by Cathy Forde
“And who’s this wee chookie-charmer then?” When Mr Milligan chucked Jenny under the chin she let up her racket just long enough to glower at him.
“Jenny. Careful. She bites.” Dad was on his feet now. Back to his cheery self. Phew. Pete let himself relax.
“And this is the coffee-spiller.” Dad had Pete by the scruff of his neck and gave him a playful shake.
“Pete,” Pete said, sticking to a nod in case Mr Milligan expected another handshake.
“We’ve met.” He winked at Pete again, adding, “Welcome to Clydebank everyone. Happy with the house so far?” Mr Milligan was really asking Mum.
“It’s very—” she began, just as Jenny burped a milky fountain of sick all down herself and Mum’s shirt.
“Well, we know what Miss Chookie thinks anyway,” Mr Milligan chuckled. He opened the kitchen door to let Mum bustle Jenny out of the kitchen, holding her at arm’s length.
“You happy?” Mr Milligan was looking at Pete.
“Listen, Jamie. We’re all happy. A job with a house?” Dad answered before Pete had the chance. “I’ll just make myself decent.” He flung his coffee-soaked T-shirt at Pete as he headed through the open door.
Mr Milligan was still looking at Pete.
“Did you get the room upstairs?” He pointed to the kitchen ceiling. Pete nodded.
“Bally good choice. Make as much noise as you like and they can’t hear you.” Mr Milligan leaned towards Pete and tapped his nose. “You probably won’t hear Princess Chookie creating either.” He gave Pete another of his winks as he turned to leave the kitchen.
“I hear someone else, though,” Pete said.
Mr Milligan didn’t turn round, but he stopped.
“A girl.”
Now Mr Milligan turned. He nodded at Pete and kept nodding, one hand running through his hair, even when the mobile in his hand rang and rang. His eyes held Pete’s, hardly blinking, though his gaze seemed far away. Only when a pager at Mr Milligan’s waistband peeped did he break eye contact to read the message it had delivered.
And then he was all action again, striding for the door. The booming voice back.
“Need to get your dad to meet me on site. Bally foreman’s out to ruin my day.”
Mr Milligan was just about to close the front door behind him when he hesitated, swung round and tapped Pete’s shoulder with his phone.
“Wait till my mother hears Beth’s back,” he whispered, as though he and Pete shared a secret.
Chapter 5
“Look out: tiger!”
Dad clamped his hands on to Pete’s shoulders. Dug his fingers in. Growled. Pete yelped.
They were in the garden, forcing a path through the wildness of it. The grass was well over Pete’s knees, many of the plants climbing even higher, catching his face, wrapping round his hands.
“Great size, eh? And it’ll look heaps better once Jamie sends round his fella with a mower.”
Dad pulled back a trailing rose bush so Pete could pass. “Seems a decent enough guy so far, El Honcho, eh?”
Pete didn’t know what to make of Dad’s new boss yet so he just shrugged. “He’s old. Mad hair.”
He didn’t know why Dad had suggested he and Pete take a walk in the garden either. Pete had been helping Mum build the cot they’d brought from London in the car, singing ‘Incy Wincy Spider’ to keep Jenny gurgling. Then Dad had arrived home from his first site meeting and summoned him. Neither Mum nor Jenny were happy about that. Now Dad and Pete were at the row of shrubs at the bottom of the garden, well clear of Jenny’s vocal chords.
“OK.” Dad had Pete by the shoulders again, though this time his hands swivelled him round to face the back of the house. “Just to knock this on the head: there’s why you didn’t hear any next-door neighbours,” he said.
And Pete could only gasp. Because Dad was right.
Pete was looking at one half of what – once upon a time – must have been two semi-detached houses joined together. But only one side remained. Ours. Pete could only work out where the adjoining building had once stood from the ragged brickwork that brought his house to an abrupt end. Now, in the space where two floors of rooms should have been, a thick steel prop shored up Pete’s new home.
“Something else, eh?” said Dad. “And wait till you see this.” He was beckoning Pete towards the no-longer-there house. As Pete approached it, the garden before him started to slope downhill. By the time he reached the bottom of the steel prop, his head was below ground level.
