Chapter 6
If you’ve come straight to this episode, it might be useful for you to know that sixteen-year-old Pea Hunter is in a relationship with AJ Silver’s brother Zak, and AJ himself has allegedly been sleeping with both local girl Nicole Waddington and Alex Robb, Pea’s best friend.
Yes, that Alex Robb. The stay itself has been fraught with issues, from late-arriving shower and toilet facilities to staffing issues to John Hunter’s alleged drinking problem.
It’s also worth noting that AJ Silver hasn’t made himself hugely popular with a number of people because of his behaviour.
So without further ado, let’s look at what happened that day.
Cathy: I remember it was a glorious day. A Tuesday.
John: I was a bit under the weather.
Cathy: John was hungover. He was like a bear with a sore head.
John: I think I had the flu.
Pea: I went down for breakfast and Sebastian was eating peanut butter on toast. I asked him if he wanted to hear about the show the night before and he said, ‘Not really.’
Sebastian: I really didn’t care that Pea had been to the show. To be honest, I was surprised she’d gone at all. It wasn’t her kind of thing. It felt like she was changing to cling on to Zak or something and I didn’t like it.
John: The kids were arguing over breakfast. That wasn’t really unusual. I made a pot of coffee and started to go through my day in my head. I had a lot of paperwork to do, so I was planning to base myself in the office with Cathy.
Cathy: John and me in the office together was always problematic. It was too small for two people, and we just worked totally differently. I was tidy and John was chaotic. So when he said he was going to base himself there for the day, I tried not to roll my eyes.
John: We were two weeks into AJ Silver’s stay, and I was counting down the days until they were leaving. I knew it would be worth it, in the end, when we got the rest of the money, but it had been a pain in the arse.
Pea: I had a couple of exams coming up later that week, so I was heading into school to revise.
I met Alex on the corner, as I always did.
He looked tired. I probably did too. It had been a late night.
But there was something else, too. He seemed touchy and off with me, and when I tried to broach the subject, he stopped walking and looked at me and said, ‘Let’s not pretend that things are the same as they used to be between us.
’ I was shocked by that. I knew me seeing Zak had had an impact on things, but I didn’t think it was a serious problem.
And then I made it worse by saying I knew he had a crush on AJ and that it must be hard to see him with Nicole of all people.
He put one hand up, a few inches from my face, and told me that I didn’t know what I was talking about.
And then he stormed off, faster than I could walk.
I walked on, alone, pulling my cardigan off and shoving it in my bag because it was warmer than I’d expected.
Alex would calm down, I thought. By the time I saw him at break, he’d be back to normal.
John: I’d just set myself up when the phone started ringing.
Cathy picked it up, and I guessed within about a minute that it was her sister, and she started filling her in on every last thing that had happened in our lives since they last spoke, the way she did.
It was so bloody distracting. I was trying to work out some figures.
I did a few sighs, hoping she’d get the message.
Cathy: John was being a total pain. Huffing and puffing while I talked to my sister on the phone, as if he wasn’t the one who’d invaded my workspace.
Zak: AJ had the day off. Maggie knew how badly he slept after shows so she usually arranged for him to have the next day free if possible.
We woke in the bus at about ten, and it stank of sweat and stale beer and smoke.
I wanted to be at home, in a proper bed in a proper house, but as soon as I thought that, I felt guilty.
Pea. I wanted to be with Pea, too. Someone from the crew went to get us some breakfast. I think we had bacon sandwiches.
AJ was in a foul mood. I’d hoped he would have slept it off but it seemed not.
He kept saying that the whole trip had been a shitshow and it was all down to John.
He really had it in for the guy. And I get it, John had made some mistakes, but AJ was brutal.
I think if it hadn’t been John, it would have been someone else.
AJ said he was going to go and find John and tell him that it needed to improve, if he wanted the rest of the money that had been promised to him.
