Forever Phoenix Read online

  I open my mouth to speak, and find that for once I have no words.

  Marley drags open the door of the little compartment at the end of the carriage, the space Jake’s mum uses for aromatherapy and reflexology appointments.

  ‘Just go!’ Then the door slams behind him, and Lexie stands uncertainly, Sami at her side. George, Jake, Sasha and Happi get to their feet too.

  ‘Really sorry,’ Lexie says. ‘It was never going to be easy, but … well, we wish you all the best, you know that, right?’

  ‘We know,’ Lee says. ‘We know.’

  And, just like that, half of the Lost & Found walk away forever.

  25

  Picking Up the Pieces

  The band survives, of course. We pick up the pieces and move forward, practising every day. We’ve lost our backing singers, our flute and cello and one of our violins – and lost our first and perhaps our best songwriter … but we still have each other.

  After all, we are the ones who really need the Lost & Found. We can’t give it up no matter what. Marley is music mad, obviously, and crazy ambitious. Dylan doesn’t care about anything but playing the drums. Lee has found a place where he can dance and play and act the idiot in a feathered beret, far away from grease, grime and car engines. Bex needs the band to blot out a troubled childhood, and I’m not so very different – for both of us it’s a chance to spread our wings and soar. For Romy the Lost & Found is an escape from looking after her mum, who’s chronically ill. A cousin moved down from Scotland at the start of January to take over as carer, and Romy is blossoming before our very eyes.

  We have drums and bass and lead guitar, a trumpet for drama, a violin to tug at the heartstrings. We have determination.

  ‘We even have a magpie,’ Marley adds, but I’ve been thinking a lot about that just lately. The first faint stirrings of spring are here, and Pie no longer waits for me each afternoon in the old oak tree. He’s often missing in action for days at a time, probably off in the park, flirting with the girl magpies, ruffling a few feathers.

  He has always been happy enough at rehearsals, but I know deep down that he didn’t enjoy the big Birmingham gig, that the TV studio made him anxious and fretful. He hates the cat basket, and taking him to London – or, worse, taking him on tour – would not be fair. ‘He’s a wild creature,’ Mum had said last year, and finally I am beginning to understand that.

  If you love someone, set them free … isn’t that what they say?

  ‘I think Pie’s got a girlfriend,’ I tell Marley. ‘He’s stepping back from the public eye for a while, to focus on his personal life.’

  ‘Please tell me you’re joking,’ Marley says.

  ‘Sadly not,’ I say. ‘He’ll still be a staunch supporter … available for occasional photo shoots and railway carriage band practices and one-off local gigs, but he doesn’t want to go on the road. Sorry.’

  ‘Never trust a magpie,’ he says with a sigh.

  So I stop calling Pie, stop looking for him, let him go.

  It leaves a hole in my heart that might never heal, but still, I know it’s the right thing to do. Pie has always been much more than a magpie. He’s taught me how to love, how to care, how to be brave, how to find my voice. He’s taught me how to rise from the ashes.

  A phoenix is a magical creature, a bird from the world of myths and legends, of fantasy and dreams. You’re never going to spot one in the wild – or even in a zoo or a conservation centre – but that doesn’t mean they don’t exist. Maybe it’s just that we make the mistake of looking for plumage the colour of fire and flames, when any magical creature worth knowing would take care to disguise himself … maybe in white and blue-black feathers with a sheen of oil-slick green?

  I place a gleaming tail feather in the Quality Street tin, smiling.

  As for the band dropouts, Marley gets over his disappointment and bridges are built. We keep on sitting at the big corner table in the school canteen, because we were never just band mates but also friends, the kind of friends who can weather a storm or two.

  ‘We always had too many people for a band,’ Lexie points out. ‘The record companies will probably prefer the new slimmed-down version of the Lost & Found!’

  And that’s exactly what happens. We go to London at half-term and meet the record company, and they tell us they love us and will move heaven and earth to make us famous. They want more songs like ‘Fireworks’ and ‘Rise Again’, and it doesn’t seem to matter about not having a cello or a flute. They ask about Pie though, and, while sympathetic about his new romance, suggest he joins us for publicity shoots now and then. ‘He’s a unique selling point,’ they insist.

