PSoML Part 5
Part 4 is here
If Ronnie had turned out more or less intact after 20 years, Hazel was spectacular. Blonde, but not too blonde, tanned, but not too tanned, and with a radiant smile for her visitor, she greeted him at the door enthusiastically. Not too radiant either: a little touch of natural human apprehension behind the smile: what was she letting herself in for?
Ronnie’s first memory of Hazel was of an extremely mean comment she made about him, concerning some girls he’d been quite keen on when he was 13. That had been on a sunny day in September, first week at the Big School. Later he saw her getting excited on the school stage listening for news about who was number one in the charts that week: David Soul. They were waiting for some kind of auditions for a school production. Ronnie took one look at her on the stage with her eared pressed to her transistor radio and walked away. School plays weren’t for him with girls like Hazel involved. He was going through a sensitive stage, and something about Hazel seemed hard edged, finished; where she should have been softer, cuter, more innocent, probably.
But after that very unpromising start they became sort of friends. It turned out in their second year in that school they did Latin, Maths, and a couple of other subjects together. Latin was a small group, and he sat on his own with Hazel and Lucy sitting right behind him. Languid youth that he was, he sat kind of sideways in that class, so they formed a sort of triangle. From there they connected, and it helped a lot that Lucy was there to soften Hazel’s naturally astringent character.
So whereas Ronnie had come to think of Latin as a dud of a subject that was no help with anything (not the way he learned it anyway), the fact that it had been such a small and exclusive group meant he was able to make friends with two of the loveliest girls in the school while his male friends were off doing physics with the nerdy kids. Hazel wasn’t so much hard-edged as quick-witted to a fault, often saying something out loud before her brain had a chance to soften it.
Hazel’s hair, back then, had none of the shining brightness of the bottle blonde, but was a soft and tending-towards-mousy colour, falling in waves down her back. She was several inches taller than Lucy and even at 15 had the best tits in their school: Ronnie’s opinion. If pushed, he would have ranked Lucy a close second, though he was never sure whether that was because he loved Lucy so much. With Lucy short and dark while Hazel was of average height and blonde, they were a cool contrast, and he considered Latin one of his favourite classes.
It was an odd relationship with Hazel, one that centred around Latin and didn’t extend itself into other walks of life. He was her Latin friend and she barely acknowledged him outside of that. Lucy, on the other hand, was in his form, and was therefore much closer to him. Hazel was known to be a bit of a fantasist, and would often just make things up on the spur of the moment. It wasn’t as if she thought she was going to get away with it, just that she couldn’t possibly give a straight response or tell the truth about something when a lie would suit. So on one occasion, after hearing a sequence of lies, he said something to her along the lines that she should see a psychiatrist. She said,
“My dad’s a psychiatrist.”
Ronnie thought that this explained everything. He said, “Really?”
She said, “No.”
What her dad was, Ronnie remembered, was much richer than his dad. He dropped her off at school every morning in a black BMW, and this was before the eighties, when every little snot with a big bonus got a 3-Series.
Summer holidays were always hardest for Ronnie. The summer between his GCEs and sixth form, he spent the entire time alone, with not a word from Dave, nor Doug, nor Lucy, nor Hazel. He locked himself in his bedroom and practised on his first guitar, an old acoustic with a bad action.
And then a strange thing happened. From being at best a casual acquaintance of Hazel, once they got into the 6th form, in a much smaller pool of students, he became one of her closest friends. Schoolfriends, that is, because he rarely saw her outside school. She greeted him that September like he was a long lost lover, and there was something of the flavour of that as she said hello to him now, on the front step of an old French farmhouse. Ronnie’s life was flashing before his eyes.
And, just as Lucy had done, Hazel wrote Ronnie letters for a while after he left school and moved away. Whereas Lucy’s letters were full of emotional content and the easy talk of friends, Hazel’s were like an ongoing serial: gossip about people he barely knew or remembered, brief details of her own life, her plans, and the different ways her parents were vexing her.
Came a point, shortly after Lucy had paid him what turned out to be a tumultuous visit, Hazel too talked about coming to see him. Ronnie found it strange to look back on it now, about to celebrate Hazel’s 40th birthday, to realise they had been barely 18 years old, still children in many ways. Hazel went to great lengths to organise her trip, elaborating details to the point where she asked if one of his flatmates would pretend to be his dad, phone her dad, and tell him that they (his fictitious parents) were travelling down to see him over the May bank holiday and would be happy to give Hazel a lift.
It was extreme.
But he was now immersed in the fantasy world of Hazel, so he went along. Ronnie’s flatmates thought it was hilarious.
