All She Wants

by Jonathan Harvey

  The one thing I didn’t tell him was that Stuart had hit me. I described our relationship as fiery. Volatile. In my eyes this gave an impression of Burton/Taylor passion, or Italian-style shouting and gesticulating; the fights would be fun, and the making up afterwards even more so. But then neither of us was Italian, even if we were fond of takeaway pizza.

  I would be lying if I said I lived in a constant state of fear and anxiety about Stuart battering me. I didn’t. But I would be more of a liar if I said that everything between us was hunky-dory. Following the ‘kitchen incident’ I’d had a fat lip for a week. I’d had to phone in sick to work and claimed to have a virus. Fortunately they believed me and didn’t ask to see a doctor’s note. And in that week, Stuart was the most delightful he’d ever been. After the shock of the punch I had lain in bed, or on the sofa, distracting myself with daytime telly while he waited on me hand and foot, tears never far from his eyes, remorse writ large on his face. If he apologized once, he apologized a million times, and I had to say part of me enjoyed not only this, but the knowledge that I could pretty much do or say anything and he would agree and jump to it. I could do no wrong. During that period I thought maybe he was the guy for me, a good choice for a life partner. I began making excuses for him. He had been drunk. He had been jealous. He’d not been thinking straight. He had asked me not to get drunk and I had, and because I was drunk I’d put myself in a vulnerable position while there were cameras around. In the clear light of sobriety he believed I wasn’t having an affair with Ari. He told me he’d never doubt me again, he’d always check the facts with me first instead of jumping to insane conclusions. And of course I believed him. I wanted to believe him. I had to believe him. Because I didn’t want our time together to have been wasted. I knew he cared for me. He’d taken me in when I had nothing. He’d uprooted himself to a city he wasn’t particularly fond of. He’d made so many sacrifices for me, what had I done for him? We entered a golden age in our relationship. I even thought that maybe the punch had been a good thing. Not pleasant to go through, but at least it had made us both stop and think. It was a low point we could move on from; neither of us wanted to sink to that level again. And he’d not hit me since. See? Life wasn’t always like it was on the TV or in films, where if the guy hits you he’s always going to do it again. Human beings do have the ability to change, and Stu had.

  But I would also be lying if I didn’t admit that after he hit me, a little bit of my love for him died. A troubled childhood was no excuse in my book, that fear that I would leave him, just as his mother had, wasn’t a reason to lash out. I veered between loving him and feeling indifferent about him.

  The thing I disliked most was how I’d gradually become a trouble avoider. I stopped going to showbiz parties, not wanting to have my behaviour misconstrued or misrepresented by a tabloid. I didn’t talk too much about guys at work, in case Stuart thought I had a crush on any of them. I didn’t stay out longer than necessary whenever I left the flat in order to avoid any ‘Where have you been?’ discussions. I was very careful about what I said in interviews in case it upset him. I turned down most public appearances I was offered through work, and there were a lot: would I go on Saturday Kitchen? Would I open a new pound shop? Would I do a PA at a nightclub? I no longer spoke to Hayls or Debs. I had been toying with forgiving them and making contact again, but Stuart insisted that would make me a loser and that they didn’t deserve my friendship and generosity – they were users.

  The other bit of trouble to avoid was Stu when he was drunk. I now knew the triggers for his angry behaviour. Although he hadn’t hit me again, he still got arsey after a big night out and my reaction to his beefed-up belligerence was to take myself to bed and ignore him. If I stayed up and disagreed with something he said, a row would ensue. This happened less if he’d eaten before drinking, so tonight at least I could feel reasonably relaxed as he had brought a pizza home to gorge on before heading out to sink an ocean of booze.

  ‘I’ve had untold texts about that interview,’ Stu said through a mouthful of Sloppy Giuseppe. ‘Got the piss taken big style at work.’

  ‘I bet you did,’ I said, though I could see just how excited he was by his brief taste of fame. ‘Best wear a balaclava when you go out. Don’t want people recognizing you now you’re a huge star.’

