The Devil’s Waiting Room
By Berry Burgess
The Devil’s Waiting Room
By Berry Burgess
Published by Berry Burgess at Smashwords
Copyright 2011 Berry Burgess
Smashwords Edition, License Notes
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For Judi, Lewis, Rachel, Elaine and Vivian.
Blood made us family,
Love made us friends
PREFACE
Few people, least of all myself, would have thought that after nearly 30 years in the advertising business I would end up owning my own design agency Armadillo Creative on the very playground I ran on when I was an innocent child the Fish Quay in North Shields.
The River Tyne has witnessed many changes through the years: from the demise of the once proud fishing fleets and the mighty Swan Hunters to the erection of designer Quayside luxury apartments and the influx of new style progressive businesses and developments. The Devils Waiting Room started out as playful meanderings through one summer in 1969, the last summer before the ‘gang’ broke up and went off in different directions to secondary schools.
It was time of innocence and change. Racism was very strong and had an iron grip on Shields, and coming from one of the few coloured families in the town that isolation and undercurrent was a major factor in my childhood. The late sixties was a time for change, and when you’re young and three-foot-odd it seems too big and of no relevance to pocket money and comics.
Where are my friends now? Who knows? Many may have left the area for good. When I was 15 I ran away from my foster parents and went to London; but something dragged me back to North Shields a few day later. That magnet has kept me here ever since, and I’m proud of my small town.
I still live in North Shields with my beautiful and understanding wife Judi, and I have two children although not that small; Rachel who is a Director at Armadillo and keeps me on a short leash, and my son Lewis who from being a cute innocent bundle of fun, since becoming a teenager now just engages in a dialogue of grunts and snorts in-between sequences of Gears of War and Call of Duty. Both grew up in my childhood playground but neither ran with such freedom or the wind on their faces like I did many years ago. For that I am blessed.
PROLOGUE
The Devil's Waiting Room is biographical journey centred around the summer in 1969 in the fishing port of North Shields on the banks of the River Tyne. Racism was still very strong and open and had an iron grip on the town during perpetual time for change. The last summer sees the changes and adventures through my eyes as a 10 year old innocent who just wanted to run and play but was caught up in the undercurrent of the times.
As one of the few mixed race families in North Shields, that created isolation and tension that a pre-pubescent child could never really understand at the time. North Shields had many interesting characters that spilt over into our lives, whether we liked it or not.
The Sandman and the Ghosts kept us awake at night till the morning broke. Outside we ran. At home we persevered. And late at night, I would hear my father cry. The world evolved in black and white, everything only ever happened in cold shades of grey. However, the summer of that year was the colour of freedom. It spun around in a spectrum of kaleidoscopic vibrant tones that no adult could ever see. While older people saw news and information, we fed on the freedom of our playground. From the Spanish Battery to the Tiger Stairs, there was no black and there was no white. This was our Promised Land, and in it we were free.
CHAPTER ONE
THE DARK MAN
It was so hot. I remember the heat burning endlessly through that last summer. It was fire on the fingertips. All this heat and space was our inheritance that summer. When you’re young, space comes very easy – you don’t have to find it, it’s just there. So there we were, with all this heat and space. Daydream Believers every one. The last summer had begun…
The Dark Man stood like a great ageing sentinel, guarding the dimly lit entrance of the two-roomed downstairs flat that was his home. A thin wry smile began to stretch across his tired face that had witnessed everything, but seen nothing. Painful eyes recorded every breath and every movement: aware, unaware. From the shadows his eyes blinked and caught the last remaining twilight rays that slowly sank across the concrete cricket pitch carved in chalk. So many miles from the balmy nights of Kingston Jamaica, where cricket was king. So many miles from everywhere. Shuffling quietly, his pajamas crept casually beneath his heavy trousers and peeked out between his shoes and his two-inch turn-ups. The string holding the coarse twill battleship grey trousers had arrived attached to a large parcel about two years previously, courtesy of Auntie Vera’s Marshall Ward catalogue.
As the sun retreated, the heat was replaced by something else, a kind of stifling entity that we could never identify. The space rapidly disappeared and an impatient waiting heaviness descended – the heat was our life, and we had runs to score and sixes to strike.
The Dark Man was never unclean, but neither was he a Jason King. At around sixteen stone, six feet, and touching the wrong side of sixty-five, it’s hard to put appearances as a main priority in one’s life when you rely on a pension book every Tuesday. The same could never be said for his children. Nobody claimed to understand the big Jamaican, least of all his two children; but everybody respected the effort that he put into his children’s appearance.
