Which is why he boomed, ‘Ellie!’ at the top of his voice, surprising himself even more than the scores of pupils who clamped their hands to their ears and dived aside like deafened skittles as he bowled the length of the corridor in her wake.
Not realising at first, in his haste, that Victor and co. were following in his slipstream, hustling him into the same empty classroom where Senga had yanked Ellie.
With a nod from Victor, Billy McIndope stood edgie at the door.
‘Well, well, well,’ said Victor, driving his knuckles into Jimmy’s stomach to push him towards Ellie. ‘The happy couple: Skellie Sook and Squashy Sook.’
‘Pure saddos, in’t they, Swifty?’ said Senga, who always called Victor ‘Swifty’ despite his periodic promises to punch her lights out if she didn’t quit.
Senga fluttered her short pale lashes, wobbling her head from side to side as though the screws on her neck had worked loose. Victor glared at Senga, driving his fingers deeper into Jimmy’s belly with jerks of his wrist.
‘Two stupit, ugly sooks, trying to get in wi’ the teachers. Writing sooky stories, and this one,’ Victor pistoned his arm deep into Jimmy’s stomach, ‘hanging about wi’ my Coach in the swimmin’ pool. What’s that all about, Sook? Trainin’ for the Fatty Olympics? Or –’ he licked his lips, ‘– following the family tradition?’
‘What?’ Jimmy straightened up, confused. What was Victor on about?
‘Yeh, what’s that all about, Sook?’ Maddo echoed, while Dog Breath, let rip a full-on halitosis guffaw in Jimmy’s face.
‘Speak.’
Victor’s voice turned ugly.
‘Aye, speak,’ chorused Senga. She manoeuvred one sovereign-ringed hand into Jimmy’s belly alongside Victor’s, her other hand tugging Ellie roughly by the hair.
‘So hungry you swallowed your tongue, fat boy?’ asked Victor withdrawing his arm. He unbuttoned his shirt cuff, rolled one sleeve to the elbow and flexed his hand. Surgically, thought Jimmy. When Victor flashed a humourless ‘watch this’ grin at Maddo, who stood grinding his fist into the palm of his hand in anticipation of violence, Jimmy noticed that the pupils of Victor’s pale blue eyes were dilated with excitement.
Victor’s voice was a whisper in Jimmy’s ear.
‘Why does Coach want you to swim?’ he coaxed, drawing his fist back in line with Jimmy’s face. ‘You better talk fast.’
In that chink of time between Victor’s question and his fist descending, several things seemed to happen.
First of all, Jimmy realised that because he was only concerned about Ellie, he wasn’t at all afraid of Victor. So he answered him. Calmly. ‘Coach doesn’t want me to swim,’ he said. ‘I want to swim –’
‘What for?’ Victor had the question out while Jimmy was still speaking. Fist poised, Victor was frowning. Same way, Jimmy noticed, as he’d been frowning while he watched him from the spectators’ gallery.
The second thing happened while Victor finished speaking. Ellie broke Senga’s grasp of her hair with a karate chop that reverse-stamped the scrolled VICTOR from Senga’s identity bracelet into the flesh of her wrist. Ellie meanwhile flew at Victor’s upraised arm, snatching blindly – literally blindly, since Senga was wearing her glasses upside down – for Victor’s fist. Her clumsy intervention was just enough to take Victor’s mind from his target and give Jimmy a nanosecond to step aside so that Victor landed his punch, not into Jimmy’s yielding flesh, but onto a hard school desk.
And that’s when all hell broke loose.
Victor howled like a cowardly wolf, showing his hand to his cronies, keeping his own head averted.
‘Is it cut? Is it cut? Feels like its broke.’
‘Wee bit cut, Vic,’ said Maddo, licking his chops at the blood pouring from Victor’s spliced knuckle.
‘See what you Skellie cow’s did to ma Swifty?’ Senga screeched like a hoarse banshee, freezing Chantal, who, entwined with Billy McIndope, was trying to sneak away.
‘Never mind Skellie. Ah’m bleedin’ here,’ Victor moaned.
‘Need stitches on that, man,’ said Dog Breath. He leaned over Victor who recoiled and moaned even louder, wafting away Dog Breath’s concern with his uninjured hand.
