Page 20 of Musical Games
‘The beginning? What’s coming next? The alarm for a nuclear attack? Warning sirens for the zombie apocalypse?’
She giggled. ‘Do you want to see?’
‘Only if I don’t have to join in.’
‘You don’t want to participate?’
Jamie crossed his arms in front of him.
‘I could give you a sticker?’
He raised his eyebrows and she held up her hands.
‘Okay, okay. So, I’ll make this quick. I won’t do the full half hour.’
‘Half an hour?’
She was already shrugging her shoulders up and down. ‘Uh-huh.’ She raised her arms over her head again and Jamie looked away. In his peripheral vision he saw her bend at the waist, her hands grazing the floor, her bottom wiggling from side to side. He closed his eyes.
‘Raaaaaaaaahhhhh!’
He leapt back on the bed.What the fuck?Sam was in front of the mirror on the door of the wardrobe with her mouth open wide, roaring like a lioness. She then scrunched her face up tightly as if she was biting into a lemon. After a few of these, she stuck her tongue out and tugged on it, pulling it out, down, then from side to side. He looked on in horror and she caught his eye in the reflection.
‘Ih ohay, ih ugun hur,’ she reassured him. She let go of her tongue and flexed her lips. ‘The tip of the tongue and the teeth and the lips,’ she repeated over and over again so fast, her mouth was a blur. When she finally drew breath, she started saying ‘onion’ at a really high pitch, stretching out the ‘ny’ sound as she brought her voice down low. ‘Red lorry, yellow lorry, red lorry, yellow lorry,’ she repeated, getting quicker and quicker until she ended with another roar and folded her body forward again.
‘Am I meant to clap?’
Sam straightened with a laugh, put her high-heeled mules back on and sat in the chair facing the bed. ‘Not at all.’
‘Does everyone onElm Tree Lanedo that?
‘Most people do something. Me and Loz do the exercises together. Ian warms up by practising his orgasm face in the mirror.’
She picked up the pile of papers she’d written her lyrics on and flicked through them. Jamie felt his face flood with heat. He’d seen Sam kissing Ian on screen and attending red-carpet events on his arm. Now he knew they were even closer in real life. Did Ian mind that she was here trying to catch Brad Bauer’s eye? Did he even care? He reached for his guitar and tuned it.
‘I don’t know how to do this,’ he said quietly.
He heard her exhale and glanced at her. She was so beautiful it made his chest hurt. She seemed unsure.
‘If it makes you feel any better, neither do I,’ she said.
‘But you’ve written music before?’
Sam shook her head.
He indicated the paper in her hand. ‘What’s all that then?’
She shrugged. ‘Desperation and divine intervention? I have no idea how I came up with this. How do you write your music?’
‘It takes a long time. Months sometimes before a song comes together. A lot of trial and error and playing to the harshest critics ever.’
‘Your mum?’
‘God, no. I could have come up with “Baby Shark” and she’d still think I was Mozart. No, it’s Fi. She’s the first to tell me what I’ve written is a crock of shite. But if she’s bad, then there’s someone even worse than her.’
‘Duncan?’
‘No, he’s my best mate, so he’s usually got my back. The Simon Cowell of this family is Liam.’
