Midnight was fast approaching, and it was Ricky’s turn to get on stage. It was a Tuesday but the club was packed with hallucinating men and women. The thundering bass hypnotised the crowd into a steady wave of movements, while the build up of electronic trance sounds elevated their hands holding glowsticks. Ricky was backstage, handing over a bulging envelope of cash to an obese figure in the dark.
‘Do you have anything else?’ Ricky demanded.
‘That’s about it. I know they’re out lookin’ still. Wherever your mate is, I hope he’s behind some thick walls.’ The obese figure stepped forward to accept his payment. The soft overhead lighting exposed a barren scalp and bloodshot eyes.
‘You know anything about where he’d be?’
‘He ain’t got no friends in London. Nobody knows. Nobody he trusts.’
‘Come on, I gave you two days and this is all you got for me?’
‘A day. You asked me last night.’
‘Are you telling me I pay you this for a day’s work?’ Ricky shot angrily.
‘What’s wrong snow prince? You don’t skimp on junk do you?’ The man glared down at him and his foul breath pierced Ricky’s nostrils.
‘Give me something I can use. You’re not worth what I’m paying you for.’
The man continued to glare at Ricky, then looked up as if to remember something. ‘Is you sure about your friend?’
‘Huh?’
‘I don’t think the target is your friend. Whatever they doin’ now, they got somethin’ else on their mind.’
Before Ricky could ask further the club manager burst in and grabbed Ricky’s arm. ‘Come on it’s past twelve, you’re on! Listen! Listen!’
Ricky didn’t have to. He could hear the crowd chanting his name loud and clear.
‘Keep looking,’ he ordered the bald junkie.
‘And keep telling me you quit. Not the prince I used to know.’
‘I’m clean,’ Ricky declared as he turned around and left.
‘Let me know if you ever need some! I made some very good friends while you were gone! The best stuff on the streets!’ The man shouted to Ricky’s back. The manager saw him grin, flashing a row of sickly yellow teeth.
When Ricky got on stage, the club was in full swing. He breathed in the intoxicating buzz of the crowd and held out his hands. His earplugs and headphones protected his ears from pain, but they picked up the entire spectrum of hysterical laughter and gleeful hooting. For the first time in years, he was in London again. He had been afraid to come back but now he was here. And he had successfully survived the first several days without resorting to drugs. He told himself that he was done with that life, and he wouldn’t let it cloud his decisions again. He couldn’t undo what had already been done but he wanted to make up for his wrongdoings. That was what propelled him to continue poking his head into Mateo’s affairs despite the throbbings of his ears. Of course, that it was eerily connected to the Vietnamese mob was another factor that drew him in. He shook his head and stopped his mind from digging into the past. Now was not the time.
The strobelights flickered violently and Ricky repeated what he said to the junkie.
‘I’m clean.’
Though it was audible to no one, not even himself beneath all the music, he felt compelled to reassure himself. As his fingers started to work their magic on the turntable, Ricky grabbed the mic next to him.
‘Hi everybody I’m Ricky Vega and I want you to make some noiseeeeee!’
The crowd erupted and Ricky smiled at the earthquake he felt beneath his feet.
Wednesday
When Tony Barlow woke up on Wednesday morning, he didn’t know who he was. There was hazy light shining anonymously through the curtains in the room he found himself in. It was a plain room, barren and without any photographs or personal souvenirs to jog his memory. His entire body felt sluggish as if it were paralysed. His brain flickered feebly as he tried to retrieve the memories, those vestiges of a distant life. They proved resolute in their flight and did not come forth so readily.
He got up from his bed very carefully. He took his time with each movement for two reasons. The first was that he was unfamiliar with his surroundings and the second was that he hoped a thorough observation of his cage would help reveal something about who had brought him there. As much as he was frightened by his cognitive deficiency, Tony was also perturbed by the absence of a friendly face to bring him back to life.
In search of that face he ventured out into the hall. It was quiet and dark. He hovered around, adjusting his eyes to the much darker hall and feeling the texture of the wall to expedite cognitive recovery, and in the course of frantically feeling his way around he knocked over a vase. A hybrid sound of shatter and thud filled the hall as the vase immediately hit the carpeted floor. Tony panicked and looked around to see if anyone would come chasing him, but there was no one.
Venturing out into the lounge, Tony saw a familiar space, more decorated than the one he had just exited. There was a feminine touch here and there, goading him to retrieve what he knew but couldn’t recall. It was beyond frustration, and Tony stood there trying with all his might to squeeze out the details of this life that encapsulated him.
His concentration was broken by the sudden sound of the door click. Tony turned and looked to see the door knob turn and a woman enter. He knew this woman.
‘Tony?’ she said softly.
Tony. That was his name.
‘Tony why aren’t you at work? Are you all right?’ She hurried over to him and raised her hand to run it through his hair. He flinched. ‘What’s wrong Tony?’ She tried again. He made an effort to stay still but his face was visibly betraying discomfort. Liz gasped in comprehension.
‘Hold on, I’ll be right back.’ She disappeared momentarily, then returned with some small bottles and a glass of water. She twisted open the caps and handed him the pills. Tony was puzzled but something told him he was supposed to trust this woman. He knew her well; she was not at all a stranger but someone very close, someone who took good care of him. She had keys to this flat and he had probably given them to her.
