Just Around the Corner

by Gilda O'Neill

  Inside, a gaggle of boys was standing by the single cracked sink cheering, as Michael and his adversary pummelled and kicked one another around the wet, tiled floor.

  ‘Right, you lot, out!’ commanded Molly. ‘And I mean the lot of yer.’

  The fight halted immediately, as did the roaring of the audience. As one, the boys made for the safety of the door.

  ‘Not you, Michael Mehan,’ boomed Molly, blocking his way. ‘Or you,’ she said, pointing at Timmy who was sneaking forward behind the crowd. ‘Stop him, Liz.’

  When all the others had left, Molly and Liz frogmarched the two boys out of the lavatory, through the musty aisles of the cinema and out into the street, collecting their shopping as they went, without a word to, or from, the doorman.

  They didn’t notice, but the elderly man treated them to a smart salute; minding shopping bags was a small price to pay for being saved the job of emptying the cinema of a bunch of over-excited, toffee-covered little boys, determined to lie low until the next house began.

  Squinting in the bright winter sun, Molly ran her hand distractedly through her hair. ‘Will yer look at the state of yer, Michael. As if Mum ain’t got enough of the hump with us all as it is. And fighting in front of Timmy and all.’ She rapped her knuckles on his skull. ‘Whatever’s got into that stupid head o’ your’n?’

  ‘You wouldn’t wanna know if I told yer,’ shouted Michael defiantly. ‘And anyway, Timmy was telling me to. Bloody girls, yer don’t know nothing. Nothing.’

  Well, I might be a girl, but I know something. I reckon Mum’s had enough of you two. And I tell yer what, I think she should put the pair of yers in one of them homes, that’s what. That’d teach yer. And, when I tell her what yer’ve been up to – and I just might, yer know – well, I wouldn’t bank on getting nothing on Christmas morning, either of yer.’

  The thought of a toyless Christmas made Timmy burst into self-pitying tears.

  ‘Aw, shut up can’t yer?’ Molly shoved a handkerchief at him. ‘What a flaming day.’

  ‘It was over you anyway,’ said Michael, with a recklessness he immediately regretted.

  ‘Do what?’ Molly grabbed him by the shoulders. ‘How d’yer mean, over me?’

  He’d done it now, he might as well tell her everything. ‘He reckoned he’d seen yer. With a boy. Over Greenwich. And he said yer was kissing him. In front of everyone. So I bashed him up.’

  ‘And I told him to and all,’ wailed Timmy, wiping his snotty nose on the back of his arm, leaving a silvery trail on his sleeve. ‘They was laughing at yer, Moll. And saying things. I didn’t understand ’em, but Michael said they was rude.’

  Molly looked at Liz, silently asking with her eyes if she was really hearing this.

  Liz rolled her own eyes in reply then turned to Michael. She flashed him a winning smile and asked softly, ‘It was that kid from Upper North Street yer was walloping, wasn’t it, love?’

  Michael nodded miserably. ‘Yeah. I hate him.’

  ‘Fancy you listening to stories like that,’ she went on. ‘As if your Molly’d be daft enough to go kissing boys right in front of anyone, especially the likes of him.’

  Molly felt herself flush crimson as Michael thought about what Liz was saying; his usually cheeky face was pulled into a tight frown of concentration.

  After what seemed to Molly like an age, he said, ‘But he’s said it before. And he said it was true.’

  Liz laughed lightly as though it were all one big joke. ‘Course he did. He was trying to get yer at it, wasn’t he? Yer know what he’s like. Little sod.’ She brought her hands together in a loud clap. ‘Here, tell yer what, I bet if you and Timmy promise Molly that yer’ll both be good and that yer’ll say no more about it, I’ll bet she won’t say nothing to yer mum about yer fighting. And yer know what that’ll mean, don’t yer?’

  ‘We’ll get our Christmas stockings?’ sniffled Timmy, his big blue eyes wide and watery. ‘And we won’t go to no home?’

  Liz ruffled his red curls. ‘Yeah, that’s right, darling, course it does.’

  ‘We won’t say no more, will we, Mick?’ Timmy said anxiously.

  Michael nodded grudgingly. ‘I was only doing it for you, Moll,’ he muttered.

