Thin Air (2 page)

‘One afternoon, I woke up with a
hangover. I was lying in the bath, throbbing with various pains
from head to foot, and then I realised. The life I’d led had
disappeared. The people were gone, the young had changed, and I
couldn’t really call myself young anymore.’

‘That must have pissed you
off.’

Jay twisted her mouth to the
side, thought about it. ‘I suppose the demise of my world grieved
me, but I’ve always been adaptable. I just cut off the spiked black
hair, changed my wardrobe, and became someone else. There was a new
mood in the air. Music had fragmented, had somehow condensed. It
was less about hedonism and release and more about money. It was
the world that created you, Dex.’

He turned away from her, leaned
against the balcony rail. ‘I existed before that, sweetheart.’

‘I didn’t mean to sound
insulting. You know what I mean, though, you must do. The music
business has always delighted in creating people. It’s a sort of
Pygmalion thing. Let’s face it; you were certainly the right raw
material.’

He glanced at her and she was no
longer sure what he was thinking. Had he taken offence? But she was
quite sure he understood her. His background had been suitably
impoverished, his manner pertinently abusive and self-assured. He’d
had no education to speak of, yet possessed the ability to work
magic with words and music. Read separately, his lyrics seemed
almost banal, which was why they’d never been printed on the CD
covers, but once they were given life by his voice, and set to the
haunting yet powerful cadences of his music, they became filled
with meaning.

‘I’m not what you think,’ he
said. ‘You don’t know everything.’

‘I didn’t mean to imply that.
God, Dex, I know your success is just as much to do with your work,
as any favours from the suits. You sing about the details of
existence with a clarity that touches people. It’s like you can see
around the corners in people’s lives and illuminate the dark
spots.’ She was amazed at her own eloquence, given the amount of
champagne she had consumed.

He laughed, but she could tell
he was flattered. ‘Sounds like you’re working now! Funny. I never
saw you write anything like that about me.’

‘You haven’t read everything,
you know you haven’t. I don’t think you read my work very much at
all. You don’t like it.’

‘Maybe. In that case, what do
you think of mine?’

She paused. ‘To be honest, it’s
a bit too commercial for me. Remember, I was reared in the grimy
alleys of the alternative nation.’ She smiled. ‘As you know, I’m
renowned for scorning anything that gleams with popularity, but
that doesn’t mean I can’t appreciate its qualities.’

‘Privately.’

She stared at him a moment.
‘Yes, privately.’

‘So what happened next, then?
How’d you get to be a hack?’

She let that ride. ‘Let’s just
say I graduated from doing artwork for independent labels - most of
them were gulped down whole by larger companies. I work for ‘This’
magazine mainly, with the odd other job here and there.’ She
wrinkled her nose. ‘’This’ is a bit self-conscious, I know, but it
has a good pedigree.’

Dex nodded. ‘I can remember when
it was still a fanzine. Black and white smudged photo-copying.’

‘Yeah. But it’s survived,
perhaps through luck more than judgement. It’s respectable
now.’

Dex laughed. ‘Well, let’s face
it, your safety-pinned punk anarchists have all got electronic
filo-faxes now, talking about ‘windows’ in their diary.’ He
pantomimed an affected voice. ‘Oh, we’re radio DJs and TV
presenters. We have our little shops, restaurants and recording
studios.’ He uttered a sound of derision. ‘They’ve become fat and
complacent, but still think they’re trend-setters.’

Jay grimaced. ‘Harsh, but
accurate.’ She didn’t want to say more, because she fitted
comfortably into that world, writing a scathing column in ‘This’
once a month that attacked anything that promised controversy.
Still, she was aware that the youth of the country burned with
different fires now, and perhaps her writing spoke only to her
contemporaries, who lived in a time bubble of when anything had
seemed possible.

She took a breath. ‘So, what
about you, then?’

He laughed bitterly. ‘You know
about me.’

‘I’m not stupid, Dex.’

He studied her. ‘No, I can see
that.’

Later, Jay went back inside
alone. Dex had uttered a friendly good-bye and left. She was
slightly disappointed he hadn’t suggested they go on somewhere else
together, but was amused by the quaint way he’d formally asked her
for a date. They would meet tomorrow. She smiled to herself as she
moved through the twittering crowd of the party, mentally replaying
details of their conversation. His ego hadn’t been painful, he’d
really listened to her, he’d been interested in what she had to
say. How long had it been since she’d talked to someone like
that?

