The Actor

Chapter 3

Chapter 3

It was too big a deal to tell the others. I needed to think about things first. I would tell Milly, obviously, but not with Claire and Amanda there. When I rejoined them they were all avid to know what had gone on.

"Did he remember you?"

"What was he like, did he mind you going to see him?"

"Did you get a repeat performance?" This was said with some sneering, because Amanda had never really wanted to believe that I’d kissed him in the first place.

I had already rehearsed a safe answer in my mind, in the few seconds between leaving his dressing room and coming outside again into the cold shock of the night air. "He was very nice, and he was glad we liked the play," I told them, as we walked back around to grab some chips from McDonalds as we still had ten minutes to go.

"That’s it?" Claire looked very skeptical. "I bet you didn’t even get to see him, did you?"

"Well I did, so…"

There wasn’t a lot you could say to that. Either she believed me, or she didn’t. In the end it was more interesting to believe me.

"But did he remember you?" Claire asked.

"He said he did. In fact…" I wondered whether it would be safe to tell them about the phone call. They would doubtless pretend not to believe it, but it would give them something to feast on. And it was hard not being able to tell them all of it. I know I shouldn’t have needed to brag, but the two of them were so smug and insufferable all the time.

"In fact what?" Amanda demanded.

"He said he tried to phone me, at my aunt and uncle’s, after that party."

"Yeah, right." Amanda rolled her eyes at this and she and Claire smirked.

We were at the front of the line now, and I ordered a large chips to split with Milly. I shrugged. "Well, that’s what he said, anyway. I don’t know why he would have made it up."

"It’s obvious why you’d make it up," Amanda said.

"Your aunt and uncle might remember the call," Milly suggested, coming to my defence.

"I suppose I could ask them."

Curiosity and a desire for gossip was outweighing Claire’s desire to disbelieve me. "So what happened with the phone call?"

"He said he was going to ask me out for a drink, but my aunt told him how old I was."

This was such a humiliating thing to admit that it sounded credible. There was a bit of a stunned silence .

"God, how embarrassing," Amanda said.

We all stood there, basking in my cringe.

"Did she actually tell him you were fifteen?" Milly asked.

"I don’t know." We were still all absorbing the horror of it. They were, anyway. They didn’t know he had remade the suggestion.

Then we were interrupted by the strident voice of Mrs Padstow. "Girls! To the coach, now! I warned you not to dawdle."

I couldn’t help feeling an extra sense of resentment at being herded back onto the coach like a load of naughty schoolgirls. Which I suppose we were. Except I was now someone who had been asked out by a handsome and famous man. I could only imagine what Mrs Padstow would think if she knew.

We piled onto the coach. I was absolutely dying to tell Milly by now. But I couldn’t take the risk that someone else would hear. We were sitting at the very back, where the cool people sat. If it had been the whole year on the trip, we wouldn’t have qualified for these seats. But since it was only the Upper Sixth English class, and Claire and Amanda were the only members of the in-clique doing English, we had grabbed this coveted position.

I had to at least let her know I was suffering with a secret. "There’s something I have to tell you. Only I can’t tell you here."

She was instantly curious. "What is it?"

"I can’t tell you. Not here."

"Can’t you give me a hint?" Milly glanced around to make sure no one was listening to us. "It’s not about him, is it?" she said, under her breath.

"I’ll tell you everything once we’re back."

Milly looked disappointed but she didn’t push it. I’d always thought Milly was the prettiest out of all of us. She had long dark hair that fell in ringlets. Ironically she always wanted to straighten it, just as I had gone through a phase of wanting to curl mine.

I watched the lights of other cars passing us on the motorway, nothing but inky blackness behind them. I was starting to feel a bit surreal about it all. Or it was feeling surreal, rather. I felt like the others must be right, and it hadn’t really happened. I mean who asks someone out after two years? And he was famous, he must have had loads of women after him.

Then I remembered how his eyes had crinkled at the corners when he smiled, and the look he had given me.

But I couldn’t go, could I? It was absurd to even consider it. And yet it was already arranged, sort of. What would happen if I simply didn’t show up? Perhaps he didn’t really expect me to. Possibly he frequently invited people to go for drinks with him. Perhaps it was something that everyone in the theatre did, go to a bar casually, after the show. He wouldn’t miss me if I wasn’t there. I didn’t need to phone the theatre or anything to cancel.

I wondered what Aunt Rosa would think about it all. I didn’t need to wonder what my mother would think, she would have gone ballistic.

When we arrived back at school, most people’s parents were already waiting to collect them. So I barely had time to update Milly once we were out of earshot of other people.

"He asked me out again."

"He what?"

"The Actor. He invited me for a drink next week."

Milly was stunned. "Where?"

"In London."

"But you can’t go all the way to London just to have a drink with someone. Besides, your parents will freak."

I was uncomfortably aware of this. "I wasn’t seriously thinking of going."

Milly knew me too well. "But you are, aren’t you?"

"No. Not really."

I could see my father’s car and wished we had more time.

"Tell me every last detail tomorrow," Milly said. "Then we can figure it out."

Back home I went straight to my wardrobe and started to stress about what I could wear if I were going to go up to London again, which I was sure I had no intention of doing. Probably no intention, anyway.

My Gucci dress was even shorter and tighter than it had been two years ago, for I had grown. If I came up to London on the train wearing something like that I would look a right slapper. It was only any good as a nightclubbing dress these days. I didn’t even wear it to parties.

