Copyright © Hugh Vaughan 2009
ISBN 978-1449576066
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior permission of the author.
Contents
Preface
I make the truth as I invent it truer than it would be – Hemingway
To paraphrase Clive James, most first novels are disguised autobiographies. These short stories are disguised memoirs – creative memoirs. Some are closer to being autobiographical than others, but they are all stories – figments of my imagination, including my reminiscing ramble Down Memory Lane that formed the basis for the stories. Hemingway suggests that by making them ‘truer’ is what makes all good books alike.
Michael McLaverty advises to go for the intimate and the local - this I have attempted. Seamas Heaney describes McLaverty’s “love of the universal, the worn grain of unspectacular experience, the well-turned grain of language itself” – this, too, was part of the endeavour.
Little nuggets of memories give birth to these flights of fancies. Writing these stories is the next best thing to time travel: exploring that period of childhood through creatively making the memories ‘truer’ was great fun. Frank O’Connor talks about rewriting stories that have been published, reworking them maybe fifty times. I discovered I was rewriting stories over and over in my head and I am sure I had versions stored on lost floppy disks, almost two decades ago.
Most of these stories emanate from the innocent years before secondary school, and the growing out of it - that awakening provides the richest well to draw from. A Bump on the Road reflects an observant child attempting to understand the world around him. Family - parents, siblings, aunts, uncles, cousins, friends, and the wider community: The Church, The Troubles, secrets, ghost stories, leaving home, myths and legends, all this comes under the microscope of a child growing up. A couple of stories deal with going to England and migrating to Australia - moving away from the security blanket that is home.
The boy (and the young man) describes that world with wit and bittersweet nostalgia. The reader is taken on a gamut of emotions in this rich and amusing journey from whooping Christmas joy, childish preoccupation with play, and avoiding boredom, to grief and fear of adults in school and church. This world of small town Ireland is brought evocatively to life by his wonderment of snow, holidays, playing, family, school, church and gradually moving away. Sorrow is never too far away.
The well of childhood is explored through various themes from seemingly routine family activities – Free Range and Family Secrets, The Troubles – Incident and Our Place, the lore of ghosts – Front Row and The Hump, Christmas expectation with a twist – Glorious Morn and scrappy street gangs - Run to the phenomenon of the show band era – If Only.
In for the Day reveals the fear of starting secondary school and the excitement of visiting the big city. It is a tribute to Eamon Friel’s folksy, unmistakable voice and lyrics that mirror the Northern Irish earthy mood; a mixture of the melancholy and the craic. Big Pol reveals bored pupils against a background of The Troubles.
Other stories included here have some connection with childhood: My Dear Boy reflects stark grief when the unthinkable happens. Milan Kundera states we are always children because we constantly have a new set of rules before us such as starting afresh either in Manchester or Melbourne: A Weak Tummy and New Neighbour.
So You’re Off Then, set in Northern Ireland in the early 1900s evolved through looking for William O’Connell and his wife Maggie, my great-great-aunt who migrated to Australia about that time, meshed together with some oral family history told to me by my Granny’s sister, Priscilla, when she was 99 years old.
In The Deliverance of Destiny, a contemporary piece on migration where the sins of previous generations permeate through to the children.
My thanks to Rosemary for her constant encouragement – it is almost as old as the memories, to Jill for reading, proofreading and making some excellent suggestions, and to Matthew who wants to be the first to buy the book.
Contact me with your thoughts on the stories - abumpontheroad@yahoo.com.au
© Hugh Vaughan 2009
The Hump
Easing the frozen net curtains off the glass, I drew a circle on the thin ice with my finger and moved the melting water to the bottom of the window. Outside, the frost hung in the air, a gleaming white-out. Everything in the crescent wore a glittering coat, from the road, right up to the shiny sloping roofs and beyond - all a silvery sheen. The wished-for Christmas had come again on seeing this magical sight, instead of the usual dull drip of rain trickling down the windowpane. My frost-free view was big enough to see the crescent, the bulbous cul-de-sac. Two houses, on our side and the same opposite, bordered it. A hawthorn hedge on the left, shrouded in mist, gave refuge to the Big House that once dominated the surrounding fields and cottages.
