The Funny Thing about Norman Foreman, Julietta Henderson [best novels to read for students .TXT] 📗

to the outskirts of the city, although not so much when I realized Norman’s show was scheduled to start in just over an hour. I had a moment of mild panic at the thought of how fine we’d be cutting it to get back to the Soft Fudge to pick up Norman and then to the Duke. But of course Leonard had it all in hand.

‘If I may make a suggestion, Sadie, I think we should go straight to the venue. I didn’t say before, but Norman is getting a lift to . . . that is, there are arrangements in place . . . to get him to the show, and we really don’t have time to go back to the accommodation. I think it’s best.’

It made me wonder just how big this show at the Duke had got, if they were sending a car for Norman, but Leonard reassured me there was nothing to worry about. And he was right about the timing. So even though I’d be attending the most important event of my son’s life in two-day-old clothes, with hospital-bed head and dog’s breath, I was alive, I was showing up and, for the first time in Norman’s life, it felt like I was actually ready for the job.

Without taking his eyes off the road, Leonard reached into his top pocket and took out his phone with our route to Ground Zero, aka the Duke Supper Club at O’Shaughnessy’s Real Ale House, already programmed in to Google Maps, and held it out to me.

‘Would you mind holding this, my dear? And perhaps . . . navigating a little?’

As I took the phone from Leonard’s old-gentleman hands, in the blink of an eye it was a different car, a different venue, a different gentle man. Get the A–Z out, Sadie love, you’re in charge! And it was the strangest thing, but for the first time in more than thirteen years I could picture my father’s smile. And it didn’t hurt a bit.

‘No problem at all, Leonard.’

Without a single false turn along the way, Leonard and I pulled into a parking spot almost directly across the road from O’Shaughnessy’s. My breath caught in my throat when I saw the crowd of people on the pavement outside the pub, but before I had time to start worrying Leonard had materialized around my side of the car to help me out.

‘Easy there, Sadie. Careful, my girl, steady as she goes.’

I had a second to wonder why on earth someone hadn’t said that to me years ago, before Leonard took my arm gently to guide me across the road. I looked to the left to check for traffic and saw a moped veer off and tuck in neatly behind a parked car. A tall, scruffy-looking guy with no helmet and crazy, wind-mussed hair stepped off the bike, then turned to help his passenger remove his helmet. The kid had the same windblown look and, although he was slight, I could see the shape that hinted at the man he’d be soon enough. Confident stance, chin out, shoulders trying to hold up the best bits of an oversized jacket. The sudden noise of a car horn made them both turn their heads in our direction and my heart imploded in my chest as the boy-man dropped his helmet on to the road and ran straight into my arms.

With my chin resting on Norman’s shoulder and squeezing his body as tight as I dared, it took me all of about five seconds to work out exactly who Mr Moped was. The how and why of him being there with Norman was infinitely less clear, but somehow it didn’t seem important. I’d find out later, or I wouldn’t. It didn’t matter. Now that Norman and I had arrived here, all that mattered was right in front of me. This place. This moment. This boy.

The second Norman and I stepped back from each other he started talking at a hundred overexcited miles an hour. A collection of unfamiliar names fell from his lips and mingled with abandon into disjointed sentences about disguises and tumble dryers and houseboats and Dave Allen. I felt the words ducking and diving and swirling around me, but all I could do was stand there and stare at my son.

The serious, softly rounded face I loved so much was the same, but there was a set to it that was entirely different. Every part of him was animated and the smile that hadn’t left his face since he’d seen me was so brilliant it made me feel giddy. Even though I couldn’t put my finger on just what it was that had changed about Norman, I knew for certain he wasn’t the same boy that had left Penzance.

It was a few seconds before I became aware that Norman’s chattering had trailed off and he was staring over my shoulder, open-mouthed, at the gathering crowd outside the side door leading down to the Duke Supper Club. To my absolute surprise, fully formed sentences began to slide eloquently out of me.

‘Don’t worry about it, Norman. It’s OK. I . . . I know it looks like a lot of people, but once they’re inside sitting down it won’t look so bad, I promise. You’ll be fine. You’re going to be amazing.’

Good god. Here it was. Twelve years late but, finally, the good-mother gene had kicked in. I could feel some more good advice bubbling up, trying to get over my tongue, but before I had a chance to find out what it was Norman started waving his arms above his head and pointing across the road.

‘No, Mum, look! That’s . . . it’s Kathy and Tony . . . they’re here! And Adam! Oh my god . . . MUM! Look! There’s Big Al! They CAME! They actually came!’

As Norman’s words started to sink in, my eyes focused on the sea of faces milling around across the road. And sure enough, I couldn’t have missed Adam, busy running into people in his mobility scooter, looking like he