The More You Ignore Me

by Jo Brand

  ‘And I presume you’re skiving off college.’ Mark’s father had persuaded him to go to a local agricultural college where his peers were attempting to erode any sensitivity that was left in him, which had the effect of increasing his determination to stay the same.

  ‘There’s no one at mine,’ said Mark. ‘Do you want to come back for a coffee?’

  ‘Yes, all right,’ said Alice and they walked together through the village, Alice pushing her bike.

  ‘Hunt this weekend,’ said Mark.

  ‘Oh yeah,’ said Alice, not really interested.

  ‘I’m going up there,’ said Mark.

  ‘But you hate hunting,’ said Alice. ‘We both do.’

  ‘I’m not joining the hunters,’ said Mark indignantly.

  ‘What do you mean?’ said Alice.

  ‘I’m going with some protesters,’ said Mark matter-of-factly, but his flushed cheeks betrayed just what a huge step forward this was from being on the sidelines seething with resentment yet socially handcuffed by his father’s bullying and eminent position in the county as one of its most rabid fox hunters.

  ‘But what if your dad catches you?’ said Alice.

  ‘I’ll just tell him to listen to that Morrissey song “Meat Is Murder”,’ said Mark. ‘That’ll turn him.’

  ‘Yeah, right,’ said Alice.

  ‘You coming?’ said Mark.

  ‘I don’t know,’ said Alice.

  ‘Put your money where your mouth is, you recently converted vegetarian,’ said Mark, poking her in the arm and laughing.

  ‘Will there be trouble?’ said Alice.

  ‘Don’t know,’ said Mark. ‘It could be good fun.’

  ‘But really,’ said Alice, ‘what if your dad does see you?’

  ‘He won’t see me, I’ll be covered up. He won’t know it’s me. I’ve arranged to swap clothes with someone. Come on, Alice, you know you want to.’

  ‘All right,’ said Alice, ‘I’ll come, but only to keep an eye on you.

  Mark grinned. ‘Bring a balaclava,’ he said, ‘or something that covers you up and makes you disappear into the crowd. There’ll be a lot of people there that we both know and we don’t want to be recognised by anyone.

  ‘All right,’ said Alice, thinking it was probably time she supported her friend in his endeavours.

  At home, she listened to ‘Meat Is Murder’ again and couldn’t get the phrase ‘unholy stench’ out of her head. Keith, passing her room on the way to the toilet, called in, ‘How did that man know I was on my way for a poo?’

  ‘Dad,’ said Alice reprovingly.

  They met early on Saturday morning and lingered just outside the small town centre where the hunt was meeting. A compact group of so-called ‘hunt saboteurs’ were there, maybe fifteen or sixteen, a high number of whom did this all over several counties and were poised ready for the fight. Alice was aghast to see quite a few of them appeared to be concealing rudimentary weapons, like homemade truncheons, under their clothing.

  ‘Is it going to get nasty?’ she said, turning to Mark who had a determined look on his face.

  ‘Don’t know,’ he said. ‘It has done a few times.’

  Oh God, thought Alice. Out loud she said, ‘If it all goes off, I’m legging it. I can’t stand violence of any sort.’

  ‘Fair enough,’ said Mark. ‘I’m not expecting you to knock anyone out.’

  When the hunt was fully assembled and had gone through much patting of each other and the raising of glasses of unidentifiable alcohol, it left the square and began to head out towards the fields. Mark and the rest of the little gang lay in wait in a lane which led down towards the woods and, as they passed, the beagles yelping and playfully nipping at each other’s paws, the gang appeared from the camouflage of several large trees and implemented their plan which seemed to be shouting a lot of abuse at this early stage.

  ‘Fuck off, you bunch of towny fairies,’ shouted one of the huntsmen, who turned out to be Mark’s dad. He obviously had absolutely no idea that his son was concealed amongst these well-wrapped and heavily disguised students. Another of the huntsmen took a swing with his whip at one of the girls who stood by the side of his horse, shouting something slightly more conciliatory and more constructive than most of the others.

  The whip caught her on the side of the face and she screamed out in pain. Someone shouted, ‘We’ve got one of the bitches!’ causing the hunters, including some relatively young children, to cheer at the top of their voices.

