by Damian Barr
The cassette stops with a click. The mambo is over. We’re trapped.
Without speaking, Mark and I look at each other, grab the ghetto blaster and drop into the fast-flowing water. We scream at the cold and laugh as it carries us away sliding over rocks and dangerously close to a trolley and the boys shake their fists in frustration like baddies in the movies. Danny doesn’t chase us. When they’re well behind us we grab some grass and drag ourselves out, shaking with cold and fright. Watching out for them we run back to Mark’s singing ‘I’ve Had The Time Of My Life’.
So it’s not surprising I still don’t get the point of decimals. If only they tested us on the mambo. I put my pencil down after the final maths test and it’s one of the last times I’ll ever use a pencil because at Brannock you’re allowed a pen.
Mark is crowned the Superstar of Primary Seven 1987 at a full assembly with the whole school crammed into the gym, ranked from wee Primary Ones at the front to us Primary Sevens at the back with the teachers sitting on the stage where we’ve all done the Nativity. As the Dux is announced I start to stand up and Brian Southlands does too. It’s a mistake, surely. A joke, maybe. On stage Mark’s acne flushes red for me. I am not the fastest or the coolest but my hand is always first up. Brian walks forward to receive his medal like Luke Skywalker at the end of Star Wars. It should be me. What have I got if I haven’t got brains? Miss Carey, the headmistress, pronounces Damian Leighton Barr as proxime accessit, Latin for ‘he came nearest’. I almost forget to stand up. Mr Baker produces a Polaroid camera. FLASH! He captures my failure for ever. It spits out a square and slowly we all swim out of the grey nothingness. Mark with his Superstars cup, Brian with his Dux medal and me standing between them because I’m the tallest and blinking back tears. Mr Baker hands the photo to me with my runner-up certificate.
The bell rings and the day is over. The week is over. The term is over. Primary Seven is over. Keir Hardie Memorial Primary School is over. Parents wait at the gates and I push through their reunions back to 15 Rannoch Avenue with the Polaroid creasing in my hand. I tell myself it doesn’t matter because AIDS will kill me soon anyway. Maybe then they’ll give me the Dux out of sympathy.
That summer there’s a general election and the evenings are hot with noise from the cars and vans that go round the schemes with their loudhailers. ‘Vote Labour, for Scotland,’ shout the reds from the back of a lorry filled with balloons and people wearing rosettes. ‘Vote SNP, for Scotland,’ shout the yellows from a packed Ford Transit. ‘Vote Conservative, for Britain,’ pleads an Edinburgh-sounding voice from the driver’s seat of something big and new and shiny. He says Maggie is the best thing to happen to this country. She seems permanent and powerful, like the Queen. Who will we get if she goes? From the roof of Mark’s shed we egg them all equally before throwing ourselves flat on the felt roof so they can’t see us. Gritty bits sticks to our cheeks when we sit back up, sure we’ve got away with it.
Every hour tally vans go round the scheme selling sweets and things – Big Al is my favourite because he used to come to 25 Ardgour Place when my mum and dad were together and he always gives me extra chocolate sprinkles on my cone. He remembers me from before and ignores the gossip about the parties and fights at 15 Rannoch Avenue even though he knows everything about everybody because they all go to his big yellow van. Be a Pal, Wait for Al! is written across the back and two cones turn jauntily at the front. His big fat smile fills the serving hatch that he whacks aside with one big fat hand. ‘Bonjoorno, Big Dame,’ he always says and he won’t serve you if you cut in front of me. He doesn’t do tick but he does it on the fly for my mum so she can get fags and milk and tea bags and all the other non-ice-cream things from his van that must be a Tardis fitting in all that and him.
‘Greensleeves’ signals Big Al and when he’s tinkled off to the next street we eat our ice cream on the shed roof and wait for the next candidate for Motherwell North to drive up. We can’t vote but it doesn’t matter who votes because Labour always wins. As pupils of Keir Hardie Memorial Primary School we were all walked hand-in-hand, two-by-two across the fields with the ghost mines underneath to see the small stone cottage where James Keir Hardie was born. I thought the hanging baskets out front were a bit fancy for the coal miner who became the first Labour MP. Mr Baker said they wouldn’t have been there in 1856 and neither would the double glazing. A curtain twitched but nobody asked us in. It’s a bought hoose! And whoever bought it wants none of us.
