27: Chain Reaction
WE all got distinctions in our exams, me 147, Leo 143 in the flute and 140 in his piano, and Paulus 145, and the school quietly buried the whole 'unpleasant business'. My detention was quietly cancelled and a letter from the Bishop stated that the Governors, considering the 'recent developments and misunderstandings', had decided no action should be taken. Whilst there was no explicit condemnation of my sexual orientation, there was no apology either and the tone of the letter was coldly neutral. I guessed they were only on my side when I was poor.
Some boys still couldn't deal with it. Stewart, for instance, ignored me, as did Tim Wilson. Some, like Maxton, just seemed uncomfortable being near me. I joked that gayness wasn't catching but he frowned and moved away. He even withdrew from the Chamber Orchestra. I felt sad for him. Gray, who was glad I was gay 'cos it left more 'skirt' for him, said they felt deeply betrayed. This kind of spilled out at on Sunday afternoon during Martin Cooke's 16th birthday party, which was at his house, one of those typical Thirties three-bedroomed semis with bay windows that you get all over this country. There weren't many of us, just enough to trial this Diplomacy game he'd got from his folks. It's set at a European conference in 1901. There aren't any dice, so nothing's left to luck. Players make alliances, break them, move their fleets and armies about the map, occupying space and building spheres of influence in neutral countries. Everyone plays simultaneously, writing orders in secret, then executing them. Cookie thought I might be the Ottoman Sultan.
''Can I wear curly slippers and a massive moustache?'' I asked.
''So long as you wear a silk turban,'' he answered.
In the event, I didn't, I wore my brown jumper, red and white check shirt, black jeans and blue-orange Reeboks, though I still played as Turkey because the plastic pieces, little bullets for armies, tiny ships for fleets, were yellow. The board, a map of Europe, was set out on a table in his dining room and surrounded by pizza slices, salty snacks and giant plastic bottles of Fanta, Pepsi and Corona.
''I don't drink sodas,'' I said plaintively, hoping for a beer or three, ''And milk makes me spew.'' Instead I got tonic water. With a slice of lemon. What the hell? Sober? On a sixteenth birthday? I mean, who were these people?
Cooke played as Russia (purple), Huxley France (blue), Rubenstein Italy (green), Paulus Austria-Hungary (red), Fosbrook Germany (black) and Cooke's brother Gareth from the Lower Sixth was England (pink). The game began in Spring 1901 with a diplomacy phase. I took my tonic water off into a huddle with Fosbrook whilst Cooke and Paulus stitched up a deal to guard each other's borders and keep me out of the Balkans. I had to get my fleet into the Black Sea. I didn't trust Cooke for a second. Bloody Russians. So I invaded Bulgaria and Armenia and persuaded David to get Adam on side, promising them both a share of the Austrian Empire. So I set a Triple Alliance of Turkey, Germany and Italy to carve up Paulus, ha ha, despite his shabby little deal with the Russkies. In the meantime, Fozzie was reaching an agreement with England and France to guarantee Swedish neutrality along the lines of 'if the Russkies invade, we'll go to war.' Belligerent little bastard, David Fosbrook. I wrote out my orders on a scrap of paper, F Ank→Black, A Con→Bul, A Smyrna→Arm, folded it and tossed it into the middle of the table. I was going into Bulgaria because Paulus/Austria was going to attack Serbia. I knew that. His Italian ally told me. Unfortunately, my grand design fell apart when France attacked Italy in Piedmont and seized Belgium, England invaded Holland and Austria marched into Rumania, right on my borders, while Russia charged the Germans. I got Fosbrook back into the huddle, then took Cooke out to the kitchen to persuade him to dump Paulus, let my fleet into the Black Sea so I could trap the Austrians in Greece and join me, Adam and David in dismembering Paulus's Empire. There, crimson with embarrassment and with tears in his eyes, he blurted out the truth, that he, too, was homosexual, and terrified his parents would find out. I hugged him, then Rubenstein, who confessed an obsession with Paul Train. It was becoming insane. Boys were coming out left, right and centre. We'd already had Simon Ayres and Mike Holt from the Sixth Form, and gay-curious gimps like Shelton, Brudenall and, in the Third Form, this scatter-brained hyper kid called Gittins coming out in Chemistry.
The game was suspended while Martin cried a little with his brother, and I said to Paulus something like ''so what about you, Andrew?'' and he shook his head and I said Leo was head over heels and Paulus shuffled uncomfortably, then Fosbrook, scratching his neck, told us he reckoned it didn't matter so long as we were happy and we should ignore the throwbacks and Neanderthals and just get on with it. I gave him a kiss on the cheek, which made him squirm and squawk like a wounded ferret. Huxley pushed his thick-rimmed specs up his nose and smiled encouragement at his friend, before returning us gently to the unfolding disaster of Fall 1904 on the map.
