Читать книгу A WAG Abroad - Alison Kervin, Jason Leonard - Страница 11

Thursday 29 May

Oh God, oh God. Head bad, bad head. Not good head. Phone ringing, head hurting. Bad drinking has happened. Phone ringing. Need staff. Ooooh … hurting.

‘Mmmm,’ I slobber into the mouthpiece.

‘Morning, darling. How are you?’ comes a bright and breezy voice. ‘Wondered whether you fancied coming jogging?’

‘No. Fuck off,’ I say, throwing the phone down. What sort of weirdo makes crank calls like that at this time in the morning?

The phone rings again and I lift the receiver angrily, but before I have chance to howl abuse the same perky voice insists, ‘Darling, it’s Sian. Don’t hang up.’

‘Sian,’ I say. ‘Oh. Sorry. What are you doing up at this time in the morning after the party last night?’

‘It’s 11 a.m.,’ she says, as if that makes it all right. ‘Come on, up you get. You’re in LA now. Time for a jog.’

‘Sian,’ I say patiently, ‘my feet were made for slipping into colossally high shoes. They were made for staggering out of nightclubs at 4 a.m. They were made for pedicures and toe rings. They were not, I repeat not, made for jogging.’

The pain and fear at the mere thought of putting on trainers, let alone jogging in them, runs through me like money through my hands, like Cristal through a Wag.

‘Oh,’ she says. ‘Deary me, are you always like this in the morning? Are you an evening jogger? Have you taken your supplements yet?’

‘Yes, no, no,’ I say, and she laughs so loudly I almost drop the phone. What is it with these enthusiastic Californians? Why are they all so cheery and full of life? It must be the weather.

‘Well, I’ve been for a run along the beach and a swim If you don’t fancy coming out I may just warm down, get a stretch and some yoga done, then come over and see you. How about that?’

‘As long as you do it quietly,’ I say, and she’s gone … off to throw her legs round her neck and push her shoulders between her knees. God, I need a drink.

Noon

Sian’s enthusiasm, healthy glow and general positive attitude are starting to make me feel quite queasy. She’s sitting bolt upright, legs crossed, beautiful soft blonde hair falling down her back and hands upturned. As she breathes she emphasizes every breath out. ‘It’s pilates breathing,’ she says. ‘It makes you feel centred. Would you like me to show you?’

‘No thanks,’ I say sulkily.

‘It was so lovely to have a little drink last night. I haven’t had a drink for years, but I measured three whole teaspoons of vodka into my fresh cranberry and Goji Berry drink.’

Ah, that’s how she looks so much more healthy than me – she was using a teaspoon to measure out her alcohol while I was using a bucket.

‘I hope I wasn’t too drunk,’ I say. I’m being polite. The truth is that I don’t think there’s any such thing as ‘too drunk’.

‘Not at all. You were fabulous, Tracie,’ she enthuses. ‘You really made the party swing.’

Oh, good. I didn’t make a fool of myself. That’s a relief, and a pleasant change.

‘Were you OK after the fall?’ she asks.

Oh, no.

‘Fall?’

‘Yes, you know – when you went flying across the kitchen floor while showing us your Pussy Cat Dolls impression.’

‘I did what?’

‘Do you not remember? I guess you must have tripped on one of your shoes when you got up after the back spin.’

Oh God. Back spin. Why?

The news of my little performance certainly helps me to understand why my hair’s so matted. I don’t remember anything after about 11 p.m. It was all one big, happy blur as far as I was concerned.

I move my hand to my hair, and subconsciously comb my fingers through as Sian chats on, reminding me of the ‘fun’ party guest that I was. ‘Then you climbed onto his shoulders and started singing a Kylie Minogue song!’

A large clump of hair comes off in my hand.

‘Oh my God,’ shrieks Sian. ‘Do you have alopecia or something?’

‘No. Just the extensions,’ I say. ‘I must have been sick in my hair last night. I do that quite a lot, then the acid eats through the glue holding them in, and they start to come loose. No big deal.’

‘Oh my God. You were sick? Have you taken supplements? Why were you sick? Let’s take you to the ER.’

‘Because I was off my trolley,’ I say gaily, adding, ‘A champagne chuck. The very worst kind of sick!’

‘You drank so much last night that it made you sick? You need to be more careful,’ she says, stretching so far backwards I think she’s going to topple off the chair.

‘Whooah,’ I say, leaping up to save her.

‘I am totally balanced. I have a strong core.’

And I think, Sian, I really, really like you, but you don’t half talk some bollocks at times. I mean, if she lived anywhere but LA they’d be locking her up.

‘Do you not ever think, Sod it, I’m just going to drink all night and sleep all day, and sod the exercise?’

‘No!’ she says. ‘Your physical and spiritual well-being must be your primary concern as a responsible adult. If you don’t look after yourself, no one will.’

