by Cyclist
CHAPTER 1
The weather had held fine for once, with just a hint of a drop of rain as I left home and none at all by the time I rode down past the speed humps to the Barnes reserve. The lockers were waiting, steel-mesh cages perfect for locking up the Galaxy complete with panniers, and as I changed shoes I felt almost happy.
It was a fine day, getting bluer above by the minute, I was out on my bike, I was about to enter a rather nice bird reserve, and one of my dearest friends was due to arrive in a very few minutes. Pity about her husband. I unloaded my telescope and the bundle of spare binoculars, and just as I started to feed my lock through the door of the cycle cage a pair of arms went round me and a wet kiss smacked into the back of my neck.
“Hiya, Rob! Great day you picked!”
“Ah, I have an in with the weather gods, all except one. The bugger with the winds, of course”
I turned in her arms to see Terry and his son smiling behind her, and I shook the former’s hand. James still had one of his own up by his face, as if inspecting the palm, and I waited quietly.
“James? You remember Rob?”
“There are eight places for bikes here. That’s not enough, Dad. What if everyone comes, all at once?”
“You remember Rob? Hello Rob?”
James turned to look at me, and there was the usual moment of very noticeable adjustment, as his focus shifted sharply from whatever he was absorbed in, to the person in front of him.
“Hello Rob. Why are you here?”
I smiled. “Hiya, James, we are going to have a walk around and look at the birds, remember?”
“Oh yes. Birds. How many are there?”
“I don’t know, James, that’s the fun of looking for them. Shall we go in?”
I led across the bridge, past the statues of Peter Scott and the swans, and with a swipe of my membership card I was in. The Howarths took a little longer, and a lot more money, but soon we were walking through the courtyard towards the exotic collections. Karen walked quietly beside me, as Terry led his son to the first of the big identification notices. That was James in his element, then, picking out each listed bird one by one.
“He’s getting better, Karen. More, I dunno, aware to the world?”
There was a twitch to her cheek. “That cow of a mother didn’t help, did she?”
“Yeah?”
“Her idea of helping him to grow out was to sit him in front of the telly and ignore him. How the hell Terry ever put up with her, I do not know. The cycling’s what’s doing it, I think, that and the camping”
“What, new experiences?”
“No, quite the reverse, I think. It’s different to what everyone else he knows does, so it makes him feel special, but we do it so often now that he’s been able to see a pattern in it, set a routine, yeah? You ought to see him put his tent up. Anyway, what’s been up with you? You come and go on the message board…Rob, are you getting pissed a lot? Some of your late night stuff…”
I looked away. “Let’s just see the birds, yeah? Talk later? Anyway, he has his own tent?”
There was a sudden bright grin. “Of course! I’m a newlywed, right?”
“Too much information, girl! Come on, we’ll do these birds and then grab a coffee and a bite before the wild stuff, OK?”
She linked arms and gave mine a squeeze. “Sounds good, Rob”
There were sedge and reed warblers singing, and Terry asked me how I could tell the difference.
“Easy, right? Reed warbler, relaxed rasta reggae mon, and sedge, spirited singer. Listen to that one: chug, chug, chugga, chug, that’s a reedy, and…yeah, hear the quicker one? That’s a sedge.”
James looked hard at me, as a small bird rose in a short song flight.
“That one’s different, isn’t it?”
“Spot on, James! That was a whitethroat”
“How many are there here?”
“I don’t know, lad. Shall we see ---no, here’s a challenge, right? See how many different types of bird we can see wild today, count types instead of birds, yeah?”
“Types instead of birds? I can do that”
Terry looked across to me and winked, and then he passed his son a sheet of paper and a pen.
“Want to write them down as Rob tells you, son?”
For the first time ever, I found myself warming to the man. He had always struck me as a little predatory, especially around Karen, but that was perhaps a result of my love of her. A true friend, how could I not be protective? His love for his son, though, that was so honest, so deep, despite his problem, and all of a sudden I found myself almost warming to him. Karen noticed.
“Getting to you at last, is he?” she whispered.
I nodded, and she gave my arm another squeeze. “You’re beginning to see what I do, Rob. But not all of it….”
“What do you mean, not all of it?”
“Well, his absolutely HUGE cock is all mine!”
She pulled back a little. “Bloody hell, you are blushing!”
“Well, lycra shorts and all that…bit difficult not to notice”
She turned serious for a second. “Is that what is digging at you, mate? You aren’t trying to say, you know, that you, blokes, yeah? You do know we don’t give a shit about that sort of thing? I mean, Terry had his share of boyfriends, years back, yeah?”
I stopped walking, and looked her hard in the eye. “How do you cope, Kaz? I mean, knowing that he used to, you know…?”
She smiled gently, wistfully. “Because I know that whatever there was one day, this day he is mine. That’s how. I mean, I don’t say I’m living for the now, more for the now and the future, right? Anyway, how are things, you know, with Siobhan?”
“They are going well, kid, really well”
“So what the fuck is up?”
“Ah, not now, yeah? Listen, hear that?”
“Bugger me, that’s loud! Where is it?”
Terry and James were back. James had his pen out.
“That, James, is a Cetti’s warbler, C-E-T-T-I. There’s a mnemonic for the song”
“What’s a mnemonic mean?”
“A way to remember something, like ‘Richard of York…’ for the rainbow. This one goes ‘Listen! What’s my name? Cetti Cetti Cetti Cetti! That’s it!’ “
He repeated the phrase just as the noisy little sod let rip again, and there was a genuine smile there as he linked the two sounds.
“Terry…”
“Yes, Rob?”
“There’s a rude version as well, one that describes the purposes of the song…”
“Go on…”
“Listen! I’m Cetti! Fight me, fuck me or fuck off! Right?”
James’ genuine smile was followed by an even more genuine laugh, and I realised he was entering one of his more lucid periods. As we walked back towards the café, he was inventing his own mnemonics for everything we heard, and at the eider pond he actually made me laugh out loud. As the drakes threw their heads with a rhythmic “Ah-OOH!” he smiled.
“Dad…Frankie Howerd ducks!”
We were still laughing as we entered the café. Karen sorted out a tray of teas and sandwiches as Terry took the lad off to the toilets, and the two of us grabbed a table. She was straight to the point.
“I know you, Rob Carter, and I know when you have something on your mind”
“Nothing really…”
“Bollocks it’s nothing. Look, here’s a trade. One of mine, for one of yours, OK?”
“Maybe…”
“OK. I was never sure about Terry till after I married him, OK?”
“Sorry?”
“I was at a low ebb, self-esteem stuff, you know that?”
Both of her hands had mine across the table. I looked back at her, small and strawberry blonde, freckles across a face with perhaps a little too much lipstick, a Howie’s T-shirt reading “Girls ride bikes too!”
“So why did you marry him?”
“Because I did something right for once, and you didn’t seem interested”
Oh shit. I stayed quiet.
“And Siobhan? Wedding bells there at all?”
“You married him because I was with Siobhan?”
“Sort of. You never let me in, did you? There was that night in my flat, I lay there, thinking, is he going to come into my room or just stay in the spare one, and…”
Story of my life. Shit, what life? 53 years of unreality, people still not seeing, and I knew what I had intended to do that afternoon, but it was all tied up in a heaving mass of snakes that had suddenly nested in my gut.
“It isn’t that simple, Kaz. Me, I’m not someone for marriage, look what happened when I did, yeah? You are happy, though, aren’t you?”
She smiled, and once more it was a little skewed, not certain.
“Very, Rob, very happy indeed, but I still wonder, I will always wonder, what if? I mean, I have James now as well, and I wouldn’t give any of that up, but…”
She drifted off, and then with an obvious effort pulled it back together.
“Your turn. You arranged this outing so you could talk about something, I know that, Terry knows that, and he won’t be back till I text him, OK? Spill”
Breathe. Can I do it? I have to do it. Breathe.
“Look…my parents, yeah? They had three sons, right? Me, Ian, Neil?”
“Yeah…”
“Well, they didn’t. They had two sons”
“Oh, I know your younger brother is gay, but…”
“No, not that”
Breathe.
“Look…where did you get that T-shirt?”
“Howie’s, you know that”
“Well…”
I pointed at the shirt, and then at myself, and gave her a little finger wave ‘hello’. Her eyes widened just for an instant.
“Oh fuck”
CHAPTER 2
She sat there stunned for just a few seconds, in hindsight, but as people bustled past us laden with trays and tripod-mounted telescopes it felt like a month.
Long enough to have second thoughts: could I pass it off as a joke, ‘Gotcha!’ called as she sat in shock? No. Fifty-three years of pain had to end, had to finish today.
Who the hell was I fooling? I couldn’t end the age of torment by admitting what I was, for I was still left with my life, my history, and the simple fact that I weighed eighteen stone and was built like the prop I had been for so many years. The skinny student with the terrific legs had drowned in my father’s genes so many decades ago I could hardly remember him. Her. Me.
Karen looked down at the table for a slow count of six, then looked at me with a tear starting to form in her right eye.
“Shit, Rob, who else knows?”
Breathe again. “Nobody. You are the first person I have ever, ever told”
“When did you realise this, mate?”
“When I worked out how to control my bladder, I think.”
“Sod it, Rob, why didn’t you say earlier?”
I clamped down on my own emotions, hard. This was a public place, and a bull-necked, bearded and bald bear of a man was not someone to be seen crying over their hummus and roasted red pepper on malted wholemeal sandwich, or whatever pretentious crap it was.
“How, Karen? How could I? My Dad was not exactly the sort to understand, was he? And my mother? Neil has had enough shit from both of them. There was no way I could cope with any of that…”
She squeezed my hands. “So why now? Why us?”
“Well, actually, it’s ‘you’ at the moment. I have a list of folk I like to think I can trust, but it’s the way things worked out. When I suggested this little meet, I didn’t know who would take me up on it. Just glad it was you”
“Yes, but why now? Why suddenly make waves?”
I gave her a flat look, I could feel the tension leave my face as everything sagged.
“Because I need to do something before I die, love”
“Oh come on, you’re only fifty-----oh. You have been thinking about it, haven’t you?”
“Look at my choices, Kaz. I have two options: stay as I am and continue to die slowly, or take the plunge as a fucking ugly woman in a bad wig, and get so much shit, more than I could probably be able to bear. Shit, that’s the third option, like. Step off the bus”
“No. That’s not what you are thinking, is it? I know you, you’d just go and do it, not talk about it. I’m just, still, surprised you have suddenly come out with this now, so late”
I laughed, and it was almost natural. “I have spent a lot of time on the net, that shouldn’t surprise you, and it made me giggle when I read it, how some of us go through life trying to be the best Real Man we can, and then, it gets late, we see the last train leaving…desperation, love, pure despair. I want to die as myself, and it’s getting to the point where I am losing that option. Can you see that? Here, take the napkin”
She was crying gently then, dabbing at her eyes with my paper serviette.
“It’s just so fucking unfair, love. What have you done to deserve crap like this?”
I sighed. “Just an illness, sort of thing. Not saying I am sick, it’s just like being born with a funny hand, or like James with his…problem. No karmic retribution, none of that crap. Shit happens, it happened to me. Look---I have no idea where I am going, like, but I needed to start facing up to this. Karen…thank you, yeah?”
She sniffed for a second or two. “Do I tell Terry?”
I sat and thought for an age or two. Could I trust him? Sod it.
“As you think fit, love. I will be telling a couple of others, I think, I have some people in mind”
“Rob, not too quick, yeah? Be safe, promise me that?”
I gave her a wry grin, as she continued to squeeze my hands.
“Look, lass, I am still alive, still here, must say something, right? Terry and the lad are just coming back, so I will leave it with you for now. And thanks. I do love you, you know that”
She cocked her head and smiled back. “I know you do, but it would never have worked, would it? I’m not into girls, am I?”
That set me off, and by the time the boys came arrived at the table our tears were of laughter, and Terry was looking puzzled. His wife looked up at him.
“Tell you later, darling. Long story, do it in bed, be better”
“I have a bed, I sleep there”
“Yes, son. We’ll make sure we are back in time, but first Karen and Rob are going to show us the wild birds. Right, Rob?”
“Right, Terry. Now, has everyone got their binoculars? James, I would like you to carry the bird book, you can use the index when we see something. How many types of wild birds have we seen so far?”
“Sixteen, Rob. Thank you for bringing me here”
“Never a problem, James. When do we go camping?”
“You got a tent?”
“I have several, mate”
“How many?”
“Oh, hell, let me think. Six, I think”
“But you can’t sleep in them all at once, so why six?”
“Ah, they are all different, lad, some are heavier, some are really lightweight for my touring. How many pairs of binoculars have we got today?”
“Five”
“And a telescope. They are tools, each one for a slightly different job, like, and you will see what the telescope is for in the tower”
“Tower? Like Mordor?”
“No, mate, just a place to watch birds from. You been watching the films?”
“No. I read. The films, they take my pictures away. I make my own pictures, in here, and they take them away. There are three books”
Every now and again the teenager in front of me would throw me off track. Each time we met, he would take up to half an hour to recognise my presence, and then suddenly I would be his best friend ever. I couldn’t walk up to him, I could never speed up the process; it was all on his own skewed internal clock. What I sometimes forgot was the simple fact that behind all his obsession with counting, his fascination with numbers, his slow, slow opening to me on every meeting, he was ferociously intelligent.
What a shitty hand to be dealt. In all the deepest pits of the depression that had unsurprisingly filled my life, I had relied on people like James to show me that I didn’t have it so bad. The day I had sat on my kitchen floor, naked from the waist down, my best kitchen knife in hand as I looked at the piece of meat that had held me back from life so long, that day I had thought of people like James, looked at my life and decided it wasn’t as bad as it might have been. That had always been the key to survival. The knife went away that day, as the pills had usually done, and I carried on.
It was always the sameness that brought on the despair, though, the idea that life would never change, could never change, that the weight of my masculinity would press down on me even in my grave. So think of James…
There was a small treasury of birds to spot from the Peacock Tower, including some snipe. James was up to a human speed now.
“Sewing machine, that’s my mnemonic, Rob”
“Why, James?”
“Like sewing machines, up and down with their beaks, yeah? Sewing snipe”
“Good one, mate. And the wheatear?”
He actually giggled. “I think they changed the name, so my mnemonic is really their real name and not a code. White arse. Is it a mnemonic if you translate it, Rob?”
Terry was standing behind him with his hand over his mouth, but his shoulders were shaking as he tried to hold the laughter in. I smiled at James.
“Lad, whatever way helps you to remember is good. Just try not to use the word arse in front of girls, OK?”
For some reason, Karen brayed with laughter at that, and I got a sly wink from her.
April the seventeenth. I decided to add it to my birthday list. For good or bad, it was out and running, my secret fox, and I hoped there would be nobody who felt the need to shoot it.
Alive. I was alive.
CHAPTER 3
I walked with them as far as the bike cages, Karen staying close by me. There was a little bit of eye language, and Terry disappeared into the toilets with James. I gave Karen as hard a stare as I could manage.
“You’ve told him, right?”
“He’s my husband. I know you have a problem with that, but if there is one person I will trust, it is the man I took my vows with. You have a problem?”
Her tone softened. “Look, you know as well as I do, I mean, you’ve already said it, yeah? It is going to be a shit time for you. You need allies, and all I ask is that you trust me on this one, all right? Come here…”
I got a tight hug. She whispered into my ear “You forgot the traditional bit”
“Which one?”
“What’s your name? Please tell me it’s not something silly”
“No, just a simple one. Gillian. Jill. Liked it when I was a little…girl”
“Well, Jill, you be safe, OK, and let us know if you need us”
Terry reappeared along with his son, who still came no nearer than he had to, but managed to thank me softly as they loaded their bikes. They were off, and I was left with the usual sense of loss as the boy rode away. Each meeting started with a locked-down mind, each one finished the same way, but as long as we had more than forty minutes or so he started to become human. It was as if he had to identify me as safe on each encounter, and as we separated the shield slammed shut. I knew it was simply his condition, but I was left with a need to explain it, wondering who had hurt him. It wasn’t that, of course, just his autism, but I ached to be able to hold him and make it better.
Getting broody, Jill. Soppy old tart. Time to wind the bike over to the station and home, spend some time working out just what the hell I was going to do now I had opened the door.
I cleared up some of the mess when I got in. A run to the recycling bins with the bottles, the better to put full ones in their place…
No. Not now. I went into the bathroom and stripped out of the jersey and bib shorts, looking at myself in the mirror as I stood naked. Not a woman checking for sag, not me, just a fat and aging man, thick chest-hair curled and damp from the ride home. Badger’s beard, and the shining space where my hair had been, the hair I had been so proud of as a student.
Who was I kidding? What choice I had, in reality, came down to passing through the gauntlet of contempt and ridicule that a change of status would bring, or dying without ever being who I should have been, and that thought hurt, for I could never, ever be that person. She would have grown into herself, not into the man I had inherited. Who the hell made bras for 48” chests, regardless of cup size?
That brought a smile, at last, as I looked at my moobs and wondered if…if a doctor ever gave me hormones, would they stay as a base for some real ones, or would I be too old to grow anything half-decent? I thought, once more, of the kitchen tiles warming slowly under my arse as I sat there, the Sabatier in hand, waiting to make the cut. Death, without ever being able to live.
Another wry smile, as I remembered the note I had written in those cold, grey morning hours, the note that declared my real name, and a request that I be buried with it and not what I had always considered a stage name.
Could I do it? Could I really cross over?
I answered the phone on the second ring.
“Hiya, Von”
“How was it today, love?”
“Went well, once James had unlocked. Nice set of warblers advertising, got a chance to show them the difference between garden and blackcap. How’s your Mam?”
“Frightened, love. I know your Mam has spoken to her, but it’s still a hooj thing to go through, innit?”
I chuckled. “The word is ‘huge’, love. Bloody Valley Commando, isn’t it, look you”
“That’s no nooky for you for a week, Mr Carter”
I don’t actually want nooky, love, not like that. Certain things are automatic, though, given the right touch.
“Well, as we won’t be seeing each other for at least that length of time, that’s hardly a threat. How are the boys?”
“Excited, innit? Bamps will spoil them, they know that. I have a couple of places to look at, so you should be with us”
“Can’t, love, no leave slots left”
“You know bloody well what I meant, Rob”
“Aye, I do, but you know the answer to that as well. I can’t live off your parents, wouldn’t be right”
A subject that came up every so often, more so as the creaking machinery of her divorce finally swung into action. Sell the house in Hampshire, pack up dogs and boys, and go home to Cwm Taff and her parents. No job there for me, certainly none I could ever hope to do, not if I wanted anything like the wages I was on. And then there was Jill.
My mother had had her new hip at the ripe age of 77, but there were no signs of an approaching end to her life. She had spoken to Siobhan’s mother, letting her know how the operation felt, which was sweet of her, but I had no illusions as to how she would take my own problem. I didn’t wish her dead, I just needed to wait.
How the hell do you explain that to someone? That you see an advantage in the death of your own mother? How sick was I, exactly?
Von was still talking, and I realised she had been describing the travel plans for the trip home, and I grunted and made the other appropriate sounds as necessary, till I thought it was time to sound as if I was listening.
“And the dogs? With Paul?”
“Aye, but at his house, innit. Not letting him get another key to the house, am I?”
She carried on in a similar vein for a while, yet another rambling account of Russian girls met over the internet and delays in allowing the divorce to go ahead, followed by the sale of the house. More appropriately-timed grunts from me, and then a goodbye. I hung up, and made my way to the spare bedroom. The suitcase still sat on top of the wardrobe, but while she was away I allowed myself the small pleasure of hanging my clothes properly. Long, loose print skirt in a dark blue, a tunic top in grey that was described as a ‘dress’ on Tesco’s website, and my favourite shoes, described as ‘nude kitten heels’ by Debenham’s. Thank fuck for the internet. I looked grotesque, I knew, but I felt so much more real, just like that. A simple pair of stretch shorts did for underwear, as I had nothing to need anything further, and as the evening chill set in I left the heating off and pulled on a simple pair of black tights.
I suppose the common impression outsiders have is of a man in all the odder underwear, cock in hand as the excitement of the clothing seizes him, but that wasn’t me. Nothing sexual, not like that, just a chance to at least feel as if I had a future.
I stuck some fish in the oven with dill, chives and lemon juice, started some water for peas, and logged in on the computer. My mailbox had a small blizzard of offers, from Dorothy Perkins, Debenham’s, Tesco, the places I had trawled for what there was of my wardrobe, but I slipped past the temptation easily enough for once and opened my favourite fiction site, one that would make my mother’s eyes water. There were a few newer stories up, from names I knew, and that would give me something to read over tea. As I went over to the stereo and put on ‘Space Ritual’, I wondered whether I had any form of life at all, never mind as myself. I went to work, I came home, I cooked something and ate it to odd music while wearing a skirt. Pick the delights and assets out of that one, Robert Carter.
Later, I sat with my fish, “Time We Left” thundering in my headphones as I read the latest stories of small-featured, feminine boys who make really pretty girls, with just a hint of a makeover, and who turn out, in the end, to be intersexed, so it’s all normal, really, nothing for a parent to worry about.
And I wept.
CHAPTER 4
Back to work the next day, of course, and I was on the folder. I don’t like platform pedals, and riding in a suit was a pain in the arse, quite literally at times, but my boss had taken a firm line on appearing at a trader’s in lycra.
So I got about by train or by bus, folding bike to hand, briefcase strapped to the rear carrier. It was a rather nice folder, actually, an Airnimal, but it still came with platform rather than clipless pedals, and I hated them. If only Clark’s would put out a man’s dress shoe with a recessed cleat…I had a sudden mental image of my court shoes fitted with SPDs, and paused for a fit of giggles as I left the house.
MAC, my current boss, had tried to make me wear a magic plastic hat for some spurious health and safety reason, but that one I had refused point blank. He had tried to live up to his nickname, though, tried to pick away at everything I did, even banning me from storing my bike in the office till I brought in its bag and pointed out the cricket and football equipment also in the store room. The Man was definitely A Cunt, and although I couldn’t remember who first came up with the acronym, it was perfect. I just wished he would stop calling me ‘mate’, for that was one thing I would never be to him.
Every time I had a run-in with him, I wondered, just a little, now much of Jill was showing at work. That was a major source of my fears, the reception at work. Too many people with what can only be described politely as firm points of view, and impolitely but more accurately as bigots.
Court shoes and a Laura Ashley or Monsoon frock on the folder…that at least brought a smile, before I hit the mean streets of Redhill. That day was a simple one, according to the assignment code, but I knew full well that the half-day I had been allocated for the Curry Palace was likely to spread into the early evening, if not another day’s work.
“Morning, Mr Khan, I have an appointment…”
“Mr Carter?”
“Indeed. Where do you want me?”
He led me into a small room off the kitchen, and the records were laid out after the ritual discussion about how he operated. Two minutes after I opened the Purchase Day Book, his accountant appeared.
“Hello, Rob. How are you this fine morning?”
“Not raining yet, Vijay, so it can only get worse”
“Mr Carter, you bring a ray of sunshine to every visit. I am going to be helping my client with his PAYE calculations, so if there is anything I can be doing to help…?”
“You know me, Vijay, I shall just be settled here in my little nest, ploughing away”
And probably finding a pile of shit in the process, of course, that you have missed. Nice guy, Vijay, but you really are thick.
That brought a small wave of affection for the man. Yes, he really was a nice guy, one of the nicest, and as honest as sunlight, but he couldn’t spot a fiddle if it sat on his shoulder and played a jig. I put my head down, and within two hours I had the handle on what the stupid bugger had missed.
I need to explain a few things about Value Added Tax, which is allegedly a simple tax, easy to apply. The trader, if a retailer, can claim back all the VAT he pays out on things he buys for his business, such as booze, in the Palace’s case. Against that, he sets off the tax on his sales. Khan was on Retail Scheme A, which is the simplest. He should simply have added up his daily gross takings for each period, in other words everything that went into his till, and applied the VAT calculation, which with the rate then at 17.5% meant dividing the lot by 117.5 and multiplying the resulting number by 17.5. Simple. Take away the VAT claimed back, and that gave the sum he owed the Crown.
I compared that to his bankings. He would, he said, count op his DGT, and then make all his cash payments from them, including paying his staff in folding money, and the rest he banked. Vijay, surely even you could spot the difficulty in thus banking, on a daily basis, more than one’s declared gross takings? I sighed, and started to make some approximations, a cup of bad coffee already cold next to me. Partway through I realised Vijay was looking down at my notebook.
“Rob…you have found a problem?”
“Oh yes”
“Oh shit, Rob, I hope you do not think that I, you know?”
I gave him the best smile I could. “No, Vijay, no, we all know how honest you are, I just need to get my boss down for a word, aye?”
I slipped out to stretch my legs, and made the call. To give MAC his due, he was quick off the mark, and half an hour later he was asking Khan to take him through the cashing up. As Khan finished, MAC looked straight at him, and said:
“I don’t believe you. You’re a liar, aren’t you?”
MAC.
Khan, to my amazement, burst into tears, and we got a semi coherent stream of woe about family expenses in Sylhet and rising wage expectations among immigrant chefs. Apparently, the greedy sods wanted money more in keeping with the costs of living in the United Kingdom rather than Bangladesh, and resented being used as cheap labour. Fancy that!
MAC worked through a series of deals that his higher grade allowed, while I took notes, and by the time we left I had the notes for an assessment of unpaid tax in the region of six grand. Not a huge sum, and certainly nowhere near what Khan had stolen, but it was better than nothing. MAC was happy, having had his daily feast of backstabbing.
“Well, mate, if I were you, I wouldn’t eat there again. Chef might have some special sauce for you”
“I always try and refuse the file for anywhere I do eat. Don’t want to see the kitchen, yeah?”
“Good point. Look, it’s half four, that was a good piece of work, why don’t you bugger off home early?”
“You sure, John?”
“Aye, I am. Just make sure you get it written up by tomorrow”
Ah. Go home, but finish the job there. MAC.
“See you in the morning, then. I have an office day”
That gave me a window, and I rang the number, and they had an opening, for it was the time of day when the rush has limped and staggered to a close. Doctor Evans would see me. I lashed everything to the back of the bike, and set off before my courage did.
“Robert Carter to room six, please”
I found the door, knocked; “Come in!”
The doctor was a new one to the surgery, and as someone who avoided them like the plague I was without a regular quack. She was mid-thirties, blonde, pretty in a sort of rinsed-through, non-colourfast way, and she had my notes ready.
“How can I help today? Reception says lower back pain?”
No, the pain in the lowest part of my back had already returned to his office. Breathe deeply, and get it out.
“It’s not an easy one, Doctor. I have a rather unusual personal problem”
“I can give you the address for the GUM clinic, Mr Carter”
“Er, no thank you, it isn’t VD. Look, the way I got this out to a friend…look, my parents officially had three sons, but one of them is really a daughter, and that’s me, and I don’t know what to do, and I need to do something before I am too old, and if I don’t, and I don’t want to be sitting there again with a knife or a bottle of pills and I’m sorry…”
She had passed me the tissues as all the floods I had held back from Karen washed over the locked gates of my screwed-up soul.
“How long have you known, Robert?”
“Some things are clichés, Doctor, and I am one. Since I was old enough to know there was a difference I didn’t have, yeah? I like to think of it as self-awareness. I knew who I was, but my parents didn’t, and I had to learn, you know, to be someone else, someone they thought I was”
She smiled, and there was actual warmth there.
“Robert, I will set your mind at rest. One of the things about what you may be suffering from is denial, and you are presenting in a rather normal way”
“But that is the point, I’m not normal, am I?”
“Why? You have a tail, or two hearts? No, I mean that many people who suffer from that…situation try and cope in a number of ways, and a classic presentation is a, sorry, butch man who loses the struggle in maturity and, well, feels the need to–I am making this sound too clinical. Sorry. Have you had any mental health referrals before, without my ploughing through your notes?”
“Some years ago. They put me on anti-depressants for a while. I stopped taking them; made the world too unreal, took away my control”
“You need control?”
“People…”
Deep breath. “Women like me, they get killed in some cases, don’t they? That girl, down the road, off the bridge?”
Her mouth tightened, just for an instant. “Yes, indeed, and you feel you need to keep your control for safety? Self-protection?”
“Exactly”
“Well, look. We have a clinic, over in Reigate, part of the NHS New Minds or whatever the clever name is. Would you like me to refer you?”
“Please”
And that was just about that. I had now crossed two of my biggest hurdles, telling friends and looking for treatment. People say that the biggest step in dealing with any problem is always the act of recognition, acceptance in the first place that one has a problem. I had known it was there since I first knew that I had been locked out of the girl’s world I belonged in, that I was too deformed to play nicely where I needed to. That first step, the acceptance, I had taken that fifty years or so ago.
I picked up a bottle on the way home. I needed to switch off. I sat that evening looking at the story site and eating a kebab and too many chips with a litre of cheap Italian white, and as I read the account of the Gabycon ride I drifted into a short fantasy of arriving as myself, as I had been at University, and the wine was followed by whisky.
I was taking the steps, but however it ended up, it wasn’t going to be as a pretty girl on a bike. Ever.
CHAPTER 5
So that was my life. It was odd, the way the euphoria came and went. I had opened the door–it couldn’t stay open---yes it could…
There were so many things I had to address, and every time I thought of what lay ahead they seemed to breed. I wanted to throw caution to the winds one moment, and then hide in a bottle the next. Nothing would be easy, I knew that, but the fear came in waves. It wasn’t just for me, but for everyone I knew. Karen had shown me that I had plenty of friends who would accept me as I did whatever I could with my life, but I was still left with Siobhan and my mother. My thoughts on both of those left me feeling ashamed, as I intended, in effect, to dump Siobhan, and as for Mam, the only thing I could see clearing the way would be her death. Not good.
Work was always going to be painful, and I knew that, had always known it. Just the thought of MAC’s reaction made my stomach turn, as he was the sort of arsehole who was always on the look-out for any individuality in his staff. Not to stamp it out, but to use it against them. I rode a bike, so I was perpetually being lectured on red-light-jumpers and road tax. One colleague kept dogs, so he had a chance to treat her to a tirade on shit and noise every time he felt the need to prove his stature. Everything in his world was a pissing contest.
That thought actually made me smile. There he was, determined to prove he had a bigger cock than someone who was actually eager to dispose of their own. What confusion that would bring him, I could only dream of.
I was back in that mood again, the slightly better one where I took pleasure in the smallest of things, such as the concept of MAC being lost for words. My mood swings were almost hormonal, and that was before any medication had been prescribed. That last thought once more took me off down another track, the one where I tried to guess how long it would be before I had to admit to my changes, which of course led to another step into the blackness, as I realised that the process would mean abuse, ridicule and loss, even if the quack or shrink saw fit to offer me anything at all apart from their contempt. Everything I read regarding transition in the UK spoke of a year or more of a real life test even before I was offered any medication, and that seemed horribly unfair. There was no way I could pass as a woman in the street, not unless it was absolutely dark and I kept my mouth shut.
Time for another drink.
I was almost late in the next morning, my head a little stuffy from the night’s anaesthetic, and of course MAC noticed it, so I resolved to make sure I outstayed him at the end of the day. He seemed in an odd mood, though, almost jovial, and I assumed he was on one of his upswings, the ones where he changed from a miserable, backstabbing snide bastard to a cheerful, grinning, frontstabbing shit. Rachel collared me later that morning, as I made a cup of tea to take back to my desk to forget as I worked, and drink much later, cold.
“You heard the news about Wilkins?”
“What, MAC Wilkins?”
“The very twat. He’s going”
“NO! Really?”