The Cooke brothers sealed their new Anglo-Russian alliance by declaring war on France and seizing Holland, Belgium and Sweden respectively, then drawing Germany in from the East and Italy from the South, and Austria declared war on Turkey, with Russian support.
ENG A Lon→Hol, F Nth C A Lon→Hol, F Nth→Bel,
FRA A SpaMar, A Pic→Par, A Por→Spa, F Bel is destroyed.
AUS F Ionian→Aegean, A Vienna→Tyrol, A Rum→Bul, A Budapest→Rum, A Bul→Greece
ITA A Venice→Piedmont, A Trieste→Venice IT F Tyrrhenian s Austrian F Ionian→Aegean
GER A Munich→Burgundy, A Berlin→Munich
RUS A Warsaw→Silesia, A St. P→Finland, A Sevastopol→Armenia, A Mos→Ukr
TUR A Smyrna→Con, F Aegean s A Smyrna. F Aegean destroyed.
I was out the next turn, overrun by Paulus' red Austrians and Cooke's purple Russians. Rubenstein, sensing the end, also declared war and sent his green Italians in. As Cooke took Smyrna and Paulus took Ankara and Constantinople and Rubenstein eliminated my last unit, in Greece, I surrendered. Meanwhile the English and the Germans carved up France, landing armies in Brest and Picardy and leaving Huxley fighting for his life in Paris.I told them they were mean for ganging up on me.
Then Martin blew out the candles on his birthday chocolate cake, we sang 'Happy birthday to you' and I sneezed a lot, which made Fosbrook talk about how awful his eczema was sometimes, and how he felt such a freak when people called him Itchy and Scratchy, or Ferret-Face. Hux hated Elephant Ears. Paulus hated Poorly. God, we were so mean to each other. I hugged all of them, and apologised. We, I told them, had to set an example.
Back at school, Choral Society settled down, especially when I had to sit in for Mark Williams at the keyboard for the first time. Fred got me off the second half of some utterly dreary Physics lesson so we could run through the final chorus, Number 67, 'Sleep well, sleep well, and rest in God's safe-keeping,' a gentle, peaceful 3:4 lullaby for the burial of Jesus. It was fairly easy, but he wanted me to play the voice parts as well as the four lines of accompaniment and be ready to stop and start, play single lines and give starting notes and chords. Anyway, when I sat at the Steinway and saw Ali sitting with Holt and Middleton, and Gray with Arnold and Paulus, I felt really really nervous, especially when Fred thanked me for stepping in at the last minute and the basses clapped. George Seymour, Kevin's kid brother, offered to turn the pages for me. Thankfully, the Super-Altos, being twats, tried to distract me. As I teased out the opening quaver chords of E flat-C-G then C-G-E flat, I saw Trent thumb his nose and poke out his tongue, Brudenall stick his thumbs in his ears and waggle his fingers and Shelton drag his eyes down with a finger and thumb whilst simultaneously pushing his nose up with his right forefinger. Grinning, I stuck my tongue out and played the G-D-B natural minim while Fred counted 1-2, and… 'Sleep well, sleep well.' Seymour, standing, turned the page.
''The G is not an optional extra, trebles,'' goes Fred, ''Bach wrote it because he wants you to sing it. Altos, bars 40 and 43, your D is a minim. Count it out, and don't breathe. Jonathan, can you play the tenor line from Bar 60, the scale up to E flat? And by the way, piano means quietly, basses? Not th
ump it out like a rugby crowd. Jonathan, play the closing chord in Bar 72, will you? You're going flat, trebles.''
I grinned at Seymour, who was watching my hands like a hawk after a mouse, and mouthed 'flat as farts' which made him laugh on and off for the rest of the hour, shaking silently, cheeks puffed and purple. When I finally banged out the closing cadence of the closing chorale and the choir sang a sustained fortissimo 'O Jesus when I come to die, let angels bear my soul on high,' I was elated and deeply moved. The choral society applauded again and Fred nodded his approval. After, he let me play the harpsichord in his office. No-one played the harpsichord, 'cept Fred and Williams. It was verboten to the point of instant extermination.
''Sir,'' I began idly, my fingers running over the keys in this D major fugue, ''You know this recital? For the Lawrence Harvey Cup?''
''First week of March,'' he said. ''It'll be in next term's calendar.''
''Do I have to do it all by myself, or can I get some of my friends involved?''
I'd had this idea to form a trio with Rubenstein and Paulus, and I wanted to play duets with them both. And Leo. Making music with others was just more fun than by yourself.
''It's your recital, Jonathan,'' Fred replied. ''You can do what you like.''
