Читать книгу A WAG Abroad - Alison Kervin, Jason Leonard - Страница 8

Monday 26 May 9 a.m.

I feel like I’ve been in a major car crash, and when I glance in the floor-to-ceiling mirrors situated just outside my dressing area I can see that my feelings are entirely matched by my physical appearance. Seriously. My hair is standing up on end and three days of makeup have layered on top of each other, papier-mâché style, to form a thick mask.

I wipe away most of the black from round my panda bear eyes, add a little lipstick, then a little more, a shed load of foundation and streaks of blusher. Happily, I’m still dressed, so that’s handy, though my jacket has sick all down the front, which isn’t ideal – it’s ruined half the feathers, and my hotpants don’t have much in common with the colour white any more. They are slightly greying at the front from where I was crawling over the floor looking for alcohol when we got back from the Beckhams’ last night.

I turn away from the dressing area (did I mention I had a dressing area? Honestly, it’s perfect. You must get one. Wardrobes are sooo yesterday!) and wander downstairs and into the garden where Dean’s sitting at our long garden table, teaching Gareth, Peter and Mark to sing football songs.

‘Luton, Luton.

Sing along for Luton.

The greatest damn club in the land.

You should always sing for Luton.

Luton, Luton, Luton.

Give the boys a helping hand.’

Honestly, it’s poetry. I can’t believe the guys have learnt all the words so quickly.

‘Where’s Jamie?’ I ask. I don’t remember much about last night. We got back from our Beckham trip, I drank bottles of champagne and I woke up in bed still wearing my clothes.

‘Gone,’ says Dean. ‘He left after I put you to bed. I think he had to get up early to return the car to the club.’

Dean reaches forward and takes a bread roll from the table. Bread? Where the hell did bread come from? I stand, rooted to the spot, scared to move any closer to the table in case the carbs jump up and attack me. You have to watch carbs very closely indeed. I know a great deal about this subject, having kept my weight below that of the average six-year-old for my entire adult life.

I was on the Bacardi and bay leaf diet at one stage but that didn’t seem to be a healthy way to live, so I tried the raw potato and whisky diet, which was hopeless. In the end I realized that the only way to look good is to eat sensibly and healthily, so these days I’m determined to eat properly and set a good example to my daughter. The only rule I follow is to avoid all fats, carbohydrate, protein and vitamins. Besides that I eat absolutely everything. As long as it’s alcoholic.

‘He left you this note,’ says Pask kindly, handing me a folded piece of paper.

‘Thanks, angel,’ I say, blowing her a kiss, but she misses my spontaneous gesture because she has turned her attentions to Dean.

‘Daaad,’ she says in her ‘I want something and I want it now’ voice that she knows is so effective on her father. ‘Pleeeeaaaasee can we go to the club today?’ Her cheeks are stained red from the exertion of whacking a football against a wall relentlessly in the sun. She looks all bright-eyed and freckly and not for the first time I’m drawn to thinking that with a little makeup and a little weight loss she could be a really attractive girl. I want to cuddle her and hold her tightly and show her how to apply eyeliner and what foods to avoid, but she shows no interest in such things. ‘Can we? Can we, Dad? You know – go to the club. Can we?’

Pask’s a real tomboy. It breaks my heart to say that, but it’s true. I know she might well grow out of it but right now she’s more male than female in her clothing and actions. She’s dressed in the Luton Town kit, and she’s pushed the football between her great white thighs while she leans in to Dean.

‘Of course, love,’ he says, and they do a high five thing. Dean’s big gold signet rings glint in the early morning sunshine as his hand smacks against Paskia’s, and the two of them smile warmly at one another. I glance down at the note. It’s got Jamie’s number on it. Hoorah! He says he’s going to spend the day at the club, trying to change their minds about the job. ‘Pop in and see me if you’re there, and we’ll arrange a time to go and see Victoria,’ it says.

‘I’m coming to the club too, I’m coming too,’ I squeal.

Dean spins round, alarm springing from every pore. ‘Don’t you want to spend the day doing your nails or shopping or something?’ he says, spraying bits of bread around as he speaks. I duck, dodge and dive to avoid them. If that carbohydrate so much as touches my skin, I’ll be three stone heavier tomorrow.

‘I can do all that later,’ I tell Dean. ‘Right now I’d rather be with you and Pask.’

