All She Wants

by Jonathan Harvey

  ‘What do you want to be when you grow up, kid?’ Nona asked.

  ‘Like you,’ he bleated. And again I felt sick. He didn’t want to be her. He wanted to be Madonna in her ‘True Blue’ outfits. But Nona nodded as if it was perfectly normal.

  ‘Well, kid. If I can offer you one piece of advice, it’s this.’

  I glanced over at Fat Bloke. He was seething with jealousy. Nona Newman had obviously never kissed him or given him advice. Mum was almost crying by now.

  ‘What, Nona?’ asked Our Joey. Blimey, he was on first-name terms with her now.

  ‘That’s not her real name!’ barked Fat Bloke. ‘That’s her character’s name. Her real name’s Yvonne Carsgrove, God! GET IT RIGHT!’

  Mum looked like she might punch him and said, ‘All right, Tubby love. Wind your neck in!’

  Nona clasped Our Joey’s hand so tight I could see the colour draining out of her knuckles, then she offered her words of wisdom.

  ‘Reach for the stars, kid. But remember, be nice to the people you meet on the way up, coz you only meet the same people on the way back down. OK?’

  Our Joey nodded, though I could tell he had no idea what she was on about. Mum was nodding her head vehemently, as if she’d been entrusted with the meaning of life itself. I saw her lips move as she mouthed the words back to herself, in case she was asked to repeat it at a later date.

  And then Nona’s hand slipped away from Our Joey’s and disappeared back into the car. As the colour returned to Our Joey’s hand, so the window silently slid closed and the car started up again. Nona Newman/Yvonne Carsgrove drove through the gates into Crystal TV and Our Joey stood on the pavement gloating like the cat who’d got the cream.

  We hung around for another hour. A few cars came and went, but no one else stopped to say hello and Fat Bloke was convinced they were ‘only extras’ – whatever that meant – then when it started to rain Mum decided it was time to go home. As we dragged our deckchairs to the bus stop Mum kept wittering on about what a special day it had been and how lovely Nona Newman was. Our Joey kept his mouth shut, which was almost more irritating than if he’d not shut up about his ‘special moment’. I thought he was still gloating until he said, ‘Nona Newman’s breath smells of poo.’

  ‘Joey!’ snapped Mum.

  ‘What?’

  ‘That’s very unbecoming!’

  ‘Why? I never said shite!’

  ‘JOEY!’

  We carried on walking. God the deckchairs were heavy.

  ‘Nona Newman was lovely to you then and that’s how you repay her? Joey McGee I am disappointed in you. Very disappointed in you. You had to go and spoil an otherwise perfect day.’

  As we waited at the bus stop, Mum took out a cigarette and lit it up. Again the dragon nose. She saw me staring and smiled. I smiled back.

  ‘Mum?’

  ‘What?’

  ‘When I grow up,’ I said, ‘I’m gonna be an actress. And I’m gonna be in Acacia Avenue.’

  Mum chuckled, letting the ciggie hang out of the corner of her mouth as she looked in her handbag for her little compact mirror. She got it out and checked her face.

  ‘You daft sod,’ she said, but she said it fondly.

  I looked out at the empty street. There was nothing to be seen for miles but factory gates and boarded-up buildings. And I thought, Why not? It was only three bus stops away. Why shouldn’t I? The teachers at school were always asking us what we wanted to be when we grew up. Everyone else in my class used to say they wanted to work at the ciggie factory like their mams and dads, but I was going to be different. From now on I’d say I was going to be like Nona Newman and be an actress in Acacia Avenue. What was so weird about that?

  And maybe, if I wished for it hard enough, one day it would actually come true.

  PART ONE

  ONE

  2012

  Keep it all in, Jodie. Keep it all in. Deep breaths, you’re going to be fine. Just get through this and then the rest of your life can begin.

  I opened my eyes. I’d arrived.

  The noise from the screaming fans outside the Royal Albert Hall was so high-pitched I thought my eardrums might explode. Thank God I wasn’t epileptic or the constant flash of paparazzi bulbs would surely have sparked a seizure. I squinted my way through the melee, convinced that every picture being taken would show me blinded by the glare, a hostage seeing daylight for the first time. It had only just stopped bucketing it down, so with every step my heels dug further and further into the squidgy red carpet that felt like it was actually sucking me in. What a great look. Jeez. What was I doing? Pressing grapes or arriving at the National Soap Awards? Hands punched forwards from the barriers on either side of the carpet, waving scraps of paper, autograph books, pens and camera phones. It would have been quite scary if I wasn’t so dazed.

