Die Hard Mod (9 page)

When the weekend came, Bobby was keen to hook up with Helen and although they had a few pints together after work on Friday, by Saturday night, Steve found himself alone in the flat while Bobby had been invited round to his new girl’s flat for dinner. Come Sunday morning, loneliness was creeping in. Steve tried to keep himself occupied with Sunday papers and TV but the temptation to ignore Bobby’s advice to keep away from Jeanie was proving too much when he knew he could see her again if he just got himself over to
Madeira Drive
by
three o’clock
.

By lunchtime he was truly bored with the papers and when he switched on the TV to find the
Eastenders
omnibus edition about to start, the lure of meeting Jeanie became irresistible.

The sun was shining and as he walked along
Western Road
, Steve looked through the windows of the restaurants and cafes full of smiling, contented faces. He was beguiled by
Brighton
life but wondered if he’d ever truly feel part of it. Outside Waitrose, the same beggar who’d been there the night he got mugged was playing a tin whistle badly and Steve chucked him another couple of quid. ‘Good for the oul’ karma, as the hippies say,’ he thought.

When he reached the seafront via
West Street
, the promenade was choc-a-bloc with day-trippers and on
Madeira Drive
, Steve felt a glow of pride when he saw a cavalcade of Mods imperiously glide past on their gleaming scooters. Outside Volks Tavern, a few other Mods had parked up and were standing around chatting and smoking. Some of the middle-aged ones looked a bit ridiculous sporting haircuts and tight-fitting clothes more suited to skinny teenagers but there were younger converts too and seeing excitable-looking, fresh-faced kids being as sharp and immaculately-dressed as the original 60s innovators made Steve smile. Mingling with the Mods was a bunch of hairy, beer-drinking bikers standing next to their pristine Triumphs and Harley Davidsons. The atmosphere was genial, as if a shared love of two-wheeled transport had finally superseded the violent rivalry of yore.

The good weather had drawn people outdoors so Steve had no problem getting a window seat in the café. He pulled a Bukowski paperback out of his back pocket and supped his cappuccino. Jeanie had never arrived on time for any of their meetings in the past so he was expecting to be waiting for a while.

After twenty minutes or so, he was getting quite engrossed with Bukowski’s drunken escapades when there was a rap on the window. Jeanie flashed him a killer smile. She had her hair tied back in a pony-tail and was wearing a Breton shirt and navy blue ski-pants. A simple type of retro chic that put Steve in mind of Audrey Hepburn in
Funny Face
. She breezed in and pecked him on the cheek.

‘Sorry I’m a wee bit late darlin’. You want another coffee?’

She brought back two cappuccinos and slinked into the seat next to Steve.

‘So how’s my favourite Mod? Bet you’re enjoying seeing your compadres in all their finery?’

‘Yeah, makes me feel the loss of my scooter a bit more deeply though… fuckin’ Trevor and Donzo …’

She stroked his arm and smiled sympathetically.

‘There there, darlin’. Sure it won’t be long before you’ve got another cool set of wheels. I’ve got nice memories of our wee excursions together… remember that weekend in Portstewart?’

Six times in one night. It was Steve’s all-time shagging record.

‘Yeah, how could I forget?’

As Steve recalled possibly the top selection from his wank jukebox, a trio of fat daytrippers in
Chelsea
shirts with loud cockney accents barged into the cafe.

‘I’m fakkin’ dyin’ for some chips… oi, Gaz, you get ‘em… I’ve been gettin’ the beers in all fakkin’ afternoon, you tight-arsed slag.’

Jeanie grimaced.

‘I think this is our cue to leave, darlin’. I’m not enjoying the ambience any more. Let’s go for a stroll in the sun, eh?’

Back in the sunshine, the young Mods Steve had been observing earlier were getting interviewed by a presenter that he recognised from a
BBC
2 arts programme. Steve and Jeanie quickly shuffled out of the way when they realised they were within range of the cameraman’s lens. Jeanie linked arms with Steve and led him along the pavement towards Brighton Marina.

‘There’s a lovely walk if we keep going along this way, darlin’… the tourists don’t know about the undercliff path so we’ll be able to avoid the riff-raff.’

Steve wondered what Jeanie was on about when an Asda supermarket and an ugly expanse of concrete came into view but once they got beyond that and walked alongside dramatic white cliffs with a dazzling sea to their right, he could see what she meant.

A pair of laughing kids holding fishing nets skipped along as a purposeful-looking lycra-clad cyclist flew past in the opposite direction. With the sun in her face, Jeanie looked content. Steve began to wonder why the chaos and drama in her life never seemed to cause her any concern. When she turned to look at him, she noticed the questioning look in his eyes.

‘Penny for ‘em, darlin’.’

Steve kicked a stone along the path as he walked.

‘Ach I was just wonderin’ why you always seem no nonchalant about everythin’… it’s like whatever shite happens, ye don’t have a care in the world.’

Jeanie stopped walking and unlinked her arm from Steve’s.

‘Well I just thought we were having a perfectly pleasant stroll in the sun. Why should I be bothered about anything?’

Steve tried to hold Jeanie’s hand again but she withdrew it from his grasp.

‘Look Jeanie, I didn’t mean to bug ye, it’s just that I find you pretty hard to figure out sometimes. And ye might as well know, I know about you and Cubitt… I showed a friend your photo and he knew who you were.’

An elderly couple had just walked past and Jeanie waited until they were out of earshot before replying to Steve.

‘How fucking dare you.’

‘Look, I couldn’t just pretend that …’

‘I said how fucking dare you, Steve. You don’t own me and it’s my business who I see.’

‘So what about the other night, then?’

Jeanie cackled.

‘Oh get a grip, Steve. A quick drunken shag up an alleyway does not a relationship make.’

