Blitz Next Door

by Cathy Forde

  “Aye right,” Dunny snorted. “What’s it really?”

  “Peter Smeaton.”

  “Peter Smeaton?” Dunny pursed his lips as if he was deciding whether or not he approved of the name. “Anyone call you Pete? Cos I’m going to.”

  “Everyone except Jenny. She doesn’t talk yet.”

  “Sister?” Dunny clucked at Pete with pity.

  “It’s OK. Baby.”

  “You just wait till she starts.” Dunny shook his head. “She’ll never shut her trap. Girls in my class, man? Yak, yak, yak.” Dunny sighed. “Easter holidays. Peace and quiet. Two more days. Bring it on.”

  “I don’t go to any school now,” Pete said.

  “Why carry your school bag about like a swotto then?”

  When Dunny tugged at the backpack, Pete wished he hadn’t bothered bringing it down to the den. What would Dunny say about his football-figure collection? Would he laugh? Think he was daft coming down to play with them alone?

  Would his new Scottish pal be his ex-pal?

  Chapter 7

  Pete shouldn’t have worried.

  “Oh man! Classics: Henrik Larsson, Roy Keane, Pelé… man!”

  As soon as Peter tipped out the first few figures from his bag, Dunny delved into the furthest corner of the shelter and dragged out a box.

  Best, Messi, Dalglish, Charlton… Pete couldn’t believe it. Dunny had a whole team of moulded plastic football stars. This was fate.

  “Let’s have a first-round play-off.” Dunny was already unrolling a felt football pitch. “My pals only want to play Nintendo Wii FIFA. Indoors.” He was pinning the felt’s corners down with stones he scooped from another box. “Pity it’s so dark.”

  “Not any more.”

  Pete flicked on Dad’s torch under Dunny’s chin. With the floor of the den lit up clearly for the first time, Pete could see that much of the space under the benches stored boxes, all full of plastic football players.

  “These yours too?” asked Pete.

  Dunny nodded without looking up. “Stash them here so Wee Stookie doesn’t muddle them up. Doesn’t come down here on his own. Too spooky for him, whooooo.”

  Dunny placed a tiny football in the centre of his pitch.

  “Must sneak down sometimes, though,” he said, “cos my teams keep getting messed about. Dead annoying, so it is.”

  “Maybe someone else is playing with them,” Pete said. “I’d sneak in if I knew all this was down here: Man U, Barcelona…”

  “…Brazil 2014. That’s going to be a collector’s item. And that one…” Dunny was pointing at a tub tucked almost out of sight.

  Pete reached in to drag it out and then yelped. Leapt back. A net of cobwebs was spun across the heads of the Celtic Seville Team 2003, and when he yanked his hand away, sticky web was left clinging to his fingers. Pete had to force himself not to panic as he scrabbled in his rucksack.

  “Cobwebs.” Pete shuddered, cleaning his fingers with the cloth he’d brought. Dunny was gawping at him, mouth open. Pete didn’t care. “Creep me out.” His heart was racing.

  “Ni-gel. Canny hurt you,” Dunny said, but not in an unkind way. “Hang on.”

  One by one Dunny picked up each Seville player and screwed his plastic head clean against the front of his top. “All gone,” he said, checking over the figures as he lined them up. “Hey, but see if you hate cobwebs that bad?” He puffed a tiny fly from Paul Lambert’s shoulder. “Man, no way you want to touch the notebook I found. Pure covered in them. Dead beasties squished between the pages. I just picked it up…” Dunny was pinching his nose with one arm and holding the other away from him the same way Dad carried Jenny’s really dirty nappies to the bin.

  “I’d’ve chucked it,” Pete said, hoping Dunny had. “Why didn’t you?”

  Dunny rearranged his back line before he answered. “Well, it was written in here,” he said.

  “So what?” shrugged Pete.

  “That’s what Mum said. Should’ve seen her face when I brought it into the house. ‘Throw that out, it’s filthy!’ You’d’ve thought it was a dead rat or something. Right let’s go: kick-off.” Dunny slid Henrik Larsson up to the ball and flicked him.

  “Straight in the net. One–nil. That’s what I’m talkin’ about!” Dunny jumped to his feet and side-skipped a whooping lap of honour round the den.

