Street Song

by Wilkinson, Sheena;

  ‘I got held up. It wasn’t my fault.’ I tried a RyLee smile but it was a pretty small, exhausted one, and all it got me was a grudging, ‘Well, let’s see your ID.’

  ‘I – must have forgotten it. Look . . .’ I tried to think. ‘Where’s Gillian? With the blue hair? She’ll know me.’

  She looked at me as if I was crazy and I knew I wasn’t going to be allowed in.

  Well, nobody could say I hadn’t done my best. I turned to go. God knows where.

  And then I heard my name.

  ‘Cal?’

  I didn’t know the man coming out of the toilets. He was short with shaggy ginger hair.

  ‘Cal? From Polly’s Tree?’

  ‘Yeah?’ Was he one of the promoters? I didn’t remember him. Had Toni sent him out here to wait for me? And then I saw his hazel eyes and the shape of his nose and I knew who he was.

  ‘You’re Toni’s dad? How did you know—?’

  ‘Ah, she sent me pictures of the three of you.’ He said to the woman at the counter, who was watching us with great interest, ‘This lad’s with my daughter’s band. And they’re on next. Now you wouldn’t stop him going in, would you? Wasn’t it the luck of God I went out to answer a call of nature in time to rescue him?’ He gave a lopsided smile, and you could see the woman melt. I began to see why Queen Jane had issues with me, if she didn’t like being reminded of her ex. ‘She doesn’t know I’m here,’ Anto told me as he steered me towards the auditorium. ‘I thought I’d surprise her.’

  He pushed open the heavy wooden doors and a wave of heat and noise hit me, as the audience clapped.

  ‘I’m too late,’ I said.

  ‘No, you’ll be grand. They changed the programme round so they’d be last. Now I know why. That’ll be the band before them coming off.’

  But he was wrong.

  That roar of applause was to welcome Polly’s Tree onstage.

  The stage looked miles away, and huge, and in the middle of it stood two girls looking tiny, dwarfed by all the sound equipment. Toni’s face was pale in the spotlight, her hair a flame. She and Marysia looked at each other, and Marysia counted in the way I normally did. Toni grabbed her mic and smiled out at the audience, and if you didn’t know her you wouldn’t have thought there was anything wrong at all.

  ‘We’re Polly’s Tree,’ she said. ‘And this is “Plastic Girls”.’

  She struck a G chord, smiled at Marysia, and started to sing.

  And all I could do was set my guitar case down and watch from the back of the hall.

  ‘Ah, son,’ whispered Anto. ‘It’s too late, isn’t it? What happened that you let them down?’

  What about all the times you’ve let her down? I wanted to say, but I couldn’t say anything. All I could do was watch numbly as two-thirds of the band I’d been so proud of limped their way through their set without me.

  In a film, they’d have started off rubbish, and the audience would have booed, and Toni would have been singing bravely through her tears, looking helplessly down into the audience. Then I’d have burst through the doors, carrying my guitar, which would be magically in tune. I’d have joined in as I made my way through the crowd, and then I’d have leapt on to the stage, never missing a note, and joined Toni at the mic. There’d have been this amazing roar from the audience and suddenly she’d have been singing like a diva, smiling through her tears at Cal, the boy who’d saved the day. It would have ended with us all grouped round one mic, arms round each other, singing together, and the audience swaying or maybe clapping along. And naturally Polly’s Tree would win. And then Toni would kiss me and the credits would roll.

  But it was real life. So none of that happened. They did their best. Toni sang her heart out, and her guitar wasn’t bad at all. But bass and rhythm guitar just wasn’t enough of a sound in a venue like this, especially in what were meant to be the instrumental bits. I knew every note of every song, so I knew how it should have sounded.

  And so, of course, did Toni and Marysia. Toni was overcompensating for the thinness of the sound so, by the time they got to “Northern Streets”, her voice was faltering on the high notes. I’d seen Toni in all kinds of moods, but, up on the stage of the Ulster Hall, I’d never seen her so vulnerable. Or so magnificent.

  When it was over, they hugged for ages, and ran off stage, clasping hands.

  The applause was polite but not enthusiastic, except from me and Anto, and I suppose, somewhere in the crowd, Queen Jane and all the Nowalczyks.

