Get Into The Light: Chapter Eleven- We'll be Brilliant, Just Remember That

It was two days before our first proper gig at the Paradiso.

Lynette and I were trying on outfits in her flat. Since the video shoot, there’d been more tension between us. Perhaps I should have been glad that Lynette was taking to the limelight so well and allowing me to slink off into the shadows but instead I felt terrible. Frustrated. Angry. And I was having more and more unsavoury thoughts about her. I imagined what she’d look like with no legs- what her expression would be if she was in a wheelchair. Or how her nose would look if someone snipped off the end with a pair of scissors. I even fantasised that she’d been knocked off her bicycle. And part of me felt dreadful for wishing misfortune on a good friend (was she a good friend though? This was one of the things eating me up) but I was beginning to realise that this was part and parcel of female friendships- no matter how much you loved someone, there was still a tiny piece of you that wanted them to develop a violent dose of herpes. And you wanted them to have thighs that chaffed together in the summer heat. For them to have to religiously sprinkle talcum powder down their legs.

I struggled to pull my new turquoise top over my head. It had cost more than four weeks cleaning salary and was completely transparent with two embroidered circles around each breast and then another patch of embroidery encircling the nipple area. It was the sort of top that would have given Mum a stroke. I imagined I would trial it first with a cardie on top and then (when I actually grew a pair of balls), I’d rip it off and thrust my chest out- at which point I would die of embarrassment and run off stage weeping.
‘I can’t imagine you’re really going to wear that,’ Lynette said, as I stood upright, pulling the top down over my stomach.

I studied my reflection in the mirror. There was something wrong with my body that meant it could never be sexy. The angles- the shapes- my posture perhaps- whatever happened the body always looked like the body of a giant baby- not the kind of body that you lusted after- that would be wrong because a baby is so warm and friendly! I quickly rolled the top back over my head. Lynette would look good in it. I thought about an angry rash that would start at her toes and work its way up the backs of her legs. I imagined it travelling across her entire body until she was just a streak of scarlet red bacon, at which point her hair would fall out and she’d develop an abnormally large cold sore under her nose.
‘Let me show you something,’ Lynette said, wriggling out of her pants.
She stepped forward and bent her knees, pushing her crouch forwards until I noticed a small, silver ring glinting amongst her pubic hair. I felt sick looking at it. Not because I was a prude (I am, I am a prude, definitely a prude) but because I couldn’t bear the sight of my friend’s genitalia. Lynette had pushed her rabid exhibitionism too far. I walked into the kitchen and poured myself a glass of water. I put all thoughts of her fanny out of my mind.
‘I didn’t wish to see that,’ I said as she wandered in after me, the ring still glinting in my general direction. The ring reiterated the fact that I was a prude, had a kind but unremarkable face and the body of a giant baby- that I would never be the centre of things - a showgirl - someone who people pushed to the front to watch perform - someone who entranced the audience - made them suspend all those niggling doubts and left them with shining eyes - someone who looked natural- unrehearsed and spectacular in an anorak - next to a lighthouse or in a field flooded with tulips and sunshine.
‘OK, chill out. I swear, everyday you become more and more British. More agitated by other peoples sexuality.’
‘I don’t want to look at your fanny. That’s all.’
I drank the water and imagined gulping back one glass, then another, then ten more until I eventually exploded.
‘Joost’s got one in his cock and one in each nipple.’
‘He’ll look completely ridiculous when he’s old,’ I said
Lynette sighed and left the kitchen. I was a prude. I was a suburban schoolteacher who went red whenever someone drew a penis on the blackboard.
‘Lynette what are you going to do?’ I said walking out of the kitchen.
Lynette was pulling on her leggings and had rolled out the blue top out so it was lying facing her on the bed.
‘You can have it,’ I said.
‘I can’t take it. It was expensive. You’ll wear it. It looks nice on you.’
‘But what are you going to do?’ I said lighting a cigarette and collapsing onto the stool next to her dressing table.
‘I’m going to leave Pete and then I’m going to settle down with Joost. Except I’m not going to get too heavy with him just yet because he’ll probably get scared off. Then we’ll get some more piercings, maybe start hitting up some of the S&M clubs and then eventually maybe we’ll have a baby.’
‘No I don’t meant Joost. I mean US ON STAGE! - What are WE supposed to do when we’re onstage?’
‘Why are you asking me? How do I know? I’ll probably just do exactly what I do when I’m in a club. I’ll take a couple of pills and dance.’
‘But what about Zarzar? Didn’t you see them dance? We’ll never come close to them. They’re incredible.’
‘I hadn’t even thought about Zarzar. I don’t think we need to try and compete with them.’
‘Of course we do. They’re our competition. We need to prove to Bob van Veen that we’re the best.’
Lynette slid onto the bed and waved her legs in the air.
‘We just need to be ourselves,’ she said.
‘Why does everyone keep saying that?’
‘Because you’re a prude,’ she said doing bicycles with her legs.
‘I’m not a fucking prude!’
‘You wouldn’t even look at my vagina.’
‘No one wants to see that.’
Lynette laughed.
‘See you’re just a prude at heart.’
‘Look, I want to be able to move properly on stage. That’s all I ask. I don’t want to look like a moron. How can I look more natural?’
‘Come here, I’ll show you,’ she said jumping off the bed and pushing me towards the mirror. She stood behind, grasping onto my hands and with her knees wedged into the backs of my legs. She pushed her hips forward.
‘Close your eyes,’ she said.
I followed her commands and tried to let my body go limp. Tried to empty my mind.
‘Now open them.’
I looked into the mirror and saw Lynette’s head peeking over one shoulder. Instead of running from the room, I tried to keep moving, following the same pattern that her hips made. She pushed my arms up and I followed those movements too and gradually, even though there was no music, I felt a loosening inside.
‘Forget all the stuff that’s going on in your head. Forget all the British crap that the nuns taught you.’
‘I never knew any nuns.’
‘Well forget about the Queen and how it’s bad to masturbate and just let your body go nice and loose.’
I closed my eyes again and tried to remember this slightly less uptight, twitchy feeling.
‘We’re going to be brilliant,’ she said, ‘Just keep saying it until you really believe it.’

