The Not So Secret Emails Of Coco Pinchard (22 page)

Also, three missed calls today from Adam.

Saturday 4th July  13:15

TO: [email protected]

I didn’t sleep, so I came down to the Allotment early, put the kettle on, and sat on my bench chain smoking. It was hot and sunny, which made me feel a little better. Around nine Adam came tramping up in the heat, the dust swirling around him. Tight white t-shirt and football shorts. Woof! I realised I hadn’t called him back.

He came and stood by the bench and asked if I was ignoring him. I said I was sorry and that things had been manic. He sat down, and I told him what has been going on. To my horror, I began to cry.

“I’m not turning on the tears!” I said, mortified.

He put his arm round me. I put my head on his shoulder and we watched some crows pecking around in the dust. He smelt all fresh and showered.

“I’m reading your book,” he said. He undid his rucksack and pulled out a copy of Chasing Diana Spencer.

“Why didn’t you tell me?”

“I tried to. Three times,” he grinned.

“Sorry, again” I said wiping my eyes. “Where did you get it from? It’s out of print.”

“The Library,” he said.

“What do you think about it?”

“Could do with a lick of paint but it does have free parking.”

“Not the Library, my book.”

He leaned towards me, his nose touching mine, “I’ll tell you, if you kiss me.”

“No! Tell me first,” I said.

“You’re interrupting our first kiss?” he said smiling.

“I’m an insecure creative, tell me!”

He leant in and kissed me. He tasted delicious. “Sorry I’ve been smoking,” I said weakly.

“Shh, don’t spoil it.” he said and kissed me again.

It’s funny how you just know how to kiss…I mean, if someone asked me to break down the process of kissing on a diagram I would have a hard job, but our mouths instinctively worked in unison, just enough tongue and tenderness, he even gave my lip a little bite which was a thrill. He pulled away giving me his dazzling grin.

“Ten out of ten, and your book is brilliant.” He hugged me tight. We sat in silence for a moment.

“So you’re stuck with this theatre?” he said. I told him that we had nothing to put in it.

“Well, what about turning Chasing Diana Spencer into a play? I saw The Woman In Black. It was incredible, and they did it with virtually nothing, a bare stage, and a few props. It was all about the story. If you’re going to lose fifteen grand,” he said. “You might as well take a risk and have a ball doing it.”

We stayed chatting for a couple of hours. He is so much fun to be around. He asked me over to his place for dinner on Sunday night. What do you think? About the play idea?
And
him kissing me, of course.

Sunday 5th July  12:34

TO: [email protected]

Marika told me to phone Angie and make sure I know where I stand. If I want to go ahead with this play, I need her to formally release me from our contract.

Angie’s response was a pleasant surprise.

“Oh babe, that is thinking outside your box,” she said. “A Coco book I can’t sell, but a Coco play, at the Edinburgh Festival could be lucrative. Hey! How about a Coco musical?”

“A musical?” I said.

“God, yes!” she said. “Musicals make tons more money than plays. You know Jerry Springer: The Opera? I was stood round the piano in the Battersea Arts Centre bar when Richard Thomas was composing it. If I’d known how huge it would be, I’d have invested, but back then I just got pissed and screamed at him to play Lady In Red
.
” I didn’t know what to say.

“Coco,” she said excitedly. “I’ll go in on the costs fifty percent, that’s seven and a half grand, in return for a fifty percent stake.”

“But, I’ve never written a musical,” I said taken aback.

“Course you can,” she said. “I was looking again at your Greg-O-Byte proposal. It’s brilliant, and you did that in an evening.”

We are having coffee tomorrow to talk about it. I came off the phone excited, then realised - I can’t write music.

Monday 6th July  00:01

TO: [email protected]

Thank god for Chris. He has seen virtually every musical at least three times. I went over to his in a blind panic.

“This is huge,” he said.

“I know.” I said pacing up and down. “And I can’t do it!”

“What do you mean you can’t do it?”

“I can’t write music.”

“You know you only have to write the book and lyrics,” said Chris.

“Haven’t I already written the book?” Chris explained that the script of a musical is called ‘the book.’

“You see. I don’t even know that,” I wailed.

