The place the label had set us up in, near the West London studios, were too big for us once Tom and Billy had moved out, so we had found places of our own. Both of us unknowingly bought penthouse apartments in the same building, just five minutes from where our own place was being built in the Docklands redevelopment area of East London.
We spent a bit of time together through the summer, working on new material, but things didn’t really begin to thaw completely between us until we got back into the studio in early September. Maca was still pretty quiet and withdrawn. I knew just from the limited time I’d been in his company that he was smoking a lot of weed. I mean, don’t get me wrong, I’m not trying to promote drug use. It was something I’d done since I was about thirteen, before I even met Maca I think, but yeah, all things in moderation. You need to be able to function and when we first got into the studio, I really think he was only just hanging on.
And then he met Carla.
Chapter Twelve
1987
The first day in the studio we were introduced to the team. The place Len had found for us was in a leafy suburb of London, not too far from Hampstead Heath. It was a brand new set up and we would be using state of the art digital technology, a lot of which was all new to us. The two sound engineers were a brother and sister team called Max and Lydia. We’d never worked with them before, but Len assured us that they knew our work and were the best in the business with the new equipment now available. Trevor and Nile were our usual producers, and we had every faith in them coming up with the sounds we were hoping to create.
We were introduced to a few office and backroom staff, and then we were introduced to Carla. She was a newly qualified sound and recording engineer who had been taken on by Max and Lydia. She was straight out of university and looked like a pixie.
No tracks were laid down the first week. They rarely were with us. We spent the time getting our sound tight, Maca working on his voice and listening to playbacks.
During that time, Carla was in and out of the live room with drinks and food for us, and I had noticed Maca watching her.
She was cute, don’t get me wrong, just not my type; short, and really petite, with an almost androgynous body. No curves, no tits, and spikey blonde hair. She told us that she was twenty-three, but she looked twelve. As far removed from my sister as you could get, really. Perhaps for Maca, that was the appeal.
On the Friday at the end of our first week, Max suggested we all go to the pub together and we ended up at The Spaniards Inn. It was a beautiful evening and we were able to get a table out in the beer garden and enjoy some late summer sun.
Drinks were drunk, conversations flowed, and we all learned a little bit about each other.
Max and Lydia were in fact twins. Their dad was a well-known session musician who had played with some of the biggest bands in the world over the years.
Max, it turned out, was married to Nile’s sister, Nicole, who joined us with their two kids an hour after we arrived at the pub.
It felt good to be in a crowd of people who just accepted you for who you were. No bullshit, no pretences. No one wanted to touch us or have us sign parts of their bodies. It was like being with family and I suddenly felt very homesick.
Over the coming weeks, it became a regular thing for us to all have a drink together on a Friday, and at first, I enjoyed sitting back, watching Maca and Carla get closer. After a while though, I noticed that she was a little bit flirty with all the blokes; single, married, she didn’t care. It was almost like she was just after someone, anyone, even me, and it made me uncomfortable. Maca wore his heart on his sleeve and the last thing he needed was to get his heart broken again.
Max, Trevor, and Len had all given Maca the ‘Don’t shit on your own doorstep’ talk. I still wasn’t exactly sure what was happening between the two of them. I’m not sure if it was because of George that he didn’t confide in me, but we could all see that Maca was happier. Despite that, I still had my reservations. Call it gut instinct. There was just something about the girl I didn’t like.
That year, Georgia’s birthday passed without a mention of it from Maca. I sent her a card and a Beastie Boys T-shirt that I’d managed to get signed for her. Jimmie passed on her thanks and a message to say that she loved it.
By mid-October, the album was finished and Maca and I had moved into our new place together in Docklands.
Although I knew he was seeing Carla, he never brought her back to our shared apartment. I’m not sure how serious things were between them at that point, but I knew for a fact he wasn’t seeing her exclusively. She was a distraction, I got it, but I did feel a bit sorry for the girl, even if I didn’t like her. By the end of our time in the studio, it was obvious to everyone that she had a massive crush on him, but I wasn’t sure how deep his feelings went for her, or how at that stage he was feeling about Georgia.
