Well, at least I’ve had the opportunity to look at the importance of the city to the British economy, he thought to himself.
As he walked home, he popped into Rajinder’s to buy the Daily Express. For weeks, the editorial had been slating the government for its apparent lassitude over most aspects of British life. Week by week, comments were growing ever more harsh, as though the paper was shifting its political stance to the left.
“Morning, Raj!” he greeted the diminutive owner. “Any good news at all?”
“Nothing, mate.” Raj replied in the cockney twang demonstrating his third-generation status. “It says this sunshine, if that’s what it is, will only last a day or two and then we’ll be back to more bleedin’ rain.”
“Do you reckon we’ll get a match tomorrow?”
“Depends whether the pitches have dried out enough and if the rain holds off. You have any trouble last night?”
“Nope! Like a graveyard. Not a cat stirred; not a dog stirred!”
Fred paid for his paper and sauntered off to his home. Dinah was waiting for him in her nightie and dressing gown, with his full English already cooked and just needing two eggs to be fried.
“Hi, sweetheart,” he murmured as he nuzzled her neck. “Have you done all this for me?” He looked at his plate piled with bacon, sausage, tomatoes, baked beans and fried bread. “You certainly know the way to this man’s heart.”
“Don’t you be putting on any airs and graces with me,” Dinah answered, as she cooked the eggs. “You say the same every morning!”
He stood behind her and slipped his arms round her waist, opening her dressing gown. He cupped her breasts, one in each hand. As he walked home, he knew that she wouldn’t be dressed yet, although very soon their two boys would burst through the door.
“And you can stop your silly antics as well, while I’m cooking,” she chided, gently slapping at his hands. But he knew, as he felt her nipples hardening, that she was happy to be fondled. He turned her round, bent down and kissed her hard on the lips. She put both her arms round his neck, which raised her nightie to reveal her shapely brown thighs. He stood up straight, lifting her off the floor as though she was a toy. “Stop it,” she giggled. “The boys will walk in.”
“That makes it all the more exciting, but I suppose you’re right,” he grumbled as he put her down. “Sunny side up please.” Pretending that he wasn’t disappointed, he sat down and started to read his paper.
“Raj says that we might get a game tomorrow,” he commented. “If the rain holds off. There’s more rain forecast for later, but no one seems to know when.”
“It’ll only make for more washing, when they come back all dirty.”
“You know you love it when they have a good time and win.”
She put the eggs onto the plate and then placed the plate in front of him. “Now, eat up and keep yourself strong, because I’ve got plans for you.” She whispered into his ear, allowing her breasts to rub invitingly against the back of his neck. She went to the door and called to the boys that breakfast was ready and that they mustn’t be late for school.
At school later that morning, David had a word before the physics lesson with Mr Smith.
“I was looking at the weather systems in America, last night, sir.” He hesitated.
“Go on,” replied his teacher.
“Well, it just seems to me that we could be in for a bit of bad weather towards the middle of next week.”
“Why?” Mr Smith was well aware of David’s intelligence, but was also cautious as he didn’t want David to get cocky with this new fad.
“You remember I researched the effect of El Nino on weather systems in the United States? And you then asked whether the same effect was felt over here?” David looked up at Mr Smith.
“Go on,” he repeated.
“Well, it seems that it does. The weather front that created so much rain in the southern United States and all that snow up on the Canadian border – well, you’ll have seen the enormous amount of damage, power lines destroyed, all flights in the US cancelled.”
“Go on.” Once again, he repeated.
“That weather front is now over Labrador and it’s continuing to deepen. There seems to be some form of anti-cyclone over northern Greenland, which is holding up its progress a bit. But if it deepens anymore and then continues across the Atlantic to Scandinavia, we’ll probably see a repeat of those winds and the rain over the north of England and Scotland. There’s another big anti-cyclone over Finland and Northern Russia, which could also slow its progress.”
