Call Me, Maybe Read online

  ‘Do you ever wonder if they’ll show Franko on this channel?’ Rachel asks, her mouth still full of food. She waves her fork in the direction of the TV.

  ‘I shouldn’t think so,’ I say. ‘They were hardly in the same league as this lot, were they?’

  Adam, Jesse, Travis and Brandon Franklin, AKA Franko, were our absolute favourite nineties boyband. We idolised them. Spent endless days listening to their albums on repeat, over and over, unpicking the songs until we knew every lyric and every chord inside out. We travelled to signings and every gig we possibly could, and we always tried to get backstage. It had worked once. The security guard shiftily nodded his head down the corridor leading backstage, and moved slightly so we could pass. Looking back now, the whole thing seems ludicrous. We found them milling around behind the stage and hung out after the concert while all the other fans stood outside, waiting to catch a glimpse. We flashed fake IDs at the bar, drank Archers and lemonade, and generally felt pretty smug about the whole thing.

  ‘I wonder what they’re doing now,’ Rachel says slowly. There’s a glint in her eye. She’s got an idea.

  ‘Who knows? Married off with kids probably,’ I shrug. I shovel a forkful of cashew chicken in my mouth and think about that as I chew.

  She sets down her wine glass and grabs my laptop. ‘Let’s find out. To Google!’ she announces, and I have to admit, I am kind of curious and definitely more interested than I thought I’d be as she systematically types their names into the search engine. But the results are thin on the ground and we don’t find much, just links to videos on YouTube, none of which have many hits, a sparsely written Wikipedia page, and a few links to a message board with an ‘error 404’ redirect. The image search results aren’t much better; mostly screenshots from music videos and digital versions of posters I used to have stuck on my bedroom walls. There isn’t much there that we didn’t already know, and apart from Brandon, who seems to be a Mark Ronson-esque producer, it’s as if they’ve collectively disappeared off the face of the Earth. And that’s perplexing. People don’t just disappear. Not in 2012 when information is so readily available if you know where to look, and not when the people you’re searching for have a past.

  Because there was a past. Franko had one fairly successful album, creatively titled Franko, and one definitely not successful follow up. The difficult second album. Ironically titled Now or Never (most reviewers said never). And when that was so harshly panned, they just stopped. We never heard from them again. Almost like they gave up. Music career over before they were even twenty, without so much as a press release from the record label, or an official announcement on frankomusic.com. It was crap. Even now, over a decade on, I still think they were great, and even though I know I’m definitely in the minority, I love Now or Never best of all. It’s got a different sound to Franko. It’s more grown up; edgy and gritty, a transition from pop to rock. There are no sugary love ballads on Now or Never. Adam screams out angsty lyrics and the bass lines are heavy and clever.

  Dissatisfied with Google, but apparently on a roll, Rachel signs into Facebook, and I take our plates back out to the kitchen, picking at a piece of leftover bamboo shoot as I go.

  ‘Cass,’ she calls through from the lounge. ‘You’ll never guess who I’ve just found! Get back here. Bring the wine.’

  She thrusts the screen at me as I enter the room. ‘Look at this. I knew we’d find something eventually. Tell me that’s not Jesse Franklin.’

  It’s hard to tell from such a tiny picture but it could be. Dark hair, a straight nose. Pretty, expressive eyes. Bit of stubble. Rachel’s favourite had always been Travis, and for a little while, Adam, but I saw nobody but Jesse. My whole world revolved around him. He was tall, with the kind of skin that tans really well at the first hint of sun, and had those big brown eyes with flecks of green. He always wore his hair messy, as if someone had just ruffled it, and jeans slung so low that quite a lot of underwear was usually visible. He was quiet, too, and aloof. Almost as if he didn’t really want to be there. Like it was all just a bit too much effort, and he’d really rather be anywhere else.

  You knew where you were with the rest of them, but Jesse was mysterious. Jesse was a closed book. At signings, you were lucky if you got more than a quick acknowledgement from him, and if he actually looked you in the eye you felt like you might be in there. I lived for it, that eye contact, and the butterflies I got when I saw him.