‘You’re dead meat, hen,’ hissed Senga jabbling a knuckle-dustered digit at Ellie, but from a distance. Her free hand clutched her karate-chopped wrist. ‘What’ll ah dae wi’ her, Swifty?’
‘Ah don’t know, stupit,’ Victor bawled into Senga’s face, splattering her blouse with his blood as he waved her back. He’d turned pale, Jimmy thought, greeny pale. Shilpit. Scared. Still scared. More scared than he’d looked moments ago when Jimmy had answered his question about swimming.
Funny that, thought Jimmy, pushing Victor aside to retrieve Ellie’s glasses from Senga’s head.
‘Ouch. You’ll need stitches in that right enough,’ he said, peering at Victor’s knuckle with casual interest. Then, with a nod to Ellie, he opened the classroom door and let her out before him as the bell rang for the end of interval.
‘Are you all right?’ Jimmy made sure he ushered Ellie into an alcove of the nearest quiet corridor before either of them had time to speak.
‘Are you all right?’ Nodding, she echoed him. For a moment, her hand reached out and rested on his sleeve. ‘Thanks,’ she said.
‘No, you thanks,’ said Jimmy. ‘Think your karate chop saved me a knuckle sandwich.’
‘Couldn’t let that vomit Victor hit you,’ Ellie sighed, slumping against the tiled wall of the alcove. She closed her eyes. ‘Wouldn’t it be great if we could just stay here for the rest of the afternoon in peace?’
Magic, thought Jimmy, savouring the smiling crescent of Ellie’s long lashes while she wasn’t looking.
‘I’ve got physics though,’ Ellie groaned, pushing herself off the wall.
‘I’ve got history.’ Jimmy handed Ellie her glasses, but he didn’t let go of them until he added, ‘then I’m going swimming. I’ve just learned. I had to tell someone.’
‘Brilliant!’ Ellie was being swept along the corridor by a rush of latecomers. ‘Tell me all about it later.’
This is a final announcement. The centre will close in fifteen minutes.
Would all remaining swimmers please leave the pool.
It wasn’t the bing-bong chime vibrating from the tannoy, but the click into darkness as the pool lights were switched off that snapped Jimmy back into real time.
After all that hassle with Victor today he’d been so desperate for a swim he’d lied to Mum. Again. Father Joseph wanted another fundraising meeting he’d said, then slipped out with his togs hidden up his sweatshirt.
Once he started swimming he didn’t have a Scooby about time, or how far he’d swum having lost count at forty – forty – lengths.
Smooth, strong, steady breaststroke.
Cutting the water, like the giant albino whale he’d watched on a nature programme once. This huge blubbery mass had moved with incredible grace and speed around the tank which imprisoned it, casting its dark shadow.
Until the lights went out, Jimmy had watched the progress of his own dark shadow sliding gracefully along the pool floor beneath him. The sight amazed him. Arms outstretched, he skimmed the glide of every stoke without effort, powered by stored energy in a kick that he would never have believed he possessed.
And he sensed, as he swam, that the Shadow Shape of his dreams was near, watching over him at the deep end of the pool. Daft, he knew he was, to fancy that some formless concoction of his imagination supervised his stroke. Ridiculous. But the notion galvanised Jimmy. Made him want to swim each length better than the one before. Had him surfacing every time he reached the deep end just in case the Shadow Shape was really real . . . was really there . . .
Afterwards, despite a long cool shower, sweat oozed from every pore on the massive surface area of Jimmy’s skin. When he tried to pull his t-shirt on, it jammed around his neck: TOO HOT. NO ENTRY.
Jimmy chuckled, working his giant und
erpants over his hips.
He’d been sweaty plenty of times: hot, sticky, and uncomfortable doing nothing more than breathing in and out of two lungs all day. But never like this.
This was a different sweat. It went with his accelerated heart-beat, and his need for a long cool drink. It went with the fire in his cheeks and the pleasant weariness suffusing his muscles.
It went with exercise.
A rivulet of perspiration ran from source in the pores of Jimmy’s neck and tricked all the way down his back. It refreshed the memory of GI Joe shaking him there, like a dog, at the end of that nightmare walk in the heat.
Still chuckling, Jimmy forced his t-shirt on and left the cubicle.
‘So we were having a fundraising meeting, were we?’
