This Is Your Life (26 page)

I jumped slightly as she began to grope my crotch. I had never known a woman be so direct before, and while I can't deny that the predatory male side of my character was excited at the obvious imminence of sex, another part of me couldn't help feeling that this was all rather bad manners. Normally before the outbreak of all-out war there's a little bit of
diplomatic tension, a couple of border incidents, increasing hostility until the troops are eventually mobilized and the explosions begin. This was straight in there with Pearl Harbor. She wasn't exactly keeping me guessing about where I stood.
Hmm, now she's squeezing the bulge in the front of my trousers, what can this mean? It must be some sort of subtle coded signal, but you could interpret that in a number of ways, couldn't you?

‘Have you got a condom?' said Tanya, momentarily releasing my exhausted mouth. There she goes again. Another cryptic half-clue to leave me guessing just how far this girl was prepared to go on this first date. Oh, if only women could just be a bit more up front about everything instead of forcing us to go through this elaborate dance, all this second-guessing ‘does she want to or doesn't she?' stuff.

‘Erm, a condom? No, no, I haven't.'

‘Doesn't matter. I've got some by my bed,' she said, launching her face against mine once more. A bed? She's talking about a bed now. I wondered if that had as many soft toys on it as her bookshelves had.

It was true that I didn't have any condoms. I hadn't gone to that party with the deliberate intention of casually seducing someone just because I was now recognized wherever I went. Besides, I couldn't buy condoms any more because now I was recognized wherever I went. What does Prince Charles do if he needs some contraceptives? He can hardly wander around the chemist and hope to sneak it past unnoticed with a comb and a toothbrush.

I think by this point I must have been expected to be fiddling with Tanya's bra strap or squeezing her breasts through her turquoise crop top or something, because she suddenly broke off.

‘What's the matter?' she said.

‘Nothing, what do you mean?' I said, slightly too defensively.

‘You seem a bit – you know, not very relaxed?'

She was right, of course, although I was embarrassed that it was so obvious. I was in two minds about going through with this. Actually, it wasn't so much ‘two minds': my brain was against it, it was another part of my body that was lobbying hard in favour of proceeding. She only wanted to sleep with me because she thought I was a celebrity. Yet I knew that I wasn't the genuine article, that I was deceiving her, tricking her into bed just as if I had laced her drink or had dishonestly promised the chorus girl the lead part in the musical.

‘Tanya, I'm sorry but I don't think I should go to bed with you.'

‘What?' she said indignantly.

‘Sorry, it just feels wrong, you know, a bit sudden.'

‘Is it because I'm a nobody; is that what it is?'

‘No – it's because
I'm
a nobody. It's all wrong. I'm here under false pretences.' I stood up. ‘Look, we've only just met. Maybe it's different for you because you recognized my face right away and felt like you knew me. But I'd never seen your face before until a couple of hours ago, and I don't know the first thing about you.'

‘Oh,' she said dejectedly. ‘So it is because I'm not famous then.'

As I walked home in the drizzle, pointlessly hailing taxis with their lights turned off, I wondered what a real star would have done. They probably wouldn't have gone back to her flat for a start. An experienced TV celeb would never risk sleeping over at some complete stranger's house. Imagine it. In the middle of the night, tiptoeing out of the toilet in a skimpy
ladies' dressing gown only to bump into some astonished flatmate in the hallway. ‘Bugger me! It's the bloke off
Antiques Roadshow
! What the bloody hell are you doing here?'

‘Oh I was just trying to flush a used condom down the lavvy, but it won't go down.'

‘Right. Listen, er, my grandma's left me these antique porcelain figures, and I was wondering what they might be worth . . .'

I finally got a taxi and slumped back in my seat still wondering if I had done the right thing. Perhaps a real celebrity would have had sex with the fan and then forgotten all about her. Maybe I lacked that ruthless, selfish drive, the killer instinct needed to get to the very top. Perhaps I should be attempting to emulate the sexual psychology of today's showbiz stars. The trouble was I didn't fancy being tied up by transsexual prostitutes while out of my head on cocaine. I attempted to be as positive as possible about the evening. Tanya had thought I was ‘brilliant', and had wanted to sleep with me because I was famous. People at the party had nudged each other and pointed in my direction; everyone wanted to talk to
me.
I had achieved everything I had ever dreamt of. I was a star, members of the public were impressed by me, at last I was recognized wherever I went. As these self-satisfied thoughts glowed inside my head, the taxi driver put his hand over to pull back the glass screen between us.

‘I hope you don't mind me saying, but you're that bloke off the telly, aren't you?'

‘Yes, yes I am.'

‘I expect you get fed up with people recognizing you all the time, don't you?'

‘Oh well, I don't really mind. In my job the time to start worrying is when people stop recognizing you!' I quipped.

‘That's true, you've got a point there!' he chuckled. ‘So how come the bloody weather forecast is always completely bloody wrong then?'

‘I'm sorry?' I said, slightly perplexed.

‘Well, they pay you all that money to say whether it's going to rain or not and you never bloody get it right.'

Now that he'd said this I suppose I did look a tiny bit like that weatherman, even if I didn't wear beige polyester. The fact that this cabbie and I had just agreed how important it was for me to be recognized made me reluctant to point out that I wasn't the celebrity he was thinking of.

‘I mean, when you say it's going to be sunny, I make sure I put on my bloody raincoat, know what I mean!' he went on. I felt slightly irritated.

‘Yeah, well, we tell you the wrong weather deliberately,' I told him conspiratorially. ‘The government forces us to.'

‘Really?'

