Part One Hundred
Nikki always had that sinking feeling when she came to that time of the month to meet Trisha at the club for business. There was always a strained edgy undertone to these meetings no matter how hard they tried. Paradoxically, it was Nikki who had first suggested this arrangement. To her practical way of thinking, they could not properly run the club together totally in isolation from each other. Besides, Trisha held the accounts as one of them had to hold them and they had agreed that it would be best to check the accounts together and to talk over future plans for events at the club. She knew that Trisha, if left to herself, would never abuse her position to fiddle Nikki out of her share of the business. It's just that went against the grain to feel dependent or beholden to an ex-girlfriend like some helpless female.She had struck out on her own when she was sixteen to become that sort of grotesque offence against all that she held dear. The practical common sense of the arrangement by routine didn't make it any more comfortable when the time came to leave the atmosphere of warmth and affection of the flat she shared with Helen on Saturday. Sundays and that fraction of a Saturday were utterly precious to her and Helen as for so much of their time, they were physically apart from each other. It was very easy and tempting to spend that precious time with Helen but it would have handed everything over to Trisha. Both Helen and her knew that it would be utterly wrong for Nikki to throw away control over that side of her life.
For all these conflicting reasons, she found herself sitting at a bar table in the cold atmosphere of the club, the smell of last night's stale cigarettes still hanging in the air.
"Let's have a look at the accounts, Trisha and see how we're doing," Nikki said without preamble.
"Nice to see you showing an interest," Trisha found herself saying despite her best resolutions.
"If you're bringing up the matter of those couple of weeks I had out with my friends while Yvonne's daughter who killed that bastard Fenner was up on trial, you should know better, Trish. He wasn't a million miles different from that bastard DC Gossard who I did time for."
Trish promptly shut up as Nikki was perfectly right about that. It was only blind chance that placed him in the club that night when Trisha had been alone that led to Nikki being in prison in the first place. Neither of them had ever felt easy at this man who had given off bad vibrations, the first time he had ever come into the club. Nikki had felt that same instant hatred for Fenner the very first time she had met him at Larkhall.
"I'm sorry, Nikki. I shouldn't have said that," Trisha said feeling genuinely apologetic.
"Yeah, I care enough to make sure with my own eyes that this place isn't going down the pan. We have a professional relationship to maintain and I agreed to put in my fifty percent. You won't ever get less than that out of me," Nikki's curt voice corrected her.
Trisha wearily slid the folders and receipts over from her side of the table to Nikki's. Trisha sat back and stared over Nikki's shoulders as she pored her way industriously over the accounts. She had mixed feelings about this as she had been in total command when Nikki was in Larkhall. When Nikki came back to the club, Trish had agreed readily that Nikki was reclaiming half of what was hers. It was only later that she realised that it wasn't as easy as that. Handing over half of the burden and responsibility was very welcome but she didn't like losing half of the control over what went on. However, both of them reasoned that it was only fair to handle the club on a strict fifty fifty basis once again. Nine years of living with Nikki had made that sense of fair play rub off on her. Nikki was more thorough and efficient than she ever used to be because studying for her degree in Larkhall had sharpened her eye for detail. At least that was a bonus that Trisha had never expected and it had helped the business flourish.
"Okay, everything's fine. Business seems to be doing well."
Trisha had that irritated feeling of being up before her supervisor in her days when she worked in a market research firm but glad at the same time that their club was doing fine. It was the only thing that they could call 'theirs' these days, she felt with a touch of resentment.
"We don't do badly even in the weektime whether you are around or me."
"On present form, we're not exactly headed for the bankruptcy courts."
Nikki spoke with a modicum of enthusiasm trying to sound more positive than she felt. She ought not to take it for granted, she told herself as she would feel terrible living with Helen with debts coming out of her ears.
"That's what made me think of an idea to push up business a bit. What about theme nights? I've checked what the other clubs do and it's becoming quite a trend."
"Straight or gay clubs?" Nikki interjected.
"Gay, naturally," Trisha shot back, offended that her judgement was being questioned.
"Just checking."
"What sort of things have you got in mind? Is it going to cost us a fortune to tart up the club?"
Trisha launched into her ideas. It was what she was good at as she had that commercial sense to sense what the average eighteen to thirty, twenty first-century lesbians wanted by way of club entertainment. She had a background in market research, which was invaluable, when they threw in their lot together to first set up their club. Enough of Nikki's mind was taking in the ideas and she had to admit that they made commercial sense. Nikki could tell in her detached way that it would pull in the punters. Trisha was always right that way.
"Okay babe, you've got me convinced," Nikki cut in while Trisha was still talking enthusiastically away.