Arms folded, GI Joe watched Jimmy squidge through the turnstile in the Leisure Centre reception.
Coach seemed well annoyed. His face was mottled red and purple. His eyes were bloodshot, all the skin around them puffed up as though he’d been crying. Like Jimmy, fresh sweat darkened the neck of his t-shirt.
‘“Oh, Jimmy’s meeting you in St Jude’s, Father.” God forgive you, my son.’ GI Joe wagged a stern finger. Then he punched Jimmy in the shoulder. And grinned. ‘I’ve been up in the gym. It looks over the pool.’
They set off walking home together. Thankfully, thought Jimmy, at a more civilised pace than last time. He was happy to enjoy the cooling evening air, letting GI Joe discuss his plans for the ‘do’ he was organising after the swimathon.
There was no mention of Jimmy’s swimming progress until they stopped at the street corner where they would part company.
‘I’ll have to show you front crawl,’ said GI Joe.
‘OK,’ shrugged Jimmy, already walking away.
‘And I’d better get you some decent togs to wear for the swimathon.’
‘What? No way! I’m only doing the cooking!’
Jimmy was too slow, of course, GI Joe having jinked round the corner and disappeared, his parting shot ringing in Jimmy’s ears.
‘What about getting your Aunt Pol down to see you? She can be your first sponsor.’
Chapter 20
Summer rain
Typical Glasgow.
End of term. Summer holidays starting at noon and it’s chucking it.
Under grey skies and plastic-bag rain-mates, bedraggled pupils overtook Jimmy, squelching uphill for a last morning of school.
The usual comments pelted him.
‘Need a push, Fatty?’
‘Walk any slower and you’ll be going backwards.’
‘Too many fish suppers last night for the big man.’
Jimmy couldn’t care less. Ellie was ahead and Jimmy was only interested in catching her before she turned into the girls’ entrance.
He knew that the muscles in his thighs were on go-slow. But not because of the bulk they supported. They were simply worn out after the work they’d put in last night. Thirty lengths with a kick float before GI Joe would show him the arm technique for front crawl.
And as for fish suppers. Jimmy couldn’t look at one this weather. All the exercise, which Jimmy thought would have had him stuffing his face, was having the opposite effect on him.
Since he’d started swimming three weeks ago, he was eating less, not more. He had porridge for breakfast, and instead of having chips-with-everything school dinners, he made himself a big packed lunch: tuna salad sandwiches, chunks of cheese, fruit and chocolate. Ate it al fresco in the yard. Sharing. With Ellie.
In the evenings, if he was swimming, Jimmy ate a bowl of his soup, some crusty bread, or maybe a pasta. No pudding. Where in the past Jimmy used to gorge from teatime till bedtime, working himself easy through a multi-pack of crisps and several litres of fizz, eyes on the telly, finger on the remote, it was only water he felt like at night now. Maybe a banana when he came in from the pool.
This morning, he’d have sworn he didn’t need to suck in his tum quite so hard when he pulled on his trousers.
‘Ellie!’
However, he still wheezed a bit as he called Ellie’s name. Wheezed some more when she stopped, and danced her funny eyes all over him, waiting until he caught up with her. His peak-flow diminished by her smile.
I think I’m losing weight. I’ve been swimming every day this week. You were wave-watching with me in a dream last night. You let me kiss you.
Despite Jimmy willing his larynx to work, he was struck mute as soon as he reached Ellie’s side. She was so petite. He towered over her, marvelling at how the dampness in the rain had sent chocolate curls springing all over the surface of her hair. He smelt the freshness of her shampoo . . .
Take her brolly, you dumpling. Hold it over you both, Jimmy’s courting self-counselled.
‘Rotten day.’ The best he could do. Pathetic!
Jimmy didn’t even think it was a rotten day. The rain had freshened the air, it was easier to breath. And that scent rising up from the moisture-parched pavements –
‘Oooh, I love days like this,’ said Ellie. ‘Summer rain smells amazing, and sounds completely different from winter rain. It whispers down like it really shouldn’t be falling at this time of year. D’you know what I mean?’
Course Jimmy knew what Ellie meant! She’d plucked the very thoughts right out of his own head.
The next thing she said sounded even better.
‘You know those CDs I borrowed?’ she said. ‘I’ve run out of blanks for copying. Can I keep them a bit longer and get them back to you next week?’