Excellent. I swigged the rest of my cold hot chocolate and belted off to English and a quiet reading lesson where I read and wrote summaries of Chapters 43 and 44 (the last-but-two-and-one) of Casterbridge. [SPOILER… why bother?] 'H becomes a hay trusser and hears that F and EJ are getting married. H goes back to see them. He buys news clothes and a caged goldfinch as a present. He goes to F's house and hears the party inside, knowing that they are finally man and wife.
'EJ comes out and sees H. He says that he hates himself. EJ says that she hates him too because he deceived her and H goes away.'
Then I sketched out my programme - I would play Mozart with Adam Rubenstein (K380 in E flat major), and Haydn with him and Andy Paulus, the Trio in G with the Gypsy Rondo finale, and Beethoven, but what? The Appassionata Op 57? The Waldstein? Or Schumann. There were so many things I wanted to play. I'd ask Mrs Lennox. She'd be delighted. Like Martin Angus, she had been on at me for ages about starting a chamber group. If we added Leo, and I could persuade Fred to let me loose on the harpsichord again, we could do some Baroque flute sonatas, Telemann or CPE Bach or someone.
Then it was all after-school rehearsals for Thursday's charity concert, which was great, except the gimps in Captain Noah's Floating Zoo were so excited they chattered like mental monkeys while we were waiting in the ante-room and got yelled at by that sour-faced git Williams. Leo and Shelters just shook their heads and said ''Kids'' so contemptuously that me and Driver, Maxton's replacement, pissed ourselves.
''When did you two turn into greybeards?'' I scoffed. ''You'll be daubing ash on your foreheads and going around barefoot dispensing lentils next.''
Which made Brooke and Dell piss themselves.
''Fifth Formers!'' Dell scoffed. ''Driver isn't shaving and Peters' balls haven't dropped.''
Paulus had a cold. I found him in a practice-room hugging his 'cello and blowing his nose miserably into a raggedy tissue. He had a navy sleeveless jumper over his white shirt.
''Haven't seen much of you lately,'' I remarked. ''You avoiding me or something?''
''Don't be stupid,'' he said, snorting some snot back up his nose.
''Could've done with your support,'' I said mildly. ''God knows I needed you.''
''You think I wanted to go through what you went through?'' He blew his nose again. ''I don't know how you can breathe the same air as those bastards.''
I shrugged. ''Their problem, Andy, not mine, and not yours. You can't let other people's hang-ups wreck your life.'' His tissue disintegrated into a sodden mass. He was the picture of misery. ''You know, telling just one person really does help. I told you, yeah?''
''There's nothing to tell.'' Twisting a tuning-key, he bounced the bow off the 'cello strings. ''Sorry, J. Unless you got Vicks Vaporub in your clarinet case, just leave me alone.''
It was time to go. White shirts, school ties, grey trousers, black shoes, neatly combed hair, the twenty boys of the chamber orchestra looked smart and felt smart as we filed into the hall behind Rubenstein to our seats. Train, second violin, looked nervous and I saw Rubenstein say something to soothe him. Leo and Shelters squeezed each other's hands. I settled into the grey plastic chair, tightening the screws of the clarinet's mouthpiece and scanning the audience for my parents away to my left, Mum in a navy blue coat, Dad in slacks, a checked shirt and a thick roll-neck sweater, probably the third outfit he'd modelled that evening. I smiled at them and at Ali, sitting in the middle with his Mum and Dad.
As Ben Finch clambered onto his bar-stool, we tuned to Simon Dell's oboe then waited for Wilf, resplendent in a blue velvet jacket, ruffled white shirt and flashing Santa bow-tie. All the music was arranged in playing order on the music-stand. Driver opened the Cimarosa at page 1. I'd got to like this piece but the first three tutti chords were so ragged they made me wince, especially as my first F was sharp and my third note, a top C, sounded like a mouse being gutted by a cat, and was a beat late anyway. The strings sounded scratchy and Shelton's grunting bassoon like a farting elephant. Lees, in front of me, missed his entry. Train fluffed a note and stopped playing for a couple of bars while he regrouped. It sounded as though we were unsure whether to play or not. We could hear Wilfo humming the tune desperately, trying to bring us together again. The rhythm faltered, then Jamie Arnold punched in on the timpani and restored some order. Unfortunately Driver, carried away, flicked the page so hard the score fell off the stand. There was no time to wait. I tried to ignore the horrified expression in Wilf's beard and made something up. Then Wilf's baton came away from its cork handle and shot across the players like an arrow. Dell, ducking sideways, collided with Keighley who collided with me as the stick struck Paulus' right thigh. Now the orchestra collapsed into a string of ragged finishes and suppressed laughter. Paulus, blowing his nose again, looked ready to cry. Finch seemed to be toppling off his stool. The audience, dismayed, seemed torn between pretending nothing was happening and roaring disapproval. Then Nicholas Shelton set down his bassoon, picked up the stick and offered it back to Wilf with a beatific smile.
''I know we're rubbish, sir,'' he piped, ''But there's no need to kill us.''
