Turning Thirty (33 page)

The short answer to this is no. But the truth is yes and no. At thirty I realise that people who are twenty will look at me and know immediately that I am not one of them. If I strike up a conversation with them they will not ask me which university I'm at, they will not ask me what type of music I'm into, because undoubtedly there will be little crossover between our two musical worlds, and they will not ask me where I go clubbing, because of the crossover thing. They probably won't want to be my friend either – who wants a constant reminder that old age, death and hair loss are just around the corner hanging out with them? And why would I want to hang out with people who would inevitably try to force me to have the exact same long-winded, half-arsed philosophical conversations about life I had ten years ago? This, like all the other things, is stuff I am going to have to accept. And I know that I can live with it.

Question
: Who or what would make me feel younger?

Ginny.

Question
: Do I feel as though I am any older?

The answer to this is once again,' Yes, but . . .' On a darker note I am aware that life doesn't always turn out the way you think it will, which is something to which I'd never paid much attention in my twenties, and on a lighter note I also acknowledge that the Remington hygienic hair trimmer will become a part of my future.(Can anyone tell me the evolutionary purpose of suddenly possessing nasal hairs that insist on growing just that little bit too long?) However, I am still light years away from weddings and 2.4 children but am also aware that a mortgage must surely be around the corner. In short, I have no desire to be needlessly young again but that doesn't mean I've got to start acting like my life is over. That said, I have no desire to be some sort of forty-something bloke, with a convertible, a flash pad in London and a continuous stream of eighteen-year-old girlfriends and no plans to ever settle down. That would only depress me.

Who or what would I like to spend the rest of my life with to save me from becoming some sort of trendy fortysomething bloke, with a convertible, a flash pad in London, and a continuous stream of eighteen-year-old girlfriends and no plans to ever settle down?

Ginny.

‘Morning, birthday boy!'

I opened my eyes with a start to see Elaine's beaming face barely an inch away from my own. ‘Morning, nutter.' I sighed. ‘Is this any way to wake a man on his thirtieth birthday? In my condition I could've had a heart-attack or something.' I rubbed my eyes. ‘What time is it?'

‘Six a.m.,' she said guiltily, showing me the alarm clock on the floor.

‘Why have you woken me up at six o'clock in the morning?' I asked incredulously. ‘Not even you can be that jet-lagged.'

‘I was too excited,' she said, still beaming.

I looked at her and smiled. I was glad she was here. If anyone in the world could make this day okay, it was her.

‘I want to give you your presents now,' she continued, ‘'cause I'm going to have to sneak back to my room in a minute before your mom finds out that I didn't sleep in my own bed.'

‘Good point,' I said. ‘It would only confuse her.' I reviewed the last couple of sentences. ‘Presents?' I repeated. ‘You've got me presents? I thought my present was supposed to be you visiting me for my birthday.'

Elaine looked sheepish. ‘I couldn't help myself. I didn't spend a fortune but I wanted to get you some things you'd really like.' She picked up a large carrier-bag that had miraculously appeared by the side of the bed and handed it to me. Inside were a number of tastefully wrapped parcels.

‘Are these all for me?'

‘No,' she said, grinning widely. ‘I'm just torturing you for the sheer pleasure of it.'

‘What are they?'

She sighed heavily in mock exasperation. ‘Do you think I spent hours fiddling about with wrapping-paper just to tell you what's in them? Open them and find out yourself.'

Ten seconds and a flurry of tasteful gift-wrapping later I found out. A
Planet of the Apes
action figure of General Ursus (‘It looked so cute in the store with its little gun and ape face that I knew you had to have it'); a tape of the self-help book
The Road Less Travelled
(‘I figured it might suit your current frame of mind'); a few CDs (‘I showed the guy in Tower Records a list of all those wailing, whining female singer-songwriters you like and he suggested that you might like these') and finally a photograph taken by Sara of the two of us lying on the Sofa from Hell eating a huge pack of tortilla chips (‘I think we look happy in that photo. Like real friends. That's what we should always remember').

