by Van Quattro
It’s seven O’clock by the time I get back to the bunker I call home. I’m still feeling a bit sadly high so I figure I’ll stay here one last night. I join the lads at the pub for the last time. They seem very tight lipped regarding any political stuff, but they look like they’re up to something. They’re all moody and quiet. I don’t want to have to deal with brown beers and anger right now so I go back to my bed, put on my headphones and listen to more of the Clash. I start to think about my mom, and Greg, and Whammy, and about not having a girlfriend. I’m lucky, the music is stronger than my vacancy blues.
I pack my bag in the morning and take it to work with me. I call Brian, when he answers he sounds like he’s been hit in the head with a baseball bat and tells me he will see me later in the afternoon.
The move is perfect, the bed is comfortable as hell and my hummus is in the fridge.
I stay busy working with the mates and feel good about having quids in my pocket. I don’t have nearly enough money to party like Brian, but when we get in situations where I can’t afford something he’ll pick up the slack. I don’t take advantage of him but I don’t refuse either because if I don’t accept I’ll simply be out of the equation. I don’t do all my partying with him though. I still go to clubs and concerts by myself.
The guys I work with like me pretty good but I think they feel I’m a bit nuts. That’s okay, they’re kinda straight laced.
I see the Pretenders at the Palais and feel really fucking special seeing them in Chrissie’s favorite country. I want to marry her. She has it all man, pretty, compassionate, tough, smart, and a rocker. She’s a rock and roll Ava.
Brian tells me the tequila gang wants to get back together for a high-end dance club night. High-end isn’t usually where I hang out for many reasons, but I’m excited because I’m going with fucking high-end people. Ha. So, high low, off we go.
We grab a taxi at ten and head to this private place where everyone is fucking decked out. There are couches and sections for very important people, like us! Ha. It’s a younger crowd and it’s cool with me, but Ava and Charles seem out of place. After a few drinks I ask Ava to dance. She does that dance older people do, or people who don’t really want to be dancing do. It’s a kinda swirling, sweeping thing; it’s sort of an intoxicated obligatory, self-contained, conserving energy, skirt swirling pretense to be interested in the music. It’s okay, but it fucks up my rhythm. I try to follow her but I feel like a retarded ballet dancer, so I figure fuck it and just rock it my way. We barely look at each other. When I’m not looking at her I hope she’s checking me out. I dance like she is, and it’s one more thing for her to admire me for.
There’s a rumor going around that Prince is going to show up but it’s already one in the morning. The gang wants no part of hanging about so they leave. I hang till four but he never shows.
I walk the West end till I find my way back to the embankment. I feel like a drunken sponge soaking in everything without judgment, letting it all drench me with the mystery of things I already know. Every space between these bricks I walk are packed with the liquid of centuries, containing stories I have never read but can feel the particles of. I think of the hard rains that washed these walls and streets collecting all bits of previous existence, settling between stones forming a potent marrow of life. Centuries meet centuries.
The streetlamps bend their necks tired, but still glow far beyond this morning to a place I want to touch and feel, but may never. I still reach though. I may never stop. I am the mortar tonight.
A few days later Brian tells me he’s throwing a dinner party for a half dozen of his friends at our flat. He wants me to be here and says he’s going to invite one girl he knows for me, only she won’t be there for the dinner, she will come later. How’s this for a setup? No competition. I hope she’s good looking.
On dinner day he cooks all the live long, many things and many courses. I help him like a trusty Boy Scout and I reward myself with vodka drippings. I set hundreds of plates and glasses and silverware and napkins and napkin rings, who knew about all this stuff? There is enough tableware here to serve a platoon. I time my vodka sips carefully to regulate my dosage. I’m in this for the goddamn whole night.
The nature of the guests does not surprise me; they’re all dressed finely, very charming and gay. All during dinner they have a loud joyous time. I pick my food and sip, sip,sip. Brian is in heaven; he is the host with the most and pleases everyone. He reminds me of Elton John if Elton wasn’t a rock star and just gave dinner parties. He won’t even allow me to help clean up. I want to but he keeps telling me to stay put while he praises me regarding something that has to do with just being me. The others don’t seem so in love with me, they’re nice but a little dismissive. See, this shit fucks with me, I mean like Brian really loves me but people like him don’t feel the same way. Why? I want everyone to like me, even people I hate.
Fuck, I’m the outsider here. Good thing I’m drunk. Dinner passes and bottles clink like it’s New Years Eve. Hard stuff is sloshing over the ten-dollar a piece fancy coasters. I’m watching fancy folks mess up fancy things, waiting on a woman.
She comes around ten o’clock, I’m feeling great. She’s very neatly dressed and polite. Brian introduces us and goes back to being the M.C. on the other side of the apartment. I make her a strong drink and watch her closely as she drinks. She looks like the catholic school-girl type who can really bring it when she gets loose. She smiles at me after finishing the strong drink and hands me her glass. I refill it. Man this is going to be some kinda fun.
