CHAPTER 6
It wasn’t easy. A simple thing to say, but emphatically true. I wasn’t just trying to read, inwardly digest and retain such things as a shedload of criminal law, statute, call it what you will, as well as the serried hierarchy of what felt like a cross between some sort of monastic order, but deal with all sorts of fitness testing and ‘safety’ training.

That last went through so many different names, but in the end it came down to how I could stop, secure and transport someone without ending up in deep shit as a result. That sounds like some sort of mixed martial arts course, and in a way it was, with added batons and incapacitating sprays, but a sizeable chunk of it came down to communication.

Be aware of where your mates are, as well as the nice member of the public you are actually dealing with, and KNOW what all of them are doing. Don’t get into a corner, blade your body, use language everyone can understand. Use your voice as a tool rather than a weapon. And LISTEN.

In so many ways, it matched a lot of what I had picked up in Uni concerning the functions of language, and not just the voice. Stance, facial expression, all the non-verbal aspects that turn noise into communication. One of my instructors summed it up.

“Nine times out of ten, if his jaw’s flapping he isn’t actually hitting you, and trust me, as I speak from painful experience. Names really don’t hurt you, but a smack in the mouth or being sliced really does. Just remember this: when one of you is speaking calmly, and the other is screaming about what your Mam did last night, and who or what with, which one of you sounds like a tit? Not just to you, but to Joe Passer-by, all those who see us as automatically in the wrong.

“Just one thing: draw your lines. Never let them build up a head of stream, never let them think they have the control. If necessary, Section 5 is your friend. It’s nickable, so if you need to— IF YOU NEED TO--- use it to take control. A lot of the time they use the shouting to psych up before they get physical. Your arse is your own responsibility, but stull watch your mate’s. Don’t let them drive!”

And on, and on, and on. There was always the other problem, of course, just like at Uni, where there was more bed-hopping than the worst porn film could ever imagine, and I got all the same shit. Frigid, dyke, miserable, lezza, and then that changed when the ones on Bridget’s bus got the same message I handed out to every lad that tried: no ta, not interested, got to mug up on Driving Not In Accordance with a Licence.

It was hard work, and all the time I was lonely, but each time someone came at me, that was how it felt. No matter how they approached the question, it always seemed to me as if I was under attack again, and I did my best to steer round any invitations or social events, as well as all alcohol. No slip-ups, Di. Not again.

Mam and Dad were there for my passing-out parade, along with Bridget and Tammy, on their first return to Wales since their wedding, which is what they still called it despite the law. I finally relaxed that night, as my parents had taken three rooms at a local hotel, generous as ever towards my dearest friend, and we had a celebratory meal along with my first excess of alcohol since I had first walked through the door at Cwmbran. I had a slight hangover the next day, but simply lay for a while luxuriating in a wide and comfortable double bed. My parents’ other present was handed to me over breakfast, a holiday in Cuba.

“You are taking… er. You can’t be serious, Dad? You can’t spend this much!”

He smiled, taking my hand over the table, casting a quick look at Mam before speaking.

“A few things to say, love. You have made us both very proud, and we know you will make us even more so. What happened… Bridget, thank you. I think I see what you did for our girl, and that is something we will never forget. Our house, your house? You are welcome, you and Tammy, any time you want. And this isn’t a solo trip for Di, so don’t worry, as I suspect you do. We’re going along as well. Family holiday, innit? First one in years, and we know she has a passport!”

Mam fumbled in her bag before bringing out a square wrapped box.

“Oh, and an early birthday present”

It turned out to be a simple underwater camera, and Dad grinned.

“Got some coral bits offshore, love. Get some shots to send these girls, show you’re happy”

Tammy looked at Bridget and grinned.

“Cairns, then? Next time any of these are down our way?”

She then looked straight at Mam.

“I mean, thanks and all, but Milton Keynes? Anyway, family and that goes both ways, so when you come down under, there’s room at ours. Always and forever, mates”

Things got a little weepy then, but in the best way. Healing can hurt so much more than the injury itself.