  ‘It certainly looks like him,’ I say, peering at the screen, suddenly curious. In this instant I don’t know how looking him up like this hasn’t ever occurred to me before.

  ‘Of course it’s him,’ she says, pointing at the job title under his name. Freelance Musician. ‘There can’t be two of them! Why would anyone pretend to be a pop star who was only mildly famous years before Facebook was even a twinkle in Mark Zuckerberg’s eye?’

  She has a point. We loved Franko, but they were hardly A list. Originally from Nebraska, they relocated to California to pursue the dream of being in a band when Adam was fifteen. Their debut album dropped in 1998, and it was then that Rachel and I had caught the bug. We were smitten.

  She clicks through but the profile is frustratingly private and she’s quickly bored. ‘That’s that then,’ she says, closing the webpage and the screen. ‘He was the only one I found, so let’s get on to wedding planning.’

  The magazines come out and so does another bottle of wine. We use different coloured Sharpies to circle things Rachel likes, and she marks pages with sticky tabs. She wants fish bowls for her table centrepieces, filled with scented, floating candles and those glass pebbles that look like flattened marbles.

  * * *

  During the week that follows my emails ping a lot. Turns out Rachel might have been on to something with this Date My Mate malarkey, and I’m excited the first time I log back into my profile. A bright pink number five flashes up from the corner of the screen indicating just how many eligible bachelors have been charmed by Rachel’s depictions of me. My first match is Nick, thirty-four, from Balham.

  I’d like to get my hands on your Venus de Milo norks.

  No thank you, Nick. I delete his message without replying, and remove that line from the profile. The next one is Henry, twenty-eight, from Bromley. Henry hasn’t linked his Facebook account, which is unsettling, but he has sent an additional photo with just a simple caption, ‘U like wot U see?’

  I’m already sceptical from the text speak but I click through anyway, and am confronted with a chubby hand with disgusting bitten-down finger nails gripping a fat but short penis, its mushroom-like head red and glistening under an alarmingly tight foreskin, nestled within a thick mass of greasy-looking pubes. No, Henry, I categorically don’t like what I see. I can’t help it. I retch. My housemate Sara looks up from the blanket she’s crocheting.

  ‘You okay?’

  ‘Absolutely,’ I choke.

  You might think the only way would be up from Henry’s gruesome offering, but you’d be wrong, and my other three matches are no better. It’s a steady flatline. Makes me wonder just how low a bar Charlotte-from-Rachel’s-work has set. I suspect so low she had to dig for it.

  Grumpy, I stomp up to bed, and my thoughts turn to Jesse Franklin. Not for the first time since we found him, I allow him to seep into my head again, to bed down on the edges of my subconscious. Because now I know where I can find him, he won’t leave me alone. Rachel might be content with what we unearthed, but I’m not, and I search for him again. I know it might be considered creepy, internet-stalking my teenage crush like this, but I shove that feeling back down where it came from because it’s not as if he will ever know. It’s okay to do this as long as he never knows, and he never will: you can’t see who’s searching for you on Facebook.

  All it takes is a few seconds and I’ve found him again, Jesse Franklin, Freelance Musician, as handsome as he ever was. I know I should leave it, click away and forget about it, but I don’t. I can’t.

  The crush was so
intense that I was convinced it was love. Actual, fierce, slap-you-in-the-face, punch-you-in-the-gut, you-are-the-one true love. Never quite complete love though, because when you love a boy in a band, it’s unrequited. Your thoughts are consumed entirely by him, but he doesn’t even know you exist, and deep down, whether you can admit it to yourself or not, you know this. To him you are one of thousands, whilst to you he is everything.

  But I’d felt it the first time we’d met. Him seventeen, me fifteen. On a freezing cold morning in February outside a TV studio. I’d tried hard to get him to notice me. I’d willed him to feel what I did. Even just a fraction would be enough. I flirted and batted my eyelashes. I let him listen to music through my walkman, sharing my headphones, and when Rachel snapped photos of us, I’d pressed myself against him and breathed him in until I was dizzy. I’d closed my eyes and sent him telepathic messages, and, just for those brief seconds, allowed myself to pretend that to him, I wasn’t just another fan. That somehow, out of all the Franko-obsessed teenage girls in the world, he’d see that I was different.