  ‘No, he’s a magpie,’ I reply. ‘A wild creature with the freedom to live however he wants to, OK?’ They have to settle for that.

  Wrecked Records put us into Ked’s recording studio in Devon to make an EP – three tracks, with ‘Rise Again’ to be released as a single. We miss three weeks of school, but Ked arranges a tutor to make sure we stay on top of schoolwork; it’s especially important for Bex with GCSEs looming. While the EP is being mixed and mastered, we do a ton of publicity. Wrecked Records have sent out a press release proclaiming that we are the next big thing, tipped by Lola Rockett and Ked Wilder to turn the current music scene on its head.

  We are interviewed by national newspapers and Sunday magazines, websites and teen blogs and a whole raft of kids’ magazines, and I manage to enlist Pie to appear in most of them. The magazines cast Marley as the cool, ambitious power behind the band, Dylan as the cute and enigmatic drummer, Lee as the energetic, eccentric joker. Bex is the smart and slightly scary punk kid and Romy is the girl-next-door type with a penchant for fifties frocks and bows in the hair. Me? I’m the flame-haired firebrand with the magpie mascot, fierce, feminist, the face of the band.

  A picture of me in the blue-black wings with Pie on my shoulder appears on the cover of a music magazine with the tagline ‘Forever Phoenix’ and Lola Rockett promises to devote a whole programme to the issue of whether the Lost & Found can rise from the ashes of a stale and worn-out music industry and usher in a new era of originality, talent and raw energy. TV cameras track our discussions with Wrecked Records and our days in the studio, and plan to follow our progress as the proposed tour zigzags across the country.

  Our first single, ‘Rise Again’, is released on 1st June in a blaze of publicity and begins climbing the charts. It’s like the world has already decided we’re something special.

  Wrecked Records have agreed to hold back the tour until Marley and Bex’s last exams are over, so we set off the day after they finish, with a tour bus and driver provided by the record company, on a whistle-stop tour of the UK.

  ‘You’ll never guess,’ Bex tells us. ‘Matt Brennan got caught cheating in his English Lit. exam – he had a whole bunch of Shakespeare quotes written on his shirt cuffs! He’s been disqualified, obviously, and Mr Simpson says he’s been expelled too. That won’t look too good on his application for a journalism degree, will it?’

  ‘Who said there was no justice in this world?’ Marley crows, and I smile. Matt, who lied about Sasha and the band to the tabloids and then tried to con me into dishing more dirt on them, will learn the hard way that cheating never pays.

  So the tour begins, and it’s a bit like setting out on a school trip without any teachers on board. Ked is keeping a steady eye on our business interests, but the record company give us a young tour manager called Mike who tries and fails to keep us in check. He’s like a supply teacher who can’t quite keep the class from ripping the school to bits, and there’s lots of squabbling, backchat and bad behaviour. Lee does cartwheels and handsprings up and down the aisle of the bus, and Moody Mike puts on his sunglasses and pretends to sleep through it all.

  We plot our journey from London to Brighton, Norwich to York, then on to Edinburgh, Glasgow, Liverpool and Cardiff and home at last to Millford. Mum comes to the Edinburgh gig with four of my ex-teachers from Bellvale, and they st
and right at the front, cheering and yelling after every song and splash out on Lost & Found T-shirts from the merch stand.

  The venues range from cute old-timey theatres to modern leisure centres, but wherever we go there are hordes of pre-teen kids. The girls scream and swoon for Lee, Marley and Dylan but they absolutely idolize me, Bex and Romy, begging for autographs and selfies afterwards. ‘I want to be just like you, Phoenix,’ ten-year-old girls tell me after every gig. ‘You’re my hero!’

  It’s surreal. Wherever we go the papers report on our success, and every show sells out.

  The tour takes a fortnight, with a few days off for rest, and we are to end up back in Millford in time to headline their summer festival. Last year, Grandma Lou and the Lost & Found cooked up the festival between them to help save Millford’s threatened libraries. Now the festival looks set to be an annual event – and we’re top of the bill.

