I'm so in love with you

We were both quite drunk, but I could see it wasn’t just that with Joel - he didn’t look very well to me. We stood on the corner, watching as the others set off back to the Burton Street squat in the old van. Joel’s face looked pale in the harsh orange light of the street lamp. He’d stopped smiling the minute the others had gone, and now he stood there, just swaying slightly. I stubbed my cigarette out and put my arm around him

“We’ll get a taxi ok?”

He looked around vaguely.

“Yes but where – you know we can’t use the account anymore don’t you”

I nodded.

“He is a bastard isn’t he. So much money too. Honestly, it makes you wonder why he minds at all. It’s very unfair.”

We were outside a pub, and some chairs had been left stacked untidily by the door. I don’t suppose anyone had thought it was worth taking them in after closing time. I pushed some rubbish off the top one and pulled Joel over.

“I’ll get one. You sit here”

It took ages to find a taxi; they normally turn their lights off and speed up through Camden at that time of night – all those fights and stuff – and so we were both really cold by the time we finally settled back into the big squashy seat. I rubbed my hands together to try to get the feeling back into them and I thought about the evening. The gig had been worth it – even though Joel looked half dead and I wasn’t feeling too good either. We’d had a table right at the front and we stayed there the whole time, to show our support. T’d had his back to us for most of it, but we didn’t take our eyes off him just in case he turned around. I thought he’d been brilliant.

Joel sat, tight lipped, next to me. I knew he felt bad about not being able to go on to the party afterwards, and I knew he felt even worse about me not going either. I tried to think of a way of taking his mind off things – to cheer him up.

“You know that girl who was there tonight? The American one who said she knew T? When I asked her what she thought, she said he sang out of tune! Even if he did, which he didn’t – you don’t say that kind of thing do you? Fucking bitch. What do you think we could do to her to get revenge?”

I looked sideways to see if it was working, and it did eventually, as I began to list different ways of annoying her, each one getting more extreme, until finally I mentioned sending bloodstained anonymous kidnap-type letters telling her to go back where she came from; then Joel laughed a little.

“Ahh – she might do that soon, but the thing is T. would probably go with her”

“No way! How do you know?”

“He told me – he’s been saving up ever since he read “On the Road”. He’s selling all the records he nicked from the shop. Some of them are quite valuable”

I felt cold for a minute at the thought of T not being at the shop anymore – I often popped in. It was a lovely warm place, full of interesting people. Once or twice I’d worked there myself; I didn’t have a clue about that kind of thing but I didn’t think anyone else there had either – they all seemed very relaxed.

Every day T would help himself from the till to money for lunch, and a taxi home, and he had a huge collection of records that had taken his fancy. Now that I came to think of it, it was astonishing it was still in business at all to be honest. It was great fun though, and very handy for the Portobello Road.

It was late when we got back to the flat, but we’d both cheered up a bit by then. We were still quite drunk, and it took several goes for us to get the key in the lock. I kept on bursting into laughter at Joel’s pathetic attempts, and then he’d have to turn around to tell me to shut up in case I woke the people on the ground floor.

Once we were in, it was strange to be alone, but also nice, and we decided to settle into Marnie and David’s room, so we could watch the television. The big bed there was much more comfortable than Joel’s two narrow little ones. I let myself fall onto it, laughing and spreading out my arms and legs to see how wide they could get.

“For fuck’s sake be careful” Joe said, coming in with a bottle, “Last time we did this you left a sock under the covers and mum went spare – she thought David had had his girlfriend round.”

I put my hand over my mouth in horror.

“Oh my god! What did you do? Did you tell her?”

“Of course not, I just left him to deny it. I couldn’t exactly say it was us could I? She might have got the wrong idea. Here…….” He opened the bottle and passed it to me

I leant on my elbow and looked at the label. “Is brandy all we have?” I sighed and took a mouthful; it wasn’t very nice. Still, we had to drink something. Joel sat on the side of the bed and began to unlace his shoes

“So…you made a hit at the cottage you know”

I was trying to kick off my boots without unzipping them and it was all going a bit wrong, they stuck halfway and I nearly fell off the bed.

“How do you mean?”

“Mum said you were looking really pretty. She said Olivier never stopped talking about you”

I felt my face going red. He was thirty something – how could he possibly fancy me? The idea was ridiculous

“Bollocks Joel. You’re making it up”

He looked at me and yawned.

“Why would it be bollocks; you don’t fancy him do you?”

I laughed, “Of course not – god you talk crap sometimes”

I was undressed by then, so I got into bed and pulled the covers up to my neck, then I took another swig of the brandy

“Are you going to turn the tv on?”

Joel reached for the remote and pressed the button.

“Steven asked me if I was going out with you the other day”

I passed him the bottle.

“Oh? What did you say?”

“I told him it was a mystery”

He was laughing softly now, and he put the brandy on the bedside table, turned off the light, and began to do a really terrible impression of Blondie, singing Denis Denis in such a horrible falsetto voice, that I put my fingers in my ears and told him I would hit him if he didn’t shut up.