  Very quickly, everything became uncontrolled and chaotic. There was some shouting and scuffling around the legs of the horses, some of whom became frightened and started to rear up, others to bolt. At this point, the huntsmen, fed up with their morning’s entertainment being interrupted, decided to split into smaller groups and pursue the protesters. They almost seemed to have a plan, as pairs of riders each isolated one or two saboteurs and began to chase them through the woodland or along the muddy, rutted paths that ran beside them.

  Alice didn’t have enough time to slip away unnoticed and divest herself of her disguise. Instead she found herself running as fast as she could alongside Mark as they were driven further into the darker part of the wood. Alice could hear her own heart thumping in her ears and felt as if her lungs were bleeding. She knew it was ridiculous to try and outrun a horse and prayed they would come to a small river they could wade through or a fence they could climb. They did finally hit a barbed-wire fence and exchanged frightened glances as they attempted to scramble over. It was no use, though, and the more they tried, the more entangled they became until two huntsmen appeared behind them wearing sadistic grins and shouting abuse. They pulled Mark down and one of them produced an evil-looking lump of wood with which he battered Mark until blood began to seep out of the scarf wound round his head.

  ‘Stop, for Christ’s sake, stop!’ screamed Alice and looked up to see Mark’s father in a frenzied rage standing over his son, about to deliver yet another blow.

  Alice realised that the two furious huntsmen had no idea who they were and pulled off her balaclava and the scarf hiding her face.

  ‘Now will you stop!’ she screamed, as Mark’s father paused for a moment, weapon in mid-air, and looked at her, nonplussed. Rather than the shock followed by sympathy that she had expected, a sneer appeared on his face.

  ‘I might have known it would be you with the fucking mental mother,’ he shouted in her face, spittle flying from his mouth. ‘I’ve told my son to keep well away from you and your mad family and I’m glad I did, you stupid little tart. And who have you got with you then? Some cretinous posh wanker from Birmingham, I expect. Well, a beating never went amiss with those sort of arseholes, eh, James?’

  He turned to his comrade who chuckled and nodded. ‘Let’s have a look, shall we?’

  He bent down towards Mark and pulled off the bloodied balaclava and scarf to reveal his son.

  A greyness filled his face for a spilt second and then he was comfortably back in his unfeeling skin.

  His friend, however, looked as if he might faint. Mark groaned, blood coming from his nose and from a cut on his face, and he curled into a foetal ball.

  ‘Jesus fucking Christ, Mark,’ shouted his father. ‘What the hell do you think you’re playing at? I’ll never live this down in the village, you stupid little arsehole.’

  ‘He’s really hurt,’ said Alice. ‘Shouldn’t we take him to hospital?’

  The friend nodded in accord and Mark’s father grunted and sat his son up. He pulled him across his body and managed to get Mark’s slim frame over his shoulder. Once Mark was secured in the manner of a fireman’s carry, his father turned to James and Alice and searched their faces with a venomous expression.

  ‘No one is to hear about this, do you understand?’

  James, who was obviously terrified of him, nodded and mumbled his agreement. ‘Yes, Phil, I promise, wouldn’t dream of it.’

  ‘Right,’ he said, looking slightly disgusted by James’s g
rovelling capitulation. ‘And you?’ he said, turning to Alice as if she was a prostitute he’d just used, which he did frequently in the grimmer part of Hereford.

  Alice stared defiantly at this brutal man, a rather more upmarket version of her uncles, and nodded her head. She didn’t want to make things any worse for Mark.

  ‘Right,’ said Phil. ‘This is the story. Me and Jim found you in the woods and you’d been attacked by two blokes who could have been with the hunt, you’re not sure. The police will not be involved, but that is the story you will tell people. Do not elaborate on the incident, decline to give descriptions and we’ll leave it at that.’

  Then he turned and began to move through the tangle of the woods like a man in his twenties, at such a pace that Alice could hardly keep up. She and James threw glances at each other every time Mark groaned and Alice realised that James was a coward, the sort of man who clings like a frightened animal to whoever is winning. She noted a tiny glimmer of sympathy in his expression and smiled reassuringly at him. But this was too much of a betrayal for James and he gave her a hard glare.