  ‘Jodie! Jodie! Over here, Jodie!’

  I turned towards the voice and stopped side on to the cameraman, maintaining the fixed smile I’d had on my face since stepping out of the limo.

  ‘You look gorgeous, Jodie!’ someone screamed.

  And so would you, I thought, if you’d spent three hours in a hotel room being primped, plucked and backcombed to within an inch of your life. I’d had little say over my look, Crystal TV provided the hair and make-up artists and some top designers had donated the dress and jewellery for free publicity. They’d delivered a van load of stuff to the hotel, and me and my fellow cast mates had fought over who’d wear what. I’m not saying blood was drawn, but a couple of the girls had had to lie down with steaks on their eyes for half an hour afterwards.

  Our producer Eva had been adamant that I should look as unlike my character Sister Agatha as possible. And as Sister Agatha was a nun I’d ended up wearing what can best be described as a dwarf’s tinfoil hankie with gladiatorally laced high heels. Setting off the look was a diamond-encrusted headband with matching bracelet. I looked like an anaemic Tina Turner entering the Thunderdome.

  ‘We love you, Sister Aggie!’ someone screamed.

  ‘Bless you, my child!’ I giggled, before being herded inside by an over-enthusiastic runner who got her clipboard caught in my bracelet.

  ‘Sorry, Sister.’

  Blimey. Even when I was wearing little more than tit tape, people still thought I was a nun. I looked again and saw that it wasn’t a runner but our press officer, Ming.

  (Ming rhymed with Sting. Yes, I’d made that mistake, too. She was Chinese, but sounded like Cilla Black.)

  ‘Ming! How many times? I’m not a nun. I’m an actress who plays a nun,’ I said as she did a fetching ‘disentangling a clipboard from a bracelet’ dance I’d not seen before and wasn’t likely to ever see again.

  ‘Oh gerrover yourself, Jodie, am only pullinya leg. Now there’s looooadsa press hoove gorra lorra questions for you. Come on chuck. And DON’T mention the war. Please.’

  (OK, so I’m exaggerating her voice, but she was totally annoying.)

  OK. The war. I wasn’t to mention what I’d done only this morning. And if anyone did ask I was to answer with a polite, ‘Not now, sorry . . .’

  ‘I’m warning you, Jozie,’ Ming said as she thrust me forward, ‘you’ve shown us up enough these past twenny-four hours.’

  Anyway. I wasn’t going to let someone as energy sucking as miserable Ming spoil my fun tonight. I was determined this was going to be the best night of my life. And that included the night I’d found back-to-back reruns of Hart to Hart on some cable channel and a twenty pound note down the back of the settee.

  I, Jodie McGee, had been nominated for Best Actress at the National bloody Soap Awards. ARGH!

  It was pandemonium in the foyer. Ming pushed me through a cattle market of emaciated babes in too much make-up and too little clothing and identikit muscled hunks bursting out of their dinner jackets. God I wanted a drink. I had promised myself I wouldn’t touch a drop till after my award was announced. I was 90 per cent sure I wouldn’t get it and that heifer from EastEnders would,
but I thought I’d better steer clear of the sauce just in case.

  Ming steered me into a side room, which had a bank of besuited and be-ballgowned radio and TV journos penned in behind a cordon, cameras and microphones at the ready.

  ‘Remember,’ Ming whispered in my ear, ‘there’s no competition between us, Corrie and EastEnders. There’s a lorra lovintharoom.’

  I rolled my eyes, stepped into the pen and beamed at the gurning simpleton from On The Sofa with Colin and Carol, who’d decided to dress as a big bar of pink soap for the occasion.

  ‘Everybody, look, it’s Jodie McGee who plays Sister Agatha in Acacia Avenue!’ She beamed into the camera, then turned to me with all the fluidity and grace of the tin man. ‘So, Jodie, can I just say you look amazing.’

  I fluttered my eyelashes and shot a ‘What, these old rags?’ grimace to camera.

  ‘Thanks . . .’ But I couldn’t remember her name. I couldn’t say Gurning Simpleton, so I just gurned back at her and said it again: ‘Thanks,’ which made it sound like I was being uber sincere. Back of the net!