Still standing quietly in the doorway, observing the final few over’s of the cricket match. He was the square-leg umpire, the final arbitrator, the spectators, the commentator, the green-keeper, the first and last word. His creased eyes squinted in the dusk as his small son patted down the concrete wicket and took his guard. While all the other children from the street were either Boycott, Milburn or Trueman, the Dark Man knew his son walked in Gary Sobers’ and Charlie Griffiths’ shoes. He was pleased. The night drew on and at eleven the stumps were pulled for the day; the light was getting bad anyway. As the boys raced down the street the Dark Man spread his huge arms to guide his children into the doorway. Tomorrow it would be hot again.
The front room of the flat wasn’t lit much better than the light at the end of the last over. One single bulb with no shade hung desperately between ceiling and floor, casting little comfort in the dark room. If anything it created darkness. Nooks and crannies opened up under its flickering glow, as long silent shadows held hidden secrets waiting to be explored by brave adventurers. The crackle of the open fire was the one point of reassurance in the room. There was heat. That meant space. Space to feel warmth, Space to feel the love that lived in that room, a love that would fight any of the shadow demons.
Threadbare…that could be the only kind description of what was once a carpet. Luckily the vastness of the dining table cast its presence over most of the carpet so it never looked quite as bad as it really was. Despite the regularity of the Bixell carpet sweeper, countless hidden crumbs mingled with the eager dust mites, surfacing for inspection in the warm radiance of the coal fire at frequent intervals. There was very little physical space in the flat. Outside we ran. At home we persevered. And late at night, I would hear my father cry.
The summer nights were strange quiet affairs. The days may have belonged to the Seventh Cavalry, but the nights belonged to my father. Endless evenings of silent solitude were broken by the scratchy whirring of dials and the interrupted intrusion of crackling and static. Distant voices called our names in the darkness, from places unheard. From the Other Side. “Be grateful,” my father would snap, when we asked yet again why we couldn’t have a television like everyone else. “Televisions damage your eyes.” was always his reply. I never once saw any of my friends with square eyes, as was often suggested.
Who knows where that big brown box of a radio came from – it didn’t really matter anyway. Two huge cream Bakelite knobs sat beneath the central speaker, which was covered in a tawdry mesh of coarse material that had certainly seen better days. Arching smoothly at the top in a gentle point, the radio dominated the corner of the room, positioned delicately on an odd-looking bedside cabinet that was way past its best. Wearing the same clothes as yesterday, and days before that; my father would hunch over the old radio, his huge frame seemingly gaining new strength from the radio waves with each minute. No longer broken by the chore of washing and cooking, his spirit soared like a bird when the voices began. It was one of the few times we actually had company in our home. The wallpaper creaked to hear any dropped word, and the shadows would fall silent.
That was the power of the Time. This was his Time; we gave him the respect, even if we didn’t understand. We valued our skin. My father’s skin was black. My sister’s skin was white. My skin was the colour of a Caramac bar. On the radio there is no colour, but his voice haunted my mind. It said something in its calmness, in its vigor, in its passion. It disturbed my summer.
“I have been to the mountain top… I may not get there with you, but I want you to know tonight; that we as a people will get to the Promised Land. So I am happy tonight. I am not worried about anything. I am not fearing any man. Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord.”
His voice was so distant, but I touched it that night. It covered my father too. I know that. His intrusion into my world was unkind. The world ended at Wallsend swimming baths. Why bring it closer? I never asked my father about the voice. I never asked my father about anything. As he crouched hawk-like over the brown box his face would stiffen as his eyes strained to see further into the fabric covering the soundbox. It was as if he was asking the radio to suck him in and take him to the Voice. The intensity on his aged brow was there for all to paint. Did the Dark Man understand? Or was progressing technology the quiet flame of bewilderment?
Radio Rentals showed a kaleidoscope of events from the Big Country – the riots, the fury and the anger. Martin’s death. I would gaze endlessly enthralled by the square box. I wanted a television. Everyone else in the street had a television but we still had a radio. Sometimes the Radio Rentals window became our second home on our way back home from school. We would press our eager faces into the cool glass of the window and stare with open mouths as the world unfolded in front of our silent eyes. “Assassinated.” they said, whatever that meant. So soon? He was only talking to us just a few days ago. Knowledge brought only confusion, and I had dragons to slay that summer.
The world evolved in black and white, everything only ever happened in cold shades of grey. However, the summer of that year was the colour of freedom. It spun around in a spectrum of kaleidoscopic vibrant tones that no adult could ever see. While older people saw news and information, we fed on the freedom of our playground.
