The History of Us

by Jonathan Harvey

  Later I went to meet Jocelyn and Kathleen for a post-mortem.

  ‘Have you heard?’ Kathleen gabbled excitedly over a pint of lager top in a pub up a back street in Covent Garden. ‘Harriet Thingy’s doing Adam’s play.’

  ‘Newland!’ I bleated, sounding a bit desperate. Desperate to show off.

  Jocelyn looked nonplussed. ‘Is that supposed to mean something?’

  ‘She’s that amazing coloured girl from Showbiz Comp.’

  ‘Black.’ That was me.

  ‘You know! The one who set fire to the mixing desk after the caretaker put his hand up her skort.’

  ‘Skirt.’ That was Jocelyn.

  ‘No, it was a skort,’ I agreed. ‘It’s a sportsy thing. Cross between a skirt and shorts.’

  Jocelyn looked like she was stopping herself from rolling her eyes. ‘That’s great news,’ she said, flatly. ‘What’s it about?’

  Fortunately Kathleen jumped in. ‘It’s a coruscating look at the troubles in Northern Ireland as seen through the eyes of four disaffected youth.’

  Jocelyn nodded. ‘Northern Ireland?’

  ‘Yeah, it’s just something that really interests me,’ I lied. Jocelyn took this in and did a grimace with her lips that could’ve been interpreted as sarcasm, but that I took to be a kind of sign language for, ‘Wow, that’s completely impressive.’

  ‘What interests you about Northern Ireland?’ she asked, before licking a prawn cocktail crisp.

  ‘Oh, you know . . .’ I said. ‘The Troubles and all that.’

  She nodded, then said, clearly bored with the conversation already, ‘Shall we go into town and do an E?’

  Jocelyn was into going out and doing ecstasy. Me and Kathleen pretended we were, so that we didn’t sound uncool, but secretly we’d never tried it. We’d been knocking about with Jocelyn pretty regularly since bumping into her at the abandoned pop video filming a few months before. It had, of course, been such an incredible surprise to see her. She was the last person we’d have expected to bump into after our riot-strewn sojourn through central London. She’d been doing some running work for the production company that were making the video and it had been left to her to tell anyone turning up that it was cancelled. It was only part-time voluntary work, so she didn’t feel that loyal to the company, which is why she soon abandoned her post and retired to a local pub with us. And ever since then we’d met up each week to paint the town red. Or pink, if we headed off to the gay club Heaven.

  Jocelyn was now working in some boring office job for Westminster Council, in the housing department. Kathleen and I were amazed. The girl who once dreamed of being a superstar, reduced to working a menial office job? I could tell that, no matter how briefly, Kathleen revelled in this information, feeling even she had a funkier, trendier, sexier job than allegedly cool, hip Jocelyn. It turned out Jocelyn had flunked her exams at school and left home after one too many arguments, then run away to London.

  OK, so she had won that one. We’d told people we’d run away, when we hadn’t really. Jocelyn apparently really had. She claimed she’d not spoken to anyone in her family for ‘aeons’ and had no intention of ever speaking to them again. She’d had to put her music career ‘on hold’ while she earned enough money to pay her way in the Big Smoke. And we all agreed it was a very expensive city to live in. She’d lied on her CV, applied for a few office jobs and, remarkably, got the one in the council.

  ‘You’re like Deirdre Barlow!’ Kathleen had said.

  Jocelyn looked horrified by this. ‘Why?’

  ‘Well, she sometimes works in the housing department at the council. Folk are always asking her to pull strings.’

  Kathleen had started watching as many soaps as possible with something approaching religious fervour. Her two main favourites were Coronation Street and Brookside. It was as if now that she was cast adrift from living in the North, she had to cling on to some romanticized version of it to make her feel secure and give her a sense of identity. Those shows held little interest for me; I had bigger fish to fry. I was going to be a world-class, world-famous, world-dominating playwright.

  She’d also taken to videoing every soap and stockpiling them whenever her bezzy mate Cynthia was away on a long-haul flight, and then she’d go over when she was back and they’d watch them together, talking all things trolley dolly.

