It didn’t bother Marron that one boy might be much bigger or tougher than his weaker opponent. In fact, it had seemed to me, as I looked at his smirking face, that he relished the sight of the blood, snot, and cries from the weaker boys.
One day he called out my name and threw the boxing gloves across to me. It wasn’t the first time Marron had made me put on a pair of boxing gloves. The last time was when he had dragged me by the hair along to the assembly hall after I’d got into an altercation with another lad, twice as big as me. We’d been standing in line at the time, waiting to go into the school block, when someone had pushed me from behind, sending me forwards and causing me to knock into the other lad. He’d not been too pleased and had given me a mouthful. Mr Marron and Mr Sweet had heard the commotion and immediately ordered the both of us to the hall to sort out our differences. I’d refused to budge, but Marron had caught a handful of my hair and had dragged me along the corridors. Once we were in the hall, they physically forced the boxing gloves onto the both of us. But under threat of losing his privileges, the lad had refused to lay a glove on me. It turned out he was as good a thief as me and so wasn’t particularly bothered about losing his pocket money.
But this time, out on the football pitch, I couldn’t wait to get stuck in to my opponent, once I knew who it was. “Walters,” called out Marron next, and I was elated. My heart was pounding as it pumped the adrenaline around my body. And in the blink of an eye, I had already planned my tactics as to how I was going to deal with this bastard. We were now on equal terms: a fair fight without his mates backing him up. There was nowhere to hide. And more importantly, it was in front of so many witnesses, so he wouldn’t be able to make feeble excuses, or be able to say he’d been cheated one way or another. I was going to teach him a lesson he’d never forget.
Why did I dislike Brian Walters? He was a nasty, vindictive parasite, who spread lie after lie about me and snitched on me for any little thing, just to see me punished. He was always trying to show he was the best at everything: football, swimming, athletics, singing, the list went on. I had no idea why he had particularly honed in on me, setting me up as one of his biggest targets.
The first time I had encountered Walters, he had kicked me in the head for no discernible reason. The second time was during Mass one Sunday morning. Though modest by nature, I don’t mind admitting I am a good singer and was sometimes told that I sang like an angel. Walters was also a very good singer, but I could hold my last note much longer than he could, as well as being able to sing much higher. That Sunday, as we were singing the “Ave Maria”, I’d noticed all eyes were on the pair of us, as we went into vocal battle and suddenly changed tempo, harmonising against all the other voices in the chapel. I must admit, it had sounded beautiful and heavenly, sending a shiver down my spine. And when we hit the last high note, we’d held it for about 20 seconds. I think I could have gone on for a little longer, if the creep hadn’t suddenly turned blue in the face and keeled over, allegedly due to an epileptic fit. I’d been more inclined to think it was a bit too convenient and he’d probably faked it because I was a much better singer, and he could not accept his defeat when it stared him in the face. And although he did go on to have more of these fits, I could never be convinced they were all genuine.
I hated him with a vengeance. I even prayed to God for terrible things to happen to him. Not for him to die, mind. I didn’t wish for it to be as quick as that! I wanted him to suffer the pain and the anguish he had inflicted on me. I’d never done anything to hurt him and yet he seemed to be possessed by an urge to hurt me in any way he could.
I avoided him like the plague, while making sure I had nothing to do with his friends. He seemed to be silently smirking at me every time our eyes met, and I would always be the first to avert my gaze from his. I suppose I was afraid of him, but this was more from the fear of knowing what he could do to me while I could do nothing, because he always had his goons alongside him, ready to stick the boot in. But now my time had arrived!
“Your minute starts now,” said Marron, stabbing his finger on the face of his stopwatch. In the background, the baying mob were calling out.
“Break his nose!”
“Gouge his eyes out!”
“Kick him in the bollocks!”