  He chuckled and wiped some stray tomato sauce from his chin.

  ‘Fuck that, babes. I’m gonna wear the exact same outfit I had on in the pictures. Take the magazine with me, leave it open on a few tables.’ Then he added dramatically, ‘Don’t you know who I am?’

  We both chuckled, but I wasn’t thinking about his night out. I was thinking, If only you knew. If only you knew I spent my evenings chatting to some random bloke online. If only you knew that we had cyber sex last night.

  Some people might say that a man who hits a woman is weak. Some might say it gives him power. Although the dust had settled on that hateful incident many moons ago, I found myself relishing the power that having a secret from him gave me. And he was never going to find out.

  Once he’d disappeared for the evening I returned to my iPad and checked who was available online to chat to. Result. He was there. I knew he would be. I clicked on his name and a little white box appeared in the bottom right-hand corner of my screen. I took a deep breath, wriggled my fingers like an athlete preparing for some exercise and wrote, ‘Matthew? Are you there?

  Seconds later I got a reply: ‘Hello gorgeous. How’s you?’

  TWENTY-SIX

  Mandy: Jodie. It is nearly three years that I have had your necklace now.

  Jodie: Sorry, Mand. Can you post it to me?

  Mandy: No. Pop round next time your down and you can sign some AA stuff I’ve got for my mum. Deal? (You owe me.)

  Jodie: Cool. Not sure when down next but defo will. XXX

  I pressed send and heard the landline ring. I snatched it up.

  ‘Hiya, Jodie love!’

  ‘Hiya, Mum!’

  Golly our voices were perky today. But then she lowered hers dramatically and purred, ‘How’s it all going then?’ with her best Denise Robertson faux concern that, had it come from anyone else’s lips, would have elicited a sharp ‘Mind your own bloody business.’ But this was my mum, so I replied, ‘Yeah, not bad thanks.’

  ‘Oh good. Good.’ (Though she elongated the second good so it sounded more like Gooooooooood.) I heard the scratch of her ciggie lighter and realized we were in for a marathon gab. ‘Only me and your dad were wondering, you know.’

  ‘No, I’m fine, yeah.’

  Kirsty MacColl was on the stereo, singing a song about waving or drowning. The irony was not lost on me as I zapped her off with the remote.

  ‘Oh that’s great. No that is, that’s really great.’

  She was slowing her words down with an insincerity that made me think she wasn’t really concentrating on what she was saying, but carefully planning where to go next.

  ‘Only me and your dad were just. I dunno. A little concerned, that’s all.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Oh, no reason.’

  I let the words hang in the air for a second or two, like the halos of smoke that were no doubt hanging above her head.

  ‘But there must be some reason. You don’t go all concerned for no apparent reason.’

  ‘Well, it’s a parent’s job to worry, you know.’ And she added one of those patronizing chuckles that people with kids do when they really want to say, You know nothing. You are childless. I am omniscient. Screw you (type of thing). And which also often infer, when it’s your mother who’s saying it, One day you will thank me for providing you with a bedroom with a single bed and Spice Girl posters and umpteen school uniforms that made you look like a Weeble. One day you will know the pain of childbirth. It’s like shitting a basketball. It was one of my least favourite laughs.

  ‘I just worry, you know?’ she continued.

  ‘Yes, I do know. When I said I was moving next door to the Mersey, you
told me you wanted me to buy a boat, in case it flooded.’

  ‘I didn’t say a boat, Jodie.’

  ‘You did.’

  ‘I said a dinghy, there’s a difference.’

  ‘A dinghy is a boat.’

  ‘Boat suggests something like the Marie Celeste. I was thinking more along the lines of something plastic you could keep in your bottom drawer.’

  ‘What, like a vibrator?’

  ‘Jodie, don’t be coarse.’

  ‘Sorry. Well anyway, I’m on the sixth floor of a block of flats. If the river does burst its banks I think I’ll be all right.’

  ‘Unless there’s a tsunami.’