  ‘So, Jodie. Great piece on Brunch With Bronwen this morning. You’ve had a lot of hits on YouTube already. Have you got the police involved yet?’

  ‘No comment. Sorry.’

  She could see it would be like getting blood out of a stone, so . . .

  ‘So, Jodie. Who’s going to win Best Actress?’

  ‘Well’ – Damn, if only I could remember her name – ‘it’s a really tough year and a really tough category, but I thought Colette Court was to die for in those wonderful rape scenes.’

  Oh God. Did I really say that? Gurning Simpleton was poking me with her mic again.

  ‘So the rivalry between Corrie, EastEnders and Acacia Avenue. That’s just something that’s made up by the press?’

  I smiled my best Sister Agatha beatific smile and suddenly remembered the interviewer’s name.

  ‘Stephanie. Colette Court and I really are best buddies.’

  The words almost choked me. I was desperate to add, Even if she does sound like a block of flats. I clocked Gurning Simpleton frowning and miming a hacking movement at her throat.

  ‘OK, can we re-record that?’ she said to her cameraman, then looked to me. ‘My name’s Penny?’

  Suitably humbled, or at least pretending to be, we continued.

  Twenty minutes later I was in the bar.

  ‘It’s not going your way. I know it’s not going your way. Don’t ask how I know.’ Eva Hart the producer of Acacia Avenue (AKA my boss) took a big swig of her champagne and my balloon of pride was burst. She’d poked it with a pin, and now she was poking me with a finger. What was it with all the poking tonight?

  ‘OK, you dragged it out of me. Lisa in the office’s boyfriend knows someone who knows someone who actually does thingy.’ She snapped her fingers, searching for the word. ‘ENGRAVES!’ she screamed. ‘He engraves . . . the awards. He’s an engraver, he does ENGRAVING. And she swears blind he had to ask if there was one or two ‘L’s in Colette. What do you think of THAT?’

  Eva had a very annoying habit of shouting words she wanted to emphasize. I shrugged coyly.

  ‘She was really good at getting raped.’

  Eva practically spat out her champagne.

  ‘BOLLOCKS! She was just lit well.’ I didn’t dare disagree. This was my boss after all. She leaned in conspiratorially.

  ‘Anyway, fuck Colette Court, I’ve got big plans for you, Jodie. Big, big plans. The writers heart you. They do, they HEART you. And they have got VERY big plans for Sister Agatha.’

  ‘Ooh that sounds fun. Like what?’

  Eva leaned in even further. ‘I suppose you’ve heard there’s a serial killer hitting the Avenue?’

  I had. It was all we’d discussed in the green room for weeks. Rumours were spreading like wildfire about who’d be killed off. Every day a cast member would come in to work and be convinced they’d seen an early draft of a script in which they were for the chop, or someone else was for the chop. Maybe if I won the award tonight I’d be saved the chop.

  ‘Well, people have been talking.’

  Eva’s eyes narrowed.

  ‘Shit! Did anyone from EastEnders hear?’ She looked around furtively as she raised her champagne flute to her lips. ‘Who told you we were planning a serial-killer story? Who’s leaking stuff to the actors? Oh, this won’t do, this WON’T do.’

  ‘No, Eva, I didn’t know for—’

  ‘I can’t possibly tell you who’s going to be the killer or who’s going to be KILLED.’

  ‘Eva, no one’s leaking stories.’

  Eva rearranged the collar on her electric-blue Bacofoil two-piece.

  ‘Suffice it to say I want you in my office tomorrow at TEN,’ Eva continued.

  ‘Eva. About this morning. When I was on Brunch With Bronwen. I—’

  ‘Don’t piss on my chips, Jodie! We’ll discuss it tomorrow at TEN.’

  Ten? Blimey, I’d better not have a hangover and oversleep, I thought. Getting back to Liverpool for ten meant getting a train at some ungodly hour. Was it even worth going to bed?

  ‘We’re gonna make sure Sister Agatha keeps on growing and stays right at the heart of the show as an FCC.’

  ‘FCC?’

  ‘Front Cover Character. I want you on all of them, darling, ALL of them.’

  ‘OK, Eva. Great.’

  But how would I be at the centre of the show? Were they going to make me the serial killer? Or have me bumped off by said killer? I started to shake with nerves. Just then Eva’s handbag vibrated and she yanked out her phone. She jabbed it a couple of times, then threw her head back and guffawed.

