2008 - The Bearded Tit (12 page)

We hugged and I felt deliriously happy as I left the pub. A bit of a prat, deep down, perhaps; a right idiot, in fact.

The bird looked straight at me. ‘Hello, Charlie!’

‘H
ey, I can’t believe it!’ I said to the girl in the toyshop. ‘You have a long-tailed tit.’

She looked confused rather than offended.

‘There, on the shelf behind you. That cuddly toy.’

She looked relieved.

‘Well, yes, that’s part of our cuddly toy bird range, sir. We have a selection of different birds: common, like the robin, that’s this one here, or rare like…er…whatever this one is,’ she said waving a fluffy toy in the air.

‘That’s a hammerhead shark. No, this is the one I want. A long-tailed tit. Amazing!’

The long-tailed tit (
Aegithalos caudatus
) was JJ’s favourite bird.

‘If you squeeze its tummy it makes the right noise as well.’

Get away, no? Yes! How about that? Squeeze it in the right place and it makes a bird noise. Not every time. Back then I had no idea what a long-tailed tit sounded like, but the noise coming from the toy’s tummy was a shrill, tinny chirrup that could easily have been a bird. This was the nineteen-seventies, remember, and a toy like this was pretty damned sensational. If I could have my time on this earth over again, I might have a squeeze on the hammerhead shark’s tummy to see what noise that made.

It was four forty-five. I was meeting JJ at five thirty to have a quick drink before she caught her bus at six thirty. I would have time to take it back to college and wrap it. The ideal present.

The long-tailed tit. A fluffy pink ball on a string. A cat’s toy. A charming sight, they are, as they move daintily through foliage in social groups. Their thin, needle-like song tinkles down from the treetops. A girly bird to have as a favourite, maybe. But undeniably sweet. And the nest, a masterpiece! A globular, domed, rounded or bottle-shaped ball of soft, springy, elastic moss, lichen and cobweb, that actually expands as the chicks grow.

My short cut back to college would take me through Debenhams department store. In the main doors and through make·up; (war-painted hags perched like vultures on stools), then into soft furnishings and haberdashery (prim, trim men giggling and nudging through the curtain material samples), up a couple of steps though the ‘cafeteria’ (and the unconvincing stench of freshly ground instant coffee), into sport and leisure (shaven-headed muscle-bound youths, inarticulately embarrassed by all but the most basic human conversation), turn left into kitchen appliances (men with suits and glasses proudly demonstrating food-mixer speeds), down a few steps and out though the back doors into the bus station and twenty yards from my room. But things didn’t turn out that way.

It was the dash through the cafeteria that was to change the course of this day. My eyes were fixed on the floor ahead as I wove in between tables, chairs and unattended toddlers when, on the outskirts of my visual field, there was a large, ginger blur. Something strong and warm overpowered me.

‘Rooooorrrrrry! I don’t believe it! The devil himself. Talk of the devil, hey? That’s neat!’

Brigid the South African waitress from my first year. If I had a list of names of the people I did not want to meet at that moment, hers would have been on it. Possibly the only one on it. ‘How are you?’ she effused, treating me to a pre-Christmas boozy waft of warm breath and spittle. ‘Let me hug you.’

There was no option. She clasped me and squeezed me hard and in my mind there appeared the worrying image of an alligator wounding its prey so it could be dragged underwater and moved somewhere else to be destroyed later. Firm against my chest I felt her bosom, which was still amazing, but amazingly unappealing. I remembered vividly why she had attracted me and why she had frightened me. She suddenly started kissing me hard, or possibly she was just using odd bits of my face to wipe her lipstick off. After a frenzy of girly gushing and vice-like requests to join her, I found myself sitting opposite the Amazonian Boer with a pre-cappuccino cappuccino in a very seventies glass cup, as if the coffee were showing no shame at its undrinkability.

All I wanted to do in the world at that moment was to go back to my room to wrap the long-tailed tit and meet for a cosy drink with the love of my life. I felt kidnapped. The rasping voice and the overexcited, inconsequential drivel became familiar again. She was so, so different from JJ.

‘I really can’t stay that long,’ I began feebly.

‘Don’t be daft. I owe you an apology. And,’ she added disconcertingly, ‘a lot more besides.’

‘I must be going; I’ve got to meet a friend.’

‘I’ll come with you. Any friend of yours…’

‘Er…’

‘Is it a girl? Even better. Like to see what the competition is!’

