When We Danced at the End of the Pier

by Sandy Taylor

  Once Peter had chewed everything over with Hassan, he’d come into the shop and give us his opinion on the latest piece of news. He had a lot to say about the new king, Edward VIII, and the latest scandal involving the American, Mrs Simpson.

  ‘That young man is going to bring down the monarchy,’ he said one day. ‘You mark my words.’

  I was balancing on a ladder and Maggie was handing books up to me.

  ‘But he loves her,’ said Maggie.

  ‘He’s got no right to love her,’ said Peter indignantly. ‘He’s the King! He can’t just fall in love willy-nilly, he has to set an example to his people.’

  ‘But he’s still a man, he can’t help who he loves,’ insisted Maggie.

  ‘He’s not just a man, Maggie,’ said Peter, going red in the face. ‘He is King of the United Kingdom and the Dominicans of the British Empire and he is the Emperor of India. Does that sound like any man you know, Maggie?’

  ‘I can’t say it does, Peter,’ said Maggie, grinning up at me.

  ‘Queen Victoria must be turning in her grave,’ he added.

  I always thought that was a funny expression. It was moments like this when I wished Daddy was still alive – I could just imagine how we would have laughed about it.

  ‘What does Hassan think about it?’ said Maggie.

  Peter was silent for a moment and then he said, ‘It’s hard to tell with Hassan, Maggie.’

  * * *

  I knew that I’d been lucky to have just walked in off the street and got this job. It felt good to be able to say that I worked in a bookshop and not a factory. I knew that my family were proud of me and, even more importantly, Jack was proud.

  ‘To be surrounded by books all day is my idea of heaven,’ he said.

  I smiled. ‘Mine too.’

  One evening Jack and I were walking on the Downs. It was late January and it was cold. The Downs was a wild place in the winter; the trees were like black silhouettes against the evening sky. The grass was blowing all over the place but the dirty old sheep were quite happily snuffling about in it as if it was a summer’s day.

  ‘Do you think they feel the cold?’ I said to Jack.

  ‘Does it worry you then?’ he asked.

  ‘It does a bit,’ I admitted. ‘It can’t be much fun living up here.’

  Jack squeezed my hand. ‘You’re a funny old thing,’ he said. ‘If it makes you feel any better, I’d say they’re warmer than us.’

  ‘Good,’ I said.

  Jack and I held hands as we walked. I’d taken Nelson’s advice and hadn’t said a word about Marion Tucker and, pretty soon, she was indeed old news. Nelson was a wise boy and I would always listen to what he had to say because I knew that he cared about me and always had my best interests at heart.

  I shivered.

  ‘You’re cold,’ said Jack.

  ‘A bit.’

  ‘Do you want to go home?’

  I didn’t, but I was actually freezing.

  ‘Not really,’ I said.

  ‘Let’s find some shelter then,’ he said.

  We walked until we spotted an old barn at the bottom of the hill and quickly made our way there. Jack pushed hard against the old wooden door and it creaked as it swung open. It was much bigger inside than it had seemed from the top of the hill. The first thing that hit us was the smell: dust and must and last year’s hay, mixed with the acrid, rusty smell of old, abandoned machinery. Jack pushed the door shut to keep out the wind and we were plunged into darkness. I stood still and hung onto him until my eyes got used to it. There was a line of wooden stalls that I supposed had once housed cattle. Jack led me into one of them and we sat down on the floor. It was smelly in there but it was dry. I felt a bubble of excitement in my tummy: I was alone with Jack in this dark place. I’d been alone with Jack a lot. We’d walked along the seafront, we’d sat on my back step, we’d walked on the Downs, but this felt different, as if this moment was leading to something. I looked at Jack’s blue eyes in the darkness and I yearned for something, I wasn’t sure what I was yearning for, only that it had to be more than we’d had.

  ‘Warmer?’ he said, putting his arm around my shoulder.