‘I don't know what to say,' I said, putting my arm around her. ‘Not only are they the first thirtieth birthday presents I've had but they will undoubtedly be the best.' I kissed her fondly. ‘Thank you. They're brilliant.'

‘You're welcome,' said Elaine. She kissed me back and slipped out of bed. ‘I think I'd better be going now.'

Watching her standing in front of me, her small frame swamped by my pyjamas, her painted toenails just visible under the hem of the bottoms she looked adorable. Absolutely perfect. Why didn't I fancy her any more? Why didn't she fancy
me
any more? The perverse nature of human attraction, I thought, is so . . . well . . . perverse.

‘Ten dollars for your thoughts,' said Elaine. ‘What were you thinking, dude?'

She pronounced the word ‘dude' like Keanu Reeves in
Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure
. She did a very good Keanu Reeves impression.

‘When?' I said evasively.

‘Just then, when I got out of bed.'

‘I wasn't thinking anything.'

‘Liar.'

‘I wasn't.'

‘Double liar.'

I laughed. ‘Okay . . . you're right. I was thinking something.' I decided against telling her about wondering why I didn't fancy her and opted to tell her the thought that had followed it. ‘I was thinking about how there's some guy out there who at some point in the future is going to fall in love with you. And I was thinking about how happy you'll make him.'

‘Is he a nice guy?'

‘The best.'

‘And do I love him too?'

‘You're besotted.'

‘Does he like the tattoo at the top of my ass?'

‘He adores it.'

‘And you can tell all that just from looking at me in your pyjamas?'

I laughed. ‘Of course I can.'

‘You're not such a bad catch at all, Matthew Beckford,' said Elaine, leaving the room. ‘Not at all.'

It was now early evening and Elaine and I were sitting in the living room watching TV, waiting for Gershwin and Zoë to arrive for my birthday drink in the Kings Arms. I'd been officially thirty for just over eighteen hours now and so far it had been a good day. After breakfast (the most huge fried affair I'd had in my entire existence) my parents had given me their presents (socks/soap/underpants/chocolate) then Elaine and I had gone for a walk around King's Heath park. After that we went for lunch at an Italian place in town, came back to my parents' and sat in the garden with them during a lull in the household-maintenance schedule. Later that afternoon Elaine had made me take a long hard look at my face in the mirror to see if I thought my new birthday had altered my features – she did it every year on her birthday apparently (twenty and twenty-two had looked really good on her but twenty-one had ‘really sucked').

‘What do you think of your new birthday skin?' she'd asked, peering over my shoulder.

I took a long time to answer her, I was so engrossed in gazing at my own reflection. I rarely looked in the mirror. The occasional glance, of course, but never a long hard poring-over-the-pores stare. I hardly recognised myself.

‘And I look like this all the time?' I asked, barely able to believe the evidence of my eyes.

‘You sound disappointed.'

‘I'm not disappointed, I'm just sort of surprised. You know how you always have an idea of what you look like even if you never look in the mirror?' Elaine nodded. ‘Well, mine's nothing like the real thing.'

‘I think you're very handsome,' said Elaine.

‘Thanks,' I replied. ‘You're not too bad yourself, but I wasn't digging for compliments. I'm not saying I'm ugly – I'm just shocked that I've been walking round all this time with no idea what I looked like.'

The front-door bell rang.

‘That'll be Zoë and Gershwin,' I said, getting up.

‘Happy birthday,' screamed Zoë, coming into the living room. She kissed me and attempted to give me a bear hug.

‘Thanks,' I replied.

‘Same again,' said Gershwin, shaking my hand, then added, ‘With knobs on. Are you all ready for your big night out at the Kings Arms?'

‘Are you having a go at my choice of activity for my own birthday?' I asked him.

‘I am indeed,' he replied. ‘It's not too late to change your mind, you know.'

‘I don't want to change my mind. You had your birthday in the Kings Arms, why can't I have mine there too?'

‘It's a well-documented fact that I'm a miserable sod. But you, Matt, are actually quite gregarious.'

‘I am not.'

‘You are. Or, at least, you were at school.'

I laughed. ‘Yeah, well, that was a long time ago, wasn't it?'

