Sorting Out Billy

by Jo Brand

  Flower and Sarah examined her face to see if she was taking the piss.

  She wasn’t.

  ‘Right, I suppose we’d better make a move,’ said Sarah. ‘Shall we go home and get ready for this gig then?’ She felt really weird about seeing her mum after so long.

  Martha was feeling regretful that she couldn’t spend the evening with Sarah and Flower as they used to do in the old days and, as they prepared to part on the other side of the river and go their separate ways, she got a taste of the way that her life would change now she had a child. The flexibility she once took for granted would be eroded the more she became committed to John and possibly to Greasy Ted.

  She thought briefly about leaving John with Junior’s mum next door and having one last night out with her two best friends but, strangely, found she didn’t want to. She had lived the life that she wanted to live, and was ready now to settle down. She had travelled geographically, sexually and emotionally through a life full of craziness, melodrama and really good friends and laughs, and that was important to her. So when Flower and Sarah looked at her with concern, she genuinely meant it when she said, ‘Look, Flower and Sarah, you go. Have a bloody good night out and have a laugh. I’ll be quite happy at home in front of the telly or a book. In fact, to be honest with you, I can’t wait to lie down in the flat and not have to be constantly wondering what I’m going to wear, where I’m going to go, am I going to meet someone, have I got decent enough pants on, does my breath smell, should I have had a bath and am I ever going to meet someone who isn’t a complete fucking tosser who pisses off after three months or treats me like shit.’

  ‘So Ted’s the one, is he?’ said Sarah, aghast. She thought having an ugly boyfriend was like having herpes — you never mentioned it to anyone in company but secretly people knew, discussed it and felt very sorry for you.

  As Flower and Sarah headed home, Flower realised how worried she was about the gig at the Comedy Store and also about the Maidstone gig tonight As she looked through her list of the new jokes she was going to try out, in her and Charlie’s room, she wondered why she was feeling so edgy. She had an upset stomach which was never the best condition to have when you are doing a gig because the facilities in comedy clubs are not of the highest calibre, and worrying that you will shit yourself doesn’t sit very well with the fact that you are metaphorically shitting yourself.

  Sarah was perched on the rough old sofa in the sitting room thinking about Billy, from whom she hadn’t heard since leaving the flat. Seven days had passed, and although she knew objectively that he was a violent man and that his violence was exclusively directed at her, the feelings of revulsion and fear had been diffused to such an extent that she missed him and even fancied having sex with him. She decided not to tell Flower this, because she knew how her friend would react with one of her lectures. It was all very well for Flower, thought Sarah, having a nice uncomplicated relationship with someone like Charlie, much harder for her, being in love with a man who was flawed.

  ‘Are you ready?’ said Flower, coming into the room with an air of doom and irritation.

  ‘Yes,’ said Sarah, sensing Flower’s mood and wishing she felt jolly enough to uplift her, but having spent twenty minutes working herself up to the belief that she was still madly in love with Billy and that no one else would do, she didn’t feel minded to be Flower’s comforter.

  ‘We’ll get the train, shall we?’ said Flower.

  ‘OK,’ said Sarah, feeling unreasonably pissed off that someone wasn’t there to drive them and wishing she could just phone Billy and ask him. ‘How will we get back?’ she asked rather sulkily.

  ‘Oh, we’ll get a lift from one of the acts,’ said Flower. ‘There’s always someone with a car who can sort us out.’

  Sarah couldn’t think of anything worse than coming back from a gig with a carful of wanky, arrogant comedians all talking rubbish and trying to outdo each other. Sarah didn’t come from the school of women who love nothing better than being close to comedians and find them clever, charming and attractive. On the whole she thought they were knobheads who were full of themselves and tended to be surrounded by sycophantic women who laughed and waved their heads around as though they had some sort of neurological condition that prevented them from keeping still. But she would make the effort for Flower, who she could see was struggling, and she would put Billy to the back of her mind until another day.

