by Paolo Hewitt
Again, in an after hours illegal joint, many of which had sprung up to cope with the demand for raving all night long, a fully E’d up guy, left the dancefloor in search of a leak. Stumbling into the urinals, he unzipped and commenced to relieve himself, until the screams and laughter of the people around him, informed him that he had not actually left the dancefloor and was now spraying those all around him. At that very club, another guy, eyeing up a particularly enticing Goddess, knelt down in front of her and requested that she spend the rest of her life with him. On receiving a stern refusal, as she played for the other team, he then started following her around on all fours, screaming, ‘I’m a love struck puppy for you, baby!’ until a bouncer came in, picked him up and turfed him out.
Wild times, people, wild times, yet I have to add that this small white pill had other uses as well and made you realise why the powers that be have designated drugs as persona non gratis. Ecstasy not only threw a manic party but it brought with it a certain frame of mind that made people start to question everything around them. Not only relationships but how this country and the world operated, and that’s when the greyers start getting nervous. Drink yourself stupid by all means because you’ll only wake up with a hangover but start looking into the nature of things and that is the one thing the greyers can’t handle.
As for me, myself and I, well, I had to put a brake on swallowing that magic pill for many reasons. To kick off with, it began interfering with my work and ruining all the best laid plans of my carefully constructed mixes. I would forget certain records or play the mix in completely the wrong order. Some nights, I was too boxed to cue the tune up correctly, or I would have to spend the whole night trying to resist the urge to leave my booth and shake it down with the rest of them on the dancefloor. Plus, no one had any true info on the long term affects and I certainly didn’t want to carry on dropping until the judgement was in on that particular matter. I mean, it stood to reason that, such was the high it gave you, an experience which had some numbers dropping as many as five in a night, (‘five! I’ve done five!’} that there had to be a kickback which I didn’t particularly want to stay around and meet.
This world is run on a balance and as that old saying goes, what go up must come down, and ain’t that nothing but the truth. On the occasions that I went AWOL from this world, the big comedown happened and without fail. What’s more, it wasn’t always the following morning that you hit rock bottom, as you do with other relaxants, but, by and large, the shutters really came down days later as you were overwhelmed by feverish nightmares and a hefty dose of vicious insomnia which kept you up until the morning sun, swearing you would never touch it again.
Six months after it came to these shores, you started bumping into medical scare stories that told of paralysis of the spine or Parkinson’s disease, accompanied by smug knowing expressions which lended even more credence to the scenario.
The other matter that bugged me out were the dealers you did business with, particularly those lonely, and for good reason, individuals who would engage you in conversation as part of the payment, when all you wanted to do was hand the cashola over and split.
The next night, sober as a Lord, the pusherman would spot you and make his way over to carry on the talk like you were bosom buddies, whilst you stood there looking for any chance to split. At the time, one of my main regrets was that Brother P. never enlisted in pill service. He wanted nothing to do with the chemical factor and was always quick to remind me that I too was once of this notion.
‘Yeah,’ I would reply, ‘but we all change. Anyway, it’s not like I’m addicted or anything. You should try it for the experience.’
‘Jesus,’ he sneered, ‘you sound like Timothy Leary.’
Matters came to a head one night when I dropped a half down at The Unity and, taking a break from my booth, waltzed into the manager’s office and belled him with the news that I really dug him and our link together. That very night, at about four in the morning, he showed up at my flat. I was still up, smoking and playing tunes.
‘Hey, P. come in.’
‘No, I won’t. I just want to say that if you have anything to say to me, you say it without that shit in your body, fucking your head up. You understand me, boss?’ Then he split into the night and I didn’t hear from him until three days later, by which time I had resolved to ease off, and told him so, adding an apology.
‘Seen,’ he said and, like the friend he is, never brought it up again. It was this bump, plus another incident, that I will now relate, which truly caused me to ease off.
