Its Colours They Are Fine

by Alan Spence

  ‘D’ye know whit happens when ye get Gypsy’s Touch?’ shouted Shuggie.

  They delighted in trying to imagine.

  ‘Ye turn intae a gypsy an they come an take ye away!’

  ‘Ye go aff yer heid an kill yer maw an da!’

  ‘Ye get covered in plooks!’

  ‘Yer skin turns green!’

  ‘Ye get scabies!’

  ‘Warts!’

  ‘Worms!’

  ‘Nits!’

  ‘Boils!’

  ‘Dysentery!’

  ‘Leprosy!’

  ‘Black Death!’

  ‘THE DREADED LERGY!’

  And at this last, the ultimate affliction, they all joined in a strangled cry and gave up trying to better each other, because no more could be added. There could be nothing worse than the Lergy. It included all the rest, and more.

  And all Les could do was turn away from them, and try to let none of it touch him, for the playground was their territory, and no place for him to get into another fight.

  On Friday night Shuggie and Aleck set out early for the shows. On their way down to Govan Cross for the subway, they stopped in at Louie’s fish supper shop and they each bought a bag of chips for their tea. They walked on, eating greedily, the chips at first burning their fingers and their tongues.

  Shuggie brought out a long skinny slithery chip, slimy with vinegar and grease. Part of it was uncooked where it had been stuck to another chip. It was green at one end.

  ‘Look at that,’ he said, dangling it between finger and thumb.

  ‘Yich,’ said Aleck. ‘That’s enough tae scunner anyb’dy.’

  ‘Lik a big snotter,’ said Shuggie.

  ‘Lik a fat worm,’ said Aleck.

  They looked at it, Shuggie making it squirm.

  ‘It’s a poison chip,’ said Shuggie. ‘Tell’n ye. Louie’s a Tally. Comes fae Italy. Jist the same as gypsies. An they hate us because a the war. Prob’ly shove a poison wan in every coupla bags.’

  He threw it down and stamped on it, squelching it on to the pavement. Aleck felt sick. He had a few chips left. He crumpled up the bag and threw it away. But Shuggie just laughed and finished the rest of his.

  ‘Disnae bother me!’ he said.

  They took the subway, two stops, to Partick Cross and walked up to the Kelvin Hall.

  They paid their money, pushed open the big heavy glass panelled doors and passed through into another world. It didn’t matter that the money they had was meagre and wouldn’t last. They were here, and the whole carnival was spread out glittering before them. It was all theirs, and they swaggered, feeling the weight of the coins that jingled in their pockets, and their only problem was where to begin.

  ‘C’mon wu’ll find the ghost train!’ said Shuggie.

  The tiny greenpainted train crashed through the tin doors and trundled into the darkness and the tape-recorded shrieks and sirenwails and howls. And it gathered speed and hurtled towards a succession of mechanical, wobbling figures, brightly lit for a moment as the train ran straight towards them, and always just in time lurched clear round another bend in the track, and the lights went out and the darkness swallowed the figures again, spectres and spooks, skeletons and ghouls, corpses, vampires, body-snatchers with skulls, giant spiders, bats and owls, all vanished till they were switched on again for the next train coming through. And the screams and low moans faded as the doors bashed open before them and they were back out into the brightness and noise of the main hall and the ride was over.

  ‘Wisnae very frightening, wis it?’ said Shuggie.

  And they moved on. They climbed the helter skelter, had a quick glimpse of the whole fair below before spiralling back down to earth; on the dodgems, with sparks flying and a smell like burning rubber, they bumped and veered and rammed in spectacular head-on collisions; they spun on the rotor, flattened against the wall as the floor dropped away beneath their feet; they guzzled ice-lollies and lemonade, potato crisps and candy floss; they rocked almost head over heels on the ribtickler.

  ‘Ah feel a wee bit sick,’ said Aleck.

  ‘D’ye wanty sit doon?’ said Shuggie.

  ‘Ach naw,’ said Aleck. ‘Ah’ll be awright in a minnit.’

  ‘C’mon wu’ll look at the mirrors,’ said Shuggie. ‘Ye better no take any merr shooglin aboot jist the noo.’

