Robert wanders to the bar. “And where are you girls headed?”
The three girls turn their heads to face him, revealing their synchronised straw drinking. All three are beautiful; they have no need to explain themselves to him so no reply is offered.
“Cat got your tongues?” Well-done sisters.
I am the last to step outside. I just see Robert’s back as he strides up the street. A pedestrian area opens up ahead and a river gushes underneath us. Robert pulls the group onwards to the main town square. When I catch up they are in a queue of fifteen people, mostly women, trying to get into the Café Blanche. Music and heat escape with each departing group from its ornate pink metal-framed doors.
We shuffle forward. The club thumps. I am in no hurry to get in, although it doesn’t take long. Inside my men now seem meek and mild. They seem to be lustily appraising female limbs around us.
I see Robert at the bar with Dan. He is mouthing, “Where’s our pussy?” but knows I can’t possibly hear him over the intense French rap. He stands on the bar footrest reaching back towards me to get the money. Robert the Supreme Being is back, as he bounces stupidly like an ape.
We ascend the spiral staircase to the source of the music on the first floor. I inadvertently brush my white-wine spritzer onto the midriff of an olive-skinned girl as I reach the top step, causing her to jump. I apologise and she ignores me. The boys are in a semi-circle in front of me: Robert, Max, Dan and Steve all seem to receive a cheap thrill from my contact.
A DJ stands behind a small pedestal, one headphone clutched to an ear, listening to his own re-mix. A sign advertising himself as Josef hangs over his head. A group of about twenty people bump along lazily to his current groove.
I re-imagine old school discos with spotty boys prowling around without the mettle to ask me to dance. I feel the tension of exclusion felt by these even weaker men. They try to project attitude to the feminine beauty in front of them. They try to feign disinterest before they can be disregarded. Four of these boys are married, one is to be betrothed in seven days’ time and one is a creepy megalomaniac. Yet all stare with intent at the dance floor, imagining improbable liaisons. There is no approval for them here, the throng boogie on regardless. I feel a trace of pity for them. I am cheapened by my presence here.
Robert must think that to be alpha-male he has to break rank. He must conquer womanhood. He looks for no support; but unleashes himself on the cheapest smuttiest looking pair of girls. They laugh at his first approach, whispering to each other as he dances alone. They can mock so much; his 1980s’ haircut, his lack of style. He makes it so easy for them to ridicule him with his dancing. I hope to witness rejection but no, they are straight-faced now and accept his intrusion. The youngest and prettiest one dances with him. The other moves aside. This is not right.
He conquered without a word; he put himself out there, having chosen his prey well. His armoury was confidence and the smell of money. Maybe to gold-diggers he fits an acceptable profile: no style but branded by Gucci loafers and his top-of-the-range Cartier watch. He pushes himself towards her ear as he had done with me earlier, slithering his hands onto her waist. She pushes her chin up to accept his kiss on her neck. I hate this woman; she has kept the merry-go-round turning, offering comfort to the other losers.
I had been staring so hard at Robert that I missed the shift of focus. The other stags are reminded of their libidos. Chris is smiling vacantly just thrilled to be near a woman. Max is thinking, maybe she might succumb. Steve is salivating. Even Johnny seems to have a lump in his trousers. They are seeing me as meat now. They all want something. Is it me or is every eye looking towards my breasts; I feel cheap for having any cleavage on show. Could Ethan be a part of this brotherhood? I feel sick in my throat.
Dan should stand apart. I know he isn’t like this but he just looks meekly towards me.
“Would you like to dance?” Max pushes his hand into mine and sneaks an arm over my shoulder. His tone is smooth. I shake my head.
“Come on Jules,” he tries again. I look to Dan in obvious discomfort.
Through his inaction I now see no difference for his years. He is strikingly the same; without the means to react, to impose himself. Say something Dan. Show me that you are ready to take this step forward. But I know this face. He looks wistful, dreaming that it will be better tomorrow so that he doesn’t have to confront today. How will I be able to reach this boy?