Saturday came quickly. The Paradiso was heaving. There were three bands playing that night and DJ Rene Van Bellen- a well-known, ‘gabber’ DJ.
‘Here’s a present,’ Joost said, handing me a giant bottle of a thick yellowy liquid, ‘Lynette told me you were nervous.’
The label showed a Toucan in a sailor’s hat. The Toucan’s T-shirt read ‘Live Fast. Die Young’.
I poured a bit into a white plastic cup.
‘It’s banana rum.’
‘I don’t care what it is,’ I replied.
‘That’s the spirit,’ he said patting me on the back.
‘How many people do you think will be watching?’
‘700-800- maybe more?’

Carl was slouched on the sofa in the dressing room. He was dressed all in black. I couldn’t look at him for any length of time. The longer I looked at him the more ridiculous it seemed that we were going on stage. Instead of watching back to back eighties films and making cigarettes, we were actually performing in FRONT OF A LIVE AUDIENCE. In this moment, cleaning seemed so much more appealing. The anonymity of squirting bleach down the toilet, the fact that no one congratulated you on a job well done, no one actually noticed that there was no longer a layer of dust on the mirrors – no one cared and you definitely weren’t trying to be SEXY. Why was I being thrust into the limelight when I was better suited to domestic chores?
‘Liz Fraser from the Cocteau Twins always throws up before she goes on stage,’ Carl said looking at his hands.
‘Yes but she’s an amazing singer. She’s allowed to wet her pants or do whatever she wants. She’s talented. It’s part of her own mythology,’ I said taking another sip of banana juice.
‘And Robert Smith from The Cure,’ Lynette said.
‘ What about him?’ I said rubbing black eyeliner into the space above my eyes.
‘And Kim Deal from the Pixies,’ Carl continued.
They were making things up to make me feel better. I finished my make up job and studied my reflection. The blue top was underneath a white blouse that was tied at the waist. And the black skirt with tights and platform shoes looked better than the glittery leggings that Lynette had made me put on earlier. I was happy. It wasn’t too OTT but it wasn’t too quiet either. Now all I had to remember was the fact that my skin was just a pair of baggy pyjamas. I was just hanging out in these pyjamas till the mood changed and I started dancing in a loose and highly informal manner. Charles was very quiet and was sitting staring at his reflection in the mirror. I wondered if he’d ever seen a mirror before. He was like a creature that had been allowed one-day pass from the zoo. I pictured him climbing on the table, beating his chest and then tearing off someone’s head and running out into the crowd with it swinging from his clenched, bloody fist. His jaw was clenched. His eyes bloodshot and he wasn’t blinking. I wondered if this was a bad sign. I didn’t know Charles well enough to judge. Eddie should have been the one checking, making sure he was okay especially now he was no longer tied to the mixing desk and away from the safe and relatively protected studio, where he could curl up and go to sleep and fart all night. But Eddie was pacing the hall. Each time he passed the door, he shouted ‘MONSTER PARTY!’ and then disappeared. Miss Ellen appeared behind him and did a thumbs up sign.
‘Did you see what she was wearing?’ Lynette said fluttering her false eyelashes.
Lynette had dressed herself in a glittering all in one. It was almost an exact replica of the costume one of the Zarzar dancers had worn. I tried to remind myself that sexiness wasn’t a finite resource and that there could be more than one sexy person in the room at one time.
‘I didn’t see it. What was she wearing?’ I said.
‘I didn’t see. That’s why I asked,’ Lynette said, ‘What have you done to your left eye, you look like someone’s punched you.’
‘I feel sick, have you got anything for nausea?’
‘MMMmm nausea, nausea, let me see…’ Lynette reached into her tartan purse and pulled out a plastic bag, ‘Well you could have half of this…just have half you’ll be OK.’
She broke a pill in half and popped it into her mouth, then slurped water straight from the tap. She handed me the other half.
‘Or let’s have another half. In fact. I’ll take another one and you just take a half.’
‘I don’t think that’s a good idea.’
‘Do you want to look good on stage or not?’
I nodded and took the other half, washing it down with banana rum.
Live Fast, Die Young Toucan.
‘This is a big night,’ I said.
‘You’re right.’
‘It’s the start of our careers.’
‘Like I said, just keep telling yourself- We’re brilliant.’
‘You’re brilliant.’
‘No you are. Remember that.’

