Six Stories

by Matt Wesolowski

  As we grow up, we get fearful and we don’t take as many plunges. Eventually the plunges stop altogether.

  —Go on. Just take your time.

  —So, after tea on that first night, us older ones, we did the washing-up and then went to our dorm; it was right at the far end of the centre, so we didn’t disturb the youngsters. I remember all of us just sort of slinking away while my dad and Sally were giving out the hot chocolate to the little ones, and a part of me just wanted to stay, just wanted to sit in the big common room with all the others, in a circle, and have my dad crack his silly jokes and hold a plastic mug full of that lumpy hot chocolate.

  But instead we went to the dorm, started drinking. Tom gave me a ‘blow-back’ off one of those ‘lungs’ – he took in the smoke and then blew it into my mouth. I was pissed already and, well … I knew what I was doing; it wasn’t like I was unconscious or anything. But everything was just so weird, like I wasn’t really there. I remember bits and bobs, but it’s fuzzy, all just … fuzzy.

  —You don’t need to go into detail.

  —No. OK. I don’t really remember anyway. But when it was over, he just sort of slunk off. We were on the top bunk. Those bunk beds were made in the seventies or something, and the top ones were sort of like wardrobes on their back – a wardrobe with no doors, just these wooden sides. I remember, while it was happening, I was just sort of staring at the sides, reading all the graffiti, just sort of absent … like I wasn’t there.

  When he’d finished, Tom just said he was going for a cigarette and, poof, off he went, down the ladder and away.

  —So, it was consensual?

  -—Yes … yes it was. What I’d give for it to have not been him, though. Tom fucking Jeffries…

  The others were either asleep or outside. I kept hearing them coming in and out of that window, their feet in the snow. I stayed awake for most of the night after that – just lay there … the room just buzzing and pulsing and zooming in and out all around me. I lay there and a part of me just wanted my dad, you know … I just wanted my dad…

  Recalling what happened with Tom Jeffries that night is clearly difficult for Eva. The fact that she and Tom slept together back in 1995 did not come out at the inquest. Both Eva and Anyu were asked if they had any romantic connection to Tom and both answered truthfully: no.

  Eva, though aware she was taken advantage of, has never wanted justice for what happened that night with Tom. A part of her, she supposes, must have wanted it to happen, otherwise why else would she have done it? It’s a tough one. Clearly Tom Jeffries knew what he was doing. We make these mistakes – these poor judgement calls – when we’re teenagers. One could argue, it’s a part of growing up. Certainly, that’s the way Eva sees what happened that first night in December 1995.

  I move on to the day afterward – the meeting with Haris Novak.

  —It was just awful that day, just awful. I felt like shit. I know you don’t get hangovers when you’re that age, but I think it was like, just a mix of everything and I was so scared as well.

  —Scared? Of Tom?

  —Not of him, but scared that he’d tell everyone; scared that everyone knew what had happened and thought I was … I don’t know … thought I was easy. I remember Brian tried to talk to me a few times when we were walking to Belkeld across the fell. He was gentle, you know, like, asking if I was OK. And I just was, like, ‘Yeah, great, why wouldn’t I be?’ Just being overly chirpy until he gave up.

  —How were things between you and Tom that day?

  —Awkward. He didn’t say anything but he kept giving me these looks – really sleazy, horrible, sort of winking, sneery looks that I couldn’t tell whether they were supposed to be derogatory or seductive or what. It was … ugh … I remember really regretting it all then. Really feeling sick whenever I looked at him.

  —You all went to Belkeld.

  —Yeah, we went off over the fell. The younger ones and my dad, they were building an igloo in the snow. My dad, he’s like, Mr Practical and was loving it – totally immersed. He was like, ‘Yeah, fine. Off you go; be back by five,’ sort of thing.

  On the way there, Tom and Charlie, they were doing their little ‘brothers’ thing – giggling and plotting. And I was just so paranoid. Maybe I still had weed in my system, but I was sure they were talking about me, like, comparing notes, or something.

  —And Brian and Anyu?