Steve’s precious memory of a sensuous moment was shattered.

‘Thanks Jeanie. It’s good to know it meant as much to you as it did to me. But I just don’t get it… I’m under no illusions about my status in life but fuckin’ Cubitt… how could you ever get mixed up with a psycho bastard like that?’

Jeanie began walking away.

‘Answer me, Jeanie. How could you be with such an evil scumbag?’

Jeanie turned round and glared at him.

‘Okay, you asked for it Steve. Because he’s a real man, not some day-dreaming backstreet loser. Oh, and he’s the best fuck I’ve ever had. I come every time with him and if you really want to know, I always had to fake it with you. It’s hard to get too aroused by someone that deep down, you just feel sorry for.’

Steve flinched like a dog that had just been kicked.

‘Ach please, Jeanie…’

All he could was stand and watch as she faded from view in the hazy sunshine.

25

Steve spent the next few weeks in a fug of despair. Work at the
Regency house provided a welcome distraction. A dividing wall needed removing in one of the larger rooms on the second floor and Steve relished taking out his frustration on it. One Friday afternoon, as the rest of the workers started slacking off as the weekend beckoned, Bobby felt compelled to have a word.

‘For fuck’s sake slow down a bit, boss. You’re showing the rest of us up.’

‘Hard graft is the best therapy I know, Bobby, but maybe yer right.’

He put the sledgehammer down.

‘Okay, I’ll pace myself so that this wee job takes me up ‘til knockin’ off time. And ye better be up for goin’ for a pint instead of buggerin’ off to see yer girl again.’

‘Alright boss. The gaffer’s gonna let us get off early today so Cooper’s Cask at
four o’clock
it is. You never know your luck… there might be some nice chicks around to admire those bulging biceps you’ve been growing lately.’

Bobby was good to his word and by five, the pair already had a couple of pints under the belt as the barmaid brought two home-made quarter-pound beef burgers with chunky fries to their table.

‘Could ye get us another couple of pints, luv?’ said Steve.

With their meals quickly devoured and a fresh pint put in front of them, Steve and Bobby lent back contentedly and watched the pub fill up with the Friday night crowd. Bobby knew all about the ill-fated meeting with Jeanie and its effect on Steve’s mood but they’d avoided the subject until half way through the third pint.

‘So boss, hope that encounter was enough to draw a line under the Jeanie saga. Time you got out there and found yourself a nice easy-going
Brighton
girl who won’t fuck with your mind or put you in mortal danger.’

‘Yeah yeah, I know mate but the other thing I’ve been worryin’ about is that I don’t have a baldy notion what’s been happenin’ back home. Like have Trevor and Donzo been tryin’ to find out where I am or have the peelers been on their case or wha’?’

‘Maybe its time you called one of your home-town confidants to find out how the land lies, boss.’

Steve nodded.

‘Aye, sure I got maself a wee pay-as-you-go job the other day. About time I made use of it.’

After another pint, they made for home so that Bobby could wash and change before he went to meet Helen while Steve was happy to veg out on the sofa. Around seven, he heard Bobby shout ‘Have a nice evening, boss’ as he left the flat. With the place to himself, he finally felt ready to put in a call to Johnny Bell to see if there was any significant news from
Belfast
. He called Johnny’s landline number, which he knew by heart.

‘Steve, is that you? Good fuckin’ job you called, hombre. Can’t say for sure if it’ll have got back to Trevor but all our crew know that you and Jeanie are in
Brighton
.’

Steve sat bolt upright on the sofa.

‘Please say yer rakin’ me Johnny. You didn’t let it slip did ya?’

‘Blame the power of television. Some feature on The Culture Show last week about Mods. They were interviewin’ these guys in
Brighton
and there yez were standin’ around in the background, as large as life. There was no mistakin’ it. Let’s face it hombre, the pair of ye are quite distinctive.’

‘Oh fuck.’

Steve remembered how he and Doug had once been caught in a close-up shot of fans during a televised
Northern Ireland
international match. He’d lost count of the amount of people who’d mentioned to him that they’d seen it.

‘Well there’s fuck all I can do about that now. Can ye tell the crew to try an’ keep a lid on it? I mean, I can’t see Trevor and Donzo bein’ regular Culture Show viewers, can you?’

‘Maybe so hombre but Belfast is a village where a lot of talkin’ gets done and I could no more stop our lot gassin’ than ye could have stopped Geordie Best drinkin’.’

Steve continued chatting with Johnny for a while but as panic gripped him, he couldn’t concentrate much on what was being said. He ended the call and began desperately weighing up his options. He had a few hundred quid and could possibly get a flight out of the country but would have little left to survive on once the fare was paid. He thought of his cousin in
Scotland
again. Surely he wouldn’t mind putting him up for a couple of nights? Steve went straight to his bedroom and began throwing all his gear into his holdall. It was decided. He’d get a train to
London
and then get himself on the over-nighter to
Edinburgh
.

Steve dashed down the stairs and walked out the front door on to
Lansdowne Place
. At the same time he met the night-time air, his jaw was met by a fist.

‘Long time no see, fuckhead.’

Steve tumbled to the pavement, and after kicking him in the guts, his assailant grabbed him by the scruff of the neck and bundled him into the back seat of a black BMW.

26

‘Nice wee town you’ve landed in, fruity boy. Is that why ye moved here? Plenty of other fruits around by the looks of things.’

The car was gliding along
Western Road
and Trevor had noticed groups of revellers who were already getting in the swing of things for the Gay Pride march the following day.

‘Fuckin’ freaks… aye, you must be right at home here with all the other weirdoes.’

As Trevor gawped out the car window, Steve’s main view was the back of Donzo’s shaven head with ‘For God and
Ulster
’ tattooed on his neck.