  The way things were going at the moment I thought Kathleen was going to suddenly say, ‘Chicken or fish?’

  Every time I thought of the play opening, I got a slight panic on. Kathleen and Jocelyn were bound to come and see it. What would they think? They would know within the first few lines that it was based on what went on in the organ loft all those years ago.

  And then I tried to calm myself. They would love it. Imitation was the highest form of flattery, surely.

  The other thing I would panic about was my depiction of Jocelyn in the play. Hard-faced. Opinionated. Brutally selfish. And shagging the Mark-style character. And having the baby by him. And pissing her mates off. How was she going to take to that? It hardly painted her in a glowing light.

  Especially as . . . and this was amazing . . . whenever we asked Jocelyn to tell us the truth about what had happened in the organ loft, and getting pregnant, and having the baby, she stuck to the party line. Why was she doing this, when she no longer had contact with her mother? Why was she letting her win like this? It was hurtful, if I’m honest, to have her continue to lie to me, to us; it just didn’t make any sense. Her version of events was steadfast – no matter what angle we came at it from, her story remained the same. Well, I’ll tell you what, she was a bloody good and consistent liar.

  Her versions of events was this: she’d spent the night in the organ loft with Mark, but nothing had happened between them. She had gone there because she’d argued with her mum over something as trivial as what time she was allowed to go to bed, and it had escalated. She’d walked out and, upset, hadn’t known where to go. So she went to the church and took solace with Mark. Mark talked to her and they fell asleep, and when she was leaving – climbing out of the window, as seen by us – he had hugged her and told her everything was going to be all right. She didn’t fancy him, he wasn’t her type, and she couldn’t understand why me and Kathleen just suddenly stopped speaking to her, cutting her dead in the street. Her mum then fell pregnant by a boyfriend and the pregnancy was very difficult so they had gone away for a month in the summer holidays for her to take the air at Llandrindod Wells. Her mum gave birth to a little boy, and they returned to Liverpool. And our wrath. As far as she was concerned, this is what had happened, and nothing else. So there.

  ‘You know, you can tell us,’ I’d say sadly, disappointed that she couldn’t be honest with us.

  ‘Tell you what?’ she’d say, chippily.

  ‘That you had a baby by Mark, and your mum passed it off as hers.’

  ‘Oh, fuck off, Adam.’

  And she meant it.

  ‘I’ve done nothing wrong. I’ve got nothing to be ashamed of.’

  ‘I just wish you’d be honest with us,’ echoed Kathleen. ‘You know we wouldn’t judge you. We don’t judge you. How is he?’

  ‘Who?’

  ‘William. Your son.’

  ‘My brother. And he’s fine.’

  ‘How d’you know?’

  ‘Because I phone my aunty in Toxteth sometimes. I’m not completely heartless. He’s doing well. Thriving, they say.’

  ‘Why did you fall out with your mum? It can’t just’ve been about stuff to do with bedtimes.’

  ‘I’m going.’

  And she always did. If we asked too many questions, she would just pick up her bag and walk out. No matter where we were. Off into the night full of fury and incredulity, incredulity that we had the audacity to challenge her.

  ‘D’you know what she doesn’t like?’ Kathleen would coo.

  ‘What?’

  ‘That she’s not your number one girl any more.’

  And with that, Kat
hleen would slip her arm into mine and simper like the cat who got the queeny cream.

  When I first saw the poster and flyer for Supper with Sam, I panicked afresh. It showed a picture of a stained-glass window, and in that glass was a picture of a black Virgin Mary cradling a mixed-race child. And the wording said, ‘SUPPER WITH SAM . . . this was no virgin birth!’

  The blurb on the flyer read:

  Belfast. Today. In the organ loft of a run-down church in Ballymcknock, three teenagers edge warily towards adulthood in their makeshift den. When fugitive Sam hides out in the loft, a bomb is dropped that will change their lives . . . forever.

  Starring Harriet Newland as Whitney (Showbiz Comp, Crossroads) Tom Hangs as Sam (Caucasian Chalk Circle on tour, Copperhead Cider advert) Suki Fielding as Conky (I Sniffed Terry Christian’s Armpit) and Joshua Moonlight as Alan (You Rang, M’Lord?).

