Nevertheless, without the Bible-bus or the ‘Hair-Bear’ hairdo to hamper her - and with Frazer’s obvious attentions giving her some sort of validation as the latest inductee into the ‘in-crowd’ - Daisy’s return to school was far less painful than it ever had been in the past.
Indeed, as she walked in with him hand-in-hand, she spotted many of the boys giving her admiring glances - even though they were clearly being mindful of Frazer’s watchful eye - after all, they didn’t want to get on the wrong side of Razor Redmond if they could help it.
As Frazer kissed her again, this time right in the middle of the playground, Daisy felt more confident than she ever had in her life - she even felt pretty. She was wearing new clothes which emphasised her new, improved figure and with the contact lenses replacing her hideous horn-rims she looked like a completely different girl.
And all of a sudden people were noticing her for all the right reasons. Where the hell was Steve Cool now?
As it was, she didn’t see Gordy until lunchtime.
She was heading up the school field with Frazer whilst Gordy was heading in the opposite direction towards the bike sheds.
She couldn’t help but think how dramatically both of them had changed over the Summer.
They had earned a degree of notoriety in the holidays whilst running Bailey’s Bandstand and had made lots of new friends in the process - without even trying.
Now they were what could only be described as ‘popular’ - the roller-disco debacle apparently forgotten with just the memory of Gordy so courageously tackling Steve Cool remaining.
It felt strange for Daisy in particular - people talking to her, being nice to her - it just seemed so unusual and it was quite disconcerting - especially as it was already so different from her experience last term.
Nonetheless, she was still feeling a little bashful about mingling with people she didn’t know and was hoping to meet up with Gordy for a bit of moral support - also so that she might find the right moment to tell him of her impending departure.
However, she had not expected Frazer to meet her out of class and drag her up the school field before she’d had a chance to speak with Gordy alone.
Nevertheless, she slowed as she spotted him, pulling back on Frazer’s hand to rein him in a little. But then she saw who it was that Gordy was heading for - Pippa bloody Wilson and her herd of haughty harpies - and suddenly she felt as if she had been stabbed in the heart.
Her sense of betrayal was almost all consuming and she was filled with the unexpected urge to run over and slap Gordy all over his freshly feather-cutted head - and maybe give Pippa a piece of her mind whilst she was about it.
She had never felt anything like it before in her life and was quite astounded by the intensity of the emotion coursing through her. Was it jealousy? Surely not.
As it was, she was rescued from the strange and unwelcome feelings boiling within her by an unknowing Frazer who said, “C’mon, Daze, hurry up - I’m dying for a fag.”
Without waiting for a response he pulled more firmly on her hand, dragging her away from Gordy who was now clearly transfixed by Queen Pippa and her simpering subjects much to Daisy’s infuriated chagrin.
Which, purely to spite him, was precisely when she decided not to tell Gordy she was leaving after all.
***
If John Travolta had been wearing a Poplar Park school uniform whilst carrying his tin of paint during the opening sequence of Saturday Night Fever to the strains of Stayin’ Alive then he could scarcely have looked more cool than Gordy Brewer on Monday morning as he strutted into the school playground.
Feather cut on top, jam tops on the bottom and a whole lot of cool in between - that was the look Gordy was going for and it was definitely working.
He was wearing a black, single buttoned box jacket over a short-collared blue shirt which was fastened at the neck with a thin black tie with a tiny knot (inspired by the photo of Bryan Ferry on his The Bride Stripped Bare album cover). On his lower half he wore black, four-pleat pegs and, of course, the much-prized, freshly polished jam tops on his feet. Super cool - or at least in Gordy’s humble(ish) opinion.
For the first time ever he felt completely confident about his appearance and was actually looking forward to school - which was another first.
He couldn’t wait to see all of his friends again and was especially keen to see Pippa, even though he felt extremely nervous about the prospect of asking her out.
