Public Secrets Part 26

"Soup," Bev put in.

"Cake and soup," he amended. "And some nice tea."

He set her down to go to the phone and ring room service.

"Come over here, Emma. I have something for yon." Johnno patted the

cus.h.i.+on beside him. She hesitated. Her mother had often said just

that. And the something had been a smack. But Johnno was smiling a

true smile. When she settled beside him, he took a small, clear plastic

egg from his pocket. Inside was a toy ring with a gaudy red stone.

Emma gave a little gasp as he put it in her hand. Speechless, she

turned the egg this way and that, watching the ring slide from side to

side.

It had been a careless thing, Johnno thought. A machine that took

American quarters, and he'd had change left after his speedy shopping

spree. More touched than he wanted the others to see, he opened the egg

for her, then slipped the ring on her finger.

"There. We're engaged."

Emma beamed at the ring, then at him. "Can I sit on your lap?"

"All right then." He leaned close to her ear. "But if you wet your

pants, the engagement's off."

She laughed, settled on his lap, and began to play with her ring.

"First my wife, then my daughter," Brian commented.

"You'd only have to worry if you had a son." Stevie tossed off the words

as easily as he tossed off the drink. Then wished he'd cut off his

tongue. "Sorry," he muttered as the room fell silent. "Hangover. Puts

me in a filthy mood."

At the knock on the door, Johnno gave a lazy shrug. "Better put on that

famous smile, son. It's show time."

Johnno was angry, but hid it well as the young, bearded reporter sat

down with them. They had no idea what it was like, he thought. None of

them, save Brian who had gone to school with him, had befriended him.

The names he'd been called-f.a.g, p.u.s.s.y, queer. They had hurt a great

deal more than the occasional beatings he'd taken. Johnno knew he would

have had his face smashed into a pulp more than once if it hadn't been

for Brian's ready fists and loyalty.

They had been drawn together, two ten-year-old boys with drunken

fathers. Poverty wasn't uncommon in London's east end, and there were

always toughs ready to break an arm for pence. There were ways of

escaping. For both him and Brian, the escape had been music.

Elvis, Chuck Berry, Muddy Waters. They would pool whatever money they

could earn or steal to buy those precious 45s. At twelve, they'd

collaborated on their first song-a really poor one, Johnno remembered

now, lots of moon/June rhymes set to a three-chord rhythm they'd pounded

out on their battered guitar. They'd traded a pint of Brian's father's

gin for that guitar, and Brian had taken an ugly beating. But they'd

made music, such as it was.

Johnno had been nearly sixteen before he realized what he was. He'd

sweated over it, wept over it, pounded himself into any girl who

would have him to turn his fate around. But sweat, tears, and s.e.x

hadn't changed him.

Finally it had been Brian who had helped him to accept. They'd been