Driver grinned and pushed his gold-rimmed specs up his beaky nose. Returning the grin, I wiped my lips with the back of my hand as the tension broke and Wilf re-set us to page 1. This time we played the overture with some swagger and much élan (Ali's review).
The Mozart was fabulous, this dark C minor opening rising in thirds, the oboes playing C, us playing B-flat, me and Driver absolutely together despite playing different notes, my first clarinet sustaining a high B-flat in Bar 11 while he played four crotchets, then, two bars later, just the two of us over Shelton's bassoon and then just me again, with Dell's oboe and Brooke's French horn. What professional musicians said was true. The woodwind drove an orchestra. We all had to be able to play solos in a way most string players didn't. It was tremendous fun and Shelters was brilliant, perky, commanding and confident, and so hot he sizzled.
Rubenstein, Woodward and Paulus hit Corelli's Christmas Concerto superbly, balancing their solos with the rest of the strings and Williams' harpsichord very effectively. Then Driver was opening the Haydn score and Arnold was rolling that E-flat on the timpani and Shelton, Paulus and Finch, piano and sostenuto, were playing the adagio introduction, joined by the intertwined flutes. I wiped my hands down my trousers. We had three pages of rests before the tempo quickened, from 3/4 to 6/8, allegro con spirito, and even then it was another eight bars till our entry with the full orchestra in a blaze of clean, dancing sound. This was wonderful, life-affirming music and I loved all thirty minutes of it.
Arriving at the interval, the mince-pies, mulled wine and apology for coffee in the ante-room, I breathed excited relief. I was done now,
except for the carol-singing at the end, and, after we'd cleared our music-stands, moved some chairs and set the stage for the second half, could settle back to enjoy the rest of the evening. This featured the jazz band, with Rubenstein on electric violin, Walton on drums, Toby Robinson on trombone and some sax players tackling Duke Ellington, 'It don't mean a thing if it ain't got that swing', and the Lower School choir's enthusiastic rendering of Captain Noah, the animals going in two by two by two by two and the Super-Altos from the Choral Society doing a trio version of 'O what a wonderful scene, the rainbow overhead…' Finally Lees, Holt, Williams and Wilfo would ring out 'Hark the Herald', 'Silent Night' and 'O Come all ye faithful' on these hand-bells. We, the players from the first half, simply had to sit on the front row of the audience, read the programme and applaud where appropriate, just as the Lower School Choir and the Jazz Band had done when we were on. At the end, as an encore, we all returned to the floor to 'Wish You a Merry Christmas'.
Lots of back-slapping, handshakes and quite a few hugs were exchanged in the ante-room afterwards. Captain Noah was wonderful. Who could fail to love our Super-Altos? I loved them all. The tinsel-ringed plastic buckets jangled by prefects in the doorway seemed full of notes, coins and occasional cheques and we were high and excited as we left, except for an utterly miserable Paulus, who kept wiping his nose on these soggy, sodden tissues. I'd tried, I told Ali. He must know we'd all support him and Leo was a ready-made boyfriend who adored him. Still, if he was too stubborn to come out, there wasn't much we could do. Then Claire Ashton appeared, in a knee-length black dress. Mum looked delighted, especially when Mrs Ashton invited me to tea again.
Woah. Ticket to Yikesville. I could think of nothing worse. Her father had considered expelling me and getting my boyfriend jailed for like a bazillion years. Anyway, surely she knew about me. Everyone knew about me. Hesitantly, I said dinner might be difficult.
''Afraid I won't be able to resist your boyish charms?'' she teased gently, ''Or that I'll entrap you in my feminine wiles?''
''Er, partly,'' I cavilled. ''Look. Has your father said anything? About me, I mean?''
''He was cross when you puked on my Kickers,'' she chirped cheerfully, dark eyes dancing mischievously.
''No.'' I squirmed uncomfortably, cheeks burning red as Santa's hat. God Almighty, why was it so difficult to tell people the truth? I glanced desperately across the wood-panelled Refectory at Ali. ''There's something about me you need to know.''
''You can tell me on our sleepover,'' she said. ''We'll eat ice cream in our PJs, braid each other's hair, try out new lippy and gossip about boys.'' She must've seen my expression for she suddenly giggled and said ''Oh, Jonny, I'm just teasing. I always thought you might be gay. You never seemed to fancy me that much, even though you knew I had the hots for you, and when you kissed me, I could tell you didn't really want to, and that night, at the party, you were so unhappy and I figured it was because kissing Mikey confused you. Then on Bonfire Night you disappeared with Ali Rose for absolutely ages, and when you came back you both had this kind of glow… it is Rosie, isn't it?''
''Yeah,'' I said weakly, wanting someone to shoot me as Claire waved at Ali.
''That's fantastic,'' she thrilled. ''I just knew you were gay. Does my dad know?''
