About That Night

In the studio, Ricky bounds down the stairs and runs to the front of the audience, as they whoop and cheer in concert with the warm-up who is conducting them from the sidelines. As he draws his hand across his throat they stop immediately as if they’ve been switched off and they sit back down, a bit disappointed and suspicious that the party might already be over.

‘Hello! Good evening and thank you for that warm hand on my entrance. Welcome to my show! Wanna know who’s on my sofa tonight?’ Ricky Clough is wearing his trademark purple suit, Doc Martens and a peacock blue custom-made shirt. His hair has been neatly combed to cover the seam of his transplant, but the curls reach down to his collar. He’s tall and his expanding girth is held in check by a clever combination of belts and expensive tailoring. His face is a light entertainment shade of polished conker. He has that unusual combination of camp and lascivious heterosexuality shared by so many successful performers. He paces restlessly around the set. His fizzing energy is almost electric. He’s an Icarus, Elizabeth thinks, you will burn if you get too close. It’s impossible not to look at him. He smiles brilliantly, revealing startlingly white teeth, as he ad-libs to the audience and cracks a joke at each of his guests’ expense, so that even Elizabeth – who’s seen it all before and knows his every facial tic – feels lost in wonder at his magnetic pull.

She presses the talkback button and says very quietly, ‘Ricky, Paolo’s ready – let’s bring him on to the sofa now.’ Paolo Culone, a young celebrity chef, is to be the first guest.

Ricky can hear Elizabeth’s instructions through an earpiece invisible to the audience and he responds smoothly by turning to the autocue camera that discreetly displays his script. He begins to read the words of his introduction. But as he moves towards his desk, he catches his foot on the step and stumbles, his arms momentarily flailing. The audience titter.

‘Whoa, babe, steady,’ Lola mutters under her breath.

Puzzled, Elizabeth kicks back her chair and goes to stand behind Robin, resting her hands on his shoulder, and they both lean forward, staring intently at their star’s face on the close-up cameras. His eyes are glittering in the studio lights and a sheen of sweat is already moistening his forehead. Nothing unusual in that, they’re used to seeing him in states of overexcitement, pumped by adrenaline, or wine – or worse. But as he arranges his cue cards on top of the desk, Elizabeth notices that his hands are shaking. His mouth is still moving but he’s stopped looking at the nearest camera. Instead, he’s looking down and his voice has dropped to a mumble. Elizabeth finds her heart beating faster. She doesn’t understand this unusual lack of grip from Ricky. Even when very inebriated, he can always keep the show going.

Robin jumps up crying, ‘Camera 5, pull wide! No close-ups. Stay wide!’

Elizabeth walks quickly back to her seat and Lola turns, her face full of panic. Elizabeth leans over the talkback microphone, presses down the button and reads from her script carefully and slowly, ‘Okay, Ricky, say after me… Now, most of us when we fancy a snack, think about a toastie, a steak bake or maybe some fish fingers…’ She turns her eyes to the bank of television screens and watches as Ricky slowly lifts his head and fixes his eyes, now glassy and unfocused, on camera 5. Out of his mouth, mechanically, come the words she recites in his ear…

‘But not my next guest, the man who invented the fish eyeball brioche! Ladies and gentlemen, Paolo Culone!’

‘Cue Paolo!’ cries Robin and the young whizz-kid of nouvelle cuisine comes running down the stairs and on to the set to wild applause, generated furiously by the floor manager. Only the lady with the flask and those sitting in the very front rows have noticed Ricky shaking and fumbling for his words and they are now sitting up very straight, alert to the exciting possibility of being witness to a proper show-business meltdown. Ricky doesn’t move from his desk chair as Paolo bounds on, but with a sort of superhuman effort, shifts in his seat so that he can greet the chef from a sitting position.

‘Ricky,’ Elizabeth continues, low and encouragingly in his ear, ‘the food props that you asked for are under your desk. You remember, we’re going to see if he recognises his own dishes by their smell. It’s a great idea – it was your idea, Ricky! Let’s do it now. They’re under your desk.’

Paolo sits down but is clearly uncomfortable with the surprising lack of a welcoming handshake. Nothing that the researcher backstage told him would happen appears to be taking place and so to fill the empty air-time, he begins to jabber nervously about meeting an X Factor finalist backstage. As he speaks, Ricky slides down in his chair and with a trembling hand, produces one of the dishes hidden underneath and places it shakily on top of the desk.

‘Mate, have some water,’ Paolo suddenly says, reaching for a glass decanter of clear liquid on a low side table. He pours a glass and hands it to him. Elizabeth puts her head in her hands and Lola cries, ‘No! Not the gin!’

But Ricky ignores the offered glass and instead eats with his fingers from the dish and licks them ostentatiously. He says, suddenly loud and clear, ‘Mmm, what do you call this dish again?’