  ‘That’s all settled then,’ said Lizzie, handing some of the smaller bags to Michael and Timmy. ‘Now come on, yer can help us carry this shopping home. Yer mum’ll be wondering where we are.’ The boys took their loads and walked ahead, whispering to one another so that Molly and Liz couldn’t hear them.

  ‘Ta, Liz,’ said Molly, letting out a long slow breath as she heaved the heavy bag of potatoes on to her arm. ‘I really thought I’d had it then. Yer know, my life is definitely getting too complicated for my liking.’

  ‘Well, you’re the one who knows what to do about it,’ Liz replied wearily.

  ‘To be truthful, Liz, I’ve known I’ve gotta finish with one of ’em for ages now, ’cos yer right what yer said before: if I don’t, I’m gonna get meself in all sorts o’ trouble.’

  ‘How, Moll?’ chipped in Michael, stopping and looking over his shoulder, his nosiness overcoming his common sense that had told him to keep his head down and his mouth shut. ‘How yer gonna get yerself in trouble?’

  He ducked just too late.

  Molly might have done better to have tried slapping some sense into herself rather than into her little brother, because that night when she met Bob, just as she had done every Saturday for nearly six months now, all her good intentions went straight out of the window.

  Her plan, worked out in her bedroom while she was getting ready, was to tell Bob she wouldn’t be able to see him for a few weeks. She would then say the same thing to Simon the next day. Her idea being that she would find out which one she missed the most, and that would be the one she really wanted to go out with. Simple. But when she saw Bob she forgot all about her plan.

  The trouble was, he hadn’t only smiled at her in the special way that he had when they met up that night, he had also told her what he was getting her for Christmas.

  Bob had paid for her, Molly Katherine Mehan, to have a proper sitting at Griffiths’, the portrait photographer’s studio in Armagh Road. Then, to top it all, he had said that he wanted her to have her photo done, so that he could show everyone a picture of her, his girl, then they could see for themselves how beautiful she was. After that, she could hardly tell him she didn’t want to see him for a while, could she? She didn’t even slap down his hand, as she usually did, when he cupped it over her breast while they were kissing and cuddling in the back row of the pictures. And she was glad she hadn’t . . .

  That night, as Molly turned off her little bedside lamp, pulled the covers up over her shoulders, and closed her eyes, she could still feel Bob’s hand caressing her. Even though she was alone, she smiled shyly at the thought of it; no one had ever done that to her before. A wave of pleasure flooded through her body.

  She sighed with contentment: her worries were over. Why shouldn’t she go on seeing the pair of them, she reasoned to herself, if nobody found out and nobody got hurt? Liz had sworn she hadn’t said a thing to Danny, and Nanna always kept her secrets. And anyway, if things ever did become difficult, or maybe if Bob wanted to see more of her – and who could say he wouldn’t now that she had let him touch her like that – she could always tell Simon that she couldn’t see him any more. And the way she was feeling about Bob right now, it wouldn’t be much of a hardship dumping Simon.

  The next morning, Molly was up and dressed for Mass before anyone else was even awake. Bob Jarvis wanted a photograph of her because she was beautiful and he wanted to show his friends!

  She felt so full of herself: happy and glad to be alive. She was bubbling over with energy and had peeled a saucepan full of potatoes and had almost finished preparing a basin of sprouts by the time the others dragged themselves, yawning, into the kitchen for their breakfast.

  As far as Molly Katherine Mehan was concerned, all was right with the
world, and, amazingly for once, it seemed that the rest of her family felt the same way. Sean, of course, was a little bit humpy, but the others were as chirpy as a cage full of canaries.

  Molly smiled to herself as she pulled on her coat and hat ready to leave for Mass; she had known there was nothing to worry about. Things really did have a way of working themselves out for the best.

  When they got home from church, the improved mood, even more remarkably, continued.