We were lying in front of the telly at home one Sunday night when Jim and Len came around.
“Big brother Lennon, to what do we owe this pleasure?” I asked as he shoved a nicely chilled bottle of Bolli into my hand.
“Come to ask a favour, bro,” is all he said before sitting down and muting the sound with the remote control.
“What the fuck, Len? Make yourself at home, mate.” Maca sat up complaining. Jimmie sat down on the sofa next to him.
“Thanks, Maca, I will.” Len winked as he spoke.
I got us all a beer from the fridge and called out to Jim, asking if she wanted me to crack open the bubbly. “Well that depends on your answer to our question,” she called back. “A beer will do for now.” I brought her a beer and went and sat on the opposite sofa with my brother.
“What’s up then? Spill the beans,” I told them both.
“The wedding’s all booked for the 3rd of June, 1989,” Jim said with a smile.
“Congratulations,” Maca and I said in unison, all of us raising our bottles in a toast.
“I’ve asked Bailey to be my best man.” Len added. I felt a little stab of jealousy, but that was just a long-held sibling rivalry issue. I knew that as the older brother, it was only right that Bailey was best man.
“But we’d like you two to be groomsmen.” Len quickly added.
“Of course, it’d be my pleasure,” I told them both, having no idea what a groomsman was, but happy to be given a role.
It was quiet for a few seconds and I just knew there was a ‘but’ coming. I watched Jimmie flick her dark hair over her shoulder and lick her lips. She was nervous. I’d known the girl since we were in playschool, and I knew when she was shitting herself about something.
“Maca?” She looked at him, waiting for his answer.
“It’d be my absolute pleasure to be a part of your wedding, but I totally understand if you change your minds about me being there. I don’t wanna cause you issues with other members of your families.”
Of course, Georgia.
“It’s not a problem for Georgia. She understands that we obviously want you all there with us and she’s good with that,” Jimmie reassured him.
“That’s not the sort of thing Gia would say. Tell me honestly, Jim, how’s she really feeling about it?” Maca asked.
She looked between the both of us.
“She’s promised to make an effort to get things back on track between her and Marley before the wedding.” She smiled and looked at me as she talked, and I swallowed down the lump in my throat. I promised my mum I would go home for Christmas that year. Perhaps that would be a good time to start building bridges.
“And what about me?” Maca asked again. “How does she feel about seeing me there?”
Jim takes a swig of her beer, looking at Len for guidance, and when he gave his head a small nod, she looked at Maca.
“She said that for me, she could do it. To give me the day that I want, she would be able to deal with being around you, just for one day.”
“Well that makes me feel wanted.” I felt so sorry for him in that moment
and pissed off with my sister.
“All I ask is that she doesn’t take anyone else with her,” Maca requested.
“What?” Len and Jimmie asked at the same time.
“A bloke, whoever she’s seeing. Ask her, from me, if she could just come on her own.” His eyes looked around to each of us. “I don’t think I could handle seeing her with another bloke,” he told us honestly.
“Maca, you have got to be kidding me? She doesn’t go anywhere to meet blokes. She goes to work and the gym, that’s it. That’s her life. She goes nowhere, sees no one. She doesn’t see any of her friends. Well, in all honesty, she doesn’t really have any friends outside of us.” Jimmie turned her gaze solely on Maca as she spoke. “When you did what you did, not only did she lose you and Marley, but in a way she lost me and Len too. Even Billy and Tom. The biggest part of her life, the part that she planned on being her whole life, her world, went too. I thought you got that? I thought you knew how isolated and alone she’s been.”
I watched him as he stroked the two middle fingers of his left hand over his lips. His eyes welled with tears, but he managed to swallow them down.