''Yeah.''
''God,'' she said, ''Wait till I tell Becky. She said you weren't, though she said you were weird, which you are. Weird and gay. It's fantastic! Now you must come to dinner and tell me all about the luscious Alistair. Is he a good kisser? I bet he is. You're a great kisser, Jonny. He's so lucky. Wait till I tell Becky. And Mary. She said you were gay ages ago.''
I couldn't help grinning. Hanging out with the girls, even Becky and Mary, might be good for me. It would provide a different perspective. Besides, I wanted to see Claire now she knew who I really was. I thought we could become proper friends.
''Sorry, Claire,'' I said. ''You'll find someone else, someone straight, I mean.''
Turned out she was already seeing Mark Gray. Everyone knew except me. For some reason, I felt a strong pang of jealousy. Then I noticed this stunning blonde girl lay her hand on Paulus' arm, and Paulus, Poorly Paulus, kissed her cheek. I almost dropped my cup.
''Who's that girl?'' I hissed.
''Jessica Marsden. She's in my house. She's really nice. Plays the flute, writes poetry, in the hockey team…'' Claire's impish eyes twinkled. ''She's Andy's girlfriend.'' Now I did drop my cup. ''Surprised you didn't know.''
Fucking hell. My best mate was shagging my ex and Poorly Paulus had a girlfriend. What'd happened while I'd been away? The world no longer made sense. And then Wheezy, a mischievous glint in his pale blue eyes, asked me to read at the School Carol Service on Sunday 14th. Me and Alistair. He spent his whole life fighting Fascism, he wheezed, and this was another opportunity to make a stand. Bloody hell.
I returned to Episode 9 of my serial and some really cute boys in cricket whites in the nets. One of them was even called Trent, ha ha. But the bloody headmaster with the Kitchener moustache had spotted 'a number of older boys consorting with younger boys' or something. I mean, WHAT? He apparently 'regarded them with disquiet and intended to put a stop to them.' He even wrote a letter asking for housemasters to 'furnish him' with a list of boys they thought were 'indulging in unhealthy friendships.' Lolling back on the two-seater sofa in my purple PJs and yellow dressing gown, I barked a humourless laugh and glanced at my folks. Man, this was set in 1918 or something, and this mortar-boarded arse is leading a witch-hunt against queers. It felt VERY contemporary to me. I mean, hasn't Britain moved on since World War One? It's nearly a hundred years ago, for God's sake, and we're still fighting our war.
Anyway, I lost my Saturday lie-in and wank to our annual Christmas shopping trip. This meant battling into the grotty semi-darkness in Regatta parka, school scarf, black woolly gloves and my red and blue ski-hat instead of cosying up in bed for CD Review on Britten's seasonal Ceremony of Carols. The weather'd turned bitterly cold and it was a dingy, sleet-splashed day where the windscreen-wipers never ceased, the streets were grimy, slippery and miserable, somehow worsened by the council's tawdry coloured lights, and the wind was sickeningly icy. I shivered as I tossed a 50p piece into a busker's yellow bucket, applauded the Salvation Army's 'Silent Night' and dodged through overcoated beardies selling Socialist Worker outside W. H. Smith's into the Castlegate Centre.
I'd emptied every coin and note out of Mr Pink Piggy Piggy-Bank 'cos I wanted to buy Alistair Bach's B Minor Mass and, from H & M, a charcoal-grey cashmere scarf, the softest thing I'd ever stroked, softer even than our late cat. I also needed his card. There was this one with an angel that I really liked, yeah? Since he was my angel, I bought it. (Stop vomiting! I'm 15 and like super-romantic?) I got this really nice lilac ski-hat for Leo, the usual chocolates and aftershave for my grandparents, uncle and aunt, and CDs for my folks, Johnny Mathis for Mum, The Shadows for Dad.
Whilst Mum disappeared into this perfume store, Dad and I ducked into Beattie's Model Shop and like drooled over this awesome railway set displayed in the window. The bright maroon-and-yellow livery of EWS, a station made from transparent plastic and lit inside with tiny yellow bulbs, neat three-bar fences, two smart green engines, little bridges of box-girders and red-brick arches, stone-pebbled cottages… they made Dentist Wilson's set look seriously tatty. Then we spotted this red radio-controlled Ferrari, a fab Scalextric set, scale models of the Starship Enterprise, the Scharnhorst and HMS Victory and a new Tamiya set of World War Two German Alpine troops. There were loads of wargames, including War in the East, the Sino-Soviet War and SPI's award-winning American Civil War game, Terrible Swift Sword. I quite fancied playing Gettysburg as the Confederates and changing history, though Rubenstein said it took longer to play the game than to fight the actual battle. Strategy and Tactics magazine apparently dubbed it Terrible Slow Sword.
