CHAPTER
SIX
S
T
IN
G
The three Presenters came in to the studio just as Sting was coming back out of the Control Room doorway over on the far side from them.
Again there was no sign of recogniion, though all the same Hampton started another little wave as Sting approached them but turned it in to a hair-smoothing motion as he got closer and then continued right past them without a pause, or even a pau, or even ... and headed back out toward the Outside Broadcast truck to continue.
"There, what did I say. He'll have been giving his segment to the control room guys for editing-in!" Larksong repeated.
Just then the studio lights buzzed and flickered and dimmed in and out a couple of times which made everyone turn their heads wondering what had happened.
"Sorry studio" announced Control Room ".. not sure what that was, maybe a surge. Taking five to check, five minutes Studio."
So while they waited Hamster just casually asked of James .. "Ummmm, that Liz of yours back in the day, your saturday supermarket job girl .. I knew a Liz once, well Lizzie actually."
And he continued, seeming to be maybe avoiding eye contact, fidgeting slightly ...
"Er .. redhead was she, yours?"
"No" said James, "brunette. Why?"
"Oh, no real reason" said Hamster, relieved and showing it, "Well, only that Lizzie was my first proper, serious crush. I’ve always remembered her, how my heart broke when she went off to University and out of my tender young life forever .. my first-love .. at just 25." he said with a wistful sigh.
"Wait a minute! You're wondering if we both ..." suddenly exclaimed a vaguely disgusted James Gray.
"No! Oh no!" interrupted Hampton with a grimace that would get worse before gettting better again. "No no no! Not at all! Really no. Oh dear no ..."
"Well that's good because then she'd have had to be around ten when I knew her!!
"Ah!" said Hampton, "Yes. Didn't think of that, sorry." and then carried on, "Although all the same, in the dark Ages when you were growing up ..." but Gray glowered at him far too loudly so he moved quickly along.
"No but anyway, I'd already tried impressing her for a while with some leet driving skills .."
"Some what?"
"What?"
"Neat driving skills?
"Near enough" Hampton replied, "stuff like handbrake turns and doughnuts and things, absolutely guaranteed to make girls instantly weak at the knees.
"Yes, but let's be honest," said James, "really it didn't always work did it?"
"Well, mostly!" he replied.
"No it didn't."
"Well actually no it didn't, but .."
"If there's a but, it's a no." James interrupted.
"But .."
"So 'no' then."
"Well .. maybe technically .." Hampton excuseified
"Like your satnav technically didn't work because you had no idea, pressed every button a dozen times and then wondered why Dunsfold was just outside Lancaster when you got there .. technically?" asked James in totally unnecessaryclarification.
"Oh alright then" said Hampton, briefly petulant, "maybe some of that stuff didn't really work, y'know, all the time, like.
But it was great playing the part, thinking the smoke and aroma d’Dunlop was macho to the max and would get your passenger seat occupied by something other than empty pie trays and crisp bags for once .. and hopefully your back seat put to its real purpose when you parked somewhere quiet later!"
"Though," he added "you didn't really need technology to pack up anyway did you in order to fail at what the Americans call 'going parking'.."
Pedant Gray butted-in "How can you go parking? You can park, you can go to park, but you can't .."
But Hampton cut him off "Like, there was this one time .. "
"LAST BIG MISTAKE"
The voice of the Control Room made it through at the third try.
"Guys? I said we're ready? we need to keep moving!"
At first under his breath, then fake-brightly, Hamster acknowledged for them all.
"Snotty little .. er, yes okay, sorry!" And then to Larksong looking at the running order "What's next again? Can't remember. And besides, this weirdy-programme feeling and stuff is really starting to get to me now!"
"You're serious about all this aren't you?" Larksong asked him,
"Yes"
"Seriously delusional!" he came back.
Hushed but exasperated, Hampton retorted
"I'm . Not . Wrong! Look, something is going on and we really need to find out what it is! Just go along with me!"
"And me!" said James
"Yes .. and him. Simply to prove me wrong if you want! But if I'm right, and if it is something like a new pay scale we're missing out on for example, then I really want to know! You?!"
"Well, I think you are barking up the wrong flagpole!" Larksong relented, "but if it helps to keep you from exploding all over my best jeans .."
"Your only jeans!" interrupted James who knew about these things but nobody ever asked how.
".. all over my best jeans," Larksong repeated, ".. let's get this next piece done then take a look at whatever it is you're hallucinating"
.. at which retort Hampton scowled, but he really should have known better because it only led Larksong to keep it going, with ..