“Really and truly. He’s got VER, going to piss off somewhere warm for the rest of his existence, Cyprus I think”
“Which bit?”
“Which would you expect? Give the bastard ten years and he’ll have some Greek knocking at his door demanding his house back. Anyway…”
She stepped in closer, which was rather nice, and lowered her voice.
“We are going to have a leaving bash for him”
That caught me by surprise. “What, you are throwing a party for that bastard?”
She gave me a very old-fashioned look. “You don’t really think he’s invited, do you? Get the fucker out the door and hit the pub, more like! Look, when are you off home next?”
“Probably about six or half past”
She rolled her eyes and crossed her arms, which did rather amazing things to her chest, which told me my hangover was easing.
“No, stupid boy! Home! Not that poxy house you live in, home to see your mother! So we don’t clash with the dates. How is she, anyway?”
“Sorry, see what you mean. Fit as a lop, now the hip’s done. She wants to come down and see That London, like, and not on a stick this time. Have to see when Von’s free”
“And how’s that going---oh shit, that touched a nerve, didn’t it?”
She ticked across to the other side of the corridor to the medical room, and after a quick check pointed at me.
“You, in here, now”
I heard the lock click behind me, and she leant back against the door, her voice softened considerably.
“What is up, Rob? I know you hit the sauce a bit, can’t help smelling it, yeah, but what is up with you and that Welsh bit? I thought it was all hearts and flowers and shit”
I took a seat on the bed. “It’s her and her divorce, Rach. You know what I told you, how she wants to sell up, move back to sheepshagger land, live by her parents?”
“Yeah…that a problem?”
“Well, she wants me to move there with her, and she can’t seem to understand what that would mean. Unemployment, for a start. Look, I can’t do that, not again”
She looked at me as I spoke, and I could see the wheels turning behind her eyes.
“So what else is up? You losing your feelings for her?”
“No, not really…”
“Oh, shit, Rob, you’re not going to tell me you’re really gay, are you?”
“Yes”
It was out before I could pull it back, my self-exposure building its own head of steam, out of my control. Rachel’s mouth was open, her face pink. I sat quietly till she spoke again.
“Von doesn’t know, then, that you fancy blokes as well?”
“No, she doesn’t, because I don’t”
“But you said, you know, that you’re, well, gay!”
“I am. I fancy women”
That threw Rachel, and she started to say something three or four times, pulling it back before she spoke, and then her eyes went wide. She stood and inspected every inch of me as I waited, and then in a calmer voice, she spoke so quietly I could hardly hear her.
“Rob Carter, if you mean what I think you do, then you have been dealt a particularly shitty set of cards”
I sighed, and did my own inspection of my shoes.
“What did you think I meant, pet?”
She waited a little while, and I assumed she was trying to decide whether she was being stupid, or would sound foolish, and then, very gently, she asked me one question.
“What’s your name?”
Another sigh. “Jill”
“Ah, fuck….Jill, who else knows?”
“My friend Karen and her hubby, and my doctor. That’s all so far”
“Well, my advice, speaking as someone who knows fuck-all about it but more than enough about arseholes, is that you keep it zipped until our friendly psycho twat is permanently out of the building, yeah? Rob, Jill, I can’t call you that, I’ll have a stupid accident, yeah? Rob, I am not going to go all nosy on you, right? Not here, not now, but I think we do have to sit down and sort some basics out”
“What sort of basics, Rach?”
“Which way you want to go with this. There’s nothing easy ahead, clearly, but I am sure there are ways we could make things less difficult.”
She started to giggle at some mad thought or other.
“What’s funny?”
“Oh, Rob, don’t you see? Just about every bloke in this office seems to want to get into my knickers, yeah, and now here’s you, you not only want to get into my knickers, you want to get INTO my knickers! Fuck me!”
“Not while I’m with Von, yeah?”
Her grin was razor sharp.
“Not ever, Carter, cause I am definitely not into either fat bastards---or girls!”
CHAPTER 6
She left me with a hug, and I wondered how this was happening so fast. I hadn’t started out that day with the intention of telling anyone else at all, and there I was spilling my guts to the leading light of both Debt Management and Gossip Central. Some small voice was telling me, however, that this was one piece of gossip she could and would contain.
I worked my way through the rest of the day, issuing the 191’s where I had to and writing the letters that I needed to, but all the time I was still thinking of her. She had absolutely everything I had ever desired, in all senses of that word, and she had been spot on when she spoke about the shitty hand that life had skimmed out in front of me. In the end, when I did leave the office, at about a quarter to seven, I ignored all my good intentions and picked up a couple of bottles from the off-licence. The next day’s first visit wasn’t until nine thirty, so I could risk it, as long as I spent a chunk of the following morning in the shower. I rang for a curry to be delivered, and answered the door forty minutes later in my dressing gown, legs freshly shaved. If I didn’t scrape them regularly, it became a bugger to get my tights on.
I laid the boxes out in the kitchen while I finished shaving, and once rinsed spread the whole mess onto one big plate and settled down in the sole armchair I possessed, in a skirt and blouse, tights and shoes, and checked the story site as “Warrior on the Edge of Time” pounded and pulsed through my headphones, and the two bottles sat on the coffee table ready.
One fifty-seven read the clock when I awoke, still in the chair, my laptop emitting a strange noise that I put down eventually to the glass of wine I had apparently spilled all over it. Fuck. I struggled out of the chair and staggered into the bedroom, where I managed to set the alarm clock. Well, I must have done, because a very few hours later it was bleating at me, and I had to drag myself up once again. Shower. Black coffee. Toast…
I was certainly not in the best of moods when I arrived at Dixon and Utley, Architects, and my mood wasn’t helped by the fact that the Dixon in question had clearly been separated at birth from his soulmate, who could only have been Wilkins. Dixon was also AC, it seemed, and my presence was barely tolerated. No offer of a cup of tea or coffee, no enquiry as to how things were going, just a sneering contempt from an Audi TT driver for someone in cheap shoes on a bike.
I sat and festered for a while, before I noticed the vending-machine cups of coffee that some of the staff were drinking. So, I asked the question.
“Is that a vending machine, Mr Dixon?”
“Yes, it is”
“On free-vend for the staff, I assume?”
“Does it look like I run a bloody charity? The lazy sods pay for what they drink! Anything else? Some of us are here to create wealth for this nation, you know. But you wouldn’t know, would you?”
As soon as he left, I started the hunt, and as soon as I had the original purchase invoice I had the date to start from. Number of pre-mixed cups, take a reasonable stab at a charge of thirty pence a cup, low enough not to be seen as excessive, and start adding. Apply the VAT fraction, and, ooh, what a nice tidy little sum of tax on undeclared income from the sale of hot beverages he now owed us. Fucking parasite, was I?
In a momentary rush of common sense, I realised that his arrogance had collided with my hangover, and this was one I needed to think about. I finished my other checks, packed my kit and left, pausing only to say goodbye to the receptionist on the way out.
“You all finished then, sir?”
“You can let Mr Dixon know I will be writing later”
Her mood suddenly changed, and with a sly grin she said “Nothing nice, I hope!”
I couldn’t help myself, and gave her a grin of my own.
“Do you do the post opening?”
“Oh yes”
“Then…you may have a nice read in the next few days”
“Oh goody!”
She seemed to be inspecting me rather closely, and I had to ask,
“Something wrong?”
“No…but…”
She seemed really hesitant.
“It’s just, I don’t know, how does a nice guy like you get into such a nasty job?”
I had to pause for a second before I found the right words.
“It’s not a nasty job…?”
“Larinda” she said, in response to my raised eyebrows.
“Larinda. Look, there are people who want to screw everybody over, whatever it takes, and that money they get from VAT fiddles, like, that’s your hospital beds, your schools, all that. You got kids?”
“Not met the right bloke, have I?”
I smiled. “Neither have I. Right woman, I meant”
She smiled, and it was truly warm. “No, you meant the right chap, but it’s not a problem with me, I’m a modern girl”
I smiled back. “I am not gay, Larinda”
A half-lie, sort of.
She gave me a particularly cheeky smile. “Yeah, whatever. Didn’t mean to be rude, yeah, but you don’t strike me as Mr testosterone, which ain’t a bad thing, looking at you-know-who”
“Well, my girlfriend is reasonably sure I’m not into blokes. Look, catch up some time, OK?”
“Here…”
It was surreal. I was being handed a mobile number by a girl who had not only assumed I was gay, but now knew I was attached. Some receptionist. She caught my expression.
“Don’t care any more, do I? Got a new job, start next week. What can he do?”
I spotted the ring at that point. “You married?”
“Divorced. He loved his cars more than me, and I sent him packing. Give me a ring, and we’ll catch up, yeah? I’ll tell you how he reacts when you send your letter. Look…I’m not looking for a shag, yeah? Well, I am, but it’s just, you, you seem to be someone I could natter with, which is what I meant when I thought you were, you know…”
She trailed off. “That was really unprofessional, weren’t it? Sorry”
“No, it’s all right, it’s just I’m not used to being chatted up in any way, yeah? So, yes, if I get the chance, we can meet up, all right with you”
She grinned again, and this one had dimples. Quite plump, pleasant face, probably an arse the width of the Mississippi hidden behind the desk.
“You forgot one thing…sir!”
“Yes?”
“I ain’t going to some pub or park or whatever and calling you ‘sir’!”
I had to laugh at that, my hangover easing. “It’s Rob!”
“OK, Rob, laters, yeah?”
“I promise!”
I made my way back to the station, ready to grab a train to my next trader, and it hit me. There I was, a transsexual woman who needed to do something about her transition, someone who had a girlfriend to ease out of her…yes, her life, and I was chatting up another woman, someone else the whole process could hurt. It seemed that even as I hated that stupid bit of meat its little brain was still steering my life up blind alleys. Shit.
The next trader was a bread and butter job, errors cancelling each other out till we ended up owing them a small sum, which I suggested they claim on their next return. Back to the office by five, just in time to see MAC leaving, and as I settled my case onto the desk Rachel was there, bursting out in several ways.
“What is up, Rach?”
“Two things, Rob! The first is that MAC has a date, and it’s in two months. The second…I finally did it!”
“What, group sex with every fireman in Surrey?”
“No, been there, done that. No, I finally distrained on a Roller!”
“Never!”
“A white one, too! Stupid bugger kept fobbing us off, so I had the bailiffs ready with a flatbed, and off it jolly well!”
“And he hasn’t paid yet?”
“Nope, but then I sort of officially went home as soon as I got back, so he’ll be without it till at least Tuesday”
“You are a grade A bitch, Wiseman”
“Oh yes, and so are you, Carter! I just get more chances to show it. Shit, sorry, I didn’t mean it like that”
“I know…look…”
I described what I was about to do with Dixon, and then my mouth ran away from me, and she got the story about Larinda as well.
“Carter, you really do have to do some serious thinking. What is the point of trying to ease one woman out, if you are just going to grab another before you’ve even binned the first one? For a fucking woman, you do seem to think with your cock, right?”
I took a little while to try and put things into some sort of order.
“I thought that too, at first, but the more I think about it, it’s not that. I mean, I don’t even fancy her, not particularly, it’s just, well, she thought I was queer, like”
“From what you said to me, you are; about as queer as it’s possible to get, right? So what is it?”
“I think…I think I just met the first person who knew, sort of, what I am, just from talking to me. Special, that is”
I took another few seconds to gather my thoughts.
“I just don’t know what to do, Rach”
CHAPTER 7
She looked at me with more than a little sympathy evident in her face.
“Be truthful, then, and tell me what you actually want to do”
I thought for a few seconds. “I suppose I want to be me at some point, rather than, well…”
I waved a hand vaguely over my face and body, and Rachel nodded. I felt I had to try and explain more of the whole shitty mess.
“Look, Rach, just look, yeah? How could I ever, ever hope to pass myself off as a woman, physically? The worst thing about all of this is the futility of it: I can’t ever be who I want to be, no matter what I do, how I get treated, ever, yeah? So we have a problem. I mean, I have a problem. What I want, what is killing me, is the fact that it is the original impossible fucking dream. The only thing that keeps me going, in truth, is work. If I had nothing to prod me along, like, then, oh, I don’t know”
“What I know, Carter, is that you need to do something, whatever you can, rather than carrying on like this. Cause one day you won’t carry on”
She must have caught something in my face, because hers twitched
“Rob, no. Tell me that isn’t what you are thinking”
I pushed my face into an approximation of a teasing smile, but it felt unreal even from behind.
“Rachel, if you knew what I knew, well, go and have a poke on the internet, aye? There’s a lot of bullshit on there, but the real sites, they can be scary. But take a few points to heart first, please. I’m a spastic, like”
“Cerebral palsy sufferer” she shot back as if by reflex.
“Kid, I am a lot older than you, and when and where I grew up it was ‘spacker’, cause ‘spastic’ was the polite term. But look: can you think of anything worse than being aware, intelligent, fucking normal, and having to live in a body you’re not wired to? That’s sort of where I am. None of this works right for me, it grows wrong, it grows fucking HAIR all over. I can’t love properly, can I, because I can’t even live right”
I could feel myself getting angry, and that wasn’t fair. I tried to rein myself in, but the pain was still there, and suddenly I realised that Rachel was crying.
“Look, kid, I am sorry, really sorry, but it’s getting to the point where I have to do something before I blow up, or break down. All I want is a chance to die as myself”
That was a revelation, even to me, and a sudden mad plan shouted for my attention. Change my name, so the buggers would have to bury me under the right one, and then sort out the mess once and for all. I pulled together another fake smile, and waited till she had mopped her eyes. Lying was easy, I had had five and a half decades of practice.
“No, that’s not what is going through my mind, Rach. I still have to outlive MAC, right?”
“Right…”
I wondered if I might be able to sort a contract out on him. Rachel and I cleared up our crap and I walked with her to the station, seeing her off on her way to Croydon and a weekend off that probably involved some serious vodka-fuelled exchanges of intimate bodily fluids with whichever piece of meat she was currently allowing into her. We never got to see any of them, just heard the blow-by-blow histories second-hand, from one of her so-called girlfriends. Marion was not someone I would ever have wished to share a secret with, not if I wished it to remain in the state I left it.
That was when my plan crystallised, though calling it a plan was hardly fair. A hazily linked set of intentions was a better description. Stage one: see how the quack came along.
Stage two: prepare a statutory declaration, or deed poll, or whatever the fuck they were called.
Stage three: start recording all this somehow, diary or something, so that they would understand, whoever ‘they’ might turn out to be.
Stage four: research. There must be a simple way, something that wouldn’t leave me either going painfully, or not going at all.
And then stage five would come when I could arrange things as best as I could for Mam and Siobhan.
Stage four would be the crucial one. I hated the body I lived in, but the thought of ending up still in it, still alive, just…damaged, that thought was pretty terrifying, for such an outcome would take any choice away from me forever.
Those were my brakes, then: two women, and the need to do it right the first time. I rode home, perversely feeling happier than I had for some time. I had a plan of sorts.
There was a thick brown envelope waiting on the doormat with my name and address handwritten on the front, and a stamp rather than a franking. Despite the personal touches, the words ‘Private and Confidential were stamped on the top left corner in red. When I opened it, after changing into a long skirt, there was a compliments slip with the square NHS logo on its front and the title ‘New Thoughts’, clipped to a bundle of papers obviously printed from the internet.
The compliment slip was sweet, signed ‘Lynn’ and addressing me as ‘Robert’
“I have enclosed the attached bundle to let you see the sort of information available on the internet. I hope it will be helpful. There is unfortunately a very long waiting list for our services, so the more flexible you can be with appointments, the sooner we can arrange your help”
Typically, the place had a bugger of a hill on the way there. I went to look it up on the mapping website, and remembered how I had fucked up the laptop the night before. And I was out of booze.
It was a very, very long evening, which I finally filled by dragging out the Airfix model of HMS Victory I had started so many months ago in an attempt to find something other than alcohol to fill my time outside of work, and to my surprise I looked up a little later to find out I had actually disposed of three hours, gone in a cocoon of sound from ‘In Search of Space’ on loop repeat. The excitement nearly stopped my heart, but I had finally got the hull together, all guns in place. I took the brushes to the kitchen to clean them, and as I stood at the sink rinsing the thinners off them I started to cry.
This was my life. A single man, in a house full of empty bottles, who never wanted to be a man in the first place. Evenings full of junk food and alcohol, or building plastic fucking model ships while waiting for exhaustion to finally turn my mind off.
Stage five. It needed to be arranged soon.
I was awake at five the next morning, and in a mad flurry where Behan’s words about teetotallers mixed with shock at how nice the day was, I decided to have another run out to Barnes. If I e-mailed…
Shit. Perhaps, if I timed it right, I could pick up a cheap computer of some kind from the supermarket. I needed my stories, needed something to let me feel I was myself. I texted a few people, ‘on way to Barnes bird reserve if interested’ and on a daft impulse I included Larinda in the list.
Half an hour later, I got back “How get thr?” from her, and nothing from anyone else apart from Karen, who simply sent “Camping in Somerset”
I sent Larinda some simple directions, and loaded the Galaxy up and hopped the train to Clapham Junction and then the urban one to Barnes. She was only five minutes behind me, and I was impressed. Her arse was a lot narrower than I had assumed, but the dimples were still there when she smiled.
“This is one of those places I always wanted to see!”
“Why not just come and do it, then?”
“Na, always wanted to have someone to show me the birds and the bees, yeah?”
I had to laugh at that. “Birds only, pet”
She grinned. “Well, for today at least. Nice legs! You shave them?”
“Er, yeah. It’s traditional, like. You get a massage, they don’t like them all hairy and that”
“Yebbut, not being funny, you don’t look like a racer to me”
“What do I look like?”
“In those shorts? Overstuffed, yeah. But…edible”
“For a natter, you said!”
“Well, a girl can dream!”
This one does. In technicolour.
“What do you know about birds and all?”
“A bit, but never really had a chance to learn about them properly. Was always working, getting money for his latest Barry job”
“His what?”
“Where are you from?”
“Boldon”
“What, Lancashire?”
“No, Boldon, with a ‘D’, near Jarrow. Tyneside”
“Oh, now wonder you talk funny. Barries are cars that have been barried up, you know; look, you know when you see some little Corsa, or Saxo, or some other dinky toy, and the driver’s got all sorts of crap stuck onto it? Spoilers, extra lights, an exhaust pipe the size of the Dartford Tunnel, yeah? That’s a Barry! There’s even a website where they take the piss out of them”
“That’s what he was into?”
“Yeah, subscription to Max Power mag, all that rubbish. Spent all our spare on crap from the car shops, and even more getting proper mechanics to put right what he’d stuck on wrong, yeah? Wanker”
She paused, and then grinned again. “Well, I assume he was a wanker, cause none of it came my way for ages. Not unless he was getting it from one of the spotty little cows that used to hang around the cruises. Oh hell, you don’t know what that means, either!”
“I am completely uninterested in cars, pet.”
“You sure you aren’t trying to get into my knickers? A cruise is where lots of sad men, mostly, drive tarted-up shit cars round and round till the Bill get bored or they break down. Are we going in or what?”
I had a guest pass, which saved us some money, and I handed her one of my spare sets of binoculars. That was when she changed. All of a sudden, I had someone more reminiscent of James than a borderline nympho, and her questions were sharp and to the point, just as her obvious delight in the place lit up the air around her and I gave myself a mental pat on the back for asking her along.
She had been right, as it turned out, and we could indeed talk. The conversation came back time and again to the birds and insects around us, but we covered so much ground I was astonished. I heard all about her ex, and her dreams of e better life without his dead weight holding her down, of Open University and advancement, while she heard almost all about me, even about Siobhan.
Almost all. At the end of our visit, as she went off to get her car, she looked me in the eye and smiled, taking both my hands.in hers.
“Rob Carter, I was right. You are a nice guy, and anyone would be lucky to snare you. And I do love a bit of meat on a bloke, yeah? Just…what is it you are keeping back? Look, not prying, yeah, I don’t think you’ve got an ounce of nastiness in your body, just, well, I can listen, and even if you are gay, I don’t give a monkey’s, right?”
“Honest, I’m not gay”
She smiled, and gave me a kiss on the cheek.
“Whatever. Bothered? Laters!”
And she was off, and I was still lying. Fifty-odd years of practice.
CHAPTER 8
“Hiya, love!”
The phone had gone almost as soon as I was on the train back from Barnes. Von had been for a job interview that morning, with an eye on finally settling everything in Hampshire and moving home. It was a conversation I really didn’t want to get drawn into.
“How’d it go?”
“Was good. They liked me, and I liked them. Just dunno if I want to go full time, innit?”
“Well, the boys are getting to the stage where they should really be looking after themselves, like”
“Aye, well, but I’m still their mam. And if I work full time, we won’t see as much of each other. I won’t be able to come up midweek. Can’t be having that, I see too little of you as it is now. Anyway, what you up to?”
“Just been for another wander around the bird place, love”
“Boring, innit? We need to find something else for you to do, somewhere you can dress tidy for once”
“Yeah, I know, proper shoes, chinos, jacket…
“Aye, I bought you that nice blazer Christmas, and you never wear it!”
“Von, I spend all day at work in a bloody jacket and tie, I like to be comfortable, out of work, like”
I thought my idea of comfort would not sit nicely in her worldview, but no need to bring that up. My one nod to femininity apart from shaving my legs was to stop crossdressing as soon as I walked in my front door. I realised I looked grotesque, but it was the only way I had found to feel even slightly as I knew I should have been. She was still going, though, on one of her regular themes.
“A man should look tidy, not like you. Any old slacks, some rugby shirt or whatever. And all that fuss you made when I wanted to buy you some cufflinks! I ask you, aye?”
That had been a hard day for me, wandering around West Quay in Southampton as she dithered over stuff I would never wear. Not just because it wasn’t to my taste, which was largely true, but because I would simply never have the opportunity. I didn’t desire the clothes she wore, I desired her freedom to wear them. The cufflinks had been nothing more than a symbol waved in my face on a bad day, a day that the weight of my form had pressed down ever more heavily as the hours ticked by.
“Von, I like it, it’s healthy, and it gets me out of the house for a bit. I don’t drag you round the way you make me wait in shoe shops”
“You’re a man, innit? You will never understand what shoes mean to a woman. Anyway, got a favour to ask. Got Estelle’s wedding coming up, marrying that Italian feller, down Bournemouth way. Found the right shoes, but the only place we can get to that has them in my size is that hooj Debenham’s in Crawley. So there’s a job for you. I’ll send you an e-mail with the details, aye?”
“No good, love, laptop died on me”
“Then you need to go and get all connected again, ay ess ay pee. Let me know when you are on. Pity you can’t make the wedding, that’s what I mean about seeing you all tidy like”
“I will let you know, love, mail you when I’m hooked up again. Look, coming into the Junction, so I’ll have to hang up. Speak later”
“OK, and make sure you ring your mother today. Bye!”
I changed trains quickly, humping the bike up and then down flights of stairs, and my phone beeped at me to tell me I had a text.
“Was nice day. Make u dnr sm nt. I do edible 2. L”
All I wanted was to peel away the layers of people around me so that I could get on with it, and more layers just kept sticking to me. That was one of my worst failings; I needed to break away from my friends, to find the room to be myself, or not to be at all, and yet I kept letting people into my life. I was lonely, simple as that. All the resolutions, all the vows of celibacy and solitude, they all came to nothing when someone smiled at me. That was how it had been with Siobhan, a bit of fun that turned steadily more serious, and now I had Larinda in tow. I realised that she was probably going to instigate more intimacy, and my inner lesbian rejoiced at the idea while I was simultaneously aroused and repelled.
I adore women, sexually as well as aesthetically, and while I couldn’t be one myself I desperately needed to hold and caress them, and have those caresses returned. The trouble came when it got to the truly intimate, for at that point there can be little pretence. It always went the same way, sexually. I would meet and like the girl, we would end up in bed, my excitement would be sufficient to override the incongruity of my anatomy, and for a few months it would be fine. Then the reality of the act would slowly exert its strength, until my own arousal, physically, would drain away. I would do as much as I could for my partner, and then plead fatigue.
And one after another, the relationships guttered and died. They were women, mature women, who wanted love, and sex, from a man, and I gave them the love, but after a while I couldn’t manage the sex, for the woman I wanted was not one who would ever want a man.
Catch-22. I could never find a loving Sapphic relationship, because I was a ‘man’. I could never sustain a heterosexual one because I was neither hetero nor male. I needed that laptop. The research really needed to get underway.
I took a detour by way of the big supermarket at Purley, hopping off the train and they had a simple laptop which had enough features for me at around £3oo, so that ended up strapped to the rear carrier as I spun straight round to the station again for the next local service.
Bike in garage, me in shower and then into a maxidress I had ordered while drunk one night, a pair of pumps on to let my feet relax, and within an hour I had everything set up again. Von’s e-mail was there, some peep-toed two-tone heels her desired purchase, and I had a momentary fantasy of being able to buy three or four more pairs at the same time, the sales assistants somehow being unable to realise they were a different size to Von’s. After all, there was no way on earth my size nines would be able to squeeze into her size sixes. Yeah, dream on, Carter.
I had taken the time to clean up my legs again, and the tights slid on so nicely without the stubble. I caught a glimpse of myself, though, in a mirror, chest hair curling over the neckline of the dress.
Hideous. And still no booze. I settled down with a cup of tea instead, and read my way through the backlog of stories I had missed. I liked the dress, I must admit, and for once I felt almost right in myself as I sat with the laptop where its name suggested. The thought cropped up that there was supposedly a risk of sterility by using a computer in such a position, and that set me off laughing. As if that was a worry for me!
The laughter turned to crying quite quickly, and I started to regret my decision to leave the booze alone for a few nights. I really needed a cosh to get myself to sleep.
A little blue square popped up as I dried my eyes, telling me I had mail. It was from Karen.
“Jill
Not heard from you for a few days. Given the circumstances, a little worried. Please let us know all is OK your end, or if not let us know whether we can help. And James wants to know if there are any other places he can see birds with you. Speak to us.
Karen, Terry and James”
No, Karen, you can’t help. I called up a medical supplies site and started my research.
CHAPTER 9
There were, it turned out, more than a few sites that dealt with what I wanted, but most of them, to be honest, were either weird or simply not for me. I didn’t want some Japanese snuff-buddy, nor advice on how to exit with dignity and a terminal illness in Switzerland. Some parts of that country have struck me as a terminal illness in their own right, but never mind.
What I wanted was a simple guide to what I should take to ensure a nice, gentle sleep with no morning after. I am not fond of heights, and I REALLY doubt that I could take a blade to myself. Then again, those nights, sitting on the kitchen’s tiled floor, Sabatier in hand, sobbing…perhaps, if I were pissed enough, just perhaps then I might find the courage I needed. It isn’t cowardice, taking your own life, it’s far more courageous than most folk can ever be.
The thought then struck me that I had fucked up big style, by actually telling my doctor. Any chance I could have obtained some barbiturates, for example, would have been lost now. I was hardly a safe individual in the eyes of the NHS any more. The old and well-remembered stories of a shedload of alcohol, some nice sleeping pills, that would be harder to arrange.
I realised I was actually feeling slightly more cheerful, oddly. The fact that I could now see the way forward was lifting my spirits, even if the way indicated was into the dark. All a matter of timing…my phone beeped at me.
“Wht you up to tmrw? L”
Already? It threw me for an instant, as we had only separated a few hours before. I sent back a quick one asking what she had in mind, and explaining my lack of any plan at all. I left out the bit about spending all day surfing the net, and certainly what for. That was when I realised I was almost ready to forget about protecting Mam and Von, and just get it over with, and at the same time actually looking forward to Larinda’s humour and zest for life.
“Brighton then, Fsh n chps. Pier”
“OK. Time?”
“10 @ stn”
And that was it, a second date in two days with someone who thought I was queer. As the saying went, you couldn’t make it up. I gave in, and put the laptop down and started once more on Nelson’s flagship.
I woke confused, no hangover for a start to drag me back under the duvet, and pulled on a pair of jeans and a worn old tour shirt from Hawkwind’s older days, some shades and just for the hell of it my old denim jacket and a pair of trainers. Cool dude, no. Fat and hairy slob in a greaser’s costume, yes. I couldn’t care less, and tried to doze as the train bore me south, better to daydream about what might once have been.
Larinda was waiting just past the ticket barrier, and unlike me she had made quite an effort, and a nice pair of black suede heels led my eyes up her legs, past the just-above-the-knee skirt to her chest, which was definitely there, and I was treated to the traditional greeting of “Oy, the girl is up here, yeah?”
I got a hug from her, and a kiss on the cheek that was a little more than a peck but quite a way short of a snog, and then she linked arms with me and we started down the hill to the sea, her heels ticking away as we went and her hip bumping mine until I altered my pace and stride to match hers. It was a sunny day, but there were clouds to the West, past the wreckage of the old West Pier, and I regretted trusting to elderly denim. Over the pedestrian crossing to the promenade, Larinda chattering away about nothing at all as I led her to the railings overlooking the shingle, and leant there to watch the slow waves breaking noisily beneath the gulls, which was when she put her hand on my right buttock and squeezed. I jerked upright, and she shushed me.
“Just curious, Rob, you being a cyclist an’ all. Just wanted to feel what a girl’s heels would hook on, yeah?”
“And?”
She licked her lips and grinned. I used a finger to lift her chin.
“Thought you said this was all about a natter?”
“Well, a girl has to keep her options open, yeah?”
She paused. “And maybe her legs too, if she’s lucky”
Where this was going was pretty obvious, but little brain was in coordination with ego for once, the flattery of being desired doing what it would do to most people.
Desired as a man; that punctured my bubble.
“Come on, let’s get out on the pier, pet. See what we can win”
“I want at least one toy to cuddle, and something sweet to chew on”
“You are a wicked woman, Larinda!”
“Me? What did I say?”
Her mock outrage collapsed into a fit of giggles, and I realised that whatever she did it would be impossible for me to get angry with her. She shone with life, and I wondered if I could ever have been like that, if…if.
We worked our way up the pier, Larinda sticking to the boards laid down especially for high heel wearers, through both sets of slot machine halls and up to the rides, where she insisted we went on some whirling thing.
“You sit on the outside, Mr Carter. If you throw up, I want it flung away from me, this is a nice blouse”
I looked down, by reflex.
“Yeah, Rob, it’s nice to the touch as well as looking good”
She put her mouth to my ear then, and whispered.
“And the filling’s all natural and organic, and EVER so tasty…”
The ride started to move then, and as the thing sped up we were thrown this way and that, but mostly THAT, and of course she had to brace herself, which involved her hand on my thigh, and I was getting very distracted by the time we got off and back onto stationary planking. She was clearly aware of what she was doing to me, by the way she kept grinning.
“Is it time for fish’n’chips yet?”
“Why not? Where do you fancy?”
Thank god for the change of subject.
“Well, don’t like the one on the pier much, and been to Harry Ramsden’s lots, so why don’t we go up the marina? Take the train thing, yeah?”
I hadn’t been on Volk’s Electric Railway for years. She led the way, and found us seats on our own in the rear carriage, taking the coat she had carried over her arm and spreading it across our laps.
“Keep us from getting a chill, right?”
As the train jerked away, her hand, under the coat, went straight onto my cock.
“There we are, warmer already!”
She left it for an instant, to put my own hand in a similar place, where I realised she was actually wearing stockings and suspenders. She slipped her right hand back onto my groin, and with her left pushed mine up.
“Didn’t fancy wearing any today, Rob. Didn’t know what might come up…ooh, he has come up, hasn’t he?”
“Are you seriously that randy, Larinda? For a fat old bugger like me?”