  ‘Much,’ I said, leaning into him. I breathed in his smell and counted the steady beats of his heart. I wanted Jack to hold me, really hold me; maybe even kiss me. I was still a child but in that moment, in that dark place, feeling the warmth of his breath against my cheek, I didn’t feel like one. The feelings that were rushing around my body were unfamiliar to me and yet I knew that they were a part of me, not quite a child and not yet a woman. They were undeniably there but I didn’t know yet what to do with them. I reached up and kissed his cheek but he didn’t respond. Then I tried to turn his face towards mine so that we could kiss properly but he turned his head away from me.

  I felt the heat rush to my face. I felt stupid, ashamed. Why had I done that? It should have been Jack wanting to kiss me, not the other way round.

  Jack started to speak. ‘Look, Maureen…’

  I jumped up and all Nelson’s advice flew out the window.

  ‘I bet if my name was Marion Tucker, things would be different.’

  Jack stood up and tried to put his arm around me but I pulled away.

  ‘Maureen,’ he began. ‘It’s because you’re not Marion Tucker that things have to be different.’

  ‘But—’ I began.

  Jack put his finger to my lips. ‘We should go,’ he said.

  He closed the barn door and we started walking back up the hill and all the while I was thinking, I shall never do that again. If there ever comes a day when you want me, Jack Forrest, then it’s going to have to come from you.

  Thirty

  Me and Monica were huddled up in one of the shelters on the seafront, eating fish and chips. The tide was out and Brenda and her friend Molly were down on the beach, collecting seaweed.

  ‘Bloody hell, Maureen!’ she said when I told her what had happened with Jack. ‘I’d have died if a boy had done that to me.’

  ‘I nearly did. I’ve never felt so stupid in my whole life.’

  ‘Have you seen him since it happened?’

  ‘I’m avoiding him, but it’s making me miserable.’

  Monica was shovelling pieces of hot fish into her mouth, then licking her orange fingers one by one.

  ‘I don’t think you should be doing that, Monica.’

  ‘Doing what?’

  ‘Licking your fingers.’

  ‘They’re greasy, anyway you lick yours all the time.’

  ‘Yeah, but mine aren’t orange.’

  ‘You worry too much,’ she said, blowing on the chips.

  ‘Well, I just think that you should look for somewhere else to work, somewhere that doesn’t turn your fingers orange.’

  ‘There’s a golf-ball factory just down the road, I suppose I could try there.’

  ‘Well, I think you should. At least golf balls are white.’

  We carried on eating our fish and chips and watching Brenda and Molly digging in the wet sand.

  ‘Has it ever occurred to you… Now, don’t get mad,’ Monica added quickly.

  ‘I won’t.’

  ‘Well, has it ever occurred to you that perhaps—’

  ‘For heaven’s sake, Monica!’

  ‘OK, that perhaps Jack thinks of you more as a friend than a girlfriend?’

  ‘It had crossed my mind.’

  ‘Well, that’s not a bad thing.’

  ‘Isn’t it?’

  ‘My mum said that you have to really like someone before you can truly love them. Otherwise it’s not love at all, it’s lust.’

  ‘Your mum said that?’

  ‘She was drunk at the time. But the point I’m trying to make is that Jack really likes you and you really like him and maybe the kissing bit will happen when it’s supposed to happen.’

  ‘I was too forward, wasn’t I?’

  ‘You were a bit and I think that’s what Mum meant about the lust bit
. I think you have to be a bit more grown-up before you start lusting and you have to be sure that you like him more than you lust after him.’

  I nodded. ‘I think your mum is probably right, Monica, but why on earth were you and your mum having a conversation like that? I can’t imagine me and my mum talking about that sort of stuff.’

  ‘It was ages ago. My dad had come home drunk as usual and he’d locked Mum out of the house. She’d had to sleep in the shed. They made up the next day and were all lovey-dovey with each other, that’s where the lust bit came in.’

  ‘It’s a good job Brenda’s not listening to this, she’d be saying that word for weeks.’

  ‘Does she still do that?’

  ‘Yes, she collects words, she always has.’

  ‘I remember.’

  ‘It used to make me and Daddy laugh.’

  ‘You still miss him, don’t you?’

  ‘Every day, Monica.’

  ‘Do you know what I always loved about your dad?’

  I shook my head.

