Lady and the Punk
In 1977 I was just a boy dressed in leather, walking down a derelict North London street. But I had heard a rumour. A myth. The speculated dirt on the local clothes shop, Nazis. There was a girl, a heroine. She couldn't be true…
I walked down the street, surely Marco had misheard. I had no idea what I was looking for, but I soon realised. You could spot the shop a mile off. It was just a normal, one-level box, but red paint had been slashed across the outside. Posters of half-naked Aryan girls in the windows. Thousands of swastikas adorning the walls. Rule Britannia was blaring out of the shop, the girls inside marching around to the sound. They were pointing their right hands high in the air.
I started to move closer to the window, careful not to attract the attention of the girls inside the shop. I scratched a tiny bit of the paint off the window and had a proper view of the shop… and the girls. One had black messy hair that stopped at her shoulders and wore a normal woolly jumper and black tights. She wore heavy make-up around her eyes matched with bright pink lipstick, quite average really. But the other girl stood behind the counter, ready to serve her friend…and she was different. Her hair seemed as if it stood 8 feet tall, her clothes were the perfect soft pink colour of suburbia, but her face was something else altogether. Pink Mondrian triangles spread across her pale face, her lips pouting, covered in matching pink lipstick. Everywhere she looked seemed to freeze under her gaze, even her friend seemed to avoid her eyes. She scanned around the shop and I was sure she saw me, but I was wrong and she went back to talking to her messy haired friend.
I decided to go in.
I pushed open the door and a little bell rang making the two girls look around at me. A huge silence hung over the shop as I stood shifting my legs and twiddling my fingers around my jacket's zips and buckles. The plain girl coughed, signalling for me to fully enter the shop. I had to find something to do. To have a reason for being in the shop, and the normal-looking girl was going. Leaving me alone with her.
I quickly scanned the shop. More posters of Aryan girls plastered the walls and rails of t-shirts were spread across the room. Tartan and chains draped from the ceiling, everything covered in safety pins. Ties hung around mannequins like nooses and skimpy leather outfits were scattered across the floor. I paced across to the far corner, getting as far away as I could from her. Flicking quickly through the shirts I found a little one; a red swastika hand-painted onto the front and the words "silly moustache" stencilled on in black. I whipped it off the rack and span on my heels. But realised what I'd done, and she was staring at me with those eyes.
"Umm…" I stuttered out and walked towards her. Placing the shirt on the counter she picked it up, with a smile on her face. Her eyes dropped to my feet and she scanned up the rest of me.
"Boots… suit trousers…leather jacket?" She smiled at her own words, "Well, I didn't think a girl's T-shirt would suit." Her crisp English words cutting into me, and my eyes widened in fear.
"Umm… what, what do you mean?" I whimpered.
"The shirt… it's a girl's one,"
She stood with her face completely straight, and when I didn't reply she burst out in laughter.
"Oh my goodness! I can't believe you didn't realise!" She burst out in laughter once again.
"I…" My eyes widened even more and I couldn't speak. My heart started to pound against my ribcage and sweat made white face paint run down my face.
"Urh." I couldn't stand it any longer… I had to escape. In the daze of her laughter, her beautifully defined laughter, I ran. Leaving the shirt on the counter and sprinting out the shop as fast as I could. I slammed the door and looked at the shop one more time. She was the girl in the posters. I ran. Escaping the girl in the local clothes shop's laughter.
I sat in my flat. Trying desperately to pull myself back together. Top of the Pops was blaring out of my TV behind me, but now not even that could cheer me up and turned it off in distaste. I went to turn on my radio and instead of over-produced nonsense from Top of the Pops the room was blasted by a shaky rendition of God Save the Queen.
"Oh shut up Sex Pistols!" I threw the radio across the room and it smashed against my plain black walls. All that lay in my flat unbroken was my TV and a few chalk pencils. And with that I set up to try and write. I needed something to take my mind off her. Slumping in front of one of my bare walls I took a chalk pencil from its box.
"It doesn't matter du, dudu, duna, du, dudu, it doesn't matterrrr, I'll get by with another b-b-b-baby, you smell."
I smiled at my little lyrics. The best way to get back at someone was to immortalise an insult in song. My smile spread even wider across my face.
"Ergh Stop it!" I screamed at myself. I was thinking of her again!
I couldn't stop thinking of her. I tried everything to get rid of her face. I couldn't. I had to talk to her.
The little bell rang as I opened the door to the shop. This time filled with enough confidence to talk. Not much. But enough.
She sat behind the counter singing silently to herself, staring at the ceiling.
"Hey Kid," she said blandly. Not even looking.
"How… how…"
"You mean your name's Kid?"
"Urh… yer…" She span on her heels and looked directly into my eyes.
"Kid? Right…" She span back round on her heels and picked up a copy of NME. The Sex Pistols were sprawled across the cover.
"Sell-outs. I'm a proper musician." I leaned against the counter suddenly overcome with something. A topic! She stood up and threw her NME down in front of me.
"I am Jordan." Her accent still clipped my ears. "If you're a proper musician, sing me a "proper" song." She sat back down on her chair behind the counter and crossed her legs, waiting for me to perform.
"Umm…"
"Come on. Don't dream it. Be it. Actually…" She stood up and climbed on top of the counter. "Aren't you going to help a lady down?" She held out her hand and I nervously held onto it, pulling her down. She then positioned my hand around her waist and grabbed hold of my shoulder, taking one of my hands in hers. There was silence as we stood.
Ready to dance.
Jordan's face suddenly dropped and she stared down into my eyes.
"Sing then!" I was just taller then her but her voice sounded like it came from metres above me, commanding me.
"I used to go to the World's End, I used to visit that shop. I didn't like the clothes there, but I liked what she got…" With each word I sang, Jordan led me around the shop floor.
A living work of art holding a singing work of art.