‘Yeah. If we say it's going to pour with rain, all the people who work outside are going to phone in sick and all the foreign tourists are going to cancel their holidays, so we are under strict instructions from the spin doctors in Downing Street to say the weather's going to be much better than it really is.'

‘You know, that doesn't surprise me,' he replied. ‘That doesn't surprise me one bit.' And he shook his head in dismay about how even the weather was being spun these days.

‘But you'll keep that to yourself, won't you?' I said as we pulled up.

‘Oh yeah, of course I will,' he lied. I paid him for driving me home and recognizing me, even if I was a little insulted that he thought I was someone else. Obviously you can't blame an ordinary member of the public for something like that; I wasn't that vain and petty and mean. I just didn't have any
loose change for a tip, that's all. He really is a tight bastard, that weatherman.

I was distressed to discover that this sort of mix-up happened more frequently than I would have imagined. I was also variously confused with a daytime TV quizmaster, a presenter on the Shopping Channel and on one occasion a man wanted in connection with a series of armed raids in the East Midlands whose photo had appeared on the news. The only group of people who never got me mixed up with any other celebrities were the celebrities themselves. The very people who had stared right through me at Billy Scrivens's funeral were now inviting me to their book launches and after-show parties and welcoming me to their bosom like some long-lost friend.

Nothing motivates a star like the fear of their own fame fading. I think I was invited to parties by VIPs I'd never met because they needed to bolster their own fame by surrounding themselves with the latest arrivals at the celebrity ball. I sensed that they didn't feel any more secure than I did. I suppose fame is so precious because it's so intangible. If you buy a new car, it's there, gleaming; an undeniable physical presence. You can drive it around, park it in the street and glance around too many times as you are walking away from it. But fame is in the air, an invisible, one-step-ahead will o' the wisp that you can never be sure is going to stay around or just flit away to glow around someone else. So the stars I met were constantly seeking to become more famous. Even if they were Oscar winners and major film stars, it still wasn't enough; they didn't feel they'd arrived yet, they couldn't see the Hollywood for the trees. Would my own nagging sense of frustration be lifted if only I could get more famous? Was the problem with this drug that I hadn't got a big enough shot of it?

Or was my insecurity different because my fame had been all smoke and mirrors in the first place? Every time I hoped I might be becoming a bona fide star I found myself having to lie again. My fancy costume was a mass of safety pins underneath. If
Hello!
magazine ever wanted to do a feature on me, I'd never be able to show them my house in Seaford.

The homes you saw in
Hello!
and
OK!
magazines all seemed pretty much the same. They had tables you couldn't put things on and cushions you would never dare to sit upon. I think it must be a precondition of them photographing a star's home.

‘Um, hello there. Look, we just have to check – you do have big puffy yellow curtains, don't you?'

‘Of course I do.'

‘Jolly good. Sorry we had to ask but you can't be too careful.'

My home could not have been more unsuitable and yet when
OK!
did finally contact me and ask if I would be interested in appearing in a photo feature, I couldn't resist it. ‘Yes, I'd be delighted!' I said. I couldn't help myself, I was just so flattered to be asked. It was another step on the show business ladder, another medal in the war against anonymity. I knew I didn't have a home I could ever possibly show them but a voice in my head said, Let's cross that bridge when we come to it. And then another panicky voice screamed: There is no bridge, you idiot! THERE IS NO BRIDGE, the ravine is completely bloody bridge-less! It's ‘Let's step off that cliff and fall to our death when we come to it!'

The only solution was to use someone else's house. If I was to be cross-examined by the celebrity police, my only chance was to give a false address. I had the perfect location: my parents had keys for the London flat of their Korean neighbours who were often out of the country. I'd been in there once with Mum when she'd gone to water their plants, and she was always saying it was like something out of
Ideal Home.
This place really looked like a star's home. Expensive ornaments were carefully placed in backlit alcoves, full bottles of lotions and bath oils were neatly arranged around the jacuzzi. These people had shelves with just one item on! At no point had this little figurine been gradually joined by some old paperbacks, piled-up videos and a couple of cracked empty CD cases.

Why shouldn't this be my London pad as far as the general
public were concerned? The Korean couple were the least likely people on Earth ever to buy
OK!
magazine. It would be a very straightforward operation. I would give a very specific time to the photographer, I'd be in there waiting for him, I'd let him in to take a few snaps and he'd be on his way again in half an hour. And all right, after the deed was done I might have to confess to Mum and Dad and persuade them to keep this little secret to themselves, but other than that it was quite plausible that ‘one of Britain's most exciting new comics' (
Daily Telegraph
), ‘the fastest rising star on the comedy circuit' (
Time Out
), should have an opulent flat like this in West London.

The arrangement was made and one quiet Wednesday morning I let myself in through the front door, entering the code to silence the beep on the burglar alarm. When I had previously accompanied Mum around the apartment it had felt legitimate, but now I felt like an intruder; a style burglar who was there to filch a little bit of this couple's opulent lifestyle for myself. I put a pint of milk in the fridge so I could confidently offer a cup of tea and then I spread a couple of that day's newspapers across the coffee table along with a scuffed paperback copy of
Carrot – How One Root Vegetable Changed the History of the World.

I sat on the sofa and lay back. ‘Yah – this was originally three rooms but my architect did a wonderful job with it.' I crossed my legs the other way and placed my hand on my chin pensively. ‘Yah, of course this building was originally an old clock factory – it's such a shame there's no real industry left in the capital—' then the door buzzer went off and I leapt up in shock. ‘Hi there, come on up!' I said to the intercom, pressing the button to release the main door downstairs. I had a last glance in the mirror to check that I was completely happy with
what I was wearing. The casual, just-thrown-on-a-few-old-things look had taken me ages to get right.