Colouring In (2 page)

My second stroke of luck was that Fergus was a brilliant director. He seemed to know exactly what I was getting at, had no desire to make vast changes in order to put his own stamp upon it. What’s more, he had an amazing cast of talented young actors at his disposal. They were all extremely keen to rehearse seven days a week, thus reducing their time for academic work. There were a dozen volunteers for each part. Auditions were enormously enjoyable. Fergus and I found ourselves constantly agreeing, most particularly that Magdalene Brewer should play the lead. Magda, very tall, looked like no other girl I had ever seen: not exactly beautiful, but with a smile so bewitching, and eyes of such penetrating understanding, that I was a gonner from the moment she walked into the room to read her lines. Luckily she agreed with me, perhaps in the exuberance of getting the much-wanted lead, that it would be a good idea to spend some time together talking about the
essence
– I flung out the word, surprising myself – of her part. So we spent a great deal of time in her room or mine. The play was occasionally mentioned. She abandoned her PPE, I gave not a thought that term to Herodotus and co. I was a playwright in love. I’m not so sure about Magda. The following term her ardour cooled. She just might have been one of those women who think it quite in order to go to any lengths to get what you want in a competitive world.

Forward, Forward
(by now known to the cognoscenti as simply
Forward
) opened in the penultimate week of the Hilary term. It was a wild success – standing ovation, Magda’s dress perilously close to exposing her astounding breasts at the last bow, general delight of an audience which, longing to be pleased, had found reason for laughter between the passages of – in my opinion at the time – profound thought. Bert, swinging a bottle of Krug, could hardly get near me afterwards, so thick were the congratulations, so struggling to show they knew me were my friends. My head was quickly turned: ambition soared.

I had dreaded a sense of anticlimax when the week was over. I read the admiring reviews till I knew them by heart –
here is a writer of truly great potential, comic wit, and wisdom rare in one so young –
was the best (funny how I still remember it today) and wondered what to do next. But just as disaster so often follows disaster so, in that dazzling few months of my youth, success was superseded by further success. A producer – a young man rich in his own right, keen to discover young talent – took the play to the Edinburgh Festival. That was quite a week. Total sell-out. Up every night, all night, drinking. Boasting of the reviews. Much talk of future plays, future productions. Magda, on a complete high, almost exhausted me. How did we do it? How did we manage to get through the days, having stayed up most of the nights to celebrate each performance? Somehow we did. And unanimous, we were, in thinking
Forward
would be one of the experiences we would never, ever forget, one of the best times of our lives and all that (actually, I think most of us would agree we were right there.) The anti-climax came at the beginning of the following term. My tutors gallantly congratulated me on my success in the theatrical world, but suggested that if I wanted to get a decent degree then it might be advisable to return to my academic studies. I heeded their warning, returned to work.

I knew that the whole glittering bubble of time that was
Forward
would flash through my mind when I saw Bert, and it would probably be the same for him. There’s nothing like shared experience to ease a reunion after long absence. It’s the element that binds friends whose lives have grown apart. It’s the engine that powers jokes about youthful folly, and warms one with the arrogant feeling of wisdom now gained. Heavens, it would be good to see Bert again this evening. The day, waiting, went very slowly.

My parents: Mama and Papa. Actually I call them Mum and Dad at school so’s not to be teased. I love them to bits. But they are
weird,
in lots of ways. I mean, take Mama. She has these very definite opinions about all sorts of things, and no one can budge her. Trainers, for instance. She absolutely hates trainers. She says they’re so ugly. Shoes aren’t ugly or pretty, I tell her: they’re just shoes. If I used my eyes, she says, I’d
see
they were ugly (she thinks all sorts of things are ugly that I don’t notice, which makes her shopping in High Streets very unhappy). ‘So what would you like me to wear instead?’ I ask. She can’t answer that. She doesn’t suggest the sort of sandals she wore back in the Dark Ages, I admit that. But all the same, every time I need a new pair of trainers there’s this row … well, argument – usually
in
the shop, which is embarrassing. Though actually, that’s the only time she does mega-embarrass me. She doesn’t talk in a loud voice at the school gate, like some mothers, or say nice things about me to my teacher, or wear very short skirts, or dye her hair orange like my friend Elli’s mother, with all the black coming through. Another of her very firm opinions is that the Beatles were the best at pop music. I admit they’re quite good – I like
Lucy in the Sky –
but I wouldn’t say they’re the geniuses she says they are: she thinks they’re the best
ever
– their tunes, their lyrics. I expect she’ll go on thinking that till she dies. No one can ever change her mind once it’s made up. I asked her what she thought of that old man who’s still around – Mick Jagger. The Rolling Stones were rougher, I think she said, than the Beatles. But she liked them too. And a whole load of others who were hits when she was young. I’d never heard of any of them. I sometimes get her to listen to my music. She makes a face and says it’s not her sort of thing. Though she does like just one group – Radiohead. Well, yes, they’re cool. I suppose a bit like the Beatles.