  It’s weird. I had no idea that camp Joshua had been in You Rang, M’Lord?, and I’d seen every single episode. I also had no idea that Harriet had been in Crossroads. And I dreaded to think what I Sniffed Terry Christian’s Armpit was all about.

  ‘Oh, it’s my one-woman show I won a Fringe First for,’ Suki was happy to tell me. ‘It’s about raving, Madchester, flares.’

  I came home one evening to find Kathleen in a funny mood. She was picking at a chicken salad in the living room, the telly on, avoiding eye contact.

  ‘What’s up?’ I asked, though it pained me to say it. I felt she was being a bit of a drama queen.

  She did a big intake of breath, then let it out slowly. Then went down the side of the sofa and pulled out . . . a flyer for the play.

  ‘Oh,’ I said, sitting next to her. Slightly mortified, but at the same time elated that the flyers were clearly out there.

  ‘There were a pile in the library,’ she sniffed. And looked at me. Dear God, she looked like she might cry. She was furious. She was furious, surely, because I’d picked at the bones of our lives and made . . . a really great stock from it, actually. This show was going to be life-changing. I just had to convince her of that.

  ‘How could you?’

  ‘It’s such a good story, Kathleen.’

  ‘How could you call me Conky?’

  And then the tears really did flow. And she lunged at me and threw her arms round me and cried for what felt like seven years.

  So it transpired she wasn’t that fussed that I’d based a play on our teenage years. She was upset because of the big nose thing.

  ‘But Kath . . . Conky isn’t you.’

  ‘Isn’t she?’ She sounded a bit disappointed by this.

  ‘No. Wait till you see it. You have this amazing speech . . .’

  ‘I thought it wasn’t me.’

  ‘Sorry. Conky has this amazing speech about bullying and . . . name-calling and . . . everyone who’s read it says it’s one of the highlights of the play.’

  She seemed encouraged by that, almost placated.

  ‘Of which there are many,’ I added quickly, ‘Of course. And Conky’s so likeable. She’s really empowering to women and stuff. Everyone likes her. And Suki’s incredible, she really takes you on a journey. Wait till you see how fantastic she is, you’ll be over the moon.’

  ‘So it isn’t me?’

  ‘It’s a fictionalized character.’

  ‘Does she live with her grandma?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Are her mum and dad still together?’

  I shook my head.

  ‘Is her dad in prison?’

  I nodded my head.

  ‘And she has a big nose?’

  I nodded.

  ‘So it is me.’

  ‘It’s inspired by you. Kathleen, you’re my muse. All great artists have muses. You’re mine.’

  And for the first time, she smiled. Then the smile froze on her face as she looked at the picture on the flyer again.

  ‘Jocelyn’s going to kill you.’

  ‘You might be right there.’

  ‘Do you want some chicken salad? Or maybe some fish.’

  It had begun.

  ‘No, I grabbed a homity pie from Cranks. Ate it on the train.’

  But all of a sudden I felt very sick. She was right. Jocelyn was going to kill me.

  And this was bad news, because recently Jocelyn had promised to help us find somewhere to live once we lost the use of the place in West Norwood. Meeting her couldn’t have come at a better time. She was going to use her contacts in the housing department and make sure we had a roof over our heads. She wasn’t yet sure what shape this would take, but we were pretty much dead certs for a council flat or a housing association flat in Westminster somewhere. And Westminster was dead posh! So we had to keep in her good books. And her finding out there was a play based on something she’d rather forget, to the extent that she preferred to lie about it, make out it hadn’t even happened . . . surely we were in for some kind of nuclear reaction!

  Before I knew it, First Night was upon us. When I got to the pub/theatre there were flowers and champagne waiting for me from Anthea. She, however, seemed to have turned into a nervous wreck. She was chain-smoking roll-ups and running to the loo every five minutes. If I’d been nervous before getting there, she was making me feel worse. And I’d still not told Jocelyn what the play was about, but she had insisted on coming to my big opening and was even getting her hair done for the occasion.

