Beneath the Blonde (7 page)

“He is. She and Greg might be the centre of the band but Alex thinks he’s her svengali—she couldn’t do it without him, wouldn’t have the right words to sing without him—all that bollocks.”

“Not true?”

“He’s probably right. She’s pretty—well, let’s say flighty. Alex is the only one who can get her to really concentrate.
And he does write really good stuff for her. Everyone knows that, he’s just dead arrogant with it. Anyway, last summer, they’ve just got off stage, everyone’s really hyper, it had been a brilliant gig but Alex doesn’t see that. Alex is off his face and screaming at Siobhan about fucking up some line or other, on and on about how she’s ruined the whole gig with that one mistake and eventually she starts crying. Greg’s not there, he’s gone off to talk to some journalist and Kev just comes up and smacks Alex in the face.”

“You saw it?”

“I mopped up the blood gushing out of his nose. Now, the guy’s my own brother and I’d be the first to admit he deserved it, but Siobhan sacked Kevin anyway.”

Saz shook her head, “I’m sorry? Siobhan sacked the man standing up for her?”

“I know it doesn’t make any sense. He was one of her oldest friends too. But you see, I don’t think Kevin ever really understood—I think they need it, the five of them.”

“Need what?”

“All the shouting and carry on. It’s just part of the game.”

“Of the band?”

“That’s right. The dynamic is just that—Alex is hateful and everyone puts up with it. They just shut up and are relieved to listen to him being nasty to someone else. Anyone else, as long as it’s not themselves. You know, when someone else is getting it in the back of the neck, it’s actually almost funny. Alex’s sarcasm is brutal but it’s definitely witty.”

“I’ve noticed.”

“And the more hungover he is, the nastier he’ll be. Siobhan always gets the worst of it but it just seems to suit her. I think she actually likes him screaming at her. She gets off on the drama of it all.”

“So what happened to Kevin?”

“Slunk back off to Liverpool, I suppose. I’ve no idea actually.”

Then Peta looked at the pile of unopened letters that had come in the second post, “Look, I’m quite happy to tell you all the juicy gossip if you’re really interested, but d’you think we could get on with some of this work at the same time?”

Peta kept Saz fully occupied for the rest of the day opening letters, checking tour itineraries with the band in an attempt to accommodate all their individual requirements. While Alex had been single for some time and Dan was newly alone, quite a few important details had to be co-ordinated with Steve’s model girlfriend Tiana and the seven stone Canadian princess was not easily satisfied. Saz had to content herself with brain-filing her own little pile of information. She planned to check out the peremptorily sacked Kevin as soon as she was free and she’d also make a few more enquiries about Alex. If he and Siobhan really did have such a vicious relationship, then it wasn’t inconceivable that he might choose to upset her just that little bit more. With a bunch or two of roses perhaps.

Saz went home to complain to Molly about how on earth she was supposed to proceed while not letting Peta know why she was really there. As she explained over their takeaway pizza—American hot with extra pepperoni and chilli sauce, “I mean, I like the woman, Moll, I’m sure she’d be cool if I told her the truth, but I’m not allowed to and so she’s really just …”

“In the way?”

“Exactly. I did what I could with her around. This afternoon I went through all the fan letters the band had ever
received. Thousands of them, all neatly filed in cardboard boxes.”

“Thousands? Really?”

“I exaggerate. It just felt like thousands. I wanted to give up after ten of the bloody things. How many different ways can you say ‘Siobhan Forrester, I fancy you?’”

“Didn’t Peta think it was weird you were rifling their archives?”

“Official business. My task was to alphabetize the letters, thereby helping her compile a fan database.”

“And did you?”

Saz swallowed a fingerful of stretchy mozzarella and sneered, “Ms Steele, that’s a very stupid question. To do that, I’d have had to actually use the bloody computer. However, one of the more useful things was finding correspondence about this Kevin bloke in with all the fan stuff. The latest address was about a year ago so I’ll follow that up tomorrow. I also made a note of the twenty-two letters with the same sort of expensive writing paper as the letters sent to Siobhan—only eight of which were printed, the others were written by hand. Once I’ve sussed out Kev, I’ll get on to checking out the addresses. Then I relocated to Siobhan’s room for a couple of hours and called practically every florist in North London.”

