What could I say? They are all completely identical, you stupid prat?
‘Right, um, interesting,’ I stammered.
‘Could you have another go at it, incorporating the best bits of all three?’
‘Um, well I could try, so let me write that down,’ I said as onlookers wondered why I wasn’t writing anything down. ‘The beginning of one, the pace of two and the ending of three. Right, I’ll do my best, but it might take me a day or two.’
‘That’s OK. Cheers, Michael, gotta dash.’
And I lay back making a mental note to send him a tape with just the one version of exactly the same mix, which I knew he’d be delighted with.
More people turned up to the barbecue as the day progressed, including Kate and Monica. Kate had brought her acoustic guitar, which she placed lovingly down on a rug while she brought out seemingly endless plates of sandwiches that she’d made for everyone. Beside me lay a bloke who called himself Dirk, to whom I had already taken an irrational dislike on the grounds that when he took a puff of his cigarette he held the fag between his thumb and little finger, like he was James Dean or Marlon Brando. I knew there were greater crimes against humanity, but at that moment, holding your cigarette between your thumb and little finger was right up there with the worst of them. In any case, my first impression of him was soon vindicated.
Popping a sandwich in his mouth without acknowledging Kate’s efforts, Dirk then picked up her guitar and started to pluck out a few notes. Kate looked mildly put out at his presumption, but said nothing. He adjusted the tuning slightly and tutted.
‘How much did you pay for this?’
‘Only fifty pounds,’ said Kate proudly. ‘I got it second hand.’
‘Fifty quid? I’ll give you twenty for it.’
Occasionally you meet somebody who is so unlikeable that you can only presume they attend rudeness evening classes.
‘Well, I wasn’t looking to sell it actually,’ said Kate, far too politely.
‘Bad luck. It’s just gone down to fifteen. You missed your chance.’ And he wedged his cigarette under the strings by the keys. ‘Fifty quid! For a crappy guitar like this,’ he muttered to himself as he began strumming. Kate looked at me in dis-belief and part of me wanted to grab her guitar off the bloke and hit him over the head with it. But I didn’t because I’m not a violent person, it would have ruined the whole picnic and, apart from anything else, it would have smashed into splinters, because he was right, it was a crappy guitar.
I tried to ignore him, but soon he became the centre of attention as a few other girls started to sing along to his rather loose interpretation of ‘Wonderwall.’ They sounded more like the Von Trapp children than Liam Gallagher, but they weren’t helped by this poser getting half the chords wrong. I could contain myself no longer.
‘Um, I think that should be E minor seventh there, actually,’ I said tentatively.
That was the first time he noticed me. He took another affected puff of his cigarette and winced, half closing one eye as he inhaled, as if his Silk Cut were mixed with the strongest Jamaican skunk.
‘Don’t think so, mate,’ he replied.
‘Yeah, it goes Em7, G, Dsus4, A7sus4.’
Suddenly he could tell I knew what I was talking about, but he couldn’t back down in front of all these admiring women. There was a new stag in the herd, butting him with his antlers. He paused. Then, instead of continuing with ‘Wonderwall’, he started a different song, one that he had obviously practised a few more times over the years.
‘Oh no,’ said one of the girls, ‘not “Stairway to bloody Heaven”. What happened to Oasis?’
‘I’ll have a bash at it, if you like,’ I gallantly offered and there was enthusiastic agreement from the assembled audience. He had no choice but to hand over the guitar, and now the whole crowd was watching to see if I was any better.
‘Would that be all right, Kate? If I played your guitar?’ She nodded and the tension built as I pointedly and slowly adjusted the tuning. A pause. Then I plunged emphatically into the opening chords of ‘Wonderwall’, strumming with a force and confidence that drew the best possible sound from the nylon strings. The blood drained from Dirk’s face as I segued into ‘The Passenger’, ‘Rock ’n’ Roll Suicide’ and the tricksiest bit of Rodrigo’s Guitar Concerto No. 2 for good measure. By the time I finished there were cheers and applause and shouts of, ‘Encore!’ and the girls looked ready to ask me if I would father their children. ‘That’s quite a nice guitar you’ve got there, Kate,’ I lied as I passed it back to its owner. It was a great moment. If only all of life could be like that. I noticed that when Dirk lit his next cigarette he held it normally. Mission accomplished, I thought.