  The train journey to the show wasn’t the most pleasant or relaxing and, after running the gauntlet of some schoolboys at the station, hanging about shouting abuse at late-night travellers, Sarah and Flower spent a miserable hour staring out of the carriage window at what they could see of the countryside festering with commuter sprawl and much-abused grass. They stepped out at the station and headed, with the vague directions that Flower had gleaned from the promoter, towards the pub where the gig was being held.

  When they arrived Flower realised with a sinking heart that there was no separate area in which the stand-up comedy would be performed and that the show had taken over the public bar of a pub, thereby giving themselves a headache as far as holding off all the regulars who wanted to cling to the bar and bore the arse off the barmaid.

  Sarah looked at the pub and even she, pretty much a comedy virgin who had only been able to get to the odd gig Flower had done because Billy wanted to do other things with her like languish in the pub or go to football, could see potential disaster looming.

  Flower said to Sarah, ‘Will you be OK on your own if I go to the dressing-room?’

  ‘Oh yes, I’ll be fine,’ said Sarah. ‘I’ll get as near the front as I can and cheer my head off. Don’t worry it’ll be great.’

  ‘I hope so,’ said Flower, wishing that they had the third member of their threesome there to bolster her confidence and shout abuse at any potential hecklers.

  She made her way round the back to the makeshift dressing-room, a smallish box in which a couple of foldable chairs and a broken mirror on a ratchety table were the only concessions to showbusiness.

  In the room were Mal Fogarty, the compère, a local guy who worked at the abattoir and whose scary Northern wife Glenys wouldn’t let him go to comedy gigs very often, partly because it was ‘a load of fookin’ shite’ but mainly because she was frightened that he’d give up his fulltime job and end up earning a pittance and then fail, leaving them all on the dole. Tonight, however, because he was near home, his wife had sanctioned his regular compèring slot and she was secretly delighted with the seventy quid he brought home every week, proudly telling anyone at work who’d listen that her husband was a stand-up comic.

  Two other comics had travelled down from London, one of them called Terry Twat and the other, Jake Ashkenazy.

  Both were totally different in style, Terry Twat emphasising his speech impediment and falling over a lot, whereas Jake Ashkenazy had a rather serious and clever political act which he feared would not be best suited to the good burghers of Maidstone. Unfortunately, it hadn’t been best suited to the good burghers of anywhere — apart from a political benefit he had done to a group of seriously committed activists who had all but carried him out on their shoulders whilst wetting themselves with joy after his twenty-minute exposition on the recent troubles in the Middle East.

  Flower had met Terry Twat, real name Joe Evans, on a number of occasions and always found him to be a nice bloke who was good fun, whereas Jake was rather distant and somewhat superior, a trait displayed by many left-wing comics whose socialist credentials don’t quite extend to treating their fellow man with much respect. Jake was incredibly posh, which seemed strange to Flower, as he had eschewed all that to live on an estate in North London, and although a big part of her admired him for this, she also thought it made him a wanker as well. It was interesting to see him in a room with a real member of the working-class like Mal because Jake didn’t have a lot to say to him apart from seeming embarrassed to be in his company. Terry Twat chatted away easily and asked Flower how
her comedy life was going.

  ‘Not too bad,’ said Flower, her stomach churning at the prospect of the night’s proceedings. ‘I’ve got my first gig tomorrow at the Comedy Store, but I’ve had this odd heckler wandering around at my gigs and just fucking things up for me.’

  ‘What, like a stalker?’ said Jake.

  ‘I wouldn’t quite say that,’ said Flower, ‘but he’s appeared more times than I feel comfortable with.’

  ‘I’m surprised Charlie’s not here tonight,’ said Terry. ‘I would have thought he’d want to protect you.’

  ‘He’s in prison,’ said Flower, ‘for causing some trouble at a demo.’

  Jake Ashkenazy visibly perked up. ‘Oh, do tell me he hit a fucking fascist, darling girl,’ he said.

  ‘No, he was caught smoking a joint,’ said Flower. ‘I’m sure they’ll let him out soon.’

  ‘Wow,’ said Jake. ‘Was he at the demo earlier today?’

  ‘Yes,’ said Flower. ‘So was I.’

  ‘Fucking great, wasn’t it?’ said Jake. ‘We showed those pigs a thing or two. I got a couple of digs in at them.’

