She was my mate’s girlfriend. That’s all there was to it. It wasn’t even worth thinking about. Was it. They’d been going out for nearly two years. When you’re 18, two years is a lifetime. A proper commitment.
But she kept looking at me. And smiling.
The gig was hot and sweaty. We had worked our way to the front, gently easing people aside, asking, politely, if we could pass, and found ourselves right below The Singer. ‘We’ were about ten in number. A gang, before we understood what that meant. A band, literally. A bunch of close, close friends, family, brothers. A group that did everything together, went everywhere together. Without knowing it, I was about to rip this group, this band, apart.
My mate couldn’t make it, that night. He had an exam the next day, at college, and had decided that he needed to do some revision. The rest of us went to the gig, arranging to meet him in the pub afterwards. The gig was at the local Uni. We got into the Student Bar, as usual, even though none of us were Uni students. It’s not what you know…..
The bar had that sweet smell of the seventies, a mix of weed and Denim aftershave.
I went to the bar, to get a round. She came with me, to help ferry the drinks back to everyone. We chatted and laughed as I tried to catch the barman’s eye, two or three back from the throng at the bar. Suddenly, we were in.
“3 pints of bitter, 2 lagers, 2 Newcy Browns and 2 Rum ‘n Blacks, mate.”
The first 2 pints came over the bar. I passed them to her and she backed into the throng. The next three pints were on the bar by the time she reappeared. She took two more, backing up, then turning into the mass of denim and cheesecloth. By the time she got back, the rest of the drinks were on the bar. I paid and turned to her, to decide how we would carry the other five drinks back. As I turned, I found myself gazing into her upturned eyes. She was staring at me. I mean that she was looking, intently, into my eyes, willing me to look at her, to lock onto her gaze, to look at her like I had never looked at her before.
Around us was mayhem. People trying to get to the bar, trying to catch the eye of one of the bar staff, people greeting friends, people shouting. I didn’t hear any of that. My memory is that it was total silence. A void. All I could see, hear, sense, feel, was her. Her left arm reached up and her hand rested on my neck. She smiled. A smile of summer, of apple orchards, of river banks, of anticipation. Her hand pressed into the back of my neck, pulling me down. She closed her eyes and I remember thinking that she was the most beautiful girl I had ever seen. She pulled me closer. Our lips were inches apart, but she pulled my neck even further, until my lips were level with her left ear. Then, in my right ear, the voice of an angel.
“I want to kiss you.”
She pulled back, opened her eyes, and looked into mine. Then, she pulled me into her, into the kiss, into a few seconds of heaven that I have remembered for 42 years. The kiss was long, slow, tongues, wet, passionate, powerful, overwhelming. I lost all track of time, all sense of reality. After what seemed like an age, we parted. I looked into her eyes. She was crying. I remember brushing tears away with my thumb, wiping the water down her temples, moving my thumbs back up to the edges of her eyes to catch the next tears, and doing it again. All the time, she was looking, deeply, into my eyes. She whispered,
“Sorry, this can’t happen.”
I nodded, knowing that we could never be together, but knowing, even then, that this few seconds would haunt me for the rest of my life.
I turned back to the bar, to the drinks, to real life. I felt her hand on my shoulder and leant slightly to my left. She whispered into my ear,
“Niall, you kiss beautifully.”
Neil Jung says
I hope that was only chapter one and there will be a chapter two shortly. A number of questions remain unanswered…
1. Who was the singer?
2. Are you still in touch with either her or your mate?
3. How frequently have you thought about her in the last 40 odd years?
4. Are you feeling any better?
niallb says
1. It was either Frankie Miller or Willy Finlayson, from Mealticket. I have wracked my brain, but old age has frozen much of that time. So many gigs – three a week, at some points.
2. Her, on Facebook. We met up a few years ago, her, him (they only lasted a few more weeks after the story,) a few of ‘the ten’ and my wife. She recently married. She is currently in Mexico, on holiday.
Him, yes, but it’s hard. He is my closest friend but, finally, he has admitted that he needs help for alcoholism. He doesn’t know what happened, and I could never tell him.
3. Not every day.
4. A bit. Thanks for asking.
chiz says
I read this one before. Mayfair Reader’s Letters, May ’79?
H.P. Saucecraft says
Can you kiss beautifully, chiz?
Junior Wells says
Great little vignette Niall but I’m an impatient man ….. Did you shag ?
bricameron says
Mills & Boon want you Niall.
Vulpes Vulpes says
ODFO
bungliemutt says
Nicely done. It’s a long time since I’ve had one of those moments of total silence. More please.
Gatz says
As is often the case, a very personal and precise truth is also a universal one which everyone will recognise. I’m sure almost everyone reading will recognise a very specific times in their teens in your post. Nicely done.
Vulpes Vulpes says
Fabulous evocation Niall. I was in The Ram Bar, back at Exeter in the 70s for just a moment there, seeing the same thing through your eyes but in my neck of the woods. Keep writing, I love it.
niallb says
Thank you, my friend.