She turned slightly in her seat, her hand leaving my groin for my thigh as she let my own hand drift away from somewhere very warm and moist. She was far more serious now, and settled down against me as the light wind of our slow passage moved her hair across her face.
“Rob, I wasn’t really sure about you. Still think there’s a gay boy in there, just thought I’d see how you reacted. And, yes, you are sweet, and it would be nice, and yeah… I’m randy as all hell. Always get really worked up just before my monthlies, yeah, and yesterday, you in that bike stuff, I just, well, a girl’s got to try and get a man’s interest”
“So you thought if sussies, heels and an eyeful of tit won’t work, then a good old-fashioned grope would?”
She grinned again, the mischief back. “Well, seems to be working so far, yeah?”
I couldn’t deny that, but thankfully the train was coming into its halt, and there was no opportunity for her to attack my zip. I carried her coat in front of me for a little while, till things could settle down, and we ate fish and chips and had a bottle of wine on a terrace as the sun stayed out and she settled back into slightly cheeky but bloody good company.
We rode back to the pier later, her hand simply resting on my thigh, seemingly content with the contact rather than needing to test my libido, and as we made the train back up at about six-thirty, she slipped her arm around my waist.
“Will be back in a bit, just need the ladies. You wait here, darling”
She strutted off, arse moving in an interesting way, while I checked the timetables, and in a few minutes she was back with a carrier bag, which clinked.
“Sometimes, a girl likes to be asked back for coffee, Rob. This one wouldn’t mind coming in for a glass or three of white wine. So it’s up to you now…”
“Tell you what, let’s see how we feel when we get to my stop, aye?”
“OK. But I think I know…”
She was absolutely right, of course, my resolution evaporating as each mile went past, and as we walked out of Redhill station the clouds opened.
“Shit! Left my coat on the train!”
We Went straight back inside, and the station staff put a call in, and ten minutes later it was found, to be secured at East Croydon station for her. Outside, though, the rain was getting heavier, and I hauled off my denim jacket and laid it over her shoulders. Another ten minutes saw us home, both soaked, and I ran through a quick mental checklist before the door was open.
Empty bottles? Gone. My skirts, shoes and tops? In the wardrobe.
Safe. I hung the jacket over the bath, and found an old dressing gown for her to change into as I towelled myself dry and did the same, pouring the wine as she busied herself repairing the damage done to her by the weather. I heard the sounds of classical music from the living room, Sibelius’ fifth, and when I entered with two glasses she was standing looking at my collection.
I realised she was still wearing her shoes and stockings, which was a little odd, and she looked over her shoulder and smiled.
“Just sorting out a couple of discs more for your auto-changer. You sit down, stick the wine on the side, I’ll just be a moment”
I sat down, taking a sip from the glass, and as I leant back and closed my eyes to the music the lights dimmed. I looked up, and Larinda was standing in front of me. Smiling, she let the dressing gown fall, and there she stood, in suspender belt, stockings and heels and fresh air. Her breasts were full, and had dropped a little with age, but what I saw was more than just nice.
“You like?”
She bent forward at the waist, pulling my own gown open, and teased my penis erect through my underwear.
“Off, they’re in the way…”
Off they went, and then she sank to her knees in front of me and kissed the tip.
“Mmm, dessert…”
As her lips slipped down, I protested, but not too strongly.
“You don’t have to…”
She took her mouth away, just for an instant.
“I’m eating. Rude to talk”
She was very, very good at it.
The alarm shook me awake what seemed like no time later, and I felt the warmth beside me. My cock was sore, for she had woken me several times in the night, and I had somehow managed to keep up as she made up for her years lost to customised cars and neglect. I slipped out to get rid of the wine, and for once, just for her sake, I did it standing up.
When I returned, she was standing, naked, in front of my open wardrobe.
CHAPTER 10
“So…”
She turned to look at me, naked, absolutely unashamed, a slightly puzzled look on her face.
“You’ve obviously got, or had, a partner, but I can’t see her wearing clothes in size 14 as well as size 22. I know I have the odd binge and diet sort of thing, cycle, yeah, but this is silly. What…ah”
She shut the wardrobe and stepped back to the bed, lifting the duvet and swinging her legs back in.
“Rob, we both have work to go to, so be a good whatever you are and put the kettle on. White, no sugar, ta”
She blew me a kiss, and I did as I was ordered in dazed apprehension, bringing the cups back in five minutes later. She flipped down my side of the cover and nodded me into bed beside her. As I settled down she slipped her arms through mine and laid her head on my shoulder. I was still unable to say anything, wondering which way she might leap.
“Lover…Rob…if I have it right, you are keeping two things from me, so understand something. I didn’t meet up with you at the bird place to get into your knickers, yeah, just for the company, and you are good company. If you have someone you see, then, yeah, it’s a pity, but me, I’m not going to worry too much. My age, I’m happy with whatever, you know, yeah? Just…am I right about the other stuff? You a tranny?”
I had to fight hard, just then, to keep the tears inside, but she felt my trembling, and squeezed my arm again, murmuring into my ear.
“’S no big deal. Rob. I like my clothes, yeah, so if I do, s’pose a bloke would too. Does it get you randy?”
I had to breathe deliberately and slowly to get the answer out without my voice cracking.
“No, it doesn’t. That isn’t what it is”
“No? So what is it, then?”
“I crossdress, yeah, but that’s when I am at work”
“What? I mean, scuse me?”
I turned my head slightly to look aslant at her.
“Work it out, pet”
“Oh! Oh fuck…you poor bugger. And your girlfriend, wife, whatever, she know?”
“No. One of my bigger problems. Don’t want to hurt her, but, it’s like Mam; I can’t really do anything about this till she can’t be hurt. I can’t just come out with it, like a slap in the face”
I have no idea at all why I was suddenly talking so openly to someone I had only just met, but the need was there, suddenly, unstoppably, the need to open up and be seen as myself. Larinda had been right in that sense: we could indeed talk.
“She’s a Valleys girl, lives down in Hampshire, like, looking at going back home when her divorce settlement is finally sorted out. She knows I can’t go with her, so, well, I was thinking, let things die a natural death, you know, distance and all that. Her parents are a bit godsquad, and every now and again she gets the call herself, sort of thing”
“So you…”
She swallowed. “You intend to get…nip and tuck thing?”
I turned to look at her properly, and she raised her head.
“I don’t know, pet. I mean, look at me. How the hell could I ever make it work?”
“Yeah…and what a waste, as well. I like that bit of you”
I tried a joke, just a slight one. “Yeah, well, at my time of life it’s going to stop working in a little while”
She actually licked her lips and then grinned. “I dunno, seems to work OK in the right…hands. Only complaint I have is that I will have to be sitting on a sore fanny all day”
“Well, you shouldn’t have kept waking me up, then!”
“Darling, didn’t know if I would get another go, did I? Did you clean them off it afterwards?”
“Clean what off it?”
“The cobwebs from my fanny, yeah?”
That broke my mood, and I started to laugh, and then yet again it turned to tears. Larinda just held me, muttering odd phrases of comfort till I came back under control.
“So that’s it, then? You either change over or you step under a train, and you think either choice is a shit one?”
I looked at her again, unfairly surprised at her sharpness. She raised an eyebrow.
“Look, I had nothing better to do while he was out scraping his bloody exhaust on the road, so I used to read, yeah? I’m not a thicko”
“No, you are not. I’m sorry”
“So is it blokes you fancy, then?”
I looked away. “I’m actually gay”
“So I was right! You are a…no, hang on, if you are…shit, I’m getting a headache here”
Ten seconds later she spoke again. “You mean you’re a dyke, don’t you, just one that don’t need no strap on willy thing. Well, not yet, yeah? Please? I likes it. A lot, yeah?”
Mood swinging like a metronome arm. “Yeah, well, much more of times like that and I won’t need the surgery. It’ll be worn away”
She slipped her hand down there. “Not yet it ain’t; ooh, quite the reverse, it’s getting bigger!”
“Please…we both have work, aye?”
She looked at me very soberly. “Rob, just talk to me, yeah, just for five minutes. I won’t interrupt. Just tell me how I can help, if you want my help, that is? I’ll have breakfast while you go through it, yeah?”
So I did, from my first realisation, to my experiments at college, and the decision to grow the beard to make it easier to resist the need to be what I was born for, and my father’s illness, my mother’s disability. All through my monologue, Larinda had her breakfast, until I had to stop talking as I began to gasp. When she and I were finished, she came back up.
“Can’t seem to get enough of that, my darling. Sets a girl up for the day, it does. Here’s the deal: we don’t know what you are going to end up doing, yeah, but you do need a mate to give you a bit of oomph. Don’t want to know anything about her ladyship, but you’re good company, and I got sort of used to being in me own space, yeah. Be strange having someone else in there, all wrong sort of thing. If you want, I do what I can to help, you do what you can for me, yeah?”
The grin that came with the last phrase left me in no doubt as to exactly what she meant. She confirmed it with her next comment.
“Just don’t be in too much of a hurry to get it chopped off, otherwise I’ll have to find some other bit to wear out!”
So we drank our tea, and took a shower together, where she tried to raise the dead once more but had to accept my suggestion that she was bloody joking if she expected more, and then we were off to our respective offices. I saw her to the station, and as she found a quiet spot near the ticket barrier for a last snog, I asked her the question.
“You said you didn’t come out to Barnes looking for a shag, but what about yesterday?”
She grinned again. “What do you think? If I hadn’t managed to get you to shag me senseless, I was going to have to do it myself. Had half of Ann Summers lying on my bed ready, just in case. Look, I’m not mad, yeah, I’m not a slut, just, well, you are a nice…woman, Rob Carter, and, well, gotta be honest, I am really curious. Never met someone like you before”
She gave me another level stare. “I’m serious. You been shat on by life, I want to see if I can make it a bit better”
“Thanks, pet. And thanks as well, for, you know, not asking”
“Asking what, darling?”
“The obvious thing, really, give us a twirl, like”
“No, want you out of your clothes, don’t matter what they are, yeah?”
Once again, that Mercurial grin lit up the space around us. She leant in to give me a kiss before leaving, and as she pulled away she whispered “Out of your clothes and in me, yeah?”
And she was gone. I rode slowly off to the LVO to collect that morning’s file, and if possible avoid even smelling MAC, and as I pedalled I tried to make sense of the previous three days. Only three days, but I knew the feelings.
It terrified me: could I actually fall in love in such a short time?
CHAPTER 11
Once more my mood was swinging, and I was bouncing between elation and despair. Larinda was somebody I could have met years ago, and now I had Siobhan to consider. The guilt was acid in my stomach, only slightly assuaged by the raw animal delight of the sex.
And that thought raised another Hydra head, as I realised I could never do anything with her that didn’t involve my external masculinity.
That summed up my life so well. I was in a situation most men dreamt of: an attractive woman who liked her underwear and was completely uninhibited and totally enthusiastic about sex had decided that I was to be her personal route to gratification, and she appeared to be asking for nothing in return except company. A teenager’s fantasy, in other words, but it palled on me because by definition I was to be the man in the relationship, and I knew that after a while my automatic responses to having this or that done to me would weaken, as my mind and soul rejected masculinity.
What would she do then? She was bright, she was funny, she stirred my libido as no other had done for decades, but she wanted my body and not me. And then, there was Siobhan. I couldn’t simply leave her to go back to her Valley haunts, assuming she would forget about me. Adults aren’t like that, or they shouldn’t be, and in the age of the car and motorway distance was much less effective in reducing affection. I had to work out which direction I needed to go, and my only compass was the imperative that neither woman be hurt.
I had to do something to give myself time to think. I finished off the two visits I had arranged for the day, interrupted by a burger meal, and rode back to the office. I booked the next pair of files out and then found myself standing in an odd sort of waking doze by the hot-water boiler, cup in hand.
“Penny for them?”
“What? Oh, hi, Rach”
“You look shagged out, Carter. Thought your missus was in Welsh Wales?”
“Er, she is”
She peered at me. “Well, someone kept you up last night. Or…”
She took a moment to look around and make sure the room was empty.
“Was it, you know, your worries? Oh, I see; you blush well, Jill”
That was it, and it all tumbled out in a mess, everything from the visit to Dixon’s little fiefdom to Larinda’s frantic attempts to screw my life out of me in all-too-frequent instalments. Rachel waited patiently, just the occasional nod or aha, a few questions to move the tale along, and it was out.
“So, what about Von, Jill?”
“I really don’t know, Rach, not at all. Just, like, I don’t want to hurt her”
“Ah, she was always too twee for you anyway, girl. All flowers and puppies, yeah? There’s a difference between being a bit girly, enjoying being female, and being all little girly, with chintz teapots and floral knickers, if you take my point”
Her eyes widened a little. “Of for fuck’s sake, please tell me you aren’t the sort of girl who goes for poodle-shaped covers for the spare bogroll!”
“No, not me. I like a bit of femininity, it sort of goes with the turf, like. Not frills and flounces, but a nice cut, decent fabrics, aye?”
“Well, that time you brought your sheepshagger out to the pub quiz, I wanted to gag. Those nail things, dear god”
I looked pointedly at her own scarlet and shaped nails, and she grinned.
“Part of the look, innit? If I’m going to tease half the office out of their concentration, I need to carry it off properly. Like my shoes, yeah? Got to be heels, but notice something about them? Plain, black, pointy. No flowers, no diamante bows, just simple, straightforward fuck-mes. Your Von, she’d want half a florist hanging off them. I bet that tart from last night had shoes more my style than Siobhan, right?”
She was right, and I just nodded. Her voice softened.
“Jill, love, that Von, she’s a nice girl, yeah, but I really don’t think she’s on the same wavelength as you, and I suspect she would never understand the real you, yeah? Am I right?”
I nodded again. “I have to work out how to leave her, Rach, and I don’t know if I have the ba…guts. I really am in shit here. I can’t be ne, I can never be me, cause I look so crap, and if I stay like this I won’t survive, and now I’ve only ended up with another woman to hurt. I’d be better off right out of it”
She stepped forward, putting her arms around my shoulders and pulling me close, her breasts squashing between us, and we held each other for a few minutes.
“Don’t ever talk like that, Jill Carter, because I know what you really mean, and it would be a fuckwitted thing to do. Promise me, yeah? Promise?”
That was when MAC walked in, and I watched his gaze slither up Rachel from her ankles to her arse, before he registered my presence.
“Have you two not got work enough?”
Rachel let me go and turned. “Sorry, Mr Wilkins, but we were making a cuppa, and I felt a bit weak, so Rob had to support me for a second. On the account of how he was such an animal last night, yeah, fair wore me out, he did”
White, then pink, and finally almost green, his face switched colours as Rachel quickly made two teas before taking my hand and leading me out of the kitchen. As the door shut behind us, she started to shudder, then snort with suppressed hilarity.
“Didja see his FACE? Fuck me!”
“No ta, I’ve got nothing left, have I?”
Rachel leant back slightly. “She’s that good?”
“Well, aye, but more like she’s that insistent”
“Sounds like my sort of girl. Trouble is, are you hers?”
“Her what?”
“Her sort of girl. Look, she didn’t freak, did she? You never know…just, Rob, promise me one thing”
“What’s that?”
“Don’t rush anything just because you feel scared, or lonely, or as if time’s pissing off too quickly, yeah? Promise?”
“I promise. Look, MAC’s going to be gunning for us both now, so we better get the crap shifted before he works out what he wants to do, like”
“OK. Coming out for a drink some evening? You could bring your tart along”
“I will think on, aye? She might not want to”
“Trust me, if she has any real interest in you, she will want to, so ask her, yeah?”
“Yeah, I will. See you later, aye?”
“Laters, yeah”
I worked through the last part of the afternoon, clearing both folders, and as I finished I saw MAC’s car leaving the parking area. Safe at last. I had expected at least a barbed ‘joke’ from him, but that had never materialised. I wrapped up, switched all my equipment off, and headed down to where my bike lay tucked in a corner of the locker room.
The tyres were both flat. Fucker.
A few minutes saw them hard enough to get me home, and I rode off without any further problems, smiling inside at the obvious culprit’s expense. Along with just about every other bloke in the office, I am sure that the idea of having Rachel was bobbing away on top of the cesspit he called a mind, and to see her apparently wrapped around me after a night of post-watershed naughtiness must have hit him squarely in the ego. What an arsehole.
I got in, and started the oven heating for the two pizzas I had picked up on the way home, and drew myself a bath. I rang Larinda as it filled.
“Hello!”
“Hi, Larinda, it’s Jill here”
“Jill…? Oh, ROB Jill! How are you? Still knackered?”
“Worn away to a stump, pet. Look, there’s this lass at work, and she has suggested going out for a drink, like”
“You dumping me already?”
“What? No, you and me, and her, together, aye?”
“Just teasing, darling. Is she sound?”
“As a pound. Look, just taking a bath, then tea, and an early night”
“Want me to wash your back?”
“Ha, I’ll leave the door unlocked then!”
“Laters, lover boy”
I hung up, and finished running the bath. As it stood, I dropped the skirt I had changed into on arrival home and after I had used my electric clippers to trim my beard, I soaped my legs and set to work on the stubble. I always loved the smooth feeling I got when my calves rubbed together, and for a while I could forget the rest of me. I rinsed the razor, and then, before my resolve evaporated, pulled it across my cheek.
First space cleared. I soaped my face, and slowly, slowly it emerged from foam and hair. Each time I exhaled through my nose, it tickled my chin; weird.
I wore a favourite nighty, early and sober to bed. Larinda climbed in at ten o’clock.
CHAPTER 12
I was still awake at two in the morning, sore where it counted, Larinda pushed up against me making snuffling noises in her sleep. The bedding was seriously in need of laundering.
I couldn’t carry on like this. At some point Von would be bound to discover what I was doing, and that wouldn’t be fair on her. Then there was Larinda herself. The sex itself was the problem, but it wasn’t the old cliché of wearing me out, the failings of age; it was the simple fact that at some point the excitement of her presence would become overridden by my revulsion for what I was actually doing. What she seemed to adore was something I had never wanted to do anything with beyond losing it.
She had reacted to my clean shave with a raised eyebrow.
“Well, now. That makes a change, won’t tickle so much when you do the dirty down below, but you are going to have to make sure you have a good shave, not getting stubble burn down there!”
“Don’t worry, I’ll deal with that”
Indeed I would. I was already listing places for electrolysis. My internet browsing my mood swings: one moment I would be checking the pharmacopoeia, the next it was sites in London for hair removal. Terribly confusing, it sounds, but I had rationalised a sort of plan for my future. The exit plan remained, I would do all I could to get a clean and painless departure ready, but I would hold fire on it until I gave the medics a chance to show me as many alternatives as they could. If there was nothing that would work, then I still had the alternative doorway.
Larinda stirred in her sleep, and her hand went straight to that part of me. I had nothing left, just then, and I lay on my back in her warmth and smell. She woke me half an hour before the alarm, in her favourite way, and we enjoyed a moment of warmth and closeness, not speaking, just cuddling, until it went off.
I had laid in some bits and pieces on the way back from work, so I was able to give her some toast and cereal between showering and heading to the station. She inspected my face over breakfast.
“You’re going for it, aren’t you?”
I looked down at my plate. “Yes, I think so. I can’t carry on like this, pet. One way or another, it has to change"
“Looks like I’m going to have to get my money’s worth while I can, then!”
“Not this morning you won’t, got nowt left”
She reached across to take my hand. “No, silly, not just that, though I will be getting as much as you can give if…look, you don’t think I’m just here for the shagging, do you? Shit, you do want me here, yourself, you know, for me, and not just, well, IT?”
I gave her my best smile, and it came easily and naturally.
“Not at all. I mean, IT is all very nice, but you were right, the first time we met, we can talk, and I needed that. It’s all very odd; you know my deepest secret, and you just go ‘Yeah, and, whatever’ and carry on as normal. How could I not want that?”
“Well, you don’t do so bad yourself, Rob. Most blokes would get pissed off sharpish with me going on and on about my old feller, but you listen, and I know you listen cause you ask proper questions about it, yeah?”
“I’m not most blokes, though, am I? I’m not a bloke at all, really”
She actually smiled at that. “Yeah, more I talk to you, more I can see it. Slike what I said about me talking about the ex, a bloke would be different”
“What way?”
“Well, a man would go ‘yeah, I know what you mean, had a bird do that to me once’ and then tell his story. Like it’s a competition”
“Yes, but men don’t mean it like that, it’s their way of showing they understand”
“Oh, I get that, but sometimes all a girl really wants is ‘oh, poor you’ and a chance to get it off her whatsit, chest”
She looked hard at me again. “Is that what you want? Tits?”
I swallowed hard. “Yeah, for starters, I suppose so. It’s much more, I don’t know, all over than that. Look, it’s confusing, it’s frustrating; I watch a girl walk away from me and with one half of my mind I’m thinking ‘lovely arse’ and feeling randy, and with the other half I’m jealous as all hell. I don’t just want to shag her, I want to BE her”
“You are going to stop shagging me, though”
I squeezed her hand. Her tone was resigned rather than sad.
“No, pet, I don’t think I’m ever going to stop wanting to shag you. You are the most shaggable woman I have ever, well, shagged. It’s just, how I will want to do it that’s awkward. After a while, the bit that’s me, me in the core, yeah, it starts to shut out the sort of meat responses, and then it all sort of goes away. But that’s just , you know, that bit. There’s other things apart from that”
She suddenly grinned again. “Yeah, now the beard’s gone it’ll be twice as nice! Come on, time for the train soon. Ro…Jill, you got room among your dresses for some of mine? I know they’ll be safe, cause you is the wrong size!”
“Putting a marker down, like?”
“Sort of, but more common sense. If I am going to kip here on a regular basis I am going to need some basics, yeah? For example, I’m due on next weekend, and that’s one thing you ain’t ever going to need”
Once more, the serious face. “Look, Jill, Rob, I don’t know what the hell is going to happen here, right? I just know, well, it’s early days, yeah, we only just met, and we seem to have spent most of the time shagging, but the rest of the time’s been talk, real talk, and you just, I dunno, click with everything in me. If we end up nothing more than girlfriends, if that’s where you go, then fuck it, I’m still ahead on what I had, yeah? But…”
There was a pause, and then a pained expression. “Do you really have to get it cut off?”
“Well, I don’t believe they do that, it’s more taking the middle out and flipping it inside itself and”
“Ugh, too much info, not at breakfast! Come on, scrub my back and I’ll do yours”
Off we went, clean without and in my case empty within, and as I left her at the station I promised to call her with a date for a meeting with Rachel. I made sure I packed two spare tubes, and I took my bag and a padlock for the zip.
Two more visits that day, one an Indian corner shop where the daughter had to translate the more difficult concepts but they insisted that I had a plate of lamb samosas with the cup of tea that was more traditional. I smiled at the daughter, only seventeen years old.
“I don’t know why, but even though most people prefer tea, it’s almost always coffee they give me. This is good”
“Best Assam, Mister Carter, best tea in the world. Dad says it’s best thing to come out of India since the Raj did”
I caught the wink from her old man then, and it was just part of one of the best mornings I had ever spent at work. A pity about the afternoon trip, who turned out to want to lecture me at length on the wastefulness of employing armies of little men like me to interfere with his overwhelmingly important role in creating wealth for the nation. I had to bite my tongue several times, especially when I spotted the small dictation machine he slipped into a pocket, and I just contented myself by imagining him and MAC in the same car crusher. Then I realised what he was doing to his credit card bills.
“Mr Soames, why do you calculate your input tax in this way?”
“I will claim it how I choose”
“And if you do so, I will take a large part of it back, Mr Soames. You cannot simply take 17.5% of the total expenditure as it already includes VAT. This notice explains how to work it out. There are also items on the bill that are not for business, or do not include VAT, such as the interest”
“Why can I not reclaim the VAT on the interest?”
“Because there is no VAT on it. Also, just to take one example, what is this?”
“A conference”
“On what, Mr Soames? I tracked down the relevant purchase invoice. What sort of conference was held at a country hotel and involved a double room and spa treatments?”
“Can you keep your voice down, Mr Carter, my wife is in the next room”
“Ah. Can you pass me the tape from that machine in your pocket? Thank you. I will send you a letter detailing the queries I am raising, Mr Soames, so if I were you I would make sure you open your own mail. Happy wealth creating and good day”
Arsehole.
I caught Rachel in the kitchen again, and I realised she must watch for me as I came in.
“What did she say?”
“How do you know I spoke to her?”
“Oh come on, Jill, I can spot the shagged-to-death look on you from a mile off, yeah? She was all over you last night again, wasn’t she?”
“Er…”
“So did you ask her?”
“Aye, I did, and she’s up for a natter”
“OK, we’ll compare calendars. Where at?”
“Oh, probably up at Croydon. Look, I’m going to see about flying up to see Mam in a week or two. Leave it till after, aye?”
“Makes sense. You going to tell her?”
Deep breath, and then an answer that covered almost all of my life to date,
“Rach, I just don’t know”
CHAPTER 13
Von was back in Hampshire a couple of days afterwards, so I had to fit in a trip down on the Monday, a day she wasn’t at work and I was able to squeeze a day’s leave in. I walked out of the Harbour station, HMS Warrior bulking beside it, and round to Gunwharf Quay, where I found her sitting in one of the coffee bars.
“I’ll have another cappuccino, love; what you want, Gareth?”
That was her youngest son, along for the day, so no PDA’s, as the Yanks called them, which actually suited me as I could still feel Larinda on me from that morning. She had spent the weekend with me, and for once it had been more than just a semi-clad attack on my body. Quite a bit of the time was spent slumped on the sofa, each of us with our own book, just touching and relaxing. There had been a moment…
“Look, it’s not me being a nosy cow, yeah, but am I right?”
“Well, yeah, I do”
“So why not?”
“Because I never have before, like, and it’s a big step”
“Well, I promise a lot of things, and I mean them, but here’s another: I won’t laugh, yeah, I just want you to know you can relax with me. Well, when I’m not shagging you, of course, that would be rude”
She tugged me back into the bedroom, and opened the wardrobe.
“Skirt and top?”
“Is what I normally wear, aye”
She pulled out a long cotton skirt and a cap-sleeved white blouse.
“Where do you keep your knickers and bras?”
That broke my mood, and I laughed out loud. “What the hell would I want a bra for, pet? And knickers don’t fit unless they are shorts-type ones. I’m not a tranny!”
She cocked her head to one side. “I’ve got it a bit wrong, haven’t I?”
“Slightly. Look, it’s not about dressing up to look like a woman, all false tits and stuff, like, it’s more about relaxing at home, about comfort, and just a little bit of saying to myself that I am a woman. A bra, that sort of thing, it would just make the point that I am not one, not in body. Look, in the drawer, yeah, pairs of tights. No stockings, are there? Tights are for when my legs get cold, not for feeling all sexy and crap like that”
“Yeah, I get it, I think. Come on, change then”
“With you here?”
She almost fell over with laughter. “Jill, considering what we were doing to each other a few minutes ago, you worry about me seeing you with your kit off?”
She was right, of course, but my worry was more in having someone watch me dress. Nevertheless, I stepped into the skirt and buttoned the blouse, hair poking over the top, and Larinda stepped in for a kiss, ruffling my visible chest hair.
“I am going to miss this…”
And there we were, both in skirts, cuddled up on the sofa with our books as rain beat on the window and her music played on the stereo, and suddenly it felt right, and safe.
Carole King and Joni Mitchell were her favourites, as her tastes seemed to run to angsty female singer-songwriters. One day, I had mentioned Alanis Morissette for some reason, and she was almost explosive in her condemnation of her as a jumped up poser.
“For fuck’s sake, at least Carole King never pretended to be anything other than a songwriter. Look how bad my multimillionaire lifestyle is, tosser. Now, try this one…”
‘This one’ had turned out to be country music by some woman called Lucinda Williams, and I nearly used it as a Frisbee out of the window, till she sat me down and said “Shut up and listen to the bloody words!”
She was, of course, right. This woman, who had come from a background where the highest aspirations of the menfolk consisted of fitting plastic mouldings and extra lights to shit cars, this woman was showing me works of art I would never have found on my own. And it was true, I was falling in love.
Gareth had wanted a hot chocolate, that came with marshmallows and a moulded stirrer made of chocolate on a wooden handle, and Siobhan rattled on about her Mam and Bamps, as the lad told me snippets about his cycling and the new dog they were looking to get, and I felt so ashamed of where I stood in life I wanted to cry.
The lad had finished his chocolate, and we strolled out onto a windy quayside, the Spinnaker soaring overhead, as she worked through her checklist of things that she just HAD to buy.
“Oh hell, nearly forgot”
I pulled out the shoes I had been sent for, which were far from my style, and got a kiss thank you.
I loved Von, but we could never have a life together that would work in any way for any length of time. Her passion was family: families lived together, or at least nearby, and family meant her family. She had only moved to Hampshire because her then husband had taken over a business there and moved the new family over. She hated the house, she hated the area, but she had put up with it right up to the point where she had found him discussing his next tryst with a Russian woman met on the internet. Two years after that, we had met, in a bike shop, and at the low ebb and edge of despair I had teetered on, her vivacity had called to me. I asked her out, we clicked, and one traditional thing led to the next, and it took six months before I realised exactly how Chapel her family were, how hidebound her views on Family and one’s role. When my younger brother had suffered a breakdown, Von’s view was that I should drop everything and rush to his side. I tried to explain…
“Look, love, I know him. If I go steaming in, he’ll run away and hide. Mam has him, she’s telling him I care, and eventually he’ll come round, like, but if I charge up there we might never see him again, aye?”
“If it was my family, I would be straight there, and make him see, innit?”
“Aye, love, but we are not your family, and it isn’t like that. He’s just been discharged, he’s got a carer, and everything has to be at arms’ length for a while. We’ll get there”
“Not right, it isn’t, if he were my boy I’d be there showing I love him”
“But he isn’t, and he’s mentally ill, so we have to do what the doctors say and what I know is right, love”
I think that was the moment I started to realise the extent of her blind spots, that even with the affection and common ground we had, there were things she would never, ever be able to understand and accept. I needed to find some way of letting her out of my life without hurting her, or the boys, of whom I had grown fond. One thing was certain: even if I disregarded my gender problem, my life was seriously over-complicated.
We finished our round of the shops with Gareth’s favourite meal out, fajitas at a chain faux-Mexican place, and then I said my goodbyes.
“Off to Mam’s next weekend, love”
“Give her my love, then. Pity I can’t come up, she’d like a woman to fuss about her, wouldn’t she?”
She will have one, love, just not realise it. “Aye, she would, but I’ll do my best”
“I know you will, love. Call me when you’re home, right?”
“OK. I fly Friday. Bye!”
No kiss, not in front of the boy, and a dreary train ride back up from Portsmouth spent daydreaming to the sounds on my MP3, and once more no booze, and no Larinda. Both absences left me edgy.
Friday came, and I jumped the hoops at Gatwick to my seat on the Flybe turboprop sitting like a toy at the departure gate, then waited two hours later for them to finally deliver my backpack at Newcastle Airport before finally slumping into another seat, this one on the Metro. I always smiled at the Geordie accent on the recorded announcements about minding the doors, and my mood lifted as I realised I was actually home. As so many people failed to understand, home isn’t always where you live.
Mam was waiting in her little car at the Heworth interchange, and as I cringed at her driving we made our way to my real home, and a cup of tea that, of course, I had to make, and there was my room, with my bed, and an attic still holding my old school books, next to the blocked off part with the loose bricks I had been able to pull out to hide the few items of clothing I had found as a child and been able to hide till I left for university. I took her tea into the living room, where she sat in Her Chair, sticks propped against the wall.
“So, how’s the hip?”