Loudhailers shout loads about saving the Craig and the economy and Europe but they don’t say a single thing about AIDS. Mark and I scour the Daily Record for useful information and what we don’t know we make up. Once we get bored egging them we go over and listen to what they’ve got to say and they all say the same things except the Conservative candidate who won’t get out of his car.
They all give balloons out and we take as many as we can because we’re planning a balloon shower in Mark’s shed for our long-rehearsed Dirty Dancing finale. As I’m blowing them I realise I’m not as short on puff as I was, maybe my asthma is going away as I grow up. We’re both light-headed and giddy by the time the last balloon is full. It’ll be worth it when we do that final mambo.
Just before the end of summer Granny Mac turns up to take me to Motherwell for my new school uniform. She’s the hand of God in this family and today she’s wearing the brown woollen coat she keeps for trips to town. You can be sure my mum has the house spotless and all the bottles and cans cleared away and tea in the pot and a shop-bought cake that day. Granny Mac stays just long enough to point out that the Venetians are a disgrace before putting us both on the Number 44 to Motherwell. ‘One and a half,’ she instructs the driver, as if we’re his only passengers.
The Cooperative is the biggest shop I’ve ever been in except for the House of Fraser where I got my foot trapped in the escalator. I was four or five in my blue wellies that I made my mum let me wear everywhere. She was shouting for help and banging the emergency stop button and my toes were getting warm and the stink of burning rubber was strong but I was just wondering what would happen when there was no welly left. I got TWO pairs of wellies from the white-faced manager.
‘You’ll grow into it,’ says Granny Mac, pulling the sleeves of my blazer. It’s the blue of the Tories who just won the election. Like everybody she says she hates Maggie but I think they’d get on, they’re both used to getting what they want. You don’t say no to Granny Mac. I imagine Maggie helping to pick out my crisp white school shirts. Maybe she’d show me how to knot my tie? She’d get 15 Rannoch Avenue in order, put Dodger and Joe out to work. The badge on my blazer has two clasped golden hands and the motto is ‘Concordia’. The aeroplane? ‘It’s Latin for “harmony”,’ tuts Granny Mac. ‘Do they teach you nothing at that Protestant School?’ Everything is too big, even my black leather shoes, but I’m not complaining. All her other grandchildren will go from St Theresa’s to Taylor High School so their uniforms are hand-me-downs. As her oldest grandchild my uniform is new even if I am a non-denominational disappointment. It smells new and I can’t wait to show it off.
We go to the till and I’m worrying about how much it all costs when Granny Mac produces a book from her pocket and it’s filled with stamps and she dares the woman to say something, anything. Burdened with bags, we stagger downstairs to the café and I am treated to a strawberry tart and we share a pot of tea and my Granny Mac blesses me with a rare smile.
‘You’re a cuckoo in the nest, Damian Leighton Barr, right enough,’ she says, peering at me as if I’m already somewhere else. ‘Whit’s fur yae disnae go by ye.’
I’m terrified it will.
Chapter 10
‘I would say, let our children grow tall and some taller than others if they have the ability in them to do so. Because we must build a society in which each citizen can develop his full potential, both for his own benefit and for the community as a whole, a society in which originality, skill, energy and thrift are rewarded, in which w
e encourage rather than restrict the variety and richness of human nature.’
Margaret Thatcher, Speech to the Institute of SocioEconomic Studies, 15 September 1975
For our first day at Brannock High School me and Mark spike our hair identically using half the world’s supply of electric-blue wet-look gel. ‘Away ye go before ah start bubbling,’ says my mum, brushing the shoulders of my new blazer. The sleeves have shrunk already. She’s got to reach up to kiss me now. ‘Yer daddy’s double.’
I stop at my dad’s on the way down to Mark’s but Mary the Canary keeps me on the back doorstep. I’ve hardly seen him all summer. He’s taking as many shifts as he can while the Craig’s still going. Because we’re now only five minutes away I often turn up after school but he’s usually out. Sometimes I just look at the house and know he might be in there and that’s enough. He never comes to our house and I’m glad because I’d be embarrassed. Whatever the weather Teenie waits at the top of his road watching for his car and he always stops for her even if it’s just for a minute then drops her off at the bottom of our street.