“I have to go, I am not well.” I push my glass into Max’s expectant hand and turn back towards the staircase to leave alone. I am afraid for Dan.
FRIDAY 17TH APRIL 2009
CHAPTER 21
Dan 06.41
Bepe is running and laughing through verdant hills; giggling prey to his father’s mock chase. He runs toward the magic windmill. Each step shudders his body, his young locked knees creating halting progress. He turns his head and squeals as the chase seems to be ending, but every time his father allows him to elude his sweeping capture. The Teletubbies play their part, distracting Dan in this game of “Run Away”. Bepe finds La La and hides behind her rotund belly for a few moments, before darting off in another direction. Pollen, wet earth and grass invade Dan’s nostrils as he determines to finally make a real capture. “Time for tubby bye-bye, Time for tubby bye-bye” lilts the echoing announcement. Bepe runs towards Po, tripping her up with one foot hooked around her ankle; she cries as she falls. He shoots his Scooby Doo gun at Dipsy and Tinky Winky; they give a Teletubby shriek as they both get jammed trying to escape down the same rabbit hole. Bepe is now pistolwhipping the fallen Po with no remorse as he tries to get to his feet. All four make a desperate escape underground as the baby sun looks down scornfully.
Bepe leads Daniel to a picture-perfect picnic on one of the many hillsides. A tartan blanket is spread out with sandwiches, jelly and cake in abundance. Bepe tucks into the strawberry jelly first, using his hands. Splashes of jelly stick to his face and wobble. Daniel takes egg sandwiches from the platter in front of him. As he chews he gets a shooting pain in his mouth. He looks down to his orange plastic plate and sees two of his own incisors lying on the bread. Blood lines his bite from the sandwich. He takes another bite in defiance but the bread, mayonnaise and hard-boiled egg mix with three molars and two front teeth in his mouth. As he can’t swallow safely he spits the bloody contents of his mouth onto the manicured grass; blood spatters onto a nearby daisy. Daniel reaches for Bepe with blood covering his hands, his mouth devoid of teeth and dripping with blood enriched saliva. He starts to wipe the jelly from Bepe’s face but only spreads the bloody mess. “Diddy hurt, get plaster,” Bepe worryingly observes his father. Dan looks up to see Sophia standing frowning alongside the four Teletubbies, all of them with arms crossed.
Again I am awoken by a frantic dream. Thursday started with a bang on my head, Friday starts with a gasp for air. I am dreaming so vividly but it is not hard to understand why. Bepe looms large in every thought. At the moment I feel so close to him, we are apart.
The room smells rank from my unwashed brother Chris. I look over to see his naked bottom exposed by a single sheet. We never did lower that heating and it is raging again now. I see the half-eaten remains of a McDonalds burger on the cabinet, witness to our hunger on the way home from the bar last night. Robert continued his weekend of my embarrassment by offering me the sexual services of his new partner’s friend. I could not tell if they were paid for their services. He looked so camp as he swung his paper burger bag at me and stormed out with a lady on each arm. Why did Juliet leave so early? Why did we all let her leave alone?
I shower with vigour to wash off some of the negativity of the first two days here. I dress eagerly today, in anticipation of enjoying today on the snow. My guitar case is still bulging with the extra clothes I brought, even after I have selected my favourite corduroy shirt to inelegantly accompany my sweaty salopettes.
I open the balcony door handle with an inelegant clunk, but it doesn’t wake the reeking Chris
; I pray he washes today. This is another chance to further Bepe’s list. Further noise accompanies my repositioning of the heavy wooden balcony chair. I am overlooking the railway bridge I called home from last night. With the mystique of the mist removed, I can now see that the second Chamonix train station serves a tram with red carriages that winds up the mountainside. A fresh coolness descends from upon high; today’s weather has yet to come over the mountain.
As I flick through the list again I feel liberated and restricted. Liberated to make some positive choices but restricted that these seven are to stand for a life spent listening. Will they collectively mean anything? Will they feel like the spine of my life when they are chosen?
Number 5 “This Charming Man” by the Smiths.
