by Jon Bounds
We perch at a table – square, brown-wood effect, wipe-clean. We survey the scene. The bar is partitioned off along one wall, at about waist height, and there are tables running alongside it. The main action is facing a huge stage at the opposite end to the sets of double doors, and row after row of four, six or eight-person tables face it and the polished dance floor before it. We're here to be entertained.
'Dan,' I say, 'do you think poor people are uglier?'
'No, they're not. It's your brain being conditioned by an idea of taste.'
But I'm not sure. When I was here before I was young and shy, but I felt that if I wanted to I could have connected with the people here. I'd envisaged talking to the people here now, finding out about what brought them to a place out of time for a week in September, but I can't think of a way in. I once had a rambling, drunken conversation with a guy that was convinced that grammar school had driven a divide between him and his family, such that he couldn't talk to them anymore. I didn't think that that had happened to me at the time, but there was something about going to university, about deciding I was 'creative' – or 'a creative', both sound shit, but there's no other word – and about living in an area far cut off from the pressures of the shop floor, which have all contributed to how I feel now. And what I feel now is a disconnect, not the usual disconnect of a few shandies or a haughty disdain for low culture, but a simple glass panel. I'm a time traveller from a more balsamic-vinegar age and I can only peer through the greenish glass. And feel sour. A green night.
* * *
I ask the bartender about the Christmas theme, wondering if it was a special theme week or something.
'It's Christmas every week,' with a slight shake of the head. 'I'm sick of it myself.' As if on cue, 'I Wish it Could Be Christmas Everyday' starts to play. The barman rolls his eyes, takes my money and goes for the walkie-talkie on the bar.
Jon has found a programme. Apparently it's time for a 'Christmas party'. Most of the Christmas parties I've been to normally involve telling your boss to fuck off and doing embarrassing things that it takes a few months to live down. This one is mainly a disco for the kids, the dances being led by one bluecoat on stage who demonstrates all the moves, and a couple more on the dance floor. The bluecoat is a mum-friendly, effeminate man who seems to turn around more often than is strictly necessary, revealing his bum held in place by his blue trousers. The couple on the dance floor are doing a good job of pretending to enjoy themselves and that they haven't done this 30 times this season, although from their body language I get the distinct impression that they don't particularly like each other.
* * *
They go through the ritual songs that have filled holiday camps since the mid seventies. 'Tiger Feet', 'Wig Wam Bam', which is appropriate now – glam rock is Christmas, after all – but it's appropriate like a stopped clock. Glam is good family music: it stomps in drinking time for the dads; it has glitter and glamour for the mums; and it's a fantasy for the kids. And now, divorced from context, it's safe. In our context, as the regular thump makes it too loud to talk or even to think, it makes it drinking time. The bluecoats are trying to sell glittery and glowing tat, all available from the kiosk outside.
* * *
Just as I'm beginning to be hypnotised by the fat swinging from the arms of one of the mothers who has got up to dance with her kids, it's time for the kids to go to bed. Me and Jon make eye contact and smile, as we both had been singing 'The Crocodile March' while getting ready earlier, and Jon thought if he bought me enough drinks he could get me to join in the march.
'Okay, everybody!' says the man over the microphone. 'Get ready for…' The kids look round to see him. '…The Slush Puppie!'
What?
The song 'Cold As Ice' comes on. No, not the original by Foreigner, the remixed version by M.O.P. A giant furry Slush Puppie mascot comes in. Jon's mouth is hanging open, and I'm scowling. Already guessing what's happened, which is that that thing, that precious special memory from my childhood, has been co-opted by a brand. Now, I love ice flavoured with sugar and chemicals as much as the next person, probably more, but this is sacrilege. I may have never done 'The Crocodile March' as a kid, but I still have fond memories of it. It indicated when the entertainment got good and I could stay up later than my siblings 'if I sat still and out of the way'. I really dread to think what my brother would have done had he been here to witness this. I suspect the police would have had to write a report about a large, crying man attacking a furry mascot.
As the kids are being led out to have their picture taken with the Slush Puppie (on sale in reception the next morning for £4.50), I notice it's soured the mood somewhat. The lights come up and the speakers say, 'We're having a break for a bit, don't forget your drinks at the bar for this evening's entertainment.'
'We should try and find some of these students,' says Jon.
'I could go back and check the Facebook group, see if there's any news about tonight,' I say, forgetting that the chalets don't have Wi-Fi.
'Or we could just go over and ask those guys over there,' says Jon, nodding his head to the table of obvious students looking bored.
'Excuse me, are you Edge Hill students by any chance?'
'Yeah,' says one of the girls, pretty in a casual way that only students manage.
'Are you the writers doing a book about piers?' says another. 'Sit down, guys.'
The students have just moved in but, like the barman, they're already sick of Christmas.