From the Spanish Battery to the Tiger Stairs, there was no black and there was no white. This was our Promised Land, and in it we were free.
CHAPTER THREE
OF MICE AND GHOST
The sharp scuttling of the tiny eager feet penetrated the damp summer nights, intent on mischief. Midnight hunters prowled the bedroom floor, hurrying between the shadows and the discarded dirty washing to wait for the Acdo. An empty milk bottle stood invitingly by the entrance to their home with a beckoning piece of yesterday’s cheese. Mice are not stupid. Blurred shapes moved restlessly on the huge iron bed, listening earnestly for the slightest sounds of movement on the cold linoleum floor. Beresford inched closer into the sleeping frame of his father, hoping that his delicate nudges and movements might awaken him from his slumber. He hated the night. The springs of the iron bed would strain and squeak with any shift in movement. Sometimes it was hard to distinguish if it was the bed or the midnight mice that were talking.
His sister Elaine was asleep on his left, the torn wallpaper facing her conjured interesting images if you looked really hard into it. It was never comfortable sleeping in the middle. It was always hot and lonely. Slowly inching his leg out of the covers, Beresford would feel the cool air on his feet and would feel less confined. If he were delicate enough he would attempt to crawl over his fathers frame and end up on the far edge of the bed. That was where he wanted to be, but things were never his choice unfortunately. Peering beyond the foot of the bed into the darkness, the waiting moonlight was patiently absorbing the heavy curtains, eating into the waiting imagination, sometimes breaking through and creating strange adventures on the shadowy walls. The window stretched from two feet above the floor right up to the ceiling, making it a perfect entry for goblins and monsters. The dirt floated around in the moonbeams from the distant corners and shrouded the silence in a damp fog. Stopping suddenly, the busy mice would stare up into the veil and consider whether to venture into it or not. Those were the longest silences.
“Bud-ump, Bud-dump, Bud-dump!”
Only the reassuring heartbeat of his father’s frame gave out any comfort. Transfixed by the light in the curtains, he would tug the purple eiderdown up a little closer to his chin as images came and went from behind the light. Bad dreams always came. Bats hung perilously close beneath the curtains: waiting. Winds brought creatures best left unsaid, returning each night like the Bird and Prometheus to torture the sleepy children. The erratic drip of the rusty tap in the sink would echo the distant wails of tortured heroes in their final death throes, in some god-forsaken land miles from home, miles from the summer. He hated that room. The darkness and the gloom ate the space.
He saw a Ghost…
It was late. The blackness of the room was waiting quietly for the creatures from the other side to start their calling. Beresford’s eyes scanned the farthest corners nervously. They were late. Perhaps they were visiting someone else tonight? The repetitious sighing of his father’s night time breathing broke his concentration for a few moments, but did little to relieve the anxiety of the restless night. They were definitely late. Beneath his feet the crumpled up pages of the News of the World irritated his toes. How scrunched up newspaper was supposed to keep your feet warm was anyone’s guess, but it was a nightly ritual that his father kept with methodical regular monotony. It was yet another uncomfortable night, the cricket match was left without a definite conclusion yet again, and the feeling of anti-climax lingered till he put on his cotton pajamas and slipped reluctantly into bed between his sister and his father.
Continuing the innings; the straight bat and strong forward defensive, proved little escape for the waiting. He felt his eyelids sink under the weight of countless monstrous sixes over the terraced roofs of the street; his limbs relaxed and his breath sank into calm warm waters. Blues and deeper blues floated over his mind, sparkling in the heat of the summer sun. Perhaps they weren’t coming tonight…
As if by some unseen force, he was awake again. The room was filled with a stillness that he hadn’t experienced before; the heaviness that lived in the far distant corners was missing. It was strange; he seemed more awake than he had ever been in his whole life. His young body felt at peace. The waiting had changed…
Straining his eyes into the night, he sensed her before he saw her. In the far left of the bedroom beside the door leading to the back yard she appeared behind the heavy shadows. Dressed all in black, a black even deeper than the shadows she came from, she stood and waited.
The cool shimmering moonlight flickered almost respectfully on a white ruffled collar that sat high beneath her chin, providing the only contrast to her black dress. He thought the dress was Victorian or something; it was certainly heavy with intricate embroidered patterns that were a shade darker than the cloth. Pinched tight into the waist, the garment had an elegant austere look. She carried an air of control about her, but her presence never once threatened. Everything was still, and everything was as it should be. She was not from the Other Side.