‘No, it’s not girl.’

Now, why did I say that?

‘Hey, listen, Rors, remember that night last year? You didn’t fuck up; I did. I was stupid and hysterical. We could have had a great night. We could be going out now. We still could. I mean, I was ready for you. I mean…hell, yeah. I was there, man. There wasn’t a problem. I dug you fine. And I know you dug me. And I know why!’

She thrust her breasts out towards me and then bit her lip coyly; though her ‘coy’ lessons had clearly been a waste of money. And where did ‘Rors’ come from?

I tried to stay focused. It was a quarter past five. I didn’t have time to wrap the bird now and I had to start walking to the bookshop at once.

‘Hey, I’ve got to get to Blackwaters before it shuts.’ I stood up decisively. She stood up too and grabbed my arm. ‘Me too. I’ll come with you and then we can go out for a drink. Or three! Ha ha ha!’

‘But…’

‘And we’ll see if our evening can have a different ending this time.’

‘I’m sure it will.’ My pessimism was undisguised.

I walked slowly back towards the bookshop to give her time to change her mind and disappear. Or just change her mind. Or, even better, just disappear. She showed no inclination to do any of these things.

‘Hey, listen, why don’t I do what I have to in the bookshop, and maybe we could meet later. After six thirty, maybe? Er…six thirty-one, perhaps?’

‘I don’t want to let you out of my sight, young man! Hey, we better stop dawdling; that shop’s going to be shut!’

It was five twenty-five and the bookshop was in view. I had no idea what to do. I was slowing down, Brigid was speeding up. And pulling me by the arm. Just at that moment, JJ appeared at the main door of the shop. She was looking at her watch and turned away from us to look up the street, then started turning in our direction. I grabbed Brigjd and dragged her into an alleyway about three shops away from Blackwaters.

‘Let’s not bother with the bookshop,’ I said. The narrowness of the alleyway crammed us up against each other. She needed no further invitation.

‘Oh, Rory.’

We kissed rather incontinently for five twenty-five on an autumn evening. ‘I love your impetuousness…your spur-of-the-momentness—maybe you are the devil! I love it.’

I was overwhelmed again by the giant freckled sucker, and coming up briefly for air, I suggested we moved further down the alleyway from the street.

Oh JJ, I’m so, so sorry. What could I do? I couldn’t go and meet her like this. I was covered in lipstick. Worse than that, I was covered in a large, ginger South African girl. I had to get this girl away from Trinity Street.

‘Let’s go for a drink.’

‘OK, where?’

‘The Moon and Sixpence.’

‘That sounds nice; where’s that?’

‘Newmarket Road. It’s a bit of a walk but worth it.’

‘Have they got nooky holes?’

What an alarming question. Nooky holes? I hoped that was some sort of South African pub game.

‘They’ve got bar billiards.’

‘You’re funny. No, I mean cosy little recesses where two people can get to know each other a little bit better.’

‘Oh yes, that’s why I’m suggesting it.’ That, and because it’s miles from the centre of town and no self-respecting person, least of all JJ, would turn up there. ‘It’s where the dead drink,’ I’d heard it described. When I first went there I discovered the dead actually served there as well. Spit and sawdust would have been most welcome in this place. They would have been luxurious extras; as would beer, hygiene and a complete roof.

But by the time we got there JJ would be on her bus home. Thinking what? What would she make of my non-appearance? That perhaps I had some important work to finish? That perhaps a lecture or supervision had overrun? No, I’d given her no reason to suppose my studies would ever prevent me seeing her.

That perhaps I’d found someone else? No, she wouldn’t think that, would she? That’s out of the question. There is no one else. How could she possibly think that?

That maybe I got drunk at some college society drinks do and crashed out in my room? Yes, I don’t mind you thinking that, JJ, my lovely. What if she thought that and came to my room to check? Oh no, what if she came to my room and I wasn’t there? Well, it would be the first time she’s ever come as far as my room. That would be a plus. Or would it? Perhaps I crashed out in somebody else’s room. Yes, that’s more like it. What if she thought I was dead? What if she really thought I had died, that death would be the only thing to make me miss my appointment with her?

But that’s true, JJ. Death is the only thing that would keep me from you. Death or a buxom, overbearing South African girl. In fact, what
was
keeping me from seeing JJ? It wasn’t death or Brigid. It was fear and guilt. It never crossed my mind to say, ‘I can’t see you now, Brigid, because I’m meeting my new girlfriend.