''Say,'' Dad began, ''Why don't we build something together? You're always making models and we always wanted
a railway. It'd be a good project.'' He gestured at this large cardboard box with a bright picture of the West Highland line on it.
''Where would we put it?'' I said. ''My room's full of stuff already.''
''Spare room,'' he said. ''We can build anything you like. If you don't want trains, we can do Scalextric or a battle diorama, whatever you like. Let's get some catalogues.''
''Can I have that wargame?'' I indicated the brown-grey Gettysburg box with a man charging out of the picture waving a massive Confederate flag.
''American Civil War? You'll start talking like East Clintwood again.''
I grinned. ''There are two kinds of people in the world, my friend, those who get prezzies and those who pay. You pay.''
Dad, grunting ''Don't I know it,'' shoved Hornby and Tamiya catalogues into a yellow plastic bag. ''I suppose Alistair thinks you're smart.''
My stomach somersaulted. This was a first. ''Of course he does. He thinks I'm awesome.'' I grinned again. ''Always said the boy was a genius.''
Dad grunted again, this time amused. ''Does he like your models? The aeroplanes and stuff? Does he make models himself?''
''No,'' I said, exchanging the £5 pocket money I'd earned by washing the car for this Tamiya Military Miniature 1/35 tent with Afrika Korps radio operator sitting on a petrol can for a Desert War diorama I'd just decided to make. ''Not yet anyway. This is cool. I can do a desert scene with those Afrika Korps I got for my birthday.''
''Maybe he could help us,'' said Dad hesitantly, ''Make it a project for all three of us.''
That was a really kind thought.
''Dad,'' I said suddenly. ''Why did you stop playing the guitar?''
He stared past me at the tiny tins of Humbrol paint. ''I realised I'd never be any good.''
''But you were good,'' I said. ''You are good.''
''I'm not.'' He ushered me into the sleet. ''I'm no good at anything really. Not like you.''
''I remember you playing Paul Simon and singing folk songs and all sorts.''
''It was just a bit of fun,'' he said defensively. ''I never did it seriously.''
''But what about the evening classes you used to go to? Why did you stop?'' He'd been to car-maintenance, plumbing, wine-making, Beginners' Italian, water-colour painting, church architecture, Basic Book-Keeping, I mean, loads of stuff, and had generally dropped out after two or three weeks. He hadn't finished any of them. Because he wasn't any good.
It all tumbled out, there on a bench by a Christmas tree in the Castlegate Centre, how his ambitions had been thwarted, his dreams frustrated, first by his parents, then by his brother, then by my mother, finally by me. I listened, horrified, as he told me he'd wanted to be an engineer and build bridges but had been told he wasn't clever enough, not by his teachers but by his family, who wanted him out of school and into a job aged fifteen. He'd been my age when he'd been apprenticed to an electrician.
''But I liked your guitar-playing,'' I said. ''It's what got me interested in music.''
''Like if he can do it, so can I,'' said Dad.
''No, not like that,'' I said. ''More to be like you, to be good at something like you.''
I'd never realised before how little self-confidence my Dad possessed, how the people in his life had consistently talked him down, undermined him at every turn. He had never undermined me. In fact, he'd always boosted my confidence, made me believe in myself, and he was standing by me now, albeit in his own quiet, understated way.
I remembered asking him once about the 'born on the bus' story, put about by his brother, and the family joke that Mum had bought one ticket into town but two coming back. The story upset him quite a lot. He'd actually been watching the Monaco Grand Prix and following Yorkshire v Northants in the Sunday League on the telly in the pub next to the hospital. Then he'd sat in the waiting room listening to Charlie Chester's Sunday Soapbox, Sing Something Simple then Semprini Serenade, (God Almighty, the stuff your folks have to do!) and finally I'd arrived in the middle of 'The head that once was crowned with thorns' on Sunday Half-Hour, from Dumfries for Ascension Day the previous Thursday, 27th. He'd cuddled all 7 pounds 9 of me then scuttled off home for a glass of whisky, A Hundred Best Tunes and Ice Station Zebra. Curiously, Tale of Two Cities, the Sunday serial gripping me now, had also been the Sunday Serial the day I was born. Weird, huh? And that hymn, yeah? The one I was born in? Well, I sang it at my audition for the Choral Society. I know. Even weirder, and Yorkshire lost by 7 wickets. Anyway, the point is that Dad had always supported me in everything I did, I mean, everything. When he said he loved me and was proud of me, I believed him. I'd always believed him. 'Cos he'd, like, always been there, you know?
''There is something you're good at,'' I said, ''Something you're the best in the world at, and that's being my father. No-one else could do the job.'' I hugged him affectionately.
''Not even Alistair?''
''Especially not Alistair.'' I hugged him again.
