by Gary Locke
“Look friend; just give us a few minutes will you? We’re trying to create a moment here?”
“I’LL GIVE YOU A MOMENT” he responded, again as loud as possible. “A MOMENT TO FUCK OFF BEFORE I GET THE WHOLE RUGBY TEAM IN HERE!”
“What a lovely way you have of using the English language,” Jeremy said, seemingly a little annoyed himself now. “Did they teach you that at this school? If they did then I know where not to send my kids.”
The rugby-topped guy seemed unfazed by Jeremy’s words and instead just stared at him before asking: “Have you got fucking CRABS?”
Jeremy looked confused before looking down and noticing his name label. He ripped it off, fairly aggressively, before he and the rugby guy continued to stare at each other.
The situation that looked like it could get extremely tense, especially if the big guy carried out his threat to bring his other, obviously also large, rugby buddies was brought to an end by Hayley who had also now arrived at the door, holding a piece of paper.
“What’s going on?” she now demanded, thankfully at a lower volume and without the potty-mouth expletives inserted by the rugby youth. “I’ve just been through our health and safety file and we actually had an inspection six weeks ago when I was off. We only ever get inspected once every twelve months, so could I ask you for some identification, please?”
Oh dear.
Gayle and Clive looked at each other and then looked at Jeremy, who looked a little flustered as; hopefully, he worked on some plan regarding what they should do next. Behind Hayley there was quite a gathering of teenagers who had all come to see what all the commotion was. From feeling completely alone in a different place and time it now felt like the whole world was watching them.
Suddenly Jeremy made a move. It seemed like whatever plan he had worked on was about to come to fruition. He stepped towards Hayley and started to take his wallet out whilst saying,
“Of course, let me show you my council ID card.”
In an attempted whispered voice towards Clive and Gayle, to which you would think almost everybody else in the youth club could probably hear anyway, he said
“You two, fire exit. Run! I’ll catch up with you!”
Gayle’s mind worked instantly and decided she wouldn’t be running for the second time today. For one, like earlier in the day, her natural response to any offer of any kind of running is: thank you very much, but NO. I’d rather boil my own eyeballs. But secondly she decided that she and Clive had not really done anything wrong and so they should just explain the situation, sort things out, and then go home – in a non-running kind of way.
Clive’s mind was a split second slower but once he had analysed the situation he made a slightly different, more panicky-headless-chickeny, decision. He grabbed Gayle by the arm, pulled her to her feet, and dragged her across the dance floor to where he slammed open the fire exit. An internal alarm began to sound as Clive pulled Gayle into the night air and urged her to run with him. She now knew she was left with little choice but to run once more.
Oh the joy!
And this time, it was very likely that there may well be a pack of huge teenage rugby players hot on their heels. What a day.....
Chapter Thirty Seven: Midnight Feast.
Clive’s mind instinctively travelled back in time and reminded him exactly what to do in this kind of situation. He had been chased through the school playgrounds countless times in the past and so his brain guided his limbs, almost muscle memory-esque, around the small alleyways and courtyards that led to the school field. It was something that he’d had to get pretty good at when he was at school. When you are being chased by dinner money thieves, and therefore your prospects of being able to eat lunch on a given day are at stake, there is a survival instinct that kicks in; enhancing skills you may otherwise not require. Anyone following tonight, especially testosterone-fuelled, freakishly large, potty-mouthed, rugby youths who are always looking for an excuse to hurl people to the floor or gouge out the odd eye here and there, would struggle to keep up. (Finally there seemed to be a payoff to being chased by those dinner money thieves and, oh yes, those other bullies that liked to pick on you for having the unfortunate privilege of wearing long trousers that were so short it seemed you were constantly mourning a cat. Sorry Clive!)
“Where are we going?” gasped Gayle in between trying to take in large gulps of air.
“Onto the field” replied Clive as they, well, ran out on to the field. “We’ll go to our corner and we can get our breath back.”
They carried on running for the extra forty metres or so that it took to reach the large oak trees that led round to the area of the school field that was hidden out of sight; the area that they both used to refer to as “our corner”. Once there, they both tentatively looked behind to see if there was an unruly rugby mob, in both their minds carrying fiery torches and pitchforks and accompanied by angry, foaming-at-the-mouth hounds from hell, chasing them down. Fortunately there wasn’t and so by quickly stepping behind the largest tree, out of sight, it seemed that they were in the clear.
Gayle bent down, breathing hard, and placed her hands on her knees in that way that many athletes do after a grueling 10,000 metres or marathon run. Not because she was feeling athletic in any way but thinking that if and when she was sick then the splash back would be minimalised the closer she was to the ground.
“Ok,” she said after about a minute, standing upright and feeling thankful that she hadn’t followed her urge to consume as many (shockingly priced) cola bottles that any loose change she had could have bought her. “Where the hell did you find this Jeremy? And why is he making us run like lunatics all the time? And please, tell me, there is no way we are ever going to do anything else he says?”
Clive, feeling a little less out of breath and putting it down to the fact that his job forced him into running around like a lunatic every day, nodded his head in agreement.