  In the hall of mirrors they joined the hysterical laughing procession, convulsed and doubled up, howling with disbelief and glee at their own warped reflections. Here they were squashed to a blubbery dumpiness; here they were stretched and elongated; here their heads split into two; here eyes, noses, teeth all merged; they moved and their images rippled, changed shape, broke up and came together again, wobbled across the surface of the glass like globules of oil, like jelly, like treacle dripped from a spoon. They were still laughing as they came to the last mirror and saw there two small shabby-looking boys laughing back at them. Aleck recognised one of them as Shuggie and eventually the other as himself. It felt strange for a moment. They were still delighted and amazed at all the freak, mutated versions of themselves they had just seen, and they felt suddenly self-conscious at being confronted by their normal reflections. But they pointed at the glass and laughed again, as if this too was a distortion.

  By the time they came out Aleck’s system had settled a bit and he felt fit enough to venture on to the rockets. The sign said Space Trip, above painted moons and planets, and round and round it flickering fairy lights chased each other endlessly.

  They ran and climbed into separate rockets, Aleck’s just behind Shuggie’s. The great radial metal arms began slowly to rotate and they lifted off into orbit around the central control-box, and Shuggie waved back, and their speed increased and they moved on and up and out. They spun towards the roofbeams and the rafters, the empty gloom above the hall, and Aleck wished his ship could break free from the machine, and he could sail out through a secret escape-hatch (known only to him) and zoom across the river to Govan, dip and loop; over his friends’ astonished upturned faces, mad with envy as he dropped a bomb on the school. He would soar past their third-storey tenement window, waving as his mother dropped the teapot and his father gaped out from behind his newspaper, and they would call him back for his supper, but he would just laugh and go on, higher and higher, and never stop.

  But as they slowed down and came to rest, his stomach was turning over again. This time he sat down on the steps and Shuggie counted out the money he had left.

  ‘Uv you goat the same as me?’ he asked.

  ‘Jist aboot,’ said Aleck.

  ‘That means wu’ve goat wur subway ferrs an enough fur another coupla hurls,’ said Shuggie.

  Aleck was looking across at a group of stalls and at one of them he saw Valerie, taking in the money. The game she had charge of was to lob rubber balls into upturned enamel buckets. Aleck pointed her out to Shuggie.

  ‘Fancy tryin wur luck?’ said Shuggie.

  ‘Might win somethin ah suppose,’ said Aleck. They sauntered over.

  ‘Haya Valerie!’ said Shuggie, hoping others would notice his casual familiarity and think he must be well in with the show-people.

  ‘Three balls a tanner,’ she said, coldly.

  Aleck paid and Shuggie watched him waste all three balls. The first went in and bounced straight out again, the second hit the rim, the third missed the bucket altogether.

  ‘Ach!’ said Shuggie, shoving him. ‘Useless! C’mon ah’ll show ye how it’s done.’ They moved on to the next stall. Wild West Aunt Sally it was called. Three balls to throw at a row of wooden faces, alternate Indians and Outlaws, scowling and mean. They both recognised the stallholder as the man that had chased them down from the fence at Gypsy’s Hill, but he gave no sign that he remembered them.

  Shuggie’s first throw knocked over an outlaw. His second sent an Indian spinning. ‘Nae bother!’ he said. He spat on his hands. He had already selected his prize, a red vinyl football, nestling among the racks of teddy-bears and te
asets, gilt mirrors and jigsaws, stacks of knick-knacks and toys.

  He drew back his arm like a baseball pitcher and threw. The ball smacked against the Indian’s flat wooden face; the face wobbled but didn’t tilt and just stared back at them, meaner than ever.

  ‘Ard luck mate,’ said the man, handing him a consolation prize, a white plaster poodle.

  ‘Wait a minnit!’ said Shuggie. ‘Ah hut that fuckin thing an it never went ower!’

  ‘C’mon now sonny,’ said the man. ‘That’s the luck o the game, innit.’

  ‘Bet yis widnae try that wi a man,’ said Shuggie. ‘Fuckin carve-up! Shower a pochlin bastards!’

  Valerie had called the man over and whispered something in his ear. He looked angrier as he turned to them.

  ‘So it’s you two again, eh! Bloody little troublemakers. Go on. Gerraway! Hoppit before I ave yer put out!’

  There was nothing they could do so they moved off, Shuggie still angry, scowling back and muttering.

  They saw Valerie crossing to a lucky-dip stall called Aladdin’s Cave and there behind the counter was Les. She spoke to him and pointed over, laughing, to where they stood, and Les laughed too.