I kind of see what she means, but it’s all so boring having to exercise and take herbs and stuff. This whole hippy world reminds me of Mum too much. She went off to live in LA for ten years, but even before that she was obsessed with anti-ageing remedies and covering herself in absurd potions. I grew up in a house with a kitchen that had thousands of pounds worth of supplements in the cupboards, and no bread. There were all sorts of lotions and potions in the fridge, but no milk. I’d wake up to the sound of chanting and go to sleep at night to the sound of the treadmill. Mum’s spiritual and physical well-being was perfect. Trouble is, she never smiled. I’d take a bundle of good times and loads of happy drinking over daily yoga and soya bean soufflé any day.

3 p.m.

Paskia-Rose has gone out all excited because she’s meeting up with the LA City Raiders Ladies team for the first time. Meanwhile, Dean’s come back in from the club and he’s all fed up. He says that everything’s going really well, and he’s confident that he can turn around their fortunes very quickly with some simple adjustments (don’t ask me what they are – I have neither interest in nor understanding of what he does), but what he’s finding hard is the fact that everyone drives in LA. Everything’s so far away from everywhere else that there isn’t even the same cab mentality that you get in London or New York. Or Luton. For Dean, who can’t drive and has never driven, it’s proving a bit of a strain.

‘You’ve got Gareth,’ I remind him.

‘I know, but I wanted him to take Paskia-Rose to the Ladies’ training session, and there’ll be times when you need him. No, the truth is that I need to be able to drive myself, then I can just come and go as I please.’

‘OK,’ I say, reaching for my keys. ‘Then, my lover, I shall teach you.’

5 p.m.

Ladies and gentlemen, praise be to God, for I am not the worst driver in the world. Oh, no – that honour goes to my dear husband. He’s useless! In fact he’s so useless that I’m in fits of laughter all the time, and that, of course, is not making things go any more smoothly.

‘I’d be able to do it if you weren’t here,’ he says angrily. I try desperately to choke back the laughter as the car hops down the street like a great metal bunny rabbit. I’m doing that terrible schoolgirl thing of trying not to laugh and thus snorting and crying and jamming my fist into my mouth, which makes me laugh all the more.

‘I don’t understand why it’s bouncing like that,’ he says, looking all confused.

‘Are you in the right gear?’ I manage to say, leaning over to check.

‘Tracie, it’s got nothing to do with clothes,’ he says. ‘The gear I’m wearing is fine.’

‘The gear that the car’s in, you doughnut. Look, it’s in third, that’s why it’s bouncing around like a fucking kangaroo.’

I tell him to pull over, and he kind of lurches to a stop, right in the middle of the road.

‘You can’t stop here. Go to the side,’ I instruct. I want to run through the gear thing with him again.

He turns the key and the car pounces forward like it’s on springs.

‘It’s in third,’ I squeal.

‘I don’t know what to do,’ he howls back. ‘I don’t even know what ‘it’s in third’ means.’

I move the gear stick for him and he turns the key in the ignition. Then, for reasons that I’ll never understand, he slams his foot down on the accelerator and zooms across the street faster than Michael Schumacher. The car mounts the kerb the other side and, just when I’m thinking that things can’t get any worse, it heads onto the plush green lawn in front of us, accompanied by screams from Dean, who is by now entirely out of control. Eventually I manage to do the only practical thing I’ve done in my life, and I yank on the handbrake, forcing the car to skid and come to a stop just before hitting the small fountain in the middle of the grass.

‘Phew, that was close,’ he says, as we stare up into the genitals of a little boy who is fashioned entirely from marble. He’s weeing into the fountain as we sit there.

‘Don’t worry,’ I say to my depressed-looking husband. ‘We’ll get you some lessons.’

‘Yes,’ he says despondently, and we decide that’s enough for one day, and I’ll drive back. We slip out of our seats and walk silently past one another on the grass. Then, as I’m approaching the driver’s seat, the sprinkler system kicks into operation, showering us both with a gentle spray of water containing some sort of foul-smelling weedkiller.

It’s all too much for Dean.

‘This is not meant to be,’ he says, his spiky hair horribly flat and wet. He has an unfortunate mixture of weedkiller and Brylcreem sliding down his forehead and dripping into his eyes, and I feel like running round to the other side of the car and wrapping him up in my arms and holding him tightly. But I also feel like jumping into the car, out of the wet, and driving away as quickly as possible before the owners of this house come out and arrest me.

‘Let’s go,’ I say, starting the engine and reversing off the grass. I zoom down the road at top speed, with Dean mumbling, ‘It looks so easy when you do it, but I just couldn’t stop it jumping.’

9 p.m.

‘Wake up, doll. Wake up,’ says Dean.

‘Mmmmm …’

‘You’re asleep on the sofa love,’ he says, as I lift my head and look around. I was dreaming of Spangles – my favourite nightclub in Luton. It was karaoke night, and me and Michaela had just been singing ‘I will survive’ at the tops of our voices. Now I open my eyes I can see that I’m in LA – a whole new country that isn’t Luton at all. A feeling of homesickness washes over me. ‘How was training this evening?’ I ask.

Raiders have started doing extra training sessions in the evening because Dean wants them to spend more time on the pitch and less time in the spa. They must think he’s a right miserable sod. ‘Oh my God, training was perfect!’ he says. ‘Let me get a soya milk, banana and walnut smoothie and I’ll tell you all about it.’