The stage was covered in smoke. Carl and Charles had taken their position behind the keyboards. I tried to get eye contact with Carl- I wanted him to give me some sort of reassurance but he was staring straight ahead, poised to start. Eddie was standing next to a wall of sound equipment. He was grinning, mouthing the word ‘MONSTER’ over and over. The crowd were growing impatient or perhaps they weren’t impatient. Perhaps they didn’t care. Who knew? The place was pitch black apart from the smoke. A bit of banana rose up in my throat and gurgled into my mouth, leaving a bitter taste. Then a fluttering in the stomach. The opening chords of ‘I Call Upon’. The music all being played on a DAT recorder. I wished it was my job to operate the DAT recorder. I wished I was facing a big pile of shit stuck to the toilet rim. I wished I was dead. Lynette ran past and squeezed my arm. I watched her glittering butt disappear into the black. I walked on stage. My teeth were chattering. I thought about that for a few seconds. Then I thought about the bit I’d seen in some old video footage where Jim Morrison falls to the floor like he’s just been given an electric shock. I thought about doing a chicken dance and how that might play out right now. Then I thought about James Brown and how he did this complex thing with his legs like there were spiders running up inside his pants. I thought about how I should be wearing a cape instead of a white shirt. I thought about what Lynette had said about being loose. I said the words LOOSE, LOOSE, LOOSE and felt the chattering abate a bit. Then the lights came up and I saw black eyes looking up. I grabbed the microphone. I clung to it like it was the last tree branch dangling into the river – the last thing before I got whisked away by a powerful flood.

I was aware of a gurgling sound coming from deep within- the banana mixture was swirling round with the anxiety, anticipation and things I needed to remember. All I could hear was the backing tape with the drums and strings blasting out. I shouted as loud as possible to ensure everyone could hear.My throat hurt. I did a dance. It was loose I suppose. Charles had pulled the keyboard off its stand and was swinging it around in the air. Eddie was mouthing – MONSTER, MONSTER. I felt I was getting into my stride. I kept going. The dance was okay I thought. And the last verse was almost said at a normal level. I realised that we’d never had a proper rehearsal before and this was it except everyone was now watching. It was going well. But then it wasn’t going well and my vision grew narrow and all I could see were two girls standing at stage left. Two girls who couldn’t take their eyes off me. Two girls who thought I was great? Crap? Funny? Loose? LOOSE. The song came to an end but I was already getting the high from the pill and everything was racing inside-I needed to sit down, to re-group, to scoop my innards up and put them back. I knew my teeth were chattering again. I caught sight of Forest- his smile illuminated by the green EXIT sign at the back of the hall.
‘That was so loud,’ Lynette said in my ear.
‘I love you,’ I said.
‘Oh god- are you alright? You’re not going to be sick again are you?’

