A Kind of Hush

by Richard A. Johnson

  You know it's strange. All through the trial, and the lead up to the trial, I was on the front page of many of the tabloids. Now that I was acquitted, and obviously innocent, I was lucky if I got a mention buried inside the paper. No scandal you see, not newsworthy. It would have been nice if they had just given me one big splash, pronouncing my acquittal. After all I'd sold a few papers for them over the previous weeks. Maybe a splash could have saved the charity. But then again, that doesn't sell papers does it?

  Anyway, I could get on with my life. Not so easy. The charity had gone, and I couldn't get it back. And I have to admit that with all of the hassle and threats that I, and my family, had experienced during that time I couldn't really be sure whether I wanted it back or not. I had learned, in the most complete way, that working with child abuse, and exposing abusers, is a very dangerous occupation. And if the intention was to close down a charity that brought many paedophiles and child abusers to justice then it succeeded. A lot of child abusers could rest happy. More to the point the man who had been allowed to bring the action against me had really won. True, he was in prison, but he got his revenge, courtesy of our legal system.

  My euphoria at being acquitted soon abated, reality reentered my life. I was like a Grand Prix driver, my car chained to the start, wheels spinning like mad, but unaware of which direction to take, and unable to take one anyway. I went back to my book. I gave it a title -'Getting Even' - this somehow summed up my feelings. I rewrote the ending, leaving it purposefully ambiguous.

  I guess Mick sums up how I was feeling, with his stumbling around, trying to find a direction.

  Shortly after the trial I was invited to an International Conference in Switzerland, where I was presented with the 1991 Award for Outstanding Service. That was great. I came home with renewed vigour.

  I attended a few gatherings here but soon realised that it was not for me any more. I kept meeting people at those places that I'd known for years but who'd kept a very low profile when I needed help. Now they acted as if nothing had happened, some even said that they always knew that I would win. I couldn't take their hypocrisy, it was a world that I no longer wanted to be a part of, a world full of pretentiousness and . . . well . . . not very nice people.

  I'd given a copy of my manuscript, as a gift, to a dear American friend while in Switzerland. She called me and told me that someone else in America had heard that I'd been writing, and had asked for a copy. She added that this woman said 'that she knew someone in the business' and that they might help me with it. I'd never thought of doing anything with the work, after all it was just written as an exercise to get rid of the feelings that I was having before the trial. But I relented and said that she could send it if she wanted.

  A month or so later I received an envelope from Hollywood. Boy didn't she know someone in the business. My work was being compared to The Outsiders and Boyz 'n the Hood, both brilliant movies. Of course I was thrilled. But a movie! That couldn't have been further from my mind. Well, it just doesn't happen to working-class blokes does it?

  What do I do? I needed an agent. I called some people that I had worked with when doing my TV stuff and dropped in unannounced at the British Film Commission to see if they could help me. They were wonderful. The combination of the two led me to an agent, and she led me to a British film-maker, and the rest is history. There is now a movie called A Kind of Hush produced and shot in London, and based on this story. I couldn't be more proud. I was a bit miffed though at the name change. Well, A Kind of Hush, what kind of title is that? 'Getting Even' is what I liked because it is what I felt I was doing; but then again things grow on you don't they? And I have to admit that I love the song.

  You know I may not be able to work in the way that I used to with child abuse, but in a funny kind of way I may well have found a better way to help. Because, if what I have written helps just one person out there then all of my troubles have been worthwhile.

  Richard A Johnson

  Chapter One

  ‘Jesus Christ, you’ll fucking kill him!’ screamed Tony.

  ‘Fuck him,’ growled Mick as he pushed the guy’s arm across the kerbstone and jumped on it. The crack was sickening. The bloke screamed in obvious agony and tried to lift his arm. It looked as if he had two elbows, one in the normal place and one near his wrist.

  ‘Please, please don’t hurt me any more!’ wailed the man as Mick quickly rifled through his pockets, stuffed the loot into his jacket, gave the bloke a last swift kick to the side of the head with his steel-tipped DMs and we all legged it.

  An hour later we were all sitting in the burger bar. There were eight of us. Mick, nineteen, he sort of looked after us all. Tony, half Italian, seventeen years old, the new boy. Pete and Den, seventeen-year-old twin brothers. Karl ‘Wiwa K’, which is why we called him Wivva, a seventeen-year-old skinhead. Weedy Si whose full name was Simon Gay, poor bastard. His name alone gave the poor sod one hell of a complex. He was just sixteen, on the run from a kids’ home in Sussex and in his socks was just four feet, eleven inches of pure dandelion flower with a really aggravating sniffing habit. Then there was Alan. No one argued with Alan. He was big, built like a tank and had more tattoos on him for an eighteen-year-old than most fifty-year-olds. His only problem was that he was labelled as thick, ESN they called it, but having said that you couldn't wish for a better bloke with you in a rumble. He was unstoppable and never seemed to feel any pain. I once watched five Old Bill try to hold him down and he still got away.

  Finally there's me. My name's Stewart, though I prefer to be called Stu. I was seventeen last birthday and I've been with Mick and the gang for about four years now, ever since him, me, Pete and Den had shared a squat in Lewisham.

