Underground Rivers (13 page)

Sam laughs, unsure of how else to react.

SAM

Come on, we're not exactly friends.

RYAN

But we've slept together.

Sam looks completely dumbfounded by the lack of relevance.

RYAN

We had sex, so now all the guy/girl sexual tension's gone. And now that's gone, to you I'm just a guy that you've been physically close to, and can talk to.

Sam takes a moment to consider this. What scares her is the fact that he's actually starting to make sense. Though she doesn't want to admit it.

SAM

I'm not sure if that's COMPLETELY true ...

Ryan stays assertive, challenging her.

RYAN

I do.

Sam sighs, as if giving up. She sees his assertiveness as being obnoxious.

SAM

Okay, did you study psychology or something?

RYAN

No. But it is interesting.

Sam's scared to admit he's right.

SAM

Okay, well you're acting like you have me all sussed out. And you don't.

They take another long pause, trying to analyse each other, Sam more subtly than Ryan.

RYAN

That's fine.

(beat)

Maybe I will.

SAM

Maybe you will?

RYAN

Eventually.

He looks at her, smiling.

RYAN

I'd like to see you again.

Their minds race during Sam's moment of hesitation. Ryan's dying to hear a positive response from her, despite trying to sound aloof. The only question Sam can muster is why he'd have any interest in spending more time with her.

SAM

(awkward)

Why?

RYAN

(jokingly)

Why not? Don't you want to see me again?

SAM

I'm sure we will, sometime.

Sam begins to feel slightly awkward, though she's glad he's showing what seems to be genuine interest. Sam looks around the room.

SAM

I'm sorry, could I use your bathroom.

RYAN

(points)

It's right down there.

SAM

Thanks.

Sam leaves the room.

RYAN

You might have to flush it a few times.

SAM (O.O.S)

Lovely!

Sam exits.

Ryan looks over to the bathroom door.

He then looks back at the empty plates on the table, he acknowledges her empty plate and gently nods.

He takes the plates away to the kitchen counter.

As he comes back to the living room, he rubs his hands together and takes a breath.

He sits down on a small sofa.

Sam enters, she makes her way over.

Sam sits down in a chair next to the sofa.

They share silence for a moment.

Sam smiles, wanting more from him.

SAM

So now what?

Ryan smiles back, feeling proud that Sam's no longer looking to leave.

RYAN

You expect me to have something planned?

END SCENE

The Entertainer

by Neil Rowland

If you are carrying a torch for an old flame, then you might be scorched more profoundly the second time around.

While Joss Armstrong stood in the
The Dog and Duck
, one of his favourite pubs in Soho, a chance encounter proved to change the course of his entire life. He squinted at a public poem, displayed on the white tiled wall, listening to drips in the cistern, as if the drops were trying to jump overboard.

“It's you isn't it? My head's screwed straight?” intoned a rasping voice.

Joss gasped and tried to twist his neck. His moment of reflection was painfully shattered. He was perched on a high porcelain step, trying to aim truly. “Depends on who you're looking for,” he replied.

“You don't look a billion dollars. Aren't those grey hairs?”

“Who are you? You're talking to me?” Joss exclaimed.

“Must be five years ago now ... No, Big Ben strikes again, seven years ago!”

Joss stepped away. He only managed a modular sentence. “Huh? What are you saying?”

“We went to university together, darling. I recognise you. Didn't we?”

“We did?”

“Have I changed that much?”

Joss tip-toed across the hard floor and began to wash his hands. He darted anxious, measuring looks towards this personage. Formerly confined to a corner of his eye this character came into view. The guy's appearance and clothes made a big impression. He was decked out in a tartan suit, some weave of red, green and blue: well tailored, but certainly of the touristy would-be-Caledonian of Regent Street.

The pub above, containing his friends and a comforting atmosphere steeped in Soho tradition, was suddenly beyond reach. Now the bar and cheerful company was as remote as heaven. No longer a peaceful sanctuary, the basement toilet was a porcelain coffin, muffling the sounds of the ordinary world, including footsteps over their heads.

“You're still not familiar, my friend,” Joss admitted. “Not immediately you aren't.”

“Give your old block a rap,” the man suggested. He was tall, knotty and rangy as a tree, wind-blasted on a Derbyshire hill. He stuck a finger into his own chest. “Gerald Goater?”

“Oh jeez, is it really?”

“Yeah, it's me, Gerald.”

“Gerald Goater. Once again. What's this present guise? You've changed a lot!”

“So have you!”

They looked each other up and down.

“Where did you come from? Suddenly I have that premature birth feeling.”

“Leave the jokes to me, Joss. That's my forte.”