I suppose the women were so enamoured of me because I expressed so much emotion with the music. If I had a guitar in my hand or a keyboard under my fingertips I could say, ‘I’m so in love’ or ‘I’m so unhappy’ and really convey how those things felt. I could never have just said the words. Right now I had to try quite hard not to show how I was feeling, which was revoltingly self-satisfied. I had just defended the honour of Kate’s guitar, it was a beautiful sunny day and the egg-mayonnaise sandwiches even had the crusts cut off. Temporary financial setbacks aside, my double life was a well-oiled machine. I had a wife, but I was independent, I had a job in which I could choose my own hours, I had the perfect amount of time with my beautiful children, but I also had my own space and all the time to myself that I could possibly want.
I eased myself up and went a few yards into the woods and wee’d against a tree. The mixture of sun and lager made me feel dizzy and I swayed slightly as I buttoned up my flies and squinted in the brightness of the sun. And then, coming through a clearing and down a little hill, I saw Millie. My little daughter Millie, not yet three years old, wandering about in the thicket forty feet away. On Clapham Common. On her own.
She appeared to be perfectly happy so I restrained my instinct to call out her name. No matter how hard I looked I couldn’t see her mother. With mounting incomprehension I just watched her, pottering along, picking leaves and cheerfully singing a little song to herself. It was as if she were a child I didn’t know; she was completely separate from me, as if I were observing her through a one-way mirror or on an old family video recording. I’d never heard her singing that song before. She was just another kid in the park, except she was my daughter. It was the same sensation I’d had when I’d seen our third baby in the scan – I could see my child, but I wasn’t able to relate to her. She felt distant and surreal.
Why isn’t Catherine with her? I wondered anxiously. I hid behind a bush so I could watch Millie without giving myself away. Part of me wanted to run and give her a big hug, but there was so much at risk. She must be lost. I would just keep an eye on her from a distance, until her mother found her, and then silently slip away. I could not afford to make my presence known, this was the only logical option I could pursue. And yet as she came closer I blurted out her name in spite of myself, not quite sure why.
‘Daddy!’ she replied.
She wasn’t particularly surprised to see me hiding there, which threw me slightly, but mixed in with my panic and incomprehension was elation at seeing my beautiful little daughter so unexpectedly. She ran towards me and I picked her up; she squeezed me tight, which was lovely even though I had no idea what I could possibly do next.
‘Where’s Mummy?’
‘Erm . . . she’s, she’s, she’s, she’s . . . Mummy, um, Mummy. . .’
Come on, Millie, spit it out.
‘She’s … she’s over there.’ And she pointed to the band-stand a good hundred yards away, through the trees. At that moment I heard Catherine calling Millie’s name, with terror and panic in her voice. There was no way out of this situation. Catherine had lost Millie; I had found her. Only an hour ago I had told Catherine I was working in Manchester. My heart was beating allegro forte and I said, ‘Oh dear, Millie, what am I going to do?’
‘Green
bird,’ she answered, pointing to the tree. And she was right. Crawling up the tree trunk behind me was a green woodpecker. How about that! In the middle of London! I’d never seen a green woodpecker before.
‘Millie! Where are you?’ screamed her desperate mother, coming closer. I put her down on the ground and pointed to her mum. ‘Look, Millie, there’s Mummy. Run to Mummy. Tell her you saw a man that looked like Daddy.’
I let her go and she ran across the open common towards her mother. As she left I heard her shouting, ‘Mummy! Daddy said I saw man that look like Daddy.’
I saw the moment that Catherine spotted her. In a split second her face went from terror to enormous relief, but then barely paused as it progressed to anger at the terrible ordeal she had just been put through. She was furious with Millie, although I knew deep down she was angry with herself for losing her. She had Alfie in one arm, but she ran towards Millie with the other outstretched and then grabbed her and burst into tears. She shouted at Millie for running off like that, and any message that Millie attempted to relay was lost in the anger, hugs and tears, so I was safe for the time being.
