Read Online 1982 by Jian Ghomeshi - Free Book Online Page B

sounded like Wendy’s mother answered. I panicked. I did the instinctive thing to do when the mother of a girl you’re infatuated with picks up the phone—I hung up. Fortunately, there was also no caller ID on phones in 1982, so you could hang up on someone with impunity. Complete discretion. Wendy’s mother probably thought it was some hooligan playing games. She would never know it was me and that this was no game.
    The second time I called—the next day—I crossed my fingers and prayed that Wendy would answer the phone herself. On this occasion, thankfully, it was not her mother’s voice at the other end of the line; instead it was her older brother, Paul, who picked up. I decided not to hang up. Bowie would not have hung up. He probably wouldn’t be intimidated. Besides, Paul was Jila’s friend. He was nice, and I thought he might be an easier conduit to Wendy. It turned out he wasn’t necessarily intent on making things so simple.
    “Hello?” he answered, with his older-guy voice. Paul was three years older than me. He was my sister’s age, and he often wore a silver-grey vest over a white shirt at school. He had chest hair that you could see peeking out from the top of the shirt that was underneath his silver-grey vest. The chest hair was an indication that Paul was older. Also, his shirt had puffy sleeves the way pirates have those flowing sleeves. Piratetype white shirts were worn by two kinds of people in the early ’80s: pirates and theatre students. Paul was not a pirate. He was quite theatrical. He dressed like Adam Ant. He also wore form-fitting black pants and boots. And he was cool. Ofcourse, he was Wendy’s brother, so it only made sense that he was cool.
    I cleared my throat and tried to sound very mature as I started to speak to Paul while I fiddled with the curly cord on our phone.
    “Oh. Hi, Paul. Um … this is Jian. I’m Jila’s brother, from school? You might remember we’ve met, and … well, anyways, I was wondering if …”
    “Yeah”—Paul didn’t even let me finish; he was laughing— “she’s here.”
    I suppose my affections for Wendy were more transparent than I’d thought. Paul had somehow discovered I was smitten with his sister. Maybe he had figured this out independently, because he was wiser and older and wearing a pirate shirt with a vest. Or maybe Wendy had told her family about the Police Picnic. Maybe they had laughed about it over Sunday family dinner. Maybe they were laughing at me right now. I could hear Paul chuckling as he put down the receiver and called Wendy’s name. I was convinced I heard a tone in his voice that suggested he knew I was taking his sister to a concert, and that he knew she was two years older than me, and that he knew she was like Bowie and out of my league.
    After what seemed like ages, Wendy came on the phone. I was worried that she might cancel on me. Maybe she had only agreed to come to the concert with me as a joke. Maybe she never meant it. Or maybe she had forgotten about our impending date and made other plans for August. I still had my fingers crossed while holding the phone when Wendy began speaking. Then, with one opening line, she made it all okay.
    “Hi, Jian! The Police Picnic is going to be rad!”
    Wendy sounded like she was actually excited. This was excellent news. Things were still on. My July phone gambit had been a success.
    As I’ve suggested, the outfit was important. Always. But it was especially important at cool concerts. I had learned as much. I needed to look really New Wave so that I wouldn’t embarrass myself or, more importantly, embarrass Wendy. On the morning of the Police Picnic, I decided on black pants, pointy ankle boots, a silver belt, and a black, short-sleeved, button-up shirt … and my Adidas bag. I had lots of gel in my hair and it was puffy and feathered like one of the members of Spandau Ballet before they changed their look and became preppy.
    I fastidiously packed my Adidas bag with all