Glue (66 page)

The rest were lost causes, but surely no Jason. Why didn’t he have a relationship with Jason? He’d pandered to the wee cunt. The zoo my arse, ah should’ve made him go tae the fitba, he thought. Too fuckin dear though these days; besides, the wee guy had shown no interest.
Terry had to concede that it was understandable, as he himself was starting to relate to the father he’d always hated. Before, all he saw was the bastard’s actions, his cruel, negligent selfishness, not the underlying reasons for such actions. Now he was reluctantly coming to understand them in terms of his own motivations. The auld cunt just wanted a decent ride, a hassle-free life, easy money and a bit of respect. And yes, as a result he had treated his wife and kids badly. But the poor bastard had been born into circumstances whereby he couldn’t accrue the monetary or social resources to put the satisfactory financial spin on things. Rich men treated their partners just as well or just as shabbily as schemies. The difference was that the cunts could keep them sweet with a big pey-oaf if, and when, it all started to go wrong. That was it. And they could do it impersonally through lawyers.

Terry had to admit that the possibility that the wee man would turn out different might not be a bad thing. Would he be like Terry? Terry tried to look twenty years down the line and see a couple of fit blonde birds going through a lesbian sex ritual in front of a grown-up Jason who was the image of Terry. Then he (Jason/Terry) would join in, fucking one after the other in different positions before blowing his muck. Then he’d peel off the virtual-reality glasses and headset and be sitting with a limp, leaking cock in a scabby run-down room full of takeaway cartons, full ashtrays, dirty dishes and empty beer cans. Terry looked forward to the twenty-first century getting properly started.

But that was the hereditary scenario. In the environmental one he envisaged the wee man as a specky cunt with a dull wife and couple of small consuming agents as kids, in a Barratt box in the suburbs. And she’d be there, Lucy, visiting on Sunday with Gawky for the roast. It would all be so nice and idyllic when they’d see a ragged, pish-sodden jakey figure staring in the window. It would be Post . . . Juice Terry . . . no, fuck that. He’d show them all one day. He ran his hand through his still-thick corkscrew hair and felt sad that he couldn’t feel more than self-pity and mawkish sentiment.

He’d entertained loads of revenge fantasies, which shocked and repelled even him. Lucy dressed in a Hearts top with number 69 SLAG on the back of it, and him giving her an ungreased one up the chapter and verse. But she was no Jambo, she hated all fitba. It was probably his old man he was thinking of; indeed, when inside Terry’s head he was going at it full pelt, he kept intercutting the scene with images of his father wearing a ridiculous maroon rosette at a Hearts–Rangers Scottish Cup final back in the seventies. Fuck it, you
should never analyse your own sicknesses too much, it only compounded them.

If any cunt should have got a punching, it was the gawky cunt, the fuckin lab technician who was shagging her. And he would have as well, had Terry not been fucking Vivian at the time and the boy’s intervention given them the chance to get it on. But this fuckin beanpole with the long hair, rash of spots and the protruding Adam’s apple. Looked like one of these heavy-metal virgins from Bonnyrigg or the like, who played records of male-domination fantasy and who’d go into fits and stutters just talking to a lassie. In fact, Terry had subsequently learned that Lucy had chatted
him
up, at a works night in Kirkcaldy, the Almabowl.

Terry almost laughed out loud when she came round and that cunt was there, with his hands by his side, opening and closing his fists, as if he was going to start something. She was packing and getting the kid ready. He should’ve battered the guy to a pulp because he was taking his wife and his son away. But he couldn’t, because all he could think of was Vivian, how he’d precipitated the situation to get Lucy to leave him, take the responsibility of the kid away in order that he could act the hurt, deserted and abandoned one. And they’d played right into his hands. Now he’d be free of the red bills, the tenancy, the cold silences flaring into vicious arguments, the moans, her desires for a house in the suburbs and a garden for the bairn so he wouldn’t have to play in the streets of the scheme like Terry did. Oh, how he’d savour freedom from all the ugly deceit. Yes, when the door closed, he contemplated his loss and had an indulgent wee whinge to himself, then packed up his own stuff, and, to her abject horror, moved straight back into his Ma’s house.

He was shaken from his thoughts by a whine from Johnny. Yes, that lightweight was fuckin well toiling. — Ah dinnae see how ye jist couldnae book another room in the Balmoral, he was suggesting mournfully to Kathryn.