“No, Jim, I had no fucking idea that was the life she’s been living. I don’t know if you realise this, but you lot don’t tell me much about what’s going on in her life. You can talk about her around me, ya know? I’m fully aware that I’m a pussy where she’s concerned, and that my behaviour’s not normal for a bloke my age, but what we had—what I have with G, ain’t normal. I don’t know what love’s like for others, but I’ve seen people go through breakups, I’ve listened to them declare that they’re heartbroken, and then a month later they’re seeing someone else, declaring their undying love for them, but that’s not possible for me. I know that I shag other birds—”
He took a swig from his beer as Jimmie chimed in with, “Lots of other birds, lots and lots and—”
“Yeah, yeah, Jim, we get it.” I cut her off.
“I don’t wanna say that I’m glad she’s as miserable as I am. You’re her brothers and her best mates, but fuck. As much as it hurts me to hear that she’s hurting, hearing it gives me the tiniest bit of hope, and shit yeah, in a weird and twisted way, it makes me fucking ecstatic.”
He drained his drink and tilted his bottle towards me.
“Let’s crack open the Bolli. Looks like we’ve got a wedding to go to, dude.”
Chapter Thirteen
1987 / 1988
The Christmas of 1987 turned out to be a bit of a disaster. We had an album and a single sitting at the number one spot on both sides of the Atlantic, and in seven other countries around the world.
Maca and I celebrated all night on Christmas Eve, and I turned up at my mum’s in a taxi, ten minutes after dinner was served. I was high as a kite, stinking of booze and perfume, and my family was far from impressed.
Any attempts at talking to George were blown out the window when she heard me telling Bailey about mine and Maca’s exploits from the night before.
My parents had moved from the house we were raised in, and were now living in a beautiful barn conversion. My dad had added a soundproofed room out to the side of the property and I’d headed in there with Bails for a sneaky joint after our almost silent dinner. He had recently split up with Donna, his long-term bitch of a girlfriend, and was living back at home with Mum and Dad.
The conversation started off innocently enough, with me asking Bailey how he was handling living back at home with the ‘rents’ at twenty-six.
“It’s actually not as bad as you think. You know mum; clothes are washed, ironed, and hanging in my wardrobe a day after I leave them on my bathroom floor. Cooked breakfast ready for when I get up and my dinner’s waiting on the table every night when I get home from work. I’ve put on about five pounds since I’ve been here.” He rubbed his belly as he talked.
I was lying with my back, pushed into a bean bag on the floor, my legs stretched out in front of me, crossed at the ankles. My back was to the door as I faced Bailey, who was lying up on the old leather Chesterfield that had been in our family forever.
“But what about when you bring a bird back? What’s the ol’ dear have to say about that?” I asked him.
“Yeah, not gone there yet. It’s either been back to their place, or a quickie in the car. Why’d ya think I drive a Land Rover?” he asked with a wink.
“Fuck that. I ain’t had a shag in a car since I was about sixteen.”
“Well, we’ve not all been lucky enough to have tits and arse handed to us on a plate like you have, Mr Rock God,” he said with a smile.
I shrug my shoulders and laugh as I think about the night before.
“Yeah, it’s fucked sometimes, mate. I’ll tell ya, women just don’t give a shit when you’re famous. They’re up for anything.”
“Like what?” he asked, passing back the joint.
“Fucking hell, where do I start? We went to a club last night and got to chatting with these girls. Bought them a few drinks and next thing I know, they’re dragging me and Maca off to the toilets. One had her skirt up and was bending over the sink with her arse in the air as soon as we got in there. I didn’t even bother to take her knickers off, just pulled them to one side and fucked her from behind.”
“Hope you wrapped it up first?”
“Always, man, always,” I reassured him.
“Anyway, this leaves Maca with three other girls all over him. One drops to her knees and starts sucking him off while he sticks his fingers inside the other two…” I trailed off as Bailey looked wide-eyed over my shoulder.