The owner, a squat man, stood at a gap in the hedge, fixing the barb wire fence. He had erected it to keep out the hoards of boys, intent on filling their jumpers with russet apples from his autumnal orchard. Hoary white on vacant trees and crisp under foot, he checked on his defences. Thick tartan socks rose out of his laced up boots, trousers tucked snuggly inside, the tight fitting jacket of purple hue buttoned up with black discs, red burnished cheeks on his pale face. Holding a spotted handkerchief, he wiped a dripping nose with an ungloved hand and then scanned the crescent before moving off, unseen, into his garden.
As I watched through my little porthole, someone opposite pulled their red curtains, giving no sight of a body, just movement through their opaque window. Otherwise, all windows in the crescent were covered within and nothing moved without. Steps led to their green doors, with little snow-covered gardens and obligatory centrepiece shrub, a mantle of white. Knee-height concrete walls bordered the footpath, overgrown with privet hedges. Our corner garden led alongside a public path, otherwise most gardens were similar; the hedge ran from our front gate down along the path to a side gate, the entrance into the back yard.
I crossed the chill lino-covered landing to my bedroom. It had two beds - a double and my single, which was covered in several heavy blankets, its multi-coloured sheets trailing onto the floor, and crowned with a deep-navy quilted eiderdown. Sliding my feet under the covers to find some warmth I knelt to look into the back yard through the damp window, the hanging frost still gathered at the eaves. Below, the shed occupied half of the yard and on its flat bleached roof lay a broken bicycle and pieces of discarded frost-encrusted timber. A wooden green gate led into a narrow vegetable garden, empty of produce, clay turned in the drills, allowing the frost to do its work.
Down the centre ran a cinder path, a snow thickened washing line hung above, attached from the shed to a tree at the bottom of the garden and on it, a solitary tea towel, suspended, fixed in space, benumbed. The line was supported by a proud pole shaped from a branch, fashioned and pared by all, and with its natural hook, a shared family delight. Edging the garden and path was a wire fence, at its foot a hawthorn hedge, barely newborn.
Beyond the back garden lay a tract of open ground, muddy and pallid, a winding pavement on its way to town, hugging the houses’ back gardens. A huge hump lay against a thick hawthorn hedge shielding a primary school. The Hump, as we called it, was the remnants of the workhouse, now an overgrown lump of broken bricks and stunted grass, nothing grew there. It had an atmosphere all of its own.
We played on it sometimes, rolling and hiding in drier summer months, playing Cowboys and Indians, reenacting the latest film or television series, cowboys always winning. Lee Enfield rifles carved by penknives into discarded lumps of wood or bows and arrows made from sinewy branches. Some Dads reenacted their own childhoods by detailing rifles - smoothing handles, sandpapering barrels and curving triggers. Many battles were fought, won and lost on that humpy hill. No one liked to stay on the mound for too long. It was a chilly place, even on a warm summer’s day.
We preferred the long grass, hiding, looking at the clouds swirl slowly overhead, the birds gathered in couples or v-shaped squadrons as we ground-dwellers jealously watched their freedom. Those were the long summer days.
The Hump was now smothered by a white blanket, barely noticeable, above; a white haze hovered, glittering in the weak sun, attempting to drain the chill from the air. Here, stood part of the workhouse, its last addition, where the unfortunate inhabitants were taught sewing, laundry skills or carpentry, depending on their sex. However, not long after this was built, the dilapidated workhouse had completed its life’s purpose, and became the local council’s store.
One stormy night, the roof disappeared causing the building’s demise and the workhouse was stripped of anything useful. It stood empty and barren, a local landmark, providing the path with its name- initially called the Workhouse Path, then the Work Path and finally, the Path. Over the years, the stone walls were tumbled and used for other buildings. During one operation, the basement floor unearthed a darker past - numerous bones. It was rumoured that the manager had housed more occupants than desired, claiming additional funds and hastening the death of the poor unfortunates, their remains buried in the basement cellar. This was the Hump. It was a quiet scandal and, like the workhouse poor, buried quickly. Many locals’ relatives unceremoniously became residents and so, by guilt or neglect, the townspeople overlooked the unpleasantness in communal amnesia.
“Are you ready yet?” called my mother. “Come on down for your breakfast.’’