Nevertheless, as he strutted Travolta-like into school thinking how wonderful he looked, he was snapped cruelly out of his self-absorbed, ‘Christ, aren’t I just the coolest’ musings to see Daisy and Frazer some yards ahead of him kissing - with tongues (yuk) right in the middle of the playground which poked a great big pin in his overtly confident, super cool balloon.
Immediately he felt a rush of anger. Anger at them for spoiling his first day back; anger at them for having ruined a perfectly good strutting opportunity and angry at them for sucking face so bloody blatantly in front of him.
And inexplicably angry at Daisy for suddenly being so good looking - how the hell did that happen?
Gordy purposely hung back, pretending not to have seen them as he loitered long enough for the pair of them to move off and into the Humanities block where they could no doubt kiss some more.
Gordy was so incensed that he barely even noticed Pippa as she and her sirens sashayed past him. She looked incredible, her pneumatic figure showed off to the full in the tightest of pencil skirts and the most ‘sprayed-on’ of blouses.
“Hey, Gordy,” Pippa said seductively, peering sideways at him through her lustrous blonde locks as her gaggle of girl friends gathered around her and giggled gleefully as she came to a stop a few feet away and eyed him coquettishly.
“Is that the one?” whispered one of the sirens within Gordy’s earshot.
“Yeah, that’s him,” replied another, “isn’t he just the—”
Unfortunately Gordy didn’t quite catch the last part of the sentence as the girls were walking away from him as they spoke - leaving him completely in the dark about what they thought he was.
Was he just the coolest? - the ugliest? - the dumbest? What in Christ’s name was he?
However, his mind still hadn’t moved on from Daisy and Frazer so his, “Oh, hi Pip!” sounded much cooler and much less-bothered than it normally would have, which was actually a good thing and seemingly had the effect of making Pippa all the more keen.
“See you at lunch, yeah?” She asked somewhat hopefully, as her friends’ attempted to drag her away.
“Er, yeah. Sure, if you like.”
“By the bike sheds?” Pippa was now some feet away and walking backwards, one of the sirens had broken away from the rest of her companions and was leading her by the hand.
“Okay,” said Gordy.
“Great - see you later,” Pippa said, as she and her friend hurried to catch up with the rest of the girly gang. However, once she was reunited with them, she turned and yelled back, “Love the new look by the way - you look just like Bryan Ferry!”
Gordy wanted to jump up and punch the air but somehow he managed to restrain himself (after all, effusive shows of emotion were simply not cool).
Nevertheless, Pippa had identified the exact look he was going for which was fan-bloody-tastic and to top it off she wanted to meet him at lunchtime, too. He couldn’t have orchestrated it better if he’d tried.
He knew lunchtime would be the ideal opportunity to ask her out - which was accompanied by a mild feeling of dread and more than a little trepidation - but it had to be done or he would regret it forever.
Thoughts of Daisy left his brain as he watched the incredibly hypnotic sway of Pippa’s hips as she and her pencil skirt continued down into the school like she was strutting down a catwalk in Milan.
Gordy wiped his mouth with t
he back of his hand, suddenly aware that he may have been drooling and conscious that if he stared at her wonderful wiggle much longer ‘little Gordy’ might make an unwelcome and rather prominent appearance in the front of his four-pleat pegs and that definitely would not be cool.
Nonetheless, if everything went to plan, by the end of lunch, Pippa (and her perfectly pert posterior) would be his.
***
Upon the ringing of the lunchtime bell, Gordy emerged from one of the portacabins on the periphery of the school field which, as a Fourth Year, was where he now reported for English Literature with the jovial, very Scottish and large-handlebar-moustached, Mr. Cuthel.
Gordy didn’t feel cool now or confident or anything particularly good, he just felt physically sick and totally terrified of making an tremendous tit of himself.
The prospect of imminently walking up to Pippa and asking her out was making his hands clammy, his forehead sweaty and his heart beat ten to the dozen. There was also a very real and rather more worrying possibility that he might actually shit himself.