'We're really waiting for Jason,' says one of the guys cryptically. They all laugh. We ask about the camp and, as with anything new, the teething problems were annoying them more. They were promised Wi-fi for the rooms. It's still being sorted out. Some of the rooms still had furniture that had to be replaced, and the buses that ferried them to the uni went at odd times, which meant they were missing lectures.
But it seems to have bonded them together quickly. They start buying shots. So do we. Me and Jon are drinkers, and session ones at that, but these super-sweet, cola-flavoured shots dropped into pints of lager look dangerous and definitely put us and the students on a level playing field. As the bluecoat show starts, we all clap and cheer a little louder than the families out that night. One by one the bluecoats are introduced onto stage. When Jason is called the students give an extra-loud cheer. He marches to the stage, resolutely not looking in our direction.
'Why Jason?' I ask the kid next to me who, like me, has joined the others in a standing ovation for Jason's walk to stage. He smiles and shrugs. You can see the force of will it is taking Jason not to look over, even though whenever it is his turn to sing or dance he is getting a thunderous reception. I guess by November Jason will have had a nervous breakdown.
The night goes quickly with shot after shot and conversation about their lives and plans. The bluecoats are replaced by a singer, competent in a crooner/big-band kind of way. He's delighted and confused as we all pile on to the dance floor to the opening notes of his taped backing track of 'Brown Eyed Girl'.
Just the ten of us dancing like nobody else was there, smiling and moving to a singer who probably hasn't had people dancing for five or so years. While a confused audience of working-class dads and mums watch on.
* * *
Sitting around a large round table, just aside from the main central area, is a group of the young, fresh and vibrant. They're a million times more alive than anything in the tableau facing the stage. They invite us to join them, at least one space round the table being empty. Something about a chap going to Alderley Edge, but I don't listen. Roy has sent word of us ahead.
In a grey lace dress and flushed cheeks, fringe heavy over deep brown eyes, and surrounded by about seven lads, is a stunning vision. I start to feel worried for her. It's not that I want her, I don't – she's young and has everything going for her, despite being at university in a Pontins camp. I have nothing to offer. What would we ever talk about? But I would die if she were hurt. England depends on her. Sometimes y
ou just see a vision. I want to reach back into the past to stop any possibility of anything that's ever made her upset.
Not that she looks upset. She looks serene.
Two of the lads, Lance and Percy, are holding court. They're telling us how the place isn't how it's meant to be, that the bluecoats don't like them. They were meant to have their own bar – Pontins usually has two, one in the main ballroom and a smaller one where 'adult' comedians can prowl from about
10 p.m. – but that hasn't been sorted out. They too are in a permanent purgatorial state of festivity, cut off from the town, cut off from campus. They are bound together by circumstances and a code – a code which seems to be more against a force than for anything in particular. They drink like freshers, and it would be rude not to join them.
A giant white dog enters, stage right, and the commoners are transfixed. It seems normal to them, and so I take it as normal too. He's introduced and applauded. It begins to move with a swooping rhythm, hypnotic in all of its six-foot height. Its ears sway. The chant is about buying, wanting, drinking. The temperature drops. It becomes winter.
'… you're willing to sacrifice our love… ' they sing.
I freeze. Are we the sacrifice?
'You want paradise.'
'Someday you'll pay the price.'
The crowd sway, clap, eyes are to the front.
I can't be sure, but on the projector at the side of the stage I'm sure I see a tall green figure chained to a wall. The sacrifice. Snap, snap. Wheels turn pulleys and the – crocodile? – is splayed further. The dog howls.
The heavy green curtains part. A tall man takes the stage, well kept, blond, handsome if ageing. He tosses his dinner jacket onto the stand after he picks up the microphone. I can see God in the ruffles of his shirt.
'Hello, Southport, I'm Arthur Wakeman. Let's keep the party going. I'm going to sing you a song.'
And he does. Strings and horns swell out of nowhere, his voice is powerful and rich. The song is new to me, but I've always known it. My mouth is moving, mouthing chewily the words that I don't know but understand as soon as I hear. He's singing of everything that holds us together. It's the truth. It's not Elvis but right now this man is the king.
The dog is swaying still, but now to the swing sounds, discoball glitter spinning into his huge eyes. The music, the song is Arthur's. The place is Arthur's. He's at home, it's his castle.
As the last chorus climbs to its height, Arthur reaches for the mic stand. He swings it up, Freddie Mercury. I rise, get closer, the bluecoats are moving to grab him. The one they called Jason is nearest, I have to stop him. He's reaching the stage and I can do nothing but thrust out a leg. It doesn't stop him but it throws him off balance and he careers into the bingo machine.
The mic stand hits the spotlight and gleams like nothing I've ever seen. It has a golden handle and the side is the sharpest thing – with a thud it hits the dog just above its blue T-shirt. A head rolls and smoke fills the stage.