She’s got tons of ideas about what’s good and what’s bad for me and she’s pretty fierce about them. Fizzy drinks, McDonald’s food, crisps – all that sort of ordinary stuff I’m only allowed, like, not very often. She’s always trying to get me to eat fruit – our kitchen table is like a fruit stall – and fish, which I hate. She’s very good at puddings, though. We have chocolate pudding some Sundays which sort of rises up out of a sauce: ace, that.

I can’t really grumble much about Mama. She’s nearly always
there –
at home, I mean. A lot of my friends’ mothers work in offices and companies and they’re never there, and they never have time to help or to listen. Mama does listen, always. Elli’s Mum, apparently, when she
is
home, is always frantic, and always on the telephone. So I’m lucky, there, having a mother who works at home. Her work is finished by the time I get back from school so we have really nice times at tea. She tells me what’s gone wrong and how silly she’s been about something, and makes me laugh. She’s absolutely useless about technical things. When her mobile rings, which is only when she leaves it on because she doesn’t really know how to turn it off, she rushes about picking up a camera or the video thing – absolutely pathetic. She thinks everything to do with computers and the internet and stuff is boring, and hates people talking about it. Well I suppose that’s just better than Elli’s Mum who gets a hundred e-mails a day and is always surfing the net. Yes: I think it’s a
bit
better, Mama’s way, though she could try harder about machinery things. I’m always telling her she’s an old fuddy duddy, still jellified (one of my best new made-up words) in the past. She says she doesn’t care.

Sometimes Mama does drive me bananas, going on about things that she likes, trying to get me to like them. Once she got very cross and said I didn’t know the difference between a chaffinch and a daffodil. Which was, like, daft. I know daffodils perfectly well. Hyde Park is stuffed with them, isn’t it? And we’ve got a few in our garden. I said I don’t know how you expect me to know about chaffinches if we don’t have any here. Next thing: she buys this hideous bird table. ‘That’s so
ugly’
, I said – and she did laugh. So now what happens? I have these bird lessons at breakfast. What’s that, Sylvie? The blue and yellow one? Blue tit, Mama. No: a
great
tit. I keep telling you, the big one is … oh honestly. She’s a pain about birds.

But altogether? Altogether I’d say I’m mega lucky with Mama. I mean you can rely on her. She’d never, ever let me down. She’s never, ever late. In fact I discovered that when she comes to fetch me from somewhere, she arrives so early, so’s not to be late, she has to wait. She says she likes that. Weirdly, she likes being shut in the car listening to Radio 3 or whatever. Then, if something goes wrong, she’s the best at giving advice. She always understands, even if she doesn’t agree. Sometimes it’s quite spooky how she knows I’m worried or not happy or something, and she manages to find out what it is without actually asking me questions. She’s not cross very often, and she forgives me a lot. Papa says she spoils me. Well, she does a bit. No so much with presents, though she’s very good at surprise presents – she remembers things I say I like and then suddenly they appear. But Elli says she spoils me with
time
. I’m not sure what that means. But I think it means that even if she’s tired in the evenings, and busy, she’ll always make time to help me with my homework, or my piano practice or things like that. Perhaps I take that for granted, though I don’t think I do now I’m older, since Elli pointed it out. Really I think I’m lucky having Mama as my mother. Despite her funny ways I think she’s the best. But then I suppose most people think that about their mothers. Except Elli.

