I saw Scott Free alive again last night. A dead man sauntering, joking and smiling. Except it wasn't him, just that portion of his soul captured and released, mere shadows of light flickering across the TV screen. It was only a short clip, and as they cut back to some opinion-for-hire telling us how important Scott had been, he disappeared into a volley of applause. He'd have liked that. He’d have hated it too.
And while the F list comedian might’ve been able to recount how a small part in Scott Free’s act had launched his career, his cardboard caricature said nothing about the man who would prop up the bar where I used to work, with a cold scowl and a need for cheap whiskey. The bitter man who abused the Coronation Street characters for their inability to break free from the Old Vic. John Huntsman, the alter behind the ego. My friend. Perhaps.
Of course I didn't like him at first. As a new barman the old fixtures irritate you, especially in places like Fredo's; dank, underground and small; the kind of place that a noir detective in a pulp thriller would call a watering-hole. I was a student in need of some extra cash and had stumbled into the bar to hide from a summer downpour. I’d chatted to Fredo and because he liked my lip, he offered me a job.
Fredo's was off the beaten track and yet in the centre of town, down one of those side streets that are invisible because they house no shops. It was never busy, just a small crowd of regulars who sat nursing cheap bitters for hours on end. But the man at the bar was different, much younger than the others, barely older than me. He never asked to be served, just pushed his glass forward; shouted at the TV whenever a soap played; and he never seemed to pay.
At the end of my first week I had had enough of his mardiness and asked him for money as we closed up. He just sighed, threw his overcoat on and stalked out of the door. Fredo asked what I'd done; shook his head and told me that if I wanted to keep my job, I should never to do that to Scott Free again. I was shocked. Scott Free? Fredo nodded, before adding that his real name was John.
After a few weeks he started speaking, or rather, I asked a question.
“What is it you hear? Who do you shout at?”
He didn’t turn, but twisted his head so that it faced me rather than the TV. He gestured at it with his arm.
“Them, the way they live their lives, the way they don’t stop and think about what they’re doing, go to a different pub, break free.”
“They can’t: they’re just characters.”
“So what? What’s the difference between them and us?”
“We’re real, they’re not.”
“But what if we're the soap opera?”
“We're not. We watch soaps, you appear on TV. If you're not there I still exist, and I'm sure it's the same the other way round.”
“How do you know that?”
“Because we live in the real world.”
“That's not an answer! And even if we're real, that's not to say that God isn’t just an audience, and we're just the entertainment for the crowd.”
“That's ridiculous.”
He just laughed to himself and drained his whiskey. Then he turned back to continue his abuse of Corrie.
It was another month before he spoke to me again. By then I knew more about him, quizzing Fredo in what I hoped was an innocuous manner when we had a quiet minute changing the barrels or cleaning the empty bar. I asked about all the regulars, but really I only wanted to find out more about Scott Free, the darling of Saturday Night TV.
It turned out that he owned the place, or at least paid the rent. All he asked in return was that we'd kick out anyone that tried to get in because of him, never go and see him perform, and turn a blind eye to his rants. The bar had been Fredo's father's, and Scott stepped in to save Fredo from losing it. And so nothing he could do, or rather, nothing he did until the end, was too much.
But I'm getting ahead of myself, and you all know how it ends: Bang Bang. But without the context the finale means nothing. Without the set up the head in the box is simply grotesque. It is not who killed Cock Robin that is important – he blasted his brains across the empty bar. What the crowd needs to know is why.
I'm not saying that I know; just that I can provide an insight.
ScottJohn got used to me, so he spoke more often. Not a lot, but occasionally. I remember one time in particular, it was after the first of his proper rants that I'd seen. I must have been shaking because when he sat down and pushed his glass across the counter, he spoke.
“You OK?”
“Yeah.”
He smiled.
“I guess an explanation is in order, right? Except I don't know if I can give a proper one. I can have a go, and if it's not good enough…
“Have you ever been somewhere and realised that you're only a bit part in whatever is going on? In a restaurant where a couple are arguing, and you know that everyone can hear but no one is looking, like you're all extras in the film of them, trying to act normal. Or when you're walking or getting a train and some refrain you're not quite sure you've ever heard before comes into your head like the soundtrack bleeding through to your life. Do you ever, feel like... like there's more?”
He was leaning forward over the bar, eyes bulging, forehead raised in question. I thought he was talking nonsense. No, not quite nonsense, but exaggerating the truth. I've not met anyone who hasn't at some point wondered whether they're in a film, but no one seriously believes it.
“I get it. I know that feeling, but you know we're not in a film. I'm real. I do everything in my life myself.”
