I stared horrified at him, but it was too late – Sappho had already enthusiastically demanded my presence on the Oxford High Street that Saturday morning. My fate was sealed.
“I can’t afford anything too expensive,” I warned her.
But she obviously considered £300 for a dress on the cheaper side. In the designer boutique she took me to, she pushed aside ones that had £1,000 to £10, 000 price tags on (I kept re-looking at the very discreet labels sure that I must have somehow imagined an extra nought or two) and plucked out their plebs range (£300 – £900). She sat in the very large, very beautifully appointed dressing room and stared thoughtfully at me, making me turn slowly round and round in dress after dress and barking orders about putting my shoulders back. Finally she announced she was satisfied. “That one,” she decided on my behalf.
I panicked. “Are you sure, Sappho? Really?”
She nodded. “You won’t be able to wear a bra with it of course, but you don’t need to wear a bra, you’re very neat and pert in that department.”
I wasn’t convinced I’d be able to wear knickers in it either. Bloody hell, it had no back right down nearly to my bum! It clasped around my neck and then swooped down open backed. The front was all loose drapes that swept to one side at my hip, and from there swept on downwards to finish just above my knee on the opposite side, leaving the other leg exposed to the top of the thigh. It was in a smoky green that they referred to as ‘larch’.
“Are you sure it won’t just slip sideways off me in some horribly public embarrassing fiasco?” I sought desperately for more reassurance.
Sappho giggled for a moment, which wasn’t at all reassuring. Then she showed me how the body of the drapes were all stitched firmly in place into a hidden belt around my waist, and the fall of the skirt was cleverly kept in order the same way so couldn’t slip round to expose my derrière like a souped-up hospital gown.
“Shame you’ve got such short hair,” She bemoaned. “It really needs finishing off with your hair piled up.”
“It’s just easier with the sort of work I’m in,” I excused myself. “I can just wash it and leave it. I used to have it really long but it just takes so much faffing!”
“I suppose it looks sort of cute in a page-boy,” she sighed, but her expression was still disapproving. “Ok, shoes and accessories now.”
My heart sank. Just as well I was getting paid a lot more now. Because I could see my credit card was going to be suffering today.
I nearly refused to go in backstage, I was so embarrassed about appearing in front of Quinn and Nish and my brother looking like this. Surely this was too over the top for an occasion like this? Sappho gave me a shove in the back, and I nearly tripped through the door. She hadn’t put me in stilettos as I’d expected, but high heeled wedges with a strappy front that laced up my calf almost like a gladiator’s sandal. She’d put a high choker round my neck, dangly earrings in my ears and a torque around my upper left arm that effectively hid the knife scar. She’d put me in pale pearly lipstick and done the rest of my make-up rather like my old school friends used to but making my eyes more almond and cat-like, and horror of horrors, she’d insisted on painting my toe and fingernails in a pale pearly pink to match my lipstick. I had to trust that she knew what she was doing and wasn’t just taking the piss out of me, but I wasn’t one hundred percent sure. Mind you, her own outfit was fairly extraordinary, in shimmering purple, so it wasn’t like she wasn’t joining in.
I’d forgotten about Kes. He was the first person to turn round and see me trying to make myself invisible at the door while Sappho danced confidently in. I suppose she could afford to be confident, she must be used to men being completely hypnotised by her. Kes whistled flatteringly at me, and came forward to greet me. I was so relieved. I trusted Kes. If he thought I looked good then I probably did.
“God, Kes, I feel like an idiot in this gear, but Sappho insisted on playing Barbie dolls with me!”
Kes’s eyes were kind. He knew I was asking for reassurance. “You look great, Eve, honestly… Sappho knows what she’s talking about with the set she hangs out with. You’ll be fine.”