Papa! Well, Papa. He’s weird, too, in different ways from Mama. His trouble is he concentrates so hard on whatever he’s doing that it’s very difficult to get his attention if he’s in one of his concentrating moods. So he’s sitting in the kitchen reading the newspaper about some war or something, and I ask him a question and he simply doesn’t hear, which can be annoying. He gets cross about different things from Mama. Like my room. He says it’s a tip, and he won’t read to me till it’s cleared up. Sometimes he says it’s a bloody disgrace. When I was young he didn’t swear in front of me. Now he quite often does, though not any of the really bad words that Harry told us about at school. He’s absolutely wonderful, Papa, at reading to me. He apparently began when I was a baby, and went on years after I could read to myself because I always ask him to. He’s so good, doing different voices and everything. I like the Roald Dahl books best, though we’re on to
Little Nell
at the moment. I think Papa is very clever. He’s got a clever face, especially now his hair is going a bit grey at the sides. He doesn’t, like, go on about his cleverness, but I think people can feel it. Sometimes I look at the faces of people he’s talking to, and they look really impressed. Once he wrote a play when he was young that nearly made him world famous. He’s got framed posters saying all about it on the walls of his study, his name pretty big. I’m very proud of him except when he dances. When my twin cousins had a disco when they were sixteen, they asked people of all ages, even ten year olds like I was then, and everyone was supposed to dance. Mama, luckily, didn’t – and she’s a proper dancer, goes to lessons. She said she couldn’t cope with the music. But Papa! He, like,
squirmed.
He moved about wiggling his arms like an octopus, and humming. I wanted to die. On the way home I said never, ever – please Papa never ever do that to me again. He told me not to be so critical of other people’s enjoyment, and anyhow there had been plenty of other fathers dancing. I said yes but you were the
worst.
We haven’t been to any more of those sort of parties, thank goodness. I dread Papa making such an idiot of himself again. I expect he will at my wedding or something.

Papa and Mama together are pretty good. I wouldn’t want them to be divorced – lots of people in my class have parents who are divorced, and some of them have horrid step-parents. But I don’t think Mama and Papa will divorce now. They’ve been married fifteen years, and they’ve got me, and they don’t squabble much. I think they’re happy actually. They laugh a lot, and they thank each other for things, everyday sort of things like when Papa puts the rubbish out or Mama finds his scarf which he’s always losing. They’re not at all lovey-dovey which I think is brilliant. I’d hate them to be soppy, kissing and stuff. They agree about a lot, including improving my mind. I tell them when I have children I’m absolutely not going to do anything to improve
their
minds. They said you wait. But to be fair they don’t bang on too much. Just subtly try to inform me now and then. I always know what they’re up to.

Funnily enough, they don’t seem to invite lots of people here. Elli says her parents are always having dinner parties and she has to have cereal in front of the telly upstairs. They go out about once a week, sometimes Papa on his own, a work thing, and I have fun with Mama. She says dinner parties are too much of a palaver, and she hates cooking, so it’s very rare that even two people come round. Like tonight. Some old friend of Papa’s and horrible Carlotta. Mama looked a bit spinny when I got back from school, shelling prawns and whizzing about, dropping things, so I laid the table for her. I picked all the pansies from the tub and arranged them for her. She likes that sort of thing. She gave me fish fingers and carrots and chocolate yogurt on a tray in the study and said I could watch telly till nine. So that’s cool. It’s a bit like Elli’s sort of evening, but much nicer. I’m even allowed a bit of Toblerone so long as I promise to eat it before doing my teeth. Which I did promise. I’m always making promises. Both Mama and Papa like it when I do, and they believe me.

Right from the beginning, with the Grants, it was easy (I was nervous they might not want to take on someone of my age – though I didn’t admit what it was). At the interview with Mrs. Grant I made myself plain. ‘I’d be grateful if you’d call me Gwen,’ I said. ‘Everyone calls me Gwen – and I’ll call you Mrs. Grant’. She agreed at once. At that very first meeting we discovered we had a lot of opinions in common: the demarcation between employer and employee, for instance, no matter who they are. Mrs. Grant told me that when she was younger she worked in publishing and was very careful always to refer to her boss as Mrs. Whatever, even though they were almost the same age. Course, it’s not like that now. Christian names all over the place, today, soon as you meet someone. Call me old fashioned, but my hackles go up if someone calls me Gwen when we’ve only just met, with not so much as a by your leave. Mrs. Grant feels just the same way.