Beresford felt strangely comfortable with the Lady, {for that is what she was} and he was glad that she had decided to visit him on that night of all nights. He stared quietly, offering no sound that might disturb her; he kept his body stone still, not out of fear but out of friendship. The midnight mice stayed sleeping out of respect too. The Lady didn’t move, she just watched with motionless eyes. She was waiting too. Her face seemed covered in the vagueness of the night’s shadows, She seemed careful not to reveal too much of her identity. Perhaps she was a Princess? Beresford thought. No, that was girl’s stuff. But she definitely carried an air about her that was coloured with some authority. He kept looking at her, waiting for her to speak, but she never did. Everything in the room waited on her, peace filled the hidden shadows and calm lit up the night time as it never would again. The silence floated around the room, and the two watchers stared into the bright calmness of the waiting hours, absorbing all the hushed whispers of all the many forgotten people who had ever walked through that room. A peace had covered the turmoil of the shadow creatures in the wall and they curled up into small tight balls and snuggled close with watching mothers to hibernate forever.
That night the Lady and the boy were the only people awake in the whole world.
Somewhere between Sometime and Somehow, the summer began to call through the heavy bedroom curtains. The room was always different in the mornings, you could stare all day at the dirty faded patterns in the wallpaper and still no creatures would appear from beneath the musty paisley. The darkness of the night was replaced by the fever of the morning. Clothes were rushed on and hot bowls of water with floating flannels were trooped into the bedroom. The Sandman was washed out of the eyes with a vigor that prepared anyone for anything that day. Beresford felt the world wake with him that morning and feared no one, not even Tony Lucas, as he left the bedroom with one last backward glance. Sitting down for breakfast at the big table in the other room, Beresford was pondering over his boiled eggs and soldiers. Elaine sat flicking her wispy blond fringe out of eyes, sending her brother darting looks as he fidgeted nervously on the chair. Their father sat in silence as they ate, never looking up.
“Dad?” Beresford probed.
Dark eyes lifted beneath heavy tortoise-shell spectacles. The events of the night were unfolded in an air of silence. His father gave him short shrift for some reason and made it perfectly clear in his manner that the incident was not to be discussed further. Beresford knew when to pull stumps and declare an innings lost. The breakfast continued in an even darker silence. Elaine flicked her icy blue eyes through her blonde fringe and flung a few barbed looks at him, which wasn’t that unusual first thing in a morning. Beresford felt like a new puppy, he wanted everyone to share in his excitement and play but he was dismissed like a tiresome plaything that was losing its appeal.
Without knowing why, Beresford hurried down his last soldier and moved gingerly into the bedroom. Moving with some purpose, he stood in the spot where his visitor had been a few hours previously and looked up at the wall. The dirty wallpaper seemed to waiting for his arrival, and shining out of the gloom of the wall was a square rectangular patch that had obviously held a photograph until recently.
Beresford had never taken that much notice of the bedroom before, it always scared him and it was much too dark. He looked closely at the light patch, then his eyes quickly circled back around the room until they came to rest on it again, and he knew what used to hang there.
It was the Lady. Where was it now? Who had taken it down? Who was she?
She never came back.
CHAPTER THREE
THE RED SWORD
“C’mon. C’mon. Whad’ya wanna be, Badger? A Rastus, or a Buckweed?”
They gathered like hounds, eyes popping with anticipation for the kill. I felt good that they were showing me all this special attention; I never really hung out with the big boys, not really. Since I was always the last to be picked during the football matches (but the first to be called on when cricket stumps were required) I reveled in my newfound importance. “Come on Badger, Rastus or Buckweed?”
I always preferred Badger, but if I had to choose a new nickname – and it was obvious I had to – then Rastus…
Amidst all the whooping and laughing I joined in, unaware of what I was laughing at but happy to be the focus of events. Keith Mather was widely thought of as one of, if not the most intelligent boy this side of the Hots. Being of superior intelligence gave him the divine right to dictate and very few of us gave any form of argument. For a week or so I relished in my new name, although my father didn’t seem impressed for some reason when I anxiously told him.
All through that summer we ran till our little hearts nearly burst. The Westerners, as we were called, derived our name because we all went to Western School. The dividing line in our hot summers was the Tiger Stairs; it separated the Westerners from the Flatties – or Applejacks if you wanted to be posh. Anything from the Bank Top to Scot’s Park was our territory; east of the Tiger Stairs and we were in bother. The Westerners comprised of Keith Mather, Charlie, Alison and Eddie Riddle, Dowsy, Burwood, Keith Curran, Tiny, Hailsy, Spud, Ian, Peter Fan, – and if we had to – Tony Lucas. There were of course other members who floated in and out, during the school holidays like Lillian Lucas, Nicolene and Eddie Burgo, the Clays, Ordy and Blev, to mention but a few.