“Surely, there’s nothing unusual in all this. It sounds like pretty normal winter weather to me.”
“But that’s not all. There’s a second depression which has just left the West Indies and seems to be moving quite fast along a more southerly trajectory. I’ve estimated that both of these depressions will arrive in European waters at much the same time. Both are deepening and the attendant winds are very strong.”
“What are you actually saying, David?” Mr Smith wasn’t really patronising the boy, rather he was encouraging him to present a case however far-fetched it might be.
“Look, sir! Putting it simply, the winds from a depression off the Scandinavian coast will blow southwards, forcing sea water down the North Sea towards the Thames estuary. A depression over southern England will have a similar effect, but that’ll force seawater eastwards up the English Channel. There could be widespread flooding in Holland and Belgium, also northern France, but the worst problems could well be in London.”
“That does sound a bit dramatic to me, David. After all the Thames Barrier was built to combat just such an event. Anyway, it’s time to start your Physics revision.”
David felt as though he had been brushed off, rather like an irritating wasp at a picnic. Somewhat disgruntled, he took his place next to John Dickinson and opened his physics textbook and checked his notes. But rather than concentrating on the lesson, his mind was drifting. He wondered whether the storms would reach Britain early enough to affect the Saturday match. Probably not, he concluded, but his thoughts then drifted to how bad the storm might be. Outside the classroom window, the sun was struggling to make an impression through a layer of low, thin cloud.
His thoughts also drifted to Jackie Bleasdale. They often did as they now seemed to be reduced to keeping in touch only by email and Facebook. They hadn’t seen each other for weeks. There had been a plan to go to a couple of parties over Christmas, but Jackie had gone down with a bout of flu and then her family had gone away for a few days. It just didn’t seem to be working anymore. Jackie had promised to come over for a school match, but there hadn’t been any since the New Year. Until tomorrow, he thought excitedly. I must send her a text!
Surreptitiously, he reached into his pocket and took out his iPhone. Under the desk, he silently switched it on. The screen appeared with the familiar time and date. He swiped his thumb across the screen from left to right and entered his code. All his icons appeared and he selected text. He tapped the icon for writing a message and entered Jackie’s name.
“Hi Jackie,” he wrote. “Been 2 long since we met. Got a match 2mrow. Any chance you cd get here for 2.30. Playing Streatham Comp. Should be a good game bcuz no sport so far this term? We’ll both be wanting to knock 7 bells out of each other!! Hope you can. Let me know. Love David xxx”
He pressed ‘SEND’ and put his phone away.
Just over 10 miles away, Jackie was supposedly revising history, when she heard her phone vibrate. She reached down, got it out of her bag and looked at the message.
Now, that is surprising, she thought. Not a peep since New Year and, suddenly, he wants me to drag over to Richmond tomorrow.
Over the autumn, Jackie had tried to concentrate on her revision, at the same time seeking more independence from her parents. It was true that her thoughts of David receded a little as she pushed her own boundaries, but her memories of their meeting back in May, still remained strong. She ho
ped that they would be able to see each other more often, but the disappointing weather reduced any opportunities to repeat that experience. They were together on a number of occasions, but the chance to get really close just hadn’t happened and that was very frustrating. She still reminisced over the intensity of their first meeting, but other normal distractions for a teenage girl had helped her thoughts of David to drift.
Mind you, I’m not doing anything tomorrow so it might be fun to catch up again.
She texted her reply, saying that she would be at Richmond School at 2.15. As she pressed SEND, she felt her heart miss a beat and her stomach muscles contracted causing a pleasurable flutter down to her very essence.
Chapter 6
Saturday – Five Days to Go
The northern depression had moved from Labrador to Greenland, where it deepened in intensity and the local temperature dropped. The winds in the Atlantic, to the south of Greenland had previously slackened, but now, encouraged by the lessening of the anti-cyclone, they were increasing again to storm force.