  As the family sat round the kitchen table waiting for Pat to get home so that they could eat their Sunday midday meal together, Katie sang to herself. Taking a dish full of crispy golden roast potatoes from the oven, she didn’t care that she didn’t have a huge joint of sirloin to carve up for her family, there were plenty of vegetables to fill their plates and to stretch what meat they did have. She was just pleased as punch that, for whatever reason, things seemed to be like they used to be: the little ones chattering away and laughing, Molly having a joke with Nora, Danny with his nose stuck in the paper – at least he wasn’t moaning! – and Sean playing with Rags, teasing him with a block of wood on a piece of string. Katie presumed it was the Christmas spirit getting into everyone; even the most miserable of souls couldn’t resist Christmas.

  As she put the roasting dish on to the table, Pat arrived home, looking tired out but happy, and red-cheeked from the cold December air. He hadn’t been to Mass with them, but had been pushing his way though the crowds in Club Row, as he did every year, in his search for bargain bits and pieces to put in his family’s Christmas stockings. As well as the bags full of secret things he was carrying, he had a huge aspidistra in an elaborately painted china art pot propped in the crook of his arm.

  He bent down and, putting the enormous plant on the table in front of where Katie was trying to dish up, he kissed her noisily on the forehead.

  ‘I was gonna save this for Christmas morning, darling,’ he said, pointing proudly at the glossy, dark green leaves, ‘but I didn’t think I could hide it from yer.’

  ‘I think I might just have noticed it,’ grinned Katie, peering through the foliage at her family. ‘But yer shouldn’t have wasted yer money on me.’

  ‘What’s the loan club for if it ain’t for splashing out at Christmas?’

  Pat kissed her again, this time gently on the tip of her nose, making Timmy and Michael slide under the table with embarrassment, then disappeared upstairs on the pretext of putting his coat and cap away in the wardrobe, which was something he never did, so everyone, except young Timmy, knew he was actually hiding their presents.

  Katie continued dishing up slices of greasy, stuffed breasts of lamb that she had spent the afternoon before boning out, rolling and tying with lengths of string.

  ‘Cor,’ said Pat, coming back into the kitchen, settling himself at the table and pulling his plate towards him. ‘I could smell this right upstairs. Handsome.’

  ‘When yer was upstairs hiding our presents, d’yer mean?’ beamed Michael.

  Timmy frowned at his brother then turned to his dad. ‘What’s Michael mean, Dad?’

  Pat looked puzzled. ‘Dunno, little ’un.’ He turned to Michael. ‘Presents, yer say? How d’yer mean, Michael? Father Christmas is the one what does all that.’ He held his hand to his face, hiding his eyes from Timmy and then winked at Michael. ‘Ain’t that right, son? Ain’t that what yer mean?’

  Michael copied his father, hiding his face from Timmy and winking broadly, something he had only recently learnt how to do without holding his eyelid down with his finger. ‘That’s right, Dad. I was only having a laugh.’

  Timmy looked relieved; he didn’t even lose his happy smile when Sean tutted bad-temperedly at all the foolishness, but at least, Katie was glad to note, he had the decency not to say anything and ruin it for Timmy.

  Surprisingly, it was Danny who infuriated Katie, by spoiling the happy atmosphere.

  Timmy had just done as his mother had asked, and had said grace, remembering to speak nicely and not to sniff once, and Pat had commented on how lucky they should count themselves to have a good meal on their table and a loving family to share it with during times that were still hard, if not worse, for so many.

  ‘Lucky?’ Danny said, shaking his head as though his father was an ignorant child who knew nothing of the world. ‘How can yer say we’re lucky? We’re having to struggle every single day just to try and keep things together. What sort o’ luck d’yer call that?’

  Pat finished chewing his mouthful of lamb, then said slowly, ‘We’re more fortunate than most round here, son.’

  ‘What, you only working every other day, if it’s a good week. You call that luck?’

  Nora nodded and crossed herself. ‘We should thank God for what we have, Danny. Sure, have yer seen the look of that poor Mr Milton?’

  ‘Huh!’ sneered Danny. ‘Bring it on ’emselves, their sort.’

  Katie stopped eating and stared at her son. ‘Would you get on with that dinner?’

  Pat was frowning. ‘“Their sort”?’ he said, as much to himself as to Danny.

  ‘Yeah, their sort. The sort what won’t help ’emselves by getting up off their lazy . . .’ Danny nearly said arses, but changed his mind. ‘. . . backsides and get things moving. I’ve said it before but people are too stupid to listen. We wanna start copying Germany or this country’ll never get back on its feet. They’ll have everything, and what’ll we have? Nothing, that’s what. And unless we do something about it soon, that’s all we’ll deserve and all.’