He took the medications she gave, and followed her into the bathroom, where she ran a hot bath for him. Then she left the old man to himself and went to the kitchen to prepare breakfast. But before she did, she went through his room and belongings to make sure everything was in place. She also made sure to check his phone for him; as she had expected there were several missed calls from the office. She called Frank to tell him Tony was under the weather and would drop in later if he could.
The sound of water running from the tap had now been replaced by tame splashes inside the tub. Liz decided to give Tony a little time to come to his senses before she went in to help. She’d read the relevant literature, which informed her that as the illness progressed the patient would start to experience intermittent lapses in longer-term memory. They wouldn’t be severe at first - mere blackouts that one should wait out as the brain rebooted. It was just like her laptop ‘freezing up’ sometimes. But she supposed that, like machines that eventually wear out and ‘freeze up’ forever, she would one day face a man who had lost his entire past. She bit her lip at the thought; there were things that she never wanted him to forget, and there were things he didn’t know that she wanted him to know. She had very strong feelings for Tony, and she knew she had to take action to enjoy what little time she had left with him.
Meanwhile, Tony was recovering his memory bit by bit in the hot tub. The woman outside was Liz. She baked one hell of an Eve’s pudding and was the provider of his Sunday roasts. It was all coming back now. He remembered the season, and that the all-important game was nearing. The club’s history would be forever changed, and his name would enter folklore. He also recalled the horrid sights of the basement sex chambers at Lady Paint overlapped with images of Emma’s pendant dangling from Mateo’s neck. The fragments of his past sped up to mesh together and form a collage of truth, which was that it was Emma, not he, who had broken them. Subdued by the chills of remembrance, Tony sank underwater to blanket his head with warmth.
Tony came up for air, and his head was clear. He looked toward the door and pictured the woman standing on the other side of it. It was delightful to imagine the hot, savoury breakfast she would serve up for him. He dried himself and stepped outside the bathroom. Liz was in the kitchen, back turned toward him as she cooked omelettes. He hoped to see that back every morning for a very long time. Emboldened by the intensity of that hope, he let go of his inhibitions and approached her, slipping his arms under hers and around her stomach. He placed his lips on her right cheek.
With the slightest brushing of her palm on the back of Tony’s hand, Liz acknowledged and accepted Tony’s overture. The gestures were so familiar that Tony recalled something he had long forgotten. His hands went limp in shock and he froze, completely dumbstruck by light that flicked on to reveal a kaleidoscopic procession of images from more than two decades ago. It was possible that he also replayed these memories the first time he saw Liz a little over a year ago. But if that were the case, he had certainly done a great job of burying them into his subconscious.
This time, however, Tony sensed the memories would stay out in the open. The impact was so strong this time; he could feel at his fingertips the sensation of long ago, of running his hand along her silky skin.
She was lying sideways without a stitch of clothing, hand on her chin, her loving eyes resting squarely on his. She giggled, he laughed and tickled her. She screamed happily and squirmed, resisting his grip and laughing some more. He covered her lips with his. He made love to her.
Tony remembered now. It was January of 2000. After their introduction over the phone, when he mistook her for Emma and she confessed that she had small breasts, Tony had formed a mild crush on Liz. Emma slamming the door in his face hadn’t helped his confidence and he grew tired of waiting for Emma to thaw. In truth, he wasn’t even sure they were a good fit. Emma sang decently and performed at a few underground venues with her small band of friends who dreamt of emulating Madchester success. Although it was evident she wasn’t going platinum any time soon, she was content to sing and dance wherever a stage beckoned her.
The energetic, carefree qualities of her youth made Tony feel shy despite his seniority. And his sense of underachievement and unworthiness amplified each time he sat next to the speakers at a show she’d invited him to. She appeared to hail from a different world that he could never fully understand and he felt uncultured around her musician friends. There was one from the Royal College of Music, who didn’t give a rat’s ass about Emma’s psychedelic riffs but came for the psychedelic substances and the subsequent surge in success rate he had for slipping into girls’ knickers. Tony despised the fellow and once tried to have a go at him as he approached Emma. But when Emma started laughing at his daft jokes about music - something about Joy Division and unknown pleasures - Tony felt a kick in the teeth. He returned to the bar a crestfallen man and downed a pint in one big gulp.
This morose context breathed life into Tony’s feelings for Liz. Whenever he called their flat it was always Liz and not Emma who picked up, and after a few conversations Tony even felt like asking her out for a beer. One beer turned into several, and a casual chat turned into a casual fuck. From what Tony could tell, Liz seemed to be fond of him as well as unconcerned about his relationship with Emma. He admired her easygoing character and fully enjoyed their brief but mutually beneficial affair.
After a couple weeks Tony went back to Emma, but it was not without a favourable assessment of his holiday with Liz; if anything the distraction had helped to repair his relationship with Emma by calming him down and nourishing his confidence. Liz never brought up the affair - she was much too bohemian for such drab conventions - and the whole thing just became a forgotten souvenir, tucked away on a shelf far away, accumulating layers and layers of dust to stay out of Tony’s sight. By the time spring came along, Tony had practically erased it from his mind. He was playing well, and Emma was rosy again. Months later, he collected his first winner’s medal after winning the FA cup. Brimming with self-esteem, Tony mustered up the courage to propose to Emma.