by Julian Clary
Eventually he’d pulled away and said, ‘Jesus!’ but she had grabbed a clump of his thick hair and pushed him roughly forward again. The second kiss had gone on and on, and she had writhed and moaned, grabbed his hand and pushed it up her skirt. Eventually, with her knickers round her ankles and Marcus’s fingers still inside her, she had managed to get her keys out of her coat pocket. Then she and Marcus had gone noisily down the hallway and swiftly to her room. Marcus’s muscular young body and eager manhood…
Enough. She covered her mouth in horror. She would never drink again.
There he was. She peered over his shoulder and looked again at his youthful face. He was sleeping soundly, breathing softly with his lips just parted and his impossibly long, doll-like eyelashes resting on his soft cheeks.
Molly solemnly shook his shoulder, said a polite ‘Good morning’ and explained, while looking directly into the dilated pupils of her lover’s dreamy eyes, that it was time for him to get dressed and leave. No, it was not possible for him to visit the bathroom. He must be very quiet.
She enjoyed watching him dress, noting with an erotic thrill the absence of underpants, and responded with a Scarlett O’Hara smile when he leant over her for a final, roguish kiss. She inhaled the sexy smell of his distressed leather jacket and stroked his hair one last time. ‘Sssh!’ was her last communication. Marcus slipped silently out of the room, out of the bungalow, on to his motorbike and away.
As soon as he was gone, Molly wiggled back down under her bedcovers, closed her eyes and tried her hardest to go back to sleep. Maybe when she woke up she could pretend the sordid incident had never happened. She felt regret. Her longed-for reunion with Daniel was somewhat sullied. But now she was awake, her mind was racing and full of memories of the night before that made her squeak with a combination of embarrassment and pleasure. In the end she gave up and dragged herself out of bed. At the window, she drew the curtains. Lilia was shuffling down the garden path with Heathcliff at her side. As Molly watched, she paused and the dog stopped next to her. She muttered something soft and held his big, square head in both her bony hands, blowing him a kiss. Heathcliff gazed up lovingly at his mistress and she looked back at him tenderly.
That overweight Rottweiler is really a form of therapy, thought Molly. The affection she lavishes on him — he’s probably what keeps her going.
Molly took her time in the bathroom. She didn’t want Lilia’s final memory of her to be a rough, hung-over one. She washed and conditioned her hair, exfoliated her tired skin and drank glass after glass of water. Makeup was liberally applied. By the time she appeared in the kitchen, she had a deceptively healthy glow, a radiant smile and fresh, peppermint breath. ‘Morning, Lilia!’ she said perkily.
Lilia was sitting in her usual place at the kitchen table, Heathcliff standing patiently at her side, as if he was waiting for his cooked breakfast.
‘Molly! Good morning, my dear. Do sit down. I have put a cushion on your chair. It is nice and soft. I was pottering in the front garden this morning and I met young Marcus. These country boys are the same the world over, don’t you find? So feral.’
‘Our last-night party got a little wild,’ said Molly, helping herself to some muesli, then sitting down. ‘Thanks for the cushion.’
Lilia leant forward and said confidentially, ‘I was once buggered by a Viennese taxi driver.’
This startled Molly, and she stared at her landlady for a long, awkward moment, unable to prevent herself from visualising it. Then she said, ‘Poor you.’
‘Not at all. It was the most liberating experience of my life. As I opened my mouth to scream, my soul fluttered out and away. It was gone for a week. Happy days. So, you see, I understand the extraordinary power of sex. And the tenderness it can leave in the nether regions afterwards.’
Molly wasn’t sure how to respond to such a surreal revelation at breakfast time. She decided to bring the conversation back to more mundane matters. ‘I’m back to London this morning, Lilia, as soon as I’ve finished packing. Thank you so much for having me to stay here. I’ve had a brilliant week with you. I really can’t thank you enough.’
‘Yes,’ said Lilia. ‘You are saying all the things an Englishwoman deems correct. The perfect guest. I have enjoyed your company also.’
‘I’m glad.’ Molly wondered if there was any orange juice in the fridge. She was craving something sweet. Her hangover wasn’t holding up well.