  And I knew when he eventually did, he’d take my hand and we’d be off. I never questioned that my parents might not be cool with their teenage daughter skipping town on the whim of an adolescent musician. In my head there’d be a tearful farewell before I left Amersham forever in a Toyota Previa with tinted windows. It’d be such a big deal that there’d be crowds of people in the street. All my school friends would hang around, looking on, commenting to the press about how they sat next to me in double science. I’d be whisked off to Heathrow to fly away on a private jet, champagne popped and flowing, even though nobody who featured in this particular daydream was old enough to drink it and access to a private jet was unlikely.

  We’d live in a Beverly Hills mansion, or a Malibu beach house. There’d be paparazzi from which we’d have to shield our quirkily named children. I’d live the rock-star wife dream, pining for his safe return after months on the road. There’d be Grammy awards lined up on shelves in our bathrooms and I’d reinvent myself as a fashion designer. It was all planned out.

  But in reality when Now or Never failed to chart they never came back to the UK. Our excited journeys to concerts or meet and greets stopped. There were no more TV appearances to record and no more hotels to wait outside. We were devastated, as if nothing in the entire world could make up for the gaping hole the four of them left behind. But gradually I stopped thinking so much about Jesse Franklin and he stopped appearing in my dreams at night. Posters were removed from my walls, and carefully rolled up and stored. Albums weren’t listened to as much as they once were, and dust collected on the cases in my CD rack. I concentrated on school, went to university, and realised that when I wasn’t pining after boys in bands, there were some right in front of me who I liked just as much, if not more, and best of all, some of them liked me back. No telepathy required.

  And now, here I am. Living in a house share in Shepherd’s Bush, West London, with Jon, who works in IT support at UCL, and tall, willowy Sara, who manages an independent art supplies shop close to Central Saint Martins, gets through more incense than a Catholic priest and likes facial piercings. They’re nice people, and even though the three of us make quite the motley crew, we’re all relatively fond of each other and by now we’re well used to each other’s habits. Occasionally, for instance, Sara will bring back a man (usually with a giant beard) she’s met somewhere and there’ll be small talk over tofu scramble the next morning whilst she giggles at him and I cradle a mug of coffee and Jon comments on the music she put on to muffle the sounds of them doing it. Likewise, Sara and I know that just before seven o’clock every morning, Jon vacuums his bedroom, and can’t ever let any of his food touch. He never partakes in the tofu scramble.

  Obviously, one day I’ll want to re-evaluate things, but right now life’s good. There might not be a rock star knocking on my front door with a giant diamond for my finger, but I’m pouring a lot of effort into my career, and as Phil Collins once sang, you can’t hurry love. So I’ll just have to wait.

  I feel like finding Jesse on the internet has stripped him of his fame and rock god status. If it’s even really him, because even though he doesn’t seem like a prime candidate for identity theft, you don’t often find the personal profiles of celebs. I lie and ponder over what he might be doing at this exact moment. Where precisely he is in the world. Does he have a partner? Kids? He’d be thirty-one now, so it’s all distinctly probable. And it’s whilst I wonder what sort of things we’d say to each other if we were ever to meet again, I give in to the herculean urge to take a chance on finding out. I can’t help myself. I’m powerless to stop it. A box pops up on the screen of my laptop. It glares at me through the darkness.

  Friend Request Sent

  Instantly, there are two separate and distinct emotions. First, a sense of bubbly excitement, one that makes a shiver run down the length of my spine. It makes me feel as if there is a weight inside my stomach. It makes my palms a little bit sticky. Then it morphs and the second thing I feel is a sense of panic. What if he’s horrible? What if he sends me a message demanding an explanation of just who I am and why I’m asking to be friends in the first place? What if it ruins everything I ever thought about him? The thought is excruciating, and now the back of my neck feels warm. I want to hide under my duvet and squeeze my eyes tightly shut. For a split second, I want to take it all back. I want to cancel the request. I could do that. It’s an option. And yet, I don’t.