He knew, of course, that all this could be avoided. He didn’t need to ask Pippa out, he didn’t need to have a girlfriend - he could just carry on as he was - single, sexless and celibate - but he didn’t want to.
All he had been able to think about for the last few months (with the recent and rather annoying exception of Daisy) was Pippa Wilson. His mission to transform from nerdy geek to cool dude had been solely inspired by his desire to go out with her - maybe even to one day be invited to rummage around inside the tightly packed cups of her amply filled front-loading bra - although the thought of that particular journey into the unknown still made him feel more than a little heady.
But if his mammoth efforts were to mean anything - indeed, if the Cool List was finally to be properly endorsed by achieving its ultimate goal - then he had to place one foot in front of the other, walk down the rickety wooden steps of the portacabin, stride down into the playground and keep his appointment with Pippa where - even if it killed him, even if he shat himself right there on the asphalt in front of her (actually, possibly not that) - he would ask her to go out with him.
The swagger had all but gone from Gordy’s strut now (much less what others might perceive as ‘happening hipster’ and much more what they would view as ‘possibly pissed’) as he made his way reluctantly, shakily, down towards the bike sheds.
All too soon he saw the object of his desire, standing there with her back towards him along with three of her loyal sirens. The sirens - Pippa’s gang of long legged lovelies (or the ‘harpies’ as Daisy viewed them) all tried, and failed, to emulate their leader. None of them had such golden hair, wore their pencil skirts quite so impressively tight or filled a blouse anywhere near so well as Pippa Wilson.
Gordy didn’t feel like Bryan Ferry at all now, in fact he felt like a complete fool - as if every eye in the whole school was on him as he walked up to Pippa.
The sirens had seen him coming and given her the nod. With a perfectly practiced Farrah Fawcett flick of the hair she turned to greet him, all tits and teeth as she gave Gordy a wide, white and very welcoming smile.
Gordy’s face had drained from a healthy pinkish hue to a very pail puce; the feeling of utter dread in his stomach threatening at any moment to pump a profusion of projectile puke all over Pippa’s plumped-up pillows as she aimed both barrels of her big, bouncy baps directly at him.
Sweat was running in rivers off his forehead and stinging his eyes as he came to a stop just a couple of feet away, the inclination to vomit almost overwhelming.
However, as he opened his mouth to speak he happened to see Daisy and Frazer hurriedly heading passed the bike sheds and up towards the school field - no doubt to do some more bloody kissing, Gordy assumed. Daisy glanced at him as she went by, giving him what he interpreted to be a smug grin (it was actually more of an involuntary purse of the lips caused by her fury at seeing him with Pippa but that was by the by).
Suddenly Gordy was angry again, all nervousness, nausea and the need to shit himself vanishing in a flash of testosterone fuelled petulance.
He turned back to Pippa, stewing over the sight of Daisy and Frazer, no longer concerned with matters in hand and said almost impatiently, “So do you wanna go out with me or not?”
Pippa looked dumbstruck; the perfectly white smile between her perfectly plump lips vanishing in utter shock at his obvious indifference.
This was most unexpected, most out of the ordinary. She was Pippa Wilson; the best looking girl in school - a goddess fated and fawned over by the hunkiest of schoolboy hunks - she had even dated Steve bloody Cool for Christ’s sake - and dumped him because of the way he had acted towards the boy who was in front of her now. She was used to being idolised - worshipped by lesser beings who would give their right arms to be like her, to go out with her. Boys fell at her feet powerless to her charms, anxious to please her, to be near her, to do anything for her.
No boy had ever spoken to her with such disregard, such coolness. Not one of them.
But somehow she liked it.
Pippa’s heart was pumping in her ample chest and she thought for a moment she might swoon as she gave Gordy her answer in a husky, breathless whisper. “Yes,” she said.
“Good” he replied. “See you tomorrow.”
Then leaving Pippa and the sirens to stare after him with a kind of Lone Ranger ‘Who was that masked man’ expression on their faces, Gordy stomped off in the direction of the Humanities Block desperately trying to rid his mind of the image of Daisy Flynn and the big punk rocker she was now dating.