  Pete felt robbed. “Could at least have blown a whistle.”

  “Sorry.” Dunny was reaching under the bench again.

  For a whistle; good, Pete was thinking.

  Instead Dunny held up one of the freezer bags people cram their toiletries into at airport security.

  “Didn’t throw the notebook out because it was written in here.” Dunny let the bag swing in the torchlight. “During the Second World War.”

  Pete didn’t know why, but a shiver ran through him. “How d’you know?”

  “Cos I’ve read it.” Dunny unzipped the bag and let the book inside slide to the floor. “And she’s written her address – the girl who wrote this.”

  Dunny was opening the notebook with the tip of his little finger. It had a cardboard cover, its original colour difficult to guess in the weak yellow torchlight. A funny smell rose from the pages. Old book smell. Damp. Sour. Mysterious.

  “There.” Dunny set the torch on the edge of the bench so its beam hit the inside cover. The rest of the den, Pete realised, seemed to have grown very dark and shadowy even though it was full daylight outside.

  “14 Cairns Road, Clydebank.” Dunny’s finger traced a single line of handwriting. And as he spoke, Pete’s scalp prickled.

  “I’m number 12,” Pete whisp ered. There is no number 14 any more. “So whoever wrote this was my neighbour.”

  “Not after the Clydebank Blitz she wasn’t,” Dunny said matter-of-factly. He didn’t seem nearly as spooked as Pete was beginning to feel; crouched in near-dark, in an old bomb shelter, looking at the notebook of a girl who… a girl who…

  The memory of that sobbing Pete had heard through his bedroom wall was replaying in his head.

  That girl?

  Was it?

  Should he tell Dunny?

  Dunny who he’d just met and who probably already thought he was soft because of the cobwebs?

  Dunny who was busy picking through Pete’s football figures, turning them over in the torchlight, checking their condition, muttering, “You were mince in that Cup Final by the way, Keano. And Beckham, don’t be an old diva if I bring you on in the second half.”

  Maybe not yet.

  Instead, Pete took a closer look at the notebook. He flicked a few pages; mostly blank, all of them stained with watermarks the colour of weak tea. When the book fell open on the last page with writing on it, the paper was so spotted with damp he could hardly read the words:

  Horrible in here tonig—

  The rest of the word was missing.

  It sounds like the end of the world —tside. Explosion after expl—

  “Tricky, innit?” Dunny said, lifting the notebook closer to the torch beam, tilting it this way and that. “And wild. Writing in the middle of an air raid. You’ll read it better outside. Later though maybe?”

  When Dunny returned the notebook to the bag, Pete was almost glad. It would be easier to read in daylight. Nothing to do with the handwriting.

  He’d had enough of the shelter for now. He’d even lost interest in the football match, and was thinking of saying he was offski and he’d better bring Dad’s torch back when Dunny picked it up.

  “Come see what else she wrote.” Dunny was pointing the light at the far wall of the shelter.

  A verse was written there in thick black pen. There were drawings all around the words, a border of funny little characters: gnomes, animals, chubby fairies with open wings and wizards with wands, dolls, boys with cheeky faces that reminded Pete of the cover of the Just William books Mum used to read him… He whistled. “Wish I could draw like that.”

  “Too right,” said Dunny. “There’s mo
re in here.” He tapped the notebook. “That’s how I know she did them.”

  Pete hunkered down to take a closer look at the drawings. They really were good. Really good. The eyes staring out at him shone with life and personality.

  “Poem’s alright too,” Dunny said, as if he could read Pete’s mind. Then he cleared his throat, and chimed:

  “Adolf Hitler don’t strike here,

  Take your bombs and disappear!

  You are hateful, you are bad,

  When we beat you, you’ll be mad.”

  While Dunny was reading, Pete followed the words. He noticed a line leading away from the ‘A’ of ‘Adolf’. It ended in an arrow pointing to a simple cartoon face of Hitler himself. A thick black cross had been scored through it over and over by an angry hand, and underneath it all was written:

  by Beth Winters. Age 11. 13th March 1941.

  “Is that…?” When Pete looked at the notebook, Dunny nodded.