The slow saxophone intro of ‘Get Into the Light’ started. The stage bathed in soft yellow and orange light. Everything was now moving very slowly and all I wanted to do was lie flat and any sort of dancing was out of the question. Miss Ellen appeared. She was wearing no clothes. At first I thought I was hallucinating. I’d had fractured visions before- static objects moving before me but this was unmistakable. Miss Ellen was naked and she was carrying a microphone and her huge breasts were wobbling as she walked past Lynette and into the centre of the stage. I put my microphone back in its stand and thought about how strange it was to be standing here with a naked woman on stage but also how it was pretty iconic and I hoped someone was filming because this was one of those moments that would be shown in a documentary. This was authentic and spontaneous because she hadn’t told any of us and despite Amsterdam being completely liberal, it was unheard of to have someone naked on stage unless you were in the Red Light District. Miss Ellen was so big that you couldn’t stop staring - it wasn’t revulsion, it was more like wonderment. Her long brown hair hung in two thick plaits, topped off with an Indian headdress with yellow and green feathers sticking out of it. The crowd whooped. This would be an opportunity to lie down because no one was watching me right now- I’d peaked too early - I sat down on the side of the stage and just swayed from side to side whilst Miss Ellen began to sing and Lynette tried to pretend that she wasn’t looking.
‘GET INTO THE LIGHT!’ she shouted at the end of the first verse.
The crowd really seemed to be enjoying this. I had a rush of energy again and jumped up and closed my eyes. It was al fine. No one was even looking in my direction.

But what were those girls saying? The two girls. They jumped into my eye-line and still their eyes were glued to me. And the feelings were no longer benevolent. There was no longer a happy universe which was overseen, not by God perhaps but by some sort of goodly force, with all of us with bags of stuff in common and able to come together at occasions such as this and just enjoy being in close proximity and enjoy music - no these girls were bad and drilling into my soul with their eyes - they could see the expensive blue top and the silly way it put my tits on show - they could see the banana goo oozing inside and they could see that my skin wasn’t like a pair of pyjamas. They could see I wasn’t LOOSE right now.

THEY COULD SEE EVERYTHING.

They were laughing at me. And any good feeling I’d experienced up to know dissipated to be replaced by a cloud of anxiety. The song finished. I was rooted to the spot just staring at these two girls. If I’d been Jim Morrison it would have probably been fine. It would have been mysterious, sexy even. Smoke billowed out of the smoke machine. Lynette came over to where I was standing. Miss Ellen had turned her back to the audience and was smiling at Carl but he was scowling back at her.

‘Those girls are talking about me,’ I said pointing down at them.
‘Of course they’re talking about you, you’re on stage you silly billy.’
‘No they can see straight through me. They can see through my skin!’ I said with alarm.
‘They’re doing nothing of the sort. Look, there’s only one more song and then we’re finished. We’re doing a great job. Remember- we’re brilliant. Remember?’
‘I feel shaky. I don’t think I can carry on.’
‘Come on,’ she said and grabbed my arms as the next song started.
I closed my eyes and pretended we were back in her front room again. The girls disappeared. The girls didn’t matter.

‘Such a cheap trick,’ Carl said back in the dressing room.
He shook his head.
‘I thought it looked pretty good. It’s hard to get people in Amsterdam to even blink- we’re all so damned jaded but that certainly did the trick!’ Forest said sitting down next to him on the sofa.
‘I don’t want to be associated with some cheap sex antics,’ Carl said.
‘Don’t be so precious. We’re a bloody dance act. You’re not Bertolt Brecht you know.’
‘We don’t have to get down in the gutter. We don’t have to play to the lowest common denominator,’ Carl said angrily.
There was a low level buzzing in my ears like a computer malfunction, just before you have to do Force-Quit.
‘Some girls were talking about me,’ I said sitting down on the arm of the sofa.
‘Which girls?’ Carl said looking up.
But he didn’t look sympathetic like I expected he would. He looked tired and fed up and like he didn’t want to deal with another petty drama. Perhaps he had every right to feel this but it didn’t stop the fact that they were looking at me and they were talking about me and it went beyond petty bitching.
‘Just forget about it Lola. You’ll have to get used to people talking about you if you want to be in band.’
‘But do I really want to be in a band?’ I said.
‘Let’s not discuss this right now,’ he said.
Miss Ellen came in wrapped in a fluffy, white dressing gown.
‘That went well,’ she said helping herself to a bottle of beer.
‘Why did you do that?’ Carl said looking angrily at her.
‘I have to do what I feel. I don’t go up there with rules and a list of things I can or can’t do. It felt like the right thing so I did it.’
She took a swig. Lynette was pulling her false eyelashes off in the mirror.
‘You just wanted to steal all the attention,’ Lynette said.
‘It was childish,’ Carl said, ‘It was sensationalist and it was childish. And if you’re going to perform with us then I’ll have to ask you to never do it again.’
Miss Ellen nodded.
‘Okay- don’t be so serious. It’s fine. I won’t do it again.’
‘Thanks Miss Ellen,’ Forest said, ‘Thanks for being so diplomatic.’
I felt a wave of static in my ears again.
‘But what do you think they were saying?’ I cut in, ‘Did anyone hear what they actually said?’