‘A what? Bloody hell, Dean. Are you pissed?’

‘No,’ he says, mashing up banana into this glass bowl and sprinkling nuts on. ‘I told you, I’m not drinking any more.’

‘Loser,’ I say, making an ‘L’ sign with my fingers.

‘I’m going to get fit and healthy and I’m going to turn this club round. I’ve got my first game in charge on Saturday and we’re gonna win it. I swear. Everyone says we’re set to come bottom, but we won’t, love. You wait till we play Galaxy. We’ll beat them hands down.’

OK, now he’s got me.

‘Galaxy?’ I enquire. ‘You mean LA Galaxy? David Beckham’s team?’

‘That’s right, Candyfloss,’ he says, tipping sunflower seeds and goat’s milk yoghurt into a bowl. ‘Where are the pumpkin seeds?’ he asks.

‘Pumpkin seeds? How the hell do I know? I didn’t know pumpkins had seeds. What’s going on, Dean? Where did all the food come from?’ I’ve not been near the kitchen except to get glasses for champagne.

‘I bought it,’ he says, and I think to myself how remarkable my man is. Most of all, though, I think, When are they playing LA Galaxy? When will I meet David? Will Posh be there?

‘When are the matches against LA Galaxy?’ I ask. I’m only vaguely aware of how this American soccer thing works (you can’t call it football here, or they automatically think you’re talking about a game like rugby in which they wear helmets). I know that the Raiders are new into the league, which contains fourteen other teams, so now there are fifteen of them, and they play each other team twice during the season. That’s all I know. That’s all I want to know. The only really interesting thing about any of it is that David Beckham plays for LA Galaxy. I think that Dean should be calling David and making friends with him, but he thinks that would be too ‘gay’ and that we’ll bump into them eventually. I think that this approach, to steal Dean’s language, is thoroughly ‘gay’.

‘When do you play LA Galaxy?’ I ask.

‘I’ve marked them on the calendar in the kitchen,’ he says.

We have nuts, seeds, yoghurt and a calendar? Who knew? I jump up and rush into the kitchen.

‘There we are, dear,’ he says, pointing out the dates over my shoulder. ‘We play them at home on 21 June, then on 9 August, away. Both MLS games.’

‘MSL?’

‘Major League Soccer. That’s what we’re playing in.’

Oh, right. I’m guessing that’s the American equivalent of the Premiership, and what it means is that there are two formal occasions on which I’ll meet Victoria, and all the possibilities that will arise through Jamie’s friendship with her as well as the fact that I’ll be tipped off every time she goes into Koi. So many chances to meet my heroine. Soon-to-be best friend. Ooooooooh, it’s so exciting. I give Dean a great big hug. ‘I love you,’ I say, and he hugs me back.

‘Come on, Tracie, let’s explore.’

‘Explore?’ I ask, concern ricocheting through me. Why on earth would we ever want to do that? I’ve never heard Dean use such a word before. ‘Go out?’ I say. ‘Is there an opening of a bar or restaurant somewhere, or are there photographers around? A film première? Why else would I want to go out?’

‘Nah, silly,’ he says with a loud guffaw. ‘Not out and explore. I meant explore the TV. There are loads of channels on it, you know. Most of them are American, but there are some brill cartoons and that. I can’t find Midsomer Murders yet, but it must be on here somewhere. Come on, love, let’s get some telly watched. You’ve been in Los Angeles for over four days and you haven’t sat in front of the goggle box for more than an hour at a time.’

‘You’re right, love,’ I say as we snuggle together on the sofa in this strange foreign country where the sun always shines. Dean is flicking through the channels with a smile on his face and I’m dreaming of shopping, pampering and getting rat-arsed with Victoria. We’re on the other side of the world, but nothing, really, has changed at all. Phew.

Email to: Mich & Suzzi

From: Tracie in LA

Hi, girlies. Thanks for the email and the gossip update. I can’t believe Mum’s back in Luton! When did she get there? It’s so weird. I thought she was loving life in Spain and about to settle down with the twenty year old.

I know that nothing Angie does should surprise me any more, but turning up at Luton and announcing that she wants to adopt three African babies? Does she think she’s going to attract someone who looks like Brad Pitt if she acts like Angelina Jolie? Someone ought to tell her that it doesn’t work like that! Poor thing – I hope she’s OK. Do you think I should write to her? All the letters I sent to her in Spain were sent back marked ‘Return to the bitch’ so Dean told me to stop writing. Let me know what you think, and remember to keep me updated on what she’s up to.

I’ll have a look for the chewing gum you mentioned – the stuff that you chew three times and it makes your skin look ten years younger. I have to confess that I haven’t seen any over here, and I certainly couldn’t find those sweets that you mentioned – the ones that make your hair blonder. You know, I’m starting to think that a lot of the things that appear in magazines about LA simply aren’t true.

Will write again soon, Trace

PS. I can’t believe someone’s smashed the statue of the Boy David in our garden. Who would do that? Didn’t anyone hear anything? Must be the same person who cut the heads off all the flowers. Kids, no doubt. Thanks for getting it all fixed. x