‘Mary, his car’s right there,’ I say, pointing to the Red Ford Escort with the black spoiler.
Her roots are really growing in now and what’s still blonde is full of pink foam rollers all pointing at me like tiny bazookas. She’s looking tired since my dad found her stash of Lambrusco bottles in her walk-in wardrobe. She’s not hitting her high notes. She’s wearing one of his work shirts, open, so you can see she’s got no bra on. ‘Hussy,’ Granny Mac echoes.
‘He’s asleep,’ she insists, loud enough to wake him if he was. ‘Night shift.’ She shuts the door in my face.
Nothing can bring me down today. I bounce over to Mark’s. In a burst of paternal pride his dad snaps a Polaroid of us both on the top step. At the bottom of his street we join a dark blue shoal of boys and girls all on the way to their first day. Everybody looks nervous. We’ve heard rumours that first years get their heads flushed in the bogs. Mark has packed extra gel in his new Nike backpack just in case.
The foyer echoes with a hundred overexcited voices. We spot Amanda Ferguson and the boobs she grew over the summer. She’s talking to some girls we don’t know about who’s the hottest on Neighbours – Charlene’s Scott or Mike the mechanic. It’s a universal language. We’re impressed by her communication skills, reaching out to strangers. A quick scan confirms I’m still the tallest and I spot a teacher coming.
‘Settle all down, first years,’ she shouts. She looks younger than the teachers at Keir Hardie.
‘I’m Miss Campbell,’ she announces, smiling. Her hair appears to be two styles and colours at once – plum-purple spikes on top and a sleek black bob at the sides. The colours can’t be natural and it’s cool, way too cool for a teacher. We stare as one and she smiles at every single pupil.
Miss Campbell places one hand on her hip and giggles to herself, shaking her head. Her hair doesn’t move. ‘Right, first years. Settle down. Welcome to Brannock High School. You’ll be having an induction assembly when the bell rings.’
At that the bell rings, louder and faster than at Keir Hardie, and I feel hundreds of people moving around with purpose. Turning on her heel, Miss Campbell leads us to the canteen where a hundred chairs wait around a lectern. Behind shutters the dinner ladies cackle and bang pots about. They go quiet when a hush sweeps in with the tweedy headmaster, Mr Margrave. He says he’s very pleased to see us all but doesn’t actually look at any of us, and he’s sure we’ll all do him proud and he has a voice you don’t argue with. He looks like he plays golf and enjoys it. Me and Mark are busy sneaking looks at Miss Campbell sitting behind him. She sits smiling behind the headmaster like she’s heard it all before. When he’s done we all clap politely and Miss Campbell gets up. Did she just wink?
‘Now, I’m going to read out a list of names. If you hear your name that means you’re in Gibson House – my house. If you don’t hear your name that means you are in Anderson House with Mr Galbraith who’ll be along in a moment. Each house will then be divided into two classes.’ She starts reading and soon gets to B for Barr! C, D then E for Ellison. And nothing. She’s on F for Farrell, G for Graham. Mark squirms. I panic. I can’t do this without him. We’ve got to stick together. Separation is not in our plan.
I’m still taking this in when Miss Campbell puts her hand on my shoulder. ‘Did you not hear? What’s your name, son?’
‘Damian Leighton Barr, miss.’
‘Well come with me, Damian, you’re in 1G2 – my class.’
And she leads me away from Mark, who is already tilting his dimpled chin up.
There are only five pupils from Keir Hardie Memorial Primary School in 1G2 and apart from me they’re all remedial but we stay close for our first class – registration. Every day for the next six years Miss Campbell will mark us all on her register. Despite living only ten minutes away I’ll be marked LATE almost every day. Staying up reading every night isn’t good for punctuality. Neither are nightmares about the boy from Salem’s Lot, about everybody being vampires and nobody believing you when you warn them.