I scrambled into my brown corduroy trousers, new for Christmas, and taking off my pyjama jacket in the unheated bathroom I speedily wiped my face and neck, its window, frosted, inside and out. Wearing my mother-knitted Aran jumper, and after taking two stairs down at a time, I was sitting at the table by the window of the warm back room, in front of the open fire, the only source of heat.
I lifted the corner of the diamond-shaped net curtain, outside the sun cast a pearly shadow over the garden and the sky revealed hints of pale blue. I heard the clink of plates from the kitchen and went out to get my bowl of steaming porridge. Taking it back to the table and placing it on a table mat of Scottish mountains and flowing streams, I sprinkled sugar across its stagnant top and poured the doorstep-icy creamy topping from the milk, forming a white circle around the edge of the bowl. My plan for eating started there and working inwards, until milk and porridge mixed into a smooth paste, and I spooned it up.
My mother arrived with tea and thickly cut bread. Reaching for the large toasting fork which sat by the fire, she forked the bread into the crust and watched me holding it close to the roasting embers. Within minutes, both sides were browned and I was buttering it thickly.
“Eat up, we’ll not be going for a while,” said she.
“Can I go out?”
“Just for five minutes. And don’t dare get your clothes dirty!”
I scoffed the warm food before dashing to the cupboard under the stairs. There, my duffle coat hung amidst the musky, heavy coats. My welly boots were stuck deep inside - I had to plunge on my hands and knees into the dank air to retrieve them. Just as I placed my hand on the knob of the back door, my mother breathed into my ears;
“Where are your gloves?”
“Dunno.”
“Find them; I think they might be on top of the knitting basket, behind the sofa.”
The round cane knitting basket with its narrow waist of red and blue beads contained my mother’s current knitting project, topped by a cane-saucer lid; in its concave centre lay a corded loop handle. Balls of wool of various sizes and colour, from past projects, littered its bottom. Beside it, stood a much-dented brass vase filled with grey knitting needles of many lengths and thickness, each crowned with a numbered disc or knob. There, of course, on top of the knitting basket, were my grey knitted gloves. Suitably assembled, I stepped out onto the back door mat, crunching its layer of virgin snow.
I followed the stream of engraved footprints down the Path. At the bottom of our garden, it took a left turn following the edge of houses. I could see someone ahead and disappear into the fog. The sun was shining on the Hump, its rays reflecting off the haze, but I knew it was too weak to shift the white mask.
Little icy wells spread across the lumpy ground and I went in search of more ice-topped pools. I found one, a hard window into the water-filled hollow, and taking off my glove I poked it with my finger. It didn’t break, it hurt. At its edge, I repeated my attempt and crashed into the bleak murk. Finding a stick and prodding the ice until it shattered, shards twisted and I plunged my stick into every icy hole I could find.
Running my fingers along the top of the frost laden grass I scooped some of the white stuff and savoured the ice melting on my tongue. The sun’s ray fell upon the Hump. Wanting to get my share of its warmth I ran to the sun spot. Sure enough, little rays warmed my face. I surveyed the surrounding landscape - gaunt trees and obscured houses, their white fences bordered the path. I puffed out and saw the cloud form and swirl in front of my nose, breathing in the sharp air and expelling a cloud, again and again.
Suddenly two people came into view, at the corner of my garden. I instantly recognized the swaddling figure, head nodding in conversation with her chatting partner. It was Aunt ‘must go’ Kate. She wore her caramel winter coat, with brown fur collar and black boots. Around her neck, a mother-knitted green scarf with matching hat.
She passed our house, most days, down the Path to visit her aunt. As always, she met some other traveller and enjoyed their company as they wandered to their respective duties. ‘Must go’ Kate got the name because she always fled to the toilet upon entering our house, muttering the words ‘must go’ on her way.
As she busily chatted with her companion, I called to her from the top of the Hump through the smoggy cold, but she continued talking to her companion. I yelled to her again at the top of my voice, repeatedly but still she continued down the path in conversation, taking no notice of me. It would only take a minute to run over and touch her, to be beside her but she didn’t take any heed of me. She was so close. Why can’t she hear me? I could feel my toes nipping with cold, my legs felt numb, and rooted to the spot.