A cheer went up a split second after the sly bastard had boxed me one to the side of my head, while I was still looking at Marron’s stopwatch, giving me no chance to have put up my dukes. And with my plan of action now in tatters, lost somewhere in the cloud of stars forming a new Milky Way inside my head, I felt two more punches in quick succession, before my survival instincts automatically kicked in and I tactically dropped to the ground to avoid further punches. Of course, Walters took this as my submission to him, and – big mistake – stood over my prone body with his arms raised aloft victoriously, leaving himself wide open to a sixteen-ounce boxing glove straight up into his privates. I’d got the snide little bastard!
My jubilation, on hearing the loud cry of pain from Walters, amidst the cheers and the jeers, brought a wide grin to my face. And as my brain kicked back into life, I got up on my hands and knees – big mistake – steadying myself to get back up on my feet, and not seeing the kick until my bottom teeth had split my lip wide open.
“Time’s up!” Marron shouted over the gratified mob. Ignoring me out of hand, Marron viciously grabbed the front of Walters’ jumper, pulling the bully towards him until he was standing on tiptoes like a ballerina. “Right, let’s just be clear on the Queensbury rules here,” said Marron, his nose almost touching Walters’. “No use of the feet, arms, elbows, head, or teeth.” Then he glanced at me as I staggered to my feet. “And no punching below the belt.” This was how he’d settled the matter, with no punishment for Walters’ actions, nor sympathy for my bleeding split lip. Hurriedly pulling off my boxing gloves, I was sent off to the washroom to clean myself up, while he called another two names into battle.
The downstairs washroom had 48 sinks fixed along three walls. Above each sink was a number corresponding with the one written on each boy’s small round tin of pink, powdered toothpaste, toothbrush, and plastic cup. I was boy number 26. Looking into the small wall mirror, I could see my throbbing lip was swollen and had a wide split about half an inch long. But it didn’t look as bad as it felt, especially when it kept rubbing up against my teeth, which, fortunately for me, were intact. Bathing it as best I could, I had only the one thought in my head: I was going to get my own back on Walters – even if it killed me.
Gone With the Wind
We were in the assembly hall, standing at ease in four straight rows of 12, waiting for the headmaster to make his usual grand entrance. We never knew what would be on his morning agenda until he sprang it on us. But on this Monday morning, I had a suspicion he’d be wanting to have his say about little Frankie McGee, who’d been taken to the hospital the previous night after scorching his hole!
Ten-year old Frankie and his best friend, Tony May, aged 12, were always competing against each other in farting challenges. I had to admit I was among the many who were impressed with their trumping talents, amazed by how the pair of them were able to fart recognisable notes to songs we all knew – “Hitler Has Only Got One Ball” being a firm favourite. If I’d had to pick the better farter of the two, then I’d have to say Tony May just squeezed ahead because of his ability to fart in different pitch combinations, as well as hold beautifully timed pauses. But when it came to the elongated fart, then Frankie was by far the better of the two. And he held the record of seven seconds, the longest one to date.
It was around 10 o’clock the previous evening when we had gathered in McGee’s dormitory for the farting competition between Frankie and Tony. There were some 30 of us packed inside and we had to peer over shoulders to get a clearer look as 14-year-old Johnny Hill, the oldest boy in the school, tossed the penny coin into the air and caught it.
“Heads,”
called May.
“Heads it is.”
“You first,” May invited McGee. And with a wide grin spread across his face, little Frankie had shamelessly slipped his pyjama bottoms off and hopped up onto his bed, before laying on his back and bringing his knees right up around his ears to expose his bare backside.
“I’m lighting up now,” warned Johnny Hill, flicking the lighter into life and bringing the dancing yellow flame a little closer to Frankie’s bottom, until it was about an inch away from his hole. “Okay, it’s lit.”
Whoosh! It was the weirdest thing I had ever seen in my life. The fart had ignited, sending out a two-foot long flame lasting a few seconds, which singed Hill’s eyebrows and lashes before he could jump out of the way. In the process, Hill had dropped the lit petrol lighter between Frankie’s thighs, causing him to leap off the bed, yelping in pain. This in turn started Donkey off into one of his hee-hawing fits of hysterical laughter. And with that, everyone scarpered back to their beds, as little Frankie had staggered off in pain to the night watchman’s room.
