The old man ran his hands over her, longingly, lovingly.
He even puckered his dry lips, softly kissed her neck. He only wished she could kiss
him back, it was so long since he’d felt a kiss with any real affection
attached to it. He stroked her tenderly, remembering how she’d come into being.
He’d been helping his father all those years ago when they’d
taken out the old fireplace and the idea came into his head, the idea to make
his own guitar. All those years ago, and here she was, still with him when so
much he’d known had gone. He knew her.
His hands knew her contours, her moods. Sometimes he’d been a man playing a
guitar, but often, usually even, they were one being. Those times it wasn’t
just his hands that played; it was his whole body communing with her, and both
of them communing with the audience.
The door opened swiftly; no knock, no ‘excuse me’, just
pushed open and in marched Nurse Cook, as usual.
“Come on now, put that old thing away. It’s bedtime.
Chop-chop, pyjamas on!”
He didn’t need to look at the digital clock glaring out 20:30
in eye-wateringly bright green numerals. Same time every night. Tonight though,
the Sunday of the last weekend in August, it was harder than usual for the old
man to stomach. Still he did as he was told, unbent himself from the bed and
carefully shuffled to the wardrobe. Meanwhile Nurse Cook had swished across the
room, switched on the dim nightlight and clicked off the main light on her way
out of the door.
“Goodnight then”
the old man muttered, pleased with the cutting tone he’d managed even though only
he could hear. He paused and realised that though he’d picked up his pyjamas in
one arthritis-knotted hand he was still holding the guitar in the other. His
grey hair brushed against his shoulders as his head shook. Was he trying to
clear his thoughts? Reject his current plight? Or was this just a defiant,
directionless NO aimed at nothing and at everything?
Whatever it was, something
seemed to snap into place with the motion and he threw the pyjamas back into
the wardrobe, reaching instead to the back of the rail. His guitar was laid on
top of the duvet, waiting patiently as he changed into his costume. He fastened
it slowly, feeling his bent back straightening as if he was donning an
orthopaedic device. Opening the window he grabbed the guitar and clambered out
before half running, half shuffling across the lawn through the twilight. There
was a phone box on the corner and, ignoring the many cards that offered all
sorts of human contact and earthly pleasures, he sought out one, a minicab
company card, made the call and waited.
He ignored the smirk on the cab driver’s face when he gave
the destination and wound down the window to breathe in the air; it might not
be fresh but at least it didn’t have the astringent urine stink of the care
home. He breathed in deeply, revelled in the smells of petrol fumes and
takeaways that signified normal human existence, as opposed to the stilted
limbo of non-existence he’d suffered since arriving at ‘Sunnyside’.
Through the open window he could hear a familiar sound as
they got closer to the venue and it poured into his ears like aural medicine.
He flexed his fingers and felt his knuckles unknotting as that elixir of youth,
the adrenalin of anticipation, surged through his old bones, sinews, muscles,
nerves. He hadn’t thought through what would happen next but the minicab
driver, still wearing his smirk like a secret sign, drove confidently up to the
gates.
“VIP guest coming through!”
He slowed but didn’t stop as the security man, fazed and
unsure, tried to look into the back of the car. The car was almost past before
he managed to focus on the old man sitting in the back, eyes shining with so-recently
rediscovered vigour. The old man grinned and nodded as if in a happy trance.
“Stop!”
The security man was waving frantically trying to get himself
in front of the cab, to force the driver to a halt. The driver gave up,
shrugged.
“Never mind, mate, nice try”.
The guard motioned for the driver’s side window to be wound
down, although the rear window was still fully open.
“Stay there. You can’t just drive through like that, hang
on.”
The guard quickly disappeared but was back almost
immediately, waving a laminated badge. He handed it to the driver,
“You’ll need to give
him this”.
For a moment the old man’s mind jolted to those days when the
staff wheeled him down to the shops in one of Sunnyside’s communal wheelchairs.
Nobody ever talked to him, they always asked the person doing the pushing
“What does he want?”
and even, once, in the little teashop that made him feel like a fully-paid up member
of the undead, the classic-
“Does he take sugar?”
Then his mind was back in the minicab, almost back where he
belonged, so very nearly there.
“It’s an ‘access all areas’, he’ll need that”.
The old man tried to focus on the guard’s face. He felt his
own eyes filling with tears, then realised that that didn’t explain the wet
smears down the younger man’s cheeks. The minicab made its way around the edge
of the festival site and through several checkpoints to the rear of the main
stage. At each one there were exclamations of recognition, each like an
intravenous injection of vigour. When the car stopped the old man was out of
the door before the driver could move and, gripping his guitar like a life
support system, he made his way with surprising speed to the only place he
needed to be, the place that needed him.
The young front man was holding one hand up, fist pumping as
the rock music soared over the surging crowd. The sudden roar took him by
surprise but he was used to thinking quickly, reacting to events. He soon
realised they were looking past him and for a moment he seethed. That plank of
a drummer was upstaging him again. How many times? He spun round to see what he
was up to now and fell to his knees, spontaneously, without, for once, any hint
of showmanship or forethought. Nevertheless one part of his brain was thinking
"Wow, good move, bet that looked great”
as the other part was screaming at him in incoherent shock.
He stood and his showmanship fought with his hero worship as the old man walked
across the stage, straight backed and lithe of limb, and plugged the beloved
guitar into an amp. The old hands stroked the strings, fingers pushed firmly
down over the frets, masterful and yet a servant to his instrument. The roar from
the crowd could have lifted a rocket into space as the young singer waved an
arm towards an ageless man, communing with an ageless guitar, and yelled into
his mike in a strangely ceremonial manner,
“Ladies... and...
Gentlemen.... ... BRIAN ..... MAY!”
The old man shook his head again. His mane of grey hair
brushed his shoulders as he sat on the edge of the bed and slowly lifted his
tired legs into his pyjamas. He looked at the twisted ropes of his fingers,
lifted them to his eyes and rubbed. The old man pulled the duvet over the
shoulder of his guitar and stroked the elegant neck resting on his pillow. The
bright green numerals were easily outshining the nightlight in their never
ending competition to keep darkness at bay. He closed his eyes in a vain attempt
to find sleep, covered his own shoulders, and sighed.