Someone or something was willing me to stay. Aunt ‘must go’ Kate was getting away from me, so I dashed off the mound, feeling as if I was ploughing through several feet of snow and yelling her name, she immediately turned to me and looked with amazement into my face. Running and jumping into her arms, I nearly toppled her, her walking companion reaching out to steady her.
“Holy Mary, Mother of God, where were you hiding? Oh, my goodness, what’s wrong with ye, you look as you’ve seen a ghost!”
Our Place
Nothing much happened here. Looking down onto the crescent - its ordinary rows of neatly curtained two-story houses with little sloping gardens walled by hedges and flowers, kids played in the streets and kids and neighbours occasionally had skirmishes, but nothing unusual in that. I lived at the corner end, the exception, and our plot was left to nature, escaping man’s attention. Our windows were permanently covered with faded curtains, its occupants permanently ignored, living outside the accepted norm of the street. Next door, Mrs. Samuel, a Protestant, friendly but distant, always on hand as emergencies developed, handing out sympathy and freshly-made chips in newspaper cones. Being a Protestant was an exception too, but she was embraced by one and all, almost overly so.
Behind our hedge lay the decaying, double-fronted, farm house; its sweeping driveway and lawn ran to the road below. It stood beyond a field, the treed border ransacked by countless youths and years of Tarzan-like adventures, ropes hung instead of lianas, weathered and broken tree houses nested precariously amid the upper branches. Our play was tolerated along this demarcation line. Sometimes we ventured beyond and gazed into the darkened interiors, but we withdrew from the forbidden territory at the least suspicion of being caught. Despite the undressed windows, little could be seen.
The interior of our house could not be viewed from without; heavily draped windows blocked the view both ways. Even the frosted bathroom windows were shielded likewise. I often placed myself between the curtains and the glass to look out; many times I stood there unbeknown to family entering the room.
The room within I stood had the barest and neatest necessities for the requirements of slumber and dressing. It had a high metal-spring bed framed by sheets of walnut, a matching dressing table, a huge wardrobe in the corner, and a wood-patterned lino floor, all surrounded by dull wallpaper of small embossed roses. The dominating quilt of lush red roses contrasted with the overall restraint in the furniture and design. Underneath lay a pale mat easing the feet onto the cool surface, where the Christian family serenely whispered their nightly knelt prayers and centred above the bed - a crucifix. Another small admission to comfort was an upholstered seat in a wickerwork chair by the bed. Visitors to the sick sat here, enhanced by the small fire. A luminescent figure depicting Christ’s last hours hung over the fireplace. By day discarded clothing lay askew. Subdued daylight flooded this utilitarian place of rest.
The other two bedrooms were just as stark and mapped out, both contained double beds as the family grew into small people. Less fashionable mismatched furniture lined the wall. Similar twilight fell from the curtained windows. The rooms were always tidy, evidence of daily duties. Atop the stairwell, the bathroom, with matching white ware of the same hue, little open window freshening nature’s odours. Broken schisms of soap solidified in the drain wells of the bath while full bars sat on the folded facecloth, its partner draped over the edge of the bath. A frosted window above the sink floods the room, a plastic tumbler with scrappy toothbrushes, flattened by the powdered toothpaste which sat alongside. Toiletries line the window sill. Lino flowed out and down the stairs to the kitchen. A favourite game involved sliding down from the turn to the bottom, on each bump gurgling a ba-ba-ba sound; if you were really brave, face downward was the way to go.
The kitchen: painted below and wallpapered above, its jaw box beneath the window witnessed weekly child-baths or the routine of motherly duties. Wooden cabinets lined the wall, a small drop-leaf table underneath, a twin-tub under the stair well and, inside, coats, brushes and other domestic instruments. The fun usually started on wash day, ejecting the wet tangled mass into the spin dryer, patting them down, covering them with its plastic top close the lid and away we go on the vibrator. Hanging off the side, the body pulsated with the orgasmic shudder of the spinning tub; wobbly bits ecstatic - the extent of my excitement.
The two rooms downstairs contrasted in use and design. The living room assembled the family for food, TV and heat. Here we gathered around the open fireplace, always warm and snug, children sat up on the sofa, Mum and Dad in their chair fireside. Tumbling children rushed from Saturday night baths to be dried and warmed. Dressing gowns lined up. On one particular winter’s night a piece of coal shot out igniting me within seconds before being rolled and extinguished by sisterly efforts. We lived, ate and stayed warm in this room.
