Page 30 of What Would Dolly Do?

I t was another Saturday night at Sonny’s Bar and I was in the back office feeling a million times more nervous than I had on the night I’d intended to relaunch myself as a solo Dolly Parton act.

Instead of bouffant blonde hair and a tasselled two-piece I now had coppery curls and was wearing my new clingy denim waistcoat with the crazy tartan trousers.

I kept looking at the Madonna-style studded boots on my feet and wondered what is was that I was ‘desperately seeking’?

My mind perhaps? Because I must have totally lost it somewhere along the way …

how had this seemed like a good idea when Tom suggested we debut my revamped look and a couple of new songs right here in the club in front of an unsuspecting audience who had no idea who Becky Mooney was and had very little reason to care?

My stomach was cartwheeling and there was a slick of sweat running down my spine. At least the waistcoat I was wearing left my arms bare so there was no risk of unsightly sweat stains appearing under my armpits. So there was some good news.

Tom had suggested I down a whisky ‘for my nerves’ before taking to the stage and Stella helpfully said she would fetch me that.

Before she went to get it, she tried to talk to me about a spate of nuisance calls to the bar, someone calling and calling but no one ever being on the line but she quickly realised I was not in the mood to take in any new information and gave that up.

So I was left pacing the tiny office alone.

Well ‘pacing’ was an exaggeration. The space was so small I could take three small steps before I hit a wall, a desk or a filing cabinet.

I was mincing more than pacing. That didn’t seem very cool for an emerging country singer songwriter so I stopped.

I had to try and get my stage fright under control.

I was hoping the whisky would help, along with the fact the Sonny’s Bar crowd would be small and were usually friendly.

Laura and Ferg and, of course, Tom had put so much faith in me, had made every effort to bolster my shaky confidence and show me how I could finally step on stage as me and not Dolly. I was desperate not to let them down.

Stella and Donald had given their verdicts on my new look and my plans to sing when I’d shown up earlier, before the punters had started to come in.

Donald had said, ‘Nice,’ with an emphatic nod of his head.

Stella had said even less but had immediately given me a great big hug. Both reactions had meant the world.

Tom was planning to sneak in and join me once the show started.

Comedian Gabby Wolf was going to be the opening act and then I would be on.

I understood the sense of Tom hanging back, it wouldn’t do for the audience to think he was planning on doing a repeat surprise performance.

My fear of failure was already high, I didn’t need the crowd to be disappointed before I even began.

I was barely coping with the suspense and stage fright. Where was Stella with that drink!?

Just then the office door opened and I turned with relief to grab the whisky tumbler from Stella.

But it wasn’t Stella standing in the doorway, it was Robbie!

Seriously!? His timing was as reliably awful as always.

He started to stutter an apology and back out of the room and it wasn’t until he saw how shocked I looked to see him that he realised he knew me.

‘BECKY?!’ It was an exclamation and a question all at once.

Bloody hell, this was the last thing I needed and I couldn’t help but show my irritation by snapping, ‘Hey Robbie, I’m a bit busy right now.’

My erstwhile partner had a tendency to look gormless at the best of times but, on this occasion, he could win an award for most dumbass expression to ever grace the face of a fully grown man.

He stood there staring at me with his eyes on stalks and his mouth hanging open.

It might have been flattering if I wasn’t so preoccupied … and it wasn’t Robbie!

What the hell did he want? Why hadn’t he called before just turning up? We’d not spoken for weeks, things had been so mad and everything had taken off so well at Sonny’s I’d not needed to call him for advice or tips on how to run the place like I’d thought I might have to.

We stood facing each other in a weird stand-off while I debated how to get him to leave. His expression was starting to change as he looked me over, his attitude morphing from shock and surprise to something that looked like … wait … was that scorn I could see written all over his face?

‘Good grief, Becky,’ he said with a snort, ‘what the fuck d’you look like!?’

There it was. The horror of his words and the humiliation of having someone look at me as though I was a bad joke washed over me.

I opened my mouth but no words came out.