  ‘I loved how gentle he was with you and Brenda. I used to wish he was my dad.’

  I tucked my arm through hers. ‘I’m sorry, Monica,’ I said.

  ‘And do you know something else? I don’t think my mum likes my dad at all.’

  ‘You never know, Monica, your dad might mellow with time.’

  ‘And pigs might fly,’ she said.

  * * *

  I still couldn’t face Jack, so the following Sunday I went to see Nelson at the home. They hadn’t chucked him out when he was fourteen, instead they’d given him a job looking after the gardens, which I thought was really good of them and Nelson liked it.

  He was fifteen now so he could come and go without an adult being present. It was too cold for the beach and the Downs, not that I wanted to go up the Downs, in fact I wasn’t sure that I would ever want to go there again. So we were sitting in the rose garden, which was Nelson’s favourite place.

  ‘No Jack?’ he asked.

  ‘Long story, Nelson.’

  ‘Have you had a falling out?’

  ‘Something like that.’

  ‘Not like you.’

  I shrugged.

  ‘You’ll make up again.’

  ‘I know we will.’

  ‘Are you still enjoying the bookshop?’

  ‘I love every minute of working there and I really feel as if I’m making a difference. It was really chaotic and now I’m getting it into some kind of order.’

  ‘I feel like that about the garden,’ said Nelson. ‘I plant things and they grow, I cut dead things back and they come alive again.’

  ‘I’m glad you’re happy here, Nelson.’

  ‘I didn’t think I would be, in fact I hated it to start with. I hated the fact that strangers were deciding what to do with my life. I had no say in it, I had to go where they told me to go, and that was hard and I missed being with you lot.’

  ‘I didn’t realise that and I should have done.’

  ‘You weren’t to know how I was feeling.’

  ‘I’m your friend, I should have known.’

  ‘You’re too hard on yourself, girl.’

  ‘Maybe.’

  ‘Did you follow my advice about the Marion Tucker thing?’ he asked.

  ‘I tried to but then it all went wrong.’

  ‘Well, you tried.’

  ‘Nelson?’

  ‘Mmm?’

  ‘Do you think that the King really loves Mrs Simpson or do you think he just lusts after her?’

  Nelson laughed. ‘Where did you get that word from?’

  ‘It’s not mine, it’s Monica’s. What do you think, though?’

  Nelson scratched behind his ear; I’d embarrassed him.

  ‘I’ve embarrassed you, haven’t I?’

  ‘A bit,’ he said, laughing, ‘but let me think about it.’

  We sat quietly for a while then he said, ‘I’m no expert when it comes to love but I think that whether it’s lust or love they feel for each other, they’ve backed themselves into a bit of a corner. The whole world is talking about them and watching them, everyone has their own opinion on it. The monarchy is up in arms and the government are making all kinds of threats. I think the more everyone tells them they can’t be together, the more they will cling to each other. They’ve almost got to stay together now because it must feel like it’s them against the world and I should think that’s a pretty powerful emotion.’

  I was staring at Nelson in surprise. I hadn’t expected him to come out with all that.

  ‘Golly, Nelson,’ I said. ‘You might not be an expert in love but I’ve got the feeling you’re not far off.’

  Nelson smiled his shy little smile. ‘Maybe,’ he said.

  He got up from the bench and walked over to the rose garden. ‘I’ve got something to tell you, Maureen,’ he said.

  I sat there looking at his back. He’d changed so much over the last few years; he wasn’t the skinny little boy I remembered any more. I wondered what he was going to say.

  He turned around and faced me. ‘I’m joining the army,’ he said.

  I was confused. ‘Aren’t you too young?’

  ‘They take you when you’re fifteen and a half. I’ll be joining in a couple of months.’

  I wanted to be happy for him but my heart was beating at a hundred miles an hour.

  ‘Is that what you want?’ I asked.

  ‘It’s what I’ve always wanted. My dad was in the army.’

  Nelson had never talked about his dad; he’d never mentioned him at all, not ever.

  I took a deep breath. I needed to say something positive to him so I said the first stupid thing that came into my head. ‘Well, I suppose there’s nothing much to keep you here.’