He had just said “for a drink”, after all. That had to be more casual than dinner. Skirts and dresses were always such a problem when it came to shoes. High heels might look overdressed, particularly in still-freezing April, but flats might be frumpy. We were all past the phase of wearing Doc Martens with everything.

I desperately needed Milly because she was the fashion expert among us.

Of course we discussed the whole thing endlessly at school the next day, and for the rest of the week. And I don’t know when I decided that I would go, but by Saturday the plan was set in stone and we were making arrangements.

“You just wear jeans - your best jeans - and a sexy top. Then you can cover it up with a jacket or whatever, if it’s too much,” Milly said, as we sat in the school dining hall picking at what was supposed to be vegetable lasagne. The room always smelt of boiled cabbage no matter what they were serving. Years of school dinners had seeped their way into the long benches and tables and walls.

“Maybe your black jeans. Then if you go somewhere smarter, they won’t look so much like jeans,” Milly suggested.

The problem was that I needed “sophisticated sexy” not “slutty sexy” and most of my sexy tops were the latter. I would have gone shopping, but I was saving my money for the rail fare and drinks. Because he might be expecting to split it all.

We’d also been looking up every fact and article on him, including various famous ex-girlfriends and anything else we could find. I felt like a bit of a stalker, but Milly said you could never do too much research. “It’s not like we’ve ordered background checks,” she said.

Compared to other celebrities, there wasn’t as much information as there could have been. If he had been in a boy band there would have been endless fanzines covering everything from his favourite colour to how many chest hairs he had. Instead he was the sort of person who got featured in the Radio Times that my parents subscribed to, or the mid-market newspapers. He wasn’t exactly “tabloid fodder”, as they say. There were no major scandals or breakdowns or stays at the Priory.

Milly was a planner and left no stone unturned. “You can say you’re staying at my place. Then whatever time you get back, I’ll let you in. You can text me when you arrive in London, then text me when you’re leaving, then text me when you get to the station.”

“So long as you delete all those texts,” I said. I was paranoid that someone might one day find them and cause havoc.

“What if you go missing and the police need them?” Milly asked.

“They must have some way of recovering them. Don’t they get the records from the phone company?” I pointed out. “Besides, he’s not going to murder me. He’s a famous actor, not Jack the Ripper.”

Milly looked doubtful. “You never know. Maybe this is his MO.”

She had been watching too many crime dramas. “I’m not going to get murdered. I’m going to have a drink, and then come home with something to tell my grandchildren.” Even if I couldn’t risk rubbing it in the faces of Claire and Amanda, it would be worth it.

Deep down, at the bottom of everything, I just wanted to see him again. There was the glamour and the risk and the thrill of it all. But there was that thing, below it all. That look in his eyes and the way it made me feel when he was joking about grappling hooks and convent walls.

That sense of us.

All the way on the train I kept thinking that it was probably all a mistake. I shouldn’t have come. Maybe he never meant the invitation seriously. Or it was all going to go wrong and I’d miss my train back home. I glanced at the passengers around me, wondering what they would think if they knew where I was going.

There were two old ladies across the aisle, wearing knitted hats, with a tartan thermos flask. I was sure they would disapprove just as my parents would if they knew. They didn’t know. They thought I was staying with Milly.

I was more nervous than excited to be seeing him again. To be honest if someone had offered me the chance to turn the train around and ditch the whole thing, I probably would have done. The closer we got to London the more my doubts grew.

I didn’t even know what I was supposed to do when I got to the theatre. Did I ask at the box office if there was a ticket in my name? What if there wasn’t? What if he had forgotten?

In a sort of automaton mode I managed to get myself there. I took the Tube from the train station and walked the short distance to the theatre through the already dark streets. London was still busy with people, I’ve never been there when it isn’t. Compared to our home town which would be deserted by this hour, on a weeknight anyway.

At night you always feel like walking a little bit faster, especially in a big city. So I arrived slightly earlier than I had planned. If there wasn’t a ticket for me, well, I would just go and get a burger somewhere and maybe find my way to Oxford Street and wander around in case there were any shops open in the evening, and then come home.

At the theatre I waited behind a short queue for the man in the ticket booth. Most people presumably already had their tickets.

“Hello. I don’t suppose there was a ticket left for me? My name is Eloise Hampton.”

His expression brightened at this and he drew out an envelope from a pile on one side of his counter. “Here you are, miss. Mr David Astwell left them earlier.”

They did turn out to be plural: there were two tickets. I felt bad about wasting one. I didn’t know if I should give one of them back to the man so he could sell it to someone else. Perhaps it was too late to do that? So not being sure, I just kept them both.

The tickets were front row dress circle. I had never sat in seats like that before. For our school trips, or if I went with my parents, we always got the cheaper seats in the stalls. And now one of these prominent, expensive seats was going to be empty, which made me feel even worse.

It was a different experience watching from there. It was almost like the actors were exclusively performing for you. Being on the front row you didn’t notice any other audience members, and the play was all spread out before you at just the right height and angle. Like there was no barrier between the stage and our seats.

I was wondering whether he would be able to see me, or the empty seat. I tried to recall what the audience looked like from being on stage in school productions. You could only ever see the front row, but then we didn’t have a dress circle in our school hall. The footlights here were also probably much brighter, which might make it harder to see the audience. But just in case, I thought I should try and look as attentive as possible.

Which wasn’t hard, given the view and how good he was, and the secret thrill of knowing I was getting to see the star of the show right afterwards.