The Saturday of the bank holiday weekend, Ronnie borrowed a bicycle and rode down to the station to meet the train that Hazel was supposed to be on. No show. He waited around for a while then cycled home. No phone call. Cycled back for the next train, and the next. Finally, he gave up and went into Safeway to buy a loaf of bread. While there, he stood at the cigarette kiosk and stared for five minutes, deciding whether to buy his first pack of cigarettes. That was the day he took up smoking, which became a 10-year habit. He did it to make himself feel better; there was no other way he could rationalise it. It was a thing to replace another thing that hadn’t come to pass. He was feeling like a disappointed child, his friend hadn’t come round for tea, and he sought comfort in nicotine.
Ronnie cycled back home with the Safeway split tin under his arm and the cigarettes and matches squeezed into a pocket. He went outside for the first one: stood staring at his reflection in a window while he smoked.
A few days later, a letter from Hazel arrived. She apologised. She was grounded, she said. Her dad had phoned Ronnie’s dad to ask if he wanted any petrol money. Ronnie’s dad didn’t know what the hell he was talking about.
Ronnie’s dad never did mention the incident to him, so he had no idea if it really happened. This is what Ronnie came to think of as the Hazel Hall of Mirrors, something like the world of international espionage, where you’re not sure anymore what’s true and what’s a lie. A few weeks after this, by coincidence, he was back home for a week. Ronnie’s parents were going on holiday and needed a house sitter. He went back. It was great for a week, to see the people he’d been missing quite a lot. Sally. Lucy. Dave. There was even an incident when he saw Julie Feint across a crowded public house.
But on his first day home, he went into town for a wander round, and he bumped into a girl, Helen, not anyone he cared particularly about. But she stopped him in the street and just had to tell him a story about Hazel. “Did you hear what she did?
“She told her mum and dad she was going to see you for one weekend, but it was a weekend her parents were going away, and she just told them that so they wouldn’t know she was having her boyfriend round. But they came home early…”
So that was where Ronnie was faced with a choice between two versions of the same story. One in which she never intended to come visit him, but allowed him to think she was; and one in which she did intend to come, but allowed her other friends to think she was planning something else. Ronnie didn’t know which was worse. Either he didn’t warrant a heads up on the parent deception, or he was too embarrassing for her friends to know about. At the time, he kind of believed the story this girl, Helen, told him.
He wrote her an angry letter, based on what he’d heard from Helen, but there was never a reply. He realised later that he’d flown off the handle about it, and he guessed she was affronted that he believed a mere acquaintance ahead of Hazel’s own explanation.
All of this flashed through Ronnie’s mind as Hazel came out to greet him, and he didn’t quite know what to expect.
“Ronnie Collins,” she said. “You really came. Are your ears burning?”
Dirty Blonde Hair
If Ronnie had turned out more or less intact after 20 years, Hazel was spectacular. Blonde, but not too blonde, tanned, but not too tanned, and with a radiant smile for her visitor, she greeted him at the door enthusiastically. Not too radiant either: a little touch of natural human apprehension behind the smile: what was she letting herself in for?
Ronnie’s first memory of Hazel was of an extremely mean comment she made about him, concerning some girls he’d been quite keen on when he was 13. That had been on a sunny day in September, first week at the Big School. Later he saw her getting excited on the school stage listening for news about who was number one in the charts that week: David Soul. They were waiting for some kind of auditions for a school production. Ronnie took one look at her on the stage with her eared pressed to her transistor radio and walked away. School plays weren’t for him with girls like Hazel involved. He was going through a sensitive stage, and something about Hazel seemed hard edged, finished; where she should have been softer, cuter, more innocent, probably.
But after that very unpromising start they became sort of friends. It turned out in their second year in that school they did Latin, Maths, and a couple of other subjects together. Latin was a small group, and he sat on his own with Hazel and Lucy sitting right behind him. Languid youth that he was, he sat kind of sideways in that class, so they formed a sort of triangle. From there they connected, and it helped a lot that Lucy was there to soften Hazel’s naturally astringent character.
So whereas Ronnie had come to think of Latin as a dud of a subject that was no help with anything (not the way he learned it anyway), the fact that it had been such a small and exclusive group meant he was able to make friends with two of the loveliest girls in the school while his male friends were off doing physics with the nerdy kids. Hazel wasn’t so much hard-edged as quick-witted to a fault, often saying something out loud before her brain had a chance to soften it.
Hazel’s hair, back then, had none of the shining brightness of the bottle blonde, but was a soft and tending-towards-mousy colour, falling in waves down her back. She was several inches taller than Lucy and even at 15 had the best tits in their school: Ronnie’s opinion. If pushed, he would have ranked Lucy a close second, though he was never sure whether that was because he loved Lucy so much. With Lucy short and dark while Hazel was of average height and blonde, they were a cool contrast, and he considered Latin one of his favourite classes.
It was an odd relationship with Hazel, one that centred around Latin and didn’t extend itself into other walks of life. He was her Latin friend and she barely acknowledged him outside of that. Lucy, on the other hand, was in his form, and was therefore much closer to him. Hazel was known to be a bit of a fantasist, and would often just make things up on the spur of the moment. It wasn’t as if she thought she was going to get away with it, just that she couldn’t possibly give a straight response or tell the truth about something when a lie would suit. So on one occasion, after hearing a sequence of lies, he said something to her along the lines that she should see a psychiatrist. She said,
“My dad’s a psychiatrist.”