  “And that,” Dunny ran his nail under the date on the wall, “was the night of the Clydebank Blitz. Nearly a thousand people killed. And you,” Dunny swung the light into Pete’s face and held it there, “won’t even have heard of it, even though today’s the anniversary.”

  “Is it? Only heard of the London Blitz.” Pete tried to see the drawings again through the floaters the torch beam had set dancing before his eyes.

  “Don’t worry, Nigel. You’ll learn all about our Blitz in school here. Everybody does. Too right.”

  “Will I learn about her?” Pete traced the name on the wall. Beth Winters. “Was she one of the…?”

  “Well, she wasn’t in the house when she wrote this.” Dunny stared at the notebook. “So maybe she…”

  The boys looked at each other. Pete shivered. He ran his own finger under the date on the wall.

  “Hey,” Dunny tucked the notebook back under the bench, “fancy a bounce?”

  Pete didn’t need to be asked twice, though he decided he did need to check in with Mum first, and definitely eat his banana for energy.

  Chapter 8

  The back door didn’t open when he tried it, so Pete hurried round to the front to try the bell. He was taking a shortcut through the bomb crater. It wasn’t just quicker, it was far more exciting, scrambling down. Pete had to watch his legs didn’t run away from themselves as he slithered over the uneven ground keeping tight hold of his banana.

  So he gasped and nearly lost his balance as he skidded to a downhill stop when a figure stepped out in front of him.

  Where did you come from? Pete might have said if his mouth hadn’t been full. Because this old woman. Well, she’d sort of just… appeared. And there she was, standing above Pete, peering down into the crater as though he wasn’t even there.

  “Hello,” Pete gulped, but the woman didn’t seem to hear, or if she did, ignored him. Her gaze lay beyond Pete, eyes darting here and there as if she was searching for something.

  Or maybe she was lost. Out of a home. Gone a-wandering in more ways than one. There’d been a few characters in Pete’s old block back in London like that. A couple in the flat above who collected stray cats and were always being brought back home by the community police. Before Jenny, Mum kept a check on the pair of them, knocking on their door with home baking. This woman leaning over the crater – too far over to be safe – was about the same age. Pretty ancient, and a bit frail-looking too, Pete decided; a tiny body hidden beneath the floaty bluebell blue layers she was wearing.

  “Careful you don’t fall in! It’s slippy,” Pete called up to the woman. Now he was thinking she was deaf, because she carried on peering over his shoulder, bobbing her head to see round Pete. The tips of her feet were over the edge of the crater. She was sliding.

  “Oi!” Pete’s warning bounced off the steep walls around him.

  The woman stepped back, seemed to notice Pete for the first time. She didn’t say anything, though, just pointed down at his hand and nodded, a slow smile of delight lighting up her face.

  “What is it?” Pete looked at his banana, half eaten. Poor old lady, bananas herself.

  “D’you want a bite?” he asked, watching his footing as he started to clamber the side of the crater. “Don’t come down, I’ll come to you. It’s too steep,” he warned without looking up. This was definitely one of those situations when even Mum would have to admit having his own mobile phone would be handy. He’d text:

  Help. Woman about 2 fall in2 crater

  And Mum or Dad would be straight down to take over and make sure this poor old…

  Except she’d gone. Disappeared in the seconds it took Pete to scramble to the top on the crater.

  No way!

  Pete swung right and left, squinting through the garden for the bluebell colour of her clothes.

  A person doesn’t just vanish. “That’s plain spooky.” The sound of Pete’s own whisper admitting this was enough to set him sprinting to the front of his house.

  “MUM!”

  Pete thumped the door as well as ringing the bell. “Open up! MUUU…”

  Mum got an earful of “…UUM!” when she flung open the door. Beyond her, upstairs, Jenny was creating at the top of her lungs.

  “Well done, Pete! Just got her off.” Mum’s voice cracked. There were tears in her eyes. “You never think, do you?”

  Pete could feel his own eyes prickling. This wasn’t fair.

  “Couldn’t get in the back door, and there’s this old woman hanging about outside and I didn’t know what to do…”

  “What woman?” Mum stepped into the street. She followed Pete to the edge of the crater. She looked left and right. “What woman, Pete?” Mum was frowning now, anger turning to concern.