The good room was at the front, heavily curtained, shadows falling even in the summer. A mystery room, cool and asleep, only to be awakened by a burning fire for the excitement of visitors or Christmas, outside the routine. I seldom sat on the embossed three piece suite or saw the brass animals edging the mantelpiece and the brass candle-sticks acting as sentinels on the hearth. A bookcase stood to the right holding books of various qualities, both in writing and condition, pushed into alignment, a shiny set of new children’s encyclopaedia shouldered the other books, never opened, to the left, aglow with shiny ornaments and china tea sets, never used. The door was permanently locked.
Lines of washing were strung along the long thin garden, up-righted with finely planed poles or irregular branches, surprisingly long enough to support the sheets or personal pieces of clothing much sought after by moonlit thieves. The cemented yard, the coal shed led onto the lanky garden of hedges and vegetables. Rows of potatoes, cabbages, and other root veggies fought with the ever-forceful weeds. This Garden of Eden was a contrast to the untamed garden at the front, testament to my father’s efforts.
Plenty of green spaces occupied our bit of our world; huge strips of forgotten land lay along the little school behind, falling away to the main road. In the centre lay the green, mainly the domain of the kids who lived at the upper end of the crescent. Here more formal games were played out in seasonal succession; cricket and tennis in summer, soccer all year round.
The imaginary play, seeded by Hollywood or Pinewood, allowed us to travel the imagined worlds of the wild west of America or the wild jungles of Africa or the wild woods of Sherwood Forest. Our neglected fields and trees were the fodder of childhood escape, feeding our imagination. The real world of family routine interrupted this boy’s adventure with mealtime and bedtime. Dirty, damp and cold weather drove us into the living room and the television, a world outlined by countries far away, so removed from our reality, of apartments in big cities, of sun, of adults playing with children, making floral pen containers, and problems solved by worried grown-ups. I didn’t have any problems, I wasn’t allowed too. Life was ordinary, nothing happened.
I sat on a corner wall half way up the street with a couple of my mates, deciding what to do. Someone wanted to get the ball or head down towards the river for a walk, but nobody was really enthusiastic about anything, just happy to fiddle away the time. In the end, we were
still there when John Crossman cycled into our company.
“Well”, says he, “have you seen them?”
“Who?” came our reply, totally confused about his ramblings.
“They are up there, some people are just floating about, spinning around, some are grabbing at trees, they couldn’t stay upright but they seem to float off again”. John told us his Mum had taken him to the head of the town, below Wiry Hill, near the copse of chestnuts, and had seen several of them hanging onto the trees.
We, of course, doubted his tales, and started to heap on the abuse. Pat, an elder boy, pushed John on his shoulder, nearly making him fall off his bike. He had barely said, “Stop winding us up, or I’ll thump ya", when along floated a bloke in grey trousers and a yellow spray jacket, nonchalantly waving to us as he disappeared behind a group of houses. He could stay upright; perhaps he had some astronaut training. We looked at each other, almost going red with the embarrassment of not knowing how to react. We set off looking for more evidence of this weird event. It wasn’t long before we saw another one floating above a house. It was the talk on every one’s lips. Within days, other news interspersed with the ‘Floaters’.
As the days of the summer and holidays wore to a close, more and more people were floating above the houses and countryside. Amazingly earth-bound people adapted to seeing oscillating humans perform stunts only seen in the circus. On the serious side, some parents organised clothing, shelter, and food; fish and chips seemed to be the favourite. They were placed on platforms in the branches. John said he could smell the vinegar. Many of these platforms were built on trees and tall buildings where family and friends could leave food and clothing. Some tried to capture them and place the people in cages or houses, but every time this was attempted the Floaters’ restlessness became intolerable and peace could only be achieved by releasing them into the open again. Some were given sleeping tablets or injections, but after they woke they became physically uncontrollable. As the trees were losing their leaves, some found shelter in church steeples and belfries, which soon became places of refuge and food. They could not settle in one place and moved on after a time. The Floaters had problems when they wanted to empty themselves. Piddling from a height wasn’t any problem unless someone was caught underneath the stream, but excreting proved a slightly bigger challenge. They could land and use ordinary toilets but tended to float above and sometimes missed. It required a deft feat of manoeuvring. Within weeks specially designed privies were built by councils and parishes. The structures were positioned inside bell towers, on the sides of buildings, and up trees.