That summer we promised ourselves the Universe. And we very nearly found it.
I suppose it all started when Charlie moved into the street. Up until then we all grew up together, went to school together, we were all in the same class – we never had an outsider before. Charlie came from Lancaster, wherever that was, and spoke with a strange accent. He moved into Sibthorpe Street right in between Keith Mather and the Riddles, so he eventually became quite inseparable from them. That put me further down the team list. I liked Charlie despite this, and if anything he became my best friend that summer. The great thing about Charlie was his toys. They came in huge boxes that were bottomless and full of such great surprises. It was an adventure in itself to go hunting in Charlie’s toy boxes. The first time we saw his Johnny Seven gun our jaws trailed the pavements; we all believed he must be a rich boy, and the fight was on to be Charlie’s best friend.
However, it was the metal machine gun that captured me. It was a Gatling gun that made the most tremendous noise when fired; its twin barrels would light up with flame red sparks, and it came on a tripod. I would humble myself to use it during Japs and Commandos, always volunteering to play base just to get my hands on the gun. While everyone was chasing shadows along the Bank Top all afternoon, I was guarding the base, alone with a machine gun, firing sporadically at passers-by to relieve the boredom. At least I had the machine gun. I guess it all came down to toys at the end of the day. Charlie had loads and I didn’t. I had a few, but not the big bright shiny new ones that everyone else had. Not the guns. A seasoned cricket stump doesn’t cut much action in Japs and Commandos. The only time we ever got toys was Christmas and even then it was odds on that it would be a compendium of games that came straight out of Bashie’s old travelling suitcase.
One day Woolworths were selling these Zorro type rapier swords for one and nine-pence, they were neatly placed in this barrel tub close to the window so everybody could see. Made out of the finest new plastic, they were the talking point of the street; the handles came in a vast assortment of bright colours that contrasted perfectly with the dull flat grey of the blade. I would float through the shop on numerous occasions and always somehow find myself staring at the barrel of swords, wishing.
The sound of Taiwanese plastic upon plastic echoed up the street as I wished the summer away. My father kept telling me that they were a complete waste of money and could poke someone’s eye out. Eventually, he slipped his flat cap on and took me over to Woolworths to get me one. I know he didn’t approve, but he got me one all the same. It took careful deliberation before I picked my weapon, but the yellow handled rapier escorted my father and I back over Saville Street and home, ready for tomorrow’s battle. That night I donned my mask and cape and prepared for the shadow demons as I climbed into bed.
It was hard to describe the pleasure of skipping down Rudyerd Street the following morning with my new friend tucked inside my belt. I felt as if I had finally joined the big boys. I joined in immediately in the savage cut and thrust up and down the Tiger Stairs, flags and handkerchiefs flying in the face of danger. I died a hundred times that day and could have died a hundred more. Then Tony Lucas came…
We were all told countless times to avoid the Lucas’s if we could; they were nothing but trouble; even their German Shepherd hound of hell Sabre ate testicles for breakfast. When Tony wanted to play, you didn’t argue you just eventually found an excuse to go home for tea. A year younger than us all, but twice as hard as all of us put together, Tony lived facing the Tiger Stairs with his parents, his German Shepherd and his dark haired sister Lillian. Brute strength was Tony’s only skill in life, and he used it to its full potential whenever he could. All I remember was one minute I had a two-foot sword, the next I was in possession of a four-inch dagger. Tony started to laugh and all the rest joined in, pointing and reminding me of my misfortune. No sword, no game. I slunk up past the old Boro Picture House with the fading laughter ringing in my ears, tears welling up in puffy eyes. I looked at my broken sword.
My father was going to kill me.
It was one of those silent, hushed nights. Even the midnight mice didn’t peek their little heads out from beneath the kitchen sink. I knew my father was annoyed. Money didn’t grow on trees, as he would constantly remind us. I knew that was the last sword I’d see from Woolworths, but I also knew that my backside got off a lot lighter than I ever expected so I had to be grateful for that at least. The following day I sat watching the sword-fights on the Tiger Stairs at a distance from the top of our back lane. My father was, unusually for him, working in the back yard. The whole of that morning was spent dreaming of what might have been and what I would love to do to Tony Lucas with my alter ego – Thor, God of Thunder.