Trisha was put out rather than thankful for Nikki's ready agreement. When they were lovers and when either one of them came up with a good idea, the other would have savoured every moment of it and repeated ecstatically what a brilliant idea it was. It was almost as if Nikki's mind was only half engaged with the matter, which, to her, was her lifeblood. They had worked so hard to set up the club at a time when there were hardly any such clubs around and had put their heart and soul into making a success of it. Nikki had had so much boundless enthusiasm for the club, which was their labour of love. When they had a good night at the club, when the music was at its most all enveloping and the lovers were on the dance floor to be free to be with each other, it had seemed a prelude for the two of them to stagger back home to their flat, dead beat to topple into bed and make passionate love. Every part of their lives seemed to flow into each other then.
This remote stranger whose eyes looked out on the world with too many bad experiences of what had gone on in those three years wasn't the same woman. Her Nik had gone for good. This strained woman had had experiences, which she had not shared. These experiences were ones which Nikki had shared with another woman and not her. She was in love with her and they were living together. No matter how gracious she had been in pushing Nikki to run out of the club that fateful day, she had known that deep down, she had done it to save herself the hurt that she would have otherwise gone through. She knew that she had lost Nikki for certain when Nikki had stood on the steps of the Court of Appeal and broke down in emotion on the three o'clock national television for the woman who she had to thank above all else. She knew it wasn't her.
"You've agreed pretty quickly to that.
"You know that you're better at this sort of thing. I trust your judgement."
Nikki's voice sounded warmer and more reassuring. She felt guilty as she knew that she was sounding disinterested in what she ought to devote her entire concentration to. Trish had made a real effort to do all the background research and she ought to make an effort.
"It's almost that now that we've made a success with the club, you lose interest," complained Trisha. "You have almost this need to be a martyr in struggling to make a living and somehow enjoying that struggle. I hated being always short of money. When you get to where you want to go in life, somehow you don't want it anymore. It's almost as if you feel guilty in having any money."
That remark brought Nikki up short. It was only yesterday that she sat on a chair in Helen's office, belligerent, angry, and daring Helen to punish her and confirm her worst opinion of her. 'Oooh, you really love playing the martyr, don't you, Nikki' Helen had said and, in that situation, she was right. Could Trisha be right as well?
"As for me, I want to enjoy the luxuries in life, wear expensive designer clothes, drink champagne and be stinking rich. If I can do it through running a cutting edge lesbian club, then what's wrong with that?"
Everything is wrong with that, the words rang in Nikki's mind, unspoken like a tuning fork being precisely hit. But what does Nikki Wade want out of life besides living with the love of her life, the first words started to peel off from her tangle of thoughts. There has to be more than that and Helen knows that well enough.
"I don't know, Trish. Perhaps I'm starting to get old. I see young kids these days and all they want to do is get totally legless. It's happening to all the clubs these days, straight or gay. I somehow don't want that."
"You don't have any trouble with managing that, Nikki. From what I hear, you are better than anyone in handling the drunks, either aggressive or just paralytic. Are you saying that you were a perfect little angel when you were young? Somehow, I can't believe that, darling," laughed Trisha.
Trisha was right to say she could handle trouble. Those years in Larkhall when she was only a prisoner taught her to depend on her own toughness, verbally and physically and to be able to psych anyone out. Nikki's thoughts went further back in time to when she and Trisha had first started the club and smiled at the memories. It was in the days when it was very hard for a single woman to go somewhere and find a partner that was not of the opposite sex. The whole thing was underground and starting the club was her crusade, to create a place where lesbians could meet openly with that most honest, fundamental declaration of who they are. That was the great motivating force and Helen, bless her, understood that sentiment completely and instantly, feeling it for Nikki to the bottom of her soul. That motivation was so very close to a major driving force in Helen. But could she have lived with Trisha for all those years and Trisha not to know that and, worse, to be operating from an entirely different agenda? She looked at Trisha and blinked her eyes. The chorus of a maudlin country and western song, complete with violin skidding up and down the scales, hit her with incredible force.
"There's a stranger in the house nobody's seen his face And everyone says , he's taken my place There's a stranger in the house nobody one will ever see And everybody says, he looks like me."
That's the answer, Nikki thought. What is she doing here holding on to a way of life that she clung onto, only because it was the first fruits? In an inverted way, Trisha was right. If she could no longer believe in what she was doing, it was time to get out of the situation. She needed a new job and fast. That was the key to her future.
"Yeah well, Trisha, you go ahead with your plans. I'm sure they'll work out fine." The irony of it all was that Trisha was encouraged by Nikki's general attitude.