  The burger bar was run by a bloke named Max which is why, I suppose, it was called Max's. It was your typical greasy spoon, and because of where it was, just up the road from King's Cross Station, and the fact that it always seemed to be open, you could always find the place full of kids using the fruit and video machines. It was a hang out for toms, rent boys, drunks, local villains and dealers. And needless to say it was a regular stop on the Old Bill's visiting list.

  Max never bothered us, but then Max never bothered anyone. He was the deafest man on earth when he wanted to be and his mouth, like his pocket, was always shut tighter than a duck's arse. You could rely on Max, he never gave credit and he kept a meat cleaver on one side for those who tried to take it. He never listened to anyone's conversations and he never gave advice; we all knew where we stood with Max and we all appreciated him for that.

  The only thing that bugged me about him was his accent, I could never place it, and he always smiled sweetly and winked knowingly but said nothing if anyone asked him where he came from. A story went around once that he was an ex-Gestapo man in hiding. But that would have made him nearly seventy and he didn't look that old, but then again those blokes were supposed to be ultra-healthy weren't they? Anyway, Wivva was convinced that the story was true and thought that he was the greatest thing since sliced bread.

  We always met at Max's when we worked King's Cross. We would leave there, do the job, and return there to share out the spoils and plan the next one.

  Mick emptied his jacket on to the table.

  'Shhhiiit! This bloke was loaded,' hissed Den, as he pulled a gold Amex card from a wallet. Also in the wallet was a wadge of fifties, a couple of twenties and a ten, one Visa card, a couple of small credit cards for a garage and store of some kind, some names and addresses on what looked like torn-out pages from a diary, and an identity card with the bloke's picture on it. Also on the table were two gold chains torn from his neck and an expensive-looking watch with a damaged strap, obviously done when it was snatched from the guy's arm.

  I picked up the ID card and saw that the man worked for some big computer company, then I flipped it back on the table. We never really cared who they were, just what they were.

  It was late, so we decided to call it a day. Mick split the cash
, we got just over forty quid each from this one, that added to what we had made from two earlier jobs gave us about seventy quid each to go home with. Not bad for one night's work. Si took the cards, chains and watch, he had an uncle who always gave him a good deal on stuff like that, that's why we let him hang around with us and off we went on our merry way home, dumping the rest of the stuff down the nearest drain.

  I hate it when I'm alone again after a busy night. I lie in my bed trying to sleep and all my brain can do is remember. I've never liked my own company. When I'm with my friends there's always plenty of action to keep me busy. I don't have to think, everything is automatic. But when I'm alone, back come all of the old fears and memories. I saw a shrink for it once, it did no good.

  Chapter Two

  When I first met Mick I was thirteen years old, I was on the run from home and I met him in Leicester Square. It was the fourth time that I had run away from home within a year and I knew that if I got caught this time my old man would kill me.

  My old man was the reason that I kept on running away. For years he had treated me and my two sisters like shit. I learned later that he was what’s called a ‘classic psychopath’. I had a few better names for him. He’d hurt people and wouldn’t even think about it. Everything he did, he did for his own benefit and he didn’t give a shit how many people got hurt in the process.

  He had made my big sister pregnant when she was sixteen and went with her for the abortion to make sure that she told everyone that a boyfriend had done it. He slept with both of my sisters regularly while I was there.

  My mum pissed off when I was six and I’ve not seen her since, but my old man has been screwing around with both of my sisters and me for as long as I can remember. The last time I swore would be just that, the last time. He made me give him a blow job in front of the girls, then he went to sleep. It was while he was asleep that I crept out of the house and I've not been back since, four years now.

  I was picked up by the Old Bill and put into care two years ago; that's when I told them what was happening at home, but they did nothing. Both of my sisters denied it, can't say as I blame them, he'd have fucking killed them if they'd said anything - and of course he denied it, so nothing was done. That's when I met the shrink.

  The psychologist said that if I could talk through in detail with him everything that had happened to me, it would take all of my fears away. Stupid sod. Any fool could see that I was far worse when I left his sessions than I was before I started. He made me feel like it was happening over and over again, and just when I really needed to let loose, he called the end of the session and I had to carry all of the shit that he had awoken in me around for another week. And of course when the next week came, I had shoved it all to the back of my mind again, so it was back to square one. He was next to useless for me. I saw him on telly a few weeks ago telling everyone how to work with kids like me, just like we are a special breed or another race or something. He still hasn't sussed that we are all different and that we all need different things. He knew nothing then and he knows nothing now and it doesn't matter how many letters he has after his name, I can't see that ever changing.

  I honestly thought that he could help me, but all he did was ask questions, hundreds and hundreds of questions. I began to wonder who was helping who after a while. I sussed eventually that he was trying to make a name for himself as an expert and was writing a book on kids like me. He wasn't helping me, he was helping himself. Mick found out where I was and sprung me. I've been free ever since.