  ‘Of course. Why didn’t I think of that? Forgive me. Unless there’s a tsunami.’

  ‘There’s no need to be sarcastic.’

  ‘I know. Liverpool is famed for two things: The Beatles and plentiful tsunamis.’

  ‘You might think what happened in Japan was funny, Jodie, but—’

  ‘I don’t!’

  ‘Your father showed me a clip on YouTube last night. A whole street disappearing. Flats collapsing. And on my life, Jodie, it was seven eleven all over again.’

  ‘Nine eleven.’

  ‘What’s seven eleven?’

  ‘It used to be my local shop in London.’

  ‘Where the guy short-changed me on that Vienetta?’

  ‘Yes, Mother. It ranks alongside the Great Train Robbery as one of the most heinous crimes of the century. Myra Hindley’s got nothing on Furqhan from the Seven Eleven.’

  She seemed to process this for a second, then continued, ‘You’re in a funny mood tonight, Jodie.’ It sounded like a leading statement. She was no longer a daytime telly agony aunt, but a full-blown psychotherapist with a practice in West Hampstead. Certificates on her wall, cat hair on her couch.

  ‘Mother. Why are you so worried?’

  ‘Well, the last the few times we’ve seen you . . .’ and her voice trailed off.

  ‘What?’

  ‘Well. You’ve just seemed a bit distant, that’s all.’

  ‘Distant?’

  ‘It means far away.’

  ‘Oh right, I thought it meant something else.’

  ‘Well, you’ve seemed a bit quiet, withdrawn. Like you were treading on eggshells with your Stuart. I could be wrong.’

  ‘You are wrong, actually. Everything’s fine.’

  ‘And then, of course, you’ve cancelled the last few Sundays. Coming here for your dinner. You used to do that all the time at one point, and now . . .’

  Her voice trailed off again sadly.

  ‘We’ve just been busy. We like to . . . mix things up a little anyway.’

  Truth be told, things had been a bit tense between me and Stuart recently. And they tended to get worse when people wanted to talk about my job. Stuart got completely overlooked. In the early days of my time on the show he’d not minded, in fact he’d enjoyed basking in the reflected glory of my newfound fame and was happy to take a back seat, it was like my ‘success’ was a sunlamp and he was happy to stick on some protective goggles, lie back and soak up the rays. But lately he seemed to find it a drag. And as Mum was still as obsessed with Acacia Avenue as ever, even going to Sandalan had become something of an obstacle course. OK, great, we got through taking our coats off without Mum rhapsodizing about my latest storyline. Result! Oh, hang on . . . Bollocks! She mentioned my latest TV Times cover while putting the kettle on . . . etc. When caught in those situations these days I grew more and more uneasy, always trying to involve Stuart in the conversation I was having, but increasingly people seemed to want a slice of me and nothing of him. I was the rocky road pie to his marzipan square. It was part of the reason I’d suggested he do the Hiya! magazine interview with me. So he felt a part of it all. I was amazed when he’d jumped at the chance.

  Mum was going on . . .

  ‘Of course, I’m not expecting you round here every Sunday for a roast but, well . . . We get so lonely, Jodie.’

  I sat down and actually heard violins start to play. That’s when I realized I’d sat on the remote control and the radio had come on playing some old Electric Light Orchestra song. I quickly switched it off.

  ‘Well, I’m sure we’ll be round soon.’

  ‘When?!’ She nearly bit my ear off.

  ‘I dunno.’

  ‘Shall we talk dates?’

  ‘I’m nowhere near the calendar.’

  ‘Only, what I was thinking was, Val and Vernon would love to meet you, so I thought I’d do a little dinner party. Kill two birds with the one stone.’

  ‘Right.’

  ‘I mean, nothing fancy. It’ll be nothing compared to the level you’re used to these days, but . . . well, you know. Never forget your roots an’ all that.’

  ‘That sounds great,’ I murmured, with all the enthusiasm of a death-row prisoner who’d just been told what sort of perm they’d be getting before heading for the electric chair.