My skin prickled as I turned my head. I already knew what I’d find.
Georgia was standing with the door held ajar. Her eyes were wide, her mouth opened and closed, as if she was going to say something.
“George…” I called to her but before I could say any more, she was gone.
“Fuck, fuck!” I repeated to anyone that wanted to listen.
“I don’t think she heard what you were saying,” Bails tried to reassure me.
“Then why the fuck did she run away?”
“Coz that’s what she does, Marls. She’s got a screw loose. Trying to get a word out of her these days is fucking impossible. She’s changed so much from how she used to be. It’s fucking heartbreaking to watch, mate, I tell ya.”
I stood up and paced, unsure of what to do.
“Leave her, mate. She won’t talk to you anyway. She barely talks to me and I’m not in her bad books.”
I heard the sound of a car start up and when I looked out the door, Georgia was heading up the drive in the little car Maca had bought for her.
I watched her go as Jimmie and Lennon walked across the gravel drive in my direction.
“She okay?” I asked them.
“Yeah, she just wanted to get home to her own little place. I think Ash is coming over tonight,” Jimmie said.
“Ash? She seeing someone?”
“Noooo,” Jimmie replied, sounding like I’d just asked the most ridiculous question ever.
“Ash … Ashley Morrison? We used to go to school with her,” Jimmie said it like I should remember her.
“Blonde hair, good looking girl?” She continued in a tone, suggesting that I should know who Ashley was.
“Well anyway, she went to school with me and George, then college with George. Now she’s working at Posh Frocks for George. She’s like the manager or assistant manager, or something like that.”
“Well, that’s good then. If she’s got a mate coming over, that’s good.” My conscience eased somewhat.
“Yeah, she’s a good girl, Ash is. Comes from a rough family, but she’s got a heart of gold and always trying to get George to go out with her,” Jimmie tells me.
“She still not going out?”
Jimmie shakes her head. “We all try, Marls. I’m not really sure what more any of us can do. It’s just a case of waiting and letting her do things in her own time.” She shrugged her shoulders, probably
feeling as helpless as we all did.
“Where did Maca end up going?” Len asked.
Once again, I had asked that Maca be allowed to come for dinner, but George had told Len to tell me that she still wasn’t ready to see him.
“He actually went to his dad’s.”
“Didn’t think he had a dad,” Bailey commented.
“Don’t be stupid, Bails. Everyone’s got a dad,” Jimmie tells him.
“They’ve just gotten back into contact with each other,” Len explained before I got a chance to.
“He’s actually an all right bloke. He’s been to our place a couple of times,” I told them.
“So now Maca’s made the big time and the money’s rolling in, his ol’ man has come crawling outta the wood work?” Bailey questioned.
“No, Bails. Believe it or not, it wasn’t like that,” Jimmie chimed in. “His dad had no idea where his mum had fucked of to when Maca was a kid. As soon as she got wind he was close to tracking her down, she moved him on again. That’s why he went to so many different schools. In the end, she moved them from East London into Essex, and that’s how he ended up at our school.” Jimmie sat down on the sofa next to Bailey as she explained what Maca’s dad, Kenny, had told Lennon on the phone when he contacted the record label’s offices.
“Anyway, when his dad first realised Maca was his son, he was worried that Mac would just think he was after his money if he showed up unannounced. He left it a couple of months and then got in touch with the label and explained who he was. I spoke with him on the phone, then put him on to Len, who passed all of his details on to Sean and we left him to decide what he wanted to do.” We were all silent for a few moments. My brothers and Jim probably doing the same as me, contemplating what they would’ve done in Maca’s shoes.
“What did Maca say?” Bailey asked.
“Pretty much what you did,” I told him. “Then they spoke on the phone a few times, met up at a West Ham game, and then went to see a band together. Things have just moved on from there.”
Carnage Boxset Page 99