I know that if I go I’ll get to see Jamie again, and further develop our relationship, and I’ll also be able to make a better case for the club employing him which will keep him on my radar. Dean’s rubbish at doing things like that. He’s too understated about things. This needs an approach that is unsullied by subtlety. In short, it needs the Tracie touch.

2 p.m.

We’re here. This is it – LA City Raiders. It’s an impressive-looking, ultra-modern, shiny grey building, with a big sign outside and a long track leading up to the offices at the front. The pitch looks perfect, according to Dean and Pask.

‘Come on, love,’ I say. ‘Let’s go and find a bar for a quick one before we meet up with the geezer in charge.’

‘Yeah,’ says Deany, rubbing his hands together at the thought. His earrings shine brightly in the sun. Bless ’im. We’re like peas in a pod, we two are. We just love doing the same things. Not so my daughter.

‘No,’ she says. ‘Don’t get drunk. Please. For once, let’s not go straight to the bar. Please can we just go in there and introduce ourselves to the chairman and say hi to people?’

‘I guess,’ says Dean as we arrive in the club’s entrance hall, but by the look on his face he thinks it’s as weird an idea as I do. ‘I can’t even remember the guy’s name, can you?’

‘I know his wife’s name is Sian Doyle. The kids are called Maia, Morgan and Hana. How about that for a memory?’

‘Blimey,’ says Dean. ‘Is that the first time you’ve remembered anything useful?’

‘No,’ I say defensively, but he might be right. Memory for anything but shoes and clothing is not my strong point. We walk up to the reception desk.

‘Chuck,’ says Dean all of a sudden.

‘Go to the loos quickly then,’ I say. ‘You don’t want to go puking all over reception on your first day in the club.’

‘No, the chairman’s name is Chuck,’ says Dean.

‘Oh, I see.’

We smile at the pretty, wide-eyed receptionist and introduce ourselves.

‘Welcome,’ she says with a sugary smile and a flash of her unfeasibly large blue eyes. ‘We’re glad you’re here. Would you like to go up to the main clubroom? Follow the signs. I’ll tell Chuck you’re here.’

I can’t believe how squeaky clean it all is. It’s like the club has just been built, as if the world of football is just arriving in this place, and my Dean will be there at the start of it. He’ll be there to lead these men as they battle to make it in this special sport that produces such joy, passion and fabulously dressed women. The stadium apparently seats 25,000 people which isn’t exactly Wembley but, as Dean says, ‘It’s more than big enough.’ They usually only get around 6,000 watching.

‘Oh my, oh my,’ Paskia-Rose keeps saying as she peers out of the window. ‘I think I’m going to completely die of excitement. Just look at those pitches down there, Mum. Imagine! Me! Out! There!’

‘Mmmm, lovely,’ I hear myself saying, because it’s not lovely, is it? Pask is twelve, for God’s sake. She’s nearly a teenager. How many twelve-year-old girls do you know who think they’re going to die of excitement at the sight of bloody grass?

‘Hello there,’ says a man with a loud voice and an even louder shirt. He is swaggering towards us sporting a pair of horrible, slightly too tight, old-fashioned tennis shorts with a moss-green shirt covered in large red flowers on top. The shirt hangs loosely over the shorts, almost covering them. He’s wearing naff aviator sunglasses and has on lace-up black shoes and black ankle socks that would be better paired with a nylon suit, by a man going to work in the regional branch of an estate agent. He’s striding through the clubhouse towards us.

‘You guys!’ he exclaims, going for a high five, then realizing that Dean is standing there with his hand out, so he jumps back a little, makes a ridiculous face, then eventually he puts his own hand out.

‘Nice to meet you. I’m Dean Martin,’ says my husband, but instead of actually shaking hands Chuck pulls it away at the last minute, pokes his tongue out, puts his thumb on his nose and waggles his fingers like a ten year old.

‘Give us a song!’ he says. ‘Come on, Dean Martin, you big crooner you. Give us one of the old ones.’

There’s a small silence before the man collapses with mirth at his own joke. ‘Only joking. Sorry, I’m a bit mad, I am. A bit crazy. You’ll get used to me. I’m Chuck.’

Oh Lord.