Eventually, Jay came across
Grant Fenton in a corner, draped drunkenly over a scantily-clad
giggling girl.

‘Hey, Jay!’ Grant drawled.
‘Where’ve you been?’

She sat down next to him, aware
she felt light-headed, excited. She hadn’t felt like that for a
long time. ‘Grant,’ she said. ‘I’ve just met the most amazing
man.’

Perhaps if Jay had met Dex five years
before, they wouldn’t have been that different, but now they seemed
like opposites; she articulate, groomed and sharp; he mouthy,
scruffy and often insulting. He never insulted her, though. She
wondered what they saw in each other, and whether other people
thought they made an odd couple. Because they did become a
couple.

He treated her from the start
with a puzzling familiarity as if he couldn’t see the exterior
she’d constructed for herself. There was something about her he
liked or needed. She wasn’t a career girlfriend, like so many other
women who fluttered desperately about the music scene. She didn’t
measure her own worth in terms of who she could persuade to sleep
with her. When she met Dex she hadn’t really wanted a regular
partner. Romance was great, lust exhilarating, but after the gloss
had dimmed, men, in Jay’s experience, tended to become unfaithful,
demanding or cruel. Dex became none of these things. She often
hated him for the things he said and did to other people, and
detested the public persona he’d created, but at home he was her
soul companion. They’d infiltrated the scene and had found each
other. They knew the truth of the music industry, but milked it for
all they could. It was their secret. They could laugh about it.

For their first date, Dex took
Jay to a riverboat restaurant on the Thames. She wasn’t sure
whether this was because he thought she’d expect something like
that or a natural choice on his part. Throughout the meal, he was
attentive and amusing. Conversation flowed easily between them. As
the evening went on, Jay was conscious of a mounting sense of
surprise within her. Dex seemed too good to be true. Could she dare
believe in what she was being shown?

Later, as they left the boat and
went to hail a taxi, a couple of kids came running across the road.
One of them screamed Dex’s name. Jay wasn’t sure whether they were
male or female. It all happened so quickly. The snarl that Dex
turned on them was frighteningly loud; the roar of a maddened lion.
‘Fuck off! Give us some respect, man!’ His teeth were bared, his
eyes dark with the emptiness of hate. Fortunately, before the
stunned fans could respond, a black cab swung to a halt beside
them. Dex hustled Jay in through the door. She lay back against the
seat blinking, feeling dazed. Dex took her hand, smiled at her.
‘Sorry,’ he said. ‘I just like privacy at times like these. People
can’t get their heads round that.’

She glanced at him. His face was
serene, his eyes warm. Should this be a warning sign? She
swallowed. Would a time come when she’d be crouched in a corner
somewhere, her arms over her head, afraid?

That night, she seriously
considered she should not see him again. She’d had abusive lovers
in the past and certainly didn’t intend to have one again. She was
too wise for that now. But, the following morning, when Dex called
her, she again felt a strong rapport with him. Perhaps she’d been
too judgmental. It must be hell to live under public scrutiny all
the time. She agreed to meet him again. They were rarely apart
afterwards.

Jay would have understood if Dex
had wanted her to remain in the background of his life – permanent
women were often seen as something of an embarrassment to stars
whose main audience was a host of adoring females – but Dex wanted
no such thing. He was proud of Jay and wanted her sizzling in the
lime-light alongside him. She knew Dex’s backing band was not
wholly happy about it, but no-one would dare voice their
complaints. She knew, and so did they, that her presence in Dex’s
life had transformed him. There were fewer temperamental displays,
and when they did occur, they were not as unpleasant as they had
been before Jay had come into his life. The band was really just
backing musicians. When Dex went on tour with them the posters
never carried anything but his own name. Still, Jay made a point of
getting to know the band girlfriends and organised social events
that they could all attend. Dex pulled a face about that at first,
but Jay explained that she didn’t want to be seen as a pushy rock
wife. She was her own person, who could make her own friends. Gina
Allen, the wife of the bass player, Dan, was the last to crack
beneath the pressure of Jay’s relentless friendliness, but they
eventually became close friends. Jay told herself that the
friendships which took time to develop were often the most
enduring.