Initially Joss was most interested in Gerald's other attire: a natty black beret and pair of winkle-pickers. He was startled by these details, as well as by wiry hair half-successfully pressed under this beret and by an intense, bulging, bloodshot gaze.

“Goater?” Joss struggled, twisting his hair. “Can it really be you? After ... seven years did you say? Can it really be so long ... since we knew each other at Uni?”

“Longer. You can't forget my hilarious turns in the old Student Uni bar, can you? When I entertained you with my anecdotes, my jokes and even a folk song or two?”

“Bless my soul.”

“Have you forgotten my stories already? Don't you remember my songs?”

“Oh hell, yeah,
The Entertainer.
”

“So kind of you to remember, matey,” he replied, loping around the confined chamber.

“God's truth if it isn't, The Entertainer,” Joss exclaimed, taking him in.

“Still performing. Not for friends anymore. In a little club off Oxford Street. The small hours shift, just like Eastwood as a disc-jockey in
Play Misty For Me
.”

“Really? You've changed your dress code.”

“Somewhat.”

“Not a gothic punk any more then?”

“Hardly.”

“And your face looks different ... your features.”

“Spot on, Joss, too many late nights and unjustly early deaths!”

Joss nodded as if in congratulation. Sometimes the oddest personalities from the past just turned up, he explained to himself.

“You've been performing in Soho?”

“My dear lad, my dreams are much grander. But I'm still young.”

“I thought maybe you were on at Ronnie Scott's. You know, it's only just down the road from here and -”

“Have a heart, lovey, show some sensitivity. I haven't been booked so far.”

Gerald had known how to command an audience at Uni, if only by the oddity and menace of his persona. It was true that his jokes had been funny, his stories elaborate and his folk songs compelling: but arguably not in the right way.

Nobody knew much about Goater's origins except that he was an orphan out of touch with a foster family, as far as Joss remembered. The Entertainer dropped theological studies after two years, to take his luck in after-hours culture. He shifted from the pulpit to stand-up.

“Are you a follower of mine?” Goater challenged.

Joss considered. “I thought you must be following me,” he replied.

“You're a journalist though aren't you? You scribble a few idiocies about pop music, isn't that it?”

“After dropping out of Uni, well, I was forced to try my arm,” Joss admitted.

“You doing all right for yourself in the music biz then, matey?”

“It's a bit of beer money,” he quipped. “The price of failure.”

“Why don't you write about me?” Gerald challenged. “Why concentrate on the no-hopers?”

“You're grabbing me for a review, or maybe an
interview
?” Joss replied.

“I'd never let you interview me, Jossy. My career's at a delicate stage. My character's been assassinated so many times it's beyond resuscitation. You'd know all about emergency electric shocks, wouldn't you? Do you think I would let your malicious opinions loose on my talent?”

“How do you know what I do for a living, Gerald, anyway?”

“How do you know what I do?”

“Well, I don't always choose who or what to write about.”

“What about your mates up there in the saloon? The ones name-dropping like a bunch old hams on the golf course? Do they know that cheeky Evansy? Do they choose their own assignments?”

“If they're an ‘editor' they do. You're overhearing their conversations as well?”

“Why don't you ask them to profile me?”

“A character like you?” Joss wondered.

“I'm a right character, aren't I! I've turned into a proper Soho Boho. No, my dear old mate, as Francis Bacon used to say to me in the Colony Club, during the good old student days:
don't pander to a pretentious ponce flashing his fountain pen!
”

“Sounds like brilliant advice,” Joss admitted. “Now I'd better dry my hands and rejoin my fellow ‘ponces' of the press at the bar.”

“But I'm not here to give you scoops, love. I don't need your help, matey. Did Susan Boyle need help? And my audience laughs with me! No, no, you'd only be completely honest and gut me. Oh yes, I often read your dreadful stuff in QA. What a lot of earnest bollocks that is, Joss. Why don't you get your life back? Who takes any notice of that? No offence!”

“You want to critique my journalistic skills?” Joss wondered.

“Have a bit of humility, Joss. Where's the common touch?”

He'd a fruity, after-hours voice, gritty as a communal ashtray, squeaky as the wheels of an old double-decker: he'd seen the back end of life, gazing through a rear window.

“Who's interested in contemporary popular culture anyway? Except to notice from time to time how awful it all is.”

“Then why introduce yourself?” Joss wondered.

“Like
Strangers in the Night
you mean? I've got a bit of information for you, Joss. Yes that's right. I'm your light in the night; port in a storm. Do me the kindness of listening properly, will you please.”

Joss tried to stand at his ease in that dripping, isolating, and echoing box. “What do you mean?” Or perhaps it was the bizarre figure that confronted and chilled him.

“I've got something to inform you, Joss. A little bit of significant news to pass on to you, matey. Why don't you give me a chance, love?”

