Red Mohair

I was at a junction turning right today when I saw her.
Fumbling with a magazine on the passenger seat, trying to get a free CD
off the cover, half an eye on the traffic moving left and right in
front of me, I saw her. She was waiting to turn right, spotted a gap
and eased her car through. As she passed me, I saw her, and knew she
knew it was me.

It's twenty years almost, and I looked like crap, dressed in an old
jumper with bad hair held back by sunglasses, but she knew me and I
knew her. In contrast, she looked perfect. Perfect blonde hair held
back in a perfect French pleat, perfect white shirt, and a perfect
child sat in the back seat. She had a sly half smile on her perfect red
lips and I just goggled, cow gum from the back of the cardboard cd
cover stuck between my thumb and my teeth.

A horn sounded, and looking in my rear view mirror I saw the bloke
waiting in the queue of cars behind me make an obscene gesture. Even
more obscene, was the sight of her brand new sunshine yellow Audi
sports disappearing into the car park.

The last time I saw her she looked slightly less elegant, punching me
in the face by a phone box on the seafront, with Kieran trying to pull
her away and Rachel screaming and crying trying to protect me. I can
still smell the blood that clung to the jumper I was wearing,
Kieran's jumper. Red mohair.


We'd caught the free bus that Raffles nightclub put on into town, and
me, Rachel, Linda and Debbie had stuffed ourselves into a photo booth
for a strip of four pictures to mark the occasion. In the black and
white images, Linda's blusher looked like striplights on her
cheekbones. We laughed as she tried to scrub it off with a Kleenex in
the mirror on the side of the booth. Too late, it was stuck on the
photo for all eternity, and after Rachel tore them into four and gave
us one each, she tore hers up. I kept mine. We were only 15.

Ten minutes later, we were in the club. It was one of those late
seventies nights of Oops upside your head, Pernod and Boots 17 Flirt
(pearly) lipstick.

I wasn't sure if Kieran would be there, but he was, with his friend
Russell. Rachel quite fancied Russ; he had a Vespa and blonde hair.
Quadrophenia all over. Debbie and Linda were very 15, but Rachel and
me, we fancied ourselves as much older. We thought everybody else
fancied us too. Someone told us that if you flicked fag ash into your
drink you got drunk quicker, and Debbie and Linda pulled faces at us as
we flicked and swigged, flicked and swigged.

God we were stupid.

Kieran came over with Russell, and stood at the top of the steps by
our table. Confident 19 year olds, they seemed to be twice our age,
unattainable and experienced. Looking back, we were so terribly young,
all of us.

I can't remember how we got so close in, but Kieran was sitting by me
and Rachel and Russell were all over each other. She came over then,
and sat down and smiled at us both, Kieran looked annoyed, but I hadn't
a clue who she was.

"She won't give you what you want".  She smiled at us both, but
the words were to Kieran.

"Maybe I don't want it from her yet" he answered. This conversation
sticks in my mind, years on. Then, I wasn't too sure what she meant. Of
course, I know now.

He looked really angry, and pulled me off the prickly fag pocked red
velvet bench. She followed us, talking all the time, I don't recall
what she was saying, I just recall that we looked like each other in
reverse. Her white jeans and black tee-shirt, my white tee-shirt and
black jeans, her blonde hair, my dark hair. I stopped, and the two of
them walked off together.

Debbie Linda Rachel and I danced that night. Looking for Kieran,
looking for the blonde woman, I drank too much.

Afterwards, we left, and walked to the car park to catch the free bus
home. There are loads of things that, looking back, seem to be running
all at the same time in my head. I know that Kieran appeared as we
left, and made me put his jumper on, because it was so cold. I remember
he made me stand in the phone box, out of the way of an icy 2am sea
wind, and I remember us hugging, his jumper smelling soft and sweet
like baby powder. He said he'd see me later in the week, that he had to
go, that there should be no trouble.

Trouble? I didn't have a clue what he was talking about. He left, the
bus came, and then the trouble happened alright.

The blonde woman, lashing out frenziedly. Rachel screaming, Kieran
running back along the sea front, I tasted blood in my mouth. I recall
bizarrely, that she had the most heavily mascara'd eyelashes I had ever
seen. Her eyes were narrow and she was screaming, a mess of sharp and
foul words flew from her mouth.

My mum knitted that jumper. Slap. His mum gave me an abortion.
Punch.

I wonder now, had the mothers traded the needles between them? Size 10
needles, perfect for knitting mohair, and foetus removal, handed over
in a pale blue Woolworths carrier bag. A silent transaction.

I don't remember getting on the bus, nor going home. I remember seeing
Kieran a couple of years later, in another nightclub. A friend of his
came over, and asked me to go and speak to him. Said that he was still
with the mascara'd blonde, said that he was very unhappy.

I said no thanks.

She's done well for herself though, give her that.