So who were these Floaters? People were worried that they might be the next to float, but as it turned out the Floaters were all violent people. Anyone who had used violence: the Irish Republican Army, the Ulster Volunteer Force, and the myriad in between, bank robbers, even some people who had no connection to gangs would appear floating about, but they soon disappeared again. Indeed, I saw one of my neighbours, a big bad-tempered bloke who routinely struck out at anything in his path floating along one day. The last I heard of him, he had floated off to England.
For months, the issue was much discussed on TV, on the radio, in the newspapers, on the street corner, in the home, from the pulpit. How would the country cope with this phenomenon? With Christmas coming, wide-spread discussion centred on how we could help the people doomed to float. Did they deserve their destiny? Life in the towns and countryside settled into a peaceful routine, with the newfound absence of violence, as all the perpetrators had transcended above. I was in my friend’s house having tea when a news report came on that someone had been arrested by police for shooting at the Floaters. Two had been found dead, caught in trees in Hammersmith, London. A group of Floaters had armed themselves. Where they’d gotten the guns, no one knew.
It was Sunday morning and I was once again sitting on the kerb outside the house, waiting for my parents. We were off to church this time. Birds flew in triangular squadrons to the copse in the field. Some families were going to the same church and were setting out to walk, saying hello as they passed. We were going in the car. Many curtains were still drawn. Many residents were still in bed on this cool ashen morning.
As we clamoured out of the car in the church car park, I met Tom, my mate. I asked my Mum could I sit with Tom but she said no, we had to go to visit Granny, as we did every weekend. I promised Tom we would go out on the bikes to see some Floaters after my visit to Granny, if it stayed dry.
“What? What are Floaters?” Tom asked with a puzzled expression.
“What do you mean?” I responded. “The people floating about in the sky! It was all so peaceful until yesterday. Are you pulling my leg?”
Tom burst out laughing, gazing at me as if I was mad. My mother shot me a dirty look as we entered the church and dragged our family in the opposite direction to Tom’s. Back to boring normality, I suppose, but it seemed so real.
The Front Row
The Front Row had bigger gardens and facades. All were semi-detached with concrete lintels over the windows and pillared porches embossing the front doors. Concrete walls bordered the neat gardens, each wall topped with iron railings. Initially the tenants were carefully selected to ensure they appreciated the extra features. The houses were grander, the occupants posher. Between the main road and the Front Row lay a green swathe of mostly low bushes and a few trees. This was the view often seen by the travelling public as they passed along to their destinations: clipped hedges, mowed lawns, borders of perennial planting, a row of cultivated living and trimming. The smell of mown grass wafted on soft balmy summer evenings.
Their back gardens were an industry of burgeoning greenery, producing edible fare for each season. Windowed sheds harboured meticulously maintained tools; projects of construction and often repair. These sheds were bastions of D.I.Y. for the male refugee seeking asylum from work and family, spending his free time working on projects that never seem to get finished. Little seats made of cushioned bags sat in the corner; hidden sacks of tobacco close to hand, even the odd beer could be stowed away from prying eyes. Tools were forbidden playthings.
Indeed the shed was out of bounds most of the time, except during the long damp school holidays, when frustrated mothers needed a space for their offspring to while away their free time, out of the cool rainy elements, but more importantly out of their sight. The shed became more than a workshop - it became living space, away from the home. One enthusiastic father installed a stove that sent a trail of smoke over the other backyards, its chimney too low to allow escape, sending sooty debris into the newly laundered clothing and bedding hung on the long lines of personal paraphernalia.
The stove in the shed belonged to the first house of the Front Row. A pebble-dashed gable wall and a garden wall stretched from the front to the lane at the back of the house, blocking the view of the back garden and shed. The black pipe of a chimney on the shed stood above the garden wall. The gable wall was fronted by a small narrow path, terminating at a gated entry to the back. This was the biggest house in the Front Row. Next door lived Captain O’Neill.