I laughed.
“I mean who'd be interested in my boring life?”
ScottJohn thrust his shot glass forward, and when I went to pour the whiskey, he grabbed the bottle, and pulled my face near to his.
“Exactly. When you go through your life will they laugh, hoot and clap? When your time on this stage is over will they care enough to whistle and cheer? Or will you be another extra who they remember seeing in something but can't quite place?”
He spat his words out, a loathsome froth forming on his lower lip.
“Who would be captivated by your life? Would they be interested in mine?”
But people were interested in Scott Free. Real people. On the bus home that night I wondered if even my parents were interested in mine. I tried phoning, but they were out.
After that, we got on better, and when he had his incidents he'd have them, and then we’d carry on. Then nine or so months since I'd started working at Fredo's, John suggested we go up to the hills, ‘get away from all the noise' . I agreed and Fredo lent me his rusty blue Mini, which we folded ourselves into and drove off towards the Pennines. We didn't make it there: John wanted to go up Pendle instead.
It was a dry, overcast day, and we climbed alone through the blotchy heather. I'd not done much walking, and my smart trainers kept getting stuck in the uneven ground. More than once I nearly twisted my ankle trying to keep up with John's walking-booted pace. I figured that talking would slow him down.
“So why Pendle Hill?”
“I don't want to go out the countryside only to be knee deep in middle class chattering. Y'know. There's too much history with Kinder – they feel it's their obligation as well as their right, it's like a lengthy queue at Waitrose. Too much drama.”
“So not the witches then. I mean isn't this meant to be where the witches were?”
“This is where the witches were meant to practise. That's true. But they weren't witches – I don't buy into all that bollocks. Just women who wouldn't play by the rules. But you want to know if I'm like them. Find a way to package my ‘madness’ away.”
“No. I mean I just don't understand it that's all. Why come out here? What are you escaping from?”
John turned to look at me with a wide smile on his face. He gestured out into the wind-spent nothingness that surrounded us.
“It's quiet out here. We're away from all the humour, tragedy and soap operatics of the city. There's no set pieces, no songs, no dance, no pay off. These are the places outside the story, where nothing of importance, no big denouement takes place. And I can't hear them out here. I'm free and there is silence. That's why I come.”
I took this as an indication that I should shut up and as we continued tramping upwards I realised he was happy in a way I’d never seen him.
Near the summit we came across two middle aged women exercising their stubby terrier. They were going the same direction as us and as we drew close they looked at John and nudged each other. One of them managed enough courage to ask.
“Are you Scott Free?”
John looked uncomfortably down at his feet.
“You are. I mean, you look just like him.”
“I’m not him.”
“Give over. Do us a trick. Just the one.”
John sighed. I guess that he figured that it was easier to do the one trick. And so Scott Free appeared: John’s back straightened and his shoulders seemed to become broader, the usual scowl transformed to a charming smile and he bowed.
“For you ladies. I shall levitate, on this hill, without props. Today you shall see that man can fly.”
He closed his eyes and then walked a little way off the path. He brought his legs together and then, I don’t know what he did, but it really did seem like he was floating unsupported in the air. And the women began to clap and laugh with disbelief.
He floated there for a minute, with the women laughing behind him, but he didn’t come down. The women looked at each other and then at him, their laughs became hesitant, laced with unease. They looked at me and I shrugged my shoulders; I knew John Huntsman not Scott Free. The dog strained at its lead, and after one last clap, they left, turning back every few steps until they were out of sight, unsure as to why he didn’t come down.
“They’re gone, you can come down now.”
Nothing.
“John?”
I pleaded with him, but he showed no signs of hearing me.
I inched my way in an arc around him, thinking that maybe I could get his attention. But when I drew around I saw that his eyes were still closed, and that his face was drawn tight in sorrow. Silent tears trickled down over his cheeks.
“John?”
“I can hear them. Even here. I thought I couldn’t but I can.”
And from somewhere down the valley the wind carried a sound up to us: of a tin can scraping along a dry stone wall, or a kid running a stick against a corrugated iron sheet. Except it didn’t clank like a tin can, or machine gun rattle like a stick battered sheet. It sounded like the sound heard from the green room, when the lights are down and the curtain closed; like we’d let the audience judge us after we’d finished treading the boards. The creak of seats being unsat in; muffled conversations from the foyer. The clapping of unseen hands.
© N.D.Gomes, 2008
The Clapping of Unseen Hands by N.D.Gomes was read by Ben Crystal at the Liars' League Fame & Fortune event on 10 June 2008.
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