— I don’t want to be anywhere near that asshole Franklin, Kathryn cursed. It had taken them ages to find a room in a city-centre hotel, even for Kathryn Joyner. Now they were heading down Princes Street to Haymarket and a smaller, but comfortable, billet.

As they checked Kathryn in, Terry mused, — Ye wir perfectly welcome tae stey at mine, wi nae strings attached, he told Kathryn.

— Terry, you’re a guy. There’s always strings attached.

The Yank lassie wisnae as daft as she looked but. — Jist sayin, Terry ventured, it’s dead near the Gauntlet. Fir the karaoke, ken?

— I gotta go to Ingliston and do this show, Kathryn told him.

— But ye sacked the boy . . . Terry bleated.

— This is just something I gotta do, she told him briskly.

Rab Birrell started dragging a case upstairs as the desk clerk issued Kathryn with her key. — Be telt, Terry, it’s up tae Kathryn, he said.

— Aye, wi’ll make the Gauntlet fir last orders in a fast black eftir the gig, Johnny said, and wondered why he was parroting Terry as he was absolutely fucked and just wanted to get his head down.

After waiting around while Kathryn got dressed, they piled into the stretch limo that Rab had called to re-route from the Balmoral, and headed out to Ingliston. Johnny sprawled across one side of the car and dozed off. He’d been looking forward to riding in a motor like this, now the experience was passing him by as surely as the busy city outside was.

Charlene was curled into Rab’s side, enjoying herself. Lisa and Terry helped themselves to drinks from the cabinet. Lisa could smell herself now, her top was dirty and her pores would be blocked, but she didn’t care. Terry was babbling into Kathryn’s ear, and she could tell that the American singer was grateful when she intervened. — Leave Kathryn alaine, Terry, she’s goat tae get ready. Just shut the fuck up.

Terry looked open-mouthed in appeal.

— Ah sais shut it, she urged.

Terry laughed and squeezed her hand. He liked this lassie. Sometimes it could be quite enjoyable being ordered around by a bird. For about five minutes.

Inner-city tenements gave way to grand villas, which became bland suburbs and motorway slip-roads. Then a plane roared above them and they were pulling into the car-park of Ingliston showgrounds. They had trouble shaking Johnny awake, and Kathryn’s security were not amused when they saw her entourage, but they were so relieved to see her that they unquestioningly issued every member of the party with backstage passes.

In the Green Room, they got stuck into the free food and drink as Kathryn hid in the toilet, puked and psyched herself up.

Kathryn Joyner shakily took the stage at Ingliston. It was the longest walk to a microphone she had ever had; well, maybe not as bad as the time she’d staggered on in Copenhagen after coming from that hotel room via the hospital where they’d just pumped the pills out of
her stomach. But this was bad enough: she thought she was going to pass out under the heat of the lights, and was aware of every drop of the aching, grimy pain the drugs had left in her undernourished body.

Nodding to the musicians she let the band strike up
Mystery Woman
. When she sang, her voice was barely audible for the first half of the first number. Then something both perfectly ordinary and enchantingly mystical happened: Kathryn Joyner felt the music and clicked into gear. In truth, it was a no more than adequate performance but that was a lot more than she and her audiences had grown used to, so in that context it constituted a minor triumph. Most importantly, a nostalgic, appreciative and pretty drunk crowd lapped it up.

At the end of the set they called her back out for an encore. Kath thought of the hotel room in Copenhagen. Time to let go, she thought. She turned to Denny, her guitarist, who was a veteran session man. —
Sincere Love
, she said. Denny nodded to the rest of the band. Kathryn stepped out to great applause and took the microphone. Terry danced in the wings.

— I’ve had a great time in Edinboro’ City. It’s been the best. This sang is dedicated to Terry, Reb and Jahnny from Edinboro’, with Sincere Love.

It was a fitting climax, though Terry was a bit put-out that she hadn’t given him his proper title of Juice Terry. — It would’ve meant mair tae any cunt oot thaire fae the scheme, he explained to Rab.

Franklin Delaney tried to greet her as she stepped off-stage, only to be intercepted by Terry. — We’ve a gig, he said, as he pushed her former manager aside. Kathryn brushed away the security guards who were ready to intervene.