It didn’t matter, Robbie was still talking; ‘Is this some sort of reaction to our break-up? A mid-life crisis? A nervous breakdown?’ With each increasingly insulting question Robbie was looking more and more pleased with himself and I plunged further and further into utter despair.

‘Ahh give us a song, Becky!’ Robbie was literally laughing in my face as his gaze lingered on my tartan-clad legs for just a little too long.

‘Go on …’ the sheer delight he was taking was spectacular and he was about to twist the knife even further.

‘I’ll start you off if you like … Bye, Bye Baby … Baby Gooodbyeeee …’

That did it, I pushed past Robbie and bolted for the exit, sprinting past Stella with my glass of whisky in her hand, as the sound of Robbie singing a Bay City Rollers hit followed me up the stairs of the club and out onto the street.

I hit the early evening Edinburgh air gasping and gulping in a desperate attempt to stop myself from sobbing out loud. Now what?

All I could think was that I needed to escape, get away from the club, from Robbie’s raucous rendition of the Rollers, which I could still hear even at street level and get out of these ridiculously inappropriate stupid clothes.

Where was Iain when I needed him? If only I had a chauffeur-driven car waiting for me right now, although I actually didn’t really want to face anybody, not even kindly Iain.

I wanted to be on my own, no Iain, no Tom, and definitely no Robbie.

I turned left and began sprinting up the street, I’d get to the corner and there was bound to be a cab I could hail near Cowgate where the traffic was busier.

I’d go back to my flat in Stockbridge, lock the door, turn off all the lights and never, ever let anyone in.

That was the goal. It seemed achievable.

Then I saw them. What the hell!? Mum and Dad were strolling down the street heading straight towards me!

They shouldn’t be here. They shouldn’t be anywhere near here.

They’d said they weren’t flying into Edinburgh until tomorrow.

I’d managed to dissuade them from coming over before tonight.

Once Tom came up with the idea of showcasing me and my songs to Sonny’s Saturday night crowd I’d told them to come Sunday instead and they’d agreed.

Or at least I thought they had. The sight of them heading my way now proved quite different.

I had seconds before they spotted me. I couldn’t risk that.

I didn’t want the questions – about my clothes, my red hair or why I was running down the street away from my own club.

But seeing my parents so unexpectedly was twisting the knife in my guts and messing with my brain.

It was tempting to simply hurl myself at them and sob like a baby but I made a split-second decision and ducked into a pub just down from the corner.

I burst through the swing doors inside the alcove and tucked myself to the side so I could peep through the small window to watch my parents go past. My heart hammered even harder as I suddenly thought this place might be exactly where they were heading but then I watched as my dad in a jaunty lemon sweater and my mum in pastel-pink slacks sauntered past.

I staggered to the far end of the bar dripping in sweat and brief relief.

The smell of alcohol was in my nostrils and I realised I was still craving that large whisky, in fact I needed it more now than I had when I’d been having the jitters in the back office.

The place was deserted save for a young barmaid who took my order without making eye contact.

I’d planned to have just the one drink but once I’d tucked myself into a corner behind a carved wooden partition I found it difficult to decide where I would go?

If I headed home I’d soon be found by Mum and Dad.

They had a key to the flat and must’ve already been there to drop off their luggage.

I couldn’t go to Forthview House; my fast exit from Sonny’s would be a complete slap in the face for Laura and Fergus my lovely new friends who’d done so much to get me to this point only for me to bottle it.

I sank the first whisky too fast but I ordered another and decided to take my time with this one, sipping it more slowly as I let the warmth of the scotch soothe my rattled nerves.

If only I had a comforting bag of marshmallows.

They really should stock those as bar snacks in pubs, I’m sure they’d be hugely popular.

The panic inside me began to subside, even without the marshmallows, but a more morose mood was blooming as I slipped deeper into my chair and into despair.

Robbie’s scornful face kept looming into my mind, the expression on it was one I’d seen before. The trigger for my stage fright and the reason I’d quit performing as part of The Moonshine Trio when I was just fourteen years old had been a similar reaction from a pair of bitchy girls from school.