The southern depression, although warmer, was also deepening as it moved to the southwest of the Azores. The wind speeds were gale force, but that was not unusual.
Both weather fronts were approaching the area of high pressure over the European land mass and, between the two, there was an area of calm, dry weather.
When David woke on Saturday morning, he jumped enthusiastically out of bed and went to the window. His bedroom overlooked the back garden, facing east. Their neighbour’s back garden was beyond the bottom hedge and that house was a mirror image of the Varley’s house. Although there were trees at the bottom of the garden, David knew that Mrs Potterton, if she were looking, would be able to see him, standing at the window, quite naked. He liked Mrs Potterton, even though she was older than his mum and dad. She was a widow and had done some babysitting for David, when he was very young. Still attractive, she intrigued David, especially as she was in the habit of hanging out her washing while still wearing her dressing gown. Although he wasn’t completely sure, it appeared to David that, like him, she was quite at home sleeping in the raw, but he had never been able to confirm this. Mind you, it had given him the opportunity to speculate on many evenings, just before dropping off to sleep.
David hadn’t seen Mrs Potterton since October, because the weather had been so awful, so it was a bit of a surprise to see her that Saturday morning. As she reached up to peg out a blouse, she must have seen him standing at the window. She reached a bit further along the washing line, allowing her dressing gown to gape open, giving David more than a glance of her thigh. He felt a stirring as he watched, mesmerised. Facing her neighbour’s windows, Mrs Potterton bent down to the basket. The top of her dressing gown fell open, somewhat invitingly David thought, giving him a perfect view of the swell of her breasts and her cleavage. He couldn’t see her nipples, of course, but as she stood up, she gave him a half wave and a smile. He waved back!
What a great start to the day, he thought, as he wrapped his towel round his waist and wandered to the bathroom for his shower. His half erection was already diminishing and he knew that he had a maximum of ten minutes before his father would want to shower. His grandfather, during a family holiday in Yorkshire a few years before, had described his son-in-law’s daily ablutions as a shit, shower and a shave. Ever afterwards, Michael’s time in the bathroom each morning was known as the three ‘shushes’.
Whistling to himself, he dressed and ran down the stairs to the kitchen where his mother was preparing breakfast.
“That smells really good,” he said appreciating the aroma of bacon and eggs.
“Well, you’ve got a match today and it might be the only match you get this term, so I thought you’d better be as prepared as possible.”
“Cheers, Mum!”
David sat down and drank a glass of orange juice, before eating his cooked breakfast. He glanced at the paper but saw no news of the impending storm.
Perhaps they don’t realise, he thought. I don’t think I’ve got this wrong, but Mr Smith was pretty dismissive. I don’t suppose he’s really interested in the weather.
He was finished before his father made an appearance. “Looks like you’ll be lucky today,” he remarked as he retrieved the Daily Telegraph from his son. “You should get the whole match played.”
“Jackie has told me that she might come and watch,” said David. His mother’s ears pricked.
“We haven’t heard that name recently,” she commented.
“Well, we’ve both been pretty busy with revision stuff and the weather’s been too bad to be cycling over to her house. It’ll be better when I’ve passed my Driving Test and can borrow the car.”
“What?” David’s father sat up straight. “I’m not so sure about that.”
“Perhaps I could have an old banger, instead,” David suggested.
“No!” said Sarah. “If you’re going to have a car, then it’ll have to be in good condition.”
Michael felt that this conversation was getting out of control, so he sought to regain the parental authority. “If you get decent grades in your exams and win your place at Sheffield University, then I’ll look into getting you a car. If not, then you’ll have to get into the workplace, earn sufficient money and buy your own.” He picked up the paper, wondering what the response would be.
“Thanks, Dad,” said David, trying not to smirk. “That seems a fair deal to me.”
He got down from the table, collected his rugby bag and humming a quiet tune, he forced himself to saunter out of the house. As soon as he was on the pavement, he punched the air as though he had scored the winning goal in a cup final.