‘Well,’ Paolo sits forward on the sofa excitedly, ‘that’s cockle ketchup and…’ but he stops mid-sentence, his mouth dropping open.

Ricky’s trembling hand, holding the dish, has suddenly dropped to his side and the plate falls to the studio floor with a clatter. His cheeks are bulging, as if with extreme exertion, his face is contorted and turning a dark purple. His shoulders suddenly seem to give way and his whole body sinks, as if loosed from its moorings. Up in the gallery, Elizabeth flies out of her chair as Lola cries, ‘Oh God! What’s the matter with him?’

The back rows of the studio audience are struggling to get into their coats and scarves because Elizabeth, taking no chances, has turned the air-conditioning glacially high in order to keep them awake. But an amused muttering begins to build amongst them – they’re clearly enjoying the extravagantly comic turn. The front rows on the other hand are half out of their seats, craning their necks to get a better look at the now slumped star of the show. The lady with the flask is foremost amongst them, the considerable weight of her experience sitting bored and cold in television studios telling her that none of this seems planned.

Under the heat of the studio lights, Ricky is momentarily motionless and a shimmering sliver of spit glistens its way down his chin. With enormous effort, it seems, he lifts his head and his bloodshot eyes search out his close-up camera. He holds its unforgiving gaze for an instant. But then his body twists and writhes, caught in the pitiless rhythm of its own maniacal dance, until one jerking spasm throws up his head and Elizabeth cries out in horror at his distorted face, his mouth gaping and gasping for air. Paolo leaps from the sofa with a scream, but still some people in the back rows are shrieking with laughter.

Elizabeth turns on her heel to run down the spiral staircase that will take her back to the studio floor. ‘Stop recording!’ she cries over her shoulder to the gallery. ‘And for God’s sake, get the warm-up back on.’

By the time she’s groped her way around the heavy black drapes that enclose the set and the audience, the warm-up is on the studio floor and calmly announcing that the show has been suspended. People are reluctantly gathering their things. On set, Ricky has slithered to the floor beside the desk. The floor manager is trying ineffectually to shield him with her own body from the openly gaping stares of the front rows. Paolo Culone is being ushered politely off the set by Zander, the researcher, whose face creases with alarm as he passes Elizabeth running in.

‘Ricky?’ Elizabeth bends low over her presenter’s head and gently touches his shoulder. ‘Ricky – can you hear me?’ Her touch seems to topple him, he rolls on to his back and she can’t help herself, she shrinks back in horror. The whites of his eyes have yellowed and a sudden spasm forces his head back, but his hand seems to find her wrist and his grip is like a vice.

‘Phone 999. Where’s the St John Ambulance attendant?’ Elizabeth shouts. She tries to find Ricky’s pulse. The flesh around his wristwatch is pudgy and his shirtsleeve is stuck to his skin with sweat. She sees Lola running into the studio and tries to restrain her but Lola sinks to her knees beside Ricky. She bends low to stroke his soaking forehead and whispers in his ear, ‘It’s okay, babe. Someone’s coming. Hold on. It’s going to be alright. It’s going to be okay.’

Elizabeth straightens up and says, ‘Get the audience out the back way. Now! Quickly! Keep the scene dock clear for the ambulance.’

She notices the cameramen are still standing by their cameras, watching curiously. They’ve seen people die in television studios before – they worked on Celebrity Wrestling – but this is definitely more sensational. Phil on camera 5, when he catches her eye, holds out his hands, palms upwards, as if to say, Who’d have thought…? She turns back in despair to Ricky and sees that Lola is kneeling and rocking beside him, almost in prayer. He is lying on his back, his arms and legs splayed, as if completely spent.

Then there are uniforms, men in hi-vis jackets saying, ‘Clear a space please, coming through’, and a stretcher. Ricky is laid out flat on the floor, behind the desk hidden from view, but he’s stiff and unresponsive, an oxygen mask over his nose and mouth. A machine is placed on his chest.

Elizabeth steps aside and takes a deep breath. She wants to be calm and capable, but she can barely think straight and her heart is pounding. She steels herself and pulls out her mobile to phone her boss: the Controller, All Channels.

‘Elizabeth? Um. Hi. Everything okay?’ Matthew sounds sleepy, slurred, like he’s just surfacing.

‘Ricky’s collapsed in the studio. The ambulance is here. They’re working on him now.’ Her voice is unnaturally high, but steady.

‘Jesus Christ! Working on him? What, like resuscitation?’ Matthew is suddenly alert. He hasn’t got where he’s got to without recognising a crisis when he’s just been told that there is one.

‘Yes. He just keeled over at the desk.’

‘Was he drunk?’

‘No. Well. Definitely no more than usual.’ The paramedics are standing up. Ricky is lying inert on the floor. She whispers into the phone, ‘Um, I think he’s – dead.’

‘Dead? Oh God! Poor Ricky. The poor old bugger. You know, I feared it might come to this… Christ – what did the audience see? We need to manage this. Call the press office. I’ll be with you in half an hour.’