“He had things planned for tomorrow, but I think we’re done aren’t we?”
Gayle nodded her head vigorously, she had never been more certain of anything in her life. As she did she turned her head to the left to look towards “their area” and her eye was drawn to a slight, flickering light that was coming out of the darkness.
“What’s that?” she asked Clive.
“What’s what?” he asked back, just now looking in the same direction and also noticing the flickering light.
“Is there someone in our area?” asked Gayle, a little angrily. Yes it was just a small secluded part of a school field and so, of course, they had no claim to it but she couldn’t help a sense of ownership and protectiveness growing inside her. It was a special place for her and Clive, forged by special memories made by her and Clive, so what right did anyone else have of even knowing that it existed?
She couldn’t help herself. She needed to go and see who was there.
“Gayle!” Clive whispered loudly, in that way that people speak to each other during tense moments in horror movies before something really bad happens to them both, as she began to head round the corner to go and take a look. Should he follow her? In that way that people follow other people in horror movies towards something scary that ultimately ends in something really bad happening to them both? Damn it, his legs were already moving.
As he walked around the tree, half expecting to see Gayle facing the corner of some room before receiving a fatal blow to his head, Clive was pleasantly surprised. The flickering light was coming from a single candle that was softly illuminating a picnic that had been set up on a blanket on the grass.
Gayle’s smiling face turned around to look at Clive.
“Did you set this up?” she asked excitedly.
Clive still a little bemused about what was happening said, “No..... No, I didn’t.”
He looked down at the spread of food, and noticed a couple of packets of salt and vinegar Discos, some Trio chocolate bars and a Tupperware box that looked like it had some milk roll sa
ndwiches inside. Clive smiled as his first thought was how Sue always used to buy milk roll as her preferred bread, and she would always refer to it as milkloaf. This always amused Clive as he couldn’t help but think that milkloaf sounded like the lame name of some shit cover band, you’d find at your local pub, who played the entire Bat out of Hell album. As he took everything else in though, including the fact that everything was sitting on a huge tartan blanket, that had been placed exactly where he and Gayle used to have their picnics all that time ago, that feeling of déjà vu again washed over him. He and Gayle smiled at each other.
“Come on.” Gayle said excitedly, grabbing Clive’s hand and walking him over to the blanket. As they sat there, Gayle felt her heart beat a little faster as her subconscious was completely transported back to when she and Clive had made love for the very first time. Right at this place, on a night that felt very similar.
Clive sniggered to himself as his memory was tweaked by the sight of a large silver-looking hipflask that stood at the far end of the blanket near the candle. His body shuddered slightly as he remembered the volatile cocktail of mixed spirits that he would pilfer from Sue’s alcohol collection (a little bit from each bottle he could find) and bring to these picnics. He and Gayle would sip away from it feeling that blend of light intoxication and nausea that came from teenage consumption of hard liquor.
Gayle smiled as she looked at Clive and breathed in the moments; both now and from the past. Jeremy must have been listening closely to her earlier in the day and had really been able to set up something that felt so similar to the past. He had really done his homework. How did he know that she and Clive would actually run here though? Was the whole interruption in the disco room set up so that they would run here? Perhaps she had mis-judged him a little? Although Jeremy was clearly bonkers, Gayle wondered now whether there was a small part of him that was quite possibly brilliant.
“Look!”
Clive had just noticed that there was a small black towel hanging on the large oak tree just like he used to put up there hiding pictures of exotic places that he used to find. Gayle looked over and even more nostalgia surrounded her. Those pictures of golden sandy beaches and mountain tops and exotic castles and mansions in the middle of nowhere – the places they dreamed that they would go to and maybe even live. Jeremy had even recreated this. They both wondered what picture he had chosen to put behind the towel.
Gayle stood up and walked over to the tree, preparing to remove the towel, just like she would have in the past. Clive sat on the blanket and waited, also like he would have in the past, only this time he also had no idea what “special” place was hidden under the towel. When she got to the tree Gayle stopped and looked around at Clive smiling.
“Go on!” he said, just as excited as her to see what Jeremy had put up there.
Gayle waited a few more seconds letting the anticipation build up. It is something she had always tried to do with Jack when he was younger by insisting on things like them having breakfast before he opened birthday or Christmas presents so to add to the excitement; because once things are open they are open and the anticipation is gone. Clive never understood this and his philosophy was to have the surprise revealed as quickly as possible.
“Go on!” he said again, even more animated this time.
Gayle gave a cheeky smile for a few more seconds before finally reaching up and carefully removing the black towel.
They both looked, confused at first, at the picture that was staring at them from the tree. It wasn’t a post card or a picture of scenic views, mountain tops or beautiful golden beaches; it was just a photograph of a simple, terrace house. It was number five Percival road. It was their house.
Gayle felt a tear form in each of her eyes as it slowly hit her what this was. She had explained to Jeremy that Clive used to put pictures of places that they could dream to visit or even live – and this was another one. It wasn’t some exotic fantasy that was never going to be achievable but it was a picture of their home. The house that she and Clive had bought together; and put their hearts and souls into making a home. The place where they had brought up Jack. The place where lots of love had lived. And maybe still did? Was Jeremy right? Did they just have to re-find it?