  Mick entered my life after I had just survived two nights under Hungerford Bridge. I had no money, no food and was feeling really pissed off. I was just about to pick a half-eaten hamburger off the top of a waste bin in Leicester Square when a voice beside me said, 'If you eat that, you'll end up in hospital with your guts being pumped out. Come on, I'll buy you a cup of tea and a bacon sandwich.'

  I turned and looked at the owner of the voice and saw a boy of about sixteen. He was slightly taller than me, wearing shades and had a pair of Walkman earphones wrapped around his neck. He wore jeans, trainers and an eye-blowing multi-coloured T-shirt with 'Aceeeed' printed across the front. He said his name was Mick and added, 'Don't worry, son, I ain't after your arse. If you want some breakfast, come on.'

  When you're out there on the street, on your own, tired, hungry and scared, you have to learn to make instant decisions, you learn to go on your instincts. In this case I had two choices. One, go with him and possibly get mixed up in something that could hurt me, or possibly not. Or two, walk the other way and almost definitely get mixed up in something that will hurt me in order to survive. Not much of a choice is there. I chose to go with him - after all nothing worse could happen to me than had already could it? and he did promise me breakfast.

  I ate two sausages, bacon, egg, chips and beans and four slices of bread and drank a Coke and three cups of tea. That was probably the best meal that I have ever had in my entire life and all Mick did was sit and grin. When I had finished, Mick threw me a couple of Mars bars and a Coke for later and paid the bill with a ten-pound note taken from a roll of notes in his pocket. He then got up and walked out.

  I wondered what the bleeding hell was going on. He can't just be that nice to me and then piss off, I thought, that's not right. I sat there dumbfounded for a few seconds then jumped up from my chair and flew out of there to catch him up, but he'd gone, totally disappeared. I looked left, right, up and down, but he was nowhere to be seen. A crazy kind of despair seemed to descend on me, I felt terrible. Just then a hand slammed down on my shoulder and Mick's voice said, 'What's up mate, you look a bit iffy.'

  'Iffy,' I said, 'you frightened the fucking life out of me. Where did you go? I couldn't find you.'

  'Sorry mate,' he said. 'Needed a slash, I didn't mean to frighten you. Anyway I think we need to talk, I'd like you to meet some friends of mine.' He took me back to his squat.

  A big Victorian place it was. The front was boarded up, but we got in by walking up an alley behind the row of houses, jumping a wall, through the garden and in a back window. As we climbed in I could hear loud rock and roll music coming from one of the rooms upstairs.

  'Good, they're in,' Mick said as we climbed the stairs.

  In a back room on the first floor two boys were sitting on an old settee. They were drinking from cans of beer and singing along with a 'Quo' number on the radio.

  Mick shouted: 'Hi guys, I've got a new one for us.' They were like two peas in a pod. Both were in denims and white trainers, both had the same hairstyle, both had the same 'Quo' T-shirt; in fact the only thing that was different about them was a hanky tied around their left arms.

  They looked over and grinned.

  'What's your name then,' said one and without waiting for an answer went on to say, 'my name's Den and that's Pete', pointing to the other boy.

  'No, I'm Den,' said the other boy, 'he's Pete.'

  'No, I'm not,' said the first, 'I was Pete last week, it's your turn now,' and pretended to be upset.

  The other boy then said, 'You weren't, it was me, I'm getting a bit cheesed off at you always choosing who you want to be.'

  'Tell you what then,' said the first. 'We'll both be Den and Pete this week and see how that works,' then they collapsed into fits of laughter.

  'Ignore them,' said Mick. 'Being twins they spend most of their time trying to fuck people's minds up.' He then explained that Pete always wore a yellow hanky tied around his arm and Den a red one, at which point both boys promptly removed their armbands and swapped them over, then collapsed again into hysterics.

  'You're fucking mental, you two,' said Mick with a grin as he collapsed on to the old settee and threw me a beer. I never was quite sure who was who between them after that.

  During that week we did a lot of talking. I dumped a lot of what had happened to me on them and was stunned to find that they too had been through very similar experiences. I was even more shocked when Mick told me that he'd seemed
to know what I had been through when he first saw me in Leicester Square, although now I understand. It is true you know, kids like us do recognise each other even though we may not know it at the time.

  Mick was sexually abused in care. He was put into care when his mother took to the bottle, he was just seven at the time. He stayed there until he was thirteen, when his sister managed to get him out to live with her and her husband.

  During his time in care he was 'looked after' by a man that everyone had to call 'Uncle Jack'. Uncle Jack, it seems, was a residential social worker with some fifteen years' experience of working with disturbed kids. He would take the kids on outings to places like the zoo and Madame Tussaud's and also on holidays to camps and adventure weekends and stuff like that.

  Uncle Jack loved his camera and was always taking pictures of the kids, the trouble was that many of the kids didn't like the kind of pictures that Uncle Jack was into. Mick said that it all started quite innocently. He would snap them swimming, climbing and playing games, but then it became more unnerving. He would creep into the showers and snap them, or their dormitories or rooms as they prepared themselves for bed. Some of the kids told him that they didn't like him doing it, so he started to give them presents of money or cigarettes if they would pose for him.