  —Brian was carrying her bag, I think. I think he thought it made him look manly or something, but he just looked ridiculous. He was wearing these boots as well, like, the exact same boots as Charlie. I was walking with them but I was quiet. I wasn’t really there, if you know what I mean?

  —I do. Eva, can you remember the incident with Haris Novak at the churchyard?

  —Oh god, yeah. Tom and Charlie, they wanted to go in the churchyard in Belkeld and smoke a joint, just because they could; because it was such a tiny village and they were arrogant, you know? Plus, there was literally no one about and well … we were fourteen.

  —Did the rest of you smoke with them?

  —I didn’t, but Brian did, and Anyu probably. We were all smoking cigarettes, I remember that. We were round the back of the church, sitting on this sort of tomb, this mausoleum thing, and just … hanging about…

  —Is that when Haris Novak came along?

  —Yeah, I think so. I think we were about to leave and he just appeared, like he did.

  —This was the first time Tom had ever encountered Haris, wasn’t it?

  —Yeah, and he reacted just like you would expect him to – like a total dick; started taking the piss. Charlie was laughing away, so was Brian, but you could tell he didn’t really find it funny.

  —What about you and Anyu?

  —Anyu just sort of … She’s so quiet, so removed, she just sort of ignored them. And I … well … I was so scared of doing anything against Tom at that point, I was so scared that he’d say something about me – like I wasn’t very good, or my body was horrible, or something, because of how he’d just … left. So I stayed quiet.

  It still comes back sometimes, that afternoon – more than what happened with Tom, even. It comes back when I can’t sleep and just plays over and over again in my head, like some film.

  —What did happen?

  —Well, we just got … the boys … they just got carried away. Tom gives Haris this bit of weed and tells him to eat it. And Brian – bloody Brian – he chooses that exact moment to do the thing that’s going to actually impress Tom and Charlie. That bloody moment he has a good idea.

  —Really?

  —I say good, but it was just awful. He has this fucking bright idea of getting Charlie to tell Haris the Nanna Wrack story. I remember thinking no, that’s the worst fucking idea ever, but Brian’s got this look on his face – this desperate, pleading look – and Tom and Charlie, they do that wolf grin at each other and start laughing.

  —Brian, I’m guessing, is over the moon at that.

  —I know, right? So Charlie, he’s really stoned at this point, but I swear to god, in that graveyard, in the shadow of the church with all the snow and the crumbling gravestones, and that quiet in the air, he tells that story like he’s never told it before. I swear to god, it freaked us out, and we’d heard it, like, a million times before. He starts going into this description of how she shambles along the fell with her hair like seaweed – like bladderwrack, which is where she gets her name from. And her skin is all pale and shrivelled, her teeth all black. He says how she reaches up from her lair in the marsh and grabs you and pulls you in. It was fucking horrible. I could see the weed was starting to hit Haris, and his bottom jaw, it just starts trembling. Tom is snorting away and so is Brian. He keeps looking at Charlie and Tom like they’re fucking gods or something. It was just … sick. I wish I didn’t have to remember that. But maybe it’s my comeuppance – my punishment for letting it happen.

  Eva says she will always regret not speaking up, for not doing something about what happene
d next. Terrified and stoned, Haris Novak runs away from the churchyard in a volley of snowballs, leaving his hat and gloves behind. According to Eva, Brian, Tom and Charlie use them to make an obscene snowman.

  Haris’ version of this story is different: he goes to look at the bats or to the shop and the snowball fight begins on his return. I think that the reality of what happened that afternoon is lost in a haze of teenage stupidity and narcotic drugs. The important part is that no one made an attempt to stop the terrorising of Haris. That’s what will live on here.

  Before me, Haris didn’t tell the police, or his mother or anyone else, that Charlie told his Nanna Wrack story that day. It makes sense. Like Haris’ cousin says, things that traumatise him, he protects himself from. And this idea – that there was some ‘creature’ on the fell – along with the tenuous legend of the Belkeld Beast kind of fits together. Is it this trauma that provoked in him that false memory of seeing something when he was a boy?