‘Too long,' said Gershwin, chuckling to himself. ‘Far too long.' He smiled at Elaine. ‘How has he been today?'

‘He's been fine, actually. I thought he might go into a bit of a birthday blues slump around mid-afternoon but he fought through it.'

‘Come on,' said Zoë, looking at her watch. ‘Let's go. We're wasting valuable drinking time.'

We couldn't leave without Gershwin and Zoë saying hello to my parents – they always liked to stop and chat with my friends, especially those who had given their parents grandchildren – and once that was all over the three of us made our way outside. Zoë headed immediately to her car, which confused me.

‘Are you driving?' I asked.

Zoë nodded. ‘Yeah, why not?'

‘But what about “We're wasting valuable drinking time”?'

‘I'll leave it in the car park and Gershwin and I will get a taxi back.'

I turned to Gershwin. ‘Tell your wife that drinking on my birthday is compulsory so I don't want her turning round to me to say, “Oh, I've changed my mind about the taxi – I'll have an orange juice.”'

Gershwin laughed. ‘I'll make sure she drinks, okay?'

‘I don't understand why you even brought the car,' I said, getting into the back seat with Elaine. ‘I mean, you only live about fifteen minutes away.'

‘It was cold when we came out,' said Zoë as she started the engine. ‘Now, will you stop moaning?'

I moved to open my mouth but Elaine cut me short. ‘Not another word,' she said calmly. ‘Just sit back and enjoy the ride.'

‘Right,' said Gershwin, after we'd driven round for nearly ten minutes. ‘Here we are.' Zoë stopped the car and I looked out of the window. We were in some nondescript cul-de-sac just off King's Heath high street.

‘What are we doing here?' I asked.

Gershwin ignored me. ‘Have you got the blindfold?' he asked Elaine.

‘Sure,' she replied, and pulled a scarf from her bag.

‘What's going on?' I asked.

‘Duh!' said Elaine, chuckling. ‘We're surprising you.'

I looked to Gershwin to clarify what I was hearing.

‘Bad luck,' he said. ‘We didn't cancel your birthday surprise because, well, honestly, sometimes you have no idea what's good for you. So be a good boy and let Elaine blindfold you.'

‘But where are we going?'

‘What is it with you today and dumb-ass questions?' said Elaine. ‘It's a surprise and we're not going to tell you until we're ready to surprise you. That's how surprises work. Now, let yourself be surprised.'

Blindfolded I was guided out of the car and along a pavement for quite some way. Eventually we reached some steps, walked across what felt like grass and on to what felt like a tarmac path. Finally I was led up some more steps, across a long concrete floor and then inside a building. Although muffled by the blindfold across my ears I could hear music. I strained hard to work out the song. It was the opening bars to ‘Holiday' by Madonna. Now I really was confused.

Listening to the clicking of my heels on a hard-surfaced floor I was led towards the sound of Madonna. When she eventually became so loud that it sounded like I was in a nightclub we ground to a halt. I could hear voices, making the occasional shout or scream. I had no idea where I was but I was certain it wasn't the Kings Arms.

‘You can unblindfold him now, Elaine,' said Gershwin.

She took off the scarf as ordered and I opened my eyes. Not only was I standing in the main assembly hall of my old secondary school; not only was I surrounded by Katrina, Pete, Bev and a person who I assumed was her husband; not only was there a full-on mobile DJ who was now playing Harold Faltymeyer's ‘Axel F', but scattered around the room, in large groups talking, in smaller groups dancing, and in huge groups queuing at an impromptu bar set up in the corner of the room, were a couple of hundred former King's Heath Comprehensive pupils from my year at school. Faces I recognised immediately because I'd seen them in Safeway, and faces I hadn't seen since the day they'd left school at sixteen. Representatives from the entire school spectrum as I remembered it were here: teacher's pets, thugs, geeks, weirdoes, loners, losers, dope-smokers, manic depressives, popular A crowd, popular B crowd, popular C crowd, golden girls, beautiful boys, brain-boxes, sporty types, petty criminals, weeds, headcases and finally, of course, a fair sprinkling of regular people too – anyone and everyone.