  ‘Gonnae get that cunt on Monday,’ said Shuggie, quietly.

  ‘Ye kin gie yer maw the dug,’ said Aleck.

  ‘Look at it,’ said Shuggie, disgusted. ‘A fuckin poodle.’

  The back of the ornament was flat, unfinished, chalky.

  ‘Kin use it fur writin on the wa,’ said Shuggie, resigning himself to it. They were standing next to the waltzers. ‘Comin oan these?’ he said.

  ‘Awright,’ said Aleck. ‘Then that’ll be us skint an we kin go hame.’

  As they climbed in, Aleck suddenly felt sad that their money was gone and they hadn’t seen the circus animals; the elephants, monkeys, horses and all the rest that made up the Carnival Zoo. But he soon forgot as the waltzers started up and the dizziness came back, the tightness in his head and the nausea rising slow. They went faster and faster, spinning and hurling and he had to cling tight, gripping the metal bar. The screams and laughter and the grinding music were suddenly more than he could bear. The journey was never going to end. He would whirl and buck forever in this brash tinny hell. He wanted nothing more than to get off.

  The ride at last came to a stop and he tottered from the machine. But it made no difference. It was just another nightmare. He wanted to be home and safe in his bed without the journey back through grey dismal streets. But he was here. The fair that had seemed so beautiful and full of wonders was the foulest place on earth. The ground was unsteady beneath his trembling legs. He sweated and shook. He wanted to be home but he was here and it was real. The clanking music jarred, discordant, pounding in his head. Stupid names, Space Trip, Aladdin’s Cave. Faces, laughing, hostile, every one ugly and harsh. Fairy lights stuttering round and round his brain, a persistent annoying rhythm.

  As he slumped down against a litter-bin, Shuggie realised he was sick.

  ‘Godalmighty,’ he said. ‘Ye look green. Green as an auld chip.’

  Aleck groaned.

  ‘Shows is a terrible place fur that,’ went on Shuggie. ‘Ah wance saw a fulla bein sick aff the chairaplane. Jist a big stream a honk flyin oot. Folk hid tae jump oot the road so they widnae get splattered!’

  Aleck turned away, retched and heaved, and up it came. The final racking misery before he could be purged and clear.

  He stood up shakily, wiping away the tears from his face, and his eyes focused on Valerie and Les and the man with the sandy moustache. They were talking together and laughing and he knew they were laughing at him, and he knew they must have poisoned him with their black gypsy magic.

  Shuggie saw where he was looking and clapped his arm round his shoulder.

  ‘C’mon hame Aleck,’ he said. ‘Yu’ll feel better oot ’n the fresh err.’

  Outside the pubs were just emptying. They hadn’t realised it was so late. They walked down to Partick Cross in silence and subdued.

  Silver in the Lamplight

  Aleck dribbled an imaginary ball past hulking invisible fullbacks, mouth hanging open, crowdroar noises in his throat. A final swerve sent the railings the wrong way and he smashed an unstoppable shot against the midden-wall goal daubed CELTIC before he turned, arms outstretched, to receive the silent greybrick terracing acclaim of the tenements circling his back court arena. He stood for a moment, his arms raised in salute, then let them slump to his sides.

  ‘The custom of saluting originated in the Middle Ages, when knights, as a gesture of chivalry, would symbolically shield their eyes from a lady’s brilliance.’ – STRANGE BUT TRUE NO. 23, one of a series issued with Bellboy Bubblegum.

  Salute. We who are about to die salute you. That was what Roman gladiators used to say when they turned to the crowd. Aleck had read about it in one of his library books. It was up to the crowd whether a beaten gladiator lived or died. If they gave the thumbs-up he lived; thumbs down and he died. The book was called Bread and Circuses.

  Sunday morning was always funny at this time; very quiet; most people having a lie-in after Saturday night’s halfpissed loudmouthed ritual. Aleck picked up an empty beercan and tried to bend it. Useless. Two slight dents where he’d pressed with his thumbs. Shuggie and Joe could always bend them.

  ‘Shite!’

  He threw the can crashing hard against a middenbin.

  ‘Get tae buggery an make a noise in yir ain back!’

  Mrs Gallacher, bleached hair in curlers. Puffy-eyed and hungover.

  ‘Aye you! Goan, get!’ Fat tits bulging under a dirty cardigan, hanging out of the three-storey window.