Still they were alone in this hard claustrophobic space: jostling for position, trapped in a fateful chessboard pattern of black and white tiles.

“What's this all about, Gerald? What bit of news do you have, to tell me?” He hadn't seen or heard from The Entertainer in years. It felt like an age since his impromptu turns in the student union bar. What bit of encouraging news could a bloke like Goater have to pass on?

“Don't worry. Don't worry, Jossy. I'll tell you what's up. Let's take a walk under the arches, along memory lane. Now why don't you cast your mind back to that lovely, charming girl friend of yours at Uni?”

“What about her?” Joss said, defensively.

“That's right, touches a raw nerve. Everybody was jealous of you. A lot of fellow scholars ruining their lives, trying to get into her knickers.”

“Are you crazy? Why are you bringing up this topic again?”

“The true love of your life, wasn't she? You know her name don't you? Karen Meadows?”

“I still remember her name, Gerald. We didn't enjoy a happy ending. No it wasn't happy ever after, not for us, I'm afraid,” said Joss. Suddenly heavy clouds filled his head and plunged his life into shadows.

The Entertainer was encouraged. “You can say that again! What a romantic flop!”

“Why remind me of the past? Let's change the subject.”

Joss attempted a casual stance and tried to erase a shamefaced feeling.

“Well do me the kindness, Joss, because I have the latest. I've got some information for you. I think you're going to find this interesting, matey.”

“Don't try to mess with my head, Gerald.”

«Karen Meadows has been chatting to me about you.”

“Oh yeah, she has? Karen has spoken to you? You've seen her?” Joss replied in astonishment.

“That's right, Jossy. She looked me up ... when she arrived at London from the Continent. Poor little chick bumped into me with her suitcase at St Pancras. She was most distraught and in need of a shoulder.”

“All right, thanks for the news update. Maybe things have gone badly for her. I don't know she's returned to England. But why should I specially care about that?”

“Show a bit of humanity, matey, please. Karen was truly tearful, weary and disoriented. She isn't even used to London like you and I, despite her student days. Wish her all the best, Jossy. It's all a journey!”

“Does she even have any friends here any longer?” Joss argued.

“She's always got you. Have some heart, don't keep it all zipped up, Jossy.”

“Very funny, Gerald, thanks for the thought,” he replied. “Anyway I already have a girlfriend. Times have moved on. We had a final break up, with no questions to resolve. As far as I knew Karen was going to marry. I never heard anything from her since university. We went out together, but it was just a student crush, at the last analysis.”

“Don't try to kid yourself, Jossy. You know you're still crazy about Karen. You can't forget her. Now you don't have to try, because times have moved on again.”

“You're crazy because it was years ago. It's all poisoned water under the bridge,” he recalled.

“Karen confided in me. I've learnt a lot about you. Far more than I ever knew at the time. A most unhappy tale of disappointed young love,” he croaked.

“Don't be ridiculous, Gerald. Ours wouldn't be the first youthful affair to hit the rocks. That's the thing about university, it brings you together. I'm not saying that university romances don't work. Obviously they do, sometimes,” Joss explained, “but not always, do they, because then you are removed from that environment ... and face the complexity of society beyond.”

The Entertainer was impatiently swaying, presumably under the influence. Gerald was drunk but did this perception undermine the truth of his tale?

“Do me the favour, matey. Sounds like that pseudo intellectual tosh you write!”

“Maybe, but I'm not going to be taken in by your hoaxes!”

“Still as mulish as ever, Jossy? Karen and I knocked into each other, after she'd hopped off the Eurostar. She came here to England to find you again. She'd made a terrible mistake in France and couldn't forget you. Wanted to know what you are doing? Where you live in London. Could I help her to find you. She opened her heart to me over a croissant.”

“What in the world has got into her?” Joss felt the tiny compartment pressing on his mind.

“I may look a bit strange, matey, but I'm a bloody good listener,” The Entertainer replied. “Yes indeed as my fans will tell you,” he retorted.

Other guys came down to answer the call of nature. Joss picked out steps coming down to join them.

New arrivals started at the peculiar guy in a tartan suit, yet selected their own square of chessboard. Of course The Entertainer always drew a second look. His life ambition was to make it stick, with as many visits as possible.

“What's she going to do here? When did she arrive in London?” Joss replied, quietly.

“When would it be? Let me check my Dali clock. It would have been about two weeks ago. She's been living in a hotel since then. A cheap hotel. Dreadfully shabby. She watched a rat running around. But she's too afraid to train it. She's got more money than me these days. I haven't made it big yet.”

“So you've been following her around?” Joss accused.

“What do you take me for?” He laughed explosively with contempt.

“I haven't seen you since you dropped out of theology. You walked straight past me that day. How did you find out where I live and work?”