“Whey, the wound still hurts, like, but I knew that would happen. That awful pain, though, the nagging one, that’s gone, and I’m really pleased about that, pet. How’s Siobhan?”
“Fine, still talking about going back to the Valleys, and that’s not something I can do, is it?”
She plumped herself up a bit. “No, that’s right, but she’s a nice lass, and you need to let her down nicely, aye?”
“Oh, I know that, Mam, trust me there. It’s not easy, like”
She looked hard at me. “What if things were different, Rob? Would you?”
The answer was at the front of my mind, and on my tongue, and out of my mouth before I could pull it back.
“No, I couldn’t”
She was looking at me with eyes that knew so much of my soul, and I couldn’t help it.
“Mam, look, there’s something we really need to talk about”
CHAPTER 14
I paused for an attempt at thought. All my plans were collapsing around me, and it was as if I was in a river taking me where it wanted to go, regardless of how hard I swam. She sat there in Her Chair, a dumpy old woman, close-cropped grey hair giving back almost as much light as her glasses.
“What have you done?”
There was no accusation there, just a neutral tone, inviting me to speak. Her voice was soft, and it was clear my mother was worried. However big, ugly and hairy I got, I was still her little boy, which of course was the problem.
“Nowt, as such, Mam. It’s a bit, well, more than that. Shit, it’s like our Neil, OK?”
That was it, out. She stared for a moment, then spoke, still calm.
“Are you telling me you are a homosexual as well, son? Is that why you and that woman you married, you know?”
“She does have a name, Mam”
“Not in this house she doesn’t. And tell her to stop sending me Christmas cards”
I paused a moment more.
“Yes, Mam, I am gay”
“Thank god one of my sons has given me grand bairns, then. Are you trying to tell me you are leaving Siobhan for a bloke?”
Breathe again. “No, Mam, I do not fancy men”
Her composure cracked at that, and her brow furrowed a little.
“What do you mean you divvent fancy men? You have just told me you are homo whatever”
“I am. I fancy women.”
“I don’t under…oh bloody hell, you are telling me you are one of them? Transvestites?”
“No, Mam, I am telling you you had a daughter fifty three years ago but it was botched, aye?”
To my horror, she started to cry, and I went to her, careful of the hip.
“Absolutely useless. What the hell did I ever do right, cause all this, all this is so wrong. One’s a puff, one’s a shit, and you, oh hell…”
I let her sob into my chest for a while, until she was able to push me away a little.
“Get the bottle and a glass, please, Rob”
The bottle was in the sideboard, her old tipple of Gordon’s gin, and I saw there was dust on the cap where she hadn’t touched it for years. I found a similarly old bottle of tonic water and to my relief it was sealed, and made up her normal mix. When I returned she had finished cleaning her face.
“Sit over there, Rob. Or is it some other name now?”
“I have had another name most of my life, Mam. It’s Gillian, Jill”
She stared off into the distance. “You were our first, and we didn’t know, those days, what you would be. We went through names, your Dad and me, family names, and of course when you were born, it had to be your Dad’s name, and his Dad’s, and his Dad’s…”
“Mam…if I had been born, well, right, a girl, aye, what?”
“Norma Anne”
I started to laugh at that, and she stared at me.
“Sorry, Mam, I ‘m just grateful it wasn’t going to be Norma Jean!”
She frowned, just for a second, and laughed as she got the joke.
“Mam, you have done nothing wrong. Look at my friend Karen, her husband has a son, aye, he’s autistic, sort of, and nobody knows what causes that, aye? Terry loves him to bits, does his best for him, I can see that now, and James…James loves his dad, and he shows it as best he can, but it’s nobody’s fault. It’s like our Neil…”
“No. That was all down to that man. He turned my boy”
“No, Mam. He didn’t. What he did was let Neil see who he really was, aye? I spoke to him, before he got ill, yeah, and Neil is what he is, always has been. Just like me”
“When did you decide this, Rob?”
“Ach, I said to one of my friends, it was Karen, I said, like, it was when I first started to be able to control my bladder”
Her voice was very quiet. “You told some other woman before your own mother?”
I couldn’t help it, and I started to cry. “I didn’t want to hurt you, Mam. I just wanted to wait until you had gone, and then, but, I couldn’t, I couldn’t take any more, and I had to, and I don’t wish you dead, I don’t ever want you dead, I just didn’t want to hurt you…”
She was crying again. “Come here…Jill”
We wept together, my Mam holding her daughter as I tried to work out what I was going to do. It was out, now, for good or bad.
Eventually, we came back under control, Mam stroking my hair as I knelt beside the Chair. She took a sip of her gin, grimaced, and said “Kettle, I think”
As I rose for the ritual, she said, still hesitating over the name slightly,
“Jill…Gillian. It’s nice. Look, this explains one thing, but I want an honest answer, aye?”
“Of course, Mam”
“It wasn’t Neil getting into my clothes, was it? I always assumed, you know, with him being a puff that…things were never back quite how I’d left them, and tights; tights stretch, and they don’t go right back for a while, so I knew, aye? Just answer one question, will you?”
“What, Mam?”
“Did you, you know, in my clothes…”
She made a gesture, and I had to laugh, as my elderly mother made a wanking motion with her right hand.
“Kettle first, Mam, and then I’ll explain, but…no, never, aye?”
Once the tea was made, I sat by her and talked her through it.
“Mam, I wasn’t dressing up for excitement, aye? I was doing it to try and be myself, just for a bit, just while the rest of you were out, like. There’s no sexual bit to it. Look: our Neil fancies men, aye? That’s all about who he likes, it isn’t about him, about who he is. With me, it’s about who I am”
She smiled. “But all he is is a shirtlifter, aye? You, you’re a tuppence licker as well as being…whatever it’s called”
“Norma Carter, I didn’t know you knew words like that!”
“Gillian Carter, your Dad was a squaddy, so how could I ever NOT know them!”
I had a moment of surprise, warmth, as I realised my own mother was deliberately using my real name. It was clear she was having major problems with the situation, as I had known she would, but her strength of character, her Matriarchal power, was there, and she was doing the best she could. Ah well, on to the next little bombshell.
“There is something else, Mam”
“Oh, for Christ’s sake, at least you cannot tell me you’re pregnant. What next?”
“It’s Von, Mam. You know she’s moving to be by her parents, like, and I can’t go?”
“Aye…”
“Well, it’s not just that, Mam. It’s…well, I met someone else”
“And what are you going to tell her about all this?”
“She knows, Mam”
“And?”
“She’s just about OK with it, just not happy that, you know, what we do will have to stop at some point, like”
“If you youngsters waited before jumping into bed, you’d be a lot better at things than you are”
“I’m fifty three, Mam”
“And I changed your shitty nappies, aye?”
Then my meaning hit her. “You’re wanting to get it all cut off and all, aren’t you”
“Aye, I suppose I am. Look, I have to have at least some time in my life to be myself, just once, aye?”
She was nodding. “I understand quite a bit, pet. This is what those games with the pills were about, isn’t it? You gave up hope”
Tears again, I couldn’t help it. “I tried, Mam, I tried to be a boy, and when it got too much, yes, that was what it was, and I’ve tried to be a man, and I can’t, and I just want…”
She is my mother, and she loves me, as a parent should, unconditionally. That doesn’t mean all is accepted, all is forgiven, but that the love doesn’t go away. She was proving that. As she hugged me once more, she murmured to me.
“It’s expensive, isn’t it?”
“Aye, Mam, it is. I will have to do a lot just to get rid of the hair, for starters. I don’t know how much the NHS helps, but if, when, I get the big one done, I think I should go abroad. They tend to be better at it, or so I am told”
“Well, I’ve got some savings”
“No”
“I helped your brother out when he got the new house”
“Aye, but he’ll pay you back”
“Aye, he said he would, but I’m not expecting it any time before the Second Coming. You can pay me back, but the money is there if you need it”
“Mam, you would put money up for, you know, one of your sons…?”
“Daughter. My daughter tried to leave me twice because nobody understood. She doesn’t get a third go. Three’s a charm”
CHAPTER 15
We sat for a while, talking. That sounds banal, but it wasn’t, not at all. This wasn’t passing the time, but rather the first time I had ever been able to tell my mother who I was, a moment I had fretted and worried over, and at the same time dreamt of. She got straight to the point.
“What are we having for tea?”
“Pardon?”
“Aye, I’m thinking of my stomach. Jill, life goes on, aye? I’ve just told you that, so while you have just turned everything upside down…”
“I’m sorry, Mam”
“No, no saying sorry. We are going to be as normal as we can, like, and that means we carry on, we eat, it’ll be fish on Fridays, ham and pease puddin’ Friday tea, and I’ll do us a roast on Sundays, just as usual, unless you want to go out to the Bowes or somewhere”
“Mam, I live in Surrey, remember?”
“Aye, but if you are having something so…serious done to you, you’ll want somewhere safe to recover, like”
“Mam, I already said I was probably going abroad, like”
“Well, then, you’ll want someone to hold your hand over there for a bit, pet. Anyway, when are we talking about?”
“Ach, I’ve no idea. I have to speak to counsellors first, then possibly a shrink, then…then I have to live, you know, as a woman for at least a year, I think”
She looked at me hard, yet again. “It’s not going to be easy for you, is it?”
“Mam, it’s never been easy for me. Girls like me, well, there is no ‘easy’ anywhere, any time. I mean, I haven’t even decided how far I want to take this, aye?”
Once more the level stare. “Like shite you haven’t. Your decision was made long before you decided to tell me, wasn’t it?”
She was right, and she knew it. My decision, I realised, had already been made when I first came out to Karen, and it had been to do or to die.
“Now, haddaway down to the Chinese, aye? The one at the bottom of the hill, not that one in the High Street. He does me a special chicken fried rice with extra pineapple, and I like that, so tell him it’s for me. That other one’s too greasy, and they put that seaweed powder in it, keeps us awake, like. And you might as well stop off in the Neville for a scotch. I know you and your beer, and you won’t have had any down there, will you?”
I felt all of twelve years old as she did the maternal ritual of getting money from her handbag for the food, sending me on an errand as if I had never grown and left home, and the warmth nearly brought me to tears again. I grabbed a jacket and headed for the door.
“Divvent be too long in that pub, like, I want me tea early enough I’m not sleeping on a full stomach, you hear?”
“Aye, Mam”
I headed for the door.
“Jill…”
“Aye?”
“I love you. I always will”
“I know, Mam, I really know”
I got the waterworks under control as I headed down the hill, and over the road to the Neville Arms. It was now around seven o’clock, and the heavy drinkers were still milking every drop from Happy Hour in the chain pub up the road. I found a space at the bar, and the huge lad who served me was an old schoolmate. Small town, narrow compass.
“How, Rob, hoo lang’re ye back for?”
“Hiya Jim, just a few days, seeing to me Mam, like. Hip replacement, aye?”
“Aye, ah hord. Thy brother’s been in, the puff one, aye? Telt us aboot it. Scotch?”
“Aye, please”
No need to ask if I wanted a pint; only women and puffs drink halves. Even Neil drank pints; the women already in the pub were drinking two halves at once, their intake matching that of their men, just from twice as many glasses. He pulled me a pint of the dark beer, and I took my first sip for nearly a year. Home.
“Hoo’s it gannin’ in cockney land?”
“Ah, not so bad. Got a cunt for a boss, like, but he’s due early retirement, so we’re gan’ te throw a party, a going away do, when he does, like”
“How, if he’s such a twat, whey’re ye giving him a party?”
I laughed. “Ach, Jim, the man isn’t invited, like, it’s for the rest of us”
Jim laughed, which shook some of the bottles behind the bar.
“I alwez loved thy sense of humour”
“Na, not my idea, it was a lass I work with, Rachel”
“She bonny?”
“Aye, Jim, very much so. The twat caught us having a hug one day, and he let the tyres down on me bike”
“Ye’re givin’ her one?”
“Na, just mates, like”
“Ye still seeing that sheepshagger lass, what’s her name?”
“Siobhan. Aye, at the minute, like, but it’s sort of dying, but, well, got another lass now, so it’s a wee bit complicated”
He laughed again. “If ye’re seeing two lasses, I bet the other’un’s a dorty piece!”
“Now, lad, I can’t say about stuff like that, can I now?”
My grin gave him the answer, though. Larinda was indeed ‘a dirty piece’, in that she knew what she liked and set out to get and enjoy it. I also realised, just then, how much I missed her. My life was changing so quickly, in so many ways, and she was becoming my storm anchor as well as lover.
“Bar’s starting to fill up, Jim, I’ll grab a table, Just having a couple, aye? Getting a Chinky for tea”
“Well, Ah’ll see thee before ye gan back, aye? Gan for an Indywoo?”
“I don’t know, Jim, see how Mam is, aye?”
“Aal reet. Let us knaa, like, afore ye gan back”
“Will do”
I turned away from the bar, just in time to catch the question another customer asked him.
“How, is that the one with the fuckin’ puff for a brother? Hoo can ye sorve cunts like that?”
I stood, back turned, as Jim answered before I could.
“Whey, marra, ah torns the tap an’ hurlds a glass belaa it, like. Piss easy. Cunts like ye, George, ye fuck off oot the door and divvent come back. Ever, Cause ye’re barred. Shut it as ye gan”
“Fuck ye an aal, ye cunt”
The door slammed just too softly to break any of the glass in it, and I turned back round to Jim, who winked.
“Watch hoo ye gan at the Chinky, Rob. George has aalwez been an arsehole, and he might try an’ be a bit lively, like”
“Thanks anyway, Jim. I’ve had worse from him”
Years of beatings in and out of school, to be precise, that only stopped when I left for college. Fifty three years of age, and my school bully was still haunting me. I finished a second pint, thought of a third, and then thought of Mam, at home alone.
“Night, Jim!”
“Gan canny, Rob”
The young girl in the Jade Palace knew exactly who my mother was, and smiled delightfully as she added some hieroglyphs that seemed to mean ‘extra fruit’, but it was spoiled ten seconds later by the shove from behind.
“Thy kid’s a puff, Carter”
I turned, and George Bell was there, head shaved to disguise his hair loss, belly hanging over his belt and fingers yellow with nicotine. When he opened his mouth to speak, there were gaps inside. Purple veins spread across his cheeks and all over his nose. I found myself laughing.
“What’s funny, puff?”
“Ah, George, we always used to joke about it, but now I can say it: fuck off, red nose”
“Ye think ye’re a big man, noo, coz ye’re livin’ in that London? Ah say ye’re a puff, just like thy kid”
There was an inevitability building in this confrontation. Fifty three, and the arsehole who had tormented me for so many years was still trying to treat whatever demons lived in his soul by visiting them on others. The shopgirl’s father was there now.
“Mr Bell, you go now, or I call Police”
“Caal the fuckin’ polliss, Ah divvent give a shit”
He reached out to take a handful of my shirtfront, and that did it. Fifty three years, that number that was so important to me, fifty three years of shit, and pain, and all those school years of beatings, and my mother’s unconditional love, and this, this piece of filth…
I stepped forward as he tugged, and before he could cock his head for the butt I drove my right knee as hard as I could, just where it hurt the most. He gave a strangled sort of scream, and fell to the ground whimpering.
“You pathetic little loser, did it ever occur to you that I’m a lot bigger than when you used to beat the shit out of me? You come near me again, and you get the same, aye?”
I bent down a little, and dropped my voice.
“You ever go near Neil, and I cut them off. Got me?”
As the chef and owner pulled him to his feet, and bundled him out of the door, he glared at me.
“Ye fight like a fuckin’ lass, ye!”
Funny, that.
“Bye, George, missing you already!”
I made my way up the hill with a bag of Chinese food, and then spent an hour being rocked by Mam till we were able to face eating. Microwaves are handy things.
CHAPTER 16
I took Ian’s old bed that night, as my room was now her sewing and craft room. It was a better evening after the confrontation, and I noticed how much effort Mam was putting into how she addressed me. It was almost as if she had forgotten I was ever called Rob, and that simple act did so much to bring me back from the pain and hatred that Bell had triggered.
Hatred was the word, for I hated him with a passion I had never lost, but kept smouldering ever since my school days. The problem was the self-hate. You can only be called a freak or worse so many times before it starts to stick, and in my case a freak was exactly what I was, what I am. Someone born with no legs is a freak, not through any fault of theirs, but they are by definition not normal. I was the same; everything about me was wrong, but unlike the poor legless person I had been left with all the opportunities that normal people get. I just didn’t want to take them up.
Why couldn’t I just get on with the life that had been handed me? I was a reasonably healthy man, with no deformities in any objective sense, and I could have a normal life without any of the adaptations that the truly handicapped would need. I was just being selfish, it seemed. I was going to put Mam through all sorts of shit, and Von, and even Larinda, just because I was selfish. Couldn’t I just get on with life like any other man would?
I lay there in the darkness on the too-soft mattress, and around two in the morning the answer came. No, I couldn’t live that life, because the pain was too much. Every single thing I did was a lie, every word I spoke as a man came as pretence. Bell…
Whatever I did, Bell and his clones would be waiting for me. If I went through the surgery, the change in role, there would be a George Bell awaiting me at every step, and that terrified me, but the reality was that whatever I did there would be a George Bell or a MAC itching to slip me the snide remark or the abuse, overt or hidden. At least, I could be there to take it as myself.
One thing I had noticed, talking to my mother, was that I was starting to mimic her movements, ever so slightly. My hands were more active when I spoke, for one, and the habits derived from being in skirts whenever I was at home were evident, if one knew how to look. I don’t mean I was becoming camp, just that as I relaxed more with Mam the inner Gillian came out to look around at what would be her world.
Breakfast was an argument from the beginning.
“No, sit down!!
“It’s my house, and I will do the cooking”
“And you’ve just had a new hip, so sit down. I CAN cook, you know!”
She started to laugh at that one. “Aye, you always were a bit of a lass that way. Just funny that I never realised exactly how much of a lass you are”
“I got a bit good at hiding, Mam. Chair, now!”
“Not yet, I’m just going to sit in the garden and have me bit tab first. Pour the tea, girl”
Just like that, with little gestures and words, she brought Jill out and made her smile. As she settled in the garden chair with her cigarette, I remembered my fears that I would kill her with shock, the conflict between needing to be out and never wanting her to die, ever. As she limped out the back door, she called over her shoulder.
“You need to make a couple of phone calls, Jill. That new lass of yours deserves a hello at least, and it would be nice if you would let Siobhan know how I’m getting on, like”
I made the breakfast she liked, full English with black pudding, Cumberland sausage, toast, beans, back bacon, scrambled eggs, mushrooms and grilled tomatoes, and of course we ate it at the table, with cloth and proper saucers for our cups. She ate in silence for a while, then put her fork down.
“I did a lot of thinking yestereen and last night, Jill. This is a big thing, a really big thing, and I know you wanted to spare me, like, but things are what they are and I think you’ve been festering too long. So what I did…look ye, I don’t want you to think I’m pushing, like, and you can do what you want, but I gave your brother a ring while you were out, and we’ll have him for dinner today. You tell him only if you want to, aye?”
“You mean Neil, of course”
“Aye. Ian’s a bit far just to pop round, isn’t he? He’ll be over for one, gives you time to have a bit sit and think. If you want my advice…”
“I always want your advice”
“There’s two ways he can go, aye? He’ll either be on your side, totally, or he’ll be trying to say how he’s normal after all, and use you to push in people’s faces, like. So gan canny with him”
I spoke to Von just after breakfast, and then left her to natter with Mam for a while before slipping out into the back garden with my mobile.
“Hiya, lover. How is she?”
“Sore, but perky. She’s speaking to Von just now. Fuck, but my life’s complicated”
“Well, at least you are doing something to uncomplicated it. You’ve told her, haven’t you?”
“About what?”
“Ah. You’ve told her it all, then. How did she take it?”
“You or me?”
“Oh for fuck’s sake, just get on with it, you teasing bitch!”
That shocked me, just a little. “You what?”
She laughed down the line. “Look, Jill, I am doing my best to get my head round things, yeah, and that’s one of the ways I do it”
“What, by calling me a bitch?”
“Well, you are planning on taking my breakfast away from me! Now, how did it go?”
I talked her through the previous evening, and got a guffaw when I described the knee to Bell’s softer parts. I told her we were expecting Neil in a few hours.
“And? You going to tell him?”
“I think so…Look, I’m going back in, I want to get a few things done this morning, and I’ll let you know how things go, aye?”
She laughed again. “Your accent has got really strong since yesterday! Laters!”
I went back in, and Mam handed me the phone to say my goodbyes to Von. When we had hung up, I asked her if she wanted to do a little driving.
“Why, where to?”
“I want to go and visit Dad. I think it would be the right thing, aye. I’ll drive, if you want”
“No, it’s my car, and I’m not a cripple”
I laughed at that. “Technically, Mam, that is exactly what you are!”
“I’ll slap your arse, you cheeky cow!”
And once more, I heard the deliberate choice of words. She was doing everything she could to help. Love, unconditional.
We made the short drive to the Crematorium after I helped her get the car out of her tiny little garage, and in the rising wind I stood and looked at my father’s memorial plate in the Garden of Remembrance there. No grave, just a small metal plaque fastened to the stonework. Fourteen years gone, eaten away by cancer until even dignity deserted him and I had to argue with the so-called carers in the shitty hospital ward he had been taken to as the end neared. And I remembered, with a smile, how he had decided one day that he had had enough, packed what he had into two plastic bags, put on his fleece jacket, slippers and knitted hat and set out to walk home.
The ‘nurses’ hadn’t missed him for nearly an hour, and by the time we found him he was nearly three miles into his journey, and their hour of neglect was followed by what must have felt like an eternity of shame as first Mam, then me and finally his brother tore verbally into them. In the end, we took him home, with the support of a truly wonderful Macmillan nurse, who stayed with us so often we got her her own cup, and then it was the hospice…
We cried together for a little while, and then, mother and daughter, we dried our tears and I tried to explain to him who I was, and how it didn’t change me, and how I wished he had been there to share with Mam what lay ahead. And I hoped, prayed almost, that he would have understood, that he could have come along with Mam to help me with all the shit I could see festering ahead of me.
It was a silent drive back.
Neil was early, by about ten minutes, and after that morning’s emotion I was struck by how much he resembled Dad now, as at the ripe age of 46 the twink he had been was now long gone. A mature man, Dad’s square and cleft jaw, taller than me with just the hint of a paunch, he was a little distant up to the point of Mam dropping the bombshell.
“Rob met an old friend last night, son”
“Who was that?”
“George Bell”
“Not funny. You know what he did to me”
She grinned. “Well, he won’t be doing owt to his wife for a while. Rob’s knee said hello to his bollocks”
He looked at me, and it was intense. “Why did you do that, Rob?”
“Long story, Nelly. Let’s just say there’s a lot going on, and he picked the wrong time to start having a dig at you, aye?”
“You got problems with that Welsh lass?”
“Sort of. Just been talking to Dad about things, aye?”
He winced. “What’s up?”
“Mam, there’s a couple more weird things, like, but let me get through this my way, aye?”
She smiled. “You did all right with me, kidda”
“Thanks, and you know I mean that. Nelly, look, do you remember once, when you were drunk, and you were feeling isolated, alone, all that…and you asked me a question?”
“There were lots of times like that”
“Aye, well, this was when you asked me what I thought of when I had a wank. Sorry, Mam, it’s what he said. He asked if I thought of men or women when I masturbated, trying to find that he wasn’t alone, like, wasn’t unique. Well, it is women, Nell, always women, always has been, aye?”
He was blushing slightly. “Aye, but even with what they called you at school, you were always the straight one”
“No, I’m not. I’m gay as a box of frogs, Nell. I just don’t fancy blokes”
There was the obvious moment of confusion, the one I was coming to expect and to recognise, and then it cleared.
“Ah. Oh fuck. Sorry, Mam, but…”
She nodded, and looked at me.
“Can you do us a favour, and put the kettle on for the gravy, Gillian?”
CHAPTER 17
I bustled in the kitchen, catching the odd word or two as he grilled Mam, and the one question I heard clearly was when he asked her how long she had known. I walked back in at that point, just as she told him when I had revealed my Jill.
“I only told her yesterday, Nell. To be honest…”
I sneaked a sideways look at her.
“I didn’t expect her to be so…so…”
She snorted. “So much your mother? You were a pain as an infant, but I can see why, now. All those arguments about your clothes”
Neil was on the mark. “What, you mean he wanted pink and stuff?”
Mam sighed, and her next remark had edges to it that could have cut flesh. “SHE always wanted grey, plain, simple as possible. It was Ian who wanted the flares, and those stupid pullovers with the stars on the front, and the platform shoes. Mister tough squaddy, ‘I hate puffs’, indeed. What was it, pet? You hiding, even back then?”
Hiding, indeed, so scared, so small, so lost. I had learnt early lessons about being different, but those school years were still a blur of painful memories, of beatings and casual sadism, mixed with exultant savagery. I hid in plain sight, until I could get to college and enter a society of people who could think, whose minds worked. And all that meant was that the sadism became ever more creative in the wounds it scored into my soul. Once, only once, I had been tempted to dress as I should always have done, at a drag competition compered by a then famous comedian; my courage had failed, because I knew that the result would simply be an assumption by the bullies that I had enjoyed it. So I hid, again, and limited my moments of peace to oddments of clothing from the charity shops, behind a locked door in my hall of residence.
And the beatings continued. Neil got them, because of whom he fell in love with, the men that he fancied. I got them because of who I was, and the only other difference was that Neil had always had the brass neck to own up to his difference, almost to rejoice in it, until the beatings went that one step too far and he had a breakdown.
Somewhere, some knuckle-dragging arsehole, some clone of Bell, was probably still having warm feelings from the memory of a job well done.
“Rob?”
I realised it was Neil, and I had drifted off. “Unh?”
“Sorry…”
He took a breath. “Jill, sorry. Look, I have to say something. I always thought you were gay…”
“I am”
“No, I mean, look, that you were like me. You , well, the music stuff, the books, aye? I’m sorry, I pushed a bit. I thought, Rob’s just hiding it, it can’t be just me, aye? I didn’t realise, and I’m sorry, really sorry, and…”
And he was crying. “Look, when you did that thing, those things, with the tablets, and the ambulance, and shit, I thought I had it bad, but fuck…sister mine, fuck, sorry, Mam, but FUCK! How the hell have you ever kept it going?”
I could smell the vegetables starting to get overdone, and the roast lamb, and Mam caught my glance and squeezed my hand before going into the kitchen to serve up, wincing a little as she put the weight onto her new hip.
“Inertia, Nelly, inertia. I could see nothing out there, nothing at all, and I’d tried leaving and I couldn’t get that right either. And it had hurt Mam so much, I knew that, and so…people survive worse, so I had to”
We sat in silence for a few minutes, till Mam passed plates through the serving hatch and we began the rather overcooked meal. Neil looked at me once more, eyes red-rimmed, as Mam kept her face as neutral as she could.
“So what’s the plan?”
“I don’t know, exactly, but at the moment I want to talk with the right people, see what they say, and hopefully move ahead”
“By that, you mean cross over, whatever they call it?”
“Transition? Yes, hopefully”
“You mean, you know, surgery, like?”
“Hopefully again, yes”
I saw the look on his face. “Perhaps that answers your thing about fancying men. Look, I never wanted the one I was born with, so why would I ever desire someone else’s?”
Mam was starting to look a little like a pressure cooker at that point. I offered a compromise.
“Look, this is going to be a bit much for older ears, aye?”
“Cheeky pup!”
“No, Mam, it’s just, we had the long chat, just the two of us, like, and I thought, you know, let him and me have our own bit talk, like. I thought, if we went round the Nev, we could get both our heads straight”
“Aye, but you will let your dinner settle first!”
“Yes, Mam”
And so we walked round to the pub an hour later, Neil looking distinctly unpufflike in a fleece jacket and jeans over an old Bowie T-shirt.
“What happened to Sharp-Dressed Man?”
“One too many punches, Jill. Look, I can’t call you that in public, not yet, like. So, Rob, aye?”
“Aye. What are you drinking?”
“Scotch”
I caught the eye. “How, Jim, two scotch, please”
He grinned as he poured the pints. “Hord ye had a few words wi’ Geordie Bell after. Ower the Chinky, like”
“Aye, I did. Should’ve done it years ago”
“Ach shite, Rob, he’d have shat down thy neck, ye were aalwes te smaal fer that. That thy kid the puff?”
“Aye, Jim, that’s my brother. What is it about him being gay that’s so important?”
“Ah, Rob, ne offence, like, marra, just like saying the baaldy chap, or the gadgee wi’ the tache, like”
He leant over the bar and lowered his voice.
“Sorry if it upsets ye, like…look, wor lad used te kick the shit oot o’ ye, aye? Wor John?”
Evil little sadistic fucking….
“Aye, he did that”
“Well…”
His voice dropped even further. “Noo, ye knaa he wes kicked oota the Fusiliers, like? Did ye ivvor hear why?”
I leant closer, knowing and remembering how this Forster brother had never harmed me, never pursued me.
“No, I hadn’t heard”
“Cos the dorty fucker got caught in bed wi’ another squaddy, like. So, ye, and thy kid, yeez sit quiet, and understand that some of us hev wor aan problems”
There was a little flicker behind his eyes, and in just above a whisper, he spoke again.
“And one day, Carter, ye’ll tell us what the fuck has pissed ye off aal thy life. Cos Ah knaa that ye are ne puff”
The temptation was there, suddenly, to let it all come out, but I forced it back down. Not now, not yet, but I owed him one. This bear of a man had shared his family’s shame with me, yet I didn’t know if it was in true friendship, or as an attempt to apologise for his words about Neil. I nodded.
“No, Jim, spot on, aye? No interest in men at all, like. One day, maybe, aye?”
“Aye, marra, aye. And George Bell’s barred, by the way!
I grinned. “I would expect no less, Jim”
As I placed the beers on the table, Neil looked over to Jim and then back to me.
“And?”
“Ah, Jim called you a puff, and then found an odd way to apologise”
“How?”
“Apparently, that evil shit of a brother of his, he got kicked out of the army”
“For?”
“Getting caught shagging another squaddy. I’ll get you a bar towel.”
I begged a towel off Jim, and Neil wiped his chin.
“Fuck me, I always thought that cunt was a bit over the top in his queer-bashing! Was he giving or getting?”
“Nelly, that is a question I really don’t want answered, aye? I’d need the mind bleach. Just…look, it seems as if you might have someone in here a little less hostile than most, like”
“You told him, didn’t you?”
“No, I didn’t”
“You wanted to, though”
I had to admit he was right.
“Jill…look, I know the feeling, you finally tell someone, and then you want to tell everyone else, all at once, because you feel so free, so unburdened, aye? And you tell the wrong person, and wham, casualty calling. Be careful, pet”
My brother just called me ‘pet’?
“Nell, at some point it will be a bit bloody difficult to hide what I am, aye?”
“Indeed, Jill, but till then why look for trouble? I do rude things with men, but I don’t wear a badge. You will have far more trouble than I ever did, and there is no way I can help with that. Not really”
He reached under the table to squeeze my hand where it lay on my knee.
“No, girl, I can’t do anything but be there if you need me, aye? Drink up, there’s an old woman at home who has a tab I can cadge”
CHAPTER 18
It was Neil who drove me to the airport in the end, Mam eased into the front seat of his car, and it was an emotional farewell in the car park as I insisted she didn’t walk into the terminal building. I wanted to be in control, and tears were not something I wanted photographed at the security gate.
I walked away from the car after a last hug from both of them, Mam’s last admonition not to do anything stupid ringing in my ears. The flight was uneventful, the plane coming into Gatwick over the Mormon Tabernacle and rocking slightly on landing. Once I was out, I gave Larinda a call.
