by Jason Ayres
“Sorry, Gran, I’ll turn it down next time.” In his inebriated and downbeat state he hadn’t realised it had been so loud.
“See that you do,” she said. “It’s a good job my Pat, God rest his soul, wasn’t here to hear it. He couldn’t be doing with all this newfangled rock and roll nonsense. He didn’t like any music after 1955. That’s when it all went to pot, he reckoned. The old songs are the best! That’s what he used to say.”
“I remember,” replied Peter, who had heard it countless times before his grandfather’s demise. “Anyway, I am going out today. I’m going to the match.”
“That’s another thing I’m glad my Pat’s not here to see. He’d be heartbroken to see them doing so badly.”
Peter had long ago lost count of the number of things Gran was glad Pat was not here to see. He had died over four years ago but the way Gran talked about him continually made it seem like he was still here.
Pat had loved Oxford United and had taken Peter to his first-ever match, a 5-0 drubbing in a League Cup game by the league champions at the time, Nottingham Forest. That hadn’t put him off, though. It was only in the last year or so that his enthusiasm had waned.
Perhaps Gran had a point. Pat had died the summer after Oxford had lifted the League Cup, or Milk Cup as it was known at the time. At least he’d gone out on a high.
“They just need a new owner to invest some more money,” suggested Peter.
“Don’t they just!” exclaimed Gran. “Have you seen all this scandal in the papers? Apparently Maxwell’s raided the Daily Mirror’s pension pot. No wonder the U’s are broke.”
“The recession probably doesn’t help,” said Peter. “People can’t afford to go. Crowds are right down this season.”
This was a valid point. Things were looking pretty bleak for the economy right now. The recession, a house price crash and sky-high interest rates had created a situation so bad that thousands were losing their homes.
“Don’t I know it,” replied Gran. “It’s a scandal, the pension this Government expects me to survive on, especially with all this inflation. Thank goodness we’ve got an election coming up. Once that nice Mr Kinnock gets in, he’ll sort it all out. I only wish my Pat were here to see it. Voted Labour all his life he did. Couldn’t stand Maggie, you know.”
“Yes, I know,” replied Peter. He had spent most of the 1980s, up until Pat’s death, listening to him going on about “that bloody woman”.
“Well, I can’t make ends meet, Peter, and I know it’s no use asking you for any more money. What would you think about me taking in a lodger?”
Peter wasn’t sure how he felt about that, but she was right, he didn’t have any more money and wouldn’t have until he graduated. Then he could get a full-time teaching job, but that wouldn’t be until September at the earliest and he was planning to move out as soon as that happened.
He couldn’t stay living with his grandmother forever. He needed to get on with his life, hence his New Year resolution to make this the year everything changed.
“I’m not sure, Gran,” he replied.
“Well, you won’t be getting this very often if I don’t,” she said, plonking a plate of bacon and eggs down in front of him. “It’ll have to be porridge from now on.”
“We’ll get a lodger,” said Peter decisively. He couldn’t stand porridge.
“Do you have any student friends who might be interested?” she asked.
“Possibly,” said Peter. “But we don’t pay well, as you well know. Maybe you would be better advertising for a professional person. What about putting a card in Dillons window?”
“I could,” replied Gran. “But I’m very particular. I don’t want any coloureds. My Pat wouldn’t like it. Now you eat up those bacon and eggs. You’ll be glad of those later when you’re standing on that freezing terrace.”
His gran’s casual support of his dead grandfather’s racism made Peter wince.
“Please don’t write anything about coloureds on the card, Gran,” he said. “You can’t put things like that anymore. You’ll get into trouble.”
“My Pat would have,” she replied. “He called a spade a spade.”
“I don’t recall him complaining when Chicken George was knocking in the goals for Oxford,” replied Peter.
He found the racist attitudes of many of her generation abhorrent. They had grown up in the era before multiculturalism and many had never really accepted it. Much as he loved his grandparents, he hoped their attitudes would die out with their generation.
It was nearly 2pm by the time he left the house on the fairly long walk to the match. It was a good mile and a half from Cowley to the Manor Ground in Headington.
Gran had been right about it being freezing. As soon as he stepped out of the front door the cold air hit him and he could see his breath in the air in front of him. In the conditions, he was very glad of his yellow and blue Oxford United bobble hat and scarf.
Barely had he gone ten paces when a middle-aged man standing under a lamp-post opposite the house called over to him.
“Peter? Peter Grant?”
Peter didn’t know it, but his prayers for a more interesting life were about to be answered.
Chapter Seven
Peter felt invisible most of the time. People rarely spoke to him on the street. So he was naturally suspicious of this stranger who was suddenly accosting him.
“Can I have a quick word” asked the man, tentatively.
“Look, I don’t mean to be rude, but who are you?” replied Peter.
The man didn’t seem hostile but there was something decidedly dodgy about some middle-aged man he had never seen before waiting for him outside his house. Why hadn’t he knocked on the door?
From Josh’s perspective, he needed to handle this encounter carefully. He could see that the younger man looked nervous and the last thing he wanted to do was scare him off. On other occasions when he had visited his friends in their past, Josh had tended to show off, dropping hints of spoilers into the conversation and generally not taking the whole thing very seriously.
