Sounds Like Radio Episode 05
They were scrubbing sticky residue off an acoustic screen.
The room smelled strongly of the lighter fluid they were using to clean.
“How do the actors fit in here?” Gerry asked, weaving her way through a forest of microphone stands.
“I mean, do you have regulars? Are any on the staff, as it were?”
“They’re all freelance, though Caleb Jenkinson is here a lot.”
“I don’t think I’ve ever met an actual actor.”
“They’re normal civilised human beings.” Cesca stopped for a moment.
“Though Caleb may be a bad example.
“He gets regular work here in an easy environment – no wigs, no make-up . . .” She giggled.
“But he feels he deserves something ‘better’ – like a season at Stratford.”
Cesca pulled from the wall a sheet of A4 paper.
It appeared to represent the studio layout and was covered in numbers, letters, lines and little icons of microphones.
“Actually, Kevin would be happier without the actors,” she said.
“He just loves the tech, really. The talent gets in the way.”
“Who’s that?” Gerry pointed through the glass.
A young, dark-haired woman was striding, head down, towards the office.
“Oh good, Miriam’s back.” Cesca hurried out of the studio.
Gerry went upstairs to make tea. Cesca had the look of someone who needed a cuppa.
While she was opening and closing cupboards in search of the wherewithal, a petite woman with a glossy black bob came in.
“Is Kevin here?”
“I think he’s in the edit suite,” Gerry said, feeling pleased just to be able to use the terminology. “Tea?”
“No, thanks.” The woman looked into the mug that Gerry had plucked out of the sink.
“I’ve tried the tea here before.”
“Are you a client?” Gerry asked, washing the mug. “I’m new here and trying to find my way around.”
“No, I’m Monica, Kevin’s wife. I’m taking him out for lunch. We do it regularly – three times a week is the aim.”
“How nice.”
It was odd. Monica did not look like a woman desperate to be with her husband.
Gerry had done a stint in the registry office at the council and knew adoration in a bride and a groom when she saw it – and when she didn’t see it.
She never wanted to go back to those days of serving the public in all its dysfunctional variety.
Gerry kept on with the tea. The kitchen was tiny and so it quickly became awkward.
Monica tapped the worktop absently.
“Second wife,” she said eventually.
Gerry was used to people opening up to her. It had happened all through her life.
She supposed that she had that sort of face.
“These lunches,” Monica went on. “They keep us . . . on track. We’ve had some struggles.”
“Who hasn’t?” Gerry said.
“Are you married?”
“Never.”
“There can be unexpected aspects.”
“I’ve not met Kevin, but I know he’s terrifically good at what he does, and that he’s a very particular kind of chap.”
“Nail hit squarely on head,” Monica replied with a smile.
“I’ll say this much: he’s the same at home as he is here, only more so.”
Gerry nodded slowly.
“We’ve had a stand pipe in the kitchen for three months,” Monica said.
“Sorry?”
“Kev wants to level the floor before refitting the kitchen. He claims it slopes. I can’t see it.
“He’s still sourcing ‘special screed’ that only comes from one supplier in the Baltics somewhere.
“And all the windows that face the road are currently boarded up.”
“Oh.” It seemed microphones hanging from curtains was the least of it, with Kevin.
“He went on an advanced sash window repair course during his annual leave, came home and took them all out.
“I was in Hong Kong visiting family.
“When I got back the front of my house was dark! He wants to get the new windows ‘absolutely right’.
“I’ve been living on a building site since we got married.” She looked up. “But I love the guy. I do.”
Monica seemed to have forgotten that Gerry was even there.
“It was worse for his first wife: she lived in a caravan while he thatched their cottage in Warwickshire! It took ten months.”
A little later Gerry watched Kevin and Monica head out together, Kevin talking away and Monica nodding patiently.
Couples, she thought, come in many forms.