“We could try there,” I said, nodding towards the lights.
“The Aspidistra Lounge?”
“Mmm. We could call it work, claim on our expenses. Georgie, the proprietor, isn’t exactly a Mr Big, but I think he could finger a few people for us, if he were so inclined. Let’s put some pressure on him.”
“Right!” she said. “I’m game.”
We dashed across the road, avoiding the puddles, and stepped through the open doorway of the disco. A bouncer with a shaven head and Buddy Holly spectacles was leaning on the front desk, chatting to the gum-chewing ticket girl. He straightened up and stepped to one side, taken off-guard by the sudden rush of customers, and tried to look menacing. I’ve seen more menace on the back of a cornflakes box.
“Two, please,” I said to the girl, not sure whether to speak under, over or through the armoured glass that surrounded her. We could have flashed our IDs like TV cops would have done, and they would have let us in, but I preferred it this way.
The words: “Ladies are free before ten,” came out of her mouth in a haze of peppermint that evaporated in the air somewhere between her and the bouncer, who she was gazing towards.
“Oh, I’ll take three, then,” I answered.
“That’ll be seven pounds fifty.”
I pushed a tenner towards her and she slid my change and two cloakroom tickets under the window. “Thank you.” The bouncer strode over to a door and yanked it open. I ushered Annette forward and said: “Cheers,” to him. We were in.
I know one tune that’s been written in the last ten years by any of the so-called Brit-Pop stars I see on the front pages of the tabloids, and the DJ was playing it.
I leaned towards Annette and said: “Verve,” into her ear. She stared at me, her eyes wide. “Bitter Sweet Symphony,” I added, determined to exploit my sole opportunity to swank. It’s a simple catchy rhythm, repeated ad nauseum. I nodded my head in time with it: Dum-dum-dum, dum-dum-dum, dum-dum-dum-dum, dum-dum-dum. Once heard, it’s ringing through your brain for days, a bit like Canon in D.
“I’m amazed!” she gasped, and I rewarded her with a wink.
Our brains slowly modified our senses to accommodate the sudden change in environment. Irises widened to dispel the jungle gloom and nerves in our ears adjusted their sensitivity to just below the pain barrier. Noses twitched, seeking out pheromones from anyone of the opposite sex who was ripe for mating. Four million years of evolution, and this was what it was all leading to.
“It’s a bit quiet,” I shouted above the battery of chords bouncing through my body.
“It’s early,” Annette yelled back at me, in explanation.
It was the same as every other disco I remembered from my younger days. A bright, small dance floor; bored DJ sorting records behind a console straight from NASA; pulsating lights and lots of red velvet. OK, so we didn’t have lasers and dry ice then, but they’re no big deal. Still permeating everything was that same old feeling of despair. These places always look a dump when you see them with the house lights up. This looked a dump in semi-darkness. When I was a kid we called it the Bug Hutch, and came every Saturday to catch up with Flash Gordon’s latest adventures.
Georgie himself was behind the bar, attired like a cross between Bette Davis on a bad night and Conan the Barbarian. “It wouldn’t cost much to convert this back to a cinema, George,” I told him, flapping a hand in the direction of the auditorium.
“Hello, Mr Priest,” he growled, managing to sound threatening and limp simultaneously. “Not expecting any trouble, are we?”
“Who could cause trouble in an empty house?”
“It’s early. We’ll fill up, soon as the pubs close.”
“Two beers, please.” The locks on his head were platinum blond, but those cascading through the slashed front of his satin shirt were grey.
“What sort?”
I looked at Annette and she leaned over the bar, examining the wares. “Foster’s Ice, please,” she said.
“Two,” I repeated.
He popped the caps and placed the bottles on the counter. “That’ll be four pounds fifty,” he told me.
I passed him another tenner, asking: “How much is there back on the bottles?”
“Isn’t he a caution,” he said to Annette as he handed me my change.
We walked uphill, away from the bar and the speakers, feeling our way between the empty tables to where the rear stalls once were. It was much quieter back there, and a few other people were sitting in scattered groups, arranged according to some logic based on personal territory. As the place filled territories would shrink and a pecking order emerge. There were two couples, three men presumably from out of town, and a group of girls. We looked for a table equidistant from the girls and the couples, but before we could sit down one of the girls waved to me.
It was Sophie, with three of her friends. I nudged Annette and gestured for her to follow. The girls moved their chairs to make room for us, removing sports bags from the vacant ones.
“It’s Charles, he’s my uncle,” Sophie told her friends, a big smile illuminating her face.
“Hello, Uncle Charles,” they chorused.
I introduced Annette to them, and Sophie rattled off three names that I promptly forgot. She and Sophie renewed their acquaintance.
“You don’t do this for amusement, do you?” I asked, looking around at the decor.
“We’ve been playing badminton at the leisure centre,” someone informed me.
“We just come in for a quick drink and a dance,” another added.
“It’s free before ten,” Sophie said.
“Right,” I nodded. Apart from the price of the drinks, it sounded a reasonable arrangement. I gritted my teeth and asked them what they’d have.
“Thanks, Uncle Charles,” they all said when I returned, six bottles dangling from between my fingers. One of the girls, dark-haired, petite and vivacious, said: “Can I call you Charlie, Uncle Charles? I already have an Uncle Charles.”
“I’d prefer it if you all called me Charlie. Uncle Charles makes me feel old.”
“How old are you?”
“Twenty-eight,” I lied, glancing up at the ceiling.
“Gosh, that is old.”
They were in high spirits, the adrenaline still pumping after a couple of hours on court, and I began to wonder if joining them had been such a good idea. Four confident young women at the crossroads: left for marriage and a family; right for a career in whatever they chose; straight on for both. I didn’t feel old — I felt fossilised.
The music paused, the DJ spoke for the first time, and when it started again the four of them jumped to their feet, prompted by some secret signal.
“We dance to this.”
“Come on, Annette. Can you dance, Charlie?”
“Can I dance? Can I dance? Watch my hips.”
I had a quick sip of lager, for sustenance, and followed them on to the floor. The difference in rhythm or melody was invisible to me, but this was evidently danceable, what had gone before wasn’t. I joined the circle of ladies, swivelled on one leg and wondered about joint replacements.
The style of dancing hadn’t changed, so I didn’t make a complete fool of myself. The girls put on a show, swaying and gyrating, lissom as snakes, but I gave them a step or two. Fifteen minutes later the DJ slowed it down and the floor emptied again, faster than a golf course in a thunderstorm.
We finished our tasteless beer and left. There was a street vendor outside, selling hot dogs. The girls’ ritual was to have one each then make their ways home. I couldn’t have eaten one if Delia Smith herself was standing behind the counter in her wimple. Just the smell of them made me want to dash off and bite a postman’s leg. We stood talking as they wolfed them down. Young appetites, young tastes, young digestive systems. Here we go again, I thought.