  We travel from Cardiff to Millford, but we set off later than planned and the timing is tight. By the time the tour bus ditches us at the park, the festival is in full swing. Moody Mike delivers us to the stage to soundcheck, then shepherds us through to the Green Room. I’ve seen a lot of Green Rooms since joining the band – this one is a big marquee, and when we step inside, tired from two weeks on the road, a roar of cheers erupts.

  ‘Wow,’ Bex says into my ear. ‘Look at that!’ A giant banner – WELCOME HOME, LOST & FOUND – is hung along one side of the tent, and a crowd of friends and family are waiting to greet us. I know I’m not the only one to melt inside at the welcome.

  Grandma Lou, elegant in teal-blue velvet, her red hair piled up and bound with a blue silk scarf, takes my hands. ‘Phoenix, I’ve missed you so much,’ she tells me. ‘Just look at you, following your dreams! We’re all so very, very proud of you!’

  I look over Grandma Lou’s shoulder and there’s Mum, looking slightly less stern and much more colourful than usual, a purple cashmere cardi over her Lost & Found T-shirt and a mustard and mauve pleated skirt. My heart is so full it might actually burst … I only saw her a few days ago in Edinburgh, yet she’s rushed down to surprise me here as well. I’d run right into her arms, but Millford Park Academy’s head teacher is standing right beside her, an arm hooked through hers, smug and smarmy in a brown-checked wool suit.

  ‘You know Stanley, don’t you?’ Mum says. ‘Mr Simpson to you, of course!’

  ‘Your mother bought me a T-shirt, too!’ he tells me, lifting his suit jacket aside to reveal the offending item.

  Nightmare. Seriously. In so many ways. It’s great to see Mum happy … but, boy, does she have rotten taste in men.

  I see Ked, our mentor and manager, the man who may or may not know he’s a jigsaw piece in our mad, mixed-up family. He is rakish as ever in his black fedora hat, telling Marley that the record company have reported a huge spike in sales this week. Our first single has now reached number three in the charts, and Ked seems to think we’ll hit the top spot next week.

  On Marley’s other side is the cute waiter from the Leaping Llama, an arm draped lazily round Marley’s shoulders, in full flirt mode.

  Ked steps up beside me, grinning. ‘I couldn’t resist popping up to see your show, Phoenix,’ he says. ‘I’m so proud of you. I’ve been spending a lot of time lately with Louisa, talking about the past, putting things together – things I should have worked out long, long ago. We have some catching up to do, it seems, you and me and Vivi. Louisa and I got a lot of things wrong, but it’s never too late to start putting them right, is it?’

  ‘No … never!’ I tell him, wide eyed.

  Grandma Lou is glowing as she looks on, and I don’t think it’s just the suntan from her stay in Ked’s villa in the south of France. Ked’s hand is wrapped round hers, best friends and long-ago lovers, ageing rabble-rousers, a messed-up family tied together by secrets and love. I can’t help smiling. I don’t think I’d change a single thing about any of them, and a whole new chapter looks like it’s about to begin.

  Of course, family isn’t just the people you’re related to – it’s all the people you love. Lee, Marley, Dylan, Bex and Romy are family now, too, partners in crime and creating havoc, the people who listen when I’m sad and missing home, who understand what it’s like to spend six hours straight in the studio and then do it all again the next day, and the day after, and the day after. They understand the sick feeling you get before a gig and the soaring joy when you’re up there in the spotlight. They know me better than I know myself.

  That’s what the others gave up, I guess, along with the long hours and the pressure, the roller-coaster highs and lows. Lexie, Sami, Jake, Sasha, George and Happi are here too, all of us together again. There’s laughter and hugs and talk, and then Moody Mike looms up, telling us it’s time to go.

  As we file out of the Green Room, we run into a family coming in. The man is tanned and anxious-looking with horn-rimmed specs and thinning hair, the woman beside him tired and cross, wearing too much make-up, an unflattering dress and high heels that are sinking into the grass and giving her a slightly lopsided appearance. She grips two bemused flaxen-haired toddlers by the hand.

  ‘Phoenix!’ the man says, and my heart stills. I’d know that anguished wail anywhere.

  ‘Dad … Wanda … what are you doing here?’

  ‘We’re in the UK so we can catch up with my folks,’ Wanda begins, but Dad interrupts.