  The dressing room was full of actors disrobing and getting into their school uniform costumes, and the air was ripe with nervous farts and panstick. All of them seemed to be saying various phrases in their cod-Belfast accents, trying to get them just right for the big event. Harriet kept announcing she was going to be sick, then running off to the loo, then coming back, seemingly disappointed that no-one had followed her in there to check she was OK. Suki was banging on about her agent being useless and really using this job as a ‘shop front for her wares’. Joshua Moonlight was uncharacteristically quiet, but would then smack his lips repeatedly, all part of his ‘warm-up’. Tom Hangs just hung out looking handsome. One day I hoped I’d be able to do that. Just hang round being awesome, and nobody worrying whether you said much, because you were just so cool. One day!

  When I went downstairs to the pub the place was heaving with the first-night audience. Jocelyn was in a corner with Kathleen, and they were both standing in front of a massive poster of the black Virgin Mary in the stained glass.

  ‘Where’s Cynthia?’ I asked, excited. I was quite looking forward to showing off to the one neighbour I knew.

  ‘Oh, she had to suddenly go on standby. She’s in bits.’

  ‘Right.’

  ‘But I’ve been thinking,’ Kathleen continued, ‘I might retrain.’

  ‘You’re not trained in anything,’ I pointed out, trying to point out that this evening wasn’t about her. For once, it was actually about me.

  ‘True.’

  ‘Retrain as what?’ Jocelyn asked.

  ‘An air stewardess.’

  I rolled my eyes.

  ‘Jocelyn, tell her,’ I said.

  ‘Tell her what?’

  ‘You can’t be an air stewardess, Kathleen. You go on the runway, they’ll think you’re Concorde.’

  Kathleen looked hurt. As well she might. And then she laughed it off. ‘Oh, I was only joking.’

  And then I felt bad. I was bad. Oh God.

  ‘Anyway. Jocelyn’s got some great news!’ said Kathleen, trying to sound brighter than she probably was.

  What? Was she not going to pass comment on the poster? Did she not understand the significance of this? It was a black VIRGIN MARY. It was HER.

  Jocelyn pulled a set of keys from her coat pocket. ‘I’ve got you a new flat.’

  ‘WHAT?’

  ‘It’s in a tower block in Paddington. It’s empty. You’ll be squatting at first. But once you’ve been there for a few weeks you’ll have rights, and the housing association that owns it will have to rehouse you. Especially if we say Kathleen’s brutal ex-b
oyfriend is trying to beat her up all the time. You might have to record a few answerphone messages pretending to be him.’

  ‘That’s incredible, Jocelyn.’

  ‘What are friends for? Now we’ve got a major showbiz opening to get through. Do all these people know these characters are based on us?’

  I looked around the room. She was taking this very well. How did she know? I’d told her so little about its content, fortunately because she hadn’t asked too much.

  ‘You know?’ I asked, in a tiny voice.

  ‘The poster’s a bit of a fucking giveaway, Adam. Well. If they don’t know now, they will do soon. I’m going to buy some champagne.’

  Of course. Of course they were going to enjoy their moment of glory. The show was going to be a huge success and they felt they were part of it, had inspired it. And so they became the most embarrassing members of an audience ever. Jocelyn and Kathleen both laughed a little too loudly and long at all the jokes. They cried really loudly and did lots of sniffing in the sad bits. And they did lots of cries of, ‘God, I actually said that, remember?’ in between lines, or ‘I can’t believe this is based on me,’ or ‘That actually happened!’ and so on. So that by the end of the play everybody knew that the girl with the big nose and the black girl were eerily similar to the girl with the big nose and the black girl in the play. And when Suki did that amazing speech:

  CONKY: Call me what you like. I don’t care. Your words can’t cut me any more, so they can’t. I’ve heard them all. Too many times. Captain Beaky, The Eagle has Landed, Pinocchio, Nostrildamus. You name it, I’ve been called it. Well, it stops right here and it stops right now. My name is not Conky. It’s Fionnula-Jayde. And from now on that’s what yous’ll be calling me, you got that? Fionnula-Jayde. Say it. Say it loud. I want everyone to hear. Shout it from the rooftops if ye have to.