Private Lives

14



The beach was two and a half miles long, that was what Mike had told him. Sam looked back along the long white stretch of sand and wondered why he hadn’t been here before. Eigan island, ten miles from the Scottish mainland, was so heart-stoppingly beautiful, with the pale sun glinting off the ripples of wet sand, the heather-fringed cliffs, even the sea eagles wheeling effortlessly above him scanning the waves for their dinner.

Sam kicked a piece of driftwood with his foot, but remembering that it made the best kindling, he stopped dead and stooped to pick it up. As he bent over, he noticed that the bottom of his two-thousand-dollar Tom Ford trousers had white rings left by the salt water. For a split second he wondered if anywhere on the tiny island offered a dry-cleaning service – as it didn’t even have a shop, he very much doubted it – but as the sunshine shimmered like a spray of tiny diamonds over the clear Atlantic waters, he felt a surge of rebellion and ran to the edge of the shore, splashing through the tide until the fabric was truly soaked.

Laughing, he rolled the trousers up to his calves, realising that although he’d only left the pampered celebrity world two days ago, it already felt like a fading dream. Eli had suggested that Sam hide out in Mexico or at a director friend’s ranch in Idaho – at least until the scandal had died down and the vultures had stopped circling. But Sam didn’t want to be surrounded by strangers, he wanted to be among friends.

‘Not many of those around at the moment, kiddo,’ Eli had said. That was certainly true. Sam hadn’t exactly been inundated with messages of support from his so-called buddies, the various actors and film people he hung around with in Hollywood. When you were dead, you were dead. They didn’t want any of Sam’s black marks rubbing off on them. So he had rung his old university friend Mike McKenzie, reasoning that he was one of the few people who would understand what he was going through. And Mike’s oyster farm on Eigan was perfect when you were seeking blissful isolation.

Eli had driven Sam straight from Jess’s Cape Cod hideout back to the airport. The jet had flown him to the tiny airport at Oban, where he had jumped into a four-seater prop plane, and he was skimming down for a juddery landing on Eigan’s north beach before most people had even had their morning papers delivered.

Sam closed his eyes. He didn’t want to think about the papers today, didn’t want to ruin a lovely day just spent walking and enjoying the sun on his face, the sounds of the waves and the birds and the wind. There was time for all that later. Much later. Reluctantly he turned to head back towards Mike’s place, the squat little crofter’s cottage he could see in the distance, white smoke drifting from its chimney. There were worse places to hide out, he thought. In fact he could see himself staying here for a long time. Mike had managed well enough for the past six or so years; it had been his sanctuary, his salvation. Maybe a simpler, less vain life was what Sam needed too.

He walked up the little path to the cottage, smiling at the seashells and pretty stones that had been laid along the flower beds on either side. It was so totally unlike the scruffy, irreverent, disorganised Mike he knew. But then Mike wasn’t the same man he’d known at uni, was he? Living out here, how could he be?

‘The film star returns,’ said Mike as Sam bumped in through the low door. ‘I was worried that the seals had got you. What do you fancy for supper? Oysters. Crab. Scallops?’

Sam flopped down in one of the rickety chairs by the old iron range.

‘You make it sound like bloody Nobu.’

‘It is, except my stuff is fresher,’ winked Mike. ‘And I haven’t got any chopsticks.’

Sam smiled. It had been years since he had seen his old friend and he had been nervous about calling him. After all, what would he say? ‘Listen, Mike old thing, I’ve arsed up my life and my career and I need to hide out somewhere the paparazzi will never find me. I know I’ve been too important to so much as send you a postcard in the last five years, but can I come and stay?’

In the end, that was pretty much exactly what he had said.

Mike had left a dramatic pause, then said: ‘Can you pick up a Snickers on your way through the airport? I’m desperate for one and the boat doesn’t come over from the mainland for another week.’

At least he hadn’t changed all that much. In fact, in many ways he was the same cocky bugger Sam had met on the second day of Freshers Week at Manchester University. Discovering they were on the same drama course, they’d bonded over a shared love of bitter and Seventies comedy. The summer after they’d graduated, they’d taken a two-man show to the Edinburgh Fringe and been a surprise hit. But Sam had always been the Dudley Moore straight man to Mike’s Peter Cook comedy genius and they had amicably gone their separate ways six months afterwards: Sam to serious theatre, darhlink, Mike to massive acclaim at the vanguard of a new generation of indie comedy, followed by his own chat show, a BAFTA-winning comedy drama and something of a reputation as a hell-raiser and a ladies’ man.