It got dark around 3. Mum dropped us at home and took off to a yoga party with one of her hippy friends. I stashed my prezzies in the wardrobe and settled down for Horace and the Spiders on the computer, a Psion game in which Horace has to ''rid the Spider Mountains of the deadly octopeds which inhabit them.'' First he has to travel through the hills by jumping up levels of platforms and over spiders using the Q and P keys, for up and right, and Z and I for down and left, then he has to cross the Spider Bridge by swinging over on a spider thread. Finally he has to destroy the Giant Web by stamping holes in it (using Keys V, B, N or M). The spiders try to repair the web by sitting in the holes, and there Horace can jump on them and kill them. It has these mad psychedelic colours, like backdrops of violent yellow and flashing titles, and this squawky electronic soundtrack. I had a high score of 3100 and, with Mum out and my homework done, plenty of time to beat it. Of course I got cocky, and bitten, and one life left, one spider left, 1100 points – yay! Killed him! Extra life and back to Level 1. Run, jump, run, jump, leap and grab a thread, swing, swing, swing, jump, ha, back in the cave, Spideys. I'll soon stamp a few holes in your web, you eight-limbed bugs. Bollocks. Two spiders, two lives, 300 points to go and stuck… YAY! 3300, extra life, back to the sky blue start. I finally expired on level 2, against the yellow sky of the bridge with 4600 points, a new record score.
Dad lit a fire and together we watched Final Score with his pools coupon – Man U drew with Stoke, the Arse lost to Sunderland, Spurs beat Man City and Wolves drew with Southampton - then settled down for Basil Brush ('Boom boom') and the last Doctor Who episode in which the Doctor, quoting liberally from Shakespeare's Henry V, recruited this bunch of rebels to storm the Dark Tower and overthrow this regenerated vampiric 'Great One'. Turned out to be a hand in a green rubber-glove. Still, one companion, in a fabulous display of TARDISial loyalty, shrugged to the other 'You said yourself you're on their menu. No sense in two of us getting the chop.' Well, quite.
The Generation Game was the usual parade of sad acts shouting 'cuddly toy' but The Two Ronnies did this brilliant parody of Mastermind where 'Charlie Smithers' answered the question before, so 'what's the name of the directory that lists members of the peerage?' elicited the answer 'a study of old fossils' because 'what is palaeontology?' was the previous question. You follow? So 'what's the difference between a donkey and an ass?' was 'one's a trade union leader and the other is a member of the cabinet.' They also did this 'Space Wars' sketch which started with a light-sabre fight between Luke and Darth Vader and morphed into Ronnie Barker (RB-PO) and Ronnie Corbett (RC-TAR-C) singing songs before being exterminated by 'Duluks' paint-pots. Nursing bowls of home-made chilli con carne, we had a nice evening, even though we didn't win the Lottery again. After Palace battered Norwich 4-1 and Leeds beat Forest 1-0 on Match of the Day, I filled a red rubber hot-water bottle to take the chill off the sheets while I continued Hornblower's journey through a storm in the Channel to land Hotspur's crew on the French coast. As I was leaving Dad to Three Days of the Condor, he said ''I'm glad you're
not going to Thornbury, son, and I'm glad you found Ali.''
I stopped in the doorway. ''Why doesn't Mum like him?''
''Oh, Jonny, it's complicated.''
''You've accepted it.''
He stared into the glowing coals. ''I've accepted you,'' he said slowly. ''You're fifteen. You're in love with Ali. You think you're gay. You might change, you might not, I don't know, but whatever you are and whoever you love, you're my son, nothing changes that. Besides, he's a nice boy. I get why you love him, and if you're gay, I'll support you, if you're straight, I will support you. You're my son. I will always support you.''
''But Mum won't.''
''Course she will. She's your Mum. It's just…'' He hesitated. ''She'll get used to it, I suppose. In time. Not having a wedding, or a daughter, or… grandchildren…''
My parents' plans for me, for them, had been suddenly and totally smashed. Everything they had expected from me had been turned upside down. If adjusting to the new reality had been hard for me, it'd been hard for them too, but when Mum returned from her party and I tried to tell her I understood, she just snapped she was tired and didn't want to talk about it. I just practised my reading for tomorrow afternoon and went to bed with my Walkman and book.
St Aidan's Chapel was especially atmospheric at Christmas when hazy yellow candle-flames glowed smokily from the carved pew-ends, coloured lights flickered in a large Christmas tree and Mark Williams played improvisations on Christmas carols. The Chapel was packed to its old wooden rafters. The Pauluses, the Trents, the Collins Clan, the Arnolds, the Sheltons, the Grays, including Moany Melissa, and a bunch of others I only knew by sight. I wondered if any of the people who'd beaten me up were here in church.
