Page 8 of The Final Beat

“That exact reason,” I protested. “Because he gives great orgasms.”

“You could get great orgasms from lots of men we’ve met over the years. Why specifically Joey?”

Because he gives amazing orgasms, not just great ones, and he doesn’t expect anything from me.

“He’s handy.”

She burst out laughing. “Well, if that’s the case, why not one of the other three?”

“Ugh, no. Far too pretty.”

“Oh, and Joey isn’t?”

He was pretty, with his olive skin, chocolate brown eyes and pouty lips, but he also had the tats, the stubble, and the shavedhead. He had the secrets and the pain in his eyes. He had the danger.He was the drummer, though.

“The others are all loved up.”

“They weren’t always.” She took another quick sip of her wine, eyeing me over the rim of the glass as she did. “Just admit it, boss, you like him a lot.”

“Fuck off.” I picked up my own glass and took a long, fortifying swig. “Not true. It’s just sex. Anyway,” I took another drink. “I don’t want to talk about him anymore. I want to discuss the tour.”

With a roll of her eyes, she lifted her feet and tucked them under her. She then reached for her bag, which she’d dumped on the floor, and pulled out a huge bottle of wine. It was so big it was probably going to taste shit.

She slammed it down on the coffee table. “Avoid it all you like, Destiny, but we will discuss your obsession with him one day, if not by the end of that bottle.”

She could get lost because I knew the truth and Joey Farrow wasn’t mine.

CHAPTER 5

JOEY

My relationship with my mother was strained to say the least. I loved her, but I couldn’t be around her. For my own sanity.

She had her own addictions, alcohol, and men, in that order. The booze generally leading to the latter. It hadn’t always been that way with her. She was twenty-eight years of age before she started drinking. I remembered it well. It was my tenth birthday, and her new boyfriend persuaded her to have a can of cider while we ate birthday cake.

“You’ll love it,” Andy said. “It tastes like really sweet apples.”

“What do you think, Joey?” she asked, running a loving hand down my hair. “Should I try it?”

I shrugged, too interested in the huge piece of chocolate cake I could barely hold.

“Go on.” Andy nudged me. “She deserves a treat, doesn’t she?”

I gave him a chocolatey grin and nodded.

That was the start of many cans of cider for her and within two months she’d moved onto vodka. After three months, anything alcoholic would do. By four months, Andy had left, telling Mum that he couldn’t stand her drinking. He kissed meon the top of the head and said I could call him if I ever needed anything. Mum ended up in hospital two months later and I needed someone to take care of me, Andy dropped my call. Thank fuck for Ronnie’s Auntie Mo who let me stay there for a few days. Being a year older, I wasn’t really that friendly with Ronnie at the time, even though they lived across the road. The whole street came out to watch as Mum was taken away in an ambulance after falling down the stairs, drunk. Mo was the only one who headed over to me. As I stared at the phone in my hand, wondering who else I could call to avoid going into foster care, she put her hand on my shoulder and said, ‘Grab your stuff, me duck, you’re coming to stay with us.’ In those days, no one thought to call Social Services or check Mo was suitable. Thank god she was, because for the rest of my childhood, I spent hours, days, weeks even, at their house. Mo never once said, ‘not tonight’ if Ronnie asked if I could stay over. She’d always laugh and ask, ‘how long for this time?’.

In many ways, Mo being so welcoming to me was an enabler for my mum to carry on drinking. Even breaking her collar bone that night didn’t make her pause and think that maybe she should get some help. Instead, she drank more to help with the pain and simply carried on when she didn’t have the pain any more. It was also then that different men started to appear with alarming regularity. Some stayed around for weeks, some days, and one, Gary, for two months. In the years since I left home, they continued, which I knew was why I’d had a call from her; the latest one had probably disappeared.

She’d called when I was with Jake, my physio, but hadn’t left a voicemail and I knew that was for a reason. She was sneaky my mum, and she knew that if she left me a message where she was slurring her words, I would never get back to her.

As my phone started to ring again, without even looking, I knew it would be her. Yet, like an idiot, I answered it whilementally reminding myself for the millionth time to allocate a special ring tone to her.

“Mum.”

“Hiya, Joe. Are you okay?”

“Fine thanks, Mum. What about you?” I closed my eyes and pinched the bridge of my nose. “Everything okay?”

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