It only took him twenty minutes to walk to the school. He knew he would be early, but he had previously arranged to meet up with John and the team coach to discuss in detail the tactics they would use.
In Hadleigh, at Thatched Barn Farm, Martin Havers announced at breakfast, that he would try to plough the top paddock. “I can’t really do any harm,” he suggested to Jennifer, “Because it’s the field that drains the quickest and, so far, it’s had the least attention from the cattle. The ground should be firm enough to take the tractor and the plough.”
“Just you be careful,” said his wife. “I know you! You’ll find it OK to start with and then you’ll just press on, even if it starts to become impossible. The bottom corner always stays wet longer than the rest. So, if you find it getting difficult, come home.”
“I know. I’ll be careful. But this sunshine and on a second day is just too good to miss.” And with that, he went through the door into the yard.
Walking towards the barn, he was glad of the time taken over the autumn and winter to service all his vehicles. It would be a matter of mere moments to hitch the plough to his trusty Massey Ferguson. The sun had lifted his spirits and he felt that, at last, spring might be on the way. As a countryman, he should have known better.
The tractor started first time and he manoeuvred it towards the plough. He reversed into the appropriate position and put on the handbrake. Getting down, he went to the back and hitched the plough to the tractor, ensuring that the bolt was firmly in place. He half lifted the plough, so that he could drive through the barn door and then lifted the plough fully upright for the short journey to the top paddock. After passing through the gate, Martin again got down to look more closely at the state of the ground.
We might just get away with this, he thought. But I’ll have to start at the top and plough back and forth, rather than up and down.
With that, he turned his mobile phone to his chosen music, ‘hits of the 1960s’, put in his earplugs and set off to the top of the field. At the top right-hand corner, he turned parallel with the hedge that was the northern boundary, dropped the plough and set off westwards leaving a furrow of clean soil, still shiny with moisture, but not sticky like mud.
At the far end, he lifted the plough and swung the tractor round to face the opposite way. With the bi
g rear tractor wheel running in the new furrow, he turned the plough over and dropped it ready for the second run. The second run was always more difficult than the first, because the line had to be kept. This meant that Martin had to keep swivelling in his seat, ensuring that the tractor’s direction was correct and that the rear wheel was in the furrow and not on the newly turned earth. Despite more than thirty years’ experience, Martin was always surprised that it took two or three furrows before his standard reached a satisfactory level.
With luck, I’ll get this done by lunchtime, if it’s not too wet lower down.
After breakfast, Fred Shemming was getting ready to meet his youth team. The previous evening, he had telephoned a pal who was involved with a team of similar age and ability based in Canning Town. He worked for the Parks Department of the London Borough of Newham and knew that there was a football pitch available up to midday on the Canning Town Recreation Ground, just off Newham Way. Through the Fire Service, Fred was able to borrow a minibus and he had already contacted all his team, instructing them to be ready at the Poplar Recreation Ground near to the Fire Station at nine o’clock. He now drove to the meeting place and was pleased to see all the boys, including Adnan, were gathered there, waiting for him. He stopped the van and got out.
“Morning, boys! Come on, let’s get going.” He opened the side and rear doors. All the bags were dumped in the back and the boys got in the side. Adnan got in the front passenger seat and put on his seat belt.
“You ready for this, Adnan?”
“Yes, Coach. We were just saying that it’s been ages since we last played and we’re all going to be a bit rusty.”
“The boys at Canning Town are a good bunch and they’re well coached so they’ll give you a good run. You’ll have to concentrate hard on your positioning because they’ve got a pretty nippy striker. Mind you, they’ll be just as rusty.”
They chatted together as Fred drove down the East India Dock road, over the flyover and onto Newham Way. It wasn’t a long journey and very soon they were parked at the Canning Town rec, debussed and ready for action.
Thursday Page 5