‘No doubt Daniel will be pleased to see you?’ said Lilia, the question loaded with sub-text. Lilia knew all about Daniel and most aspects of Molly’s life. She had slowly but firmly prised everything out over the days Molly had been at Kit-Kat Cottage. When they’d been shopping in Sainsbury’s for the after-show party, Molly had told Lilia everything about her lonely childhood, failed university career and determination to make it as a musical actress.
‘He’s busy working, I expect,’ said Molly breezily, stirring her muesli intently but unable to consume a spoonful without the very real risk of retching.
‘I hope you will keep in touch with me,’ said Lilia, suddenly. Her eyes seemed to search Molly’s face for a positive response.
‘I intend to,’ said Molly. ‘You’ve taught me a great deal. I leave here a wiser girl. A Lilia Delvard graduate.’
Lilia turned to stare out of the kitchen window. ‘Not a sign of my starling or my dear little thrush. It is a dreary day. When it is grey and raining it is hard to remember what the sun feels like on your skin. But if you try very hard you can remember.’ She turned and focused on Molly. ‘Do not forget the things you have learnt here. I have tried to impress you, Molly, not because my ego demands it, but because I have suffered. There needs to be a payoff. A wise and illuminating conclusion that benefits the world I leave behind. I don’t know why I chose you, but I feel somehow we are connected.’
‘You’re being very solemn and serious for this time of day,’ said Molly.
‘I may never see you again,’ said Lilia. ‘I want you to remember me as a cabaret artist, not a silly old German woman. Cabaret. That has been my life. I was born into it, as I have told you.. It runs through my veins and is more than just a few songs and a threadbare feather boa. Please remember me, tell others about me. Don’t let me vanish into obscurity — not entirely.’
‘I won’t,’ Molly promised.
‘Good,’ said the old lady, allowing a big sigh to billow out of her mouth. She seemed satisfied.
Half an hour later Molly had packed her cases and loaded them into the car. ‘Goodbye, Lilia, and take care,’ she said, hugging her and kissing her on both cheeks.
‘I will, my dear. And you — I wish you all good fortune. You are a special girl. I am sure that great things await you. I hope I see you again one day.’
‘God bless!’ said Molly, with finality, and wheeled her suitcase down the gravel path towards the gate. She felt a slight twinge between her legs and resolved to stop at the nearest shop for some cranberry juice.
Molly was at home in London by lunchtime. After Lilia’s gloomy, cluttered bungalow, the fiat she shared with Daniel seemed bright, sunny and minimal by comparison. It was nothing special, just a second-floor, one-bedroom arrangement in a cheaply built nineteen-seventies block in a nondescript side-street off Tufnell Park Road, but it was affordable and bright, with laminate flooring and Ikea furniture.
Everything was neat and clean: Daniel had obviously made an effort. On the kitchen table there was a ‘Welcome Home’ card — a picture of a cat asleep in a basket by a coal fire, a bowl of milk at her side. Inside, in Daniel’s slanting, masculine writing, it said: ‘Molls! You’re home at last! I’ll be back around six and will show you how much I’ve missed you. There’s a present in the fridge. Love you, Daniel xxx’.
Ah, bless, she thought lovingly. She could guess what the present was. She propped the card on top of the microwave and pulled the fridge door open. Champagne and white chocolate truffles. Her favourite. Next she took her case into the bedroom.
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br /> The sheets were clean and the carpet had been hoovered. It was good to be home. She unpacked, put some laundry into the washing-machine, made a cup of tea and sat down to open her letters.
Before she did so, she allowed herself a contented sigh and a long sip of tea. It was always a joy to be in her own space after a long, intensive period of work. Having spent all day every day of the last month cooped up in the theatre and her few spare hours locked into Lilia’s strange world, it was lovely to have her own things around her.
It always surprised her how quickly she readjusted to her old life, and how swiftly the work routine and the people she had been with faded from her consciousness. Actors and dancers who told you every intimate detail of their lives, laughed and cried with you, discussed their dreams and aspirations with you and hugged you tightly on the last night, vowing to meet up in town and resume the deep friendship you had embarked on, were swiftly forgotten. It all meant nothing. The tight-knit family group was, seasoned pros understood, merely for the duration of the contract.