  Anto turned to me. ‘Weren’t they great? he said. ‘But,’ he went on, more musician than parent, ‘they missed you, didn’t they?’

  ‘Yeah.’

  I couldn’t bear to hear the adjudication, so I pushed my way back out of the hall and out into Bedford Street. Lights shone from the restaurants and bars. Cars, mostly taxis, drove up and down. I wished I could go away. Just away. But I crossed the road and waited in the shade of an empty building, guitar and backpack at my feet, folding my arms against the cold of the night.

  At last people started to throng out of the Ulster Hall, laughing and chatting. But not Toni or Marysia. I saw Jess in a crowd of girls, but she didn’t see me. More than once I was tempted to leave, and if I’d had somewhere to go to, I might have done. The pavement sent chills through the thin soles of my Converse.

  But at last they came out. Toni and Marysia, with Queen Jane and Marysia’s family behind them. I looked for Anto but there was no sign of him. Maybe he’d talked to her inside and that was why they were so late.

  Toni looked small and defeated, swamped by the guitar case on her back.

  ‘Toni!’ I moved out of the shadow of the building and started to cross the road, dodging a beeping taxi. For a moment I thought she hadn’t heard, or was going to ignore me. But she stopped and looked at me. She didn’t come towards me and I realised she wasn’t going to make it easy.

  Well, I hadn’t made it easy for her.

  I stood in front of them. I could hear my own breathing, loud and fast. She was wearing a necklace I hadn’t seen before. It was the shell, on a thin leather thong. She saw me looking at it. ‘So much for luck,’ she said. She yanked it off and threw it down on the pavement. It lay, delicate and perfect against the grey, still showing the hazy purple sky from our perfect day. I thought she was going to stamp on it.

  ‘Let me explain—’

  ‘No,’ she said. ‘Whatever it is, I don’t care. You’re a—’

  ‘Toni,’ Marysia said. ‘We should let him try—’ She bent down and picked up the shell and after a small hesitation, slipped it into her pocket.

  ‘No!’ Toni shook her head. Her eyes were full of tears. She dashed her hand across them and said, ‘I never want to see you again. You’re nothing.’

  In a film she’d have slapped my face and then we’d both have cried and fallen into each other’s arms and made up.

  But it was real life. So she turned and walked away.

  47

  I sat in McDonald’s and tried to look like I had some tea left in my cardboard cup. This was the second time they’d come round and brushed the floor. The other punters were loud and drunk and young, apart from an old guy on his own like me. I wondered why he was sitting here after midnight. He wasn’t scruffy and he didn’t have any bags. Maybe he just couldn’t sleep.

  So. I was down to my last three pounds with seven pence phone credit – not even enough to send a text. The battery was dying anyway and I’d left my charger plugged in at Joe’s. There wasn’t a single place in Belfast where I’d be welcome. Joe’s was out, obviously. If I’d any sense I wouldn’t go near that part of town again.

  Maybe it was time to go home now. I’d run out of options.

  Facing Ricky – not just his anger that I’d assaulted him, but his scorn at me creeping back with my tail between my legs, with nothing to show for my months away except broken friendships and a bad cold – would be horrible. But at least I wouldn’t be sitting in a late-night café with nowhere to go and
all my possessions in a backpack. And God, I felt like shit. I wiped my nose with the scratchy paper napkin, and shivered. I couldn’t stop myself fantasising about arriving home, letting Louise look after me, the coolness of clean sheets, the light warmth of my duvet, all my music and clean clothes and the sparkling kitchen and Sky TV. Maybe Ricky would be away. And I wouldn’t have to stay. I could pick up my ID, get some stuff together, organise a new life somewhere else. Only better this time.

  There was nothing to stay in Belfast for.

  I went to the toilets and saw myself in the mirror: I hadn’t shaved for a few days and I hadn’t washed or combed my hair today; my face was red and sweaty. I looked like a wino. No wonder the police had been suspicious. No wonder Toni had recoiled.

  I never want to see you again. You’re nothing.

  And though the memory was enough to flay the skin off my face, I knew I couldn’t leave Belfast without trying to apologise. Even if it was the last time I ever saw her, I wasn’t just going to disappear.