The loneliness of the morning dragged on until just past dinner time and considering the previous days events I was a might surprised to see my fathers smiling face greet me as I sat down to eat. I kept one eye on my plate and the other on my father’s huge frame as I ate. After lunch he disappeared into the darkness of the bedroom and re-appeared with something behind his back. His eyes smiled and a few deeply unrehearsed mumbled words were exchanged, then he brandished this huge red sword that gleamed with the reddest, thickest, stickiest, tackiest gloss paint that you could ever imagine. A carpenter he was not. Without exchanging any words he handed me the sword and it nearly went straight through the floorboards, such was its weight. I was utterly speechless; not because of the thought, but because of the sheer ugliness and crudity of the monstrosity. Next to the delicate plastic rapiers, this was a Sherman tank. It was the only thing my father ever made for me, and it gave me raw spelks all over my palms
The sword stood up to my chin and was of the crudest design imaginable; basic, simple, a kiddies’ sword – not a sword for heroes. I knew it was only a matter of time before the gang saw the red plank and I was dead. I may as well take up knitting. I was destined for oblivion. My summer was over.
I proceeded into the back lane with my sword, under my father’s watchful eye. After he had gone I hid behind Alfie’s barrow and sat there, contemplating my future existence in the street with a hand made piece of two by four timber that was heavier than Moby Dick. I was history. I sat patiently waiting for the sun to swallow the day up.
The paint was still tacky and clinging to my fingers when George Hails appeared around the corner hotly pursued by the rest of the gang. I stood up sharply and tried to hide the sword behind my back. Too late, the catcalls had begun and the probing and the pushing were reaching a fever pitch, I could feel my eyes starting to fill up. It was Freak Show time again. Tony Lucas was in his primitive element. He teased me into a duel with the plank from hell. As he prodded his bright blue sword into my chest repeatedly with a bit more than playful intent, I knew there was no way out. Tony wanted more than total humiliation, he wanted annihilation. This was what Tony lived for. He consumed badness in abundance, he ate destruction for breakfast along with his barbed wire Weetabix…and it was fast approaching dinnertime
His eyes betrayed his intentions. I knew that this was what he had been waiting for; it was Christmas without the snow. I had little room to manoeuvre myself out of this one. I took a long hard gasp of air and wheeled my sword along the dirt to try for any kind of momentum to get the thing off the ground. What would Thor have done in this situation? Tony was still laughing at my attempts to lift the sword when I somehow managed to get the thing upright, even if it was wobbling quite precariously. Before anyone knew what had happened, our swords clashed in the summer sun. The coarseness of the timber was hurting my palms and the smell of the paint was irritating but I brought the beast down with all the strength I could muster and heard the crack of Tony’s sword as it shattered under the Red Sword’s mighty swing.
The silence seemed to last forever.
I had won. I had won.
Tony looked on in disbelief, his eyes filling up as the gang all gazed mesmerised at the Red Sword with some kind of reverence. Slowly, the large circle of justice evaporated in a hushed silence and the gang drifted down the back lane following Tony’s retreating frame.
I stood alone with the Red sword clenched in my hand and I realised that like Thor, I too had Mjolnir – a weapon of substance, a bringer of justice, a lawgiver. I swear I grew a few inches that day. Nobody ever laughed again when the Red Sword appeared. Least of all Tony Lucas.
Who needed plastic swords when you had an Equaliser like I had?
That summer the Red Sword and I traveled many distant lands and saved countless races from oppression and injustice, and I’m sure my father smiled from the inside.
CHAPTER FOUR
THE BLONDE ASSASSIN
The Red Sword vanquished all that opposed that summer. All but One. The Evil One. The One that we all must follow. The One that cannot die. My sister Elaine.
The heat of that summer was only matched by the coldness of being in her shadow, the length of which sometimes extended from insignificant to invisible. The only word to describe her was – Better. Better at cricket even though she didn’t know how to spin a Chinaman or play a straight bat. Better at Cowboys and Indians, better at running, better at fighting, better at just about anything. It wasn’t just me who was standing in her shadow when she got going; it was all the boys of the street, even Tony Lucas. Everyone fancied my sister, but I wanted to murder her. She was beautiful, okay I’ll give her that, but something must have disturbed her childhood psyche for her to abandon her Wendy house and inhabit my battlefield. She was the Avenging Cathy Gale, she was the Blonde Assassin. Her presence always put me further down the pecking order, which was just what I needed.
