The Pool Party
My black Honda 250 turns onto an avenue, trees in full leafy bloom on either side. The street is so wide it could be a high street in dirty inner London, where I lived my first nineteen years. Hell, they've even got speed bumps and no litter.
I'm feeling good in my new clothes, a small fortune spent at the trendier Tooting Broadway shops this afternoon. A little out of my element in those boutique places but Fashion and Design students expect a certain level of up to ‘dateness’. My fancy friends tried explaining to me about the pool at the house. They tried, but boys from Balham don't find it easy to understand how an enclosed pool can be attached to a house. At my school, the poshest kid didn’t even have a garden shed.
Now I’m at Shawn, or Sean’s (I can never remember which), house. Seven thirty prompt, as instructed. My leather jacket and helmet locked on the bike outside. I’m in the pool area. It’s incredible - blue water and as long as the Queen’s Speech when you’re waiting for *Top of the Pops*. It’s a party, not a swim meet. We’ve got beer, wine boxes, swanky pre-mixed cocktails and soft drinks too. All my fancy friends are here: Simon, Sean or Shawn, Mary-Jayne, Louise, that little feisty blonde girl[1]. There’s the very blonde and lithe Swedish girl, as well as Pat and Clive. Clive is keeping a distance from Pat. She wants to be with Clive, but Clive only has eyes for someone else. Chlorine mixed with beer fills the air. Above is an ornate, frosted glass roof, and along one side, the length of the pool, sliding doors open onto a large perfect lawn, looking lush and green in the evening sun. I don’t belong here.
Louise approaches, introducing me to a host of people I don’t know. “I love the outfit,” she whispers and squeezes my hand. We’re moving to where the drinks are. I tell her I have a new mixtape, and she eagerly puts it into the house system cassette player. I still feel like I’ve landed on an alien world. One of those *Star Trek* episodes where the planet is perfect in every way, but you know a terrible monster is lurking somewhere.
The beer helps. I’m talking to strangers. My mix tape plays the latest dance and soul tracks, and people are dancing to it. Louise keeps bounding by and dragging me off to dance or meet someone else. “Kirk to Enterprise – maybe I’m the monster?”
The pool has underwater speakers and music-activated lights. That’s pretty cool. No idea what kind of money you’d need to have to have such things as a mansion-size house, attached indoor pool with sound system and lights, I just know I will never that kind of wealth. One of the girls I didn’t know is swimming, and it occurs to me I didn’t think to check if my new clothes would cope with getting wet, so I stay away from the edge and any splashes. Everyone is barefoot - shoes left by the door, that was one rule made clear to us all.
My mix tape ends, but it seems to be crowd-pleasing enough so much so that they’ve turned it over and are playing it again. I must confess there are a couple of killer new tracks on there that I know they’ve never heard before. Rick at Goodness Records never lets me down when I visit him for hot new imports.
The party gets loud, but no one seems to care. I guess the neighbours being a football pitch sized distance away helps. Mary-Jayne follows me around, and I see Louise distract her again. “MJ, meet this person” (subtext ‘get away from my man’). I find myself forced to admit I like that MJ is a little infatuated with me. I like it even more that Louise is concerned enough to try and keep her away.
Some more beer and a long chat with my little blonde friend. She’s not happy with her boyfriend. He isn’t here, and that’s good, because I don’t think he’s a good person and I definitely do not think he’s good for her; she’s too nice, full of energy and mischief. So, I’m glad he’s absent, because the party is becoming too much fun, to stress over him.
Well, it was too much fun. The music stops suddenly, and Shawn/Sean (let’s stick with Shawn) is playing whale songs. He says it’s real recordings of whales, and I’m wondering how you record a whale. The pool’s lights shift green and blue in time with the eerie, guttural sounds.
Everyone falls silent. Mesmerised by the otherworldly noise. Darkness has fallen outside, the perfect lawn illuminated by soft mood lights. Held drinks start getting warm and the wax puddles around candles in the corner have grown unnoticed. The ghostly glow of the lights seems to draw me close to the water. I feel an odd sense of maturity.
Shawn stands behind Simon and very quietly, though loud enough for us all to hear, says,
“It’s much more realistic when you’re in the water,” and with a strong shove, pushes Simon.