Terry led the way, striding out across the car-park to the taxis, which were waiting to ferry them to the Gauntlet public house in Broomhouse. Kathryn was seeing things come to her in powerful clarity, not on an intellectual level – she was so fucked she could barely think straight – but this was it, this would be her last gig in a long time.

To the outside world she’d been a phenomenal success, yet to Kathryn Joyner, the years of her youth had flown by in a series of tours, hotel rooms, recording studios, air-conditioned villas and unsatisfying relationships. Since the stultifying boredom of the small town near Omaha, she’d lived a life on a schedule dictated by others, surrounded by friends who all had a vested interest in her continued commercial success. Her father had been her first manager, before
their acrimonious split. Kathryn thought how Elvis had died, not in a Vegas Hotel in a jumpsuit, but at home on the toilet in Memphis, surrounded by family and friends. It’s as likely to be the people who love you who precipitate your demise as the new hangers-on. They’re less likely to notice your incremental decline.

But it had suited her. For a while. She hadn’t realised she was on a merry-go-round until she couldn’t get off. This starvation shit, it was all about trying to exercise control. Of course, they had all told her that, but now she was feeling it, and she was going to do something about it. And she was going to do it without the rescue fantasy figure who always showed up on cue when things got too much, who could recommend a new date, or look, or consumer durables, or a piece of real estate, or self-help book, revolutionary diet, vitamins, shrink, guru, mentor, religion, counsellor, in fact anybody or anything who could paper over the cracks so that Kathryn Joyner could get back into the studio and on the road. Back to being the cash-cow that supported the infrastructure of the hangers-on.

Terry, Johnny, even Rab, she couldn’t trust those guys any more than the rest. They were the same, they couldn’t help it, swallowed up by that disease that seemed to grip everyone more every day, the need to use the vulnerable. They were nice enough, that was the problem, they always were, but dependency on others and, conversely, theirs on you, just had to stop. They’d shown her something though, something useful and important, during those last few days of drug-addled nonsense. Strange as it was, they cared. They weren’t world-weary or blasé. They cared about things; often stupid, trival things, but they cared. And they cared because they were engaged in a world outside the constructed world of the media and showbusiness. You couldn’t care about that world, not really, because it wasn’t yours and it never could be. It was sophisticated commerce, and it just chugged on.

She was going to sleep for a few days, then she was going home and disconnecting the phone. After that she was going to rent a modest apartment somewhere. But first she’d sing to a public. Just one more time.

So it was that Juice Terry Lawson and Kathryn Joyner duetted on
Don’t Go Breaking My Heart
. When they were announced winners of the prize of a range of kitchen accessories supplied by Betterware, they encored with
Islands in the Stream
. Louise Malcolmson was hostile, especially as she and Brian Turvey had given a good account of
themselves with
You’re All I Need to Get By
. — Fuckin crawlin up that rich Yank cunt’s erse, she said in loud drunkenness.

Lisa’s face hardened, but she said nothing. Terry had a quiet word with Brian Turvey, who took Louise home.

In future years they’d say that Kathryn Joyner’s last gig was in Edinburgh, and they’d be right. However, very few would know that it wasn’t at Ingliston, but the Gauntlet public house in Broomhouse.

If the Ingliston gig was a watershed for Kathryn, so was the Gauntlet one for Terry. When they’d headed off, he’d deliberately left his jacket over the back of a chair in the pub. He’d never keep shagging cool young lassies like Lisa dressing like a twat. He resolved to make more of an effort to slim down, kick those Häagen-Dazs, white-pudding supper and masturbation sessions into touch. Somewhere along the line, he realised, he’d lost a bit of pride in himself. And it didn’t necessarily mean dressing up like a poof, because Ben Sherman was back now. He’d had his first one at ten. Maybe this was the indication of a Juice Terry revival in middle age. Get a haircut as well. It grew so quickly, but a number one or two every other Saturday would be cool, if he could lose the weight. Buy some Ben Shermans, new jeans. Do over a fuckin clathes shop! Maybe a leather bomber jacket like Birrell’s. He had to admit that was smart. New Terry, New Clathes.

Aye, he’d be in that Tony Blair cunt’s Cabinet soon! That boy had it sussed, it didnae matter what you did, as long as you looked and talked the part. That was all people in Britain wanted, a sympathetic ear from a well-dressed and well-spoken man. Somebody who told them that they were all very important. Then you could sit back contentedly when they shat all over you and showed you that you were fuckin nothing. It was the spin that was important though.