But things were different now and there was to be none of his past bravado. Getting lost in time had well and truly taken the wind out of his sails and there was too much at stake here to mess about.
“My name’s Josh Gardner” he said. “You don’t know me – or at least you don’t know me yet. But I know you. Or at least I will, in the future.”
He delivered these lines slowly and deliberately, in order to keep things calm. But he wasn’t setting Peter’s mind at ease.
Peter looked at the stranger’s face closely. Looking at the lines on his face he estimated he must be in his fifties. Other than lecturers and his own parents he didn’t tend to hang out with people in that age group. Despite the stranger’s claims to know him, Peter knew he had never seen this man before.
“You may think you know me, but I certainly don’t recognise you” replied Peter. “So what is all this about? And what do you mean about knowing me in the future?”
As he spoke, Peter began to edge away from the stranger, keen to get to the main road where there would be more people about, just in case he was dangerous.
Sensing Peter’s apprehension, Josh realised he needed to get to the point and quickly. It wasn’t the first time on his time travels he had found himself in this sort of situation. He sensed that Peter wasn’t going to give him time for any long-winded explanations so he needed to come right out with what he needed to say right now.
“I’m a time traveller” began Josh. “In 2018, I will be seventeen years old. You will be my English teacher. My friend Charlie and I are going to discover a time bubble that transports people to the future. This is going to get us into all sorts of trouble and we are going to turn to you for help. A lot’s happened since then, which I’ll explain later, but to cut a long story short, I’ve got stuck in 1992 and now I need your help again.”
Josh had given versions of this speech to various people on h
is travels and had received plenty of negative responses. He hoped that Peter, who had always had an open mind about such things, would be more receptive than most. He was to be disappointed.
“Ok, you’re clearly deranged” replied Peter, feeling more than a little scared and wondering if that had been the right response. What if he really was a nutter and pulled out a knife or worse?
“I’m not deranged” replied Josh. “Just give me half an hour of your time. I’ll buy you a pint. You like real ale, don’t you?”
Peter nodded that he did.
“Of course you do”, added Josh. ”I’ve seen you sup enough pints of it in the future. Now let’s go for a drink and talk about it. If I’m lying, well, you can walk away and you’ve lost nothing. But what if I’m telling the truth? Wouldn’t that be exciting?”
“I don’t believe a word of it”, replied Peter, who was totally unconvinced. “And besides, I can’t go for a pint now. I’ve got a ticket for the match and I’m going to be late if you don’t get out of the way.”
“Why don’t I come with you to the match, then?” suggested Josh. “I’ve been to see Oxford a few times, even though Aston Villa’s my team.”
“Ugh, wash your mouth out with soap and water” replied Peter. “I can’t stand Villa. Anyway, you won’t get in without a ticket, they will have sold out. It’s FA Cup third round day.”
“Really - sold out?” questioned Josh. “I didn’t think anyone was that bothered about the FA Cup.”
“You’re having a laugh” replied Peter. “The FA Cup Final is the biggest match of the whole year. Everyone wants to get to Wembley.”
“Well I guess it’s less important in my time. It’s all about the Premiership and Champions League now. Of course, you’ve still got all that to look forward to.”
“OK time travelling man” said Peter, sarcastically. “If you know the future, answer me this. What’s the score going to be in the Oxford v Tranmere match this afternoon? If you can predict that, I might start taking you a little more seriously.”
“Ah, yeah, well there’s a bit of a problem there” replied Josh.
“I thought there might be” said Peter.
“Honestly, I ought to be able to tell you. I brought the whole set of this weekend’s football results back from the future with me so I could land a betting coup but unfortunately I don’t have them anymore.”
“That’s convenient” replied Peter, sarcastically. “And why don’t you have them any more.”
“Well, they sort of…caught fire” replied Josh, realising how lame this sounded and not relishing the look of disbelief on Peter’s face. This was going badly. “I do remember that Oxford won, but I don’t know the actual score.”
“You know if by some million to one chance you are some student of mine from the future, I wouldn’t be very impressed if you came up with that as an excuse for not handing in your homework. You may as well have told me the dog ate it. Now this whole thing is clearly ridiculous, will you please get out of my way and let me get to the game?”
He barged past Josh, and marched quickly up the road, hoping to leave the weirdo behind him. When he dared to look back, he saw that he was following, but at a safe distance. Well he couldn’t follow him into the ground and hopefully he’d be gone by the end of the match.
It was a good half an hour walk to the ground from his gran’s house and about half way a light rain began to fall from the gloomy January sky. As he walked up London Road, he began to merge with other fans going the same way towards the Manor Ground. As he got closer to the ground, more fans joined from side streets until there was a steady flow of blue and yellow surging towards the entrance.
Despite the team’s recent poor results, the atmosphere was cheery as he approached the ground with the match day crowd chanting and cheering. He bought a programme for £1.20 from one of the many sellers outside the ground and turned to the back page to look at the team line ups.