The fact that he was now going out with Pippa Wilson didn’t even register.
Chapter Fifteen
The realisation hit Gordy eight minutes and fourteen seconds later - almost a lifetime considering the enormity of what had just happened - but it had taken that long for Gordy’s indignation to suitably subside. However, exactly why he did feel so indignant, so utterly peeved, about Daisy going out with Frazer seemed to completely elude him - or maybe he was just in denial, refusing to recognise the truth of what he was actually feeling; the laws of attraction and all the subtleties that accompanied them about as alien to Gordy as The Clangers.
All he understood about it could be summed up in one word - ‘boobs’ - and Pippa had them in abundance (even though Daisy’s were now almost as impressive - which was confusing him somewhat).
Yet it was Pippa he focussed on - which was when, eight minutes and fourteen seconds after asking her out, the realisation hit him and he had to sit down among the coats in the cloakroom of the Humanities Block before he collapsed with shock.
Pippa Wilson had said ‘yes’ and he was apparently now dating the hottest girl in school!
Blimey.
***
It took Pippa only until the next day to see through Gordy’s accidental aloofness - which she had found so thoroughly irresistible - but by then, quite amazingly, she was already rather surprisingly hooked.
Gordy made her laugh and she found him ‘cute’. Even the sirens took to him - although he much preferred it when he and Pippa were alone.
At first, he was dreadfully nervous with her, awkward and stumbling - he had been absolutely hopeless in the kissing department and had merely held Pippa’s hand for the first three days as they aimlessly wandered around the school grounds at break and lunchtimes. Indeed, it had been Pippa, herself, who was much more worldly wise (some would say ‘forward’), who had initiated their first kiss (behind the bike sheds at break time on day four).
The kiss was a disaster, for a start Gordy had absolutely no idea about what to do - especially when she pushed her tongue into his mouth - and secondly because when she did, it caused him to have such a fierce boner that there was just no way she could fail to feel it poking into her tummy.
Gordy nearly died of embarrassment but Pippa seemed t
o take it in good part, in fact she clearly enjoyed it, remarking rather salaciously, “Is that a gun in your pocket or are you just pleased to see me?”
In fact, bashful boy’s bayonetting her bluntly with their burgeoning boners was almost commonplace for Pippa and something she rather took pride in. She found that it bolstered her self worth and fed her desire to be wanted.
Nevertheless, it happened repeatedly to Gordy - he couldn’t help it, his perky pink pal just sprung up unbidden of it’s own accord and he was powerless to prevent it. In the end he took to placing a precautionary hand in his pocket every time they kissed to keep a rein on his persistently pointy penis.
However, once Gordy became accustomed to this new kissing lark ‘little Gordy’ settled down somewhat and only awoke when they indulged in ‘heavy petting’ sessions (as illustrated by the signs at the swimming baths which Gordy had never previously understood until now).
With his kissing affliction under control and his initial nervousness no longer an issue, Gordy managed to be really quite an interesting and fun boyfriend.
Of course, he was something of a celebrity at school nowadays thanks to his stint over the Summer at Bailey’s Bandstand and the kudos he’d earned there was carried with him daily - heavily bolstered by the fact that he was now with Pippa.
She, herself, revelled in the attention the pair of them garnered as the ‘new hot couple’ in school (or one of the two new hot couples at least). But Pippa was born to be in the glare of the spotlight and loved being noticed.
However, deep down she was quite a troubled and insecure girl.
Pippa’s mum was what people in Bradley referred to as ‘a good time girl’ with a penchant for hooped earrings, tight fitting leopard skin and a well-earned reputation as a man-eater.
In short, she was a thirty something dolly bird who was frankly a bit tarty.
She had Pippa when she was just fifteen - something of a scandal back in the day - and since then had been fairly light on morals and the whole issue of parental guidance.
Jam Tops, the Fonz and the Pursuit of Cool Page 17