Half an hour later, we could hear the chatter of voices coming up from the other end of the corridor, with a loud Mr Lilly throwing question after question at poor Frankie. Slipping out from my bed, I saw McGee strapped onto an ambulance chair just outside the night watchman’s room, and he wasn’t looking happy.
“Does the lighter belong to you, McGee?”
“No, sir.”
“How did it get into your bed?”
“Someone must have put it there, sir.”
“While it was alight? Do you think we’re blithering idiots, McGee?”
“No, sir.”
“So how did you manage to burn your skin and not your pyjama bottoms?”
“I wasn’t wearing any sir, I was hot, sir.”
“Were you playing with it?” Matron cut in. “Under the covers?”
“I’m not a wanker, Matron!”
“The lighter, you fool,” snapped Mr Lilly.
“Can I go to the hospital, sir. It’s hurting.”
The incensed headmaster instructed the ambulance men to take McGee away, but not before promising, “I’ll deal with you tomorrow.” But as we hadn’t seen Frankie this morning, I could only assume he was still in the hospital.
“Ah-tennn-sion!” cried Mr Sweet as Mr Lilly finally made his grand entrance, slow marching into the assembly hall, his podgy hands behind his back and a look of disdain on his face. This wasn’t helped by our slapdash way of coming to attention, before singing out our usual lethargic and somewhat insincere, “Good Morning Mr Lilly” greeting.
He looked cheesed off as he stood silently glaring out at his audience for a moment or two, before telling Mr Sweet to stand us easy.
“Stan-at-ease!” screamed Mr Sweet, and we automatically followed his order half-heartedly, forcing Mr Lilly to shake his head in frustration.
“Right you lot,” bellowed Mr Sweet. “We’ll do it again! Ah-tennn-”
“Not now,” said the headmaster, with a wave of his hand. “Can we get on with the music?”
We spent around five minutes listening to a classical violin concerto, written by a German composer called Johann Sebastian Bach, who was born 300-odd years earlier. And for that short spell of time, I was able to leave this miserable world, listening to the violin’s emotional voice calling out to me, lifting my spirit free. Every morning, we would have to listen to a piece of music from the headmaster’s vast classical record collection, which he would play on the old gramophone set up in the assembly hall. It was my favourite time of the day, besides bedtime. I enjoyed listening to the music and I wasn’t the only one. After a few months, a good few of the lads could recognise many classical pieces, from Bach and Beethoven to Chopin, with Rimsky-Korsakov’s “Flight of the Bumblebee” being my favourite piece of all time. It was so busy and hectic, I could close my eyes and instantly fly off to anywhere my imagination allowed me to go.
“Spontaneous human combustion.” Mr Lilly suddenly brought me back to reality. “Is there someone amongst you who can tell me what this is?” He cast a sly eye over us, probably expecting some bright spark to shoot their hand high in the air and answer the question. Unsurprisingly, there were no volunteers willing to risk his wrath, even if they knew what it meant. “Spontaneous. Human. Combustion.” He repeated the words in a slow, deliberate manner. “I take your silence to mean none of you has a clue as to what I am talking about?” The deafening silence continued.
“Putting it in much simpler terms: burning from the inside out. That’s precisely what it is. And this stupid, idiotic stunt that McGee decided to pull could have proved fatal. He could easily have burnt to a cinder. Gone, in a flash.” Mr Lilly clicked his fingers to emphasise the quickness of the flash. “In all my years of dealing with delinquent, imbecile children, such as those I see standing before me, I have never, ever, come across such a ludicrous and dangerous thing to do to oneself. Setting one’s backside alight! What’s the joke, Williams?”
“Nothing sir. I was only coughing sir.”
“You’ll be more than coughing if you don’t get that smirk off your face. Right now!”