  “I don’t see anyone, love.”

  Chapter 9

  “Sorry, pet.”

  Mum was squeezing Pete in one of the biggest hugs he’d had from her in a long time. She kept hugging even though Jenny sounded as if she was auditioning for the lead role in Scream: The Baby From Hell.

  “You were doing the right thing, coming to tell me about the poor woman. She’ll have realised she wandered into the wrong garden when she saw you.” Mum let Pete go with a kiss and was tramping back upstairs. “Was trying to get Madam down before the furniture arrives,” she was sighing when a parping horn drowned her out.

  That meant Pete ended up on Jenny duty while Mum directed the removal men and made them mugs of tea. He kept her upstairs, watching memories of his old life being carried into his new one from the front bedroom window. He jiggled Jenny, who arched and wrestled and shrieked in his arms until she conked out, exhausted at last. With great care Pete laid Jenny down in her cot and tiptoed out of the room and back downstairs.

  “Don’t suppose I can go and play now? I was invited by this boy in the next garden.” Pete knew he shouldn’t have bothered asking, even though Jenny was in her cot. The hallway was already cluttered with furniture from the old flat.

  “Could really do with all hands on deck, son.” Dad passed Pete a couple of kitchen chairs.

  Mum added, “And, anyway, I’d need to check it was OK with your friend…”

  “Dunny.”

  “…your friend Dunny’s mum.”

  “And I’d like to check this Dunny fella out first too,” Dad chipped in, just as the bell rang.

  “Excuse me?” piped a voice from the doorstep.

  Even though the front door was wide open and Dunny, bobbing from one foot to another, could see Pete quite clearly, he asked, “Is Peter there and can he come out, please? My mum says he’s welcome.”

  Dunny was talking in such a proper voice, Pete snorted with laughter as he pushed past Dad. “And you called me Nigel?”

  “Sorry, son, Pete won’t be out for a bit, but you,” Dad squeezed Dunny’s skinny bicep, “are more than welcome to come in and lend a muscle or two so long as your mum won’t mind. There’ll be a fish supper in it.”

  ***

  It was non-stop for the next few hours, Dunny more tha
n happy to muck in, “And a lot stronger than you look, wee man,” as Dad kept telling him. By some miracle, Jenny stayed asleep. This was despite Dunny sneaking up to her cot every few minutes to stroke her tiny hand and pat her cheek to check if she was awake yet.

  “Thought you didn’t like girls,” Pete had to keep reminding him.

  “She’s a wee princess, but.”

  It was Dunny who helped Pete carry his desk and his mattress upstairs. Then they fetched the crate marked ‘Pete’ from the sitting room.

  “This is a blast. I’d like to go into the removal business, in and out of people’s houses, checking out all their mad stuff.”

  “Just be a burglar then.” Pete was shoogling his desk against the window. It fitted exactly where he’d hoped it would.

  “I can see the whole garden from here,” Pete said, “plus the den.”

  “And my place. Look. There’s Wee Stookie. Hey!”

  Dunny had the window flung open before Pete had even picked out the trampoline in the garden beyond his hedge. On it, a mini version of Dunny bounced, his arms windmilling in the air, whooping.

  “Hey, Pee-the-bed. I see you. Lookie, Stookie.” Dunny leaned out the window and croaked. Pete watched as Wee Stookie bounced this way and that, trying to figure where the creepy voice was coming from.

  “Over here! Lookie, Stookie!” Dunny waved and yelled in his own voice. “There’s Mum too, hanging out her big knickers. Mu-um!”

  This time, when Dunny called, Wee Stookie spotted him and waved. So did a dark-haired woman, flapping the towel she was holding. Wee Stookie kept waving, bouncing higher and twisting himself around.

  “Look at meeeeee!” Pete heard him cry, although that proved impossible because he never bounced up again. From Dunny’s garden a woman’s scream pierced the air.

  “Trouble!” Dunny was clattering downstairs before Pete even realised something was wrong. “My fault again,” Dunny shouted back.

  From the window Pete watched his friend tripping and stumbling through the undergrowth – “I’m coming, Mark. You alright?”