'Goodnight. God bless.'
He's gone as soon as he arrived, the music back to coming from the PA. The dog is slinking off, picking up his head for tomorrow. Captain Croc is leading the kids out of the room, back to chalets and to sleep.
There is only one way to beat the future and it's to dance to the tune of the past. I dance with the brown-eyed girl, and the rest. We all pour shots of thick red into our mugs and down them. 'You can do anything you want,' she whispers. If I knew what that was, I would.
I feel like I'm underwater: sounds are looming in and out. I keep having unexpected changes in perspective, in height, in angle.
Goodnight, campers.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
WALES OF THE UNEXPECTED
I wake up the next day tasting bare mattress, which is preferential to the film on the inside of my mouth, which tastes like the floor of a New Orleans taxi cab. Midge is already up and in the shower. I stumble into the living room, where the great lump of Jon is still sleeping. I crawl onto the bed and give him a cuddle. He barely wakes and soon I have to fight dozing off myself.
* * *
I wake on the double sofa – for privacy's sake, I'd called the only bed in its own room. Of course I made a play of magnanimity, taking the put-you-up rather than the actual beds – but really I wanted to sleep alone. Well, not alone, but not next to the unshowered. I wake with the bounce that, even without opening my eyes, I know signifies Danny jumping in next to me. That's okay, it's not as if I was slumbering with a semi and half a mind to take that further or anything. The grumble he gets isn't all hangover.
* * *
'How do you feel?' I ask Jon.
'Orrible,' he grunts, 'How's your head?'
'I feel like a microwavable dog-shit sandwich bought in a petrol station and dropped on the forecourt.'
At that point Midge walks in from the shower, towel around his waist. 'What are you guys doing?'
'Spooning,' I say.
'Jump on,' Jon adds, 'room for a little 'un.'
'I wonder about you two sometimes,' says Midge as he goes into the bedroom.
* * *
We've a kitchen, but nothing to cook in it. I make myself a cup of hot water, more through desire for ritual than anything.
* * *
Midge looks into the rear-view mirror.
'I've worked it out,' he says, catching my eye.
'What? The satnav? Took your time,' I say.
'No, why people find you so charming, how you do it.'
'Really, how do I do it?'
'You talk really loud and really quick, so people don't get a chance to not like you. You're already shouting at them anyway,' he says.
'Oh,' I say. 'I thought I did it by trying not to be a prick, as that's pretty rare nowadays.'
'No,' he says. 'It's definitely the shouting thing.'
* * *
The mood is light and up, only a little tender and caffeine-fuzzy. We have often been unable to keep the number of piers there are left in our heads, but it's easy now: there are seven in Wales, five today and two tomorrow. It's Friday, I think, and we're going to make it back easily on time. We've all but done it and something has changed in my head. I think I've broken a link with the past. I think I understand my place at the seaside.
Midge puts his foot down and we almost hit the speed limit on the dual carriageway into our new country. We enter a tunnel, a cave blasted out of solid rock. The outside noise is muffled and the radio plays 'Tunnel of Love' by Fun Boy Three. I smile at it and the reception stays on all the way through.
A mining conveyor belt sticks out over the road and into the sea. It's not the pier; more like a dark-universe twin of one. The outcrop of a coke-blacked hell. But we're past the hump and I can see industry and commerce for what they are, things to be controlled but not afraid of. We drive under, focusing on the deep colours of the sea and the magical mist around the horizon.
* * *
After a short while we get to Colwyn Bay. The road that follows the coast is a lot higher than the beach. We park and around the corner we see the pier. Standing high in the distance, even from here I can see it's dilapidated, but it suits the place, like Sleeping Beauty's castle. As we get closer we can see the signs telling us it's closed.
'Well, if we can't go on it, we're going to have to go under it,' says Jon. The hangover being in its third upward swing, I just nod slightly and head down the stairs to the beach. The pier is closed after a bankruptcy order brought against the owner Steve Hunt. He claims it was spurious and malicious. The council say it was for unpaid business rates. Before that, it was owned by a maritime engineer who, after trying to renovate and repair it himself, admitted defeat and tried to sell it on eBay.
Two hundred yards away from the pier a single metal chain fences around it. A sign warns that it's dangerous to go under the pier without a safety helmet. I look at Jon. He just shrugs and we step over it.
'Oi!' We look around and see an angry small man with a big guy who looks like som
ebody called central casting and asked for an 'English builder'. The smaller guy is waving his clipboard, although the builder is communicating quite effectively that he could give neither a fuck nor a shit.
'Can't you read?' he shouts. 'Did you not see the fence?' We had obviously seen the fence as it was quite tricky to step over, but even hung-over I can spot a rhetorical question when I hear it.
'Seriously!?' I shout back. 'It looks all right.' The hangover knives are killing every English instinct I have to just apologise and walk away.