Ronnie thought that this explained everything. He said, “Really?”
She said, “No.”
What her dad was, Ronnie remembered, was much richer than his dad. He dropped her off at school every morning in a black BMW, and this was before the eighties, when every little snot with a big bonus got a 3-Series.
Summer holidays were always hardest for Ronnie. The summer between his GCEs and sixth form, he spent the entire time alone, with not a word from Dave, nor Doug, nor Lucy, nor Hazel. He locked himself in his bedroom and practised on his first guitar, an old acoustic with a bad action.
And then a strange thing happened. From being at best a casual acquaintance of Hazel, once they got into the 6th form, in a much smaller pool of students, he became one of her closest friends. Schoolfriends, that is, because he rarely saw her outside school. She greeted him that September like he was a long lost lover, and there was something of the flavour of that as she said hello to him now, on the front step of an old French farmhouse. Ronnie’s life was flashing before his eyes.
And, just as Lucy had done, Hazel wrote Ronnie letters for a while after he left school and moved away. Whereas Lucy’s letters were full of emotional content and the easy talk of friends, Hazel’s were like an ongoing serial: gossip about people he barely knew or remembered, brief details of her own life, her plans, and the different ways her parents were vexing her.
Came a point, shortly after Lucy had paid him what turned out to be a tumultuous visit, Hazel too talked about coming to see him. Ronnie found it strange to look back on it now, about to celebrate Hazel’s 40th birthday, to realise they had been barely 18 years old, still children in many ways. Hazel went to great lengths to organise her trip, elaborating details to the point where she asked if one of his flatmates would pretend to be his dad, phone her dad, and tell him that they (his fictitious parents) were travelling down to see him over the May bank holiday and would be happy to give Hazel a lift.
It was extreme.
But he was now immersed in the fantasy world of Hazel, so he went along. Ronnie’s flatmates thought it was hilarious.
The Saturday of the bank holiday weekend, Ronnie borrowed a bicycle and rode down to the station to meet the train that Hazel was supposed to be on. No show. He waited around for a while then cycled home. No phone call. Cycled back for the next train, and the next. Finally, he gave up and went into Safeway to buy a loaf of bread. While there, he stood at the cigarette kiosk and stared for five minutes, deciding whether to buy his first pack of cigarettes. That was the day he took up smoking, which became a 10-year habit. He did it to make himself feel better; there was no other way he could rationalise it. It was a thing to replace another thing that hadn’t come to pass. He was feeling like a disappointed child, his friend hadn’t come round for tea, and he sought comfort in nicotine.
Ronnie cycled back home with the Safeway split tin under his arm and the cigarettes and matches squeezed into a pocket. He went outside for the first one: stood staring at his reflection in a window while he smoked.
A few days later, a letter from Hazel arrived. She apologised. She was grounded, she said. Her dad had phoned Ronnie’s dad to ask if he wanted any petrol money. Ronnie’s dad didn’t know what the hell he was talking about.
Ronnie’s dad never did mention the incident to him, so he had no idea if it really happened. This is what Ronnie came to think of as the Hazel Hall of Mirrors, something like the world of international espionage, where you’re not sure anymore what’s true and what’s a lie. A few weeks after this, by coincidence, he was back home for a week. Ronnie’s parents were going on holiday and needed a house sitter. He went back. It was great for a week, to see the people he’d been missing quite a lot. Sally. Lucy. Dave. There was even an incident when he saw Julie Feint across a crowded public house.
But on his first day home, he went into town for a wander round, and he bumped into a girl, Helen, not anyone he cared particularly about. But she stopped him in the street and just had to tell him a story about Hazel. “Did you hear what she did?
“She told her mum and dad she was going to see you for one weekend, but it was a weekend her parents were going away, and she just told them that so they wouldn’t know she was having her boyfriend round. But they came home early…”
So that was where Ronnie was faced with a choice between two versions of the same story. One in which she never intended to come visit him, but allowed him to think she was; and one in which she did intend to come, but allowed her other friends to think she was planning something else. Ronnie didn’t know which was worse. Either he didn’t warrant a heads up on the parent deception, or he was too embarrassing for her friends to know about. At the time, he kind of believed the story this girl, Helen, told him.
He wrote her an angry letter, based on what he’d heard from Helen, but there was never a reply. He realised later that he’d flown off the handle about it, and he guessed she was affronted that he believed a mere acquaintance ahead of Hazel’s own explanation.
All of this flashed through Ronnie’s mind as Hazel came out to greet him, and he didn’t quite know what to expect.
“Ronnie Collins,” she said. “You really came. Are your ears burning?”
posted by Anonymous at
Wednesday, March 24, 2004
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home