Jay felt that Dex saw his life
with her as a sanctuary. He had chosen her deliberately, and had
perhaps been looking for someone like her for a long time. Maybe he
thought the right woman would hold him together. She managed to
influence his appearance to a large degree, realising his
scruffiness came from self-neglect rather than choice. They moved
into the ranks of the beautiful people, photographed smiling in
airport terminals, laden with bags from L.A. During the first year,
Jay’s life became a hurricane of activity. Her own work had to be
slotted in between media events and rushed trips abroad, but she
did not feel it was taking a back seat to Dex’s career. There were
just so many good opportunities for travel and meetings with
celebrities she could not miss, and anyway she could always write
about them for ‘This’ afterwards.

Every year, Dex scooped up
trophies at the MTV Awards and the Brit Awards, as well as other
ceremonies in America and Europe. Each time, the spotlight would
sweep across Jay in the audience, who would be wearing exquisite
designer gowns, her hair a sleek cap curling around her shaded
cheekbones. On one occasion, Dex even dragged her up on stage to
tell the audience she was his greatest inspiration. Jay kept a firm
control over these situations, exuding the right blend of
self-effacement and pride in her partner. No-one could accuse her
of hogging the limelight, or of using Dex as a vehicle for her own
ascension. She made sure of it.

Every summer, Dex and his band
would play at one of the big music festivals. Jay would make one or
two appearances back stage, haloed by camera flashes. She spoke to
the Press more than Dex did. She knew the ropes, and could appear
to speak freely without actually saying much. At home, she was
interviewed for women’s magazines, when she spoke warmly of the
harmony in her home. Dex might be a wild man of popular rock, but
to her he was a loving and considerate partner. ‘But what about his
reputation?’ the bravest of the journalists might ask. In their
eyes would be the other questions: ‘Doesn’t he drink at home?
Doesn’t he throw tantrums? Aren’t you sometimes afraid?’

Jay would smile tolerantly. ‘You
shouldn’t believe all you read in the papers,’ she’d say. Her
glance would not even flicker.

Dex reserved a part of himself
solely for Jay, which she loved, but it was only a part, and her
commitment and trust were not enough to sustain him. She always
knew the cracks were there, even though he tried to hide them from
her. People speculated how difficult he must be to live with, but
he wasn’t. The problems arose when Jay wasn’t there.

Twelve months after they’d met,
Jay decided the honeymoon period was over, and she would no longer
accompany Dex on tour. She did not enjoy life on the road. Hotel
rooms held no appeal for her and she found it difficult to
concentrate on her writing in them. Increasingly, she found herself
yearning for the smoky cosiness of her small office at home. When
she informed Dex of her decision, he was disappointed, but
understood her feelings. The first time he went away without her,
more than one friend asked her how she could bear to let her man
travel alone, exposed to the fleshly temptations that lurked in the
wings of every stage. Patiently, Jay would explain that she and Dex
were not possessive with one another. She didn’t feel she needed to
keep an eye on his fidelity. If the occasional indiscretion did
occur, Jay didn’t want to know about it. She trusted his heart,
which was enough. But despite this faith, Dex couldn’t always
control himself. Women were the least of the problems. Sometimes
there were scuffles and arguments, punches thrown at photographers,
broken furniture in hotels. Music press headlines screamed
gloatingly about his exploits. He drank a lot, before and after
gigs, picked fights with his band, went on the rampage, sometimes
disappeared for days at a time. Only Jay’s presence, during what
the band came to view as that one idyllic year, had kept Dex’s less
savoury characteristics at bay.

Jay was used to getting frantic
calls from the band’s manager - often in the middle of the night,
when she was red-eyed at the computer trying to meet a dead-line -
despairing of how to cope with Dex. Only Jay could control him, and
she was honest enough with herself to know it wasn’t even that. Her
presence merely soothed him, quieted his demons. But Dex was an
adult; she could not be constantly at his side like a mother.
Initially, she had dropped everything and flown out to deal with
the situation, wherever he was. Whenever she walked into the hotel
room, or the bar, or the venue, she would find him subdued,
sheepish, but grinning. He was always pleased to see her. Jay did
this rescue act precisely three times, but knew it would have to
stop. She and Dex talked about his difficulties and how he should
take responsibility for his own actions. That was the sort of
relationship they had. She did not approve of his binges, but
neither would she continue to stride in and interfere. Really, his
behaviour on tour did not touch her life, for she never witnessed
it firsthand. In her heart, she did not wholly believe the stories
of mayhem and rage, and thought they were exaggerated. As a writer
herself, she knew how the creative mind could shape mundane real
events into dramatic fiascos.