The guys are way into their own shenanigans, wrestling or whatever, so I get to pick out all the loud music. Roxy Music is fucking perfect for this. I start to sway. She joins me knocking back her drink and throwing off her coat and scarf. We dance like we are the reason for the carnival.
Some of the fellas thin out or pass out. Lori, my gift from Mother Mary in a bra and panties, and I are dizzily and lustfully entwined with Brian trying to insert himself between us like a puppy full of milk looking to nest. The music plays on, and I am wacked in a very nasty way. Nasty good.
Somehow I end up in my own bed all groggy. I feel someone tugging at my underwear. It’s dark as hell but it’s one of Brian’s party guys trying to unbutton my pants. This fucking dude is on the floor next to my bed, and he’s ready to grab my dick. I look him right in the eyes and say, “No,” like I’m a fucking death squad leader. He crawls out of the room whimpering. Hey, maybe they did like me, he did that’s for sure.
Man my new place is the swankiest place ever. I feel like a royal dude or something. One way to accept something you feel you don’t deserve is to party then your worthlessness doesn’t hit so hard. Reading also helps. I’m reading this book about a guy that jacks off a lot. It’s pretty funny.
So speaking of royal stuff there is this big deal Royal Wedding thing coming up. Some regular girl is going to marry a prince or something. I don’t understand all this King and Queen stuff, I actually think it’s kind of funny. I mean people walking around with jewels and crowns and shit while poor people cower in front of them; I don’t even think they do anything, do they? Well, the whole world is getting ready for the wedding like it’s an asteroid destined for earth. Brian is all hyped up about the social events he is going to. He doesn’t ask me to come to any of them. He just says, “Baby it’s won’t be your kind of thing.” I’m fine with that. I don’t want anyone lollipopping my dick if I get too stoned. Brian and I are getting along pretty cool. He declares his love but never really makes me feel weird about it.
All this royal family bullshit has me thinking about my mom, like I’m wondering if she’s sick, and just missing her I guess. I call her collect and she accepts. She tells me she’s going to have another open heart surgery. Wow, see I knew something was up and I should have called her. Only thing is she begins laying it on me about not being there for her. This will be her third one. I was in the hospital waiting room for the other surgeries. They a
re so weird. When they wheel her away to the operating room she’s drugged out and all truthful and gooey eyed, and the thing is you don’t know if you’re going see her again alive. I see her like, right then, it seems realer than twenty years of crazy upbringing.
Well, in-between her telling me the newest dangers and challenges of her operation, she goes on about how the Queen really hates Diana and that Diana is after the Royal throne or something, and she might poison Charles. She says she wouldn’t trust Diana as far as she could throw her and asks me if I’ve seen the ring? I’m like what the fuck, how would I ever even give a shit about this stuff?
I have to say I’m sorta glad I’m going miss this heart surgery. It’s too damn much. I do feel bad though so I promise my mom I will get Diana’s autograph and maybe a photo with her in her wedding dress. That makes her feel a little better. Then she tells me to say a prayer for her new heart.
It’s the wedding day and over coffee Brian tells me the city is going to be completely shut down. There won’t be any taxis, buses, tubes or anything. He says where you end up this afternoon is where you’ll be in the morning. I love that idea. I’ve got a hundred pounds in my pocket and a pint of vodka lodged in my undies. I head out for the pubs in Knightsbridge around eleven a.m.
Thanks all you royalty, for giving everybody a real reason to party.
The roads are gridlock with people but the route for the pumpkin carriage is empty and clean as a baby’s room. People wave English flags and scream things like, ‘God save the Queen,’ baring the gaps between their teeth. Little kids white as kitchen sinks are licking lollipops, balloons cheerily fluster in the breeze; hell yeah, let’s party, kids and all. Music is coming out of a crappy citywide speaker system trying to make a classical song sound more important than an air raid.
I’m pretty close to St. Paul’s Church and the mobs start to bubble with excitement. I can see a bunch of vehicles coming and I yell shit like, “Yeah!” and, “You’re the King, you rule,” along with whatever everybody is yelling. The procession goes right by me. I mean like, right there, in front of me. I don’t recognize anyone because I don’t know what the hell they look like anyway. I do see some Royal type heads waving. That’s probably them. They go inside the church and we can hear what’s going on in there through the speakers as far as the ceremony goes.
I don’t care a hoot about the ceremony; I can barely understand a word anyways, so I work the crowd asking people what this wedding means to them, and if they think Diana is a phony and stuff.
“What do you think of the king of America?”
“Well America doesn’t have a king now does it? Does it? Oh my goodness I’m not sure. Is it that Reagan fella?”
“Yeah that’s our King. What do you think of him?”
“He was an actor wasn’t he?”
“Yeah, a bad one.”
“Well I don’t know much about him. I suppose he’s fine.”
“Farah Fawcett is our queen, do you like her?”
“Oh yes I love her, I didn’t know she…Now you’re putting me on. Right?”
“Nope, she’s the queen of America.”
