island. But it also has huge significance for Seaview itself. My parents, along with Krystal Kane, were a major part of the folk music revival of the 1990s and their festival has helped so many musicians find their feet, musicians who have gone on to great success and come back to Seaview year after year,’ she paused. ‘Including, as I’m sure you all know, Luc Harrison.’

  A rumble of agreement rolled round the chamber and Willow swallowed, ignoring the butterflies that arrived in her stomach at the thought of Luc. ‘The Folk Festival also helped put the Island back on the map after the disaster of the festivals in the 1970s – you might even say it helped pave the way for the main festival to return.’ Willow wasn’t sure how true that statement was but she was desperate.

  ‘I hear that ticket sales are low this year,’ a councillor she didn’t recognise said. ‘Despite Luc being here.’

  ‘Ticket sales have been low year on year,’ Roger interrupted.

  ‘Ticket sales fluctuate from one year to the next it’s true,’ Willow agreed, grateful that she’d had a good look through her mother’s past paperwork after Roger had dropped the hint about poor ticket sales last week. ‘But my parents have always tried to keep the festival small and intimate – we never sell huge numbers of tickets and have no desire to do so. However this year is particularly low – that’s also true. I suspect most people don’t want to buy tickets to a festival that might not go ahead so they’re waiting on the council’s decision.’

  ‘There doesn’t seem much point going through the process of granting the necessary licences to a festival that might be cancelled because of low ticket sales,’ said the councillor Willow didn’t recognise. Roger nodded in agreement. ‘How can you guarantee that you won’t cancel the festival after the council has done all the hard work to approve it?’

  Willow looked at Roger who was staring back at her with one eyebrow raised like a pantomime villain. She looked over at her mother who was sitting quietly, wringing her hands in her lap. The festival was the most important thing in her mum’s life and Willow didn’t know how Cathy would cope without it. The Seaview Folk Festival had to go ahead. It was time to put her crazy plan in motion. Compared to the risks she took in her job in the City on a daily basis, what she was about to do was fairly small fry but she crossed her fingers behind her back for luck anyway.

  ‘How will you guarantee ticket sales?’ the councillor repeated.

  A voice in Willow’s head that sounded a little bit like Charlie, was telling her that she was ridiculous, that this couldn’t possibly work. She ignored it and took a deep breath.

  ‘What if I could get a folk legend to play at the festival?’ she said. ‘That would guarantee your precious ticket sales.’

  ‘A folk legend like who?’ asked Roger with a smirk.

  ‘A folk legend like…’ Willow paused as though she was pretending to think. ‘Storm Tyler.’

  A silence descended on the council chamber as Willow looked over to her mum again. Cathy was staring at her in disbelief and suddenly her grand plan didn’t seem so grand anymore, it felt more like opening up a Pandora’s box.

  Roger was still smirking. ‘Storm Tyler,’ he said. ‘The Storm Tyler who disappeared many years ago and has never been heard of since?’

  ‘The very same,’ Willow replied with false bravado, quite surprised that Roger seemed to know so much about Storm Tyler.

  ‘And how are you planning to contact the elusive Mr Tyler?’ Roger went on. ‘How are you planning to tempt him out of retirement?’

  Willow resisted the urge to glance over at her mother and forced herself to keep smiling her confident, if fake, smile. Now that her plan had been spoken out loud it seemed more ridiculous than ever.

  ‘Roger,’ she said calmly. ‘My family were and still are the centre of this folk festival as I’ve said. We have our contacts. Trust me, I know what to do.’

  Willow had absolutely no idea what to do or why on earth she had ever thought this truly ridiculous plan was going to work but she could hardly back down now. She looked around at the other committee members who were regarding her and Roger with interest.

  Roger opened his mouth to say something else but the Chair of the Planning Committee stood up, interrupting him. ‘Thank you, Ms Cole,’ he said. ‘Our decision will be available online tomorrow.’

  *

  ‘What were you thinking?’ Cathy asked in the car on the way back to Seaview. ‘Making such a rash promise?’

  ‘I’m trying to save the festival,’ Willow replied.

  ‘But why Storm Tyler of all the people? Is that why you were asking me about him earlier? What’s going on, Willow? What have you heard?’

  Cathy’s hands were gripping the steering wheel of the Jeep, her eyes focused on the road ahead. Willow knew she had to come clean.

  ‘Luc and I found a tape in your workshop. It was an old DAT recording and we wondered what it was.’

  Cathy didn’t say anything.

&nb
sp; ‘When we listened to it Luc recognised it as Storm Tyler and I recognised your voice.’

  ‘You did?’ Cathy asked. She didn’t deny it being her.

  ‘Of course I did, Mum, I’d recognise your voice anywhere.’ She paused but Cathy didn’t say anything else. ‘Anyway, the tape was dated 1999, which made me think he’d been here at some point and your voice, plus your reaction when I mentioned his name earlier, made me think you must know him and…’ She trailed off. She could feel her mother’s anger from the passenger seat.

  Willow looked over at her mother whose face was pale in the glow of the oncoming headlights.

  ‘You shouldn’t have done that,’ Cathy said quietly. ‘Not without asking me.’

  ‘I was just trying to save the festival,’ Willow repeated.

  Cathy didn’t reply and neither of them spoke for the rest of journey until Cathy pulled the Jeep up in front of her house in Seaview.

  ‘Tell me how you came to be rooting around through my things,’ Cathy said. ‘How you ended up listening to the tape.’

  Willow told her mother about finding the tape, about how both she and Luc thought it was something important. She told her about booking the studio time so they could listen to it, about realising how special it was.

  Cathy was quiet after Willow finished speaking and she sat very still in the driver’s seat, still looking straight ahead.

  ‘I’m sorry, Mum,’ Willow said.

  Neither of them said anything for a moment.

  ‘And what is your grand plan to tempt Storm Tyler out of retirement then?’ Cathy asked.

  ‘Oh, Mum, you know full well I don’t have a plan. I just said that to try to get the council on side.’

  Cathy sighed and pressed her hand to her forehead.

  ‘So what are you intending to do?’

  ‘I have no idea,’ Willow said. ‘Unless you know where he is?’

  ‘I don’t want to talk about it,’ Cathy replied. ‘I can’t talk about it.’

  She got out of the car then, slamming the door behind her and leaving Willow with a very strong suspicion that her mother knew exactly what had happened to Storm Tyler.