“Hiya, lover, speaking English again yet?”
“Better than mockney!”
“I do NOT talk like that! I’m a Penge girl, South London, innit?”
“Penge…explains a lot. Always thought that place sounded like some sort of animal disease. Anyway, train goes in ten minutes”
“You got my breakfast with you?”
“Bloody hell, woman! You are incorrigible”
“Well, I haven’t had a good corridge for nearly a week, and I want to make the most of it before you slice and dice, yeah? Want me to bring a curry round?”
“Aye, would be nice. See you at?”
“About six? How do you want me?”
“Smiling will do”
“Jill...can you do me a favour?”
There was a catch in her voice.
“What?”
“Just…dress for me, yeah? Look, I know I didn’t ask, that time, but, just once, yeah? Let me see who I’m dealing with?”
I held that thought all the way home, and once in I set the water to heating as I stripped off. I looked at my chest…
Larinda came clattering in the unlocked door, skirt tight and heels high, obviously making the best effort she knew to catch my interest. She went straight to the kitchen, calling out a hello as she went, while I sat in the lounge shitting myself.
“There’s wine in the fridge, kid! Pour some for us?”
“Pour it yourself if you want, but I’ve got a couple of bottles of Kingfisher for the curry, so come and pour that instead, yeah?”
I got to my feet, heart pounding, and walked into the kitchen, my heels ticking on the tiled floor. She pointedly kept her back to me as I walked in, skirt swishing across my nylons, and I turned my own back on her as I brought out some beer glasses.
I nearly dropped them when she squeezed my arse.
“Not stockings then, eh? Thought you’d be making an effort”
“Larinda, this is how I dress. Stockings, shit like that, they aren’t what it’s about, aye? It’s not about sex”
She turned my head and kissed me.
“You are standing there in three-inch stilettos even more fuck-me than what I’ve got on, and you say it’s not about sex?”
“Look, I like shoes, OK, and they are totally feminine, and…”
“Oh sod it, Jill, I am NOT going to work around a pair of bloody passionkillers. Brought these for you, they’re hold-ups, so don’t have to worry about waistline, yeah? Chop-chop, get ‘em on. No bra neither…same reason?”
“Yeah, what do I need one for?”
“I’m dishing up now, so get changed and get back, right?”
We sat in the dining room eating properly, as if I had been transported back to my mother’s, and I noticed that Larinda was also doing some noticing.
“How much hair have you got rid of, Jill?”
“Er, just about all of it”
“Well…look, here’s some tips, yeah, just not meant nasty like. You don’t suit green, and that dress is very green. Avoid hooped patterns, yeah, make a girl look fat”
“I am fat…”
“Cuddly. And I will warn you, I want cuddles tonight, not just shagging, OK?”
“Well, I have had a long day, so don’t mind”
That grin was back. “Didn’t say I don’t want no shagging, did I? Want to be corridged properly and go home sore again!”
It was a nice curry, and she’d brought some films along as well as the beers, and so we settled onto the sofa as some chickflick or other started, till her hand ended up just there, and my skirt went up, and she went down, and, well, stockings are much handier than tights. Partway through, as she knelt before me, she lifted off long enough to say a few words, while I could still think.
“This must be the kinkiest thing I have ever done…”
“That’s the problem, I don’t want to be kinky, I just want to be normal, like”
She stopped my thought processes a minute after that, and then snuggled into me after straightening my skirt.
“You OK with this?” she whispered.
“Why did you ask for this, why now?”
“Shit, Carter, it’s just…I told you, I want to hang onto you, whatever you do with yourself, to yourself. There’s more to me than sex. I just wanted…wanted to see what you were, what I should expect, yeah? And no, I wasn’t sure, but no, this isn’t a turn-on. So why don’t we get comfy, out of this stuff, yeah?”
“Aye, come on”
I helped her up, and we kissed again, and then there was a sort of stumbling collapse into the bedroom, as skirts and stockings, blouses and shoes, and a solitary bra fell by the wayside, and I had another twinge of guilt about Von before realising that this, this was the right thing, far sweeter and more natural than things had ever been between me and Siobhan. As we lay in our sweat, hours later, she murmured into my ear as we held each other.
“I tried, Jill. I don’t know what I am going to do when you start changing over, but I gave it my best shot, and it’s weirding me out. I don’t know. I just don’t know…but I don’t want you lost”
She paused for a while as she caressed my chest.
“Shaving don’t work, yeah. Can still feel stubble. We shall have to get you waxed”
Up and down, just like my moods, and I wondered exactly how hard she was finding it to deal with my needs. The dressing up had felt awkward, for it had never been for sexual purposes, just for comfort, for a semblance of feeling right about myself, and I knew full well how bad I looked. Dressing in front of another person had been a first for me, and it had left me nervous and awkward. That wasn’t what I wanted; when a lover next lifted my skirt, I wanted it to reveal me whole.
“How quickly will you change, Jill?”
I laughed, softly. “I don’t even know if I will, kid; the quacks have to decide if I am, what’s that phrase? A suitable case for treatment, like. They might say no”
“What happens if they do?”
Stage five happens, Larinda, and all debts are paid. I couldn’t tell her that, though. Some things are just not to be shared.
She was up, as usual, before the alarm, so then I was up, and then down, and tea was drunk, and we walked hand in hand, but dressed differently, to the station, where I saw her off with a kiss that made me so glad she had cleaned her teeth.
“Can’t come down tonight, lover, got to sort out a few things at home, yeah…”
And she was off through the ticket barrier, leaving me wondering whether the things she had to sort out were in her house or in her head. I rode the short distance to the office, and picked up the day’s folders. One pub, one farmer, and I knew the latter would be a pile of ill-structured and mismanaged shite that would keep me there for an hour or two of unpaid overtime. Bollocks.
Neither MAC nor Rachel were about, and so I set off for the pub, where they insisted on feeding me bacon and egg sandwiches as I shuddered over how close the place was sailing to insolvency as the tenant was fleeced of almost all of his income by the management chain that actually owned the place. She was trying everything, from decent food to poker and video racing nights, but as the company raised the rent, she was forced to put up her prices, and the drinkers were falling away to the cheaper supplies in the supermarkets.
That was one of the less obvious parts of my job: I got to see business from the inside out, observed the way the big fish used their muscle to screw everyone else over. If a bill was unpaid, or just late, it would be one to a major company, not a one-man-band, and they did it because they could. Bastards.
I found her some extras on ‘use of home as office’ and told her to claim them on her next return, before setting off to the farmer, the sandwiches seeing me through the need for a lunch break, and it was everything I had expected. Not even a cup of tea, as the man ate his tea at the same table I was working at, and I was left in a mood that was only slightly worsened when his cat pissed in the cardboard box of purchase invoices. I was so, so tempted to disallow the lot, just BECAUSE, but I held my temper and disallowed his car.
“What do you mean? It’s an agricultural vehicle!”
“It’s a car. They are non-deductible, and always have been”
“It’s not a car, it’s a farm vehicle!”
“It’s a Porsche Cayenne. The fact that it’s a four by four doesn’t make it an agricultural vehicle. It’s got four wheels and seats behind the driver and carries less than twelve people, and it is designed as a people carrier”
“I use it for work!”
“Mr Bowen, I looked in the window as I walked past it. It has leather seats, and a ‘Baby on Board’ sticker to go with the child seat in the back. I shall be sending you a notice of assessment once I’ have written the visit up. Good day, Mr Bowen”
“How do you fucking sleep at night?”
“Wonderfully, Mr Bowen, due to my purity of spirit”
“Don’t you be cheeky! I pay your fucking wages!”
I sighed. “Mr Bowen, you were told in writing that it was not allowed when you claimed your first car back, and again the second time. This is the third time you have made the same so-called mistake, and this time I will be speaking to my boss to see if we can add a nice little surcharge for your recklessness. That do you, Mr Bowen? Next time, it might be the Magistrates’ Court, aye?”
I smiled nicely and made my exit, and some miles further on found myself in front of an off-licence. I looked through the window at the bottles, and heard Mam. Don’t do anything stupid.
It wasn’t stupid at all. Two bottles were just enough to answer Bowen’s question.
CHAPTER 19
I was a little slow to work the next morning, which was an office day. I stopped at the coffee shop next door and bought a large filter coffee, which they called by some stupid name or other, and along with that a double espresso, which I intended to tip straight into the large white as soon as there was room.
I locked the bike up and juggled the two increasingly hot cardboard beakers up to my room.
Door shut. Folders out from the day before. Start typing. ‘Electronic folders’: I remembered when it was all paper, paper and ballpoint. If things were to be typed, they went to the typing pool, where a bunch of middle-aged women turned a hand-written scribble into proper civil-service speak.
Middle-aged women. I realised I was still on a downer, the mess with Larinda and the hangover conspiring with my depression to render any and all references to femininity profoundly painful. By rights, by simple justice, I should have been one of those middle-aged women myself, but I hadn’t had the young girl bit, never mind the young woman, and suddenly I had an ear-worm: Eleanor Rigby. If I couldn’t have any of those, I could at least get the last bit of the song right. I sat and mused for a while as I typed, sipping the livener from the coffee shop as I slowly woke up.
Fuck it. I logged onto the internet just for a bit, just for a look around, not to do anything…deed poll. Statutory declaration. Name change. Wikipaedia, of course, had the thing in template form, and so with a bit of typing here and some cut and paste there, it was ready to go.
Gillian Marie Carter was what I had eventually settled on. It’s odd; we are given our names before we know what names are, and they seem normal, commonplace to us in most cases. People like me, though, we search for a name that speaks to us, that has our soul buried in it. Some, I know, simply play spelling games. Robert could have become Roberta, or Robina, but the first was too close and the second sounded like a blackcurrant drink for kids. I needed something that made a statement about who and what I had been, and for a moment I smiled, as the initials covered both the governing body of the doctors I hoped would be able to help me, and a car manufacturer that Larinda’s ex would no doubt have adored.. I entered the details, and before my mind could delay me pressed ‘print’.
To my horror, the ‘choose printer’ dialogue box didn’t appear, and I realised that my little attempt to cheer myself up was being printed somewhere in the building, god knew where. Shit. I hurriedly reset the printer, and got it out of the machine in my own room, just as Rachel came in. She held a bundle of paper out to me.
“Bit more careful, yeah, Gillian Marie?”
“Shit, thanks, Rach. I was crapping myself a bit there!”
“Well, came in handy, anyway. Wanted a quick word. Walking the corridors always looks better when you are carrying bits of paper, looks official, like. When do I get to meet this floozy of yours?”
“I don’t know, just now…sort of on hold, like”
“Ah shit, Jill, what did you do?”
I sighed. “Well, you will have noticed I’m a bit less hairy than I was…”
“Bit difficult not to, yeah?”
“Well, Larinda wanted to see me dressed a little while ago, aye? Before I had the trim, like, so I got sort of changed, skirt and that, and we sat and read for a bit together, all very companionable. Then, last week, she says, get dressed proper, so I did, and she came, and we…got friendly, and it freaked her out, I think. I don’t know where we stand, just now. I mean, I like her a lot, but…but I can’t stay like this for the rest of my life”
Rachel sat on the edge of my desk, swinging her foot.
“What do you want from a woman, Jill? Sex? Marriage? Kids? Back rubs?”
I sat for a couple of minutes asking myself the same question.
“It’s hard to put into words, Rach. I mean, I enjoy the sex, but I know that one day I am going to start seeing it as less to do with me and more to do with a bit of meat I never wanted, aye? Larinda…she sort of tried it out with me as, well, ME, and she got very stressed by it. But sex; no, it isn’t really about sex, and kids are out of the loop, like…it’s more, it’s more having someone to share things with, to wake up next to. Like when you see something nice, and you turn, and you say to them ‘Look at that!’ and they are THERE, beside you”
A pause, as images tumbled through my mind.
“Look, that first time, aye, when I got dressed for her, and it’s all hair out of the neckline, and beard, and we just snuggled up and did our thing, aye? That is what I want, and to have someone who wants that with and from me. That’s what I want from another person. No, fuck it, that’s what I want from a woman. Just to be there with me as I should have been, aye?”
“So you don’t want the sex, then?”
“Don’t be daft; course I do. Just, well, not that way so much, like”
She stood and stretched, which was an interesting sight, as she damned well knew.
“See? All I do is wiggle my tits, and you perk up. What are you hoping to do with this new woman? Did you give her my message? She free tonight?””
Sod it. “Hang on…Hello?”
The phone was picked up. “Dixon and Utley”
“Hiya, kid”
“How may I help you?”
“The boss nearby?”
“That is correct”
“Well, Rachel is asking if you fancy a pint tonight”
“I will check his calendar…yes, that date is free at the moment”
“Seven? Home Cottage?”
“That time slot is vacant at present”
“It’s the pub up behind the station in Redhill. Mock tudory thing”
“Do I get corridged?”
“Boss out of the room, then. Aye, as long as that’s what you want, what you want for yourself, aye? Not for my sake”
“I don’t know what I think at the moment, Carter, so let’s just talk, yeah? You eating there?”
“Rachel? We eating there?”
“Yeah, why not. Look, if we go there from work, we get brownie points, and MAC is out of the building first, yeah? Look, better dash; bye, Larinda!”
She was off, and I returned to the phone. “Seven, then, and we’ll eat, aye? You sure, pet?”
There was a very audible sigh down the line. “No, I am not bloody sure at all. I just know that you fit into my life too well to chuck out, but I am fucking confused, yeah? Look, see you later, lover, OK?”
“Yeah, will do. Bye”
I had finished both of the files by lunch, which consisted of a sandwich from the corner shop and another bucket of coffee from across the road, and I spent the afternoon making a series of phone calls trying to tie down traders for the next fortnight’s visits and chase up those I had left various requests for documents with. At three, I knocked on MAC’s door. It had to be done.
“Got a small problem with a trader…”
“Yeah, and?”
“Well, I think it’s gone past the 191 and pay us back stage. It’s a car”
“Well, just assess it”
"Yeah, but it’s the third one in as many years. It’s a Porsche Cayenne this time. Previous two were Beemers. Just wondered if we might be looking at a repeated misdeclaration penalty”
There was a little moment of slippage behind MAC’s eyes as he realised that rather than having a slim possibility of being AC to me, he now had the near certainty of being AFC to a trader, and for once I was actually travelling in the same direction.
“Fifteen percent of the 191 figure do you?”
“It’ll twitch the man’s sphincter, like”
“Then send me the necessary and I’ll run it past the surveyor. Oh, and Carter?”
“Aye?”
“You know I’m off in the next few weeks? I’ve booked a room in the George, there’ll be a buffet and drinks behind the bar, yeah? Pass the word”
Of course I will, but not the way you’d like me to.
The clock ticked round, and MAC had left the building an hour and a half before Rachel stuck her head round the door.
“Offski?”
“Yeah, might as well. Just log off, aye?”
“I’m done”
We left the empty building, the click of her heels echoing off the walls, my bike waiting in the locked parking area for my return the next day on foot. Rachel linked arms with me, and every now and again I felt her hip sway against mine.
“What’s the plan, Jill?”
“I don’t know, Kid, I really don’t. Everything depends on what Larinda feels up to”
“You really like this one, don’t you?”
“Aye, I must admit I do. She ticks an awful lot of my boxes, and I hers, but I don’t know if it’s enough”
I stopped her, just for a moment. “Look, I am not exactly normal, am I? You can’t make someone gay just by pushing a button, and if I, you know, things, then whatever there is between her and me is between two women, aye? Everything changes”
“Yebbut, you’ve always been a woman, that’s what you say”
“Aye, and my knickers have always told another story, and that’s the one she likes listening to. Look, it’s no biggy, if I have to live alone afterwards, then I live alone. Nothing I can’t deal with”
“You are a truly shit liar, Carter. Come on, mine’s a dry white, large glass”
“Why am I buying first?”
“Cause you’ve still got a cock, yeah? Straditional. Now which one’s…ah, she’s waving, I better let go of you. You get to the bar, I’ll take her order”
Five minutes later I had two large glasses of white wine and a pint of Fursty Ferret on the table Larinda had grabbed and Larinda had her hand on my knee.
“Larinda, Rachel; Rachel, Larinda”
They nodded to each other, and Rach took a hefty gulp from her glass.
“Right, Larinda girl, let’s get down to it. What the fuck are we going to do with this stupid tart? Oh, Jill, I brought those papers you printed…”
CHAPTER 20
“Hang on a minute. I am actually here, and I don’t remember delegating the rest of my life to you two!”
Rachel gave me a look of utter disdain. “Making such a good job of it you are as well…”
“Yeah, well, it’s till my life”
She turned to Larinda.
“This is how good she is at running her own affairs. Printed this off, didn’t even check which printer it was set to”
She passed the declaration across the table, and Larinda gave it a cursory read, before giving me a little bit of a stare.
“Rachel, how much has he…she…told you about me?”
“That you’ve been seeing a lot of each other. Usually all of each other”
“Has she given you any background? Shit, this is weird, she and her and that”
Rachel took a quick sideways glance at me, as if to check for permission. “Look, this is serious shit. People die over it, and Jill here has made it as clear as whatever that she is what and who she is, yeah? Shitty situation, shitty choices, but let’s go with it for now, yeah?”
“Yeah, but it’s weird, innit, when you see someone in the raw, yeah, and do…STUFF…and then they go girly. Not easy”
Once more, that check. “Yeah, but why hurt people if you don’t have to?”
Rachel drew a slow breath as Larinda winced.
“Look, she’s already hurt you, is hurting you, yeah, so why spread it about? That’s what kids do”
“OK, but look at my side. Not easy: thought I’d finally found someone, you know, the right bloke, not just shagging, yeah?”
I was feeling sidelined by their discussion. “You thought I was queer!”
Larinda rounded on me. “And I was fucking right, yeah, but not how I thought! Look, Jill, Rob, whatever, it’s not easy. I tried, but it’s awkward. Awkward. Useless bloody word. What I mean is that it freaks me out, you dressed like that, I’m seeing two different things at once and it makes my head hurt, I’m trying to make love to two different people, and yeah, it is making love, because…shit, because I thought that was where we were going”
There were hints of tears in her eyes, and I squeezed her hand where it still sat, surprisingly, on my knee.
“Aye…and that’s exactly how I feel”
She looked up sharply at me.
“Then why do you have to go through all this crap? Can’t you just, like, keep on as you are? You’ve managed fifty-odd bloody years!”
She shook her head, abruptly, as I tried to think of an answer.
“Shit, sorry, I’ve read so much on this, I should know better. Forget I said that, yeah? Just…what do we do?”
She turned to Rachel. “I done a lot of reading, once I knew, yeah, and this is all so usual. They go through their life, and they do the bloke thing, the manning up shit, and then one day they say, no, can’t do it no more, and they go to ratshit”
I was feeling locked out of the exchanges at that point, but Larinda turned to me, and she was calm, eyes moist, but voice level.
“When…how many times have you prepared for it, Jill? Topping yourself, like?”
Larinda had the ability to shock me every so often, as the accent and the background concealed the astonishingly sharp mind that hid behind her eyes. She had me cold, dead to rights. That was such an appropriate phrase I started to laugh, and then, naturally, that turned into a hiccup and a sob, and I had to reel everything back in as Rachel sat there open-mouthed.
“Got me, kid…”
Larinda just nodded. “Told you I did a lot of reading. Turned out to be really shitty, and you dropped me into a lot of it. I don’t know what to do, lover. I mean, here’s this bloke, what I fancy to bits, got a nice you-know-what, and it’s either slice it off or slit his wrists. What the fuck am I supposed to think? What the buggery bollocks am I supposed to do?”
Rachel had obviously recovered a bit. “I suppose that’s why we are here. Look, got to be blunt, yeah, but so much of this depends on you, Larinda. I mean, what she does next is going to be little steps at first, but one day it’s got to be, you know, bigger, sort of thing that gets public. Jill, yeah, you dress up at home, right?”
“No, Rach, I dress down. THIS is dressing up”
“Fuck off, girl, you know exactly what I mean. One day, you are going to want to stop what you call dressing up, right? Then where do we go? You will have been looking at doing more than shaving, and don’t think that has passed by without comment in the office. Just don’t come in without getting all your make-up off”
“I was never one for make-up, really. Not to my taste. Bit of lippy sometimes, when I was younger…”
Rachel was shaking her head. “This is too bizarre for words”
Larinda laughed, which was better than the state she had been drifting into. “Welcome to my world, woman! I mean, I bought her stockings, just for the try out, yeah, but discussing shades of bleeding eye shadow would be too freaky. Look, we have to come to some sort of way out of this shit, yeah, so listen to me for a bit”
She took her hand away from my leg and extended both arms across the table, clearly waiting to take my hands. She held and squeezed them, and tried on a badly-fitting smile.
“Look, remember what I said to you when we first met? That you would be good for a natter, good company, like, even if you were gay? Well, that still stands, because you are everything I said. Even the gay bit. You have made such a difference to me, I can’t throw that away. Self-confidence, all that crap, yeah?”
“Sorry? Self-confidence? You come strutting down Brighton Pier, groping me in public, and you talk about self-confidence?”
She laughed, and that time it was genuinely better.
“Yebbut, without you there, I couldn’t have done that, yeah?”
“Aye, but all the other stuff? You know…”
I sneaked my own sideways glance at Rachel.
“In bed and stuff…”
Another laugh. “Yeah, but that’s different, innit? I know what I like, don’t I? And fuck me if I don’t know what you like too…look, Rachel, yeah, at some point tonight, sorry to be so blunt, but could you sort of bugger off, not now, yeah, but later, so I can screw what’s left of her brains out? Sorry for the plain speaking and shit, but…”
Rachel laughed out loud. “No wonder he’s been looking so bloody tired at work! This is all very well, you young lovers and crap, but it doesn’t move anything further on, yeah?”
Larinda was shaking her head. “No, you’re wrong there, girl. It changes a lot of things. I got to get some priorities sorted, and one of them is this person here. Took me a long, long time to find someone I can talk to, and I’m not throwing that away now. We are going to find some way of dealing with this shit, coz I ain’t walking away. Just…look, no shagging in knickers no more, yeah? It don’t work for me”
She looked down at the table, and very softly muttered one more word.
“Yet”
Rachel reached out and took a hand from each of us.
“Thanks, Larinda, really thanks. I have her back at work, right, but we really need you for everywhere else. And my glass is empty, and so are yours. Ferret, Jill? Glass of white?”
Larinda shook her head. “No, my round this time. Talk amongst yourselves, yeah?”
She ticked off to the bar, and Rachel watched her bum as she went.
“Receptionist, yeah?”
“Yeah”
“How the fuck does someone as sharp as that end up in such a crap job? Don’t answer, I know that one. She’s got no self-confidence at all, that one. Trust me, I can spot them. You be careful; drop her and she’ll shatter”
“I don’t want to drop her, Rach; I think I might actually have found, you know, soppy fucking term, but, well, The One?”
“Yeah, Carter, and you have to go and complicate the whole thing beyond all belief. Just don’t hurt her, yeah, or I’ll be on you. It’s a girl thing…oh arse, what am I saying? You know what I mean!”
Larinda was back with the drinks, and Rachel changed the subject.
“You coming out with us in a week’s time?”
“That the famous leaving do? Jill told me about it. Man’s a ---“
“Yeah, MAC. Be nice to have you there, make the boys jealous of this one”
“Oh, come on, I’m fifty!”
“Yeah, and if I still have your figure then I’ll be astonished. Look, thanks. I am going to down this one, and then get off home, kick the kittens or whatever. Just, like, leave some juice in this colleague of mine for tomorrow, yeah?”
She knocked back most of her glass, and then tipped the rest into Larinda’s before kissing her cheek and darting away, which as always was an entrancing sight.
“Oy, you, it’s my arse you should be adoring, not hers. Now, get that down you, and take me home. I have plans for your cock…”
She took my hand once again, and her tone changed to something far, far softer than her earlier brassy jest.
“And, well, I want to try and sort out some plans for the rest of you…”
CHAPTER 21
I lay in bed afterwards, wondering how I was going to find any more energy, ever again. Larinda was in her usual position, which involved curling up with an arm across my chest and her head on my shoulder.
“You have no idea how confused you leave me, Carter. You do what you do, and then you get me used to it, then I get to depend on it, and all the time, it’s the time, yeah, ticking away till it’s gone. I know it’s a waste of a question, but…”
I sighed. “Kid, it’s never a waste if you are asking something because you care, aye? And if it’s the usual one, well, I don’t know how to explain it more than I have already. This is right, yeah, me and you, in bed, this is what I want, and it’s great, it’s sweet, it’s more than I could have hoped for, all that jazz, but…but it’s not me and you in bed, it’s you and someone I live in, and it can’t go on”
“But I can’t fancy women, yeah?”
“And I have never fancied men, from inside or outside. Look, have you ever done a long haul flight?”
“Went to Orlando once, when he wasn’t being such a tosser”
“How did you find the seats on the plane?”
“Cramped, no leg room. Why?”
“You find yourself squirming around, trying to find a position you could be comfortable in, and not getting one?”
“Yeah…”
“Well, imagine that, not just for a few hours, but for your life, aye? That’s me. All my life in the wrong seat”
She hugged me with the arm across my chest.
“Yeah, I’ve read all that, all the analogies, like, but it don’t change the fact that you will be different, yeah? Like, not the bloke I fancy”
“But I will be…”
“Shit, Rob, Jill, I know all that, it’s in here, in my head, yeah, but what I’m going to be seeing is like you in a trick mirror, all warped, and in a dress, and I tried, yeah, and it was just wrong, and it’s really getting to me, cause, well, I’m all stuck on you, and it’s not just the shagging, cause it’s you, and I don’t want to lose you, but I don’t know if I can keep you as someone else, yeah?”
I had to tell her. “Larinda, the problem is, well, if I don’t, you know, then I don’t know if I can, well, I don’t know if I can keep going. I’ve had enough”
I could feel her tears now, warm on my chest.
“Yeah, I read all about that, and don’t think I didn’t notice. You got your girlfriend, yeah, but you’re shagging me, and you don’t care too much if she finds out, cause you’re thinking, fuck it, I ain’t gonna be here much longer, and so you don’t need to worry about a future problem because you don’t intend to have a fucking future, yeah?”
Every time I turned around, she had sliced another piece of my camouflage away. Her fingers dug into my chest as I lay quiet, not trusting myself to say anything.
“Trouble is, Carter, that I still want a future, and I am hoping to have it with you, because despite you being a selfish sod, so stuck up yourself about your own shit, you are really the nicest bloke I have ever met. Bloke, woman, whatever the fuck you are, and you leave me so fucked up, because I can’t see myself without you, and then I can’t see myself with a woman, and then you are the same fucking thing, person, and shit, why couldn’t you have been normal?”
I tried to get the words out, but they were sideways in my throat, and she was still speaking.
“See, Jill, Rob, whoever you are, I love you, and I haven’t got a clue what to do about it. I mean, this is exactly what we said in the pub, yeah, but here, like this, it’s so different, it’s just us, and it’s more, like in your face, more real, yeah?”
“I love you too…”
“I fucking know that! I’ve known that for ages. And that really screws us up, because it means that we have no choices left. I can’t leave you, and you can’t dump me, and now you can’t fucking top yourself, just because, yeah? So we have to stagger along, deal with this shit, yeah? You promise, yeah? No running away? I am not wearing black!”
So I promised, and I kissed her, and I did have some energy left, as it turned out, and just before we settled down to sleep in a tangle of sweaty limbs and damp sheets, she murmured in my ear:
“But you do have to do the right thing with that other woman, yeah? We do this, we do it honest, OK?”
Yes. It had to be honest.
The next morning was almost routine, for that was what we were developing. I walked her to the station, I kissed her and set her on the train, and then took myself to work. As she left, she gave me one last instruction.
“Cut me a door key, Carter. You don’t get to lie there in the dark on your own, yeah?”
I was trapped, and it was beginning to feel rather nice. That lunchtime, I got a spare set cut.
Two more traders, nothing too earth-shattering, apart from the usual household bills passed off as business expenses, and I was back at my desk by four. Rachel brought me a coffee at half past.
“Well?”
“Well what?”
“Oh, for fuck’s sake, you were read the riot act last night, what’s the outcome?”
I sat for a while, trying to divert myself with the important decision as to whether I should drink the stuff through the little hole in the top or properly, like an adult. The thought made me chuckle.
“What’s funny?”
“These cups, kid. They’re like those baby mugs, the ones with the lid on, and here I am, an alleged adult, who can’t get their life on track, and it sort of fits, aye?”
“That bad, eh? She give you hell?”
I thought it through, and in a way Rachel was right.
“Sort of. She doesn’t like where I have to go, but she understands I haven’t really got much choice, so…so she says she’ll try and stick with it, and, well…”
“You are sweet on her, aren’t you? Really fallen hard”
I nodded. “Aye, I am. She’s clever, kind, sexy as all hell, and there’s a person behind the tits and the grin, aye? Her husband, what sort of fuckwit was he, to miss all that?”
“Ah, Jill, girl, you know, I don’t think he did. I sort of get the impression that she’s a bit self-made, stepped away from the hubby-mirror and found who she really was”
“Hubby-mirror?”
“Word I made up. Woman, no self-confidence, yeah, she gets hitched and the only way she has to evaluate herself, see what she’s worth, comes from whatever hubby says. She sees herself only as a sort of reflection from him, yeah? Woman’s value set on Patriarchy terms”
I started to interrupt, and Rachel held up a hand.
“No, hear me out. I know that sounds like some stupid feminist slogan, but it’s what it his. He’s The Man, she’s ‘er indoors, to do as she’s told. Thank fuck he started ignoring her before it got to the stage of ‘He only hits me cause he lurves me’ “
There was real venom in her words, and I realised how little I really knew the woman before me. Years of working together, drinking together, and I knew nothing of her life before we met. Yes, Larinda was right: I had spent so much time eaten up by my own worries that I had missed those of others about me.
“You were…?”
“Married? Yeah, and young, and he told me one day I was too fat, and then I was doing the great white telephone thing cause he was The Man, and it didn’t go too well, and I got too ill, and then one day he tells me, yeah? What do you say to an Essex girl with two black eyes? Nothing, that’s what, because she’s already been told twice. And he did that once, he told me once, and that was once too much, and he got a fucking standard lamp round his head, and I have never, ever judged myself by what someone else says, ever again…”
She paused, panting a little, and stared at me as if preparing to receive an argument.
“Sorry, Rach, I didn’t know”
“Nobody here does, yeah, so schtum, OK? Look, what I am saying is that she is doing her own person thing, but it’s new to her, so don’t bruise her. If she is willing to even consider staying with you when you do the slice and dice shit, then you are lucky beyond words, yeah? But there is one thing, Carter, and if she hasn’t already said so, I will be astonished”
I pulled together a weak smile.
“Siobhan? She already said, Larinda said, that we have to do things honestly”
That brought back the normal Rachel grin.
“See? I was right about that girl! You treat her right, or I will tell you myself, yeah?”
Her voice softened. “Look, Jill, this was never going to be easy, was it? You knew that, yeah? But, fuck it, you are going into it with more than most, so don’t waste it. I’m off home. Got a hot date with a DVD and half a pound of milk chocolate”
Suddenly, she was on me, almost squeezing the air out of me.
“Jill…be lucky, yeah?”
CHAPTER 22
I was on my own that evening, waiting for the phone to ring, but there was nothing. No Larinda, no checking up, and certainly no second thoughts. I logged onto the internet, and before I could stop myself the latest offers from Dorothy Perkins were on the screen.
