CHAPTER 25
It didn’t happen that year, though, and not for several more. I was still too terrified of the place, too worried that someone might shout “Boy in a dress! Billy Wells in a dress!”, so we left it and left it until I thought Mam and Dad had forgotten.

I never did. How on Earth could I?

We lived as gypsies for most of the year, anchored to the rest of the world by a few fixed points, at Druridge Bay for one, where I spent my time doing schoolwork in a dip among the dunes as the marram moved in waves and little drifts of fine sand broke across the pages. That boy in a dress seemed a lifetime away, even though parts of my body continually reminded me of where he had gone. I was sixteen now, and more than settled into the life I should always have had, but Lorraine was pushing me hard.

Maths and geography; history and general science; English, language and literature. She had called in some favours in Cannock, and we had a syllabus of sorts, or at least the set texts for the last of those subjects, and there was a school in Ashington that allowed for ‘itinerants’ to sit in on the Ordinary-level General Certificate of Education exams, which were to take place just before we were due to leave the Milburn farm. I lay on a towel, in a one-piece costume, the sun warm on my back in the stillness of my little hollow, the long grass sighing over the hiss of the sand grains, and I understood.

Ken, Dad, had been so clear that first Winter in his advice about life on the road, and I would need formal qualifications for that, but Mam had played the trump cards.

“This is about the rest of your life, love. It’s like the music. Ken and me, well, we’ve shown you what we could, music-wise, but there’ll be stuff you’ll find for yourself, new stuff we’ve never heard of. Something of your own, not something we gave you”

I started to argue, and she just smiled, holding a finger to my lips.

“And when you find the new stuff, love, you bring it back and share it with us. Agreed?”

“Agreed”

“Anyway, this is all about your future, as I said. These bits of paper can make a lot of difference, trust me on that one. We both know, me and him, that you will do your best, so no worries there. Graham’s lending us a car. Be a bit easier in the town than the van, so no worries, no push, just do us proud”

The school was a huge place, far bigger than the one little Billy had attended, and I was conscious of the stares as I walked in. School uniform met jeans, leather jacket and my latest denim cut-off, as I had outgrown the first. I still kept it in a drawer in Cannock, but Ken’s original name tag had been transferred across, along with my collection of metal badges. I was at the school three days running, and each day, after Loz had dropped me off, I had to walk in the gates past groups of uniformed locals, many of whom muttered “Tinker!” or “Fucking gyppo bitch”. There was always at least one call of “How much for a quickie?”, but Mam and Dad had warned me in great length and detail.

Three days, and it would be done. Three days, and I could abandon all the embryonic straights to their sad little lives. Three days in which my evening would be spent on a beach more beautiful than their crippled imaginations would ever realise. Three days.

So I sat on a plastic chair behind a little table, and I answered questions on quadratic equations and Queensland, King Lear and kinetic energy, and I kept my head down as I worked and walked to and from the car, and none of the bastards ended up sliced open because my own blade was left at the farm.

Three days, and done. They had our address in Cannock, they had my name as Deborah Petrie, and I was finally free of organised education. I settled into the passenger seat of Graham’s car just as the first egg hit the back window. Lorraine drove us away smartly, parking a couple of streets away before turning to me with a smile.

“Well?”

“Well what?”

“How did it go?”

I couldn’t help it, and started to laugh.

“Really? What with Dad on the science and maths, and you on the geography, and Mister Milburn on the history, how could I fail?”

“And the English?”

“Um, don’t know. Didn’t like the Shakespeare, did I?”

“Well, what’s done is done. Celebration tonight, love. We have a right mix of stuff, and Graham has a proper wood-fired range, so we will be doing roast lamb followed by rhubarb crumble, and then cheese and biscuits to go with the wine”

“Wine?”

“Thank god you didn’t sit oral English, love! Yes. Wine. You’ve done all we asked, and it’s time for a proper celebration”

“Mam?”

“Yes, love?”