Or the girl who soon will be my new girlfriend when we get to know each other better.’ Why didn’t I say that? Why didn’t I turn up to meet JJ and say, with total innocence, ‘Hey, JJ, this is Brigid, an old mate of mine from my first year. She just wanted to say hello to my special new friend. Right, let’s go, JJ. See you around, Brigid.’ Now it all seems so very easy. Back then, there was fear and guilt. Guilt about the desires I once had for Brigid, and fear of offending JJ, of hurting JJ, of losing her.

‘Hey, this pub’s closed down,’ said Brigid as we arrived at the Moon and Sixpence. ‘Look, it’s all boarded up and there’s a hole in the roof.’

‘No, it’s always like that,’ I assured her. ‘Let’s go in. You’ll like the landlady. She’s a lovely person. A great sense of humour for someone who’s decomposing.’

We went in and Brigid sniffed the dank air.

‘I’m not drinking here; let’s go somewhere decent like the Elm Tree or the Blue or the Free Press.’

I looked at my watch. It was six forty-five. It didn’t matter any more where we drank. JJ wouldn’t be walking in on us. She’d be on her bus home having serious doubts about our relationship. If we still had one. I’m so sorry to have hurt you, JJ. You were my whole life and now you’re gone. Thank you for caring about me. But wait, what if she didn’t care? A new fear flooded my soul. What if she didn’t care that I didn’t turn up? What if she found it a bit of a relief that I stood her up. What if she thought, thank God he’s not here, I can catch an earlier bus home. Or go out for a drink with a mate from work. Or, it gets worse. Supposing she thought, I can use his not turning up as an excuse to finish this silly non-event of a relationship, which, let’s face it, is only based on our common interest in birds. And I’m not convinced he actually cares much about birds anyway; he was probably just infatuated with me in that embarrassing, virginal student way. He was probably just pretending to be interested in birds so he could hang around the shop all day and chat me up like that sad loser he is. I was mortified by this thought.

A searing pain seemed to dart out all over my body starting with my crotch.

‘Hello, are you there?’

Brigid had grabbed my balls really tight and was squeezing them in what she claimed was an affectionate manner.

‘Where are you? What do I have to do to get your attention, handsome?’

‘Oh, sorry, I was miles away.’

‘Why don’t we just get a bottle of wine and go back to your room?’ she asked insistently.

Because I don’t like you, I don’t want you, I’m madly in love with a special girl whom I’m letting down badly by being with you and I certainly don’t want to be alone in the confines of my room with you!

Was the correct answer, but somehow I came out with a rather pompous, and bizarre, alternative.

‘Because this country has the most outmoded and repressive licensing laws of anywhere in the world, based on First World War legislation and wholly inappropriate to the nineteen-seventies, so I don’t intend to waste any second that a pub is actually open and serving alcohol by not being in a pub!’

‘Well said!’ She gave me an undeserved hug. ‘We’ll go back to yours after the pubs shut.’

I resigned myself to the fact that I’d have to ‘explain’ everything to JJ when I saw her, in whatever way I could find most acceptable, and hope that it hadn’t spoiled what we had.

‘So, what is it that you have?’ I could imagine Kramer saying. ‘You have nothing to spoil.’

We had a lot to spoil.

I knew it.

JJ knew it.…Didn’t she?

I wasn’t going to shake Brigid off easily and I was really anxious about ending up in bed with her so I thought I’d cut my losses and just try to have a convivial night’s drinking. We could do several pubs, then the college bar; she would be ill and have to go home. We’d certainly be too drunk to even attempt anything vaguely carnal—well, maybe a doner kebab from Dodgy Ahmed’s later on. The plan, of course, would only work if I could stay one step ahead of (that is, a few drinks behind) Brigid. She was a formidable drinker, but as she would almost certainly insist that I buy the drinks all night, I would retain some control.

The Free Press, Elm Tree, the Cricketers, the Clarendon, the Fountain, the Castle; things were going according to plan. Brigid was significantly tipsier than I. Then we went to the Maypole, where hunchback Harry refused to serve us, and then barred us after some South African expletives. Next on the itinerary was the Bun Shop. Then the Cambridge Arms and then the Maypole, from where, hunchback Harry reminded us, we’d been barred half an hour earlier. Next was the…er…then the…oh, dear I can’t seem to remember where we went after that.