  Back to Eva Bickers; we move on to the last part of the interview. The summer of 1996: the trip when Tom Jeffries disappeared.

  —It’s hard because it feels like I got it all out then. I went through it all, over and over. To the police, my dad, everyone. So now, all these years later, it’s like it’s hard to recall it. Like it all got used up back then and there’s nothing left.

  —Well, let’s start like we did before, with the ride to Scarclaw in the minibus.

  —OK. Well, that was just a normal Rangers bus ride: my dad driving, singing that Ilkley Moor song; Charlie badgering him to put his stupid tape on; Brian trying to sit with Anyu. Nothing of note.

  —What about Tom?

  —Like I said, nothing to write home about. He was sat up with Charlie, on about weed most probably.

  —So Tom wasn’t putting on the false charm this time?

  —No. Now, of course, I know it’s because he’d got what he wanted from me. Anyway, you know the worst thing about that trip – the fucking worst thing about it? It was one of the most normal trips we ever had; one of the least memorable … well, up until what happened to Tom, happened.

  —I know you’ve been through it again and again, what happened that day, the sequence of events, but let’s just get a few things clear.

  —OK.

  —There were just the five of you teenagers – you, Charlie, Anyu, Brian and Tom – plus your dad and Sally Mullen?

  —That’s right. Everyone else was ill. We nearly didn’t go, but … well, all of us, we just loved it there.

  —Now, that first night you were there, what was it like, compared to, say, December the previous year? Within the group, I mean.

  —Not a whole lot different. Charlie and Tom were still close. There were small things, though. Charlie had been getting into more trouble at school; he’d been suspended a few times and he was smoking a lot of weed.

  —Were you and Charlie still close?

  —Yes and no, sort of. We were when Tom wasn’t around; but when he was, I just didn’t want to be around the two of them.

  —Did Tom make any more passes at you, any attempts to err…

  —To get with me again? No … well, he might have done, but I just stayed clear, you know? That wasn’t going to happen again. No way.

  —That first night at the centre…

  —That was a bit different from usual, I suppose. It was hot, really hot, that summer, and we just sat around with my dad and Sally rather than going to the dorm and getting wasted. It was nice. Peaceful.

  —So you didn’t drink or do drugs that first night?

  —I didn’t. Anyu and Brian, neither. In fact, even Brian was being less puppy-like; we were actually having quite a nice chat. I think Charlie and Tom were smoking, though. They went for one of their walks in the wood. Usually Brian would have tagged along, tried to follow them, but I think he’d given up by then.

  —Was Tom still picking on him?

  —No, not really; not anything big that I remember. Brian had a big spot on his chin – it was huge, with a big yellow head – and I think Tom made a big deal of it, pointing it out so everyone was conscious of it, you know, put Brian in his place. I think Charlie was sick of Brian copying him all the time as well. I think they were just sick of him.

  I remember me and Anyu, we went to sleep early. The boys may have stayed up, but it can’t have been for long. In fact, all of us were just tired.

  —And the next day, you met Haris Novak again, right?

  —Oh god, I was actually really scared. Scared that we’d, like, damaged him the last time. I’d totally forgotten until then about Tom giving him the weed and the snowballs and stuff. Me and Anyu, we were ahead of the others – quite a bit ahead. We were cooking dinner that night and wanted to get back. The boys were just messing about – dawdling, smoking, so I don’t know what Haris said to them. But it was like he had forgotten, too. We didn’t see him for long – just said hello and stuff. He went away again sharpish, though.

  —Did Tom talk to him?

  —I don’t know. It’s hard to remember. Probably. They had this stupid thing going on with Brian’s bag …that massive rucksack. Poor Haris kept carting it back to his house, full of Tom’s ‘lungs’ and stuff. I was always terrified that Haris would tell his mother, and then she’d tell the police and we’d get in trouble. But that never happened.

  —And that night?