And Pete was standing in a crater. Rubbly. Overgrown. Sprouting bluebells and dandelions.
“What happened?” Pete asked as Dad clambered down beside him.
“Casualty of Herr Hitler, according to Milligan. Direct hit.”
Dad’s voice echoed through the crater and bounced off what would once have been the internal walls of a home. When Pete looked up he could still count the ex-rooms of the ex-house, their boundaries etched into the bare brickwork. There was the front sitting room. Pete could see the outline of where the fireplace and mantelpiece would have sat, the chimney now exposed. The kitchen must have been there, symmetrical to the one Mum was sitting in right now, feeding a wriggling Jenny. Pete could even trace the ascending pattern of the staircase, one or two of the original wooden treads still jutting from the brickwork. He identified the bathroom from random cracked tiles surviving on a section of wall, and next to it – Pete gulped – scraps of wallpaper had survived too. Rosebuds. Girly.
“Were the people who lived in this house in it when it was…?” Pete’s question ricocheted around the vacant space.
Dad was already out of the crater.
“Knew you’d ask me that.” He held his hand down for Pete to grab. Pete stayed put. “I hope not, pal, eh?”
I mean, could they have been…? Pete didn’t even want to finish what he was thinking. “And is our house even safe?” he asked instead.
“Safe as houses, let out by a top-notch architect like Milligan. Did I not tell you?” Dad was on the move again, striding through the grass to the far end of the garden.
“What?” Pete’s voice echoed off the bare brick of the crater.
“Sure I told you. Our house used to be his house. And I doubt he’d have let his old mother live in a dangerous building on her own once he flew the coop. Chop chop…” Dad called over his shoulder. “One more thing to show you.”
Scrambling out of the crater was harder than it looked. When Pete caught up, Dad was already pushing at the door of the ramshackle outhouse Pete had spotted from his window. The corrugated iron frame gave a long rusty complaint as Dad eased it just wide enough for Pete to follow him inside. The roof, also corrugated, seemed intact, although rust had nibbled into it too. This allowed chinks of sunlight to enter, sparkling the floor and letting Pete see enough to decide that the building was about the size of three of his London papa’s allotment huts stuck end to end. The space seemed empty save for two rows of slatted wooden benches running the length of the walls on either side.
“Know what this is?” Dad gave the roof a rap with his knuckles, sending a shower of rust flakes swirling down on both their heads.
Before Pete could suggest, My den? Dad was smacking the wall. “Air-raid shelter. Amazing it’s survived. All the folk from there, both sides –” Dad was pointing back towards their house, “– they’d’ve sheltered in here till the all-clear sounded. Milligan was one of them. Can’t have been much older than Jenny. Speaking of which –” Dad was already halfway through the shelter door, “– Jenny duty calls. Big boy like me can’t hide in your new den for ever.”
Dad was grinning at Pete.
Pete grinned back.
“Not many lads nowadays have a personal Anderson shelter, eh?” Dad said as he left Pete and pushed a path back through the garden. “Told you life would be braw up here.”
Pete caught up with him, pointed at the ruined site.
“Dad, d’you think the people on the other side of us would’ve
been in my shelter when their house was bombed?”
“That’s what it was built for.”
“And how come I heard a girl crying?” Pete tugged Dad’s arm.
“Pete.” Dad rubbed his hand over his mouth. He exhaled a long sigh. “I showed you the crater and the ruin. There’s no girl crying. Except our girl.”
Pete could hear Jenny too. The drill-shrill pitch of her rage.
“But, Dad, I heard—”
“Son, if you don’t believe me, ask Milligan. He’s dropping by with the low-down on schools round here for you to start after Easter.” Dad chuckled as he went through the back door. “Be thinking you’re a currant short of a fruit scone, though.”
Great. Peter groaned. In the excitement of moving he’d forgotten he’d need to start a new school. Him with his London accent. Without Simon and Alfie. His best pals for years.