  Somehow I’d keep myself safe and dry tonight – at least it wasn’t raining – and in the morning I’d find somewhere to wash and shave and make myself look less like a tramp, and I’d go and explain to her. Then I’d busk until I had the fare for Dublin, and then I was out of here.

  I was no stranger to being up all night, but it was usually to party. Staying awake because you’d nowhere to sleep was a whole different thing. The city was alien. When I left McDonald’s at closing time I thought I’d just walk and see what happened. After all, I’d been asleep half the day, though that felt like weeks ago. And as long as I was walking I could tell myself I was a normal person with somewhere to go.

  But my guitar and backpack felt twice as heavy as usual and every step sent waves of pain through my back and legs. Even my skin hurt. Bloody Joe and his germs. Every street was endless. People piled out of clubs, laughing. Lines of taxis crept up to street corners, their headlights stabbing my eyeballs. Everyone had somewhere to go.

  The club crowds dwindled; the streets emptied. A fox dashed across my path, its tail a bright plume under the streetlights. Like Toni’s hair. I wandered vaguely in the direction of Toni’s house, so I wouldn’t have so far to go in the morning. I passed the park, and thought of trying to get in – because that seemed in keeping with being a free-spirited troubadour. It could be a story – Did I ever tell you about the night I slept in a park in Belfast? But the fence was far too high and spiky to climb, especially with a guitar. In the end I found a deep sheltered doorway, the porch of a big old house that had been made into a solicitor’s. I felt self-conscious rolling my sleeping bag out, but that was daft, there wasn’t a sinner about. And I’d slept on the beach a few times, and I liked camping. What was the difference?

  I knew the difference. I was just trying to make it OK with myself. I might be kipping in a doorway with my guitar behind me to keep it safe and my backpack as a pillow – and thank God for my sleeping bag! If Joe’s attic had had a bed and bedclothes I’d be really scuppered now – but only because I was a traveller – a free-spirited troubadour – who hadn’t organised things very well.

  At first it felt good to be lying down. But the doorstep cut into my hips every time I tried to move, and soon the coldness of the ground seeped through my sleeping bag, right into my bones. I couldn’t make my mind switch off. I wondered if Shania was asleep in her own house, with that worried-looking mother crying downstairs. And what would happen to Joe, if he’d be arrested.

  She’s jailbait. Surely if Toni knew why …

  I stuck my head inside my sleeping bag, and somehow, for minutes at a time, I slept, and the minutes joined up until a creeping grey dawn and the rumble of early-morning traffic told me the night was over.

  48

  This time, it was obvious she wasn’t going to invite me in. She didn’t even let me say hello.

  ‘No way,’ she said. ‘You can’t keep messing up and then turning up on my doorstep.’

  ‘I wanted to expl—’

  ‘No.’ She looked me up and down, and the hurt I’d seen in her eyes last night had gone. I saw only anger and disgust and disappointment.

  Mostly disappointment. I’d seen it in enough faces to recognise it.

  I didn’t have the energy any more to try to explain. I half-turned away, my guitar case bashing my leg. ‘Oh,’ I said, ‘I’m leaving town.’

  She shrugged. ‘Nothing’s stopping you.’

  And she slammed the door.

  49

  Nothing’s stopping you, Toni said.

  But she was wrong.

  I had less than a pound.

  I thought of hitching to Dublin but even though I’d washed in a café toilet, dug out a comb and changed out of last night’s clothes that reeked of stale sweat, I didn’t look like someone you’d pick up at the side of the road. I wondered where Anto was. Had he seen Toni? Had she been pleased? Would him being there have made up in any way for me letting her down? If I’d had my wits about me, I could have scrounged a lift back to Dublin with him.

  At least I had my guitar. And if I didn’t earn enough for the bus fare home today, there was always tomorrow. I’d already survived one night. OK, it had been horrible, my hip bones still felt the ache from every time I’d turned over in the night, but nobody had hassled me, no dogs had pissed on me, and I was still here. Alive, if not exactly kicking. If I had to do it again, I could.