Dean and Chuck eventually shake hands and slap each others backs in a manly fashion, with Chuck making several hilarious jokes about Dean’s name. ‘Not brought the Rat Pack with you then? Ha ha ha … sorry – I did warn you. I’m the funny guy in this place. Now then, what have we here?’ he says, looking me up and down, and adopting a style of eyebrow-raising rarely seen outside a Carry On film or an episode of Benny Hill. ‘Tracie, Tracie. As fresh and lovely as a summer rose. What is someone as gorgeous and, may I say, sexy as you doing with this rascal Dean, then?’

‘Oh, I’m just using him for sex,’ I say, and I’m pleased to say that it floors Chuck completely.

He looks from my stunning orange face to Dean’s shocking red face, and then over at my daughter’s pale freckly one.

‘Well, hello there,’ he says, and off go the eyebrows again.

‘I’m Paskia-Rose. It’s nice to meet you,’ she says firmly, shaking his hand with a vigour that he’s clearly not used to. He clutches his hand to his chest in mock pain, then starts laughing again, slapping his thigh.

‘Fooled ya!’ he says, pointing at Pask.

Oh God. How much time will we have to spend in this man’s company? He’s driving me nuts already. All three of us are standing there, looking from one to the other. I know that Dean, Pask and I are all thinking ‘What a complete knob.’ I have no idea what he’s thinking, though, except that he’s staring unashamedly at my baps. I feel as if I ought to say something to break the tension seeping out of the silence.

‘I’ve got a whole dressing area for my clothes, you know. Not a wardrobe, but this whole area …’

‘Maybe you could show us round,’ interrupts Dean, cutting me off in my prime. Dean does that a lot, as you’ll see.

‘OK,’ says a slightly bewildered-looking Chuck. ‘Let’s all head on outside and have a look at the pitches. Dean, perhaps you could sing as we go. Ha ha ha! I did warn you. I did, didn’t I?’

OK, so I have three immediate problems to deal with – first, Chuck’s unbearable. Second – no sign of Jamie anywhere. Third problem … outside … pitches? How the hell am I supposed to walk across grassy pitches in these clothes? I’m wearing a lime-green knitted mini-dress with a huge white belt that’s pulled so tight it’s stretched the wool and made the whole thing see-through. Happily I predicted this outcome, so to avoid unsightly underwear show-through I have worn nothing underneath. I have on massively high white patent boots, and am sporting more gold round my neck than Jimmy Saville.

We walk outside and the men stride ahead of me, with Paskia-Rose skipping behind. She’s wearing her Arsenal shirt now and it strikes me that she’s always clad in nylon. Can that be healthy? One day she’s going to rub her legs together, cause a spark and whoosh – she’ll spontaneously combust. There’ll be nothing left behind bar smoke and a puddle of liquid nylon in the Arsenal club colours. As she walks, Paskia swings her foot to launch an imaginary ball across the beautiful lush green pitches in front of us. I teeter along behind them all on tippy-toes, hoping that I don’t fall over but being self-aware enough to realize that it will be a miracle if I don’t.

‘Over there is the baseball pitch,’ explains Chuck with an accompanying swing of his arm which narrowly misses Paskia’s head, while Dean nods and looks around, and I try to do faster tippy-toe running to catch up with them. ‘You guys ever heard of baseball?’ he asks. ‘It’s different from your damned cricket. They manage to finish on the same day as they started, and they never blame the weather! Ha ha.’

‘And what’s that?’ I ask when I arrive next to them, elated that I’m still upright. I’m pointing to a large concrete outhouse tucked in behind the row of trees that separate the baseball and soccer areas.

‘This was part of the old club, before we had the major renovation installation completion,’ explains Chuck, opening the unlocked outer door and taking a key from a small hook near a shelf on the right. He opens the white inner door and leads us inside. The place is set out like a small office with an old-fashioned typewriter on an ancient wooden desk. ‘Ah,’ he says, wistfully. ‘This is how things were.’

Paskia hovers in the doorway, still looking longingly at the football pitches while Chuck walks round, mumbling to himself. ‘There is simply no point working to a launch and then finding a house of cards, is there?’ he says.

‘No, no point at all,’ says Dean, out of politeness more than agreement.

We walk back to the main building and Chuck starts telling Dean how he made his fortune in the canned food business.

‘Once I’d got all my ducks in a row it was fairly smooth running to my first mill,’ he’s saying. ‘I’m not claiming it was easy – there were some major cows on the line which could have derailed the whole project, but I did it. I mean, if anyone can put a pig in a dress and call it grandma, I can!’