I had arrived at The Unity for the nightshift one night and, in a slightly reckless mood for I had been dwelling on the Sandra business, checked in my tunes and proceeded to drop an E. J.J., my warm up man still had an hour to go and I figured that by the time I was due on, I would be over the rush that can buckle your knees and leave you speechless, and firin’ up on all cylinders.
Swallowing the bitter pill, I made for a dark corner and, sure is sure, twenty minutes later it was lift off time and I was off, feeling groovy, spending the time just checking out the few dancers that had arrived and digging the scene as the music filled my head, and that warm glow suffused my body.
No one paid me any mind until I felt, once more, that magical surge of power and energy take a hold of me. I badly wanted to DJ, now that I was filled with an unstoppable enthusiasm, whose pull I could not resist, and an unquestionable belief that I was the best DJ around, and no one there was to touch me. I felt as if I was walking on the clouds as I made my way to the booth to start playing and, giving J.J. a brief hug, which caused a look of slight shock to cross his face, I pulled out a current fave and true classic, Frankie Knuckles’s transcendental ‘Tears’, and mixed it in, aiming to follow it up with Doug Lazy’s ‘Let It Roll.’
All the time I had failed to notice the commotion going on at the club’s front door, and nor did I see Jill, who had been distinctly cool with me since the Sandra business had kicked off, standing next to me until I felt her tap on my shoulder. When I clocked her my first impulse was to try and clear the air with her, sit her down and tell her my side of the story, but she was not at all interested in what I had to say. She had a far better line to deliver.
‘Have you seen who’s outside?’ she asked and then, a little pause for dramatic timing, ‘Sandra’s here and she’s got a baby with her. Looks just like you, loverboy.’
I couldn’t help it, I laughed out loud. ‘Ease off, Jill. I’m working.’
‘See for yourself.’
‘Look Jill, I know you’re pissed with me but you don’t have to go this far.’
‘I’m not joking. Check it out.’
I looked over to the front door, which you can clock from the booth, and saw Charlie, the bouncer, shaking his head and obviously arguing someone. I couldn’t believe it was Sandra.
‘You’re taking the piss, I know you are, Jill.’
‘Afraid not, sweetheart. It’s time to face the action because if you don’t go over there and let her in, then I will. Simple as that.’
‘Look Jill, I know we’ve had problems...’
‘Go to the front door. I think it’s you who has got a problem.’ I swallowed hard.
‘I can’t leave here. I’m working.’
‘I’ll get J.J.’
Jill went off on a search party and I began trying to compose myself, to search for a normal state of mind, but it was not forthcoming. Fact is, people, I was as high as a kite and with no landing space in view.
Jill returned with J.J. and I made my way to the entrance, wishing to God that there was an exit door I could just disappear into, but, of course, there wasn’t one, just Charlie who was using his arm to block Sandra’s entrance.
The first thing that caught my attention was the contrast between Charlie’s muscular, black arm thrown across the door, and the virgin white of the baby’s blanket. In fact, I got so wrapped up digging this particular colour clash, I failed to hear what Charlie
had to say on the matter, although his words soon cut through.
‘You deaf or something? I said, I’m not letting this woman with that child into the club.’
I gazed slowly at Charlie’s concerned, tight set face and then at Sandra who, just by the look of extreme determination on her face, told me that it would take a nation of bouncers to stop her.
‘It’s alright, Charlie. Just let her in for five minutes.’
‘No way, pal. Absolutely, no way. You might work here but I am not going to be held responsible.’
‘I’ll be responsible,’ I replied. Sandra let out a loud tut.
‘Cha! The day you show any responsibility will be the day the earth freezes over.’
It was a true horrorshow and what compounded the nightmare further was the fact that I was finding it increasingly hard to focus on one person or distinguish their voices. Colour blurred my vision and babble was all around me. I tried to concentrate solely on Charlie.
‘Look, Charlie, man, it’ll be cool, I’ll...’ but the words just fizzled out and melted away into thin air. My mind was a blank, all I could see was the virgin white of my baby’s wrapping and I could think of nothing to parlare with.