“Sorry, sir.”
“Where was I?”
“Gone in a flash, sir” offered Williams, clicking his own fingers to emphasise the flash.
“What?” Lilly’s face went a deep red.
“The flash sir? When McGee lit his fart.”
“Flatulence! He lit his own flatulence!”
“I thought it was a fart, sir.”
“Outside my office. Now!”
Lilly went on to tell us a weird, though fascinating story, about an old lady who had been found sitting in her chair next to the fireside in her front lounge. Well, she wasn’t sitting in the chair, but her ashes were – a big pile, by all accounts. Luckily for her, the police forensics had been able to identify her by her feet. Remarkably, these were all that was left of her amid the smouldering ashes, and the only evidence to show she’d existed. Apparently, her feet were still in their Hush-Puppy shoes, which were in perfect condition, with no signs of burning or scorching on them.
“And that,” concluded Lilly, “is the consequence of spontaneous human combustion.”
He didn’t go as far as to tell us whether this was caused by the woman sitting too near the fire and letting a fart drop. Or whether she, like McGee, had deliberately struck a match to one of her own farts. So we were none the wiser as to how she had suddenly burst into flames. But McGee had been lucky that his flame had shot outwards and not inwards. The thought of striking a match near a fart that could suddenly burst into flames and burn you to death from the inside out made my skin crawl.
That Sunday Feeling
Another weekend was upon us. And just like the previous weekend and the one before that, along with all the others before those, this one would pass without leaving any fond memories from which I could derive some comfort. I’d been used to living within a large family in Stamford Street. There were 15 of us in total (when my parents were there), though at times this number would increase to around 20 or so, with aunties, uncles, and cousins popping in for a visit and staying for days, or weeks on end. Nanny Gavin, a first cousin of ours, seemed to have been a permanent fixture, until she upped and left the house one day, never to return. We never questioned this. In fact, we had never questioned any of the goings-on in our house because it had been an acceptable part of our lives. That’s how it was. Uncles, aunties and cousins, some of whom we’d never set eyes on before or afterwards, came and went. Living with my family and living under the roof of St Vincent’s were oceans apart.
Looking from the outside in, perhaps my siblings, particularly the older ones, might well have seemed to the stranger’s eye to be indifferent to one another’s presence. I suppose that would have been understandable, considering our age differences and the fa
ct of having to deal with the personal issues going on in our individual lives. But we were nonetheless a very close family, living up to the adage that blood is thicker than water, with no doubts about the love and compassion we had for each other when it mattered most. This was in complete contrast to life at St Vincent’s Approved School, where indifference and knowing who your friends were became the key to keeping relatively safe. I use the term friends loosely because, in truth, although I had my own small peer group who I was comfortable with, I did not have anyone at the school that I would, or could, call a true friend.
Not too far from St Vincent’s, there was a slate plaque in one of the front gardens of a house we would often pass on our many walks to Formby beach. And I would pause to read the inscription, which served as a reminder to me of how volatile, cold and lonely this world can often be.
True friends are like diamonds,
Precious and Rare.
False friends are like Autumn leaves,
found everywhere!
Simplicity was always the key to my life. I didn’t need to be educated to know what life was about. I saw it, I felt it, I lived it day to day. And just as I expected to achieve nothing from my life, I didn’t expect to give it anything in return. Mr Lilly would have us believe our lives were mapped out for us from the moment we were born. Once, he’d angrily told us in assembly, “You are all born thieves,” and he likened us to “leopards that will never change their spots”. This was after someone had nicked Matron’s new bicycle, which had been found the following day, sitting high up in one of the orchard’s apples trees, minus both of its wheels. These had been found a few days later up another apple tree, minus their spokes and innertubes. I was not one for accusing innocent people, but after the theft, Michael Fleming made some powerful catapults from innertubes and bicycle-wheel spokes, which he sold to us and also over the wall to some of the local kids.
Boy Number 26 Page 11