".. although, when you are this wound up you grow almost two inches! That's nearly to my chest! You really might want to try and cultivate that."
Fortiunately for his shins Control Room spoke again before Hammond could bite back.
"And so! .. on to the caravan segment in ten ... you have the lettter, Jerome?"
He nodded, though the audible wince wasn't his but had come from James who had always thought how paradoxical it was that Larksongs' given-name firstly wasn't chucked right back in the Font at the time, and secondly that it ryhmed with "comb"! Now that's ironic, Alanis!
"OK, so in 5, 4, 3.."
And the red light went back on, and Larksong looked the camera straight in the lens.
"We've had a letter. A whole one."
"A whole sackful actually," he said, "so thank you for something to throw on the stove and keep warm when winter comes, very considerate. They were all in response to the piece last week about caravanners."
"Now, it's no secret of course that nobody here has much to say for these rolling roadblocks, and I don't think you can deny that their true worth lies in their entertainment value when used for a giant game of conkers for example, or raced sideways, or jumped over things .."
"Into things!" offered Hamster
".. jumped into things" he continued, "or off ramps, or set ablaze just by peeling a few spuds! So when we get a letter like this one .." and he shook it out, "trying to convince us that we and the entire rest of the Planet are wrong and that caravanners are never any nuisance to anyone at all .. and that there is in fact a whole joyous rosy-glow ..
"That would be the blaze .." interjected James.
" .. a whole rosy-glow side to it" Larksong carried on, ".. with endless golden pleasures to be had as part of some deeply wonderful romance of being a weekend nomad, well you'll have to forgive us if we're not completely convinced."
"In fact we've yet to see actual proof of any of that, and we have genuinely tried, honestly!"
"Instead, however, we've only ever found even more proof of the utter waste of humanity and intelligence that is Caravanning, even when someone has made a genuine attempt to endow it with rich quality and deep meaning."
Hampton snorted at the very idea of such a thing, as Larksong continued.
"But this time we thought we’d step back for once, leave it to someone else to speak about that and not just let you hear it from us yet again.
So we'd like to share with you something that we didn’t have any hand in at all, something that quite simply bears out the pointlessness and utter futility of caravanning but now from the inside, actually from the experience of an ardent caravanner."
And he began to read ...
"CARAVAN TANGO"
At the end of the letter Larksong has an uncharacteristically sad expression at this caravanner's very sad fate.
He folded the letter back up very deliberately and returned it safely to his pocket with the rather surprisingly regret-filled comment
"So that really just chucks away the key on the whole caravan thing I think ..."
Suddenly the studio lights buzzed and flickered and dimmed again, again to be shortly followed by Sting arriving and taking another video-pak across in to the Control Room.
The Presenters' combined gazes followed him, and they could one-side eavesdrop on what went on in there because the Control Room mic was still open from them holding the studio down while they checked for any lighting problem.
And they heard the Control Room Tech ..
"Greeeeeaaat! Been waiting for that!
What? Oh she's real good thanks, sends a big hug like always ..
.. yes, and she's still talking about the amazing party at yours the other week. Hasn't stopped going on about you throwing all those brilliant shapes on the dance floor!
.. ha-ha yes .. calls you a perfect host, doubts I'll do anything like as good a job for our anniversary!
Yeah! Women, right?! Ha-ha.
Oh! .. and I just got your vocal track for the new theme song. Amazing voice man, truly amazing. Just had to say!"
Hampton, Larksong and Gray exchanged quizzical looks at the Tech guy's matey conversation with Sting who for them - and as far as they knew for everyone else as well - had always been entirely non-responsive.
Sting reappeared in the control room doorway, and the Tech quickly added ..
"Oh, and just to check .."
Sting paused, frozen mid-step, remained entirely static.
".. this is the final plugin? ... completely finishes off the series now, yes?"
Sting slowly turned just his head to look back in to the Control Room, paused briefly though no obvious communication took place, then turned his head back in the same deliberate way and continued across the studio and back out of the door presumably hading for Outside Broadcast 1 truck to pick up his stuff ... whatever "stuff" that might be!
Hampton looked blankly at Larksong and points too late at already-departed Sting, and Larksong returns an arms-out shrug to the other two.
"Absolutely No Idea!!" said Hampton, completely bewildered.
Then,
"So , okay studio, that was a really good segment ... thank you ... and thank you guys. So, let's make that a break for lunch! So, back at 2 to resume. So, promptly please, we've still got a lot to get through."