‘Um, we should ring Lorna. His wife? Do you want to ring her…?’ There’s no response on the end of the phone. ‘Or shall I?’

Matthew hesitates. ‘Can you do it, Elizabeth? As you were there, you know. In case she wants any details. You’ve worked with Ricky for so long, she knows you two were close. And you were there, at the house the other week, at Ricky’s party. I think it might be better coming from – you know – a woman.’ He pauses and Elizabeth can’t help thinking that Matthew was at that party too – he was the one who gave Ricky his big break in the first place – he’s known them for years. But she says nothing and so Matthew adds with some relief, ‘Right, I’m leaving now. Elizabeth?’

‘Yes?’

‘You okay?’

Elizabeth presses her cheek against her phone. ‘Yes,’ she says finally, ‘I’m alright.’

The ambulance crew lifts the body on to the stretcher. ‘We’ll take him to St Thomas’s, love,’ one of them says to Elizabeth. ‘It’s Ricky Clough, right?’

‘Yes. Thank you. Does someone need to travel with him?’

‘No, not necessary.’ The ambulance man looks at Elizabeth carefully to see if she has understood and she nods. ‘I’ll phone his wife and tell her that’s where he is.’

Once the ambulance has gone, the cameramen pack up their equipment in respectful silence. The last few members of the audience are filing out of the side doors, whispering in hushed voices. They’re unsure what they’ve just witnessed, but it was definitely more eventful than the last Ricky Clough show they saw. Lola is sitting in the front row, crying into some paper napkins from the canteen. The rest of the crew have also gathered on the studio floor and are standing about looking stunned. The researcher, Zander, tells Elizabeth that Paolo Culone is now in the Green Room, happily drunk on the show’s warm white wine and has the X Factor finalist sitting on his lap.

‘He thinks it’s all a planned joke.’ Zander’s solemn grey eyes turn towards her, searching for guidance. He’s in his late twenties, tall and very lean, with broad bony shoulders; good-looking in that well-bred way with soft curly hair – neatly and expensively cut – and a warm, charming smile. His impeccable Etonian manners make him an excellent booker of celebrity guests: he’s unfailingly polite but incredibly thick-skinned, and simply never takes no for an answer, without ever seeming to offend.

‘Tell them all to go home,’ Elizabeth instructs him. ‘And tell them Ricky’s gone to hospital. Don’t tell them anything else.’

She moves to a dark quiet space at the back of the set and spools through her contacts to find Ricky’s home number. She peers round the drapes that separate her from the set and sees that Lola is still sitting in the audience, her head in her hands, her shoulders shaking. Elizabeth has met Ricky’s wife Lorna a number of times over the last six years, although she no longer comes to any of his shows. Elizabeth presumes Ricky put an end to her visits once he grew close to Lola. She was a former dancer and they met on the set of a music show, back in the days when he was the UK’s most popular breakfast DJ. They’ve been married for eighteen years and Elizabeth reckons Ricky managed to stay faithful for at least four of them. Lorna Clough picks up immediately and Elizabeth gives her the news slowly and carefully: Ricky collapsed, he seemed to have trouble breathing, there was nothing anyone could do… Her voice cracks and breaks in the end. Lorna, however, is composed. She takes a short, sharp intake of breath, but then says quietly that she will go straight to the hospital. Once Elizabeth has established Lorna can get a friend to drive her there, she tells her that someone from the television network will meet her when she arrives.

Elizabeth takes a moment to compose herself before hurrying to find her team in the Green Room – a saloon furnished with plump sofas and a bar that groans with wine bottles and buckets of beer. The Green Room is a sort of celebrity farmyard pen, there to hold the guests before a show and keep them well watered. She joins the rest of her production team, most of whom are red-eyed and speechless, and she hugs each of them in turn. She spots two of Ricky’s old schoolfriends in the corner, including his sometime manager and mentor, Deniz Pegasus. Deniz left school in East Ham and became a brickie during the day and a roadie for his DJ mate Ricky in the evenings, but he soon found a gap in the building market by supplying low-cost ‘affordable’ housing estates for council tenants. It proved to be more than very affordable for him, and he quickly made a fortune from careless councillors whose political ambitions he fed and watered in various clubs around town and who afterwards couldn’t be bothered to check his books. Recently, Deniz has started coming to all of Ricky’s shows and afterwards offering Elizabeth his opinion, which she finds annoying.

Deniz is holding two Pomeranians in his meaty arms, staring at her. She beckons to Zander. ‘What are we going to do about Hiss and Boo?’

Zander turns and looks puzzled at the two leather-jacketed men.

‘Ricky’s dogs,’ Elizabeth says patiently. ‘The ones with the four legs.’

‘Oh!’ Zander says in relief. ‘Shall I ask them if they can take the dogs home with them?’