It was what I needed to hear apart from his obvious close acquaintance with Sappho. That meant she’d been in their company a great deal, which could only mean one thing…
Jamie kind of stared weirdly at me. Tianna his girlfriend came and introduced herself saying she couldn’t think why we hadn’t met before. She had a sleek bob of a haircut herself cut high at the back, with dyed purple stripes running through the black. Plus heavy eye make-up and that many layered style of dressing with what looks like several skirts and tops and waistcoats at once in contrasting colours and patterns. She had massive black wedges as shoes with sparkly purple toes on them. Plus enormous rings with skulls and big semi-precious stones and lots of dangly bracelets. Jamie’s hair was even spikier than I’d last seen it and his outfit even more out there, so her influence was obviously continuing.
Nish turned round and scanned the room for me once he’d clocked that his sister had arrived. He looked dead amused once he’d spotted me and I felt the heat suffuse into my cheeks. He himself was in a simple purple silk shirt with long sleeves, and black trousers. I wondered if Sappho had picked the shirt out, as it was the same colour as her dress.
Quinn crept up behind me. “Hello,” he murmured into my ear. “I see you’ve bought a new outfit at last.”
I jumped away, startled. He smiled and looked me up and down. “And going commando underneath I see,” he teased, “very brave!”
By now I’m sure my cheeks were scarlet. Honestly! One quick glance and he knew if a girl had underwear on! He ran a hand down my exposed spine from the nape of my neck to the small of my back and then up again, and smiled into my eyes. I blinked and took a deep breath. I’d been so angry with him recently, that since he’d asked me out I still hadn’t managed to feel any sexual attraction to him, which had seemed a bit of an odd situation to be in when facing a potential boyfriend. Unless you were Jo of course. But I wasn’t Jo.
Given the fact that when they first formed the band Jamie had ordered Quinn to rein in his outrageous outfits, I was somewhat surprised to find out how dressy the whole band had become. Although Quinn had ditched the male basques and Elizabethan ruffs and such-like, he still managed to look strikingly distinctive. His mass of wiry dark curls was arranged now into decorative swirls of cornrow plaits with the remainder tied up at the back in a tight bun. He’d left dark designer stubble growing. He had a slashed flowing shirt, with similar designer slashes in his tight black jeans that showed blood red silk behind. His bright red leather flat soled boots had contrasting black zips and laces in them, and to top off the whole he wore a dashing long red leather coat in an eighteenth century military cut, with huge black buttons.
I took a sharp step back to put some distance between us, then someone interrupted to ask Quinn something urgent, and I retreated to safety with Nish.
“I can’t rescue you tonight, Eve,” he warned with a slight smile as I appeared at his side. “I’ve got to do my bit on stage…”
“Have they set out a defined role for you tonight?” I asked, putting just one finger into the palm of his hand. He obligingly curled his hand around it.
“Only sort of – it’s all a bit loose…” He answered.
“God, that sounds terrifying to me,” I exclaimed. “On stage in front of all those people with no defined role?”
“Thanks for that, Eve,” he said wryly, “you’re really helping…”
I bit my lip. “Sorry!”
He looked sideways at me. “That’s your problem isn’t it? You can’t cope if you’ve no defined role…”
I frowned. “God, you’re right Nish! I’d never noticed that! Give me a stool at the race wall any time…”
He looked teasingly at me. “How about a defined role as Quinn’s girlfriend?”
I didn’t answer.
“You don’t need to look so
scared! What’s the problem? You used to be really easy with each other, and really physical, and now you stiffen whenever he comes anywhere near you!”
I shrugged.
“I used to get the impression that you two belonged to each other big time,” Nish observed.
I looked for a long moment at him. “Yeah, everyone seems to think that…”
“Everyone except you?” Nish suggested.
I lowered my eyes and didn’t answer.
“Shoulders back,” Sappho ordered, poking me. Then she said, “Time to go round the front, the boys have to go on in a few minutes.” She smiled at her brother. “Good luck!” Then she dragged me off round into the main auditorium where a huge group of her friends were waiting for her.