Sam watched as Mike shovelled more coal into the fire, his dark fringe hanging down. His hair had always been on the Byronic side: Mike always said he used it like a hypnotist’s pendulum to lure girls into his bed.

‘What are you looking at?’ said Mike.

‘You, you great jessie. You look like someone from a BBC Thomas Hardy adaptation.’

‘Bugger, I was hoping for more of a David Essex gypsy troubadour look.’

‘More “Come On Eileen” than “Winter’s Tale”, mate.’

‘So says the limp-wristed thesp. I’m not the one getting my back waxed, am I?’

‘Hey, if it’s in the contract, I have to wax,’ laughed Sam.

He loved how they could fall straight back into their banter as if no time had passed at all. He just wished he hadn’t left it so long; he still felt guilty that he hadn’t been there when Mike had needed him the most.

Sam hadn’t been entirely surprised at the news that Mike had had a breakdown just when his star was at its highest. He’d always been mercurial and slightly manic, but that was just Mike. He would always be involved in some weird fringe play or organising a huge themed party. He painted and grew cacti and cooked curries for twenty people at a time; he was a powerhouse that never stopped. But Sam knew him well enough to see that he was just running to stand still; Mike once confessed to him that he feared that if he ever stopped, he’d fall into the empty space at his centre.

Finally, seven years ago, Mike had fallen into that hole. He’d been discovered wandering naked around Loch Ness, mumbling that he was looking for the monster. He had just finished a record-breaking sell-out run of his solo show at Wembley; he should have been basking in the glory. Instead, he was sent to a discreet psychiatric clinic in Wales. When he was released two months later, Sam had offered him a room in his LA home and introductions to his Hollywood contacts, but Mike had other ideas and moved out to Eigan. Since then, whenever Sam was in the news – an acting award, a starry premiere – Mike would send him mocking postcards reading: ‘Heard about the nomination. I spent the day digging up potatoes’; or ‘Loved you in the new film, we have foot and mouth here.’

But Sam’s packed schedule coupled with the strain of maintaining a relationship with Jessica had meant that he barely remembered to send Mike a Christmas card, let alone come out to visit his old friend.

Mike took two tins of pale ale from the cast-iron fridge and handed one to Sam. ‘Tell you what, Mr Bojangles. Let’s go for lobster tonight. Then you won’t feel so homesick.’

‘What about you, Mike? Don’t you get lonely out here?’

‘How could I get lonely? There are twelve sheep per acre here.’ He smiled. ‘Plus there are six families; we even have a school – eight kids on the register, I believe.’

They ducked through the low-slung doorway to head outside, sitting on a low stone wall facing the sea. Sam tipped his head back, loving the feel of the warm breeze on his face. On a nearby bluff there was the ruin of a small chapel, covered with a colony of nesting seagulls. It was just perfect.

‘I can see why you wouldn’t want to leave. How did you find it?’

‘My cousin Lucy moved to Mull. After the clinic I came up to visit, and one day I was walking past an estate agent’s and saw this advert reading “Oyster farm for sale”. I wanted some peace and quiet, and oysters aren’t known for answering back. Plus I always fancied myself leading the Good Life. It was just all that fame that got in the way. And the girls, and the cars and the money.’

‘Do you miss it?’

‘No,’ he said bluntly. ‘Twice a year I go and do stand-up in Oban in a pub where they serve cockles and a pint for three quid. Mostly they just throw the cockles at me. But I think secretly they know my stuff is good.’

‘I believe you. So you’re still writing?’

Mike stepped inside the house and came back out holding a dog-eared notebook.

‘This is a script about a priest who goes to work in Hollywood. I’ve written dozens of ’em. Some of it’s the best stuff I’ve ever done. Must be the sea air.’

He threw it into Sam’s lap and Sam flicked through it, feeling a rising excitement.

‘Laugh a minute, old son,’ said Mike confidently. ‘I should know, I’ve timed it.’

Sam didn’t have to read Mike’s script to know how brilliant it would be. The word ‘genius’ was bandied about a lot in LA, but an on-form Mike McKenzie was the real deal. He wasn’t just funny, he was sad too; he made the thoughtful seem so throwaway – you’d catch your breath and realise the impact of his words long after he’d moved on to something else. Sam had never been able to write anything even close to Mike’s output, which was one of the reasons he’d gone off to become an actor. It was hard living in such a tall shadow.