I said, ‘Yeah, promised, AJ, you can’t just threaten to take it away,’ and he said, ‘I can do whatever the fuck I like. Just because you’ve got this thing going with his daughter.
’ I told him it was nothing to do with that.
He had this wild look in his eyes, and when he pulled open the door of the bus, I knew I should follow him.
John: AJ strode into the office, looking like death warmed up. Zak was a few steps behind him. I thought, Here we go. I wasn’t in the mood for it, I really wasn’t. He started jabbing the air with his finger, saying nothing had been good enough, that we needed to get our shit together.
Cathy: I was shocked, honestly. I’d thought things were back on a pretty even keel.
Zak was looking sheepish, not making eye contact, and AJ was just ranting about everything that had apparently gone wrong since his arrival.
When he brought up the delay with the showers, John was quick to point out that that was Maggie’s error and not ours.
But he wasn’t really in a place to be reasoned with, I don’t think.
He was agitated and looking for someone to blame, and John and I were there.
Zak: It was embarrassing. First off, there had been a few small problems, but AJ was making out like everything had been terrible, blaming them for things they’d had nothing to do with.
And remember, these were the parents of the girl I was falling in love with.
The last thing I wanted to do was get on the wrong side of them.
But I’d known AJ his whole life and I knew that when he was in this kind of mood, there was no changing it.
You just had to ride it out. He knew he could get away with as much bad behaviour as he wanted to.
John: After a while, I said I wasn’t listening to any more of it.
I wasn’t going to be told off like that by a jumped-up little kid.
He lunged for me, then. I really think he would have punched me in the face if I hadn’t ducked out of the way.
He roared, ‘Who are you calling a jumped-up little kid?’ I folded my arms, said I would have thought that was obvious.
Zak came forward then and caught AJ’s arms, stopped him going for me again.
Wise move. I was this close to throwing a few punches myself.
Cathy: John was so red in the face I thought he was going to have a heart attack.
John: Zak told AJ he needed to calm down and sort of manhandled him towards the door.
But just as they were about to leave, AJ turned back and said, ‘If you think you’re getting all of the money, you’re very much mistaken.
’ It’s a good job he left then, I’m telling you, because I felt this rage start to build in me and I didn’t feel in control of it.
Everything we’d done, everything I’d sacrificed, for this.
The loan shark was already on my back about the rollercoaster money, and I’d given him some of it when we’d got the second instalment, but honestly, there were a queue of people I owed money to and he wasn’t at the front.
The very idea of not getting the rest put the fear of God into me.
It would be the end of everything. When they’d gone, I turned to Cathy and she said she thought we all needed a few minutes to calm down.
I said I was going to speak to Maggie or Lou, and she said perhaps it would be best if she did that.
I had to admit, she was calmer than I was.
But I wanted to be there too, to make sure we got our points across.
Cathy: We found Maggie outside, striding up and down, looking at her mobile phone and muttering about the lack of reception. I touched John’s arm, asked if we should maybe come back later, but he said no, we needed to get this sorted. I knew nothing good was going to come of it.
Maggie: The first I knew about the problem was John and Cathy waiting for me to finish my call.
I was trying to talk to the Glasgow venue about merchandise sales, I think.
Some supplier had messed up and they only had T-shirts with the latest album cover on in extra-large.
I’d been trying to say that there weren’t too many extra-large teenage girls and they needed to sort it before we got there in two weeks’ time when I lost cell coverage.
I was feeling all hot and bothered, and John started launching into a tirade about AJ and how he’d said they weren’t getting all their money.
Cathy shouted him down, reminded him he’d promised to let her do the talking, and I thought – though it was nothing to do with the matter in hand – that their marriage was in trouble.
There was no fondness in either of their eyes when they looked at each other.
I thought it would probably be over between them within a year or two.
Cathy said, ‘Look, we’re sorry to bombard you like this, we’re just a bit concerned because AJ’s been in the office throwing accusations around and saying we won’t get the amount that was agreed…
’ I cut her off. I said, ‘You leave AJ to me.’