Morrissey seemingly asks on behalf of both of us if nature will make men of us. His apparent bashfulness always made me feel comparatively strong; reminding me that I did have some good qualities, whatever they were. This was my signature tune for the decade, the heavily rotated soundtrack to my first real job, as a copy checker at the Chester Chronicle. Max knew someone high up there so got me an interview. Life seemed to be taking shape again on my terms after London and this happy-go-lucky tune fitted perfectly. The lyrics resonated with my previously troubled northern soul.
I had come back north with my tail between my legs. It was as if London just spat me out. My college friends were now scattered back across the country. Having been rejected from numerous jobs in London, I could not live on the state and have a life. In contrast I loved the small city mentality and youthful optimism of Chester, all played out under its Roman walls. It seemed a warming antidote to the harshness of the big city. Why didn’t Morrissey have a stitch to wear though? I never understood what he meant about returning the rings; I always assumed that it would just make sense to me one day but it never has. I do hope Bepe and I can live a life of being interested in each other’s music. Don’t judge your dad’s taste too harshly when you listen to them in years to come Bepe; I was a child of my time.
CHAPTER 22
Dan 10.11
The helicopter blades chop insistently at the air above me, releasing a metallic roar into the valley. This unnatural sky-high platform must have heavenly views of the mountain massif, reaching across Italy, France and Switzerland. For a few moments it is the lord of this place; with nothing higher it flaunts its power. What a great vantage point to look into the souls of the people inhabiting the valley.
Juliet doesn’t need to stare into my soul from above. She can usually see my truth, the one I always mask. Can she see that I have Sophia’s love but it is without passion? I am sure that the flavour of my love would not delight her palate. How to describe it? If my love for Sophia were an ice cream, Juliet’s tongue would push expectantly towards the cone, eyes closed, expecting the refreshing flavour burst of lemon sorbet, but getting the confused disappointment of Tutti Frutti.
Our group is gathered but apart. We have no option but to wait as Aldo is ten minutes late at the designated meeting point. Skiers have to squeeze past us, as we are awkwardly accumulated beside the ski lift. Kronk our resident Dutch giant and Mari Elena stand separately away from the four of us.
“Your ski suit is really nice, what make is it?” Juliet reaches across the divide to ease the discomfort of the young girl. How does this generosity of spirit come so easily to women? They dissolve boundaries of age or any chance of competition with a pure well-meant exchange of views on ski suits. A flurry of fashion information allows them to sympathetically climb inside each other’s lives.
I stand unsure that I can prove myself again. Will I fall today? Will it matter if I do? I am taken back to my first days working as a copywriter for Max, holed up in a one-room office above a pastry shop on Eastgate Street. Every time he passed on a new client brief to me I would sit frozen over a blank sheet of A4 paper. Thoughts would come quickly, but my perverse desire to write something memorable would make me tragically halt. I would keep clicking my pen top back on just when I thought I had a breakthrough. I would be paralysed for days, clinging on to the comforting smell of sausage rolls from below, hoping that Max stayed away and failed to get more clients that I couldn’t write any copy for.
It was my lack of productivity that made Max insist that I started to call anyone I knew who could possibly give us any business. I remembered Sophia, one of Juliet’s friends from college, had an Italian family shoe business with shops in Manchester. I called her at home, having plucked up the courage to get the number from their office. She was genuinely pleased I had called and we talked for an hour and a half; I couldn’t find the point to interject the real reason for my call without hurting her feelings.
We met in Manchester but it took six more nights out before I could ask without it seeming callous. At last in Henry’s bar I asked if I could approach her father to talk business, but she instantly suspected an ulterior motive. Seriousness descended upon her face. I now know that she thought that it was an elaborate way for me to move the relationship on to the next level and meet her family. She respected my apparent directness. On a battered green studded leather couch she leant over to kiss me with a determination I had never felt before. I got the meeting with her dad after a five-course Sunday dinner at her house with every relative they could dig up. Importantly Centurion got its first reasonable client. Suddenly I could write just enough to justify my existence at work. Years later she gets to marry me.