Then he made his way towards the turnstiles for the London Road end. He handed his ticket to the attendant, an elderly bald man, and pushed hard to get the ancient grey metal bars to admit him to the ground. As they turned they creaked like they needed a decent drop of oil on them. In fact, the whole ground was in need of a serious spruce up.
The rest of the fans didn’t seem to mind and the steady drizzle falling from the skies wasn’t dampening their spirits. As he made his way up the steps towards the London Road terrace they were still singing away.
“Wembley! Wembley! We’re the famous Oxford United and we’re going to Wembley!”
This was optimistic in the extreme going on the team’s current form but Peter still joined in. Then a familiar voice piped up behind him.
“Sorry to disappoint you but there’s no chance of Oxford getting to Wembley. Spurs are going to win the cup this year” stated Josh, confidently.
Peter groaned, inwardly and exclaimed “Not you again! How did you get in?”
“There was a guy selling tickets outside the ground” replied Josh. “I couldn’t resist coming in to take a look around. I’ve heard all sorts of stories about this old place. Bit spit and sawdust isn’t it?”
The crowd was getting thicker as they reached the top of the steps and poured into the right hand side of the stand. Clearly Peter wasn’t getting rid of this guy any time soon.
“What do you mean by this old place?”
“Oh, it doesn’t exist anymore” replied Josh. “The club gets a new stadium in about ten years’ time - well, three-quarters of a new stadium anyway.”
“I can’t see that happening” replied Peter. “They’ve been going on about getting a new stadium for years but they can hardly afford to maintain this one.”
The two of them had made their way on to the terrace and now had a clear view of the pitch, where the teams were already coming out.
“This must be the famous sloping pitch, then” remarked Josh. “It doesn’t slope as much as I thought it would. Anyway, where are your mates?”
“What mates?” shouted Peter, over the increasing din of the crowd.
“I just assumed you’d be meeting your mates here. Isn’t that what people do when they go to football.”
“No, it’s just me” replied Peter.
“That’s a bit sad” said Josh. “Good job you’ve got me here to keep you company then, isn’t it?”
Peter sighed. Clearly there was nothing he could do to get rid of this idiot for the time being. Perhaps he could try and lose him at half time.
There was a fence dividing the terrace into two sections, and all the fans in the left hand side burst into song.
“We are the left side, we are the left side, we are the left side of London Road.”
Peter then joined in with the fans on his side.
“We are the right side, we are the right side, we are the right side of London Road.”
“Is that the best you can come up with?” remarked Josh, incredulously, as the left side repeated their chant. “Not very imaginative, is it?”
Peter had to admit he had a point. It was a bit moronic and he wasn’t even sure why he joined in with it. Even so, he decided to ignore Josh and concentrate on the pitch where the game was about to kick off.
At half time, he went to the toilet, and then grabbed a cheap looking pie containing some unidentified grey meat. He had intended to move across into the left side of London Road on his return, but Josh collared him again at the top of the steps.
“You don’t get away that easily” he said. “Look, let’s just go for one drink after the match and if you don’t believe me after that then I promise I’ll leave you alone.”
“Alright, one drink” agreed Peter, hoping he wouldn’t come to regret it. It wasn’t as if he had anything better to do. After being kicked into touch by Amanda the previous evening he needed something to take his mind of his dismal lack of a love life.
At the end of the match, which Oxford won 3-1, the two of them headed out of the ground wit
h the rest of the jubilant, singing crowd.
Darkness had fallen, the rain had stopped and there was a distinct chill in the air. The two of them made for The Royal Standard across the road which was packed with Oxford fans celebrating the win.
Safety in numbers, thought Peter, still not feeling completely secure in Josh’s company.
It had just gone five o’clock, and the pub had the radio on, with James Alexander Gordon reading out the football results. When Oxford’s score was announced a huge cheer went up, followed by a massive boo a minute or so later when it transpired that Swindon had also won.
It took a good ten minutes to get their drinks in the rush, and after they did, they sat down at a small, round, red table made out of cheap MDF. Complemented with the short, faux leather red stools they were sitting on, the furnishings could only be described as basic.
“My, this place has changed” remarked Josh. “It’s been completely done up in my time. Mind you, that’s true of most pubs – the ones that are left, anyway. I’ve spotted quite a few around Oxford that are long gone by my time.”
Peter had to admit that Josh sounded convincing. He had decided to humour him a while longer and see what else he had to say. It was a little intriguing to say the least, and it was doing a reasonable job of taking his mind off things.
It was certainly preferable to another riveting evening with Gran watching Noel Edmonds gunging people on his irritating show. Saturday evening telly had really gone downhill in recent years.
“I’ve got to admit, you do sound convincing” said Peter. “But you can’t keep this act up forever. Look, I’d love it if time travel was real. I’m Doctor Who’s biggest fan. Or at least I was until the BBC cancelled it.”
That really rankled with Peter. He knew Sylvester McCoy wasn’t everyone’s cup of tea, but he felt it had been getting a lot better during the last series.
“Don’t worry, it’ll come back eventually” said Josh. “And when it does it’ll be bigger and better than ever! When I was growing up it was the most popular show on TV. Everyone sat down to watch it on Christmas Day every year.”