“I’m talking to a guy on Gaydar at the moment who is in his last year at the Royal Academy.”

“Don’t change the subject,” I said helping myself to a glass of his expensive decanter whisky.

“No,” said Chris. “I mean we could get him to write the music. He’s a student, he needs credits for his CV.”

He logged onto MySpace, and played a song from this guys musical, called Jackie Stallone’s Psychic Arses
.
It was very good and before I knew it, Chris was instant messaging him to come to the coffee meeting tomorrow with Angie. He poured me another whisky and cleared his throat awkwardly.

“Coco,” he said. “Would you let me be the director? I will do it for nothing; you can use my house to rehearse…You loved the British Airways Air Steward Charity Panto I directed, and they’re a bitchy lot to co-ordinate, what with all their layovers.” He looked at me pleadingly. “I need a career… I’m going mad with nothing.”

“Okay,” I said.

“Really?”

“Yes, I would love to have you involved.” He hugged me, and then he reminded me I had a date with Adam at seven, and it was already six fifteen. I raced across Regent’s Park, wellies flapping and into the Baker Street Tesco Metro. I grabbed a basket and was working my way through to the wine section when I ran into Adam. He was reading the back of a ready prepared Moussaka and had frozen Lasagna in his basket.

“Damn,” he grinned. “Busted. What would you prefer, Greek or Italian?”

I said Italian. He then went on to ask what dessert I wanted and before long, we were food shopping together.

When we reached the wine aisle there was a middle-aged woman running a sampling promotion. She gave Adam a sample of Bordeaux then asked if his ‘lady friend’ would like some.

“Here you go lady friend,” he winked. She looked at us both, and her look didn’t seem to judge that I was out of my league. When we got outside we realised we had spent nearly an hour shopping, and our date had begun.

We both stood there.

“Look,” he said. “Do you just want to come back with me? Not that what you are wearing doesn’t look great, but I presumed you weren’t going to come to mine in wellies,” I looked down and laughed.

“I’ve got a great outfit laid out on my bed,” I said.

“The Wellington boots are actually doing it for me, you look like a girl who…”

“Likes getting dirty,” I said. “I mean, muddy.” I blushed.

“Come back to mine,” he said. “We’re having fun.” There was a real sparkle in the air. I said okay.

He owns a little ground floor flat off Baker Street, a modern cosy Victorian conversion with scrubbed pine furniture and wood floors. There was no sign of another woman’s work, a recently departed ex, etc.

He poured us some wine and I nosed round his living room whilst he put things away in the kitchen.

He has acres of DVD’s and books with a big cinema-style TV with some dark squashy sofas. The only visible alarm bell was a PlayStation with controllers and a stack of games.

I realised I had drunk all my wine when he was beside me topping up my glass. He squatted down to put some music on. As he put his arm out to grab a CD from the shelf, his shoulder muscles strained against his white t-shirt. I instinctively slid my hand under the collar and onto his warm back. He turned to look at me with a lopsided grin. He stood and began kissing me deep and slow.

I pulled off his t-shirt, he pulled off mine and expertly unhooked my bra. I slid my thumb under the waistband of his football shorts and pulled them down. Before I knew it, we were naked, our warm bodies pressing together. We sunk into the sofa and had sex, twice. I cannot remember the last time I did it twice. We drank wine and talked and Adam was just looking like he could go a third round when I realised it was nearly midnight and I had the meeting to prepare for. We hadn’t eaten any of the food we chose and I said I had to go. As I was pulling on my clothes, he looked disappointed, and, I felt a bit cheap. Should I have stayed?

I slopped home in my dirty wellies replaying our dirty evening in my head.

Tuesday 7th July  12:01

TO: [email protected]

Chris has asked me to forward the minutes of this morning’s meeting to you. I am not sure he knows how to take proper minutes.

MINUTES OF MEETING TUESDAY 7th JULY.

09:00 Christopher Cheshire, Coco Pinchard and Angie Langford met at the Cafe Nero in Old Compton Street. But there were no tables available. It’s full of poofs in their workout gear, either going to or from the gym. We decide to move to the BMX Literary Agency office.