“We move away from here!” Aldo has arrived without apology and signals us away from the ski lift. We line up in front of him further down the run.
“Ciao everybody. We don’t have much time but maybe we stop for coffee in an hour so we meet each other. Everyone has good night? Everybody has boots closed?” He looks at me with affection and ridicule smirked across his face.
“Okay today we try more pizzas but start to ski parallel with two skis. We move un-weighted ski in to join weighted ski. Everyone okay? I show you.”
And so the procession leads off again leaving me last in line. I wonder if my emergent ski ability will have been erased overnight. I will wait for the first edge to engage before I believe I can still do this. If you think too hard there is no logic to having control on skis. I try to walk through the ski turn in my mind, you can do it, you can do it. Hip to the hill, shoulder to the valley. I attend to the permanent running of my nose, using the integrated nose wiper on my gloves.
Just let me go please. When I am instructed to follow I defy my instincts and push my body forwards towards the snow. I scratch unconvincingly around my first turn. Carving the omnipresent snow crystals, I nervously imagine each one is only a light beam away from extinction. I am sucking in air, flying into space. Growing willpower is defeating my logical fears. However, hypercritical self-judgement follows in my tracks. How fast am I going? How smooth was that turn? How do I look? Leave me in peace to ski.
“Here comes the beach boy,” Aldo greets my arrival. “Good stag, you are forward more, we allow the ski to do the work. Skis close to parallel, good, good.” I am getting somewhere. Juliet seems much quieter today. After three more practice runs we move on to Aldo’s proposed coffee break; I admire his Italian lack of urgency.
Johnny and I take our coffee from a hole in the wall of the on-piste restaurant.
“You really came on there mate,” he says with surprise obvious in his voice.
“You are not so bad yourself. I wish we could just keep going now.” My praise tries to deflect what I think is true. I can ski.
“How is the track listing coming?”
“It’s almost signed, sealed and delivered,” I confidently pronounce, revealing the five tracks to date like I am presenting an Oscar.
“Great choice, but there are so many essential artists to fit in. What about Kraftwerk, New Order, The Beatles, I could go on.” Johnny remains impressed that I can pin down such a mammoth task. He would never do it just in case any of the artists found out about their exclusion.
“Maybe I will start listing some other stuff for him, things I have done, places I have been and so on. I am going to make him proud of me one day.” I speculate.
“I have been meaning to tell you something exciting. I think I am close to getting a record deal. Would you believe it, Rough Trade is interested?” I had been so wrapped up in my drama that we had not even talked about him in the two days we have been here.
“They are still going strong, with Arcade Fire and Jarvis Cocker and such like.” He continues in unnecessary justification of their impeccable pedigree.
“That’s fantastic mate, after all these years it might happen for you.” Johnny has written songs all his life and they have kept his dream alive. I can’t stop a pang of raw jealousy that he might step out of our shared world of fandom.
“I will find out next week I think. You can be my road manager if you want.”
“Maybe mate, but I probably have to hold down the nine to five grind now I am getting married.” I keep falling into the middle-class plot that Joe Strummer so openly exposed.
Fourteen ski boots click clack back into their skis, prefacing our return to the lesson. I make sure I stick closer to Aldo, as the plateau becomes a slope again.
“Don’t get too big for those boots Dan.” Juliet smacks my bottom gently with her ski pole and gracefully slides by to where Aldo has stopped. This is the top of the run I fell down, but with sun on the slopes and my ability on the rise I look forward to taking the test again.
“This is red slope, but we can all do this no? Keep behind my line and we will be okay.” That means we must stay away from the ice. Aldo skis over the lip Juliet had paused at yesterday and I follow them both this time. Push forward, weight on one ski. The danger is much reduced as my edges bite the snow and I can see well. The point of my fall is now acknowledged as a danger spot, guarded by two crossed poles dug into the snow. This is yet more vindication that the conditions, not my ability, defeated me twenty-four hours ago. The three of us stop with the lift in sight.
Snow Blind Page 11