THE QUACK

My oldest brother, Jack, is not one to express himself with words. The evidence that he cares is presented via organising events, offering logistics to your life, and giving gifts. However, Jack’s gifts are not always the most typical; more often than not, they are damn right random.

When I was a teenager, I had a chain of Christmases where Jack bought me statues; one year, it was a wooden chef, and another was a man and woman ballroom dancing. For my 21^st, he gave me a second-hand maroon military hoodie. And recently, a framed Taylor Swift shrine was delivered to my door.

I was a little relieved when Jack gave me the option to choose a show to go to for 32nd birthday. I told him that I would love to go to a comedy show. What I got was four tickets to Derren Brown’s Unbelievable.  

As a people pleaser, I find magicians stressful. It takes a lot of energy to be in awe of a middle-aged man when he’s pulling cards out of your hair. However, this was a Derren Brown’s production, so I was expecting something a bit more thrilling.

And so, we went to The Criterion Theatre on Piccadilly Circus. I was relieved to find our seats were safely tucked in the middle of the stalls, far away from the stage, and so were at no risk of being picked on. Still, this didn’t stop Jack from pressuring me to put my hand up every time a magician asked for a volunteer. But I told him to leave me alone, as I was happy to observe the magic from afar. I saw water being turned into a Long Island Iced Tea and watched a pianist play a song that was in someone’s head. All very entertaining. All very relaxing…until the last act.

The magicians wheeled out a tumbler with balls that had every seat number on it. They picked out five of them, including H15. My seat. My gut twirled and twisted as I stood up. And then an audience member had to pick which one of the five should go up on the stage. 

“Erm….H15,” he mumbled into the mic. My gut fell out of my butt and onto the theatre floor. 

Jack laughed at my displeasure as I shuffled past him to get to the stage. When I got up there, I was blinded by the stage lights, but I could just about gather the rows and rows of faces staring back at me. 

My first task was to check if the old wooden wardrobe on the stage was empty. I confirmed that it was. Then I was told to ‘make myself comfortable’ on a plastic tree stump.

At this point, I realised that the magician was gorgeous and far from a middle-aged man with a pack of cards and a disappointed mother. This one had fluffy storm cloud-coloured hair and was pulling off the ‘undone suit look’ remarkably well; with a tattoo peering out from under his rolled-up white sleeve.  Unfortunately, about 500 people were watching us, including my brother, and so instead of flirting, the Hot Magician told me about a spirit who could sense my energy.

To be fair I’ve had worst chat on dates.

A spooky voice echoed around the theatre. “Mary, I can sense a ‘J’ in your life. Ju…Julie….Julia?”

“Yes, that’s my Mum,” I said.

The Hot Magician looked shocked. “Your mum? Wow. So that we know we have the right Julia, please tell us something that only you and your Mum share that nobody else knows.” I sat on the plastic tree stump and had a long, hard think. Too long perhaps, because the Hot Magician hurried me. “Anything at all…”

I got it. “What… was the song … we used to sing in the car…. on the way to school…. when I was thirteen years old?”

A flash of worry crossed the Hot Magician’s face. “You want to know…. what song you sang in the car with your mum when you were…. thirteen years old?”

I tried not to take offence to how much he emphasised thirteen as if I had just said 1733.

“Yes.”

“Give or take?”

“Sure.”

The spooky voice came back into the room. “The song you and Julia sang in the car when you were thirteen years old was Hero by Enrique Iglesias.”

Hot Magician’s eyes narrowed. “Is that…?”

I nodded. “That’s it. That must be my Mum.”

 The audience gasped and Hot Magician breathed again. Hot Magician then got me to hold a red balloon. I don’t know why I had to hold a red balloon, but there were a lot of things I couldn’t explain at that point in the evening. 

Hot Magician said, “If you could say something special to someone right now, what would it be?”

“I would say, thank you to my lovely brother Jack who got me these tickets as a birthday present.” The audience let out an ‘aww’.  They didn’t quite get my sarcasm. 

“That’s sweet, but what about your Mum? What would you wish you could say to her?”  Hot Magician said, refocusing the show. I am not as bad as Jack, but I’m still quite British when it comes to expressing my feelings out loud, especially in front of a whole West End theatre, so I made a joke instead. 

 “Um, I would say thank you for letting me share your Netflix subscription. And thanks for making all the vegetables at Christmas vegan-friendly, even though everyone knows that butter makes the potatoes taste better.”

A laugh errupted which made me very happy, but I could sense by the serious thick eyebrows on the Hot Magician’s beautiful face, and the slow piano now playing in the background, that Derren Brown was going for a more ‘emotional vibe’ for this part of his show.  

I dug a millimetre deeper. “And thanks for always picking up the phone even though I’m in my 30s, and really should learn how to do life without calling my mum all the time.”

  “Aww,” went the audience. The Hot Magician nodded. He was proud of me. 

“Well, Mary, you can now say it to her face.” 

He opened the wardrobe door……and Mum was sitting inside, smiling, waving her arms.

Baffled by Mum’s presence in a wardrobe, on a stage, in London, I turned to the audience. The only person not applauding was my brother, for he was laughing too hard to be able to clap.  I guess it was a comedy show – for one person at least. 

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