  ‘Look at that. Look at THAT.’ She shoved her phone in front of my nose. ‘Aren’t my kids ADORABLE?’

  I really wanted to push her away from me and say, ‘Actually, can I just have five minutes? I’ve been really looking forward to tonight. It’s a really big deal for me to be nominated for this award and yet you’ve just told me in no uncertain terms that I haven’t won it. I just need five minutes to process that. Plus you’re confusing me with your serial killer musings . . .’

  But instead I was looking at an image on her phone of three toddlers holding up a sign saying, ‘We Miss You, Mummy’. They weren’t adorable, even if Eva had signed them up with a kiddies modelling agency, but then I wasn’t really the maternal sort. I got into trouble last year when a former cast member paraded her new baby up and down Acacia Avenue to adoring wails from present cast members about how cute and angelic-looking he was. I spoke before I thought and said, ‘Ooh, isn’t she fat?’, which had triggered the former cast member to burst into tears and run to the green room, clutching her baby to her bosom.

  On the back of that I guessed honesty wasn’t the best policy with my boss. Eva’s kids were very important to her. I knew every mother would say the same about their kids, but Eva had adopted hers from Lithuania. It had been all over the papers at the time because Eva was in her early sixties, so her biological clock had ticked itself out decades earlier and no British adoption agency would touch her with a very long bargepole. Plus she was single, all of which meant she was the devil incarnate as far the press was concerned. Eva was, in her own words, ‘a ball-busting media bitch who took no prisoners,’ so I heard myself saying, ‘God, Eva, I want your kids.’

  ‘You can have them. An episode fee each. Only KIDDING!’

  And she poked me again. I’d been Eva’d.

  ‘I think you’ve done something really amazing there, Eva.’ I smiled and she smiled back.

  ‘I’ve got it all, Jodie. Got it all. And I just wanna share it with someone, you know?’

  She had lowered her voice and in that moment she sounded almost human. But then she saw someone more important than me and sprinted over to speak to them.

  Left alone in the melee, I looked across the room and saw none other than Colette Court sweep into the room in lots of mushroom-coloured tulle, a tiara perched on her jet black beehi
ve, looking like the queen of all she surveyed. And with that lazy eye she surveyed a lot. I smiled and when I thought she was looking over at me I raised my glass of orange to her, which is when I realized she wasn’t looking at me, she was looking at a tray of mini burgers, which were heading her way on the arm of a spotty-necked waiter. She appeared to snort the lot. One minute the tray was full, the next it was empty and Colette Court was chewing away like Ermintrude the cow in The Magic Roundabout. A voice cooed in my ear, ‘I know, babe. How does she stay so slim? She totes has an eating disorder.’

  I looked to see who it was. It was my best friend on the show, Trudy. She laughed her head off to show she was being sarcastic, then pecked me fondly on the cheek.

  ‘You look fabulous, babe.’

  ‘Thanks, Trude.’

  ‘Who cares what the papers say? I think you dress really well.’

  She cocked her head to one side and rubbed my arm.

  ‘Everyone’s saying you haven’t won, babe,’ and then she quickly added, ‘I’m just saying coz I’m your friend, babe. Don’t want you to be too disappointed if you don’t.’

  I gulped and realized I wanted to cry. I looked around the room. Was everyone laughing at me for coming this evening?

  I’d looked forward to this night for ages. I was going to be the first person to win Best Actress at the National Soap Awards and then go on to win an Oscar. Fat chance of that now.

  I know it sounds daft. But I once met a gypsy in Blackpool who told me that one day I would win an Oscar. Mum reckoned Our Joey had put her up to it, but I had an inkling Gypsy Donna Marie could see the future.

  ‘Anyway,’ added Trudy. ‘It’s the taking part that counts, babe.’

  I was starting to cry.

  ‘I have to go the toilet,’ I said.

  And I legged it.

  I sat on the loo for what felt like an eternity and quietly cried my eyes out. I went to text Stu, then realized I couldn’t. Not any more. Then I heard some rustling in the cubicle next to me and wondered if it was Colette Court from EastEnders chopping out a line of coke. Rumours abounded that she had a drug problem, though I found it hard to believe: she certainly didn’t have the figure of a drug addict. Not that it did her any harm, audiences loved her, presumably unthreatened by her ample shape. Just then I heard Eva’s voice.