  —After dinner we went to the dorm. We had a bit of a drink, a smoke. But there were only five of us, plus the two adults, so it wasn’t like we could get wasted or anything. We were pretty paranoid about it, to be fair, so it was all pretty low key.

  —So, you had a drink, a smoke; then what? Did you go to the mineshaft again?

  —No. That’s it. Then we went to bed. And in the morning … well … Tom just wasn’t there. He’d gone.

  —And had he said anything about going? Did he seem out of it, not in control?

  —That was the weird thing. Tom was never out of control; he was never wasted. He left that to everyone else. Like fucking Charles Manson or some shit. No, Tom was just … Tom; just his usual dickhead self.

  —What do you think happened to Tom, Eva? What’s your opinion, your theory?

  —I honestly have no idea.

  —You remember so much about the trip in December, but this night – the night Tom vanished – there just seems … I don’t know … nothing. I mean, what did you guys talk about?

  —Just normal, teenage stuff, I imagine.

  —What about Charlie or Anyu – did they do anything out of the ordinary?

  —I don’t know.

  —Do you think Brian Mings had anything to do with what happened to Tom?

  —It makes sense, doesn’t it? It all points that way: poor, bullied Brian finally gets his revenge on the guy who picked on him. All that rage building up. Yeah, it makes sense. But it’s impossible…

  —Really?

  —Yes. The night that Tom disappeared … well … Brian was with me.

  Not long after this, Eva says she’s had enough. She’s been through these final hours over and over, she says; in her head as well as to the police. I understand. What is interesting, though, is, for all Eva has been open and honest with me about what happened at Scarclaw Fell in December, she is elusive and brief about the summer of 1996.

  What we do understand, in terms of Eva Bickers, is perhaps the reason why her form teacher at school noticed a change in her after the Christmas holidays back in 1995. That’s understandable, too.

  So what conclusions, if any, can we draw from this episode?

  Clearly, Charlie Armstrong had an effect both on Eva Bickers and, to some extent, on Anyu Kekkonen, whether that effect was his imagination or just his personality. We’ve also seen another side to Tom Jeffries: a controlling, manipulative side that definitely did not come out in the press at the time.

  There are some things that I still want to know more about, though. One of which is, if something terrible happened to Eva Bickers in the winter o
f 1995 (her experience in the bunk bed with Tom Jeffries), what explains her elation the previous spring? She’s vague about that, too. Despite my prompting, she claims she doesn’t remember anything ‘significant’. But I’m not so sure.

  There’s also the question of Brian Mings’ bag and the ‘deal’ with Haris Novak.

  I feel that trying to prise any more information out of Eva Bickers is going to be futile and I don’t want to end our interview on a bad note, so I agree not to contact her regarding this matter again.

  Fair enough.

  Next time, on Six Stories, we will find out more about the day that Tom Jeffries disappeared and a very different picture of the group dynamic will emerge from my interview with another member of the Rangers.

  This has been Six Stories with me, Scott King.

  This has been our third story.

  Until next time…

  Belkeld 2017

  Fixed with cable ties to the old sign that reads ‘Welcome to Belkeld’ is a smaller sign, which says ‘Bloomin’ Britain Runner-Up 2013’. The announcement is flanked by two wooden barrels stuffed with drooping pansies, as if to hammer home the point.

  I like to think of the Bloomin’ Britain judges arriving in this tiny place, which isn’t near anywhere, petunias tumbling from the hanging baskets on every lamppost, Sweet William standing taut at the roadside behind the trimmed grass; all of those colours screaming, pleading to forget 1996.

  To forget Tom Jeffries.

  Right now, the hanging baskets look a little half-hearted; the verges at the sides of the roads are untrimmed and dandelions peer out furtively between the swathes of long grass.

  Guilt fills me and I pull my bobble hat down, pass the sign like a sinner.

  The streets of Belkeld are empty, but I feel the prickle of a hundred thousand glaring eyes from behind net curtains. But they won’t recognise me. And, anyway, what if they do? What happened at Scarclaw Fell in 1996 is no more my fault than it is theirs.