This Is Your Life Read Online Free PDF Page B

undergraduate, Billy Scrivens had been in the Cambridge Footlights and my old English teacher at school had
also
been in the Footlights about ten years before him. I paused for a moment, wondering how to broach this, but Betty was not so reserved and ran right up and sniffed his dog’s bottom.
    â€˜Bit windy today,’ said Billy Scrivens. I laughed heartily because I presumed the word ‘windy’ was a fart joke referring to his dog’s posterior and my dog’s interest in it. He seemed thrown by my laughter, which made me realize that all he’d meant was that it was a bit windy today. I searched for some witty rejoinder to demonstrate that I was totally unfazed at having bumped into a TV superstar.
    â€˜Yes,’ I said. And then he walked on.
    *
    â€˜So did you chat for long?’ said my brother-in-law as my family focused on me with a level of concentration that felt as pleasing as it felt unfamiliar.
    â€˜Not that long, I had to get back . . .’ In fact, I had turned and watched Billy as he ran off and was then stopped by an attractive girl asking for his autograph. Funny how she’d recognized him when she hadn’t even looked up from the ground when she’d passed me.
    â€˜What did you talk about?’ said Mum.
    â€˜Er, well, you know, the usual stuff. . .’
    â€˜No we don’t know! Tell us!’ demanded Carol.
    â€˜Um, well, look, I don’t want to sound pompous or anything but with someone as famous as Billy I think one should treat private conversations as exactly that. But Billy’s just an ordinary person like anyone else . . .’ Nothing I had said so far was actually a lie.
    â€˜So you often stop and chat with him, do you?’
    â€˜Yeah, quite often.’
    Oh. That was.
    â€˜Billy,
he calls him,’ said Mum.
‘Billy,
not Billy Scrivens. So is
Billy
coming to your birthday drinks later this evening?’
    â€˜Er, no – I decided not to invite him in the end. It’s hard enough for him in a little town like this without all my mates from the language school asking him to repeat his catchphrase all night.’
    It felt good being the friend of a superstar. I’m sure he would have appreciated me protecting him like this.
    â€˜Well I never! My son, a pal of Billy Scrivens’s, just wait until I tell the girls.’
    â€˜No – don’t go round broadcasting it, Mum.’
    â€˜Would he like to have dinner with us now, then, if he’s not coming for drinks later? Give him a ring, ask him if he wantsto come and have some chicken in a basket. It looks nice in the photo.’
    â€˜No, Mum, really, I don’t want to disturb him now.’
    Even though ‘Billy’ would not be joining us for dinner, there was a noticeable shift. For the rest of the mealtime I was more interesting. Mum and Dad were visibly more proud; I had gone up several notches in status. All because I had exaggerated a chance encounter with a celebrity. Now they were basking in the warmth of the Stardust that had rubbed off on me.
    â€˜Maybe Billy Scrivens could help you get a job in television, darling,’ said my mother. Though I had promised myself I wouldn’t tell my family about my secret project, the moment suddenly seemed ripe. They were temporarily impressed with me, and since Mum had alluded to a change of career I proudly told them my big news.
    â€˜Screenwriter?’ said my dad, sounding momentarily optimistic about this turn of events. ‘What’s that, like a computer thing, is it?’
    â€˜No – writing films. A writer who writes scripts for the big screen.’
    â€˜Oh lord,’ he said with a world-weary sigh.
    I didn’t expect them to understand. At least my brother was interested, as I might have expected since he was a bit of a movie buff himself.
    â€˜What’s it about?’
    â€˜Well, it’s very early days; it’s hard to explain.’
    â€˜What is