I liked the styles, though they were mostly too young for me, and some of the shoes were exquisite. What a pity that platforms had made a comeback. I had hated them the first time round, and the second, and yet here they were again, ready to be strapped to the feet of overweight women carrying counterfeit designer bags, lips welded to a cigarette.
If I couldn’t be a woman in reality, by god could I bitch like one. I was settling down into a daydream of clothes shopping when the phone finally rang.
“Hello?”
“You cutting me off, Rob?”
“Hiya, Von, how’s it going?”
“Got a buyer, love. Time is rushing on us, rushing us on, whatever. When are you going to start sorting out a move of your own?”
“When did the buyer come along?”
“Last week, love, but as I hadn’t heard from you for so long I wasn’t exactly able to tell you, aye? And answer the question…”
“Look, you know I can’t move. No job for me there, and I can’t go and sponge off your parents, I told you that. Told you that many, many times”
There was a pause. “So, what are we going to do, Rob?”
“Ach, we’ll find a way, people do”
To let you go as gently as possible. The more time I spent with the Other Woman, the more I realised how much of my relationship with Siobhan had been based on loneliness and need rather than any true meeting of souls, or even of minds. I had to find a way, a manner of leaving that would be as gentle as possible. Some way of letting her blame me rather than herself.
“What you up to at the weekend, kid?”
“Boys are with Paul…could have house to ourselves, aye?”
“I could only stop the Saturday night, pet”
“Better than nothing, isn’t it? Let me know, and we can get a Chinese in, or maybe go out to the Crown, aye? Talk you through what’s happening with the house, aye?”
“Sounds fine by me. See you Saturday?”
“Want me to pick you up from Southampton?”
“Aye, that would be good. About eleven?”
“See you then, love”
I hung up, and immediately redialled.
“To what do I owe the pleasure of so many phone calls from my eldest?”
“Hiya, Mam. Just, well, advice, like. My life is just a bit messy at the moment”
She actually laughed out loud at that. “Sorry…lass, but that’s like saying a wee bit pregnant. Let me guess: Siobhan?”
“Aye, Von. She’s got a buyer for the house, so she’s off to Taffland some time soon. At some point, I have to break up with her, and I have absolutely no idea how to go about it. I don’t want her to be hurt, Mam”
I could hear the sigh down the line. “But that’s the point, like. Whatever happens, she will be hurt. Can I be really, really blunt, Jill?”
“Aye, gan on. That’s what I was hoping for”
“You have a couple of decisions to make, and the first one is whether you want her to hate you. You can get rid of her, if that’s what you want, just by telling her about that other woman. It won’t be pretty, but it would be bloody quick, like. The alternative is to keep her hanging on from Wales, until time and miles, aye?”
“Yeah, that’s about what I thought. Trouble is, Larinda wants honesty. She says it isn’t fair to keep on, a secret, sneaking, like”
“Good girl, that one. Now, have you thought of just doing what you did with me? Telling her, outright, like? Who you are?”
“Aye, Mam, I had, but…she has the sort of background that wouldn’t help. God made the world, male and female he created them, et cetera, et cetera”
“Aye, well, your choices fall into long slow death or short term nastiness, aye? But I will tell you one thing: that lass of yours is right. It is not fair to deceive someone like this. I know it’s very different, not your usual problem, but Siobhan needs to know one thing: that it isn’t her fault. Can you do that?”
As usual, she had cut through my confusion to the core question, which was to leave Siobhan without guilt on her part. All of her personal issues seemed to stem either from her Chapel background or from the simple fact that her husband had decided to spend time in bed with someone else, and that meant that her sense of worth was very poor. If I told her outright about Larinda, it would reinforce her doubts. If, on the other hand, I told her about Jill, then all blame would land on my own shoulders.
“I think you have got it right, Mam. I have to let her go with her pride intact, like”
“Well, she has a lot more to her life than that. Sons, parents, she has her family round her, and you of all people know how important that one is. Am I right?”
I laughed, despite the subject being discussed. “Aye, Mam, you are. Are you ever wrong?”
“Never, pet. That’s what being a mam does. We get special dispensation for righteousness. Now, keep me informed, aye? If you need any help, or even just an ear and a shoulder, you seem to have remembered my number at last”
“Aye, I will. Love you, Mam”
“And I you, Jill”
One more call.
“Thought I’d ring you as I hadn’t heard…”
“And?”
“And what? Got your key, if that’s what you meant”
“And you know exactly what I meant, Carter”
“Aye, I do. Just been speaking to Mam. Had Von on the phone a little while ago. She’s got a buyer for the house”
“So she’s buggering off to Wales, yeah?”
“Indeed. Look, I did a lot of thinking, and talking with Mam, like, and that word you used…”
“Honest? Yeah, I like that word. A bit of a lack of it in my life”
“You and Rachel both…sorry, tell you some time, aye? Look, I don’t think it’s fair her hanging on from a distance, let her get on with her life, like. So…fuck it, I am seeing her on Saturday. I will tell her the whole pile of shite then”
“You sure?”
“Larinda, we made an agreement, that I do this honestly, aye?”
“Jill, there is a bit of a difference between being honest and having a death wish. If you are sure, then go ahead, but promise me that if it goes to ratshit you will ring me?”
“Of course, love”
“Yeah, the L-word, just throw it at me”
“Sorry…”
“Well, it just gets thrown back to you, yeah, love, so let me know, right?”
“Will do…look, I am off to bed, got a lot to think about, so talk tomorrow, OK?”
“Yeah, will do. Carter…”
“Aye?”
“Leave your door unlocked tonight, please”
I settled down afterwards, trying to watch some crap film on the BBC internet thing that kept stalling and freezing, until I had had enough of its irritation and found myself playing solitaire over and over again. I realised my mind was completely looped as the whole question of Siobhan threw itself at me, angle by angle.
She had saved me from the loneliness I had been drowning in, brought sunlight into some dark corners, but there had never really been a true match there. She was too conventional in an almost Victorian way, too compartmental in her world view. Right was right, wrong was wrong, and black and white made no such shade as grey. Mam was right: I had to make it as clean a break as I could, and leave her in possession of her own moral high ground.
I eventually gave up, crawling under the covers and settling as best I could. Larinda joined me at around eleven thirty. We didn’t make love.
CHAPTER 23
The train rattled and shook its way down the Arun Valley, Arundel castle looming to the right, and I started looking for the Hawker Hunter jet fighter still on its plinth at what had been Ford airfield. It was almost a milk train, stopping at nearly every station on the line, passing three castles, two cathedrals and any number of harbours.
The run round the riverbank into Southampton seemed to take forever, past the football ground and the Hell’s Angels clubhouse, until we finally entered the short tunnel before the station. Years later, I heard of someone who had arranged their own stage 5: climbing the fence from the car park, they had walked calmly to the track taken by an oncoming train, and just as calmly laid their head across the rail. Twenty yards from the ends of four crowded platforms. I understood their despair, but not their desire to make it so public.
Von pulled into the waiting area ten minutes after I left the station, and drove us over to the massive shopping complex of West Quay and the Japanese chain restaurant she liked, after a raised eyebrow at my clean-shaven face. She was clearly a little on edge, and as we worked our way down the menu she was straight to the point.
“Why won’t you come, Rob?”
“I can’t, Von, told you that. No jobs going, and not just in HMRC. Can’t sponge off your parents, like, can I?”
“So you keep saying, but that isn’t why you haven’t been ringing me, is it? Don’t try and blame your Mam, either; she has a phone there, just like you have at home, aye? What is going on?”
Not stupid, not unobservant.
“There are a lot of things going on at the moment, Von”
“Oh yes, and one of them is your beard going missing, aye?”
She stared at the latte she had ordered before the meal.
“Who is she, Rob?”
“Who?”
“Whatever woman you have been seeing that has taken all your time up, aye?”
Battle lines drawn. Suddenly, I had had enough. I couldn’t stay and torment Siobhan, and I could most definitely not keep up the lies. Honest…
“It’s me, Von”
What a cliché that was, the other woman being the man himself, but it was the best I could think of.
“What do you mean it’s you?”
“Me. The other woman”
“What the hell are you talking about, Carter? Make sense, aye?”
I still couldn’t just come out and say it, so once more I fell back onto the tactics I had used with Mam. Siobhan, though, as ever, was more interested in talking than listening.
“What it is, Von, is that I am gay–“
“And you have been with my BOYS?”
“No, pet, no, I fancy women, you know that, not men”
“But you just said…oh”
Not stupid, not at all.
“Robert Carter, you will leave now. You will stay away from me, you will stay away from my children. You will not bring your Godless perversion into my family. Now, Carter”
“Von, I never wanted to hurt you–“
The coffee cup smashed against the wall behind me, just missing my head.
“NOW! GO AWAY NOW AND NEVER, EVER COME BACK, YOU PERVERT!”
She was red-faced now, screaming, as diners looked round and a waiter hurried over just as the saucer followed the cup. I stood.
“I am so sorry, Von”
“NOW! GO! FUCK OFF NOW!”
She was looking round, probably for something else to throw, and I forced back my tears as I turned to leave. Perversely, some idiot part of my mind was standing apart from the rest, making the sarcastic remark that the situation could have been handled better. I walked slowly back to the station, as the restaurant staff fussed around Siobhan, and caught the first train back I could. I had been tempted to stay and try to salvage something from the shipwreck, but I knew there was nothing possible I could do except make her even more angry.
Pervert. Yes, indeed, they don’t come much more twisted than I felt. Man up. Be a man. Embrace your outer masculinity. So bloody impossible. I settled into my seat as the train rounded the Itchen, and pulled out my mobile.
“Yeah? You not staying there?”
“No, kid. I decided to take your advice, honesty, like, and it got sort of heated”
“What, you just out and told her? About me as well?”
“No, pet. By the time I had the first bit out, she was throwing things at me”
“Well, what the fuck did you expect? I mean, you’ve only lied to her all the time you’ve known her, yeah?”
“Yeah, I know, but what else could I do? At least I haven’t lied to you, have I?”
“True, Carter, true, but you are still screwing up my life, yeah? Look, what time does your train get in?”
“About half two, three”
“What say I do you dinner? Got a small lamb joint in the fridge, could bring it down, we could have a bottle of wine, sort of thing, yeah?”
“I don’t know, Larinda…”
“I do. And…”
Her voice tailed off for a bit, then returned to normal strength.
“Wear something nice for me, something elegant”
“You sure?”
There was a catch in her voice, and I wondered if it went with tears.
“Rob…it’s going to happen, yeah, one day, and I don’t want to be without you, whoever you are, you see? This is something I have to face, and fuck it, if I can’t see past some fucking clothes, what sort of lover am I? Yeah, cause that’s the word, so we need to get this out of the way A S A P, right?”
“Aye…love, but are you sure you want this now?”
“Abso fucking lutely. Look, I intend to fuck your brains out tonight, and that will not involve you in a frock, yeah? But I know I can deal with you, you know, sitting quiet, so we get that ball rolling. Dress for dinner, Rob, and I will do the rest”
What had it taken for her to come up with such an offer? Siobhan was almost pushed out of my thoughts, until my phone beeped as a text arrived. It was from her father.
“Come near them again and I bury you”
Deep joy. Yes, indeed, that could have gone better.
Back home, Larinda was already there, the oven heating and the promised small joint of lamb, with a thick layer of cross-cut fat that she was threading with rosemary. She left the kitchen, pushing me backwards through the house to the settee, hauling down my trousers and very, very efficiently…
“Right, you off, and change. I’ve put a liner on the bed so you don’t dribble the rest into your knickers. I have brought ‘Calendar Girls’ for later, but I didn’t want you getting frisky till I have you naked later, yeah? One step at a time, lover”
There was a sharpness there, brittle brightness, as if she was reassuring a child that all was well when it most obviously wasn’t. This was her third attempt at seeing me in some sort of reflection of how I felt myself truly to be, and it was clearly costing her some effort. She busied herself in the kitchen again, as I sorted my choices until I had the one I felt best suited her predicament.
Stockings, the same ones, and plain knickers with the prescribed liner, and then, over the top, a simple sleeveless knitted shift dress in light grey, and a pair of black suede kitten-heeled slingbacks. Ignoring the contents, an elegant outfit, suitable for dinner with another lady. I walked over to the kitchen, and she turned, eyes moist, at the tap of my heels.
“You do, don’t you? Relax, sort of thing, when you get dressed up, yeah?”
I just nodded.
“Yeah, Jill, I can see it in you, almost, when I stop trying to see Rob. You’re not the most girly girl, are you?”
She was crying now, openly and freely, but there was no catch to her voice, no hitch in her words. She spoke, clearly and calmly, and her tears fell.
“That’s what I am trying to see, Jill. I’ve got this bloke, this fat hairy thing, that I realise I fell in love with, yeah, and he’s not real, but the love is, and he loves me, I’m sure of that now, so I got to do my best, yeah? But it ain’t easy, cause he’s, she’s made how she is, and I am the same, I am what I was made, and, no, it don’t come easy, so, yeah, perhaps I need a hug, and I need it now, and we’ll see if we can get this life going better, yeah?”
We hugged, but she insisted on putting a tea-towel between us so that her tears wouldn’t stain my “pretty dress”.
Larinda pulled back, eyes red, and looked me in my own, which felt just like hers must have done. Then, with no ceremony, she kissed me, softly, long and sloppy. As she pulled away, she pushed something into my hand.
“Peel the spuds, Jill”
CHAPTER 24
I woke up once more with Larinda’s weight on me, and the knowledge that the Von problem was, if not exactly sorted, at least on a different plane. She knew, that was all. I didn’t think she was likely to torch the flat or boil lagomorphs, but there was a temper behind her Valleys persona that could burn hot or simmer slow and deep.
I lay for a while, just enjoying the warmth and smell of my companion, up until the romance of a full bladder moved me from the bed. She made a strange grunting, and turned over away from me, still asleep. I realised, so clearly, how easy it was to become accustomed to her presence.
Kettle on, and a quick wash, changing into one of my long cotton skirts coupled with an old sweat shirt. That brought a pause; every day, I dressed up as a man, and each evening I threw off the trousers that felt so, so wrong. A skirt was more than a badge of femininity desired, it was a practical, comfortable garment. As I walked the tea through to the bedroom, I realised that with all the crap the day before, I hadn’t picked up the post from the door mat.
There it was, the hand-addressed letter. Inside was the first request for an appointment, interview, therapy session, whatever. I realised that it was indeed an interview, but for a life rather than a job. Was it one I could afford to fail? I took it back upstairs to the bedroom, and shook Larinda awake for her tea and a council of war. She read the letter through in silence, her lips thinned, and then looked at me without a word. I filled the silence.
“This is make or break, kid. You do understand I have no choice?”
She sat silent for a while, sipping her tea, then looked up.
“I’ve made my choice, OK? I’ll say no more”
Three days later I was there. I had taken a day’s leave from work, and I was crapping myself. There was one strand of thought that wouldn’t unwind from my head, and that was my appearance. I had read so much about my options, and over and over again had come across references to ‘passing’ and how so many doctors hesitated before signing anyone off who they felt didn’t look womanly enough. If you were a skinny waif with a fat arse, then you would easily qualify. Those like me, more normal in appearance, were faced with an uphill struggle. Not fair, not fair at all, in so many ways.
“Mr Carter? Room 12…”
The receptionist waved me towards the corridor to the consulting rooms. I was finding it particularly hard, as despite all my preparations, I didn’t have an earthly as to what to expect. I opened the door after a quick rat-tat with my knuckles.
“Good morning. Who do I have today?”
“I should be down as Carter…”
“No…”
He was a small man, quite shabby, rather unshaven, in a cardigan that showed old food stains, and for a brief moment I wondered if I had found a patient rather than a shrink.
“No, I meant do I have Robert or Gillian today?”
Deep breaths, as ever.
“Gillian. Always Jill. Rob is an act”
He smiled, but it didn’t seem entirely to reach his eyes.
“Hello then, Jill. My name is Alec Devereaux. I am a counsellor, not strictly a doctor, so you can call me Mr Devereaux, or Alec, or if you really prefer, Doctor. Up to you. I like my visitors to be relaxed, or at least to make the effort. So…do you want to tell me, or shall I ask?”
“As long as you don’t ask anything silly. I’m just a little, you know…?”
“Pissing yourself, but not with laughter? It’s a big thing, what you are doing, even if it isn’t real. Be surprising if you weren’t at least a little apprehensive. Tell you what, you set the pace, I follow behind, right?”
“OK. I suppose you want me to tell you how long I have felt like this?”
“Well, it would be a start”
“I rehearsed a whole raft of ideas before I came, er, Alec”
“I would be astonished at you for that, too, if you hadn’t. Well?”
“Well…a bit like handedness, aye? Knowing which shoe goes where, which hand to eat with, which one feels right? Same time”
“Uh-uh”
“Same time I start seeing girls as different to boys, and that’s sort of phase one, aye?”
Not stage one. Phase one. Keep away from thoughts of stages.
“Phase two?”
“Ah, that was the hard one, when I realised that those over there weren’t in my seat, and that I had to stay with the aliens”
“Aliens?”
“Aye, aliens. Look, I read a lot of fantasy stuff, a lot of SF, and there are these tropes, yeah?”
Alec laughed. “Reading my textbooks?”
“Ach, it’s the right word”
“Who did, do you prefer?”
“As a kid? Oh, André Norton; some Heinlein, but he was always a bit too brutal for me, except for Podkayne, but that was a bit silly in places”
“Well, it WAS a juvenile!”
“And so was I, yeah? No, Norton, she had the Janus books, and that first one, Judgement, that was a dream for me. You dig something up, find the magic bean, whatever, and you fall asleep and…”
“And you wake whole? Yes, I know that trope. It’s not a real one, though. There is no magic bean, no fairy spell”
“You think I don’t know that? Fifty-three years of this, I worked that out, there’s no magic, and it isn’t easy. There is a pile of shit ahead, but it’s better than…”
“Than?”
“You know what”
“Indulge me”
“This is the bit where I tick the GID boxes, the can’t-live-on-as-a-lie ones”
“Can’t you?”
I surprised myself, just then, as all my careful presentation evaporated like a snowflake in water. I stared, ever so softly, to weep. Alec handed over the usual box of tissues, and waited. Then he sighed.
“When?”
More of those deep breaths.
“Once I had separated from my girlfriend. Once Mam had gone…”
“So, you were looking at the welfare of others first, or just saving yourself from being shown up in public?”
“You…oh. Saving my mother from a coronary, really”
“And how did she take it?”
“How did you…oh, nice guessing. She has astonished me, same with my brother. He’s gay, so, well, I suppose it must be easier for him to understand”
“Not necessarily. You may find some gay men and women to be less than appreciative. I assume you are gay yourself?”
Sharp look, rather than deep breath this time.
“What do you mean?”
“Simple, really. You are either a man with a fetish, possibly gay, or a gay woman with a rather awkward anatomy”
“Fetish?”
“You dress up?”
“You want the pat answer, Alec, or a longer one?”
“Try me with the pat, first”
“This is dressing up. This is acting”
“I see. Now, when you are at home…”
He grinned, and this time it reached his eyes, then put on a rather silly voice.
“…would you like to tell me what you are wearing?”
I had to laugh at that, tension easing. I suddenly felt I could talk to him, really talk, and then, immediately, I wanted to talk, to spill everything, bare my soul.
“Nothing special. I like long skirts. Nothing tight; just comfort. I have some really nice dresses, but I can’t get into them all. Bought them online, as I can hardly go in and try them on, aye? Some tops, got some tights, and I do like shoes”
“Tights? Not stockings?”
Had that conversation. “No. Larinda bought me some once, think she thought they’d look sexy, like”
“Did they?”
“Not to me. I wear tights to look right under a skirt, and they keep my legs warm, aye? Some shoes, nylons make them fit better, specially pull-on boots…am I being too detailed?”
“No. Carry on. Larinda?”
“Er, new girlfriend. She knows all about me”
“Ah. And how does she take things?”
“Very hard. She’s straight as all hell, which gives us a few problems, like”
“Such as?”
Yet again, he took me by surprise, and the waterworks came on.
“This is someone, aye, that I should have met decades ago. If I had, I might have been able to make a go of this life”
“You really think so?”
I thought about that one for a few seconds. The answer was there, and it was painful in its simplicity.
“No, Alec. No. Not for long”
CHAPTER 25
“No, not really. I have tried, you know…”
He sighed. “Tell me, how have you presented?”
“What do you mean?”
“How do you feel that others have perceived you, over the years?”
Over the years…my thoughts went back to my school hell.
“I was always a bit small as a kid, like. I think now, you know, if I had started treatment, back then, perhaps I might have had a better future, more feminine, like. But that’s not what you meant, though, is it?”
“I‘m here to listen, Jill”
Thank you, Alec. “No, I was picked on from the day I arrived. Small, clever, vulnerable…”
“What did they call you?”
“A puff, mostly. Homosexual, like. It’s odd, isn’t it: the way they can smell blood, like sharks. They see the difference, and they might not know what it is, exactly, but they can guess, and it doesn’t matter, really. Just being different, that’s enough”
“And how did you take this?”
“How the hell do you think? Two bloody juvenile attempts to get away from it”
“You like euphemisms”
Not a question. No argument from me, either.
“Yeah, I found my way of hiding. What’s that phrase? Hiding in plain sight. As soon as I got away from them, I started the man game”
“Game?”
“Aye, you’re right there. As much of a game as Russian roulette, aye? Same outcome if you fuck it up”
Alec took his glasses off, rubbing them clean on a scrap of tissue from his box. Eyes bare, he looked tired, and I wondered how his job wore on him; day after day of hearing other people’s shit whilst trying to steer a neutral and constructive path. He slipped them back on, and looked at me again, head cocked.
“It is quite a classic picture, you know. The attempt to be more butch than a pit-bull, more manly than–well, I half expect the next James Bond film to come out as ‘Licence to Transition’. Tell me, what do you hope for from this chat?”
“Well, more chats, for a starter”
“The flippant answer. It’s a displacement activity, you know? A delaying tactic before the truth slips through. So, can we cut to the chase?”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean…what do you want? Not just what you desire, but what you think you need”
Yet again, those calming breaths.
“I need not to be in this body. What I desire, that’s another story”
“And?”
“Will you stop the cryptic stuff? Look, all I want is a few adjustments. I can’t have what I always wanted, but I can at least make a few nods in that direction”
“But you are frightened”
“Of course I bloody am. I mean, what chance do I stand of fitting in?”
“So why did you grow a beard? I can see the difference in your skin tone; how long ago did you shave it off?”
“I thought you’d have known the answer to that one. Shaved it off very recently, as you know”
“Ah, indulge me again”
“You know damned well, aye? Once I grew too big, I needed a way to stop myself dressing up, as you called it, a way to take away the temptation to go out, the death wish, aye”
“Death wish”
“You know what I mean”
“Tell me…”
“I stopped trying to be me years ago, just for a decade or two, tried what you said, tried to be a man, and it hasn’t worked. If I had ever tried to go out on the streets I’d have looked bloody stupid, so I made it absolutely failsafe, like. And then…”
“Then?”
“Well, there’s always the hope, aye? Always the little dream to put myself to sleep with. If I had shaved all my life, the skin would have been, you know, rough as all hell. Just let it grow, get rid of it properly if, when…”
“When? You had a plan?”
“Of course not. Just get through each day, like, get it past, move on to the next”
The next stage. Suddenly, that seemed further away. I realised that despite the nastiness of Von’s explosion, I was past the worst, or so I hoped. MAC was going, Mam was on side, Larinda…Larinda would try, try her best, that I was sure of.
“Alec, I sort of have a plan now, if it works, like. I haven’t got a lot of people that I worry about upsetting with this. Well, not any more. The ones I worried about have either come on side or pissed off in a huff, so all I am left with, in essence, are strangers. There’s always a risk there, like, but I think I can cope there”
“What if you can’t?”
“I don’t know”
“Liar”
“I beg your pardon?”
“Jill, you have so many little tics and tells it is easy to spot when you are either lying or trying to steer this onto safer ground. Like. So please be honest”
He was tired, clearly, he was cynical, but he was very, very good.
“You’re obviously not daft, Alec, so you know what my options are”
“Oh, I do indeed, but do you know what they are?”
“I think so”
“I don’t”
“What, you don’t know, or you think I don’t know?”
“Jill, see what I mean? You know perfectly well what I meant, but you try and derail the conversation with side issues, deliberate misunderstandings. I will share a secret with you, a therapist thing: the more you try and steer me around, the more I know I have something juicy to bite at, LIKE”
I almost laughed at that. He was, of course, spot on.
“Alec…Alec it’s obvious really, isn’t it? I either cope or I die, slowly or at a time of my own choosing. Is that what you wanted to hear? The typical suicidal tranny? Yes, you found your juicy bit, but then we both knew it was there, aye?”
“Aye, lass, appen we did”
“For fu–god’s sake, Alec, that’s Yorkshire. I’m a bloody Geordie”
“So when did you intend to kill yourself?”
“Once I’d sorted…bastard”
He smiled, sadly, and with that word I don’t mean a little bit of world-weariness, rather a weight of near-despair that I might not have noticed if I wasn’t so wound up. I looked at him differently.
“I wouldn’t be the first, would I?”
He gave a very deep sigh, and sat for a few moments, clearly weighing up his options.
“No, Jill, you wouldn’t, neither in general, nor for my own patients. Think how long it took you before you saw me, yeah? Staff cuts, funding cuts, all of that crap, and in the end none of us can switch caring off. So, yes, I know what you have planned there, in what you think of as your private space, and I have a limited time, and less support, in which to help you see further than you realise you can. So all I ask, please, is that you talk to me. I can do nothing for you without that”
Shit. “You weren’t, you know, that girl, the motorway?”
He shuddered, his face curling in on itself in remembered pain.
“No, not me; that was a colleague of sorts. That what scares you? Another bunch of arseholes with the need to hurt The Other? Just remember one thing: Melanie was alone, completely and utterly, apart from her own therapist. You have friends, yes?”
“Yes…”
“Friends who know and accept what you are, and don’t run screaming away?”
“Well, Von did, and Larinda isn’t too happy…”
“Von is history, no? And this Larinda…is she still around?”
“Well, aye”
“Melanie had friends, but she forgot that simple fact. If she had picked up the phone, they would have been there. Your friends are right here and now. So you have it easier, don’t you?”
“I suppose so”
Off with the glasses again, and I revised my estimate of his age downwards. So, so tired.
“Jill, here’s the score. Suicide amongst people like you is far more common than in the general population. Don’t look surprised; your nature is bloody obvious. How you have managed to get through life so far in stealth mode astonishes me, but I didn’t say that, OK? But remember this: people tend to kill themselves for two main reasons. The first is despair, and that exit is usually made simply and efficiently. Not a bundle of pills, or anything like that, just off Platform 13 at Clapham Junction as the Gatwick Express is going through, or a short walk off Beachy Head or the nearest multi-storey car park. Bang, done.
“Trouble is, it screws up so many other people’s lives. Train drivers, bystanders…I had one of the poor buggers who drove over Melanie’s body. You have more than that. Every person you know is on that list, yeah? How old is your mother…ah”
He shook his head. “Your face is crap at hiding stuff, you know. Look, we are out of time, and in the manner of the NHS I have people queued ten deep outside. Just remember this: to those people, you aren’t a random body splashing their hush puppies with Kensington gore, you are a friend, a son, a lover. Do nothing in a hurry, yeah? Look…”
He wrote a number on a compliment slip.
“My mobile. Any time you feel that shitty, you call, right?”
“Well…”
“RIGHT?”
He stood, and I took it as my cue to leave.
“Jill…look, there are rules here, but fuck ‘em. Inappropriate behaviour, yeah? So if you don’t want a hug…?”
I did, and, clearly, so did he.
CHAPTER 26
That had been a hard one. Alec was clearly switched on, which I had expected, but it had come almost as a shock to realise how much he actually cared. I had expected the usual NHS assembly line treatment, where all the right things are said from a mask of compassion put on for each patient in turn, but he had made me realise how lucky I really was.
Rachel, Larinda, Alec…each of them had their own darkness, their own ghosts haunting the shadows of their memory, and there I was reflecting them. Alec had used the word ‘tells’, and they were there, in his own face, when he spoke of the poor dead girl.
He cared, Karen and Rachel cared, Larinda cared; how could I really go wrong? And Mam, Neil…I had been on a roller-coaster, I realised, up, down, up, but always, in the end, down, and for the first time it was looking as if I could step off.
I caught my reflection in a shop window as I paused at some lights, and there it was: ugly. For a moment, I almost slipped back into my rut, and then I forced myself to look around, at the pedestrians clogging the footpath or crossing at the lights. That old lady; her beard was almost as thick as mine; that munter eating the burger as she walked, she was fatter than me, surely?
Alec had given me a bundle of forms and leaflets to go with the stuff I had been posted, and there were support groups, forums, all sorts of shit that made it clear how unalone I actually was, but then I had never actually been alone, not once I accepted that there were real people out there who had real feelings, that really cared.
I was actually singing as I went in the front door, but as it was ‘Born to Go’ and my voice is crap it was nothing for public consumption, and there was Larinda, sitting on the sofa.
“Somebody’s happy! ‘We were born to go, as far as we can fly’, yeah? Tell, go on!”
“Ach, not a huge story, but he was very, very nice”
She gave me a Paddington stare.
“Now, you aren’t going straight, are you?”
“No, I mean he was just, you know, someone who obviously wasn’t doing it by the numbers, aye? Really seemed to care, round peg, round hole, like”
That was when her comment sank in.
“You said ‘straight’, love…”
She looked away, mouth working as she sought the words she needed. It took a while, but I waited, as I had to.
“Rob…Jill, it’s hard, yeah? We’ve had all the chats, we’ve tried the games, the dressing up, and I have been struggling to get my head clear on all this shit, but…look, you’ve come in here, you are singing some shit song I’ve never heard before, and you are happy, bouncing, yeah? And I can see it, REALLY see it, it’s like the first time. Even with you dressed like that, I can see YOU, and it’s what I saw that first meeting, at work…shit, you know, when I thought you were gay?”
“I remember…”
“But it’s different this time. Jill, I can see you, right through the mask, yeah? And…oh fuck, I can see this woman, and I still love her, yeah? How bloody weird is that?”
I stared for an instant, as she cocked her head to one side.
“Jill…this is the bit where we snog, yeah? It’s sort of traditional”
It was different, somehow, tentative, slow, as our lips met, and retreated, and she looked me in the eye just for an instant, as she pulled back.
“I have no fucking idea how to handle this, but I love you, whichever you it turns out to be, and…oh shit, just kiss me, yeah?”
So I did, which was when the phone rang.
“Hello?”
“Rob? It’s William”
Von’s eldest. “This is a surprise…”
“Yeah, sorry, Mam won’t be happy, so don’t tell her, yeah? It’s…look, is it true what she said? That you are, you know, queer?”
I had wondered what Von would tell her family, but after her Dad’s text I had simply assumed it would be something about kiddy fiddling.
“What did she tell you, son?”
There was a long pause at the other end, and I used it to write down who it was, for Larinda’s benefit.
“She said…she said that you were a homosexual, who liked little boys”
Bang on the money, then. “Ah, shit–sorry, Will. Look, there’s no easy way of doing this, yeah, but life can be complicated. Here’s your exam question, and it’s the same sort of joke thing I have used on other people, aye? What does it mean if I say that yes, I am absolutely gay, but add that it means I fancy only women?”
“Then…but…oh, Rob, shit, you really have it bad. Fuck”
“William…”
“Sorry, Rob, but I am seventeen, and, well, shit!”