What the fuck is he on about? I’m listening to his talk of how he had to do a lot of blue-sky thinking, while picking my way through the mud, feeling a lot like Margo out of The Good Life (Dean loves that programme) only better-dressed, obviously.

‘So what do you actually do, Chuck?’ Dean asks. ‘Is it the cans you make, or the food that goes in them?’

‘That’s right,’ says Chuck. ‘Bang on.’

‘Oh, OK,’ says Dean. ‘So is it all canned food or just particular sorts of food, like fruit or vegetables or meat or something?’

‘Dean, I’ve done them all and I’d be lying if I didn’t say that I’ve had to jump through a few hoops along the way. Luncheon-meat-related issues are particularly tough right now, whereas corned beef is just an exercise in box ticking. Personally I sense that a great future in cans is set to cascade down, then we can all play in the corporate waterfall.’

‘Yeah, cool,’ says Dean.

We arrive back and I’m so busy thinking about waterfalls and cans cascading down that I simply don’t see the boot scraper that the others have stepped so elegantly over, and I clatter into it, completely lose my balance and squeal pathetically for the duration of my fall to the floor.

I’m lying flat on my face, half in and half out of the door. My dress is up by my waist, giving the Raiders Club chairman and LA’s hottest canned foods magnate a bird’s eye view of the ‘Other Way Round’ tattoo on my bottom. Why do things like this always happen?

‘Whoops. Cheeky,’ says Chuck, lifting me up and putting me onto me feet. Dean has his head in his hands and Pask doesn’t know where to look. Honestly, it’s not that bad – it’s only a bottom.

‘Are you trying to embarrass me?’ asks Dean quietly.

‘No,’ I assure him. I’m not trying; I’m managing to do it with no effort whatsoever. If I tried, imagine how embarrassing I could be!

Dean, Paskia and Chuck have gone up the metal spiral staircase leading to the side entrance to the main club room. I follow them, clinging onto the handrails and hoping that no one comes in below me.

‘Here comes the lovely little lady,’ says Chuck when I appear at the top. I have mud on my legs, covering my boots and smeared across my face, but other than that I’ve survived the walk perfectly well.

‘Ah, darling, you’re here!’ trills a voice from a distant room, then in walks an astonishingly thin woman – all bones, huge unblinking eyes and a smile that stretches the width of her face. She has long blonde hair with a thick, almost child-like fringe.

‘Woooah,’ says Chuck, flailing his arms around as the woman gives him a kiss. ‘I’ve never seen you before. Who are you?’

Both Chuck and the woman collapse into hysterical fits of laughter.

‘Isn’t he a card? God, twelve years of marriage and he still makes me howl with laughter every day. I’m Sian.’

Goodness. She’s so thin it’s scary. I never realized before that it was possible to be too thin, but here we are – proof that it is. ‘Nice to meet you,’ I say, putting out my heavily bejewelled hand, but instead of shaking it she clutches me in a massive bear-hug and squeezes me into her skeleton. I’m terrified she’s going to snap in half. Then she pushes herself away and scrutinizes me closely.

‘Wow, but look at you!’ she squeals. ‘Wow, wow, wow. Why do you have such a funny outfit on?’

Funny? Jeeeezz … The lady’s got a nerve. Sian, let me tell you, gentle readers, appears to be wearing no makeup at all! None! I know – it’s offensive. She has great skin but, really, no makeup? I do my makeup before getting in the shower, before I go to bed, washing my hair or putting on a face mask. How could she leave the house without makeup?

‘Let’s get juice,’ she says, still staring me up and down.

‘Pask, are you coming?’ I ask, but when I look round my daughter is staring wistfully out of the window.

‘Come on, Dean,’ says Chuck. ‘Let’s brainstorm the dynamics and interpersonal relationships in this team. We need to look behind the power curve and throw up some thought showers that we can circle back on next week.’

‘Yeah, OK,’ says Dean. ‘But it would be quite handy to have a chat with you about coaching.’

‘Yes,’ says Chuck, patting my husband on the back. ‘That’s what I just said.’

Sian marches me towards a room further away, as fast as my mud-covered platform stiletto boots can take me. I know I’m going to like her, even though she’s thinner than me. I don’t normally take to people who are thinner than I am. Come to think of it, I don’t think I’ve ever met someone who’s skinnier than me before.

‘I have a couple of questions for you,’ she says. ‘First up, will you let me host a party for you on Wednesday night? Please say I can. There’ll just be a few of us there.’