  Nelson bent down and picked a rose. He walked across and handed it to me.

  ‘You’re right, Maureen,’ he said sadly. ‘There’s nothing much to keep me here.’

  We said goodbye and I started walking down the drive. I was holding the rose in my hand. The rose was yellow, its petals tinged with red. I held it up to my nose and breathed in its scent and then I was running back up the drive.

  Nelson was just about to go into the house. ‘Nelson!’ I shouted.

  He turned around and started running towards me. I put my arms around him and said, ‘There’s lots to keep you here. There’s me and Jack and Monica and Brenda and we all love you. Lots of people love you, Nelson, and we’ll all be here for you when you come home.’ There were tears pouring down both our faces.

  ‘That’s all I need to know,’ he said. ‘That’s all I need to know.’

  Thirty-One

  Of course me and Jack couldn’t stay away from each other for long and soon him and me and Monica were spending most of our time together again. It was December and freezing cold so it was getting harder to find places to go where we wouldn’t actually freeze to death.

  One evening we were sitting on our back step, shivering when Mum opened the kitchen door.

  ‘For heaven’s sake,’ she said. ‘Haven’t you lot got homes to go to?’

  Three frozen faces looked up at her.

  ‘Come on then,’ she said, sighing. ‘You can go up to Maureen’s bedroom.’

  Gratefully we all trooped into the kitchen.

  ‘I’ve got some soup on the go, will that do?’

  ‘You’re an angel, Mrs O’Connell,’ said Jack, giving her a cheeky grin.

  ‘An angel, eh?’ said Mum, smiling.

  ‘Absolutely,’ said Jack.

  We all ran upstairs and me and Monica plonked ourselves down on the bed.

  ‘Where’s Brenda?’ said Monica.

  ‘At Molly’s birthday party. Molly’s dad is bringing her home later.’

  Jack was standing at the bedroom window. ‘So this is where you spy on me,’ he said, grinning.

  ‘I stopped spying on you a long time ago, Jack Forrest,’ I said.

  Monica was lying on the bed, looking thoughtful.
‘Do you think that the King is going to give up the throne, Jack?’ she said.

  Jack nodded. ‘I don’t think he’s got a choice.’

  ‘Nelson says they’ve backed themselves into a corner,’ I said.

  ‘I think Nelson’s spot-on,’ said Jack.

  Monica sat up. ‘I don’t see why he can’t marry Mrs Simpson and still be King. I mean, what difference would it make?’

  ‘It’s against the constitution,’ said Jack.

  ‘That didn’t seem to bother Henry VIII much, did it? If he didn’t get his own way he’d just chop someone’s head off.’

  ‘I think things have moved on a bit since then, Monica.’

  ‘OK, Jack,’ said Monica. ‘Forget about the constitution, what do you really think?’

  ‘I think that a man who puts his own needs before those of his people isn’t strong enough to be King.’

  ‘He’s so good-looking though, isn’t he?’ said Monica dreamily.

  ‘Maybe that’s the trouble,’ I said. ‘Maybe all his life he’s been told how special he is and now that he can’t have his own way he’s stamping his foot.’

  ‘I think that if the King does give up the throne, his brother might well surprise us all,’ said Jack.

  ‘He’s not nearly so good-looking though, is he?’ said Monica.

  At which point we all burst out laughing.

  * * *

  On the eleventh of December we were all crammed into Jack’s front room, along with a bunch of neighbours. Jack’s parents were the only people in the street with a wireless and we were waiting to hear King Edward speak from Windsor Castle. Once the wireless had warmed up, Jack’s dad fiddled with the dials. It eventually crackled into life and let out a series of high-pitched whistles. There was some nervous laughter from the women in the room.

  ‘I don’t trust all this modern stuff,’ said Mrs Boniface from number twenty-five.

  ‘If it was up to you we’d still be living in the Dark Ages,’ said Mr Boniface, scowling at her.

  There were more crackles from the wireless, then someone started to speak.

  ‘I think we’re getting somewhere,’ said Jack’s dad.

  ‘This is boring,’ whispered Brenda.