  When they reached the road, Phil flagged down a Land Rover belonging to Stan, a smallholder from the edge of the village. James helped Phil into the car with the semi-conscious Mark. As Alice tried to climb up too, Phil turned to her and under his breath said, ‘Not you, you can walk home.’

  ‘Is she not coming?’ shouted Stan from the driver’s seat. ‘She’s welcome, you know.’

  ‘It’s all right, I’d rather walk,’ said Alice and despite Stan’s protestations she headed off up the lane without a backward glance.

  As the Land Rover disappeared round a corner, the shock of the attack overcame Alice and her legs started to buckle. She sat down on the verge and began to cry.

  Some hours later she arrived home to find a quiet house. Keith was asleep in front of the telly and her mum was upstairs in the bedroom. Alice calmed her shaking body. She didn’t want to tell Keith about the scene that had just occurred in the woods unless she absolutely had to.

  ‘Hello,’ shouted Alice up the stairs, more out of habit than any expectation that her mum would answer.

  ‘Hello!’ came back the reply.

  Alice raced up the stairs two at a time, not quite believing what she had heard. Her mum was not in her bedroom but in Alice’s room where Alice found her staring at her big poster of Morrissey.

  Gina looked her normal dishevelled self and although there had been no miraculous transformation into the old Gina, something about her facial expression told Alice that a sense of interest in her surroundings had begun to re-emerge.

  ‘Who’s that?’ Gina asked.

  ‘It’s a singer called Morrissey,’ said Alice.

  ‘Oh,’ said her mum and retreated back into her normal silence.

  When Keith woke up and shouted up the stairs, Alice raced down to meet him.

  ‘Mum answered me!’ she shouted as she ran triumphantly towards Keith and hugged him.

  Keith simultaneously managed to think how wonderful this was and also how tragic that the mere answer to this question should elicit such joy.

  ‘So, what’s different?’ he asked.

  Alice looked a bit defensive and said, ‘Nothing really’

  Alice wondered if it was time to tell him about Gina’s new regime of medication. She felt shaky and damaged after the incident with Mark’s dad and a longing to confess nagged at her.

  ‘Alice?’ He only needed to use a certain tone of voice and out came every piece of relevant information he needed about what had been going on. Alice detailed the two visits to hospital, and her meetings with Marie Henty, although she left out the bits about promising to facilitate a romance between Marie and her father.

  ‘Alice.’ This was an angry voice laced with a tiny shred of concern.

  ‘I’m sorry, Dad,’ said Alice, ‘but I can’t stand it for Mum. And I don’t suppose she can stand it either.’

  ‘I know, love,’ said Keith wearily ‘All right, we’ll try it for a couple of months and we’ll see how it goes. If not, she’s straight back on her injections.’

  ‘OK,’ said Alice. ‘Marie Henty’s been great, though, Dad. She really does care, you know.’

  ‘Yes,’ said Keith, somewhat surprised by this positive refraining of Marie Henty, who for years had seemed to irritate Alice.

  ‘Yes,’ Alice went on. ‘I had a really long talk with her and she wants the best for Mum like I do — well, she wants the best for all of us, you know.’

  Keith’s expression of increasing bemusement stopped Alice in her paean to Marie Henty Realising she was laying it on a bit thick, she said, ‘I’ve got some work to do upstairs, I’ll see you later.’

  ‘Okey dokey,’ said Keith. ‘I’ll make us some food. Cheese and toast OK?’

  ‘Vine,’ said Alice, smiling to herself. Poor Keith struggled to come up with ideas suitable for a recently spawned vegetarian. Alice climbed the stairs again to find her mother still sitting in her bedroom staring at the poster.

  ‘Tell me some more about Morriston,’ she said as Alice came into the room.

  ‘Morrissey,’ Alice corrected her. ‘Well, why not listen to some of his music and see what you think?’

  ‘OK,’ said Gina.

  The pair sat on the bed and Alice put on the first Smiths album and they listened all the way through, neither saying a word until Keith came into the room.

  ‘Well, I never,’ he said. ‘Mum’s listening to that Morrissey, is she?’

  ‘I like it,’ said Gina. ‘He’s saying something to me. Keith and Alice exchanged half-worried, half-bemused glances.