  ‘You twatted a copper?’ said Mal.

  Jake noticed that the muscles on Mal’s neck were slightly strained and his face had taken on a bull-like quality that wasn’t there before he mentioned hitting a policeman. He backtracked and laughed in an embarrassed fashion.

  ‘Not really hit him, man,’ he said. ‘Shouted at him — you know.’

  ‘Well, I hope you didn’t hit a copper, because I might have to hit you,’ said Mal.

  Jake quivered and looked at the floor. Mal winked at Flower. The landlord stuck his head round the door. ‘I think we’re ready, mate,’ he told Mal. ‘The natives are getting restless.’

  ‘Right you are,’ said Mal.

  It had been decided that Jake would go on first, Flower in the middle and Terry Twat at the end to balance the show properly. Flower wished she could go on first, so there was a good excuse for dying on her arse and she could get home and see whether they’d let Charlie out.

  Jake went on first and his heart sank as he saw he was faced with a whole cohort of the working classes, many red-faced blokes on their way home from Saturday shiftwork who had stopped in for a pint and were hoping for a lot of sexism, a touch of racism and plenty of filth served up for their delectation; Jake Ashkenazy was certainly not what they wanted.

  ‘Hello brothers,’ he began.

  ‘I’m not your fucking brother, you cunt,’ said one of the red-faced drinkers. ‘I wouldn’t have a brother who sounded like he’d been born with a silver spoon in his gob. Gonna tell us what’s wrong with our lives and how you’re gonna put it all right for us, are you?’

  That was exactly what Jake had been intending to do. He wondered whether to persevere and desperately hoped a lot of knob jokes would come to mind. Unfortunately they didn’t and after a brief struggle, Jake Ashkenazy was strangled at the birth of his act and resolved immediately to do a tour of arts centres in the hope that he would only encounter the middle classes who loved being told they were working class and wouldn’t dream of aiming the ‘C’ word at him.

  Jake slunk back into the dressing-room as the red-faced drinkers claimed their first victim. They had left Mal Fogarty well alone because they liked him and he was one of their own, but these posh wankers from London were a different matter.

  Sarah had been a bemused spectator when all this was going on and felt sorry for Jake Ashkenazy because he was good-looking, although of the few minutes he actually had managed to perform before he left the stage, not a word had she understood. Mal Fogarty, on the other hand, she immediately warmed to because he reminded her of the men who had surrounded her mother while she was growing up. Her mother had been the only negative part of the equation, being grasping, spiteful and unfriendly to a series of men who loved her to distraction for her wild looks and quick humour, something that sadly, Sarah hadn’t inherited.

  She was just thinking what a pain in the arse her mother was when there was a tap on her shoulder.

  ‘Long time no see, Sez! How you doing, gel?’ followed by an unmistakable high-pitched laugh.

  ‘Mum, It’s great to see you,’ said Sarah, wondering if it was.

  ‘Well, I couldn’t pass up the chance to see you and your big-nosed hippy friend, could I?’ said Connie McBride. ‘And hey presto, here you are. Besides, I quite fancy the MC.’

  ‘Mum,’ said Sarah wearily, ‘he’s married. Leave him alone, will you.’

  ‘All’s fair in love and war, Sez,’ replied Connie sagely.

  ‘Can I get you a drink, love? Anyway I’m bored shitless with Philip — he’s getting right on my tits.’

  Philip was Connie’s long-term and longsuffering boyfriend, a mild-mannered, slightly hirsute bank manager in his early sixties who couldn’t believe his luck when Connie had dragged him into her bed and done things he had never been allowed to even think about with his wife.

  ‘How’s that gorgeous Billy?’ demanded Connie, who had heard about him from her daughter during one of their rare phone conversations. Sarah wasn’t sure whether to tell her mother what had happened for fear she might jump on a train to South London and try to bed him, as she had always flirted relentlessly with any of Sarah’s boyfriends whenever they had come down to see her.