  He gave her the V-sign and regretted it immediately. She would tell his old man he’d given up cheek.

  ‘Jistyou wait malad! Jistyou wait!’ Woodbine cough. Bang-shut window. We who are about to die tell you where you can stick your fucking thumb. Quiet again. Might as well go up for Joe. Crunch across the pitted lunar wasteground and into Joe’s close. Stale beer and catpish smells. Gurgling closet – must have just been flushed. He rapped at Joe’s door.

  ‘Is Joseph comin oot?’ Always had to remember to call him Joseph. It was Mrs Kelly that had opened the door, letting radio music and breakfast sounds come seeping out of the kitchen. Aleck thought Joe’s mother was middle-aged, which meant she was about thirty-five, and she smelled of nicotine and babies and hair and scent and sweat.

  ‘Waitnull see.’ She smiled and pushed a lank strand of hair back from her tired face.

  ‘Joseph! It’s wee Aleck fur ye!’

  She went inside for a moment and came back to the door.

  ‘Joseph’ll no be a minnit.’

  The door was pushed to but not closed and Aleck looked absently at the chalkings and scrapings on the dingy brown wall of the close.

  A.J. LOVES T.K. TRUE BY A.J. Theresa Kelly is a RIDE. 1690. Fuck the Pope. King Billy was a POOF. NO SURRENDER. Up your HOLE. And there was the inevitable CELTIC 7 RANGERS 1, but with several nothings added after each number. The falsification of history was made by angry supporters of one side or the other who couldn’t bear to see an adverse score written down. So first it would become CELTIC 7 RANGERS 10, then CELTIC 70 RANGERS 10, and so on forever. At the moment it stood at CELTIC 7000 RANGERS 1000. That wouldn’t do. Aleck took off his snake-belt and held up his jeans with one hand while he carefully scraped another nothing with the buckle on to Rangers’ mythical score. He tried to imagine a real game with a score like that. It would have to be like a Charlie Chaplin film but even faster. 17000 goals in 90 minutes. That would be 1700 goals in 9 minutes. That was nearly 200 goals a minute. It was impossible. It always gave Aleck a funny feeling to think about things like that. Why couldn’t he imagine it? It was like trying to imagine the highest number possible, or putting two mirrors face to face so that you see yourself reflected again and again and again, getting smaller and smaller forever . . .

  ‘Haya Aleck!’ Joe banged the door behind him. His greeting had c
ut right into Aleck’s thoughts and made him jerk back.

  ‘Haya Joe. Ah nearly shat a brick therr.’

  ‘Muss be a guilty conscience. Don’t think ah didnae hear ye scrapin at the wa!’

  Joe was a Catholic and therefore a Celtic supporter and would change the score back in their favour as soon as he could be bothered.

  Together they shuffled out into the street, hands in the back pockets of their jeans. They wandered along towards the corner, where they found Shuggie. He was sitting on the doorstep of the corner-shop, leaning against the locked door, his legs jutting out into the pavement so that everyone coming round the corner had to make a detour to avoid stepping on him. He’d already been growled at by a scabby mongrel and kicked by a young overalled apprentice on his way to do an overtime shift in the wireworks just up the road. But Shuggie wasn’t troubled by any of it. He just enjoyed provoking people, seeing how far he could push them before they’d react. He was bigger and stronger than Aleck or Joe and he tended to boss them. He’d been too much for his mother, ever since his father had been killed. That was about a year ago, and it had made quite an impression on all of them. Shuggie’s father had been knocked down by a hit-and-run driver late one Friday night and was dead by the time they’d got him to hospital. There had even been a bit about it in the paper and they’d all experienced that strange realisation that somehow their lives, and the places and people they knew, had a being and a relevance in the bigger world, the world of the newspapers. And in Shuggie’s reaction, in spite of his distress, there had been pride in this simple recognition of their existence. He’d cut out the newspaper paragraph telling of the accident and kept it flat between the pages of his Scottish Football Book. Aleck remembered him cutting it out and saying, ‘Jist imagine Aleck, hunners an hunners a people readin that.’ And he’d looked pleased at the thought.

  Nowadays, Shuggie’s mother had to rely on his older brother Davie to help her keep him in check.

  When Aleck and Joe came up to Shuggie, Joe made motions like a streetsweeper, pretending to sweep the pavement and poke at Shuggie’s legs.