  Finally, my logical side takes over, and it tells me in a stern, yet soothing voice to stop overthinking it. Don’t panic, Cassie, it’s saying. People add other people as friends on Facebook all the time. I have exactly nothing to lose here. I’ll either get accepted (hugely unlikely) or ignored (probably). Jesse Franklin will likely never give it any thought. He probably gets this all the time.

  Chapter Two

  From: Date My Mate

  To: Cassie Banks

  Subject: Message Received on Date My Mate… Could It Be Fate?

  Hi CassieB83,

  You’ve received new messages on Date My Mate.

  Click here or log in now to read your messages and find out if it could be fate!

  Good luck!

  The Date My Mate Admin Team

  * * *

  Name: Tom

  Age: 35

  Location: Stoke Newington

  Hi babe, spit or swallow?

  * * *

  Name: Mike

  Age: 29

  Location: Watford

  Hey beautiful. Shall we swap numbers?

  * * *

  Name: Ronan

  Age: 23

  Location: Ealing

  New in town, looking for a hook-up. How would sex with you work?

  * * *

  Name: Andy

  Age: 34

  Location: Richmond

  How about some fun in the back seat of my car (Audi) in Richmond Park? Surrounded by deer and people.

  * * *

  Name: Fred

  Age: 31

  Location: Clapham Common

  Just wanted to say hi. I’m pretty new at this, so sorry if this is lame/crap/a rubbish message.

  I’m Fred, I work at a tech startup in Shoreditch, but I promise I’m not one of those dreadful man-bunned hipsters. Live in Clapham with my housemate Tyler and my cat, Martin. It’s a proper lad’s place, to be honest.

  Anyway, it was Tyler who set up my profile. Still trying to work out if he’s done me a favour or not. Like I said, this is new territory for me.

  Sorry if you were expecting a picture of my penis.

  Bye!

  Fred.

  p.s., I think you’re very pretty.

  * * *

  To: FredTed49

  From: CassieB83

  Hi Fred,

  Thanks for your message. I didn’t think it was crap but I’m also fairly new at this so what do I know? It’s hard to say if Tyler’s done you a favour or not. Guess that remain
s to be seen.

  I wasn’t expecting a picture of your penis and truthfully, I’m relieved you didn’t send one. I wouldn’t have replied if you had. Actually this is the first time I’ve ever responded to anyone.

  Thanks also for the nice compliment. You’re not so bad yourself :) And don’t you have to play the ukulele to be classed as a hipster?

  I live in Shepherd’s Bush with a couple of housemates, and I work at Beauchamp and Taylor head office in merchandising.

  Thanks for not being a total creep!

  Cassie

  Chapter Three

  Jesse

  Two weeks ago someone called Cassie Banks sent me a friend request on Facebook, and this was odd for two reasons.

  Firstly, I don’t know anyone called Cassie Banks. This Cassie lives in the UK, and I’ve not been there for a long time. Maybe she moved there? Maybe she’s someone from Nebraska I went to school with? I think back to all the people I’ve met at various studios and gigs and sessions over the years, but come up with nothing. The name isn’t at all familiar. I can’t place her. Each time I try, I draw a blank.

  Secondly, I keep myself as low key as possible on the internet and I always have. Or so I thought, and the reason is glaringly obvious. I worked so hard to put Franko behind me, to get on with things after it ended. Family aside, everyone I am connected with on social media is someone I met after that part of my life ended.

  In hindsight, now that sufficient time has passed, I know there are kids out there who’d give anything for the life we had, and in the beginning, when everything was shiny and new, it was a riot. But trust me, when you have a manager like Dad, who pretended that state laws for working minors weren’t a thing, and didn’t believe in time off, and you’re constantly a little bit jet lagged because you’re never anywhere long enough to acclimate, and half the time you’re not even sure what day it is, it soon stops being the vacation you thought it might be. Neil Young says it’s better to burn out than to fade away, but in my experience burning out is much, much worse. At least if you fade away, you’re not so goddamn exhausted.