  I walked into town. It was much colder today, and every time I stood still shivers nipped my back, so I found a spot in one of the malls, out of the wind. Christmas shopping had started properly. The shops belted out Christmas songs. I had to sing really loudly to try and be heard, but my throat was too raspy to make much noise.

  Two kids in red anoraks stopped beside me. I smiled. They started walking backwards away from me. ‘You’re shite, mister,’ one of them said.

  I stopped smiling.

  * * *

  I nearly didn’t see the paper. And if I hadn’t, if I’d got on that bus and ended up in Dublin, I don’t know what would have happened. Because in Dublin there were places I knew, people I knew, where I could have gone. I probably wouldn’t have ended up sleeping in doorways, but I can guess what other kind of trouble I’d have ended up in.

  Anyway, that’s not what happened. This is.

  50

  Considering how rough my voice was, I didn’t do that badly. Maybe people were full of early Christmas cheer. By mid-afternoon I had nearly ten quid. But my throat was on fire, and my head like a cement mixer, and standing busking all day after a night in a doorway was starting to get to me. Another few quid and I could get on the bus and sleep. What happened when I woke up in Busáras in Dublin, still miles from home, I didn’t let myself think about. And what would happen when I came face-to-face with Ricky I definitely didn’t think about. You can only take so much at a time.

  I needed a break. I gathered up my money, hoisted my backpack onto my back, grabbed my guitar case and looked round the shopping centre. There was a food court upstairs but the thought of dragging everything up the stairs made me shudder, and anyway I didn’t want food, I just wanted to sit down and maybe have a cup of tea. There was a little café opposite the newsagents. It was busy, the only seats left were outside, but I didn’t care as long as I could sit.

  I set my tea on the table, unloaded all my stuff and sank into the small upright wooden chair, trying not to think about the cosy beds all over Belfast that were barred to me through my own stupidity. Even the attic floor at Joe’s – well, I hadn’t lost that through stupidity. However grim things were right now, I knew that helping Shania had been the right thing to do. I wondered briefly if she was OK, but to be honest I was too wrapped up in my own problems.

  I wasn’t really reading the headlines on the papers outside the newsagents. I was sitting there, not focusing on anything, trying not to get too settled because I knew I’d have to get back up and try to earn the rest of the fare. My brain also wasn’t working that
well because I had a fever and hadn’t eaten all day. So when I saw a familiar face and read I WON’T TURN MY BACK ON LOVE RAT NOLAN SAYS LOYAL LOUISE my brain just went Ah, there’s my mam, until the message kicked in.

  ‘Would you mind keeping an eye on my stuff while I run and get a paper?’ I asked one of the women at the next table. She nodded without breaking her conversation with her friend, and I dashed over to get the Irish Sunday Star.

  Most of the front page was about some rugby player who’d been caught with his pants down. The fuzzy picture of Louise, looking rabbity and tired, was quite small; I suppose it had only caught my eye because she was my mum. Under the headline it said, Story on Page 6. My fingers fumbled with the cheap paper, and there it was:

  Louise Callaghan Nolan, wife of pop impresario Ricky Nolan, has spoken on social media of her heartbreak at recent revelations about the mogul’s affair with model Tiffanie Tierney. Louise (39) told Twitter followers, ‘Ricky and I are made for each other & we aren’t gonna let some teenage tramp break us up!’ Nolan (47) denies having an affair with Tierney (19) despite the model’s assertion that she is pregnant with his baby. The couple deny splitting up, but Louise was seen yesterday boarding a flight to Palma de Mallorca, where Nolan has a luxury apartment. Nolan issued a statement saying, ‘Louise and I have not split up.’ However, he had ‘no immediate plans’ to join his wife.

  Louise, who has been married to Nolan for under two years, is the mother of ‘bad boy’ PopIcon winner Ryan ‘Rehab’ Lee, once managed by Nolan. Lee, who has battled addiction, is thought to be abroad but it is not known if Louise plans to join her troubled son.

  I stared at the paper. Why hadn’t I known any of that?

  Because I’d been living in my own world. My own wee world, as they’d say here in Belfast.

  Well, there was no point in busting a gut trying to earn the rest of the bus fare. No point going back to Dublin if Ricky was in the house without Mum. I couldn’t even imagine him letting me in to get my stuff.