  ‘No, Wanda, we’re here to see Phoenix,’ he says firmly. ‘We’ve been following your progress, love, and when Vivi told us about this gig I knew we had to come over. We wouldn’t have missed it for the world! I’m so very proud of you, Phoenix! We’ll be out there, cheering you on!’

  ‘Aww, Dad …’ I don’t get the chance to say any more, because he hauls me in for a hug and whispers in my ear that he’s sorry, that he swears things will be different from now on. I don’t know whether to believe him, but, let’s face it, I’ve turned over enough new leaves of my own not to at least give him another chance.

  Released from the hug, I lean down to say hello to Drake and Dara, the two half-brothers I’ve never even met until now. They look a little overwhelmed, but also very cute and possibly cheeky. Dad and Wanda may not be as perfect as I’d like them to be, but there is still time to train Drake and Dara, surely? I’m pretty sure I could be the best-ever bad influence and big half-sister.

  ‘Phoenix, what’s the big hold-up?’ Moody Mike yells, and I’m whisked away, promising to catch up with Dad after the gig.

  Moments later, we’re standing in the wings gathering our breath and trying to focus as Pretty Street, the hip-hop band who supported us in Birmingham before Christmas, wind up their set and run offstage. I recognize their friendly backing singer and dancer, Bobbi-Jo, but I can’t quite believe my eyes when Sharleen Scott, dressed in a lycra minidress, follows her offstage.

  ‘Break a leg, Posh Girl,’ she says, and I laugh, because when we first met Sharleen’s swift kick to the shin almost did just that, and now here she is, somehow part of a band after all, dancing rather than singing, wishing me luck.

  Maybe the last set of a two-week tour is always the best, or maybe it’s because we’re home at last, or because we know there’s so much love out there in the crowd, but the gig is electric from the very start. We’re on a high, feeding off the audience buzz, digging down to find energy where we thought none was left and spinning it into gold. I can see Dad and Wanda in the crowd, each with one of my half-brothers on their shoulders, arms waving … it’s seriously weird.

  The set flies past, and then it’s the encore, and Marley steps up to the mic and announces that some very special guests will join us to play the last two songs. George runs on with his cello, Sami with his flute and Happi with her violin. Even Lexie, Jake and Sasha are here with tambourines and smiles on their faces, and when Ked joins me at the mic, the crowd go crazy.

  ‘Ready, kiddo?’ he asks.

  ‘You betcha, Gramps,’ I tease, and although he leans in to hug me, laughing, I am
willing to bet not a single soul in the audience of thousands watching us has a clue what they’ve just witnessed.

  We launch into a cover of ‘Phoenix’ in honour of Ked, and the crowd go wild. They don’t hear him tell me he’ll have to add an extra verse now, to give the song a happy ending, but they definitely see the huge smile that puts on my face. The very last song is ‘Rise Again’, and as I start to sing the whole world seems to shift before my eyes, jagged and bright and broken and beautiful, as if all the feelings, good and bad, are too close to the surface to be hidden any more.

  I’m on the last chorus of ‘Rise Again’ when I look up at the darkening summer sky and see a black-and-white bird swooping low, circling above the crowd, gliding in soundlessly to land on my shoulder. Lee has to take my hand because tears are streaming down my cheeks, and there’s an explosion of camera flashes and the TV camera rigged up in front of the stage zooms in to capture it all.

  Friends are forever, even the magpie kind.

  Dad, Weird Wanda and the cheeky half-brothers have long since retreated to the safety of their hotel, with promises to do better at keeping in touch, but, even after they’ve gone, the Green Room party lasts late into the night.

  The moon is high in a star-bright sky by the time we head back to Greystones, a big crowd of us – Grandma Lou, Ked, Mum, Mr Simpson, Jake and his family, Sharleen and hers, and assorted others, to carry on the fun. A distant glimpse through the big sash windows reveals Grandma Lou’s family painting, now hanging in pride of place on the far wall, no longer a secret.

  Lee and I linger for a while by the wrought-iron gates, saying goodnight … and then it’s past midnight so we say good morning too. I kiss Lee’s nose and tell him that I love him, laughing as the tips of his ears go scarlet and knowing I’ll never get tired of seeing that. At last Lee heads off to his own house, his own family.