  Pat wasn’t sure where to start; not only was his son talking the rubbish he knew drove his dad to distraction, but he was interrupting the Sunday dinner after his mother had gone to so much trouble for them all. And she had been so happy. It was for Katie’s sake that Pat did his best to control his temper.

  ‘There’s proper ways for people to go about getting what they want, boy,’ he said.

  Danny threw up his hands. ‘That’s exactly what I mean. We’ve been sitting back for too long. Things have gotta change in the East End. We’ve let ’em get away with it for too long. We’ve gotta act. Now.’

  Katie was more than ready to put in her own two penn’orth to the argument, whether it meant spoiling the Sunday dinner or not, but Pat beat her to it.

  ‘Exactly how d’yer mean?’ he asked.

  ‘There’s plenty can be done.’

  Sean, without saying a word, stretched his arm out between Danny and his dad and reached for the potatoes.

  Pat pushed the pan roughly towards Sean with the back of his hand, as he continued to speak to Danny. ‘What sort of things? Having another general strike, maybe?’

  ‘Do me a favour,’ Danny sneered contemptuously. ‘You and yer union meetings. What good does all that do? Proper action, that’s what’s needed. Real politics. Getting rid of the people what cause all the trouble in the first place.’

  ‘And what people would they be then?’

  ‘Scum.’

  Slowly, Pat put his knife and fork together on his plate. ‘I asked yer what people yer meant. Yer wouldn’t mean the people they write about in them leaflets, would yer? The leaflets what them no-good filth hand out about Jewish people?’

  Danny lifted his chin and looked challengingly at his father. ‘I bet you ain’t even seen ’em. That’s you all over, that is, talking about things yer know nothing about.’

  ‘And what you’re talking about ain’t nothing to do with no politics, boy.’

  ‘Ain’t it?’ Danny asked insolently. ‘What would you know? You don’t know nothing. I’ve been talking to a bloke who knows more’n you’ll ever know.’

  Katie could hold her tongue no longer. ‘Danny! That’s enough. That’s no way to talk to yer father. I won’t have it. Especially at me own table.’

  ‘No, yer all right, Katie. Let him speak,’ Pat insisted, still sounding calm. ‘I’m interested in hearing what he’s got to say.’ He held out his hand, gesturing for Danny to speak. ‘Well? Come on then, who is this
bloke who knows so much?’

  All eyes were on Danny. ‘That don’t matter,’ he said, smiling knowingly. ‘What matters is that I’m seeing things straight for the first time.’ He gave a sneering little laugh. ‘I thought yer’d be pleased. It was you what always wanted me to take an interest in things. So I have, and now I’m just speaking out about what’s right, that’s all.’

  Michael opened his mouth to say something, but Nora stopped him; she jabbed her finger towards his plate. ‘Just eat,’ she said under her breath. For once, Michael was sensible enough to do as he was told.

  ‘I’d be right interested to know what yer’ve got to complain about.’ Pat was leaning right across the table. ‘Joe Palmer’s done you proud. He’s given yer every opportunity a young feller could want. He’s made himself a good business out of carting, even during hard times like these, and if yer play yer cards right and keep yer trap shut so that yer can learn something from someone with a bit of sense, yer might be able to do the same one day.’

  Danny leant back in his chair and folded his arms defiantly across his chest. ‘I’ve been thinking about turning me job up, if yer must know.’

  ‘You what?’

  ‘I don’t like the idea of working for a didicoy.’

  Pat whacked his hand down on the table, making them all flinch, but no one except Danny said a word. They just listened, shocked at what they were hearing as, eyes shining, Danny launched into a speech about what was wrong with the East End and how it was all the fault of people he described as ‘filthy outsiders’.

  What Danny said was completely at odds with everything that the Mehan children had been brought up to believe in by their parents and their nanna, but it was the way in which he was speaking that really bewildered them all. He was talking as though he had learnt a speech in the schoolroom, repeating it as though it was the five times table. But his words were nothing to do with how many fives made fifty; these were words of hatred.