Still hiding among the trees I watched Catherine get ready to leave the common. What was she doing down here anyway? She was miles from home; she never came south of the river. I knew that getting the kids ready would be a major operation. She tried to strap Alfie into the double buggy, but he wailed and struggled and arched his back, demanding that he be carried. Millie was upset at having been told off and was also crying. Her mother took a bag out of the buggy and put Millie in. As she was hooking the bag over the pushchair handles Millie started to become hysterical, screaming and holding her arms out to be picked up, jealous that her little brother was being carried.
Catherine picked Millie up out of the pushchair, and as she did so the weight of the bag slung over the handles tipped up the buggy and, in a violent surprise see-saw action, the whole thing up-ended. The bag hit the tarmac and I heard the sound of shattering glass. That’ll be the bottle of Aqua Libre, I thought to myself. That smelly melon drink she buys with a name that means ‘free water’ and costs a fortune. The designer drink was seeping out of the bag and onto the ground. Still supporting the weight of both children, I watched as she squatted down and, with her remaining free hand, tried to stop the liquid ruining everything else in the bag. Then I heard her swear as she cut her hand. Her hand bled as she tried to put Millie down but, being just under three, Millie refused to see the situation from Catherine’s point of view and would not let go. Catherine angrily pulled Millie off, who then lay on the ground and screamed. At each step I had felt that I could see what was about to happen, but I was powerless to prevent it, like watching a series of cars bumping one another on one of those compilation videos of motorway accidents. I really would have liked to have gone and helped, but how could I? How could I suddenly appear in the middle of Clapham Common an hour after I had said I was up in Manchester?
‘Checking out the local nannies?’ sneered a voice behind me. It was Dirk, still smarting from being outplayed on a cheap plywood guitar.
‘Er, no, I was just watching that woman struggling with those two little kids. She’s their mother actually. Er, I’d say.’
‘God, who’d have kids, eh?’ he said as Millie lay on the floor sobbing and kicking. I found myself half nodding in tacit agreement and then felt guilty for betraying my own children so casually.
‘Look at that little brat screaming. I don’t think people should be allowed to have kids if they don’t know how to control them.’
Suddenly I was fuming, What did he know about it?
‘It’s not her fault,’ I said, bristling. ‘It’s hard on your own. And most two-years-olds are like that.’
‘Look how she’s shouting at the poor child. No wonder it’s screaming.’
‘Well, she’s probably at her wit’s end. Not sleeping and all that.’
‘Yeah, single mother probably,’ said Dirk as he headed off back to the barbecue. Catherine was now sitting on the ground crying. She looked Utterly defeated by it all. I had never seen her give up like this. Her hand was bleeding and both her children were sobbing, too. And this being London, everyone else rushed past as if she was some drug addict or alcoholic nutter. Wasn’t anyone going to step in and help her?
‘Are you OK, Catherine?’ I said.
She looked up and was so astonished to see me standing there that she immediately stopped weeping.
‘How on earth did you get here?’
Since I didn’t have an answer to this question I thought the best policy would be to ignore it.
‘What have you done to your hand?’
‘Oh, I cut it,’ she said, holding it up.
‘Ah, that would explain all the blood dripping onto the tarmac.’ I wrapped my handkerchief around her fingers and she sat there gazing at me as if I were her fairy godmother and a knight in shining armour all rolled into one. ‘I can see you cut it, you idiot. What were you doing?’
‘Well, I was trying to get all the broken glass out of the bottom of the bag.’
‘And you say this broken glass somehow cut your hand? Well talk about a freak accident.’
She smiled and I hoped the moment had passed when she would have asked what I was doing there in the first place.
‘Me and Daddy saw a green bird,’ said Millie helpfully.
‘God, she’s still going on about that. We saw a green woodpecker about two months ago.’ I tied the handkerchief into a knot. ‘Let’s go and get a coffee and I’ll buy Millie some crisps or something.’