Captain O’ Neil’s son, Liam was my age, went to the same school as I did, and I guess we grew up together, except that he grew faster than me, so while we may have grown up together, he was always a head above, not only above but sideways too. He grew outward, probably to the size of someone twice his age, really useful, as no one messed him around, so no one messed with me either. This did not include adults. I may have been threatened, given the eye and dirty vengeful looks, but given I was in his mate, I was mostly left alone. Several moments of panic I remember vividly, when caught alone. However, despite these stomach churning incidents, I seem to have come through unscathed.
Liam was sometimes called Captain too. Liam’s father was named because he was away at sea most of the time, home for a few months, sometimes weeks, and then off again. Captain resented the absent father, although he never said so, but told me tales his father had told him of derring-do in foreign fields and ports: finding gold in Australia, escaping pirates in the Caribbean or finding oil in Texas. His father’s stories often coincided with recent films on the television. Captain O’Neil actually spent most of his time riding the waves of the Irish Sea, so, most of the time; the exotic ports were Belfast and Liverpool. However, over the years he took different positions that allowed him to visit many ports all over the world.
Young Captain had a bedroom facing the main road. He was lucky; his older brothers had left home and were working in England, and a sister was still at home, completing her final examinations at school. She was the first O’Neil that would go to university - a studious, quiet girl who never gave young Captain much trouble, just reminding him to do his chores and homework, but helpful in both.
His bedroom consisted of a double bed, a wooden, leather-seated dining chair from his Gran’s, a chest of drawers, darkened by age, a built-in wardrobe that frequently took him on his own adventures over the seas, and walls of tiny flowers that he never really noticed. The window was draped in thick green, the net curtains providing privacy and softness, often stuck to the window on sharp frozen nights. His only form of heat at night was a hot water bottle and layers of blankets. Money was not a problem in this household. His father had regular employment and the boys sent money and presents home.
Captain had a bird’s eye view of the passing world from his window: a bus stop opposite, a side road where cars could pull in and where people, mostly men, got lifts. Few had cars, people took buses or walked. To his right, a cul-de-sac provided a turning area and was treed, sheltered from the main road and the housing nearby, a perfect place for awkward courting couples to share furtive kisses. The main road led over the bridge and into the town or onto the next village. This passing parade of people and vehicles was a slight distraction for Captain and me on a wet weekend or on long dull grey summer holidays. During the summer, we’d watch marching parades, various community groups or bands striding up and down the Main Road, anything to distract us for a few minutes from our usual routine. Sometimes, we watched from the bedroom, other times we stood by the kerb staring at gaily coloured uniforms and listening to their music.
On occasion I slept over with Captain during the holidays. We would watch through the window, and see the cars and lorries flow in both directions. One Saturday night after midnight, when everyone had gone to bed, we knelt up, cloaked in the curtain looking out. It was a mild clear night, and Saturday was always a sure bet to watch the couples swooning in the car below.
“Wouldn’t it be great if we could hitch a ride to the seaside or a big city, or surprise me Da in some port, just walk up to him and say, ‘How’s it going, Da?’” said Captain.
“Yeah. Sitting up in those high cabs, looking down, watching everything go by, and just travelling on. It would be great to drive one of those big things. Did you see that one? It had two sets of back wheels. What was it carrying?” I asked.
“Don’t know, going far too fast,” replied Captain.
Just then a car pulled into the cul-de-sac, and into the little turning area sheltered from passing cars and eyes. The inside light flickered, illuminating two animated faces, and then blinked off again. The two melted into one. Screeching brakes tore our eyes to the main road as a cab with a trailer pulled up. The driver got out, lifted something from the front of the cab, put it on the pavement, looked around, climbed back in and screeched off in a hiss of a second. The car couple couldn’t see what had happened as they were out of sight of the road.
“What is it?”
“Your guess is as good as mine,” said Captain, looked at me.
The clock struck one and both of us looked at it simultaneously. Our eyes met, we smiled and after a few silent moments we were turning the back door key. With a clunk, it opened. Stepping outside together, our bare feet cut into the iron grill for cleaning muddy boots.
“Daaa-ump”, muttered Captain, as he muffled his agony. A similar utterance from me had us grabbing each other to silence and support our fumbling exit. We walked slowly to the shed, taking large steps and glanced in the moon light at our red and tracked feet, realising the back door was still open. Captain went back, as agile as possible, to gently close it and then returned.