After we’ve all said our names Miss Campbell sketches out the future for 1G2. For the next two years we’ll take all our classes together. After that we’ll be split into streams based on academic ability as we prepare for our Standard Grade Exams, what the English call GCSEs. So E1 will be for pupils on course for As and maybe Bs. E2 is Bs and Cs. E3 is everybody else. After Standard Grades the remedials will leave to go on benefits and we stay on for Highers, ‘far superior to the English A level, giving you a broader base’. If you’re not clever enough to sit Highers you take ScotVec modules in things like food hygiene. If you’re really smart or really square, or both, you can stay on for sixth year for more Highers and something called Certificate of Sixth Year Studies (CSYS). Get an A in CSYS and go on to study that subject at a Scottish university and they’ll let you skip the first year. If I get As for everything I can finish uni and be a journalist like Mrs Hart by the time I’m twenty. ‘Don’t turn into wannae they yuppies, son,’ my dad warned when I told him my plans.
‘I will also be your guidance teacher,’ explains Miss Campbell. ‘That means you can come to me with any problems you have at school or home and talk in confidence and I will do whatever I can to help.’ Pause. ‘Bullying is not tolerated at Brannock High School.’
There is a special guidance room off the foyer with low, foam-filled armchairs designed to instil confidence and extract secrets. It would be easy to go in and sit down and confess everything but everybody in the foyer would see you. As soon as the door closes, rumours sweep the school: she’s pregnant, he sniffs glue, her dad interferes with her, he’s going to run away. Usually they’re not wrong. So I decide to go on without guidance.
The rest of the morning flies by as we fiddle with highlighter pens while we sketch out our timetables and work out where the different classrooms are on the map.
The bell rings for our fifteen-minute interval – we’re too old for ‘playtime’ now. In the foyer I stand on tiptoe looking for Mark’s blond spikes. Nobody’s outside cos it’s raining. The second years are the meanest, pulling at hair and spitting at us, maybe because they were us so recently. Third years and fourth years are more interested in each other but you’ve still got to be careful. We’re completely beneath the notice of the occasional fifth and sixth years. Sharks don’t eat minnows.
Or so I thought.
I’ve just found Mark and I’m asking him what 1A1 is like when I’m shoved from behind and fall on my knees. Laughter all round. I get back up because I’m trying to make a new start and show them all I’m no poof.
‘Barr?’ grunts a tall boy with dark curly hair who has to be a fourth year at least.
‘Yes,’ I say, too formally, standing up straight and brushing down my blazer. I should have said ‘Aye’ and tried to deepen my voice.
Another big boy with nearly see-through skin and proper carrot hair sniggers next to him, pic
king his chapped lips. ‘Me an’ aw.’ He grabs my shoulders and pushes me back down on to my knees on the shiny blue lino and hisses in my ear, ‘Ah’m yer big cousin, Peter.’ He leans right into my face. He has lovely teeth. Some older girls tell him to stop. ‘Don’t. Ever. Talk. Tae. Me. Got it?’
‘Got it,’ I nod. He spits on me before walking away. In the divorce I forgot my dad’s two brothers and sister, my uncles and aunt. I can’t even remember their names. We never go to see them. They never come to see us. There are no birthday cards or Christmas presents. Granny and Granpa Barr sometimes send a birthday card addressed to ‘Master Barr’. Granny Barr is fat, even fatter than Clare the Bear. All she eats is cakes. When she’s not scoffing she’s talking and throwing her head back to cackle. She’s always ‘getting the glad eye’ from some amorous neighbour. Granpa Barr is tall and thin and stooped and always looks surprised behind thick glasses. Like my dad he rarely speaks. When he does it’s through Snowy – Snowy is their white Persian cat and whenever one dies it’s instantly replaced by an identical feline with the same name. He’ll say, ‘Snowy, tell Mrs Barr I don’t want mince for dinner.’
So I’ve been reminded I’ve got cousins with the same second name as me. They’ve not forgotten me. Well, Peter’s not. Nothing to see here. The watchers move away and Mark helps me up but only after I put my hand out.
There’s more indignity that first lunchtime. At the end of class, one or two of us are kept back. We don’t know why until a list, which I read upside down, is produced from a drawer: SPECIAL ASSISTANCE – FREE SCHOOL DINNERS. I feel myself blush but my stomach growls gratefully. I find Mark and we queue up with our aeroplane-style trays and I get a baked potato with beans and grated cheese and a battered sausage and a vanilla slice with custard, all in their own portioned spaces. Baked potatoes are future food, something they’d eat in London. I’ve never had one. At the till I hand over my card and the dinner lady folds ‘Monday’ neatly and rips it off, dropping it in with the notes.