We ended up flying from Gatwick, in the end, with Tommy Cook, if I remember it rightly, to the east end of the island, passing over what I later worked out was Bermuda on the way. The airport was Holguin, and it was a scruffy place, as was our resort, but it was comfortable and clean despite the wear evident on the walls. There were birds everywhere, including lots of what I was told were turkey vultures wheeling through the sky. The sand was pristine, full of burrowing land crabs, the water was warm and reasonably clear, there were indeed coral heads a little way off, clouded with colourful fish, and my new camera filled memory cards by the half-dozen. Mam spent most of the ten days we were there in a sun-lounger with a glass beside her, and this part of my healing became less painful with each smiling waiter or towel sculpture left on my bed by the cleaner. I realised then, if I hadn’t done before, how much my parents loved me as well as each other, and for an instant I felt worse, for I would never have an opportunity to be like them thanks to one bastard in a BMW.

Holidays end, though, and I left them at Gatwick station as they took the train up to London while I headed off for Southampton and the slow train to Cardiff. My new job was waiting.

It wasn’t a full-tilt charge into active policing, of course, for I had a probation to work through. It’s a bit of a faff, but it involved initial observation, in essence, accompanying established coppers and lending a hand as needed, mostly in the admin side of things, followed, what felt like aeons later, by real probationary stuff, assigned to a local station, still working with a mentor but in a radically different way.

My early baby steps had been made following someone around, and now they were following me. I was given a slot in James Street, with all the delights of city-centre policing. Drunks, more drunks, drunk drivers, punchy drunks, sleepy drunks, jovial drunks--- everyone seemed to be drunk, including the three who, on separate occasions, puked on bits of my uniform. Two years of drunks, two years of a single bed in a single room with, all too often, left-over takeaway food for breakfast, with that particular meal not necessarily being taken in the morning. I will be honest in saying that I enjoyed it, but I could really have done with a but less alcohol in my life, especially when it had been consumed by other people.

My boss at the time was a a wiry Asian with a flamboyantly broken nose called Sammy Patel, and the day he signed me off my probation he had me into his office.

“Oh for god’s sake, sit down, woman. Just us in here. Cuppa?”

“Please, sir”

“Sammy in here, Di. Sugar? Milk?”

“White without, er, Sammy”

“There you go. Ah… needed that. Now, how do you feel it’s gone?”

I wondered what traps he was laying, so kept it simple.

“Quite well, I think. Nobody’s raised any complaints with me, and the lads and lasses have all been very welcoming”

“You’re no longer new here, Di. Got your feet under the table proper now, tidy-like. I hear good things”

“Thank you”

“If you don’t mind me asking, why didn’t you go fast stream?”

Because that might take me away from two bastards whose balls I wanted for my very own.

“Just feel better as a proper copper, Sammy. More real, more involvement with the community”

He stared at me for a little while, then just shook his head.

“Whatever. Anyway, how would you like to lose the uniform?”

“You what?”

“Dai and Bernie have both been very complimentary about you, girl. Dai Gould in particular says you go beyond, SEE beyond, the obvious. I don’t need to know why you chose the plod route rather than high flying, but I always look for officers with working brains, the ones who don’t take things at face value. What do you think?”

Plain clothes? Shit.

“Are you offering me CID, Sammy?”

“Not exactly, Di. Just some time there, do a bit more mentoring, see if you fit. I really think you’ve got the skills for it, and both your mentors feel you have the attitude”

He took a sip of his tea, looking over his cup at me.

“You don’t let things go, for a start, do you? They’re both gone now, girl”

“What the--- beg pardon?”

“Dai Pritchard and Bob Evans. Both gone. Your encounter with them wasn’t the first of their little games”

“How the--- I mean how did you know about them?”

“I have my sources, girl. And Bernie saw you searching the official address book. Look. They stuffed up once too many times, and their cards got marked. Someone else had a bit of an issue with them”

I was starting to understand now.

“Would this someone have a sister? Got a slapping, and then a hospital visit from those two?”

He raised both eyebrows, saying nothing but staring over his cup.

“Sammy, what the fuck were those two doing out of area?”

More silence, then a slow smile.

“As I said, you don’t let things go, and you see past the obvious. Civvies on Monday, then, and I’d avoid skirts for now”

So civvies it was, and a trouser suit from New Look, but I stuck with my issue boots. What was I going to do NOW?