Long blonde hair trailing down her back, a short four-inch fringe (cut every month by father with a borrowed pair of scissors) covering a pair of ice-blue innocent eyes. Eyes that were forever hunting. Her skin was like Be-Ro flour, the pallor of the Snow Queen: at a glance much too fragile and sensitive for the hardships of the summer heat. However, she continually disproved all our theories with pleasant abandon. A lot taller than I and at times almost two years older – except on my birthday when it was only one year. Brother and sister. The fact that I had the complexion of a toffee and she not didn’t seem out of order in the make up of the universe all those summers ago.
Elaine lived with Dad and me. Dad, me and Elaine. brother, sister, father. Only mother was missing, but since we grew up giving mothers’ day cards to dad – the fragile structure of the universe remained just okey-dokey. One of the main reasons Elaine used to play with us all so much was that all her female fellow class friends somehow stopped at four o’clock. None of them ever came home with her for tea – not one, least of all Christine Burtenshaw. School Captain and highly desirable object, for any boy wearing short trousers and harbouring dreams of manhood. Unfortunately for me she never asked them, not that they would have come even if they were invited. Dad questioned a few times but busy homework schedules always blew him off the trail, I think. All my friends fancied Elaine. She could have had anyone. She went for Keith Ord. Next to Keith Ord, even I looked good. Yep! I liked old Ordy.
With the two older Armstrong brothers in Gardener Street still fighting each other over Elaine’s attention, she walked out with Ordy. The skinniest runt on the Bank Top. Always looking anaemic and possessing the expression that startled rabbits earn seconds before they are squished onto the road. He was a catch all right. Even my dad was surprised. But the lad was as pleasant as one could be without a sainthood, and he never said boo to a goose unless he got permission. ‘Stickleback’ was the term we gave to him only good for making the numbers up. I liked him a lot. He gave my life meaning, now that I was only the second last person to be picked when we were siding up. I felt superior to him even though I was younger, and I could boss him about – after all I was Elaine’s kid brother. A looker he was not but he did come complete with the intelligence of Brains from Thunderbirds, although, despite being a puppet I genuinely believe Brains possessed more of a personality. Elaine and Ordy continued their friendship through the following summer. It never stopped Elaine going out with other boys, and Ordy would sometimes hibernate back indoors with his mother until Elaine requested his presence again. Meanwhile along in Gardener Street, Terry and George Armstrong relentlessly continued to fight
Saturday mornings were the day we both looked forward too. With our pocket money in our itchy little hands we raced like the wind to the paper shop on the corner of Borough Bank to buy our comics. While I immersed myself in dazzling adventures with the X-Men in the latest issue of Fantastic, Elaine cooed like a Northumberland Square pigeon with her copy of Jackie. Sometimes it came with a free perfume sample or a ticky-tacky pink hair slide with glittery beads stuck to it, but mostly it came with a lovelorn sigh that emanated from my sisters mouth as she flicked through the pages, and stared longingly into the eyes of teenage heartthrobs that would never adorn her bedroom wall. Those lovey-dovey stories used to make me wince; all that kissing and heartbreak and wet eyes was just girls. Considering Elaine spent most of her time humbling us lesser mortals on the cricket pitch and at every opportunity she could find, it was quite ironic that she felt more at ease wrapped in the sugar of true romances. Still, if you dared to scribble upon or rip any of those hallowed pages, her sledgehammer of a right hook would bring you straight back down to earth. What would have Ordy paid to have acted out just one small scene of those illustrated stories with Elaine, with himself as the well built tanned hunk?
One day when Tony Lucas used his thick Neanderthal fist one too many times on my ever-receiving cheekbone. Elaine sprinted down Rudyerd Street like a blond Jesse Owens, pinned him against the Cobbles doorway and proceeded to pummel his astonished face with her Milky Bar hands.
The squeal of his reputation disappearing in the midsummer sun woke most of the street from their snatched afternoon siesta. There is no finer sight than a bully being humiliated in front of his followers. Elaine showed him no mercy and relentlessly softened his podgy completion with more than a smattering of barbaric enthusiasm. Only the intervention of Alison Riddle prevented Tony from losing half his hair and his blood count.