“Will…what is it that you wanted? I am not trying to get rid of you, like, just puzzled that you are calling me. I assume that Von doesn’t know”
“No, Rob, she’d kill me. Oh hell, she’d kill me anyway, if she knew…look, I just needed someone to talk to, and after what she said, look, you’ve always talked straight to me, about everything, not like Dad, yeah?”
Oh hell indeed. “Are you trying to tell me you are gay yourself, Will?”
I made the question as soft as I could, and Larinda started up from beside me. At the other end, I heard a catch in his throat, and when he spoke again he was clearly in tears.
“Yes…”
“Where are you now?”
“I am out in Portsmouth, bunked off college for the day. Just too much shit, yeah?”
“I can understand, son. Look…want to meet up at Gun Wharf? Don’t know what time the trains get in”
Larinda mouthed ‘got my car’ and the decision was made.
“See you as soon as I get down, yeah? Have a coffee, have a chat, see what we can sort out, aye? Just remember one thing, Will: whatever anyone says, all you are is a normal human being. No Satan, no evil, no perversion, just a boy…I love as a son, yeah? Now clean up, and I’ll be there as quick as I can”
The tears were there, still.
“What am I going to do, Rob?”
“Talk to me, that’s all, and then we will find a way, OK?”
“OK. See you in a bit, then”
“Mexican food?”
“Fuck, yeah!”
“That’s better, Will, but a bit less on the language front would probably ease things along. Laters!”
Did I just say ‘laters’? Larinda had spotted it, and she was giggling.
“See how I grow on people? Get right under the skin, just like a verruca”
She dropped her grin. “Seventeen, and trying to come out? Poor little sod. Scuppers my chances of seducing you, doesn’t it?”
“Laters…?”
And the grin flashed on once more. “Bloody hell, aye! Look, sort out what you need, and we’ll get on the road”
It took over an hour to get down to Pompey, but I took her down the Arun valley once more, to get away from the bustle of the A23 and the coast road, so it was only the stretch through the roundabouts by Chichester that held us up. William was waiting by the escalators for us, and I got a very searching look as he spotted Larinda.
“Will, this is Larinda. She sort of stepped in when my little problem blew up, and so far, she is doing a hell of a lot better than your Mam could, so, well, if it causes a problem…”
He shook his head. “Considering what Mam would say to me, well, no, not my business”
Larinda looked up at his six-foot-plus of height, grinned that grin, and just said “What a waste! Sure you’re gay?”
Will flashed me a hard look, and I shrugged.
“Larinda is very direct, Will”
She nodded. “And not at all someone to worry about, kid. My way of ice breaking. Look, just to mix up all the metawhatsits, I don’t sit around ignoring elephants in rooms, I go up and give them a poke. If Jill here says you are worth knowing, then that’s all I need”
“Jill? Oh, yeah, right. Jill…”
I needed to get things on track, before he ran out of time.
“Will, is there someone else involved?”
He blushed, and Larinda chuckled. “If there isn’t yet, he’s hoping”
My Paddington was met with a raised eyebrow.
“So it’s normal, innit? Will, I tease, yeah, I tease a lot, but what I try not to do is judge. As far as I am concerned, this is all normal, no nasty disease. Why would I be anti-gay? I mean, I wouldn’t have this one if she weren’t that way, yeah?”
He was shaking his head. “This is all too weird, you talking about…her as if she, he, arse, you know what I mean”
Larinda was more serious. “Sort of happened today, yeah. She comes back from the shrink’s, all happy, and it was the first time, I mean, I knew, she’d told me, and I was trying to get my head round it, like, but there she is, and suddenly I can SEE her, yeah? So it sort of fucks me up a bit, cause, well, I am straight, I don’t fancy women, and yet…there’s this one, and it’s not that I fancy her, it’s that I am in love with her, yeah, so that makes three of us who are a bit screwed. Well, not yet, but later, I hope”
Will had a hand up. “Too much information!”
That cheeky grin, once more, the grin I was in love with, that suddenly seemed to be making sense of my life.
“Whatever. Now, someone said Mexican? I want fajitas!”
CHAPTER 27
There is a chain Mexican restaurant in the shopping complex that is Gun Wharf Quay, and while hardly authentic the food is tasty and plentiful, and they had a small booth well away from any other diners. We did, indeed, have fajitas, which are ideal for a social meal.
You take the tortilla, slather it with a mixture of gloopy stuff in various colours, load on some meat and veg, roll and eat, trying not to dribble stuff down your front. That means that you are eating only part of the time, rather than the steady pace of a more conventional dinner. So there is time to talk. I cut William off before he could turn the day round and hide his problem in my own.
“Will, I will go through this once, just to answer any questions, like, and then it’s your show. Name is Gillian, Jill as you have heard. Yes, I have always known; no, I have no interest in men; Mam and Neil both know and support me; Larinda and some other friends have been more supportive than I have ever hoped; yes, at some stage, I hope to change everything around. Got that?”
He just nodded, and I continued.
“Look, I know this is all very odd, but we don’t have a lot of time to talk. Your bamps has threatened me quite explicitly if we are in contact at all, so you need to be careful, we all do. Now, what has brought this on?”
He busied himself with tortilla and thoughts for a while, and then spoke, eyes down.
“It’s…look, I’m off to Uni next year, yeah? And Mam, she wants me at home, here or Southampton, or over in Wales where Bamps and Nan are. I mean, she even worries when I take the train on my own, and I’m seventeen! And I want, well, I want to go somewhere I can be a bit more…unwatched, yeah?”
Larinda asked, softly, “Is it someone at school, Will?”
He shrugged, eyes still down. “Yes, and no, and maybe, I don’t know. I mean, there are boys…”
I realised he was blushing, so I put a hand on his arm, which made him jerk slightly away. His head rose, and moist eyes looked straight into mine.
“You really are, aren’t you? I mean, I can see it now”
“Aye, Will. It’s odd with me too. I mean, I have always known myself to be a woman, but spent all my life playing a man, sort of thing, so now, I find myself being me, and sometimes I manage to forget what it actually looks like when I do, aye?”
He nodded again. “That’s it, er, Jill, I still see the beardy man, and yet, you, you are under it, and I have to concentrate. This is weird”
Larinda sighed. “Tell me about it. That is what I finally saw when she came back from the doctor’s. I had hopes, but they can’t be met. The reality’s a bit elsewhere for that to happen. Will…this is your show, yeah?”
“OK, yeah. Look, what I said, earlier, about being further away, it’s like a chance to be a bit more myself. Got a bit of a dream…”
I squeezed his arm. “We all have. I tried mine out at college a bit, but lost my courage”
“Yeah, but mine was sort of simple, not more than going there, away from home, away from Chapel, and it’s hi, I’m Will, no, you’re all right, cause I’m actually gay. Just be me from the start, no coming out as such”
“You will have to at some point, Will”
“Don’t I know it. I just wanted to do it on my terms, at my time, maybe with some friends around me”
Larinda reached over for his other hand. “That’s something you already have, Will. Oh shit, got a tissue here, nobody’s looking”
He wiped his eyes, as I explained how similar our plans had been, my own attitudes and hopes about Mam and Von. He found that almost funny, and a little of the lad’s humour resurfaced.
“Jill…still seems odd, but it will come. Jill, your mam, how did she take it? Your brother, he’s like me, isn’t he?”
“Ach, Will, she is fully supportive of me. Astonishing, really, but that’s what she’s always been. Neil, well, he sort of said he’d always thought I was gay, but him, too, he’s on my side”
I started to laugh at a sudden memory, and Will gave me a sharp glance.
“Sorry, Will, it’s just something I heard when I was last with Neil, aye? We both used to get very badly bullied by an evil shit called John Forster, and his brother told me he’s been kicked out of the army”
I paused, holding the punchline.
“Got caught in bed with another soldier”
This time, Will’s tears were from laughter. I had to cut the mood back, though.
“Look, with Neil, Mam hates what he is, but he’s her son, and she makes so many allowances it amazes me. Perhaps Von…?”
He shook his head, hard. “No. Never. And not Bamps, either. And Chapel…Look, one thing has occurred to me, yeah, and that’s something that might really help. Your Mam…would she mind if I was near hers, at college? It would give me a bolt hole, if things got nasty, yeah?”
“Well, you have two universities in Newcastle, so it all depends on what you want to study. Shit, this’ll crease you up. There’s Newcastle Uni, and then there was Newcastle Polytechnic, aye? And when they became a university they asked the students what name they should use, and now they are Northumbria Uni?”
Larinda gave me a questioning raise of her eyebrows, and a little gesture of the hands meaning ‘and?’
“And they very nearly went with another suggestion…which was City University Newcastle upon Tyne”
I counted the seconds, and Will got it first.
“The clever buggers!”
Larinda was still puzzled. “What’s the joke?”
Will was grinning. “Initials, woman. C-U-N-…”
“Oh bloody hell, students! Never change, do they? Now, Will, this girl here’s right, and you are right. If you stay all boxed up, you is going to have some serious shit in later life, and, well, no shagging in your best years for it, and it don’t come back, youth, does it? Let’s see how things turn out, exams and stuff, and you got two mates to look after you for now, yeah? Only, you are going to sort out the college place based on the course, not how close you are to Jill’s family. But you don’t do nothing stupid, as I keep telling this one”
William was nodding, soberly. “Yeah, I have to get the right degree, get the job I want, all that. Be good if there’s something in Newcastle, though. Then…look, do you understand? It’s Mam; I can’t be myself if I am having to live with her, yeah, but, it’s, well, she’s still Mam, still my mother, and I can’t just drop a load of crap on her. One day, yeah?”
I took his hand this time. “What I told myself, Will, the same thing, and suddenly it’s fifty years gone. I know what you mean, but the only thing you can be sure of keeping into old age is regrets. So you need to think carefully, every step worked out, but just remember the important thing. What Larinda says, you are not alone”
He squeezed my hand in return, and the tears were there again.
“Thank you. I had hoped, you know, and Jill, I didn’t believe her, not once, yeah?”
“I know, Will, I know. Look, you need to go, or Von will get worried. Nothing stupid, nothing that seems like a good idea till you run it past us, right?”
Larinda was writing on a serviette. “Here, this is my number, yeah? You can’t get this one, you ring me, right?”
He stood, and went over to her to hug her and kiss her cheek, and then, to my astonishment, did the same to me. He whispered into my ear.
“Need the practice, don’t we?”
And gone. Larinda was quiet as I sorted out the bill, and as we walked hand in hand to her car she maintained the silence.
“Something up, pet?”
“No, not really. Just wondering how you ended up with his mother, yeah? And, well, how he turned out so nice and stuff when she is clearly a right cow. He’s a good lad, that one”
“Ach, girl, she’s not that bad, not really. She’s a good mother; just, well, narrow in her world view, like. Too much Chapel for her opinions to be anything else”
“And how did you two…?”
“Just met by chance. I was lonely, and so was she, and it sort of snowballed. Look back now and, well, wish I hadn’t, if you see what I mean”
We had reached the car, and she turned to face me.
“Regrets, you said. Well, look at it this way. That boy, he’s a good ‘un, yeah? You hadn’t met her, you’d not have met him. And then he might have been lost, just like you nearly were. Got that? Now get in, cause I want to ravish you and it’s a long drive back”
CHAPTER 28
I slept the sleep of the just that night, the just-ravished, for Larinda had been true to her word. She had lain on my shoulder, afterwards, while she went through options for William’s future, almost as if he were her own.
“What?” she demanded.
“Just, dunno, you seem to be taking charge, almost, with Will”
“Ah, just used to having to do everything on my own, innit? Sort of got into the habit of sorting things before they get out of hand. Never been anyone else about to do it for me, yeah?”
“Yeah, well, no taking over my life”
She giggled into my chest, then stroked it.
“Need a shave, love, or should I book you a waxing? Smooth….naughty Laz, put thoughts away, time to sleep. Changing subjects, yeah, we got that night out with your workmates?”
“Aye, three days from now. He’s arranged his do on the actual day he clears his desk, so hopefully once he’s out the door and off to the pub he’s picked it’ll be the last we see of him. I think Rach’s organising a table at the Raj for afters”
“Yeah, meant to say, what with all that Mexican crap we ate…”
“That was very nice crap, I thank you!”
“Yebbut, it’s also very fat Mexican crap, yeah, and if you are having a curry and beers then we need to get you cutting back. Not shopping for dresses in any size starting with a two or a three, yeah?”
“Shopping?”
She bit me very, very gently on the nipple. “Yeah, shopping. Sort of been thinking, yeah, and I was right. Not going to say I don’t care what you look like, how you dress and shit, cause I do, right? Just, what I said, it’s true. You don’t get away from me. Look, I’m not good with words, am I?”
I kissed the top of her head. “Not done so badly, as far as I can see, aye?”
“Yeah, well, I’m good at the straight stuff, right to the point. I know that. What I’m saying, like, is that you are more than this little bit down here…oh, not so little…where was I? You are you, and after you saw that shrink, yeah, I can see you better, and I still love you, cause it’s you, and not some stranger coming through a mask, yeah? That make sense?”
I lifted her face for a proper kiss. “Perfect sense, pet”
“Ta. Now, you going to use this, now it’s back? Mind if I do?”
Autonomic systems, automatic, hard-wired anatomical responses to arousal, and yet even though I wished I had never had the anatomy in question it just felt right, with Larinda, even while completely wrong. With every other woman, Jill had gradually pushed Rob out, and the response had failed. I still had no intention of keeping it, if I could manage the change, but for now it was by far the best I could do with her and, to be honest, it did feel more than pleasant. How confused was that?
I woke, of all things, to The Beatles, and realised suddenly that Larinda’s possessions were accumulating rather quickly in my house. We’d have to talk about that one, and I had a sudden urge to push the issue, after her words the night before. She appeared at the bedroom door, my old dressing gown around her and two mugs in her hands. After a kiss, I raised the idea.
“Larinda, how many of your CDs do we have here now?”
She blushed. “Er, most of them. Not got a lot, but that space rock stuff of yours, yeah, needs a bit padding out”
“Open the wardrobe, love”
She did so. “Got a lot of dresses here, inchya?”
“Yeah, and how many of them are yours?”
“Dunno”
“The answer is ‘not enough’, aye?”
She stared at me, and there was a care in the way she held her expression, as if she didn’t want any tells to leak, any thoughts to show.
“What do you mean, Jill?”
“What’s the rent on your old place? What could we spend it on?”
We were both late for work that morning. She started moving her stuff in the same night, and gave her notice the next morning. It was a big step for both of us, but now, just for once, I really felt my impulsive decision was exactly the right thing to do, for both of us. Damn the torpedoes.
Three days later, MAC called everyone into his office at three o’clock.
“Ladies, gents, this is it. Thirty-five years of the department, under various names, it’s up. As of five this evening, I am officially a free man, and to mark that, as you should all be aware, I will be in the Red Lion. There’s cash behind the bar, and sandwiches laid on, so I will see you all there!”
With that, he was straight out of the door, before anyone could say what a jolly nice chap he was, or similar lies, and Rachel held her hand up to keep the rest in the room.
“Now, we all need to celebrate Mr Wilkins’ departure, right? But–shush at the back–we sort of don’t feel like doing it anywhere he’s still infesting, am I clear?”
There were a few laughs, and a call of “Was that infesting or infecting, Rach?”
“Either will do! So, people, bring your drinking shoes, and be at the Home Cottage for half five, gives him time to piss off round the corner. Raj for curry after, yeah? Let’s give him a good send off, just, well, not have him there to spoil it!”
Right on time, MAC was out of the door, his cardboard box of possessions loaded into his car and then off home to change out of his manskin, let his scales breathe free for a while, finalise his invasion plans, whatever it was that people like him do when they are out of work, before heading back to the Red Lion. Other people slipped out half an hour later, MAC’s departure making that safer, to make their own preparations. At five ten, Rachel came into my little office and leant against the door jamb, smiling.
“That tart of yours coming?”
“Of course. She’s not got as far to travel, now”
“Fuck me, you moved her in?”
“We are now cohabiting, yes”
“Jill…you sure about things?”
I thought for a little while. Was I sure? No other answer could be given.
“Absolutely. We seem to click on so many levels, Rach. I know what you are going to ask, and, yeah, she has issues, but she says that I am leaking , now, leaking Jill round the edges, like, and she still likes me, and I’m Jill, and so…”
“And dressing up?”
“Oh, well, sort of getting there, though she hates it when I put tights on. Passion-killers, she says. Oh, and Rachel…”
“Yeah?”
“THIS is dressing up, what I am wearing now, not a skirt and top, yeah? But just, tonight, keep it as Rob, like”
She laughed, and came over for a hug, and as I felt her in my arms the thought came again: how could anyone hit someone like her? How could anyone ever believe she deserved hitting? Fucking men, I hated them. Well, perhaps not all. We sorted out what we needed, locked everything up, and made our way with various colleagues up the hill to our own pub, Larinda turning up at six and getting wolf whistles when she snogged me. She looked up at that, grinned that special grin, and went to hug Rachel hello. With a shock, I saw them line up for a passionate kiss of their own, and just for an instant the room fell absolutely silent in anticipation, till the two span round with a cry of “Gotcha!”
Larinda pecked Rachel on the cheek, and we settled down for beer and banter, and the reason for our night out made the atmosphere so much sweeter by his absence. At seven thirty, my next surprise came, with the arrival of Karen and Terry. I looked at Larinda with a raised eyebrow.
“Well, you mentioned them, yeah, so I sneaked a look at your phone’s address book, gave them a ring, and there you go!”
Karen nearly suffocated me, whispering “Name tonight?” into my ear.
“Rob, here and now. Where’s James?”
“With my parents tonight. He works OK with Dad. How is it going?”
“What’s Larinda told you?”
“Nothing, really. She said she was stretching things by calling us, so the rest had to be your business, your call. She’s switched on, Ji–Rob. I think you have a keeper, yeah?”
I hugged her back. “I don’t think so, I know so. I’ll introduce you round, yeah, but in essence, yeah, going better than I could ever have hoped for”
“Great. We love you, you know; never forget that. Now, Pimms, bottle there, got my name on it!”
Two and a half hours later, we were sitting at a long table in the Raj, trays of pickles around us, as we did the fun and traditional trick of breaking poppadums with a strike of the index finger, and I looked up and out the plate glass of the front window, as a slumped figure stared in, before walking slowly off. No longer the monkey on our backs, no longer the Old Man of the Sea of Sinbad fame, he was just a sad old man, who turned and walked off to a pension and an empty retirement. I almost felt sorry for him; but only almost.
Larinda handed me another bottle of Kingfisher, and I realised that nobody else had seen MAC at the window. I left it that way; we had already done what suddenly felt far too much.
CHAPTER 29
I looked round the long table, where about twenty people sat, laughing, joking, spilling sauce down their shirts, oblivious to the scene outside. Karen was on the other side of me from Larinda.
“What are your plans tonight, Kaz? I have a spare bed”
I got a soft smile for that. “We were sort of hoping you might. Just, don’t like to impose”
I squeezed her hand under the table. “Don’t be daft. I’ll lay out some fresh bedding when we get in, and if we spin past the all-night garage I can grab some bread and shit for breakfast. When do you need to be back?”
“Not till late; Dad’s taking him to the Science Museum”
“How is he?”
She snorted. “You and those birds! He decided to make a bird book, of the ones he has seen, yeah? But with his own mnemonics or names. Trouble is, it took a while to explain that cutting the pictures out of a twenty-odd quid book was a bit…wasteful, though in the end we used the internet and a colour printer. It’s turned out quite good, really; sort of beginner’s guide to remembering what they are, rather than how to identify them. I mean, it’s worked out doing the same job, in the end, but it’s such a different approach–I’m babbling, aren’t I?”
“You’re proud of him, aren’t you?”
I realised Larinda was peering over from my other side, as Karen weighed her response.
“Rob…yes, I am, very proud. He’s a sweet boy, once you get past the tics, and if you balance a bit of steering with some acceptance…shit, you know that, don’t you? You do it with him, you understand”
Larinda called across me. “You asked him, then?”
“Yeah, and he said yes too”
Hang on. “You already asked Larinda?”
Karen grinned. “Always ask the one who doesn’t wear the trousers---sorry, sorry Rob, I didn’t mean it like that!”
Larinda nudged me. “Live together, share the decisions. I am not going down the same shit road as last time, so sorry if I overstep, yeah, but, shit, you know what I mean. And I already put some sheets out”
Terry was obviously trying very hard not to laugh, and all three of us, as well as Rachel, turned to stare at him.
“Sorry, but…”
He whispered in his wife’s ear, and she laughed out loud before repeating the whisper into our own ears, one by one.
“Terry says you should remember that the Chinese ideogram for ‘trouble’ means ‘two women under the same roof’ “
I almost loved him, right then. Rachel snorted, and then, somewhat wistfully, asked “You got any room?”
I looked at her closely, and there were little hints of pain behind her eyes.
“You OK, kid?”
“Ah, Rob; just a bit down. Saw something earlier on, and, well, it would be nice to have an evening with friends, yeah? Not an empty flat sort of thing”
Once more, Larinda took over. “Back in five” she said, and disappeared out the door. Six minutes later, she was back, with a small bag, which she handed to Rachel.
“Can’t do you no fresh knickers, Rach, but there’s a toothbrush and a face cloth in there. As Rob says, we’ll stop by the all-nighter and pick up some pigging-out stuff for the morning, yeah?”
Karen was looking thoughtful. “You two got bikes? Just, you know, one day…”
I started to laugh at that, the mood from MAC’s ghost lifting. “Don’t listen, girls, she’s on her evangelical schtick again. Before you know it, you’ll be buying tents made of cobwebs and elf spoo and sleeping in fields in February”
Karen laughed again, ostentatiously taking Terry’s hand. “And what’s wrong with that? Some of us have got more than our righteous souls to keep us properly warm, yeah?”
I suddenly realised exactly how much things had changed for me. Not so long ago, I would have twitched with resentment at a scene like that, especially after Kaz’s comment about getting fed up waiting for me to make a move on her. Now, I looked at the two of them and simply felt soppy. Two good friends, in love together, and yes, Terry was a good friend. He had taken me as I was, simply and openly, accepted my revelations and carried on as if I was telling him I had some minor ailment that the doctor would have me cured from shortly. No drama, no fuss, just a mate.
Finally, I was seeing him through her eyes; just without the lust. Perhaps it was Larinda’s presence in my life, but I was realising how blessed I truly was. Then I looked up at Rachel.
“You OK?”
“Yeah, just a bit overtaken by all this soppy love shit, and, you know, stuff…”
Realisation hit me as to exactly how lonely she must be. There is a cliché in which the pretty girl is left well alone, because every man thinks he doesn’t stand a chance. In my experience, said cliché is rubbish. For every lonely beauty, there are a hundred arrogant and picky little madams, and for every timid guy too fearful to make an approach there are ten thousand self-obsessed pricks who just KNOW the world is theirs for the seizing. Rachel was like neither. I took a while to study her, the figure I would almost have killed for, the long dark hair and perfect skin, the dressing so sharp that the world parted in submission to her presence. But her eyes…
There was pain there, and loneliness, and I remembered her joke about Essex girls being told. Those eyes now shouted “Victim” and Larinda caught my own expression.
“Rach, want to freshen up, as they say? Rob, you can’t, just yet, yeah?”
“I can’t what?”
“Socialise in the bogs…come on, you”
The two of them trotted off, and Karen turned to me. “What was done to her, Rob?”
“Rachel’s business, pet. If she talks to you, well, then you’ll know, but private, aye?”
Terry snorted. “She’s like a magnet, this one. Gets all the little birds with broken wings…me, James, you, and now, I’ll lay you ten to one, your friend”
He turned to his wife. “Look, love, none of this is a complaint, but you can’t heal the world. I adore you for it, but…”
She smiled at him, and once again my heart melted. “I can have a damned good go, love. Let’s just see with this one, yeah? She might not want to share, so let’s just smile and have a good girly night together”
He put on a mock frown. “Yeah, only bloke in a houseful of bloody women, wonderful”
At that point, with those words, I loved him.
The other two were back in a few minutes, Rachel’s face clearly freshly repaired, and we wound the evening down with the ritual of paying the bill. Look at it, decide that we’ve had similar portions, divide by 22, shovel a huge bundle of cash onto the table, smile, hug, and off. Smiling waiters waved us out the door, and our little group walked arm in arm to the all night shop. As Larinda and the happy couple loaded up with bread, bacon, eggs and so on, I caught Rachel staring at the wine display.
“It would be rude, Jill, wouldn’t it?”
“What would?”
“To stay at a good friend’s and get absolutely paralytic”
“Aye, it would. Getting a bit silly, like, in good company, friends, yeah?”
She looked hard at me, and I could see the tears that wanted to break free. “You are so fucking lucky, girl. She is more than anyone could hope for, and she’s yours, and I am so happy for you. And your friends there…”
“Rachel, knowing them, they see themselves as your friends too now, aye?”
“Whatever. And I think back to that shit that…my ex, yeah, the bastard. Not fair, girl, not fair. And tonight…”
In a flash I knew. “You saw him too, didn’t you? At the window?”
She nodded. “He looked so, so alone, Jill. Nobody deserves that. Man’s a cunt, yeah, but, shit, what have I done?”
I brought her into a gentle embrace. “I thought the same, pet, exactly the same. I thought it was funny, aye, same as you, a great idea, but now I’m not sure, like. I saw his face…”
“You, yeah, the four of you, you all care, you all try and do your best for others, and I never realised how much you were like that. I can’t do that. I see most men and I see his fists, and I say never again, and it’s hard, girl, it’s…lonely”
I smiled, as best I could. “Well, I don’t know what you straight girls see in men. Ewwww!”
“You dykes, all the same, always trying to lead us straight girls off the path of normality…”
I waggled my eyebrows at her. “Want to come back to my place, darling?”
“Yeah, all right then”
With that she was laughing, and then crying, and Larinda was there to pass a tissue, just when needed.
“Jill, can you finish the shopping, and I’ll get this one straight home, get her sorted out and the kettle on, yeah?”
Rachel looked up from my shoulder. “Home? Oh, yeah”
Larinda just nodded, and smiled at me. “Yeah, home”
CHAPTER 30
With Karen and Terry’s help I managed to find things I wouldn’t have thought of, including vegetarian sausages. Terry was very direct.
“Just remember, woman, that as soon as you cook these in the same pan as the meat they cease to be veggie, OK?”
“Got three frying pans, mate. Or with those beasts, probably best to do them in the oven, like. Now, we have the booze?”
Karen held up a case of Shiraz. “Yup! Anyone want beer, sort it yourselves”
I touched her gently on the nose with a fingertip. “This is a sitting quietly and savouring moment, yeah? Just, think I’ll clean my teeth when we get in. Curry doesn’t work with red wine, aye?”
Karen grinned back and waved another pair of toothbrushes. “We know, love! Now, let’s get this paid for and catch the others”
As I opened the front door, I could hear a low murmur of voices in the living room, and when we entered I saw the two girls sitting side by side on the sofa, teas in hands. Larinda just gave me a smile and a short nod.
“Jill, can I have a word?”
She led me to our bedroom, and putting a finger to my lips flicked the light on.
“No”
“Yes, Jill. This is how it starts, yeah? I saw YOU, after the doctor’s, yeah. This is you, and it’s you I love, so it starts, starts now, and we do it, not you alone, yeah? You, and me, and these people what I didn’t realise love you as much as I do, just different, yeah? You, me, our friends. Get changed…”
She had laid out one of my favourite long skirts, and a simple print top, with a reasonably high neck, by chance or keen observation exactly the two garments I wore most often when sitting round the house. As I changed, not really reluctantly, I asked the obvious question.
“You talked to Rachel, then?”
Her face slammed shut, mouth taut. “Sometimes I need people like her, love. People who have really had the shitty end. I mean, what the hell has ever gone wrong with my life? So I married a wanker, but he’s fucked off, and now I’ve got you, so what the hell do I have to complain about?”
She paused, just for a moment, jaw muscles working.
“Jill, did you know she wears a plate?”
“Sorry?”
“A plate, girl, a dental plate. Bastard didn’t just black her eye, he took two of her teeth. How the hell do you get past that one? Not just mental shit, scars, yeah, every time she eats or fucking drinks he’s there again. Fucker. Look…she hides it well, yeah? All tits and hair, and I was almost jealous, but, bleeding hell she’s screwed up. What we gonna do with her?”
I finished changing and took my other half in my arms. “We do what we can, love, we do the best. And I suspect Kaz and Terry will do the same, yeah? So, let’s go out there, pour the wine, let her know she’s with friends, aye?”
She kissed me, as hard as if she was checking for dentures, and then smiled. “Aye, we will that, Jill Carter. Know something?”
“What?”
“I am really glad you are gay. Clean your teeth”
I stepped into my ratty but comfy slippers, and headed off to the bathroom. Five minutes later I walked back into the living room, and it was clear that they had all been prepared for my appearance. Karen nodded towards the coffee table.
“Poured you a glass, Jill, and Terry managed to find some olives and rice crackers while I was getting the good stuff. You look…”
She started to giggle, and I could feel my face burning. Stupid bloody idea…
“NO, no, Jill, no. Pause: I am not laughing at you. It’s just silly words in my mind, yeah?”
I stood, waiting, heat still there in my cheeks, as she found the words.
“It was just the phrase that jumped into my mind: uncomfortably comfortable. You came in, and you were so clearly nervous about us seeing you, all stiff and twitchy, and at the same time, well, you were relaxed in the clothing. More…yourself, yeah? Look, sorry it came out as a laugh. I didn’t mean it that way”
Terry was nodding agreement. “She’s right, Jill; you just fit them better. Your back’s a little straighter, shoulders down a tad. More you, indeed”
I looked at the immaculately dressed woman next to Larinda, and she cocked her head to one side.
“What? I have to criticise? OK. You need to lose half your body mass, grow some hair and tits, and do something with your skin. That better?”
I couldn’t hold my laughter in following that little snippet, and squeezed onto the remaining place on the sofa, next to my lover.
“Yeah, well, the hair I can do something about, but the tits are in the post, I hope. As long as the quack, you know…”
Larinda was nodding herself at that. “And I have already started on her weight, yeah? Getting rid of some of those shag-handles is a priority. I like a live weight, not a dead one, yeah?”
Rachel suddenly laughed. “Too much information for a good girl like me! Shit, Jill, you do scrub up almost decent, but you’ve got a long way to go”
I smiled at her. “Is this the traditional bit of the plot where the girlfriend offers the makeover, or the girl lessons?”
I suddenly realised I had four blank stares to choose from.
“Sorry; look, I read a lot of fiction, like, about people like me, and there’s a sort of tradition in some of them, aye? Where the plot goes, like fairy tales, where you have the wicked stepmother, the frog prince, sort of thing. There’s always one or two good female friends, and the new girl always looks better than anyone else, and the friends give lessons in walking, and make-up, and they spend hours shopping for clothes, all that sort of shit. It’s like, I don’t know, like the authors seem to think that it’s like learning a part in a play”
Rachel was totally absorbed. “And it isn’t? You step out one day, knowing how to be female, all that jazz, just like that?”
“That’s the point, Rach! I AM female! That’s the whole shitty bit about my life, aye? I read stories of sex-changes, about men who become women, and it’s all bollocks. I mean, I could go on about what sex is, and gender, but sod that. Look, the whole point is that there is no bloody change. I am what I am, always have been, always will be. I’ve said it before, it’s not about clothes, and earrings, crap like that, it’s about ease in my body, being in a state where those things are available if I want them, aye? You know what? I think the doctors agree with me on this. They’ve called it a lot of things, like ‘change’ or ‘reassignment’ surgery, aye? But now, I keep reading the word ‘confirmation’…that’s what it is. Girl lessons? Like teaching me to breathe…sorry, I’m ranting, aren’t I?”