I waved at Ali, who was wearing his dark grey suit, school tie and black gown. Dad also raised a tentative hand, mainly, I think, to Mr and Mrs Rose. Mum kind of sniffed. Claire Ashton, sitting with her mother and brother, flashed me a smile. Mum noticed, waved, nudged me, said what a nice girl she was etc. etc. while I read the Order of Service. I was the 'Member of the Upper School' doing the Fifth Reading, and Ali was the 'School Prefect' following.
The service began with Paul Train singing 'Once in Royal David's City' from the door, then the choir, resplendent in blue cassocks and snow-white surplices, processed through the Nave. I had never really noticed Train before. He was short, had a snubby nose and curly mud-coloured hair. To be honest, I wasn't really sure what either Rubenstein or Fred saw in him. He must have had a tongue like an electric-eel or something. Though Paulus, in the tenor section, looked so sensational my knees wobbled a little, and Leo Trent looked like an angel.
''O God,'' wheezed Wally, ''Who makest us glad with the yearly remembrance of the birth of thine only Son Jesus Christ; grant that as we joyfully receive him for our Redeemer, so we may with sure confidence behold him when he shall come to be our Judge, who liveth and reigneth with thee and the Holy Ghost, one God, world without end. Amen.''
Eddie Collins, the 'Chorister', squeaked his way through the Fall of Man (Genesis chapter 3), from the highest step, and even then you could only just see the top of his head. One of the tenors dropped his hymnal with an echoing thud during the reading by the new Chair of the PTA, Mr Seymour having resigned, which provoked an angry glare from Dr Ashton and a lot of giggling in the choir. I was a little nervous when it came to my turn but I had practised it twice in front of my bedroom mirror. As I walked slowly up the Nave between the parallel lines of flickering candles towards the massive eagle-winged lectern, trying to avoid the cracks between the slabs 'cos I definitely didn't want to break my back there in the chapel, I felt every eye on me, saw the choir nudging each other, heard the whispers, 'is that him? Is he the one? He's the queer, is he?' and some mutters of disapproval – how could he have the nerve to be in a church? I mean, did these people have no shame or sense of propriety? I had polished my shoes to a crow-black shine, ironed my shirt and trousers, put on clean socks, washed and brushed my hair, tied and re-tied my school tie (for a school occasion) so I looked as smart as a soldier on parade. Dammit, I'd even fastened the top button. As I took my place behind the lectern and found the right page in the massive green New English Bible, I unconsciously touched the sheaf-and-crown school crest over my heart, glanced at Wheezy, then Bunny, then fixed my eyes on Alistair's deep teal pools.
''The people who walked in darkness have seen a great light. Light has dawned upon them, dwellers in a land as dark as death. Thou hast increased their joy and given them great gladness… for a boy has been born for us, a son given for us, to bear the symbol of dominion on his shoulder; and he shall be called Wonderful Counsellor, Prince of Peace.''
Prince of Peace.
I returned to my seat for that little town of Bethlehem and waited with proud excitement for him to replace me at the lectern to recount the story of Jesus' birth and the angels' visitation to the shepherds. The muttering returned - 'that's the boyfriend, I think. He's a prefect? What does Ashton think he's playing at? God, he's so much older…do you suppose they're doing it?' Eyes bored into my back once again. 'Their poor parents must be going through hell.'
''Now in this same district,'' read Ali, ''There were shepherds abiding in the fields, keeping watch through the night over their flock, when suddenly there stood before them an angel of the Lord, and the glory of the Lord shone round about them and they were sore afraid, but the angel said unto them 'Fear not, for I have good news for you and for all people. Today in the city of David a boy has been born to you, the saviour who is Christ, the Lord'.'' Then I was getting the usual thrilling tingle from ''Hark the Herald Angels Sing, Glory to the new-born King, Peace on Earth, and Mercy Mild, God and Sinners Reconciled.''
Christmas was coming. Yay! But it wasn't a reconciliation with God that worried me. That had been achieved by Jesus. No. As I scurried home to watch two explorers fighthing prehistoric half-humans in a giant cavern At the Earth's Core, the Mastermind semi-final from Stirling with questions on Napoleon's Russian campaign and the life of Richard III and Eddie Shoestring working with a psychiatrist to resore someone's memory, it was Mum that worried me. She seemed more remote than ever.
Whilst Mrs Paulus had blithered on about how well I'd read, and how strong I'd become, and Mr Trent had patted my shoulder and praised my leadership, thanking me for coming out, making a stand, challenging biogotry and changing the rules, Mum had stared at the wood panelled walls and the portraits of long-dead headmasters, no doubt wondering if Dr Flogger would have been able to thrash the demon out of me.
When Leo and Andy both hugged me, Mum's lips kind of twisted like she was being force-fed a nitric acid/dog-shit cocktail. She didn't even look at Alistair, and when Dad actually congratulated my boyfriend on his reading, I thought she was gonna puke. This was gonna be a challenging Christmas.
Out: A Schoolboy's Tale Page 27