I was a bit gobsmacked by the enormous space that was full to bursting with mainly young people. Thirteen to thirty demographic. Probably lots of them Uni students. And it seemed it was the thing to dress up for Full Frontal gigs. There were some extraordinary styles strutting around out there. There was yelling and clapping and even a bit of screaming when the band came on. By a few songs in I realised where a lot of the band’s money must be going. They must be ploughing it all back in to equipment – lighting and such like. It was a far cry from their grubby pub era with dodgy feedback. It was like being at a proper performance. By that I mean, it was a proper performance. Professional. And Quinn was reeling them all in with his usual inimitable style. People were up and dancing and cheering whenever he announced the next song or an enthusiastic roar would go up as the first notes started as though the audience actually already knew the songs. Jamie, these days, seemed to have moved over to a sort of keyboard come computer that wove really complicated effects into the music, only occasionally reaching for his bass guitar. Quinn’s voice sewed a pattern in and out, and Nish’s voice soared above it all, or harmonised with Quinn’s. Kes was stunning on the lead guitar, occasionally joined by Quinn on his own. Sometimes Nish picked up his saxophone and made some startling additions. They didn’t have a break, just went right through. Near the end, Quinn announced, “We have a special treat for you all tonight – first of all, as you know – it’s Anish Gilbraith’s first live performance with us during his down time from being a Formula One driver, so we thought we’d perform ‘Squawk’ for you, and as an extra special surprise we’ve also got the actual squawk with us… Come on up, Ginty!”
My jaw dropped and he laughed at me, his eyes sparkling mischievously across the space between us. The bastard!
“Come on, Ginty! Or do I have to come and get you?” He challenged.
As I stood, frozen to the spot, the packed audience started chanting, “Eve! We want Eve McGinty!”
Quinn jumped lightly down from the stage and physically picked me up and dumped me on the edge of the stage. Then he hopped back up and to roars of laughter round the auditorium, pulled me to my feet and dragged me by my wrist over to his microphone. He held me there with a firm encircling arm around my waist. “Here she is. And I warn you – she hasn’t got a musical gene in her body! So this is what I want you to do, Eve,” he instructed me in front of everyone. “When I poke you, you make a real loud squawk, and if no noise comes out, I’ll get a cattle prod, and then you really will squawk. Understood?”
Bastard! I thought again. But I can’t refuse to do it and ruin their gig. He knows he’s got me over a barrel now. I stared out over the auditorium. You couldn’t see the audience out there most of the time, the lights were in your eyes and it was really hot up here, but every now and again a beam would rake across the surface revealing face after upturned face. I tried to remember how the finished track had sounded – I’d only heard it the once at Nish’s. The worrying thing was that I seemed to remember that my squawk came first.
“So, off you go, Ginty,” Quinn instructed. “Give us a squawk!”
I stared frozenly at him, completely unable to open my mouth to make a sound.
“For fuck’s sake sis, just make a fucking noise!” Jamie shouted across at me.
I turned sharply, “Piss off little bro!” And I raised a deliberate middle finger to him.
Everyone started laughing.
“Feeling the love, sis,” Jamie drawled.
I turned to the audience. “How many of you have little brothers?” I asked into Quinn’s microphone. “Put your hand up if you have a little brother!”
Loads of hands were waving back at me. “Bloody annoying, aren’t they?” I announced.
There was general laughter and shouting back at me.
“Ok, Ginty, ready this time?” Quinn queried with a grin. “Every time I squeeze you, you let out a real good squawk!” He held me back against me, his front burning hot against my cool bare back and his arms tight round my waist. “Ok, off you go!” And he squeezed me tight. This time I was ready, took in a deep breath and let out the most almighty discordant noise.
“Blimey, Ginty!” Quinn laughed and winced at the same time, raising one finger into his nearest ear, “That could cut glass!” And the band broke into the song.
Every time Quinn squeezed me, I dutifully let out some horrible noise and unlike in the original track, each time I did it, he made up some increasingly ridiculous and critical remark about it, reducing the audience to helpless fits of laughter. Once or twice even Nish had trouble blowing the right note into his sax as he got the giggles and became distinctly wobbly.