‘Look at him,’ I heard a voice say. ‘He’s off his nut.’
‘He’s on one!’
‘Get right on one, matey,’ came a third laughing voice, and if there’s a hell below then this is how it must be, a nightmare chorus of faces and voices screaming with laughter at you, and there you stand, unable to even move a muscle in self defence.
Luckily, in the midst of this terrordrome, Jill had gone to fetch Costello, the manager who, thankfully not checking the condition I was in, and wishing to get the queue moving, instructed Charlie to let Sand ra pass. There was a smattering of applause and cheering when Charlie reluctantly moved back his arm, and then came female shouts of encouragement.
‘Go for it, sister.’
‘Tell him how it is, gal.’
‘Don’t take no shit. They’re all the same, the wankers. I should know. I married one.’
‘Shut up, woman. You’re the one that said yes.’
Costello led us impatiently into his tiny office, which is just inside the entrance to the left, a small space that is dominated by a large desk with papers, coffee mugs, overflowing ashtrays, wrapping paper from the fish shop down the road, strewn all over it.
‘Five minutes,’ he barked. ‘I’m running a club here not a nursery.’
And then, shooting me a glance which did not bode well for my future employment, he made his exit. Sandra turned to me and held the small bundle in her arms up to me. I clocked a small, sleeping, light brown face, with a single wisp of hair falling down the forehead, and realised here, indeed, was my daughter.
‘This,’ Sandra softly said, ‘is Kimberley. Our baby. I do hope you like the name but as you weren’t around after the seven hours it took to bring her into this world, I took the liberty. I hope you don’t mind and tough shit if you do.’
Sandra started going into one but to be God’s honest it was of no consequence for her words, like the sea beating against the rocks in a rage, crashed uselessly against my ears.
All I could do was to stare at this tiny, human form and try and make a link and, cruel as I know this sounds, I found it impossible. I could not check that this was my child for I saw nothing of myself in its sleeping face. She looked like a thousand other babies.
‘Of course,’ I heard Sandra saying as her words suddenly flooded in, ‘both Kimberley and I are very honoured that you’ve taken this time to see us. We both know what a busy man Daddy is, don’t we baby? Yes, we do and we both really respect your hectic schedule. But don’t worry, Kimberley is really into clubbing it, aren’t you, darling? Even at this age, all she wants out of life is to DJ. She’s got such big ambitions, just like her dad.’
Boy-o-boy did that woman have a tongue on her although her sharp words did help to clear my mind a little.
‘Look Sandra, I don’t know what you’re playing at but I could lose my job here.’
‘Good. I hope you do. Look at you. You’re a disgrace, man. I can’t get a penny out of you and here you are out of your head, having the time of your life. How much you pay for whatever it is that’s made you look and act like a zombie? Uh? 10 quid? 20 quid? And I’m struggling to put food into baby’s mouth.’
A tear involuntarily shot out of her eye and she angrily wiped it away.
‘Whether you like it or not this is your daughter and you better wake up to that fact instead of spending time off your stupid face in this poxy club, pretending that everything is cool. It isn’t.’
‘Damn right it isn’t,’ I shot back but she had wounded me badly and I had to admit it. ‘But if it’s dosh you’re after I’ll start sending some over, okay?’
‘Don’t be too generous.’
‘Why don’t you just cut this crap and leave, babe. You’ve got what you wanted.’
‘Crap? Cut the crap?’
‘Yeah, you heard me. Just leave, woman.’
‘You haven’t even met your own daughter, your own flesh and blood and you talk to me about crap? You should have a look in the mirror, boy, before you start dishing out advice.’
By now, the drug inside had weakened, wounded by the fire of her words, and now it went the opposite way as I felt anger swell up inside.
‘You don’t get it, do you? Haven’t you got a brain? How many...’
‘Don’t shout in front of my baby, if you don’t mind.’