Pete never even got the chance to say goodbye properly. Dad’s new job and the move all happened so fast. One minute it was the start of a normal school day, the next Pete was in the car, passing the park where he and Simon and Alfie used to play footy, the swimming pool, the old-fashioned café where they drank Shirley Temples, the cinema…
On the motorway up north, Dad had tilted his rear-view mirror to catch Pete’s eye.
“Cheer up, champ,” he said. “Your pals’ll come and stay in the summer. Only a couple of months away.”
But Pete knew that wouldn’t happen. Clydebank was far too far from London.
And we’d have so much fun in this den, and out here, he was thinking. Alone in the garden.
Just then, out the corner of his eye, Pete caught a movement on the edge of the bomb crater. He had to dodge about on his tiptoes, peering over and though the tall grasses to see better. But there! A glimpse of blue, same colour as the bluebells nodding about his feet. Someone was facing him. Looking towards him. Pete could swear it, though he was sensing it more than seeing anything. And when he thrashed his way a little closer to where the figure he thought he’d seen had stood, there was no one.
Chapter 6
Pete stood in the kitchen listening to the voices upstairs: Mum’s, Dad’s, Jenny’s. All raised at each other, trying to make themselves heard. Pete knew he wouldn’t be missed. At least for a while. Checking his prized footy figures were still in the rucksack he’d brought up in the car from London, he grabbed a banana and a can of cola, since Mum wasn’t about. On the way out the back door he spotted Dad’s torch so he grabbed that too, along with a cloth from the sink. The shelter had looked a bit too cobwebby for his liking.
But – oh boy! – was Pete keen to go back and check out his new den properly. Sort it out.
Thrashing through the garden, he almost felt happy. It was sunny. He liked the house. The space. The smell of the air outside: far fresher than London. And Dad had work. Best of all: Dad had work. Even better than best, Dad had let slip that Pete wouldn’t need to start whatever new school he’d be starting till after Easter.
Pete was free – for nearly three weeks – to settle, explore. If only Simon and Alfie… he wished as he reached the doorway of the shelter again. The pair of them jostling at his shoulder: Whoa. Check this place out!
Pete was so busy imagining his London mates were with him, he was less surprised than he should have been when something came hurtling at him through the gloom of the shelter. Or someone.
“Oi. Trespassing, pal,” a boy growled, right up in Pete’s face. “Beat it.”
He spoke like Dad: Scottish accent, but with added un-pally-ness. In a different place Pete might have been worried, but not here in his own garden, where this boy was trespassing. Oi yourself: my new den. And anyway, this boy wasn’t any taller than Pete. Skinny.
“Nah, mate. I live ’ere, don’t I?”
Pete didn’t know where that voice came from. Watching snatches of Eastenders before Mum turned it off, maybe. Not anything like how he normally spoke. He let the words dangle on his lower lip, fists clenched and swinging like those lads from his old school. Those lads he and Simon and Alfie tended to bodyswerve. Hide from sometimes. Inside he was praying he didn’t sound posh.
“I live here too.”
The boy wasn’t backing off. His tone, though, had lost its threat.
“See, that’s my back garden,” the boy said, moving outside the shelter and pulling aside a chunk of hedge to reveal a smooth green lawn bordered with neat flower beds. “And the den belongs to it.”
The boy was dodging back into the doorway of the shelter as he said all this, as if to stake his claim on it. He needn’t have been so worried; Pete was too busy making a mental note of one of those giant trampolines Dad just kept saying, “Sorry, pal, not when you live in a flat with no garden,” about. Pete couldn’t take his eyes off it, even when the boy told him, “You talk funny. Where you from then?”
“London. Just moved in last night.”
“Landon,” the boy repeated. When Pete glared, he grinned. “Don’t sound like you’re from Landon. You sure?”
Pete was secretly chuffed. “Born there, but my dad’s Scotch. From Glasgow.”
“So you’re Scottish really.” The boy gave Pete two thumbs up but then he swiped them in front of Pete’s face like windscreen wipers. “Not Scotch. Only whisky’s Scotch. I’d remember that.” He clicked his tongue before swaggering to the back of the shelter as if their meeting was over.