“Her and Di will get along very well then.” I ask one couple what they think of the Royal family thing and they tell me it’s as important as the air they breathe. Most people I talk to love the whole idea of the fairytale and are cool to me. Man, I am having a blast. I feel like some kind of stand up comedian, I’m feeling brighter than a piece of silver at Brian’s dinner party. One would never know the kind of piece of shit I can feel like sometimes. It’s okay today, now is fucking now.
I still have half the vodka but I want to save it so I work my way through some pubs killing time and brain cells until the evening. I keep hearing Leicester Square is going to be packed tonight so I head that way.
It’s mid afternoon and the place is already jammed, I have never seen this many people in a city just roaming and shit. This is what life should be: people with people, with larger sounds and larger loves, booze and all, but mostly moving about in good spirits.
Man, when I have a good buzz going I can satellite for a long time. I circle and recreate with new faces and new drinks with the energy of a babbling two-year-old.
I start telling people that Charles and Di got into a fight on the way home from the church and Di had to get a hotel room because Queen mom didn’t want her at the palace till she apologized for calling Charles a wuss. I don’t think too many believed me but it’s fun as hell telling them. Leicester Square is my romper room.
Crash.
There comes a time getting high when you hit a wall and no matter how much more you drink you don’t get any drunker. I have peaked and am now socially graceless, I’m a bit of a slurbilly. My energy is gone without a warning. It’s a saturated feeling of listlessness, a pickled surrender. At least booze doesn’t have the come down of drugs, the shame, the hopelessness, paranoia, the shakes and all that. Drugs throw you right off the cliff. With booze you jump with a budgie cord. The cord may be too long most times but at least the fall isn’t so goddamn scary.
I walk the outskirts of the square hoping to find a way home. I am done and would love to crash out. I am fucking magic, so if there is a way home I will find it because shit happens on summer nights. I come across a cab and the driver kindly tells me he made a bad move earlier and was fucked till morning. I try to convince him to give it a try anyway - we can go up sidewalks and shit, people will get out of the way, I can yell at them to warn um, no one will care tonight, but he won’t go for it.
I walk back to the center of the square and some homeless looking guy asks me for money. The smallest bill I have is a fiver so I give it to him, his eyes water and he says, “I will pay you back.” I nod, like sure. I really admire this guy’s conviction though; you’d think I just gave Christ a loaf of bread.
I am so wacked I find the nearest park bench and collapse. There is still so much life going on around me I want to jump back in but my body won’t move. Directly in front of me ten feet away is a phone booth, I think I hear it ring but I figure its my soggy brain wishing someone was calling me, but above all the noise I hear a damn ringing sound again. I can barely move but I find the strength to lean towards the booth and I fall flat on my face. I crawl over. It is fucking ringing. I look around to see if anyone’s expecting a call and no one moves so I slither up the booth and pick up.
“Hello.”
“Hey, hey mate, who is this? Who am I talking to?”
“It’s Van”
“Oye Van. Where are you mate?”
“I’m in Leicester square “
“Leister Square? Fucking England? No bloody way mate. Really?”
“Yeah why.”
“’Cause I’m in fucking Australia.”
“ NUH UH.”
“No, really, I’m in Sydney.”
“Really? Who you calling?”
“No one. I can’t fucking believe this. I’m talking to fucking Leicester square in England.”
“Why did you call?”
“Hey man, I’m just sitting with me mates and we picked a random number in Britain to call”
“You serious? Nah. Really?”
“I am so damn serious. I swear on me mother.”
“Wow, that’s awesome. What’s it like over there?”
“Oh, you know, it’s good n all. I want to know what’s happening over there?”
“Uh…well there is a lot of people still buzzing around. I mean its like packed.”
“Hey Van, you don’t sound British. Where you from?”
“I’m from los Angeles.”
“Get the fuck…Hey I’m talking to some bloke from Los Angeles in Leicester Square in England.”
“Yep you are.”
“Did you go over just for the wedding?”
“Fuck no, man. I didn’t even know about it till I got here. I followed some girl named Tess here.”
“Right. Tess, nice name. Did you see the wedding?”
“No, but they went right by me.”
“We’ve been watching maybe we saw you.”
“Maybe. I have on a brown shirt. Probably not though.”
“Di is fine isn’t she? Charles is a wanker.”
“Hey, what does wanker mean?”
“Oh, you serious? It’s like, you know… sticky pudding all alone.”
“You mean like jacking off?”
“Yeah that’s it. So hey Van do me a favor…yell out to everyone that Gus from Australia says hello.”
“Okay sure.” I do it with every last bit of strength I have. Gus is roaring with laughter on the other end.
“Ta Van.”
“Sure. Hey man… Gus, what does ta mean?”
“Ta means, thanks, mate.”
“Ooh”
“Hey van, I’m going to go now. God save the queen and all that…tell Charles he’s a wanker if you run into him…Hey do you know any movie stars?”
“No, not really. John Travolta winked at me once.”
“You mean like in a poofta way.”
“I don’t think so, kind of a like your cool way.”
“I heard he could be a poofta.”
“I don’t know if he is.”