CHAPTER 30
It seemed that my vice, the one I pandered to and indulged, was being hugged. I wasn’t quite the centre of attention at the gathering, but close to it, and I felt a little embarrassed at taking the interest away from what had been a superbly organised event.

I looked round the room, and even though I had only just met people like the Summers I felt entirely immersed in friends. Now that we had set out our stalls, the conversation moved on. Softly softly, she is fragile.

As we chatted, I pumped Kelly about Saburo, trying to get a hint of what she or her parents had paid for him. I couldn’t see myself letting him go, but I wanted to give fair return for him if she passed him over. When I asked, she started to laugh.

“You want to know what I paid? Really? It was a tenner, we found him at a boot fair. , I felt guilty for about thirty seconds…he had all sorts of tat, the bloke selling, including one of those mandolins, you know, the round-backed ones they hang on walls with bent necks and buzzy struts, and he wanted forty for that rubbish!”

“Well, I must give you a proper price for him”

“You did. You played him and gave him life. That’s what good instruments are for. Hang on, they’re warming the telly up”

Jerry called us all into the living room, where we squeezed onto chairs and sofa, and the odd dining chair that Steph brought in.

“My ladies, gentlemen and banjoists!”

Eric shouted back. “You can stop taking those lessons right now!”

Jerry grinned impishly. “We had a decent camera set up this year, I have the tapes ready to play. Those susceptible to embarrassment can leave the room, but I have copies of the recordings stored in a secret place. Payments should be in used notes and left with my usual fence. I give you….music day!”

They had actually had three cameras, but there hadn’t been time to edit the tapes together. Nonetheless, there was enough there to produce sighs, smiles, laughs and gasps. There were dancers smoothly gliding through figures like professionals, there were bemused groups standing still while they tried to work out what to do. Passing strangers raised their glasses to the cameraman or mugged for their friends, and there was film of the band. Naturally.

The rhythm section was bloody good, Ben’s snap and thump fitting perfectly, but like all egos mine fastened on what I was doing. When my piece on Saburo came up, the camera panned around the faces of my partners in sound. Kelly got some teasing when she appeared, mouth hanging open, but it was Eric’s lips that caught everyone’s eyes, as they clearly formed the word ‘shit’

I have described what it was like to be inside the music, but watching it from outside gave me a few surprises. I now understood exactly what Geoff meant when he spoke of his wife going ‘all hairy, and he should really add the word ‘hungry’ for her facial expression, but how had I missed Eric’s cock-rock pose, not to mention his rather sharp guitar playing? And when had I ever become so arrogant? That was the only word for it; Steph was simply mad, but I was strutting, posing, for god’s sake. Once more I felt the blush. Eric muttered behind me.

“I had sort of wished I could forget doing that bit…I look like a refugee from Status Quo”

“You look, and sound, bloody good, mate. We’ll make a musician of you yet!”

Steph….I hadn’t realised how far her blush goes, but it was at least down to the top of her breasts. “Look, it’s not deliberate, I just get carried away a bit!”

There was a chuckle from her family. Geoff shouted out “I love my hairy wife!” and then collapsed with a fit of giggles, and I realised there had been more wine consumed than I had noticed. The evening was about to start winding down, and Ginny came over to me and offered a lift home.

“Kate’s brought the car, and being a sensible wifey she has put the bike rack in. Eric, you getting the train home?”

“Ah, I might take Annie up on that offer of a spare bed. Still open?”

“Of course. How did you carry the two instruments, anyway?”

“Simple, hard cases with pannier hooks screwed into the back. One each side of the rear rack”

“Clever boy! Right, people, it is time for some of us to be off. Thank you for the meal, but mostly, well, thank you for your kindness. It means a lot to me”

There was a round of hugs and wishes, and then we were outside strapping rack to car and bikes to rack. Eric and I squeezed into the back with his instruments across our laps, and Kate drove us the eight miles or so back to my place. I asked them in for a coffee, but they were adamant they needed to get back down to Brighton for the cats. Bikes locked up, and instruments lugged in, we settled down with a cafetiere of decent ground stuff and a warm glow. Eric sighed as he slumped into the armchair.

“That was one bloody magical day. I didn’t think I’d be able to keep up with the others, but with that bass line, and the percussion, it just….I don’t know, clicked together?”

“That’s the thing about playing with others, when it is good, it gets better and better, and when you are doing the silly stuff you need a good back line to play against. Steph was bloody frightening, she looked hungry there, like she was waiting for a fix!”

“You can talk, Miss watch-me-on-one-leg!”

“Ah, we all had our moments there. I was trying to see the other’s faces on that, but it was mostly Jan’s and Geoff’s that came out. She was so intent…”

“Yeah, and he was grinning like an idiot. It’s funny, Annie, but he said he fell for her the first time he saw her dance. She’d been so shy up till then, and suddenly there was music and she just went off with it. You are a bit like that yourself, you know”

“What, shy? Me?”

“Yes, you. You hide away, not just because of, you know, but because you don’t want to load people down with your problems. Then that switch gets thrown, and you explode. Two people, you are, and I wonder…..if you do get the right answers, and the right doctoring, might you be the same person all the time?”

I thought about that one. “I suppose….if I wasn’t feeling like I am acting, then maybe. When I play, it’s like a focus, I can forget the rest of the world, and it’s freedom but chained to the playing, if that makes sense?”

“Yeah…could it be like your touring, you know, what’s the phrase, gender neutral? Something to focus on that doesn’t immediately make you say boy/girl?”

I grinned at him. “Not another bugger subcontracting to Sally? I think you are right, there. The cycling lets my mind wander, and I can pretend I am someone different, and the music is the opposite, it sucks me right in and stops me thinking of anything else. Yeah….”

He yawned. “Enough. Let’s get ourselves some kip, today is catching up big style”

We went into my bedroom and there, still on the bed, was the suitcase. I had forgotten all about it, and after pulling out some bed linen for Eric, I opened it. He came back in as I stood and stared at the contents. It was no cross-dresser’s dream, no extravaganza of lingerie and frills, but solid, simple, practical, feminine clothing. No bras, so clearly silly at this stage, but skirts, dresses, blouses, simple tops, and some shoes. The shoes were the surprise, as while everything else was obviously used, the shoes were in my size, and new. Three pairs, various styles, with a note wedged into one of them.

“We thought you could walk a mile in someone else’s skirt, but you’d better have your own shoes. K and G xxxxx”

I was bleary-eyed as I hung it all up, and Eric smiled gently, gave me a hug and left me to my new wardrobe. I showed it to Tabby as I put it away, then slipped into one of my nighties.

I was back on stage, and the crowd were yelling as I wailed and thrashed the air, and the bass slapped away, thump, thump, thump-thump, thump-thump, lub-dub, lub-dub, a heartbeat, and the crowd noise faded away along with the band. Lub-dub, lub-dub, a heartbeat, and I turned back to the audience, and as turned I could hear the wailing of a bereaved woman, and…

The baby was still in its chair, its car booster seat, as it always was, the marks of the glass and the road livid, and it was looking right at me this time, and it was like Steph, hungry, and suddenly my nostrils were full of the smell of the roast lamb from earlier, except it wasn’t lamb, it was pork, it was petrol, it was teenager, and Eric was holding me as I thrashed and yelled until I suddenly hit the real world and started to shudder in his arms, and then weep into his chest.

We stayed like that for a small age, as my tears eased, and my trembling tailed off. He stroked what there was of my hair, as if I was an infant, until he could lay me back down as sleep started to haul me back.

“What the hell” he murmured, as he slipped in beside me and once more spooned me as I drifted off to better dreams.