  ‘Oh good. Well, text a few dates over to me and we’ll take it from there. And, you know, it’ll all be very casual.’

  Mum was wearing a long dress when she answered the front door.

  ‘Jodie! Stuart! Entray!’ she bellowed in a very posh accent that made her sound almost as ridiculous as she looked. She saw my bewildered glance at her red floral-print maxi dress, which I now realized was actually a very flared strapless jumpsuit. The sort of thing J-Lo wore to go to Kwik Save.

  ‘You look nice, Sandra,’ Stuart said as he handed her a bottle of white in a Tesco’s bag.

  ‘Thanks, Stuart. Alan says I look like Liza Tarbuck.’

  ‘I didn’t say Liza Tarbuck, I said fucking Jimmy Tarbuck.’ That was Dad coming out of the bedroom.

  Mum spun round – on what I now saw were cork platforms, her dangly silver hooped earrings whiplashing her cheeks in the process – and hissed, ‘No swearing in front of our guests!’

  Dad rolled his eyes and carried on into the through lounge.

  ‘I don’t mind a bit of swearing, San,’ insisted Stuart.

  Mum cast him a contemptuous look, then boomed, ‘Val and Vernon are already here. Shall we follow through?’

  She flung an arm out towards the open door and marched into the living room. She had to really lift her feet up in the jumpsuit to stop herself tripping over her flares. It made her look like she was doing some kind of army-based keep-fit routine. We did indeed follow through.

  ‘This is Val!’ Mum was pointing to a woman on the settee sporting a similar flared jumpsuit to Mum’s, except hers was orange. They must have got a job lot on one of their many days out together. Val had a coquettish look on her face, a bit like Cilla Black used to have before she sprung a surprise on someone. It was an unsettling mixture of excitement and confidence that something fantastic was about to happen. She jumped to her feet, flung her arms wide, like that big statue of Jesus in Brazil (but with a maxi-dress-that-was-really-slacks on), and went, ‘Jo-DEEEE! Come and give Vally a hug!’

  Great. That’s just what I needed. Physical contact with someone who spoke in the third person. She enveloped me in bingo wings and nylon, and I was overcome with a heady aroma of Elnett and Anais Anais as she scratched my back enthusiastically with what felt like Swiss Army Knife nails. She rested her head on my shoulder and whispered, ‘Mummy’s told me so much about you. And now I’m beginning to see. Everything really is true. You’re a poppet.’

  What was I, six?

  She then pushed me away, but clung onto me, looking me up and down like a new rug she was considering buying, shook her head – with no moveage of hair – and repeated, ‘An absolute poppet. Isn’t she a poppet, Vern?’

  I contorted my head round to see her husband, Vernon, stood by the serving hatch, jingling some change in his pocket with one hand and holding a pint of frothy lager in the other. The most striking thing about him was that he had bright orange hair, worn in a style similar to Chucky from the horror films. He broke into a smile when I looked round and rais
ed his glass towards me.

  ‘I bet you drink champagne, don’t you, Jodie? Hmm? Nice cold, ice cold champagne, my lovely? Hmm?’

  ‘Erm.’

  ‘You telly box stars are all the same, I’ll bet. Now!’

  And she left me standing in the middle of the room as she turned her back on me, bent over and went rummaging in a handbag the size of a small elephant.

  ‘And this is Stuart,’ Dad added from the kitchen, coming through with two glasses of something fizzy for me and Stu. Stuart wasn’t a big fan of champagne, so it was obvious they were doing this for show, to impress Val and Vernon. The whole evening was clearly turning out to be a mission to impress.

  ‘Hi, Stu my lovely!’ Val called, still rummaging, arse in the air. I could make out some serious VPL. The lines appeared to be a mile apart. I looked away. Mum appeared from the kitchen with a plate of tiny white plasticky blobs.

  ‘I did quail’s eggs with celery salt. Hope that’s acceptable.’

  ‘Vern can’t eat celery, San. Not since the bypass. Has an unfortunate effect on his rectum, doesn’t it, Vern?’