“Exaggerating again?”

“All right, I didn’t bother with too many in the outer reaches of Colindale. Anyway, it’s not as if any of them can remember someone coming in and asking for more than the usual number of yellow roses.”

Molly laughed, “And what’s the usual number?”

“It’s an engrossing statistical study actually, you might be very interested.”

Saz sat up from where she was lying on the floor at Molly’s feet and pushed the finished pizza carton away. She had been absent-mindedly forwarding through the pile of
old video tapes, one of which she knew held the Orson Welles version of
Jane Eyre
, which she and Molly planned to settle in and watch that night. If she could ever find it. She pulled three sheets of close printed figures from her file and looked down the numbers. “According to my research, most people buy red roses, then white, followed by tacky red carnations, then even tackier pink carnations …”

“What’s wrong with carnations?”

“They’re nasty, cheap and I hate them.”

“Carrie?”

“Who else? Sent me three bunches in one week.”

“To say sorry?”

“No. She sent them the week before she left me, buttering me up.”

“I’ll remember that.”

“Please do. I’d prefer lilies. And finally, a surprising fifth in our top ten poll of flower buyers’ favourites, yellow roses.”

“All of which means?”

“Absolutely nothing as far as I’m concerned. No one’s jumped up and said, oh yeah, sure, bloke comes in once a week for an armload of yellow roses, then takes them off to his pop star love. None of the letters match directly, and even if I found one that did, I couldn’t do any more without fingerprinting and all that analysis nonsense.”

“I wouldn’t let Helen hear you say it’s nonsense.”

“It’s only nonsense when I don’t have access to it.”

“Ask her to help.”

Saz shook her head. “Can’t. Siobhan won’t let me contact the police at all and the other reason is …”

“You know that Helen and Jude don’t approve of you working alone after the last disaster.”

“Thanks for the memory. The fact that since my recovery I’ve had two cases of missing fathers, addresses and phone numbers passed on to the mothers—”

“So they could make their own decisions about the Child Support Agency?”

“I’m nothing if not politically correct. Further, I’ve proved one cheating wife and disproved one cheating husband.”

“None of which involved a mystery caller who may or may not be dangerous.”

“May or may not be a member of the same band. Very juicy.”

“Very risky.”

Saz sighed, “Moll, I like my job. I know you’re worried for me, but this feels good. I’m enjoying it.”

“You just said it was frustrating.”

“Don’t be such a pedant, it’s meant to be frustrating. It’s work. And yes, I am still a bit scared. But it’s bad enough living every day with the scars, I’m not going to let what happened in the fire make me give up. You fell in love with a woman who had a life; you’ve just accustomed yourself to living with an invalid. You have to learn to trust the old Saz, not the needy burnt one.”

Saz knelt up and pulled Molly down to her, kissing her hard. Then she drew away and turned to look at the television. Elizabeth Taylor was simpering sweetly on her death bed.

Saz laughed, “See, Molly. Now that’s what I call a burns victim. This one however,” she added, pointing to herself, “this one, is risen again and in control. Now pass me those tissues and get ready to sob.”

She rewound the tape and they watched the movie in silence, Molly’s hand occasionally and gently stroking the scars on Saz’s bare leg.

Making the bouquet happen can be quite an art. I liked choosing the flowers. It gave me satisfaction. I would go to a flower shop or stall, far from her, and choose them one by one. Pick each perfect yellow rose, one by one. It can be hard to find twenty-one flawless yellow roses. Sometimes I would have to go to three, even four shops in one morning. It was like work. Like having a job. It was my mission. I wore gloves. For my safety, you understand. Thorns. Fingerprints. The fingerprints of bloody, pricked fingers are a double giveaway, double bind. When the Prince finally hacked his way through to Sleeping Beauty he must have been scratched to ribbons. Maybe he liked it. Maybe it was a Jesus thing. Perhaps he’d left his own crown behind. Anyway, I wear gloves. I’m careful with my hands. I’m an artist.

Having gathered my rosebuds, cut their stems, water sprinkled the petals, I would take them to another shop, the gift wrapping shop where the nice lady with the sweet soft smile and the sweet soft hands would take such care to get the paper just right. Painstaking. She was taking pains. She liked me, she said I was a sweetheart. Perhaps I am. I am charming. Lots of people have said so. And then back to my car and laying them down so softly on the back seat. Laying down on the back seat. The delivery of course was my
coup de grâce
.