It was a similarly unspoken rule that any affairs and liaisons that might occur while on tour or during the run of a play or panto were of little or no consequence. What happens on tour stays on tour. Everyone in the theatrical world knew that. Outsiders didn’t, unfortunately. If you were a teacher or an estate agent or an office worker, intimate encounters in the workplace would not be as inconsequential. There was not the built-in escape at the end or, indeed, the abundance of suitable locations, such as dressing rooms with handy day-beds. And theatre people had the added temptations of working in the evenings, the after-show parties with liberal amounts of booze, the frisson of on-stage relationships where the boundaries between acting and reality might so easily become blurred and confused. Not to mention the occupational hazard of fragile egos needing reassurance and the occasional touch of comfort …
These were Molly’s vague thoughts as she drank her tea. She was determined to dissolve the niggling twinge of guilt she was feeling about her night of lust with Marcus. Daniel wouldn’t understand that theatre folk operated under different moral rules and she had no intention of trying to explain it to him. She couldn’t even say she particularly regretted what she had done. It would be a private memory that no one knew about. Only Lilia —and she was miles away, safely in the past now. If anything, her love for Daniel had been intensified by the experience with Marcus. Or so she told herself.
The one person she could share absolutely everything with was Simon. Their silly falling-out was, she had no doubt, just temporary. They hadn’t spoken since he had hung up on her the day she had arrived in Northampton. It wasn’t unusual for them to behave petulantly with one another. Once, they hadn’t spoken for six months, after Simon called Molly an interfering busybody and she told him he was a bitter and twisted queen, incapable of sustaining a relationship. Their reconciliations were always accompanied with fresh declarations of eternal friendship, plans for turkey-baster babies and a blissful old age together somewhere fun and unexpected, like Las Vegas or Casablanca. Molly resolved to call him later, after she’d had a nap. The hangover was just a faint ache now, but she had time for a rest and a bath before Daniel came home.
Simon had marked in his diary the date of Molly’s return to London and was half expecting her call. Their reconciliations were always full of affection and laughter. He had missed his soulmate more than he cared to admit. It was all very well drinking with Charles and cruising on his favourite commons, but he never felt quite as happy as he did when he was with Molly. No one else amused or understood him like she did.
He sat in the Sunday-morning sunlight that poured through the windows of the flat, illuminating the dust and the empty bottles piled up by the fireplace, staring at the phone and wondering what to do. Not only did he want to hear all about the tour and everything that had happened in Northampton but he couldn’t wait to share his exciting news with her. Things had been moving apace since Genita’s last stage appearance, and he knew Molly would be staggered, excited and delighted by what had happened. But he was very aware that he was the one who had hung up on her, rather unforgivably. He was still feeling guilty about it. She only ever wanted the best for him. It was very bad behaviour to throw that back in her face and act as though she was the one in the wrong.
Should I make the first move, he wondered, or should I wait? Perhaps she’s still cross … But that wouldn’t be like Molly. She was always quick to forgive even his worst tantrums. He decided to wait until Monday, to give her time to have the passionate reunion with Daniel she was no doubt enjoying at that very moment, but he couldn’t last any longer than that.
When the phone rang at three o’clock, he knew at once who it would be. He snatched it up with an eager ‘Hello?’
‘Si, it’s Molly. I’m back in London.’
‘Are you, now?’ he said, unable to disguise his pleasure at hearing her voice again. ‘And how was Northampton? As glamorous as ever, I trust?’
‘I had a very odd time. I can’t wait to tell you all about it.’
There was a pause. Simon rubbed his fingernail along some dirt embedded in the edges of the telephone table. ‘So I’m forgiven?’
‘Well …‘
‘I’m sorry about that little snit I was in,’ he said quickly. ‘You know I didn’t mean anything by it, don’t you?’
Molly laughed. ‘Oh, Si, I do know. Let’s forget it. How have you been?’
‘Rather busy, thank you for asking.’