“You know this wasn’t about asking and stuff? That I wanted to do this?”

She sighed.

“I know that’s what you’re thinking, love, that you were doing it for me and him, and we both know that, but I want you to realise this is for you. You will have a bloody good life, if you keep going at it the way you have done so far. This is your future”

“Not without you, though!”

“No, love. Not as long as we can help it. Now, call in at this garage and rinse that egg off, then we’ll hit the supermarket. Oh, and Carol has a key, so I asked her to keep an eye on the post and let us know what you get, unless you want to open it yourself”

I left that one for consideration, as we duly rinsed and scraped, then stocked the car with nice things, including parsnips, something I remembered my original mother roasting once or twice, and Bird’s custard, in tins. Lorraine grinned as she picked it off the shelves.

“Don’t care if it’s tinned, I like it, and so does Ken. Let’s get on the road, love!”

Back to the farm, where I was sent straight off to the beach for some thinking time, or, as Dad put it, to rinse the taste of the straights from my mind.

‘How much for a quickie?’ indeed. Let the little shit try asking me that face to face. Where was Rosie when I needed the edge of her tongue instead of that of my own knife?

Sunlight through the sides of the tent, and a really dry mouth. My first, if slight, hangover. The evening had gone well, especially after the other guest had turned up, a plump woman called Grace that Graham had introduced as “The lass who has that café out by Cresswell”

Grace had brought the rhubarb crumble, as well as a pot of home-made mint sauce, with two bottles of fizzy wine, and she was funny, and cheeky, and in the end I had got more than a little drunk, feeling that she was as safe as someone I had known all my life, or at least all Debbie’s life.

Roast lamb done to perfection, spiked with fresh rosemary, served with six or seven different vegetables including my roast parsnips, and eaten with laughter and teasing from all sides. My hangover wasn’t too bad, even for my first experience, and I was up before the other two, kettle on before I went to answer the needs of my bladder.

“Morning, love! How’s the head?”

“Fine, Mam. Bit dry in the mouth, though. Thanks: that was a good night”

“One of the best, Debbie. He’s a good lad, is Graham”

“How did you meet him?”

“Ah, years ago, it was. We were parked up not far away, and there he is in one of his fields, with an old Fergie that’s knackered, so Ken wanders over and says ‘Need a hand?’, and the rest is one of those exams you just did!”

“What, geography?”

“Oh, bugger off, love! Kettle’s nearly there, so warm the pot while I break out some brekky”

I rinsed out the teapot with a little bit from the kettle before setting it back on the gas, then poured the water over the leaves as it finally boiled.

“I liked his girlfriend too, Mam. Grace”

“Oh, dear, Debbie! That’s not his girlfriend. Our Graham is… Well, I think Gracie’s the same. She’s not into blokes, that one, but Graham is. Not to go chatting about that, if you don’t mind”

She caught my change in expression, and turned to me, eggs forgotten for the moment.

“No, Deb. Not like that. I know what you’re thinking, and you’re wrong. Not kids. Just not women, either. You’d think that of Graham Milburn?”

My first real lesson in human diversity, I realised later, rather different to the other lessons I had been given by Charlie and Don. They were more about perversity than anything else. I stood in front of Lorraine, a flush of shame on my cheeks, so of course she held me as the tears came and went.

“Getting tall now, love. What was it Gandalf said about sticks?”

Laughter after those first tears as I remembered how Samwise had mangled his father’s comment, and then I lost the mirth as well. Rosie had argued with him about some boy or other, and over the last couple of years, in visits to the Fumble as well as at other rallies, I had seen her smiling and dancing with boys, now edging towards young men, and that was the moment my own sexuality shouted its name to me.

I wasn’t jealous, for I could never begrudge anything that girl found. I was envious. It hit me with a rush of shame and despair, for I was neither something nor nothing. Not something for the boys to desire, for I wasn’t what they would ever want, and not nothing, for I was real, and I could feel pain, and it hurt me deeply.

What future could I ever have?