I would take them into the city and find myself a vagrant. Not hard to find, it’s true. A homeless person, a dirty, city-encrusted
baby. I’d give them cash to get the flowers to her. I know she received some of them. Some of the flowers, some of the time. Maybe not all. I don’t mind, the money went to a good cause. It was ideal really, touching her and doing a little charity work into the bargain. I’m very philanthropic at heart. Underneath this tough exterior lies a heart of pure mush. Honest.

But then, aren’t we all something else really? Underneath?

Saz took the morning off from work at the office, lying to Siobhan about following up a lead with the flowers so that Siobhan could lie to Peta about why Saz wasn’t coming in, so that Saz could go to visit Kevin the ex-tour manager. The series of untruths were rather more convoluted than the directions to Kevin’s home. Kevin hadn’t gone back to Liverpool. In fact, Kevin was living just a mile or so from Siobhan in a tired first floor bedsit in Camden, not yet elevated to the lofty heights of “studio flat” by the simple landlord strategy of stripping the floorboards and putting up blinds instead of faded red curtains.

Kevin Hogan, tall, stooped and unshaven, was not exactly Beneath The Blonde’s Number One Fan. He and Siobhan had known each other at school—the kind of knowing that Saz suspected involved at least a fumble of early sex. He’d moved to London around the same time as she had, they’d shared friends, shared a squat for a few months one summer and then when she’d joined the band, he had too. He’d gone along to rehearsals first just as Siobhan’s mate and, once they’d managed to finally get a few gigs, he went along as driver. The fact that Kevin’s big brother loaned them his old PA and Kevin himself had access to a van that could fit the dodgy gear and the rest of the band—at an extremely tight squeeze—meant that he was very valuable to them. Over the years his value increased in direct proportion to his growing knowledge of the music scene. Eventually, however, with the band’s greater success, the status of their relationship
changed until rather than the band needing him, Kevin was the one who needed the band. Not that he expressed the situation in quite those terms. Drawing heavily on his third cigarette since letting her in, he exhaled his bitterness at Saz, “Fucking cunts used me for years. Took advantage of my generosity and all my hard bloody work and then the minute things started to go really well for them, it was over. Goodbye, matey, thanks but we don’t need you anymore.”

Saz had introduced herself as a journalist doing a background story on the band and had no problem getting Kevin to talk. For a start, he was drinking cheap whisky in his instant morning coffee and secondly, he was hugely bitter about being left out of Beneath The Blonde’s success and perfectly happy to tell Saz anything she wanted to know—as long as it was likely to make the band look bad. And it did. Kevin detailed the early years of rehearsing in Alex’s squat, the dreary South London pub gigs, the signing on and working at rubbish jobs to get the money to pour back into the band. He told it all in glorious shades of drab squalor. “I don’t suppose you know about Dan’s early career either?”

Saz shook her head.

“Yeah well, Mr Petty Poof hasn’t always been so bloody clean. Spent most of his teens in and out of care getting done for petty theft and burglary. You know, videos, TVs and the like. They’ve managed to keep that out of the press so far. That one’s too fucking groovy by half if you ask me—doesn’t care if the whole world knows he’s queer but got to keep the criminal record hushed up at all costs.”

Saz bit her tongue and offered a non-committal shrug, “What about Steve?”

“Nah, Steve’s all right. Bit of an odd job boy until the band started to make money. He’s big, strong. I offered him work as a bouncer once—I used to do a bit of work at a
mate’s club—but he’d rather hump sideboards up staircases for three quid an hour for his dad than run the risk of getting himself messed up. Steve would always shag anything in a skirt and he didn’t want to ruin his future chances with a bent nose. Spends hours down the gym, that one. Very proud of his body—all his own work, apparently.”

“Apparently?”

“Nah, you’ll not get me having a go at Steve, luv. He’s the only one I’d trust out of the whole lot of them. Let’s just whisper steroids and leave it at that, yeah?”

Kevin looked at the dirty clock on the kitchen wall and then at Saz’s jacket hanging on the back of her chair. “You got any cash in those fancy leather pockets of yours?”