‘Good. Er, busy doing what? Your usual nocturnal activities?’
‘Not really, no,’ said Simon. ‘Listen, I have so much to tell you. Can we meet up somewhere?’
‘Not today. Daniel’s coming home in a minute for roast beef and Yorkshire pudding.’
‘I’ve never heard it called that before.’
Molly giggled. ‘How about tomorrow? Lunch at Delancey’s?’
‘I’ll be there at one o’clock sharp. Longing to see you!’
‘Dying to hear your news!’
When Simon put the phone down, he felt restored and happy. In just the right mood for his first glass of something.
Delancey’s was a favourite lunch spot of theirs, an unpretentious French bistro in Camden Town that was open all day, and they had spent many a long, lazy afternoon there. The waiter recognised Simon when he arrived just before one, and ushered him to his and Molly’s favourite corner table. When she arrived a few minutes later they flung their arms round each other and hugged. When they finally sat down, there were tears of pleasure in their eyes.
‘How blissful it is to see you,’ said Simon. ‘We must never, ever fall out again.’ He called to the waiter, ‘Champagne, please!’
‘I am so pleased to be home,’ said Molly, wiping her eyes with a napkin. ‘You’re looking so handsome!’
‘Are you glad the tour’s over?’
‘Oh, yes. It wasn’t my most memorable job, but I was missing Daniel, and missing you, of course.’
Simon’s smile became a little fixed at the mention of Daniel, but he thought it wise to refrain from saying anything catty so early in their reconciliation.
‘So tell me,’ continued Molly, ‘what’s the big news?’
Just then the waiter arrived with the champagne in an ice bucket, and Simon maintained an enigmatic silence until their glasses were full and the man had withdrawn.
‘To you!’ he said, raising his glass.
‘And to you, my dearest friend in the world!’ replied Molly.
‘Now then,’ began Simon, ‘take a look at this.’ He plopped something on her empty plate. It was a glossy leaflet advertising a fun-packed night at the Black Cap, a pub just north of Camden Town. The main photograph was of an extraordinary creature dressed in a black sequined power jacket with matching mini-skirt and turban. The makeup was extreme — glamour gone mad — huge black eyes sweeping up to the forehead and pouting lips encrusted with glitter. The words, in a jaunty pink font with stars dotted above and b
elow, read: ‘Live on Stage — the Drag Scene’s newest sensational discovery MISS GENITA L’WARTS! Friday night. Be there or be straight!’
Molly wondered why he wanted her to read this information. Then she looked again at the photo. ‘Oh, my Lord!’ she shrieked, with surprised amusement. ‘Simon! What have you done? Is that you? You are Miss Genita L’Warts?’
‘At your service, bitch.’
‘Oh. My. God!’ Molly screamed again.
‘It’s all happened rather quickly.’
‘I’ll say. You were swigging the whisky and pursuing a happily married man the last time we spoke. Suddenly you’re a cock in a frock with the career prospects of a young Danny La Rue. What happened?’
‘Well, you see,’ said Simon, lowering his voice as if someone might overhear, ‘high as a kite I signed up for the amateur drag night at the Black Cap. Just for a laugh. The next day I’d forgotten all about it, but they phoned and told me I was to turn up the following Thursday and I had a five-minute slot. I was sober then and something about the challenge appealed to me. Suddenly I was possessed by a dark, daring and, if I say so myself, hilarious spirit.’
‘Oh, Simon! Whatever happened next?’ exclaimed Molly.
‘Well, my dear, Thursday dawned and Genita was feeling supremely confident. I strode out on to that stage and I fucking slayed them!’
‘Good for you. What did you do exactly?’
Simon could see that Molly was struggling to understand his extraordinary news. He had never expressed any interest in performing before: Molly had always been the star turn and perhaps he had detected just a teaspoonful of chagrin in her tone. ‘Well, that’s just the thing. I haven’t the faintest idea. She just babbles away. It’s almost as if I talk in many tongues.’
‘Do you sing?’ asked Molly, and took a gulp of champagne.
‘No, don’t worry. Not yet, anyway.’
‘I’m not worried, Simon, just asking.’