Behind Sandra I could hear the dull thud of the music thumping through the wall. I imagined the crowd living it up and wished I could be with them, anywhere but here. I took my voice down to a frantic whisper.
‘How many times, Sandra, how many times? I don’t want this child. It’s lovely and great and if you want to go play happy families, then cool. But I’m not coming with you. I’ve told you I’ll give you money but that’s it. Just don’t bring me into it anymore.’
‘Don’t bring you into it? You put her inside me. You helped make this child, in case you’ve forgotten. And what do I get? I get shouted at in the street, I had to go through the birth on my own, I’m treated like a fucking leper because you haven’t got the guts to face me. You ignore all my calls and then I’m forced to get on a bus and come to this shithole so that you can meet your daughter, who is now seven months old. And you say, don’t bring me into it? Sweetheart, it’s too late for that business. You’re in it. The moment you put yourself inside me you were in it.’
‘You know your problem, Sandra, you think you’re so right and perfect. Oh yes, I’m just off to Trinidad to think about things and when I come back I’ll make a decision. Oh my, is that three months gone already? Don’t worry. I’ve only known you for less than three months but, hey, let’s bring up a baby. Wouldn’t that be nice?’
Before she could respond there was a knock on the door and there was Costello motioning that enough was enough, and back to work.
‘Okay, Mr. Costello. I’ll be there in a second.’
Sandra laughed out loud. ‘My, my, so there is someone who’s got you on a piece of string. Wonders will never cease.’
‘Sandra, if I lose my job here you are going to be the first to hear about it. Believe that.’
‘I came here,’ she replied with grit, ‘to tell you one thing and that is if you don’t start paying your daughter the attention she deserves, I am not only going to slap you with every court order going but I’ll make your life hell. Believe that, loverboy. This is your last chance to get your act together. Our daughter needs a father and if she doesn’t get one then I am going to make you wish you had never set your eyes on me.’
‘Baby, I wish that already.’
‘Yeah, well let me tell you sweetheart, you never did me one favour, in or out of bed.’
With that last stinga, Sandra walked and it was all I could do not to slam my fist down on Costello’s table, although, I must add, that I felt a certa
in relief at her exit for it signalled, I prayed, the end of the nightmare. I returned to the booth and took charge of the dex, sullenly mixing in tunes with a cold shock hanging close over me, Sandra and the sight of our baby cramming my mind at every possible moment. When the lights came mercifully up, I packed up my tunes and, not stopping to parlare with any of the regulars such as The Sheriff or Jasmine, I was outta there and in fast time, let me tell you, heading homeways as my mind’s solar system went haywire. The truth was that this was the first time the reality of my actions had been forced upon me and it had cut me to the quick.
They often say that the killer punch is never the sledgehammer blow but the soft one you never saw coming, and Sandra had thrown it beautifully, no doubt about it. To be boxed outta my head and then be forced to confront her and the child, had not only kicked me hard but it also convinced me, there and then as the cab sped Northways, to ease off the white pill. The cashola saved would go to Sandra.
The next night I had arranged to meet up with Dillon and travel southside to a secret rave he had helped organise. I didn’t particularly fancy going but as I had given him my word, we met up although I have to say that at the back of mind it was slowly dawning on me that I only really checked for the man either when I was charged up or in his shop, buying up tunes. Outside of that the chit-chat tended to dry up.
The rave was situated in a deserted warehouse and was full of youngsters in loose dungarees, smiley t shirts and wallabee shoes, the uniform of the scene which they all adopted without question, their eyes buggin’ and gums working overtime, and I felt little in common with them, no doubt due to the events of the night before and the comedown I was now anticipating with dread.
When Dillon went off in search of a hit, I went wandering listlessly around the club when I bumped into none other than Lord Haw Haw, standing stiffly against a wall and obviously lost in space. I knew he wouldn’t recognise me, their sort have people to do that for them, but I hung close by, figuring that my tailor amico, Davey Boy, would be somewhere in the vicinity, a hunch that was proved large and correct. I checked him first.