  ‘Come on then, let’s eat,’ said Keith and they all went downstairs together like a proper family and sat at the tiny kitchen table with Keith and Alice trying to ignore the fact that Gina was eating like a toddler and managing to get more dinner on her clothes than in her mouth.

  About nine o’clock the phone rang and Keith answered it. He held the phone up towards Alice.

  ‘It’s Mark,’ he said.

  Mark was ringing from a call box in the village. Alice took the phone out into the hall and sat tugging the lead as far as it would go while she talked to him.

  ‘I’ve left home,’ said Mark.

  ‘What, forever?’ said Alice.

  ‘I haven’t really thought that far ahead,’ said Mark and he explained that after a trip to casualty where he had been checked over, X-rayed, had a few stitches and his wounds dressed, he had gone back home only to face an avalanche of abuse from his dad, the content of which concentrated mainly on what a disgrace and embarrassment he was to his family.

  ‘What did your mum say?’ said Alice.

  ‘Not much,’ said Mark. ‘She’s scared of my dad so although I know she’s on my side, she doesn’t actually say anything to support me in case it winds him up.’

  ‘Do you want to stay here?’ said Alice. ‘You can, you know.’

  ‘I’d better not,’ said Mark, ‘it’s the first place my dad’ll come looking for me. I’m going to sleep in the woods tonight. Is there any way you can meet me up there and bring me some food? I left the house pretty quickly’

  ‘Sure,’ said Alice. ‘Do you mind if I tell my dad about it?’

  A silence.

  ‘Not sure,’ said Mark. ‘Will he cave in and tell my dad where I am?’

  ‘Not a chance,’ said Alice.

  ‘All right then,’ said Mark, ‘but no one else, OK?’

  ‘Not even Karen,’ said Alice.

  ‘Especially not Karen,’ said Mark. ‘She can’t keep any sort of secret, as you know.’

  ‘All right,’ said Alice. ‘Where are you going to be?’

  ‘Do you remember where we built that shelter in the woods round the back of McCabe’s farm?’ said Mark.

  ‘Course.’ Alice’s heart somersaulted. It was where she had gone the night of the miscarriage.

  ‘Meet me there in half an hour or so,’ said Mark.

&nbs
p; ‘What shall I bring?’ said Alice.

  ‘Food, drink, a sleeping bag, torch and a waterproof sheet of some kind if you’ve got one?’

  ‘I’ll see what I can do,’ said Alice and went back into the sitting room.

  ‘Dad,’ she said, ‘Mark’s left home for a bit.’ Keith nearly said, ‘Sensible boy’ Instead he said, ‘Why, what’s going on?’

  Alice explained, feeling relieved that she didn’t have to keep this secret too. Although Keith’s face didn’t betray any feeling, inside he seethed with hatred towards Phil whom he had always believed to be an ignorant bully.

  ‘He can always come here, you know,’ he said to Alice. ‘Thanks, Dad,’ said Alice, ‘but he doesn’t want to put you under pressure in case his dad comes here looking for him.’

  ‘I can handle Mark’s dad,’ said Keith; compared to Bighead and Wobbly, Mark’s dad was a lightweight.

  ‘Well, I’ll talk to him,’ said Alice. ‘I said I’d meet him up behind McCabe’s.’

  ‘Is he sleeping out?’ said Keith.

  ‘Yes,’ said Alice.

  ‘Better take some extra blankets,’ said Keith and turned back to the telly.

  Alice was used to scrunching about in the woods in the dark. She had never felt the fear that many people do of all the unexplained rustlings and calls from birds and foxes, and although a person from a well-lit town would describe the countryside as pitch black, it was not long before she could see where she was going and turned off the torch to conserve the batteries.

  As she neared the meeting place to see the father of her lost baby a huge longing came upon her to tell Mark what had happened, but she knew that this was not an appropriate time, given his other more pressing problems.

  ‘Mark,’ she called softly.

  ‘Here,’ came the reply and Mark’s dirty, slightly tear-stained face appeared from behind a beech tree.

  ‘Give us a hug,’ he said. ‘I bloody need one.’

  They stood there hugging for several minutes and a kiss wasn’t too distant a prospect when Mark pulled away and tensed at the sight of a pair of headlights flooding the lane nearest McCabe’s, which led down to Alice’s cottage.