Tender (A britpop era fiction)

It's Better People

I hate this chapter. I really, really fuckin hate it, I've tried to write it for ages and it's just not worked out in the slightest as I hoped it would. But I didn't want to make you wait any longer. Next one will be better, I promise.

Lots of love as always,

Sally, x. 

It's ten in the morning and I sip on my coffee, quietly watching Matt as he sets up the camera. Like he promised on Friday, there is no one in the room besides us aand it'll stay that way until the interviews are done. I can't bring myself to talk about the things that'll come up inevitably in front of strangers. To Matt on the other hand, I have a strange trust I can't really explain.

Patiently I wait until he's done and sits down.

"How was your Monday so far?" he asks with a crooked smile.

"Hectic." Getting the kids to school today was a right nightmare, Dylan overslept and her running around frantically to gather her stuff only made the rest of us nervous. Finan couldn't find his toy dinosaur and spread the contents of his toy chest all over his room. Alika downright refused to get into the car and only Paul holding her hand all the way could calm her somehow down.

"Are you going to be at Suzie's later?" I asked Dylan before she could jump out of the car and run into the school building.

"Not sure."

"Dylan please" I said. "Imma need you there."

"What d'ya need me for?"

"Being more leavel-headed than I am." Dylan laughs.

"Mum, I don't think anyone's been more leavel-headed in this than you."

I shrug, dismissing it. "And yours?"

"Stressful" he says. "Early meeting with the other producers."

I raise my eyebrows.

"Any problems?" I ask.

"Not more than the usual crap that comes along with getting a production like this going" he dismisses it. I get the feeling thats not all, but I choose to ignore it as he ignores it. In a way I owe it to him.

"Claire, before we begin I wanted to say I'm glad you invited me Friday night to stay with you for dinner. It was..." He smiles with bright eyes. "It was a very pleasant surprise. Meeting them all."

"It was a pleasant surprise for us as well." Especially for my daughters. It hasn't escaped my attention, Dylans good mood all weekend long and Alika couldn't shut up about her new friend for even a minute.

And I like Matt. I don't really know why. He's as professional and polite as one can wish him to be and usually journalists or people asking me too much about my life in general are not very much favoured by me. I hate nosiness. It took years for me to find a way around the paranoia that would overcome me whenever someone would ask a question that went beyond the usual small talk and I'm still very, very careful. When the media started to take interest in me, first because of my brothers and then because of all the shit I pulled, I overshared far too much in interviews. When Damon and I went public, that blew up right in my face. The scrutiny that followed my every move after that made me learn my lesson the hard way.

My work is public and everyone can ask me anything about that. My family life, my love life especially, should remain as private as possible. But within the last few years, especially since the break-up of Oasis, it seems to me that the interest in the Britpop thing is increasing again. For years journalists and media people would leave me alone with questions about Britpop for a long time, but for a certain while now I've noticed they ask again, very curious and sometimes borderline provocative.