09:12 Angie Langford’s office (BMX Literary Agency). Proper introductions, I have never met Angie. (Nice shoes). None of us have met Jason Schofield our composer. He is twenty-one, handsome and plays a sample of Jackie Stallone’s Psychic Arses. He is hired. Yay!

09:35 Angie Langford unveils the poster image she has mocked up for the show. We have to submit this to the Edinburgh Fringe office to make the festival programme deadline, which is 5pm today. Angie says she will call the Carnegie Theatre after 5pm and tell them that the show is no longer going to be Anne Frank: Reloaded but Chasing Diana Spencer: The Musical.

09:50 Coco Pinchard who has been a bit mute up until now rushes from the meeting.

09:53 Meeting moves to ladies toilets. Coco Pinchard won’t come out of the lavatory cubicle, says she does not ‘get’ musical theatre, and says she was the only one in the audience who didn’t cry at the end of Blood Brothers
.

09:59 Coco Pinchard is coaxed out of toilet cubicle. James Schofield reminds Coco Pinchard that she needs only to write an hour long musical, as this is the length of theatre shows at the Edinburgh Festival.

10:02 Coco Pinchard rushes back into cubicle wailing that she can’t get her whole book across in an hour. Angie Langford lights cigarettes.

10:03 Coco Pinchard calms down but James Schofield has a mild asthma attack.

10:15 Meeting re-converges in office. James Schofield by open window with his inhaler. Coco PInchard will write a rough draft of Chasing Diana Spencer: The Musical over the next few days. James Schofield will read the book. I, Christopher Cheshire will put an advert in The Stage newspaper for actors and Angie Langford will draw up contracts and set up a limited company so her accountant can fiddle the tax easier.

Tuesday 7th July  14:13

TO: [email protected]

Hi, I just realised I don’t have a personal email address for you, just the one at your work in the Health and Safety Department. Could I have your personal one?

I had a wonderful time last night. I should have stayed, but I am new to all this and I really like you, and the last time I slept with anyone other than my ex-husband, in the same bed, was twenty years ago. When I mean sleep, I mean actual sleep, not that I have done anything else with anyone. Just so you know.

It looks like this musical is going ahead. I have to start writing it today as my agent Angie and friend Chris have zoomed into action and made a lot happen. I am trying not to freak out.

I would like to see you again.

Coco x

Wednesday 8th July  21:34

TO: [email protected]

The script is coming along very nicely. I spent the day up at the Allotment, absorbed in writing. Adam knocked on my shed door just after five; he had come from work with pizza and wine. I had promised myself to take it slow but we ended up having a re-run of the other night, in my shed, under the table of old flower pots. At one point Agatha and Len walked past, and they must have heard one of the flowerpots fall and break. They stopped. I heard her say,

“What’s that noise Leonard?” Footsteps came closer, crunching on the dry grass outside the little window.

“Look she’s left a whole pizza out!” said Len hungrily. I heard him try the doorhandle.

“Len!” hissed Agatha. “Come away!”

All throughout this, Adam had put his hand over my mouth, and carried on… It felt rather thrilling.

Afterwards he asked if I wanted to come back to his and chill out with a DVD but I had to keep writing. Now I’m really worried he thinks I am a slut.

Thursday 9th July  17:39

TO: [email protected]

You’re going to see Nan tonight, aren’t you? Could you do me a favour and ask her if she is free tomorrow to help us to open and sort applications for Chasing Diana Spencer: The Musical? The living room is full of envelopes.

Thursday 9th July  18:44

TO: [email protected]

You can tell your Nan thank you, but minimum wage is £5.80 per hour, not £10 as she is claiming. On this occasion, though, I can go up to £7 per hour to reflect, as she puts it, her “life experience.”

These are the roles we are casting for:

Queen Elizabeth II, Queen of England, the Commonwealth, the High Seas etc. etc.

Prince Phillip / Prince Charles (played by same actor with interchangeable prosthetic ears)

Camilla Parker Bowles

Lady Diana Spencer

Hans Von Strudel (Queen Elizabeth’s hunky Footman.)

Male Actor 1 To play various parts; servants, French, old and young.

Female Actor 1 To play various parts; servants, French, old and young.

Friday 10th July  19:24

TO: [email protected]