‘Why did we split up again?’

Mike gave a wry smile.

‘Creative differences. That’s what your Wikipedia entry says anyway.’

‘The truth is, I just wasn’t funny.’

‘At least you had the balls to admit it.’

Sam gave him a sideways glance. ‘It was tempting not to.’

Mike shaded his eyes and peered down at him. ‘What do you mean?’

‘I thought you were my meal ticket.’

Mike snorted and threw a pebble at him. ‘The international movie star thought I was his meal ticket?’

‘It’s true. You were so f*cking funny. I could so easily have tagged along as your Ernie Wise, but . . .’

‘But you wanted to be the star?’

‘Yep,’ said Sam, sipping his tea. ‘And look where that got me.’

‘So do you want to talk about it?’

Sam laughed.

‘Jesus, Mike, I know you’re casual about things, but I didn’t think you’d wait a full two days to bring it up.’

‘Well, apparently the whole world’s talking about it. I wasn’t sure you’d want anyone else chucking their ha’penny’s worth in.’

‘The difference is you’re my friend.’

‘Okay, seeing as you ask, I think you’ve been a right knob. Shall we move on?’

Sam chuckled.

‘That’s what I love about you, you always find me hilarious.’

‘Me and about a million other people.’

‘Ah, you’re talking about the past there.’

‘Come on, Mike. You miss it.’

His friend was quiet for a moment and all they could hear was the bleating of a lamb on the hillside behind them.

‘I miss making people laugh,’ he said finally. ‘Mentally I’m better, strong enough to do it again, but I’m wary of stepping back out there. I mean, look what’s happened to you. You wanted to act. You’ve become a circus show.’

‘Cheers.’

Mike gave a low, thoughtful laugh.

‘They were good, the old days, though, weren’t they?’

‘I knew you were tempted, you sneaky sod. Why else have you been writing about priests in Hollywood when you could be chatting up the local milkmaid. I tell you, Mike, you could be the next Will Ferrell if you wanted to be. You’re certainly tall enough.’

‘Give me the Edinburgh Fringe over Tinseltown any day.’

Mike’s eyes glazed over as if he was lost in the nostalgia of their twenties. ‘Remember that first show we did straight out of uni? You were bloody funny, by the way.’

Sam shrugged to accept the compliment. He knew the sharp comic timing that had won him some of Hollywood’s best romantic comedy roles had been honed in rehearsals for that very show.

‘We should do it again.’ Mike’s voice was quiet and nervy.

‘Do what again?’

‘Edinburgh Fringe. Me and you.’

‘Come on, Mike. You know I can’t.’

‘Why not? Too famous?’ he chided. ‘Your fragile movie-star ego not able to handle a few gentle hecklers?’

‘Don’t be daft,’ blustered Sam. ‘It’s just not what I do any more. It never really was.’

‘Don’t look at it as stand-up. See it as entertainment. And no one does that better than you, Sammy boy. Look, it will be too late to get in the official Edinburgh programme, but you know there’s not a promoter in town who wouldn’t bite our hands off if we said we wanted to do a two-man show.’

Mike’s mercurial temperament had undergone one of its mood swings, his reluctance to step back into the limelight, so obvious just a couple of minutes earlier, replaced by a euphoric desperation to make it happen. Sam hated to disappoint his old friend, but the thought of cranking out jokes to a roomful of pissed students seemed as alien to him as joining the astronauts on the next space mission.

‘I can’t. But you do it,’ he said with encouragement. ‘The comedy world needs a new hero.’

‘What’s stopping you?’

‘I have a career. In Hollywood.’

‘Then why do you look so shit-scared when I ask how long you’re staying on Eigan?’

Sam felt embarrassed to be caught out. Eigan was idyllic, but that wasn’t the reason why he wanted to stay on the island indefinitely. Its remoteness and solitude protected him, and made him feel so disconnected from reality it was as if the events of the previous few days – Katie, the court case, the showdown with Jessica – had never happened.

Mike looked at him sympathetically, as if he was reading his thoughts.

‘I know how much your career means to you. Go back to LA. Sort things out. Make some decisions. You can’t hide away here for ever.’

‘You did,’ Sam said softly.

‘I’m not you,’ replied Mike, and deep down Sam knew that his old friend was right.