Not for Pete.
“Excuse me, this is my den now.” He was trying to sound more definite than he felt. “My dad said it was shared by the two halves of our house. It’s the old air—”
“—raid shelter. Yeah, he’s right. But our house shared it too,” the boy interrupted. “And the houses next door, and I’ve lived here since I was two so it’s been my den for nine years. Beat that.” The boy’s chin was cocked at Pete. Trying to look hard, Pete decided, but something about his expression was too kind. In fact – despite his coppery red hair and pale skin, crocheted in freckles – he reminded Pete of Simon. Jamaican Simon.
“We’re the same age then,” Pete heard himself say. “Well, when I’m eleven next week.”
The boy looked at Pete and said nothing.
Pete shrugged. “Could we… maybe… share the shelter?”
The boy narrowed his eyes, looked Pete up and down, then down and up. “You play footy?”
“Come on,” Pete snorted, the question not even worth answering, though he did add, “Support Scotland?”
The boy nodded. “You like music?”
Pete took a step further into the den. He couldn’t help himself. “More than footy. I play it. Guitar. Dad teaches me. I’m into The Beatles. Elvis… He was The King…”
“Old stuff.” The boy wrinkled his nose. “You look like you play music. I only like big drums…” He beat his hands in the air – Pow! Wak! Baow! – until he was out of breath.
“Sweet,” Pete said. “Where d’you play?”
“Just down here.”
“On a drum kit? I could bring my guitar,” Pete said, but the boy was shaking his head.
“Keep asking for one but they ignore me, so I just…” The boy beat the air again. For a long time. “Crazy, eh?” he panted at last. “Still want to share the den?” The boy’s fist was outstretched for a bump before he had finished asking the question.
“Jimmy Dunn,” he said, “but everyone calls me Dunny.”
“Dunny?”
“That’s my name, don’t wear it out. And what’s so funny?”
“It means toilet in Australia.” Pete knew as soon as he’d sniggered that he shouldn’t have bothered.
“Except we’re not in Australia,” Dunny took a step closer Pete, “we’re in Scot-land, alright?”
“It’s just that my dad worked there once and—”
“My dad lives here and he’s Dunny and so are my uncles and my cousins. Everyone in our family’s a Dunny, alright? So it’s not funny.”
“Alright.” Pete’s voice must have come out even sm
aller than he felt, and he was just about to add, “Sorry,” when Dunny dropped down into a squat. He blew a long raspberry fart, and flushed an imaginary handle.
“Actually quite funny. Us Dunny Dunns all being toilets.” He grinned. “Except Wee Stookie.”
“Who?” Pete was glad the conversation was moving on.
“Stookie. That’s what you’d call a plaaaster in Engerland.” Dunny’s attempt at a Cockney accent was so pathetic Pete nearly laughed at him again.
“A what?”
“Plaster cast. Like you get when you break something? Arms, legs… He’s always doin’ that, is Wee Stookie.” Dunny made another stab at his tragic Cockney. “My little bwuvver to you, mate. Only four he is.”
“Wow, I’ve only ever bitten through my lip sliding down a hill in a box. Never broken any bones.”
“Same,” Dunny said in his normal voice.
“Quite like to,” Pete admitted.
“Same. Maybe this arm.” Dunny held his left arm up to his chest as if it was in a sling. “So I couldn’t write my sums, but I could still run and…” Dunny booted an imaginary ball. “Yeah.”
Dunny was shifting his arm about like it was already broken and he was trying to make it comfortable. Pete was lifting his right one to see how an imaginary sling felt on his chest, when Dunny swung his arm out and jabbed him.
“What about your name then, Landon boy? Something pure posh, is it? Cecil… or… or… Boris…” Dunny was snapping his fingers, trying to pluck more high-class names out of the air. “Or, I know: Ni-gel.”
“How d’you guess? Nigel Fauntleroy the Third. Jolly delighted to meet you,” Pete hoity-toitied. He bowed, one hand on his tummy, the other against the small of his back.