Catherine wiped her smudged eye make-up. ‘Oh God, Michael, I’m so pleased to see you. I lost Millie. It was awful; she just wandered away from the bandstand when I was changing Alfie, and I ran round behind the café, but she must have gone in the other direction because I lost her for ages. It was terrifying. And then the buggy tipped up and the bottles smashed and I cut my hand open and the kids were screaming and I just couldn’t cope . . .’
‘OK, forget the coffee, how about a glass of wine?’
‘What about the baby?’
‘Good point – I’ll get one for him, too.’
I hoisted Millie onto my shoulders and we headed towards the Windmill Inn, away from the direction of the picnic. If the empty seat in the double buggy had been slightly bigger I would have strapped Catherine in next to Alfie and pushed her all the way there. We sat outside the pub and Alfie sucked his bottle and I sipped my pint and Catherine knocked back her glass of wine in one. It seemed like everything was all right again, for a moment at least.
‘So why did you say you were in Manchester?’ she asked suddenly.
I only had one crisp in my mouth, but apparently my mouth was so full it was impossible for me to reply.
‘Manchester?’ I finally said. ‘What are you talking about?’
‘You said you were up in Manchester.’
There was a pause in which I tried to regard her as if she must be completely deranged and then I steered my puzzled face into exaggerated realization as a way out suddenly came into my head.
‘No, no, no. Manchester Street. I said I was in Manchester Street. In the West End.’
She looked confused.
‘But you said you were in Piccadilly.’
‘Piccadilly Circus, yeah?’
She laughed at her foolishness. ‘Oh, I’d got it into my head that you’d gone up North for work again.’
We shared a good-natured laugh at this mix-up and I breathed a silent sigh of relief that Catherine had forgotten, or was unaware, that Manchester Street was a good couple of miles from Piccadilly Circus. Before she had time to think about this I changed the subject.
‘So what are you doing this side of the river? Weren’t you worried about the border guards stopping you on the bridge?’
‘I was supposed to be seeing Susan and Piers’s new house in Stockwell, but we got to the front door and there was no-one home, so we thought we’d have a bit of a run abou
t on Clapham Common, didn’t we, Millie?’
‘Me and Daddy saw a green bird.’
‘Yes, all right, Millie. You said,’ I interjected. ‘Have another packet of crisps.’
‘What about you?’ Catherine asked me.
‘Well, after I’d finished in Manchester Street, I got the tube from Piccadilly Circus to go to my studio and thought I’d walk across the common when I saw you. Coincidence, eh?’
‘Yeah, well let’s not tell my sister. She’d probably put it down to ley lines or psychic energy or something.’
‘Oh, that’s a good idea. I’ll tell her I took a diversion across the common because I could sense the negative vibrations you were sending out. We’ll never hear the end of it.’
Catherine was laughing again, although there seemed to be a slightly hysterical edge to it. I got her another large glass of wine and Millie her third packet of crisps and Catherine seemed more like the wife I knew; the breakdown by the bandstand far behind her. But then, as the alcohol kicked in, she seemed to become almost too tired to keep laughing. I volunteered to change Millie’s nappy and that extracted a brief smile. I laid Millie on the changing mat and set about unbuttoning her baggy pink dungarees.
‘Michael?’ said Catherine ominously.
‘What?’
‘I’m not happy.’
‘Sorry?’
‘I’m not happy.’
‘Is it dry enough? I asked for a dry white wine.’
‘With my life. I’m not happy.’
‘What do you mean, you’re not happy; of course you’re happy.’
‘I’m not. I felt guilty about it so I kept it to myself, but it’s just such a strain. It’s like there’s something missing that I can’t put my finger on.’
‘It’s just the drink talking, Catherine. You’re feeling tired and a bit drunk and suddenly you think you’re not happy, but believe me, you are one of the happiest people I know. Next you’ll be saying you can’t cope with the children.’
‘I can’t cope with the children.’
The Best a Man Can Get Page 14