That evening, Mr. Lucas knocked on our door with his loudest giant knock, his bruised son slinking behind him. My father stood in the doorway blocking the evening rays trying to enter the hall. Tony Lucas’ dad was a big man and had some Caribbean blood, but not as obvious as my father. The conversation was harsh but my father’s fame stood stone still, arms firmly crossed and flexed ready. It was quite clear that the disagreement ended on the doorstep and would not enter his house. Despite all the yelling and screaming for my sisters blood, the frustration wore Tony’s dad down and he peeled away, striding down the street while shouting under his breath and slapping Tony across the back of his bowed head every ten paces. As I said before, nobody was foolish enough to cross my father – not even the Lucases
We watched them disappear down the street, the curtains twitching behind them as they passed. My father turned round, closed the door and I swear he threw me the slightest wink. I loved my sister.
CHAPTER FIVE
BASHIE
The knock on the door was expected. Turning the old radio off, Vivian lifted his heavy frame from the stiff straight backed chairs, dragged in a long drawn out sigh, cleared his throat and then slowly shuffled his huge feet over to the living room door. Elaine and Beresford looked eagerly at each other as they sat by the open fire drying their hair. Anxious glances passed between them while their father entered the hallway of the Tyneside flat, flicking the sneck on the front door to let the sinking sun penetrate the darkness of the narrow passageway.
“It’s Bashie!” whispered Elaine as she tousled her damp blond hair with delicate precision. The children strained their ears as the two men exchanged words on the doorstep. “I think it’s about cricket.” Beresford winced “Oh great!” Elaine replied with zero interest, as her attentions were transferred to more important issues like George Armstrong or fleeting images from the Marshall Ward catalogue.
The door swung open and a bright familiar face strode into the room, bringing with him freedom, adventure and of course stories of the outside world. It was always nice to see Bashie, especially as he always brought with him some sweets in his bulbous coat pocket.
His round voice filled the small flat with life. Bashie looked down at the children, produced some Turkish Delight from his deep pockets and chirped “How many centuries you scored, boy?” With his mouth full of the sticky delicacy, Beresford mumbled a reply that was as half-hearted as his last innings. “Never be a Garfield Sobers if you don’t keep a straight bat, boy.” smiled Bashie as he rubbed his hands through Beresford’s hair, surprised by the dampness.
“What you got, Bashie?” enquired the boy “What I got? What don’t old Bashie got, more like,” said the big man cheerfully, his smile growing and reaching from ear to ear. Bashie despite being roughly the same colour as Vivian wasn’t West Indian, even though he carried a passion for cricket like a true calypso king. His face was rounder and much smoother than Vivian’s, and he had a smell about him that was strange and new. Vivian and Bashie would often first sit down at the table and discuss recipes; herbs and spices, ginger and nutmeg versus garram massala and turmeric, yams against nans. After the ritualistic culinary contest both competitors left the table honours even, chuckling and laughing, patting each other’s broad backs while both still trying to get the last word in. Now down to business.
Beresford inched his neck up to try and get a quick glance at the treats to come, while still trying to dry his hair in fierce combat with Elaine, jostling and nudging for position. Bashie placed his big suitcase on the table and popped the clasps with a vigorous snap. The silence waited eagerly. Elaine turned her head with token interest. She never got anything that wasn’t functional from Bashie’s suitcase. “It’s clothes,” she drawled with muted grunts. Beresford was hoping that Bashie had sneaked in some shiny plastic toys, but since it was the summer it was odds on it would be jellybean sandals or khaki shorts. Bashie didn’t disappoint the boy, and the jellybeans and army surplus khaki shorts were pulled from the suitcase and presented with a delicate air. The quality and fit were discussed, as well as the weekly payments. “Stand up son,” Vivian drawled, looking down through his bi-focals while still keeping one eye on the material as his son raised himself from the hearth, tiredly preparing for the ritual fitting experience again. Holding the shorts against the boy’s waist, a few murmurs and casual nods signaled that a sale was imminent.
“I’m doomed.” he sighed.
Both coloured men were happy with each other’s deal and exchanged a few more booming chuckles. Then Bashie dipped his head, turned and grinned widely to Elaine with a huge crooked smile and whispered her over to his suitcase to have a look. Elaine’s head perked up curiously; there was never anything in Bashie’s suitcase that really interested her. As she stood she was suddenly as attentive as a fox cub, then Bashie swept out three brightly patterned mini-dresses. You could have knocked Elaine down with a feather. “Mini-dresses!” she squealed. She had only ever seen them in catalogues and on episodes of the Monkees. This was it – Groovy time. Vivian was smiling which was strange since he surely wouldn’t approve of such fashionable excess, but Bashie never brought anything that Vivian wouldn’t know about. Elaine continued to squeal like a trussed up little porker escaping Campbell’s the Butchers. “Dad I like this one. Dad I quite like this one too- Ooh Dad isn’t this one great!”