Out of school.
He’d have to see her out of school.
Get her phone number.
Arrange to meet her.
Make a date, in other words.
Too many delicious possibilities rampaged through Jimmy’s head. He tilted his face to the rain, letting it cool his ardour.
Some of the water must have softened his brain, diluting his wit. Instead of ignoring the voice which growled, ‘Oi, Kelly,’ after he waved Ellie into the girls’ entrance, he ambled into the bin-lane to see who was calling him.
‘See what you done?’
Here was one way to slam Jimmy back to the real world.
A spell of absence following the desk-punching incident hadn’t improved Victor any. His mug was meaner than ever under his floppy blond hair as he backed Jimmy against a suppurating wheelie bin, waving his injured hand, bulbous in a filthy crepe bandage, under Jimmy’s nose.
‘Twelve stitches and a cracked knuckle.’
Yesssss, a voice hissed triumphantly in Jimmy’s head.
‘I’ve missed all my football sessions with Coach and it’s two weeks afore I can swim with the squad,’ Victor intoned. He was deadly serious. Paced back and forth in front of Jimmy. ‘Why d’you have to do this? I’m racing butterfly in the swimathon.’
‘But I didn’t touch you, Victor,’ Jimmy sighed as the morning bell rang through the rain. He’d his last ever domestic-science-instead-of-games lesson with Ellie first period and he had to share it with her.
Maybe that was one reason why Jimmy couldn’t feel his heart pulsing its usual bossa nova rhythm at the imminent prospect of being Victor’s punchbag or pincushion: It was otherwise engaged. Or maybe it was because, Jimmy decided, Victor wasn’t being his usual menacing self. He felt there was something changed about Victor’s agenda. He was alone for a start, no Maddo lurking as lookout, and on his own Victor actually looked much smaller; scrawny. Inches shorter than the Vic Swift who swaggered around St Jude’s with his mates as if he owned the place, getting in everybody’s face. If anything, Victor was prowling in ever increasing semicircles away from Jimmy.
Easy, easy for Jimmy to walk away.
Which is what he did. Just walked. And Victor let him go. Didn’t spit on him. Didn’t give a mouthful. Merely called something after Jimmy, and the way his words came out – this was the really odd thing – it sounded as if he was the one being threatened. Not the other way around.
‘My maw we
nt to school wi’ your auntie,’ Victor sneered. ‘Says you’ll be swimming to try an’ copy your big-shot dad but,’ he added, ‘I tell you Kelly, I’ll always be a better swimmer than you, even with a gubbed hand.’
‘. . . and I don’t know what Victor was on about. My dad couldn’t swim,’ Jimmy was whispering to Ellie as they laid out their equipment in domestic science. ‘When I asked what the heck he was saying, he yelled, “Ask your auntie”.’
‘He’s jealous,’ hissed Ellie, stuffing her hair into a bobble before Busty Bacon descended, opening and closing a pair of scissors. ‘You said he’s been watching you swimming? Must think you’re catching up on him. A threat.’
‘Cut the cackle you two and get busy with that fairy cake recipe on the board. I’m in an important meeting with Mrs Dunlop for the rest of the period,’ said Busty sweeping from the cookery room. ‘McPherson, make sure I get samples of your work. Kelly, don’t be licking the icing off the spoon. McGrory, I hope none of those veruccas that keep you off games touch my ingredients.’
McGrory was Chantal, a forlorn figure without Senga and her mates around her. Fingering the toilet paper necklace she wore to hide Billy McIndope’s lovebites, she stared miserably at the lumpy mess of cake mixture in her bowl.
‘No Senga today, Chantal?’ Ellie asked her.
‘She thaid she’d be here but she’th dogging an’ ah canny dae thith rethipe,’ Chantal whined, shrinking her head into her neck like a tortoise going into hibernation when Jimmy came round to see what she was up to. She was squirming Jimmy realised, left alone with the very pair she tormented non-stop, no brazen pals for backup. But he didn’t turn the tables as he could have done. Although he whisked her bowl away. Stared into it. Then scraped its contents into the bin. Rinsed it out.
‘We can’t do this recipe either, Chantal,’ he said cheerfully, giving the bowl back. ‘Stand beside Ellie and copy me.’
Fat Boy Swim Page 8