I always love that moment when the band is just about to come on. The anticipation reaches a kind of critical mass. You can feel the wave of energy that’s gathering force before it crashes down over you, drenching you in euphoria.
There was a loud roar as the lights at the side of the stage began to strobe the crowd, even though it wasn’t yet dark.
Anya squeezed my hand and whispered, ‘I didn’t know.’ She was grinning wildly now, happier than I had seen her all day.
When she saw my look of bafflement, she nodded at Zoe and Tabitha, whose fingers were entwined.
I stared.
‘I didn’t either.’
Zoe saw us looking over at her.
‘There’s only so much diversity Beverley Park Primary School can take, isn’t there?’ she shouted with a grin.
I laughed, but it was forced. Surely, I wasn’t someone Zoe felt she had to hide anything from? I was her mate. But had she actively kept it from me, though? Had I ever bothered to ask about a boyfriend or a girlfriend, even though Anya repeatedly tried to pump me for this sort of information? Well …
My thoughts were interrupted by a thunder of cries from the crowd, so loud I felt them thrumming through my feet, and the band bounced onto the stage.
Dave Grohl shouted, ‘Are we fuckin’ ready?’ and everyone went wild.
A few songs in and my throat was aching from shouting and singing along. Forests of arms in exultant Vs waved before us and I couldn’t control the daft grin on my face. I glanced at Anya and saw she was trying to crane her neck to get a better view. The group in front of us were all unusually tall.
I nudged her and pointed to my shoulders, waggling an eyebrow suggestively.
She shook her head and laughed, mouthing, ‘No way.’
I got down onto my haunches and patted my shoulders again.
‘Come on!’ I yelled. ‘I can take it!’
Anya was giggling now, eyes gleaming.
‘I’ll break your neck!’ she shouted. I turned and gave her a hurt look.
‘Are you casting aspersions on my manliness?’
Chortling almost helplessly, she hitched up her long skirt and carefully wound one leg over my shoulder, then the other, holding onto my head as she wobbled into position.
In truth, she was an awful lot heavier than I’d expected her to be at this unfamiliar angle. Plus, I realized that I was actually quite drunk. But I was a determined man. As I struggled to my feet, Anya sliding around on top of me, I felt a warning twinge of pain in my lower back and a burst of masculine pride all at the same time.
The band began to play the opening chords of ‘Everlong’.
Despite the pain increasing by the second in my back, warm, sweet contentment spread through all my synapses. Anya’s hands were in the air, my fingers clasped around her slim ankles. My mind was fuzzy from cider, but I knew somehow this would be one of those moments I wouldn’t forget. I even pictured myself doing this with a child one day; carrying a little boy or girl on my shoulders and pointing out planes, dogs, cars …
We’d be the sort of parents who still went to gigs, too.
I don’t really know what happened next. It felt as though she shifted and I slightly lost my balance. For a heart-lurching few moments I thought we were both going to smash face down into the people in front.
She shouted above the music, ‘Down! Let me down!’
I crumpled awkwardly to my knees and Anya climbed off my shoulders so abruptly she almost wrenched my head off.
‘What happened?’ I said, rubbing my neck. It came out more angrily than I’d intended, but I was in pain.
‘You almost dropped me, that’s what happened,’ she said. Her eyes looked huge, stricken, in her ashen face. Then she said, ‘I want to go home.’
For a moment all I could do was stare at her. Anya was usually the last person dancing when they turned the lights off. I’d literally never heard her say anything like that before. I didn’t know what to do with it.
‘I mean it, Ell,’ she said and that was when I saw her eyes were brimming over with tears.
‘What’s wrong? What is it?’
‘I don’t feel well.’ She swiped at her eyes with the heel of her hand. ‘There’s something going around at work. Maybe it’s that. Or maybe it was that kimchi earlier. I should have had the burger, like you did.’
The thought of leaving before the end of this much-anticipated gig made resentment burn like acid in my guts. I wanted to say, ‘I’m not going anywhere. You do what you want,’ like a disappointed little kid. The words were right there, about to spill out. Then I saw how sickly and green she looked. What kind of person would that make me? Especially as I had almost caused her to break her neck.
I pulled her into my arms and could feel her trembling.
‘Okay,’ I said, and began to lead her through the crowd.
It took us for ever to get through the press of sweaty, beaming faces that turned to frowns as we pushed past. The air smelled of sun cream, beer, and sweat, with the odd sweet waft of weed.
When we got to the gates I turned to her, to make one last bid.
‘Are you absolutely sure about this?’ I said.
‘I need to go home,’ she said, and with that she threw up all over my shoes.
Twenty minutes later, we were in an Uber. Anya had barely said a word since being sick. I’d hurriedly offered her water and called the cab, then she’d sat on the side of the road with her head in her hands until it arrived.
Inside the car, she leaned her head back against the seat and closed her eyes. My happy drunkenness was quickly morphing into a flat, depressed feeling.
I gazed out of the window as the car got onto the brief stretch of dual carriageway, but, before we were able to reach any kind of speed, we hit a traffic jam. I sighed and sat back in my seat. The air was filled with the desperate wail of an ambulance then the blue lights of a police car flashed past us in the burgeoning dusk.
The sight tapped into a deep, unhappy place inside me, a place where memories too painful to share were kept. I looked across at my sleepy wife, as if she were a talisman against these feelings. To my surprise, her eyes were open, and she was staring right at me. It was unnerving; like she knew what I had been thinking about.
Picture a little girl waking up in her bedroom with primrose walls on the morning of her tenth birthday.
She still has her toy Simba in her arms, even though she pretends she doesn’t cuddle him at night. It had been a babyish present, but she secretly loves him. In fact, she loves everything about The Lion King, which is why, when her mother suggested it as a theme for the party, she couldn’t hide the excitement. Some of her friends might think it’s a bit silly when you are in Year Five but she doesn’t really care.
She bounds downstairs and sucks in her breath when she sees the transformation happening in the den. Balloons in every shade of green are hanging in cascades along one wall and a huge, painted sticker says ‘HAKUNA MATATA’, over a table that already groans with food.
A woman with a white apron on bustles past her and places a tray of sausage rolls on the table, next to a bowl of animal-shaped chocolate biscuits. The table is covered in some sort of matting stuff so it looks like it is wearing a grass skirt.
There are cupcakes with swirly green icing shaped like leaves, and some have orange snakes