Finally Quinn allowed me to escape after forcing me to take a bow, and then some bloke in the front row helped me down off the stage and the people that were squashed up hard against the front leaned over to high five me. I was so not ever coming to a Full Frontal gig again!
The only eating place open after the gig was over was an Indian restaurant, which stayed open until two. The band, the guys who volunteered as roadies, and the various sisters and girlfriends, all piled in, and I had an opportunity to get to know the other band members who I only vaguely remembered from Jamie’s college days, and some of their partners. Apparently Danny the drummer from their B.S.E. days had decided it wasn’t his sort of thing and parted company to join a Country and Western band. Kes was single again. It had fizzled out with the last girl who he’d been mad about for a bit. But no bitterness, he assured me. It just died a natural death. Quinn sat beside me and fingered my bare leg under the table, running his hand slowly up and down. And if he wasn’t doing that he was running a finger up my back again, or along my bare forearm. I concentrated on ignoring him, but it quite hard to do that with the effect it was having on me.
Sappho was sitting opposite him and she was exercising herself to get his attention. Flirting, attempting to press knees under the table. I could see he was finding it hard to know how to deal with it. Presumably he hadn’t seen her since my ultimatum to him, and she was expecting a certain outcome to the evening. He tried to keep her happy by smiling in a measured way at her and tilting his head towards her in acknowledgement of things she said, but she was gradually getting the message and she wasn’t liking it. I excused myself to go to the toilet. Jamie bumped into me on the stairs coming back from a similar mission.
“For God’s sake just screw the guy, will you?” He threw at me. “He’s driving us crazy!”
“Piss off, Jamie, it’s nothing to do with you!” I snapped.
“I don’t know why you didn’t get it over and done with when you were sixteen,” he asserted. “Then at least we might have got some peace and quiet.”
I went to push past him, then stopped and turned back. “How many girls has he slept with over the past couple of months?” I asked.
Jamie frowned. Then he frowned some more. “Now you come to mention it…” He was silent for another long moment. “Not that we’ve been together very much, not like when we’re on tour…” He mused. “Nope,” he concluded at last, “can’t think of a time I’ve seen him heading off with anyone recently.” He looked at my expression then rolled his eyes. “Honestly Eve, you’ve got his balls in a pair of nut crackers hav
en’t you? You’re a fucking menace! Either sleep with the guy or give him the final heave-ho. Just put him out of his misery, will you? Surely nineteen odd years is punishment enough?” He turned to go.
“Are you going home for Christmas?” I asked suddenly.
He pulled a face.
“I know it’s fairly awful,” I agreed. “But if we turn up at Christmas, then we can stay away the rest of the year. It’s a small thing to do for them…”
Jamie sighed heavily. “I just hate the cow, that’s all…”
I stared at him. “You always seemed to get on ok with her! I was quite jealous of how blasé you seemed about her when I was so wound up…”
He shrugged.
Odd really. I’d come round to her myself. She’d been really kind to Kathleen Quinn when she was dying, by all accounts. She’d helped out looking after the orphaned smaller Quinns. She was coping pretty well with the rigours of caring for such a disabled child. And most of all, if she made my dad happy, then what else could we ask for? That was the most important thing.
Turned out Nish had been designated as the driver of the band van as he didn’t drink.
“So how do we get his car home?” I enquired practically.
Apparently, in my absence, it had been voted that I’d be driving Nish’s car home for him. I glanced at him.
“You’re still on the insurance,” he informed me with a resigned look on his face. “Thought it might still come in useful sometime.”
Even worse, it turned out that my only passenger was going to be Quinn. Ok, so I knew which way the evening was heading then. More than a little stage managing from a certain source was clear. I got into the driver’s seat and slammed the door. Nish came over and leaned in through the open window and raised an admonishing finger to me. His eyes warned me that I wasn’t to take it out on his car, whatever happened between me and Quinn on the way home. I gritted my teeth as Quinn cheerfully slid into the passenger seat. I drove us away.
The Way Back (Not Quite Eden Book 6) Page 42