‘Oh, thanks, that would be lovely,’ I say, meaning it. I love a good party.

‘Great. You’ll meet Poppy and Macey – two girls from the club. Poppy’s going out with one of the players – Rock Lyon. Do you know him? He was a great player in his day. Macey’s lovely, too. She’s an artist who paints the best watercolours ever. You’ll love them. She’s been doing portraits of the players for an exhibition. She did a portrait of Van Dooley – do you know him? Great American writer.’

‘I know a writer!’ I exclaim, glad to be able to contribute something to the conversation. ‘He’s called Simon. He’s the guy who helped me write my columns in England. He’s coming over on Sunday and staying for a few weeks to do research for a novel he’s writing, set in LA.’

‘Wow, honey, I love English writers,’ she says. ‘Dickens, Austen, Archer. Is he a good guy?’

A good guy? I wonder to myself. I don’t know how to answer that. How do you explain the qualities of someone like Simon – a man who’s become the third most important person in my life in such a short period of time? How do I explain that this is the person who guided me when my mother turned on me and started selling stories to the tabloid papers; the man who sat next to me and listened patiently to my pain and anguish after Dean’s nan passed away? How do I go about explaining that?

‘Yeah,’ I say. ‘He’s a good guy. The best. After Dean.’ It almost feels as if any attempt to explain our relationship will somehow diminish it.

‘Well, then, I need to make the most of you before he comes and takes up all your time, don’t I?’ she says. ‘We can do yoga together and go for runs and swim and …’

‘Are you mad?’ I say. ‘What do we want to do all that shit for when we could just be getting pissed?’

‘Oh, Tracie, you don’t drink alcohol, do you? You know it’s terribly bad for you.’

‘Drinking’s just great. I hate being sober, to be honest.’

Sian almost chokes with laughter.

‘You’re so funny. Look, anything you want – you just call me. I want you to feel at home here in our lovely country.’

‘Oooo,’ I say, seizing the moment. ‘One thing I’d really like would be if you could re-employ Jamie at the club. I met him yesterday and he seems such a nice guy. I know he’s worried about where he’s going to work. I’d love it if you could keep him on.’

Sian looks quite taken aback. ‘Well, he just helped out from time to time when we needed a driver but in the end we had to let him go,’ she says.

‘Oh, that’s a shame. Can’t you offer him more work?’

‘No, Tracie, I’m sorry. There are reasons why the club can’t employ him.’

‘Is this about money?’ I say.

‘Absolutely,’ she says, nodding.

So the club has no money. Shit! I thought it was all looking too good to be true. Poor Deany, he’s not going to be given the budget to buy any good players. He’ll be heartbroken. He’s been picking out players he wants since he got the job – a bit like me when the catalogue from Cricket comes through. I think, Oooh, I’d love those patent-leather slingbacks from Dolce & Gabbana, and he thinks, Oooh, I’d love that big, powerful striker from the Ivory Coast. Probably not much difference in the cost, the way the pricing strategy at Cricket works.

I feel as if we were lied to about these money problems. How can there be money problems? I’m a Wag, for heaven’s sake. I don’t do money problems; I do reckless spending and hedonistic nights out. We were told this was a rich club in a posh area, hoping to make it big time. We were told that money wasn’t an issue, that they wanted success and would pay for it.

‘Please don’t say anything to anyone. Not at the moment, anyway,’ says Sian, coyly.

‘No,’ I say. ‘I won’t say anything, but I have to say that I feel totally conned.’

‘Yes,’ she says, nodding. ‘We all were.’

How awful. Sian’s the chairman’s wife and she didn’t know about the financial problems either. Her words have got me desperately worried about our future here. I’ll have to see whether there’s any way I can make some money while I’m out here. I certainly can’t cut back. I don’t do cheap.

‘Hey, come and see this, doll,’ shouts Dean, breaking our moment of female solidarity and beckoning me to follow him into the bowels of the club. ‘Look,’ he says proudly, sweeping his skinny arms before him and indicating the most magnificent spa ever.

‘Bloody hell, is this for the players?’ I ask.

‘Yes,’ says Dean, hugging me tightly. ‘Isn’t this great, doll? I’m working in a brand, spanking new club with loads of money and loads of potential.’

‘That’s right,’ says Chuck, wandering over to join us with a smile on his face. ‘Always remember – we’re selling the sizzle, not the sausage.’