Simon falls, a loud swear word echoing around the hushed pool followed by a huge SPLASH.
For a second, I feel the atmosphere go from chill to tug-rope tense before Simon comes up laughing and grabs Shawn’s leg.
The tension snaps and the room erupts. On the other side from me, someone else hits the water with a massive splash that soaks those nearby. There are screams and laughter. Noise upon noise. Even the whale sounds seem more upbeat.
I’m a kid again. I feel a push on my back and stumble forward. I half-turn and grab the pushing hand. If I’m going, you’re coming too. Louise and I hit the water at the same time. We’re laughing and splashing each other. I don’t care if my outfit doesn’t recover from this.
We’re nearly all in the water now, ducking and splashing. Mary-Jayne is not. Someone tries to pull her in, but she screams as if she’s about to be eaten by Kirk’s monster (not me I have decided). She’s left sitting near the edge, watching the fun.
The noise is incredible. The shouts, screams and laughter of a bunch of slightly drink-laden teenagers ringing through the refined confines of the enclosed pool, the look of which I could never have imagined, but now I think will be a memory forever. Eventually, some people start climbing out.
We’re all out of the water now and there’s a closet with more towels than I’ve seen in my entire life, and now they’re being handed out. Underwear stays on, but there’s a lot of young, perfect skin on display. Louise comes over, towel around her waist, bra cleavage showing, looking both sexy and homely. We hug.
I’m glad my towel is tied around my waist as she nibbles my neck.
“Cut that out, you two!” comes Simon’s voice from across the pool.
Slightly embarrassed and reddened, we pull apart and I’m off to put on the next mix tape - a more sedate set. What will come to be known in later years as a chillout tape.
Now the lights have dimmed. Midnight is long behind us. Little groups huddle, talking quietly and occasionally laughing. Louise, myself, Mary-Jayne and the girl whose name I forgot are discussing our favourite relaxation ideas. Mary-Jayne takes it literally and is sleeping. Louise points her out to Tracey. Tracey! That’s my feisty friend’s name.
Some people drift off either to the house to sleep or home to get ready for their summer jobs. It’s apparently 4am on a Monday morning. But giving it a name or time seems almost a betrayal of the night.
It’s England in June, and the thin line of dawn is eager to push the night sky off the Surrey hills. The only people awake are Shawn, Louise, Tracey, me and, post-long nap and slightly grumpy, Mary-Jayne.
Shawn asks if we want to see the abandoned aerodrome. Hell yes! We follow him out and through his garden, bigger than a city park. A gate is subtly hidden under vines. We step through it into a large field, the tall grass looking dry and faded in the dawn light.
We follow Shawn as he leads us toward a concrete structure, a derelict pillbox or bomb shelter, some distance away. It lies across a field of thigh-high grasses that hide the occasional startled rabbit or piece of broken concrete waiting to twist someone’s ankle. We walk on. The little, tired exploration party is becoming strung out in a long line, and Louise, who always has a camera on her, takes some photos which capture the moment. A group of young people slowly marching toward the increasing light, through a field that was once part of a world war. Each one of us - Mary-Jayne, Louise, me, Tracey, Shawn - walks into the new day, into the unknown. A beautiful evening behind us, and a broad, brightening horizon in front.
We finally reach the concrete structure, graffiti-covered and stripped in places, revealing its iron-rod bones. In the trees at the edge of the aerodrome, the birds strike up their morning greetings, and the sun continues its climb and finally peeking above the hills. Slowly, the group of friends heads back to the house.
It’s 10am and I’ve dropped Louise off at home, end of the street since her dad doesn’t appreciate her being on the bike. I’m on my sofa in my parents’ familiar, working-class flat. Patterned wallpaper and thin carpet. I call into work and claim sickness. Here the sky seems a little less bright, a continuous drone of traffic fills the air outside the of smog-stained windows. I put on the first mix tape from last night and realise that this flat, which used to be my entire world, now feels a lot more like a prison.
I wake on the sofa. Was it all a dream? It feels like it could have been, but this tape is no longer my creation, it’s a soundtrack. The flat feels small. The world outside seems, well, endless.
[1] who I’d later wish was still in my life, but we drifted, and the streams carried us in different directions
Bazza
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