Clive smiled as he too realised the message that Jeremy was trying to get across. It had been their dream home; a place where they had grown older and brought Jack up together. A place where a family had lived; a place where love had lived. He couldn’t help but focus on the picture though because it felt like a photograph that could have been taken by an estate agent. It looked to him like a photo that you see on the internet or in an estate agents window because the house is for sale. It was their home, but like a lot of important things in Clive’s life, it felt like it was slipping away. Maybe very soon another young couple would be moving in. A young couple with the same ambitions, aspirations and dreams, and love that he and Gayle had when they moved in. Hopefully they might be more successful.
“Look!”
Clive looked across to see that Gayle had sat back down and was now holding the hipflask in her left hand (that she’d maybe just noticed) and a small, black walkman in her right hand (that Clive had not previously noticed). She patted the blanket and, although feeling like he was a dog who had been summoned by its’ owner, Clive shuffled over to be right next to her.
They both looked at the walkman and the long ear-bud headphones that were attached to it. It had been a long time since either of them had seen one. In the days before streaming and MP3’s were even dreamed of, and probably even before CD’s had become popular, the humble walkman, with its cassette tapes, had seemed like the height of technology. Now it looked like it belonged in a museum somewhere. Gayle flipped the cassette holder open and saw that there was a tape in there although, after inspecting it, noticed that there was no label attached to advise what was recorded on it.
Gayle took a small sip out of the hipflask and then passed it to Clive as she grimaced because of the harshness of the taste. She was no longer an expert on hastily put together mixed spirits but could certainly taste some vodka, whisky and sherry and, as Clive took a swig from it himself, could almost feel her stomach lining being stripped away by the lethal liquid straight away.
“Wow, that’s …… horrendous!” said Clive reacting to his own intake of the mysterious liquor.
Gayle smiled. Even though she completely agreed she couldn’t help feeling the alcoholic warmth in her tummy reminded her of their previous times here in their “special place”.
“Don’t be such a big girl!” she said, taking the hipflask off him and taking another, larger swig.
She passed it back to him as she extended the ear-buds. She placed one in her right ear (after, of course, checking that it was the one marked with the “R” on it) and passed the other one to Clive. He took another mouthful of the mixed spirits, this time making sure that he kept any “big girl” reaction comments to himself, before accepting the second ear-bud and placing it in his left ear. To make sure that neither of their buds were pulled out they had to bring their heads tight together, just like when they had listened to music in the past. Clive waited patiently, knowing that Gayle would soak in the moment for an open-ended amount of time before pressing play. He closed his eyes and, after trying to ignore the foul taste in his mouth, started to enjoy the warm feeling in his own stomach as he waited for Gayle to start the walkman.
After a good thirty seconds of sitting there, her head almost leaning against Clive’s, Gayle was ready and so pressed play on the walkman. It clunked down in that familiar way after needing a good, hard press of the thumb. She closed her eyes too.
Immediately they both recognised the soft keyboard melody intro to one of their favourite songs: Bad English – When I See You Smile.
As John Waite began to sing the opening lines Gayle said “hold me” and she snuggled into Clive’s arms, just like she used to; comfortably where she fitted.
Sometimes I wond
er how I’d ever make it through,
Through this world without having you,
I just wouldn’t have a clue.
Clive tightened his arms around Gayle and breathed in her sweet perfume and, after not feeling like this for years, now had that special and content feeling again just like he had in the youth club disco about fifteen minutes earlier. He could feel butterflies in his stomach again. Maybe it was because his stomach was seriously contemplating ejecting that cocktail of spirits or, more likely, because of the excitement of the moment. He held Gayle tight but knew that very soon he was going to turn his head to face her, even if it meant their earphones coming out, because he wanted to kiss her; he needed to kiss her.
Gayle let the music fill her head and allowed the moment to take over her. It was amazing, again, how a song, in the right circumstances, can completely take you to another time and place. All she could think of was her and Clive in love and, specifically, the first time they’d had sex; right here. She was almost breathless, excited at the prospect that it might just happen again. She wanted it to happen again and knew that it would feel just as special as that first time; all over again. (Of course she would probably take the time to check for the nearest doc leaves first this time.)
Clive decided he would let the first chorus play out and then would “make his move”; a thought process that made him feel like an awkward teenager all over again.
When I See You Smile,
I Can Face The World,
You Know I Can Do Anything,
When I See You Smile,
I See A Ray Of Light,
I See It Shining Right Through The Rain,
When I See You Smile,
Baby, When I See You Smile..... At Me.
This was it.
Clive rather awkwardly moved his body to get his face in range of being able to kiss Gayle. He caught her by surprise, making her jump, and she jerked her body sideways, leaving her well out of the reach of Clive’s lips and removing both their earphones in the process. They both laughed at each other as Gayle being startled had, in turn, startled Clive, before staring and smiling at one other. It felt like a pleasant and warm moment. Before any thoughts of resurrecting an attempted kiss could develop however, Clive’s attention was caught by the muffled sounds of someone shouting, that was slowly getting louder.