  Sarah asked her mother for a vodka and tonic and Connie went to the bit of the bar where Mal was standing and leaned against him as much as she could without becoming a surrogate Siamese twin. The landlord had called a bar break in between each act as he thought it would drive the normal punters mad if they had to wait until a proper interval. Connie had been in the pub for some time, apparently, and had managed to get herself quite pissed.

  ‘When’s your mate on?’ she enquired genially, leaving Sarah to hope that when Flower came on, Connie wouldn’t feel the need to converse with her.

  ‘She’s on now,’ said Sarah, as Mal introduced Flower who had been shaking just behind the thin curtain that separated them, the stars, from the riff-raff.

  Flower walked up to the microphone. ‘Good evening,’ she said. ‘I was at the demo up in the City today. Hit a few crusties, caused a bit of mayhem.’

  The audience looked bemused.

  ‘Still,’ said Flower, ‘it’s a great life being a fucking copper.’

  Big laugh.

  ‘Sarah never told me you was a copper,’ came a voice from the front row where Connie had deposited herself to gaze adoringly upon the portly physique of Mal.

  ‘Bloody hell,’ said Flower, ‘I didn’t realise that Camilla Parker Bowles moonlighted as a stripper in Maidstone.’

  There was a huge roar of laughter from the crowd. Flower felt exhilarated and really mean all in one go.

  ‘Fuck off,’ said Connie, rather hurt.

  ‘I hope you don’t use that sort of language round Highgrove,’ said Flower.

  The crowd loved this and continued to play along as Flower got stuck into Connie, feeling rather guilty about her being Sarah’s mum but convincing herself it was fair because Connie had started it.

  It was going very well when suddenly a familiar voice cut through the laughter.

  ‘What are you being so fucking nosy for?’ said the voice. ‘I suppose with that conk you can’t avoid it.’

  It was at this point that Flower learned that even though you may have the love of an entire audience floating around you like honey, they are never a guaranteed support and a split second can turn them into your greatest enemy.

  The crowd laughed loud and long at this intervention and Flower froze; all the joie de vivre she had garnered bantering with Connie flew away and she was struck dumb. She prepared for battle, but it didn’t come. Just the one heckle and whoever he was melted back into the audience.

  Flower stayed and struggled on for long enough to earn her money and then she came off. ‘Sorry, Connie,’ she said to Sarah’s mum.

  ‘Soyoushouldbe,’ said Connie, who by now was running
every other word together.

  ‘Well, you started it,’ said Flower.

  ‘No, I fucking didn’t,’ Connie objected.

  ‘You did,’ said Flower.

  ‘Look, you silly little cow,’ said Connie, ‘you were crap and you know it and if I hadn’t been there helping you out you would have had a terrible time.’

  ‘Don’t make me laugh,’ said Flower.

  ‘You certainly didn’t make me laugh,’ retorted Connie, quite cleverly for one so drunk.

  At this point they turned to Sarah, who had spent the evening so far blissfully unaware of the proceedings and just thinking about Billy.

  ‘Oh, I don’t fucking know,’ she said and walked out.

  Once outside the pub and having walked fast for five minutes, Sarah found herself on a semi-rural badly lit road and in that sort of reckless bolshy mood you get when you’ve just split with someone, which allows you to walk home alone through graveyards, swear at policemen or approach strangers and speak to them in a very aggressive way. She decided to head for town and was nearly within range of some dull orange light when a hand came from behind and clamped itself round her throat.

  Flower was a bit worried when Sarah didn’t reappear that night but just presumed that she had ended up going back to Connie’s to kip down. Not having Connie’s number she didn’t bother to phone her; Sarah was bound to turn up at some point during the next day.

  Sarah eventually phoned late Sunday morning.

  ‘Hi Flower, it’s me,’ she said with a strange strangled cheerfulness.

  ‘Down at your mum’s?’ said Flower.

  Sarah didn’t answer this question.

  ‘I’m not coming back to yours,’ she said. ‘But I’m really grateful for everything.’

  ‘Staying at Connie’s for a bit?’ said Flower. ‘Are you sure that’s wise?’

  There was a long silence.

  ‘I’m back with Billy,’ said Sarah.

  ‘Fuck, shit, wank, what did you do that for?’ said Flower, unable to pretend she was pleased.