Karen was open-mouthed. “Bloody hell, what a difference from that day in April! What brought that on?”
“Probably time of the month…”
That broke the mood, and we were back to laughter, but I knew the real answer to Karen’s question: impatience. The session with Alec had brought it out, but right then, right there, sat dressed as I liked among friends, I needed to make it my default state. Why couldn’t I just be myself all the time? It wasn’t the time of month, it was the time of life. I tried to put it into words.
“Look at it this way. Lots and lots of changes for me, right now, but while they’re too fast, they’re not fast enough, aye? Are we nearly there yet? Is it Christmas morning yet?”
Terry laughed, pouring some more wine. “Got you, Jill. You finally broke loose, and you want it all, right now. You did the brave thing, but it’s all stalled, right? It hasn’t, though, really. Here you are, as you should be, among friends, and I won’t say ‘nobody cares’, because that is exactly what we do, we care, we care about you. And that is why we two, here, we have been worried”
I realised how transparent I must have been, how my plans must have shown through. Karen nodded in agreement as Terry continued.
“You’ve turned that corner, though, haven’t you?”
Larinda squeezed my leg. “She has, most definitely. That day, in the office, when we met, she’s a different girl now. I can see her for what she is, yeah”
I looked around the room, at four friends. “You plan this?”
Rachel piped up. “Plan what, girl?”
“All this ‘girl’, ‘woman’, ‘she’, ‘her’ business”
“Would you prefer it if we didn’t?”
I looked at her, the beauty of her form hiding so much damage, and I couldn’t reply for a minute or so.
“Rach, all of you, yes I appreciate it, and I am really grateful to you for making the effort. It just knocks me sideways a little, it’s all I ever wanted, almost, and here we are…”
She settled further into her chair, and smiled, and it was gentle, and sweet, and the pain that had been written on her face took a bow and an exit.
“Odd, that. When you told me, I looked at you, and thought ‘fuck me, no way’. You hid it so well. And yes, here we are, and you are so relaxed…no, Jill, no effort at all. It just fits”
Larinda gave me another squeeze. “And all spoken for, as well, Rachel”
She laughed. “Told her, I did, I’m straight, me. Only fancy men. Speaking of which, I seem to remember we have one here, so why is my glass empty? Garçon!”
CHAPTER 31
I was getting used to it. The feel of a warm presence next to me in the morning, the knowledge that I was no longer alone. I slipped as quietly as I could from the bed, and made my way via the bathroom to the kitchen.
Rachel was already up, a coffee beside her as she sat at the kitchen table, and she raised an eyebrow as I came in.
“You don’t mind?”
“Don’t be so daft, Rach. That’s what it’s there for. You itching to be off or something?”
“No, Jill, just thinking. I didn’t sleep that well last night. No, wasn’t the bed, I just have a lot to process right now”
“Such as?”
“Well, you, for a start. You’ve made quite a few waves in my thinking, you know. New life for you, new woman, and fuck me she’s a keeper, that one, and then here I am, same shit, so many days of it. That’s the phrase, yeah, SSDD, but it’s not, it’s SSSD, same shit, same day. We talked quite a bit, last night, me and your girl. You do know how stuck on you she is?”
I nodded. “I am not exactly, you know, unhappy with her. She said you’d spoken”
Rachel took a gulp of her coffee. “She has a way of getting at things, but you know that, don’t you? Told her more than I meant to… What do I do, Jill? I mean, there’s those friends of yours, joined at the hip, there’s you two, and then there’s the fucking maiden aunt here”
“Rach, you don’t know half of any of our stories. Took me a bloody long time before I could accept Terry, like. He’s…”
I took a quick look in the living room, just to check, and lowered my voice.
“He’s got a foot on two different buses, like”
Her eyes widened. “Bi? Bloody hell! And Karen is OK with that?”
“Karen loves him to bits, and to be honest as far as she is concerned his sexuality is irrelevant. I mean, if he were to sleep around, it would be the act rather than the recipient, aye? Oh, and apparently he has a HUGE you know what!”
Rachel laughed out loud. “Every now and again, you say something that just screams ‘girl’. Sometimes you manage to achieve ‘bitch’! I see what you meant last night about lessons, but here’s one for you”
She put on a mock-stern expression. “Length is something men obsess about, and while they are telling you it’s what you do rather than what you have, they still want to be hung like an Arab stallion. And, as usual with men, they have no idea at all. Length is irrelevant. It’s girth, my girl, thickness…as long as he’s not hung like a tin of tuna…”
She couldn’t keep it up, and the giggles came. “That was a rite of passage, Jill. Sitting with a girlfriend and talking about men’s bits, yeah?”
I smiled at her as I busied myself with kettle and teapot. “Not really relevant to me, is it? I fully intend to limit my experiences of them to one”
“Not even a test drive, you know, afterwards?”
“Nope”
Her face tightened a little. “Yeah, and who am I to advise anyone about men, with my history, yeah?”
“Plenty out there, plenty good ones, pet”
“Yeah, and look at my judgement, wonderful, ain’t it?”
She cradled her coffee before her mouth, almost hiding her expression, her face.
“I wasn’t always the ravishing wet dream that sits before you, Jill. A lot of this was hard work, saying ‘fuck you’ to the bastard, yeah? Make him regret what he did. This is what you could have had if you treated me right. Thing is, it sort of turned into a full-time job, suit of armour business. Lonely pretty girl, like those stupid press stories”
I remembered my thoughts the evening before, about isolation, beauty and arrogance, and knew without a doubt that she was the exception.
“Rach…look, I’m not looking to be a matchmaker, or anything stupid like that, aye? But, well, you have friends here, real friends. I’m not saying we’ve got some special bloke stored up, cause we haven’t, but, well, sometimes it’s easier to meet new people if you are in a group already?”
She laughed, and started to sing softly. “Has he got a friend, has he got a friend, fooooooor me…”
“Pardon?”
“Old song I like, Richard and Linda Thompson. He’s a miserable fucker, but good way with words. Look, I wasn’t looking for a trawl around your single mates. If I ever find one, it’ll be on my own terms, yeah, but yes, if you have room in your busy social whirl for a gooseberry, I’m in”
I grinned. “Got a bike and a tent?”
She raised an eyebrow. “The first, yes, actually. Use it to go down the gym”
“Eh?”
“I have to work to keep this vision of loveliness intact. I used to drive down there, get on the stationary bike, pedal away, and then one day I thought, you know, all that energy wasted. Save myself some petrol, I do, and ride down. Means I spend less time in the gym, but still keep the body looking right”
“You don’t like the gym?”
“Fuck me no. Women’s changing rooms are full of soppy tarts doing their make-up before they do their work-out. I mean, how fucking stupid is that. Oh, for fuck’s sake, Jill. Look at me. REALLY look at me. How much slap do you see on me, normally? Very little. That’s what I have to teach you, your girl lesson that you said you didn’t need. Karen’s got a taste for lippy, but I think that’s more of a two fingers to the world thing, and Larinda’s like me. Some of us find what suits us, some of us don’t, and some of us go our own way entirely”
She took another mouthful of her coffee. “What I’m trying to say, girl, is that it struck me last night that all of you lot, you have all found your own way, and I am jealous. So, if you let me hang around with you, as you offered, well, perhaps some of that might rub off on me. So thank you, and if you have a bike thing some time, I might join you”
A hug came from behind me. “Supposed to bring it me in bed”
Rachel laughed. “I thought I heard him do just that, last night”
“Tea, not nooky, you dirty-minded strumpet! What’s this about bikes?”
“Thinking of a ride out, take Rachel along. Could find you a bike too, if you want. At least one of mine would fit you”
“Where to?”
I had the answer immediately. “Just thought…what about Arundel? Take the train down, ride up to the WWT place, have a look at the castle and the cathedral, oh, aye, and there are some ace book shops there”
Rachel was puzzled. “WWT?”
“Wildfowl and Wetlands Trust”
Larinda was nodding. “Like that place at Barnes? Yeah, I’d be up for that, as long as it’s flat and you carry everything. No, not like that, not saying it as a man’s job, yeah, just as the expert cyclist’s duty to us lesser mortals”
Karen and Terry were coming down the stairs, and I poured them a tea each before starting the breakfast rituals. Larinda broached the subject.
“Jill’s talking about a bird-watching cycle out. You up for that?”
Terry looked slightly off. “Bit busy for a newbie in London, I think”
“Nah, down Arundel, she says”
Karen perked up immediately.
“Ooh, they have a boating lake, with proper rowing boats! You can row me around, and I shall wear a floaty hat and carry a parasol!”
He laughed. “No, James can do that”
“Wear a hat?”
“No, silly, the rowing. Jill, this reserve, is it the same lay=out as the other one?”
“Aye, but I think there’s more of everything. James should like it, and then there’s the town”
Karen was nodding. “Tell you what, I think me and Larinda here are the same size…”
“I am not wearing no shiny shorts!”
“No, I was thinking more of a skort, or some mountain bike shorts. I don’t wear that stuff, neither of us do”
Rachel raised a hand. “Please miss, I do!”
The ironically-raised eyebrows from the rest of us set her off in a fit of giggles that seemed at last to break the dark mood that had hovered around her, and breakfast was one of those moments of friendship that should be bottled and kept for darker days. We arranged to meet at the station the following Saturday, and eventually I was left with a house empty, save for my new partner, and it felt absolutely right that she was there.
I spent the week, apart from work, sorting out an old mountain bike for Larinda, fitting it with road tyres rather than knobblies, and the labour left me feeling happier than I had for a very long time. All those thoughts, the simple plans I had drawn up, the exit strategy, all floated away like morning mist. I was wanted, I was needed, and here I was doing something material for the woman I now knew I loved. Life was good, far better than I had dreamt it could be, even allowing for my issues. I could almost face keeping my ‘bits’ as they were, as long as I could move out of hiding and be myself.
Almost.
That Saturday morning, I peeled the duvet from her body, ignoring her shrieks, and smugly accepting her cries of “Bitch!”, and we rode together down to the station. A parcel had arrived midweek for her, holding a baggy pair of MTB shorts from Karen, and she had been spot-on with the sizing. Panniers loaded, we found our way into the cycle space, such as it was, where we found Rachel, and after a quick hug Larinda settled into me on our double seat and promptly went back to sleep. I shook her awake, once more.
“I have to tell you something about James, love”
“About his problem? Terry told me”
“He’s a good boy, love”
She kissed the end of my nose. “How could he be anything else? Now, let me sleep, tiger”
Past the airport, through Crawley and Horsham, and finally down the Arun Valley to our station. The castle loomed grandly to one side, but it was overshadowed by the trio awaiting us. Once more I saw James switching his focus as his mind and parents prompted his eyes. Indeed, Karen may have been his stepmother, but she was very much his Mum. So gently she steered him…
“Hello, you’re Rob, aren’t you? I have a bird book”
Just for a second or three, Larinda didn’t exist for him, but then he turned.
“Larinda. That’s your name. Not Von. Von is gone”
She smiled. “You are James, and you like birds”
His smile broke my heart, for at once he was handsome, a teenaged boy to make young girls swoon, and then it was gone. “Yes. I have a book. I made a book”
Terry was gentle. “James, we need to ride our bikes now, to see the birds, OK?”
“OK. To see the birds”
He was still in lockdown, just a little, not even noticing Rachel, , and as we sorted out our own bikes Rachel quietly asked “Is he OK, you know, in traffic?”
“He’s brilliant, actually. When he was very young he couldn’t balance, but something in his nature just clicked with road riding. Odd, that”
“Sort of like an idiot savant, yeah, but he’s no idiot, is he?”
“Not at all, love. I want to see his bird book. Come on, tea at the reserve, aye?”
The car park was packed, and to my astonishment more cars were parked all down the lane. I used one of my group discount vouchers to get us in, and as I paid I asked the cashier what the crowd was all about.
“You not looked on Birdline?”
“We are birdwatchers, pet, not twitchers”
She dropped her voice to a whisper. “Ah, sorry. Just, there’s an American coot in, so all the trainspotter weirdos are here. And it’s decided to park its arse on the water right in front of the visitor centre.”
I sighed. “You aren’t impressed then?”
She shook her head. “Look, I started here as a volunteer, yeah? Gorgeous place, and all the birds are fun, and I mean, who can ever be bored by something like a kingfisher? And this lot, they turn up, they take loads of pictures, and they’re gone, half an hour tops. They come in, they tick off one bird, and they ignore everything else, the saddos. Don’t like ‘em”
I smiled. “Don’t worry, we’re here for a few hours at least. No ticking, I promise”
Except for James, and he had an excuse. We made our way towards the café, and it was packed with a crowd consisting almost entirely of men, in a sort of slow Brownian motion as they took their pictures and pulled back, not so much in some charitable act to allow another bird-collector his tick, but more to get out and back to their cars, to hare off to whatever other rarity their message service had announced. I turned to Larinda.
“No chance of that tea, love”
Karen grinned. “Flasks in the panniers, Ji---Rob”
We turned away from the throng, to head out into a more peaceful area, and Rachel grabbed my elbow.
“Rob, look, in the camouflage jacket”
“They all have camouflage tops, Rach”
“No, there, on the left, right at the window!”
“Fuck me…”
It was MAC.
CHAPTER 32
He was pushed right up against the window, a camera with a stupidly-long lens to his eye, and every now and again I saw his elbow give a dig to someone who had just knocked his arm. He wore a Bluetooth earpiece, and the shape and weight of his satchel suggested a number of heavy books. I leant over to Rachel and whispered in her ear.
“I am going to bet that his bag is full of bird books, the expensive shit, aye? Not the AA pocket book of garden birds, more some hardback stuff with every age-related plumage of every gull in the world. He’s a twitcher, Rach. Come on, let’s get out before he sees us”
Too late. He turned from the window after a particularly heavy nudge, and I could see from his face he had seen us. His eyes dropped, and yet again I saw that sadness there. I hurried out onto the path to the Hawaiian geese enclosure, and he was lost in the crowd. So alone…
We caught quickly up with the others, and James was already using his home-made book.
“Eider. Frankie Howerd ducks, Dad. Rob. Rachel. Karen. Larinda”
Rachel had to ask the question, one I had long been tired of.
“Rob, what exactly is the difference between twitchers and birdwatchers? I mean, I got some idea of the trainspotter bit, but humour me, yeah?”
“It’s a fundamental thing, almost always male. Look, what do you think of steam trains? You know, compared to Southern Railway’s stuff?”
Her face lit up. “Love ‘em! I was always a fan of Thomas, yeah, and they are magic. Not like the modern stuff”
“Would you go out of your way to see one?”
“I go over to the Bluebell Railway now and again”
“Have a ride, listen to them chuffing away, smell the steam?”
“Of course!”
“Well, a twitcher would go there long enough to write down all the numbers of the engines, all the numbers of the carriages, and then bugger off somewhere else where there’s another lot he hasn’t seen. You know they do books which list engine numbers, so they can tick them off?”
“Sad bastards!”
“Well, you can now buy books of carriage numbers to tick off”
“Oh, for fuck’s sake…so those anoraks, they’re just here to tick a bird off a list?”
“Yup. Once it’s ticked, preferably with lots of photos, they bugger off. There’s a text message service for them. Look, see the eider? Beautiful bird, makes silly noises, and I have seen thousands over the years, but I still love watching them. There’ll be butterflies along here, water voles, dragonflies; it’s all part of the delight of the place, you know, out in the country. They can’t see it”
She pointed to James, laughing at the eider. “They sound a bit, you know…”
I sighed. “Absolutely, Rach. Asperger’s, aye, part of the ASD, autism spectrum disorder. Lot of evidence to show that they are at the edge of it. Social skills often missing, or totally screwed up, like”
“You seem to know a lot about it”
“Aye, well, Larinda’s not the only reader, and with knowing James, like. He’s a sweet boy, and he is getting easier to interact with. Terry…I had my issues with him and Karen, but the way he looks after his boy I can’t fault, and she has done wonders with him. Look, follow our lead with him, aye?”
“Aye aye skipper. Better catch up”
Just as we closed the gap, a Cetti’s warbler blasted its song from a bush, and James laughed. Karen looked at me, with a mock frown.
“Do you know what he has called that one?”
James was clearly delighted. “Forte fortissimo, Rob! I called it forte fortissimo. Because that is for very loud in music, and because it has a symbol which is three Fs. And that is what the song says. Fight me---“
Karen interrupted. “Rob knows, darling. Have you got a name for that one over there yet?”
That one over there was a wren, and James paused for a second or two, before another smile lit his face.
“Shrimp cocktail!”
He pulled out a pen, and found a railing to rest his book against as he added the name. Larinda took my arm and whispered: “Where the hell did that one come from?”
In James’ usual way, he let us all know. “Shrimp because it’s so little, and cocktail because that’s what it does with its tail, it cocks it, so it’s a cocktail”
That brought a laugh, and the realisation that we had the other James with us for a while, the happy boy with the razor-sharp wit, and I sneaked a look at his father. If there had been any doubt that he loved his son, they were swept away by the expression on his face and the dampness in his eyes. Karen took the arms of both of her men.
“Well, boys and girls, we have come prepared. Everyone who wants tea, say Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwllllantysiliogogogoch!”
“Mum, you know I can’t say that!”
Mum. Oh. The mother concerned smiled. “I know, James, and that is why there are cans of pop here as well because you don’t really want tea, do you? I made a list last night of what we needed, so I wouldn’t forget, and on it I wrote bring pop, because James can’t say Llanfairpwllgwyn–“
“Mum! You are being silly!”
We all joined in the laughter at that, and as the family sorted out our drinks, I took a seat on a bench with Larinda and Rachel. Larinda looked at Rachel and asked the question that was so, so obvious.
“What the hell did we two do wrong in our lives, that we ended up with a spare arsehole each? I mean, nice blokes exist, there’s two just there”
“I don’t know, girl. I keep telling myself the same thing, like the poxy X-files, yeah? They’re out there”
Larinda laughed. “Ah, girl, you got plenty of time. How old’re you; thirty-three, thirty-four?”
“Forty-two”
“Fuck me, you scrub up well!”
“Yeah, well, fat lot of good it’s done me. Anyway, you shouldn’t be looking around, you’ve got yours right there”
Larinda’s face clouded slightly. “Yeah, you’re right, I suppose. Just a tad more complicated than I really hoped for. But…yeah, you’re right. I got mine”
Karen handed out mugs of tea, and some fruity fizz for James, and I relaxed in the sun, happy amongst my friends. Rachel was still musing, though.
“So these twitchers, they don’t get to enjoy all this?”
“I don’t know if they could, pet. Bit like bee purple. Bees see it, we don’t”
“So they really don’t know what they are missing? Ah well, all the more room for us. I was just thinking about what you said, and about MAC, yeah? Social skills?”
“You’re regretting the party thing, aren’t you?”
“I did as soon as I saw him at the window, and now you explain all that shit, it sort of fits, doesn’t it? We need to put it right, Jill”
“Careful, you will confuse James”
“Sorry”
We made our way out through the ‘world of birds’ collection, Terry explaining the difference between captive and native species, and finally to the wild area, where I set up my telescope and waited to see what might happen by. It was a time I always loved, just sitting by the water, almost meditating, calm and at peace for a while. James was still in his lucid state, and I quietly explained to him what we might see.
“There are lots of kingfishers around here, James, so watch for the blue colour. There’s supposed to be a bittern about as well. Watch the edges of the reeds. Sometimes, here, they take a boat out for people to have a ride round in”
Just then, there was a loud bird call, and James just said. “Pinker. That’s my name for that bird. Pinker. What bird is a pinker, Rob?”
“Bearded tit, James. Ah. See, down there, on the reeds? Long tail? Oh, gone again”
“It flies silly! And there’s the blue! Bluewater, like the shops. That’s my name for that bird. You said Kingfisher, Rob”
He was on a roll, and after a while Rachel and Larinda went outside for a lie in the sun, just as a very large brown bird flew across the top of the reedbed before settling right at its edge.
“James…that’s a bittern. Very, very rare. See the streaks down it? Helps it look like the reeds, so it can hide better from things that might want to eat it”
“Bittern…reedwalker. It walks in reeds and it looks like reeds, so it’s a reed walker. Looks like reeds. That’s camouflage, Rob. That’s when something looks like something else to hide”
“Exactly, James”
Karen smiled at him. “We are going to have to print some more pictures off the net for you, James”
“Yes. I need a bittern, don’t I?”
He turned back to me, and there was a faint look of puzzlement on his face.
“Bittern. Camouflage. Are you a bittern, too? Rob, not the right name. They called you Jill”
Suddenly, a real teenager was there, just for a few seconds, and once more I was dazzled by who he might have been.
“Jill…what are you camouflaged for?”
CHAPTER 33
I looked at him, the puzzlement plain on his face. Every minute I spent with James was a surprise. At times, he came across as mentally damaged, in the sense of speaking like a small child or someone of profoundly limited intelligence. Other times it took the appearance of OCD, especially in his persistent need to number things, or to say everybody’s name as a greeting. And then…and then there would be a break in his walls, usually when his sense of threat had faded, and there would be a bright, clever boy who very simply couldn’t get past his own mouth. Those were the times when I could see why his current Mum loved him.
What a hell of a life, in this wonderful world, where terms like geek are applied to ordinary, sane people by those who have no idea of what the word really, originally meant. And I was sure that James got far, far worse, and could only hope that when he did he was in one of his less aware phases. This was not one of those.
“Sometimes people call their friends by different names, son, like when you give new ones to the birds”
“No. That isn’t right. You are Rob and you are Jill, and one is a man and one is a girl. A man can’t be a girl and a girl can’t be a man”
“That’s right, James”
He carried on talking, as if I hadn’t spoken, his hands together in front of his chin, looking past me into the green of the reedbed.
“But a girl can be man camouflaged. Two skins. Can’t take skin off. It hurts. I took some skin off once. That hurt a lot. But if you have more skin underneath does it hurt? How many skins make Jill?”
I couldn’t decide how lucid he was, but everything he was coming out with made perfect sense.
“James, how do you know this?”
He looked at me, then, and the bright boy was there, shining an instant of life at me.
“Jill. It is Jill, isn’t it? Hiding in Robskin…will it hurt when you take it off and just be Jill?”
I felt tears start, and realised that the others had been as caught up in his words as I was. Larinda put her arms around me from behind, and Rachel and Karen took a hand each, as Terry laid his own arm across his son’s shoulders.
“James, it is already hurting her. I know you remember everything I say to you, so please remember not to hurt Jill by telling everyone, yeah?”
“I don’t hurt Rob, I don’t hurt Jill. How do we help her?”
Terry hugged his son to him. “By being there when we are needed and not when she needs space, James. That’s how you help anyone”
“Is she going to take off her skin?”
Terry looked at me, just then. “She’s already loosening it up ready, son”
Karen squeezed my hand. “Shall we walk on? What’s left to see, Gillian?”
James was nodding. “Rob is Jill is Gillian. That’s like the Cetti’s warbler. Two names, one of them to keep quiet from other people who aren’t us”
Terry looked at James as he fitted pieces together. “Can you do that, son?”
Once more a bright flash. “I ‘m odd, Dad, not stupid. Three names. Rob has three names”
There an instant, and gone. I realised how lucky I truly was, just then, right there. I had my problems, but I could talk them through with people as long as I was lucky enough to choose an audience as loving as the one I had. With James the communication wasn’t an option. I didn’t know a lot about the details of his ‘oddness’, but I wondered: was he in there, screaming to get out, as his mouth made the lists and his hands joined before his face? Or was the scar deeper, cutting right through his self? I remembered a girl I had worked with years before, a woman with obsessive-compulsive disorder, and she had spoken to me about it, about how she watched her hands line everything up on her desk, how a missing object brought panic even as she KNEW it was a delusion.
I had it so, so easy. James looked at me, his hands together again.
“Rob’s my friend. Is Jill my friend? Gillian?”
Karen smiled at him, then looked at me.
“Of course, love. Jill is Rob, and Rob is your friend”
“No. Rob wasn’t my friend because Rob wasn’t real and Jill is. Jill is my real friend. I have one friend”
I turned my head at a soft whisper of sound, and realised that Rachel was crying.
“No, James, you have three friends here, and they are all girls. James has three girlfriends”
Larinda had tissues, of course. We moved on through the wild part of the reserve, as the wind soughed through the reeds and James recited a bird list, and I realised that all my careful planning had been wasted. All the time spent working out how to leave the world that had hurt me so badly had been time lost from my life. How could I begin to compare my problems with someone so broken, so fundamentally ruined from birth? Larinda took my arm.
“That the look of someone realising they aren’t so shittily off after all?”
I sighed. “Guilty. At least I can now see myself doing something about it, like. Hope, sort of. Normally…normally, when I get that sort of delusion it’s just before the big crash, aye? False dawn? And don’t you dare say owt about darkest before the dawn, because that’s bollocks. You OK, Rach?”
She nodded. “Yeah, I will be, just thinking about how much pain this world seems to donate free and for gratis. Terry…”
She waved him back from his family. “Terry, how many actual friends has he got?”
He shook his head, sadly. “His mother used to leave him in his room most of the time. Easier to deal with the hard stuff by not doing any dealing at all. When we were together, he got invited to a few kids’ parties, but I realised…”
He drew a long breath. “I went to pick him up from one, and it was abundantly clear that the only reason he had been invited was as the entertainment. He’s not been to anything like that since. It’s taken a long time to get him to where he is now; little nudges, patience…so much patience. I went off the rails a little when he was in hospital once or twice…”
Rachel pressed the point. “Hospital?”
“Accidents. He broke a cheekbone walking into a tree once, and it was years before we could trust him with a hot drink. He’s HFA most of the time, but he drifts a little”
“HFA?”
“High-functioning autism, Rachel. Means he can sort of get by in society, but always will be odd, as he put it. Sometimes, though, when he’s tired, or frightened, he just shuts down. Meeting people does that”
“What did you mean by off the rails, Terry?”
He actually had the grace to look ashamed. “Screwed around a lot. I’m what the gay folk call ‘greedy’, and…Jill, you hated me, didn’t you?”
Bastard, catching me right in the soft bits. “You want the truth?”
“Oh, I know the truth. You knew what I’d been doing, and you wanted Karen spared from that, and you fancied her yourself. Look, sorry, you mind, you know, with these two around?”
“Clear the air, aye?”
“Aye. Yes. You never, ever made a move on her, and I stood there and watched as she dropped hint after hint, and thought, bugger it, if he’s not going to take the bait…shit. You didn’t want to hurt her, did you? What? Being, you know, or taking your exit?”
Nail firmly struck. “Aye, Terry, I saw what you’d done, and I thought, I love this girl, but…Look, she chose you, she married you”
He was nodding. “And because you are such a soft, loving girl you took me along in your caring, yeah? You even came to our wedding”
“I don’t take friendships lightly, Terry”
He looked over at Larinda. “Do not let this one escape. I know very few humans with that level of honesty, of loving-kindness, to quote the god-botherers. She hates me, and yet, well, here she is”
I looked him in the eye, trying to keep my expression neutral. “But I don’t hate you, do I?”
He let a little smile creep in. “No, not any more. I do grow on people. Took Kaz a while, but she got there”
I gave him a smile, but before I could answer Rachel butted in. “Crap, Terry. It’s not your charm, it’s James. How could anyone not love him? Anyone who doesn’t must be some sort of fuckwit. Look, Jill, Tel, yeah? Do I take this as being some sort of truce?”
His smile was broader now. “No, I don’t think so. I think this is better than that”
Suddenly, he stepped forward, and I had a man’s arms around me, and for a second I froze, only slowly letting my own arms come up to return the hug. His voice was soft, but clear.
“Thank you for being so very, very loyal to my wife. Thank you for being such a wonderful inspiration to my son. Thank you for allowing me such opportunities to show you that I am doing all I can to become worthy of Karen”
And then he kissed my cheek. We stood for a few seconds, till it suddenly became awkward, and then, wrapped up by my two women again we caught up with Karen and James, who was staring at a peacock butterfly as it sunned itself on the path.
“Jill…can I use a name that has already been used?”
“What name is that, son?”
“This is an eye-eye-fly. That’s my name. But there is an aye-aye that’s a lemur and they are primates in Madagascar and this is a butterfly which is not a primate but an insect”
I looked at him, and smiled. Rachel was right: how could anybody not love him? The butterfly started away in a swirl of black underwings and brilliant topcoat, as a shadow fell on it, and there stood MAC.
CHAPTER 34
He looked drained, and for the first time ever I saw him look uncertain, and I wondered if he had actually been following us or just stumbled into our group as he rounded the corner. He had a copy of the Helm “Shorebirds” open in his hands, so I assumed that it was the latter.
“Hello John”
“Er...Rob…Rachel….”
I thought I’d attack, rather than wait.
“People, this is John, he was my boss till recently. Karen and Terry, their son James, my other half Larinda”
“Ah. I thought you…Rachel, hello”
Rachel was eying him sharply, her earlier sympathy evaporating under the hot glare of suspicion.
“You not back with the other twitchers, John?”
He shrugged, the weight of his satchel distorting it.
“Someone suggested there was a semi-palmated sandpiper here, and I haven’t had one this year”
She took a step forward. “So you weren’t following us, then? I know you saw us, back at reception”
He pulled himself up at that, almost back to full MAC state. “Why would I follow you, after what you did to me on my retirement do? You didn’t just not come, you organised another bloody do!”
This was the Rachel I had grown more used to, and despite the way she was dressed, her posture was pure skirt, heels and cleavage-flashing strut.
“You say that to us, ‘mate’? After every fucking…sorry, Karen, after every thing you did to us over the years? You even let Rob’s tyres down, you bastard! How fucking petty is that?”
She drew a breath. “Oh, fuck it, John, why did you have to be such a cunt? Sorry, people, I can’t have this conversation without swearing. If you want to walk on a bit, I can catch up”
Karen sighed. “After forte-fortissimo, we are sort of used to it, so do carry on. Would this be ‘Man’s a Cunt’? Rob’s told us so much about him. Pleased to meet you, MAC. Sort of”
Larinda squeezed my arm, and I realised what was happening. In-group, out-group, the herd closing ranks. Rachel was building up to a real blast, and it wouldn’t be the right thing. Wilkins was bristling back, but behind his eyes lay the fact that he was no longer the boss, the big man with the sanctions, he was just a rather small 58-year-old twitcher in an ill-fitting camouflage smock. I tried a new tack.
“I should explain that the boy here gives his own names to birds, like. Forte-fortissimo is a Cetti’s warbler”
He looked puzzled. “Yes, it is very loud, but why that name”
I turned to James. “Why that name, son?”
“I call it forte-fortissimo because it is very loud and the mnemonic Rob taught me is fight me fuck me or fuck off which is not just the way the song sounds but it is what the song means because it is a male bird calling to females to mate and telling other male birds to go away because they are in its territory”
John blinked at that. “Where did you hear a Cetti’s warbler…James?”
“At the Wildside in Barnes reserve which is in London and run by the Wildfowl and Wetlands Trust”
I was astonished. Every time we met, James had always had his period of adjustment, where he had to warm to my presence, and yet he had simply accepted Wilkins without a flicker. All I could think was that it was the subject under discussion. He had already been locked into his naming ritual, and MAC had slotted in just right. James was in full flow, though.
“I have made a book of my birds but I will be adding butterflies even though they are not birds but insects and not primates”
Shit. I realised James was starting to loop, and caught Terry’s eye. He nodded.
“Son, want a drink? John, is it? We have tea, if you would like some”
I look back now, and I realise that if I ever truly warmed to Karen’s husband, it was right then. For us all, and for his son, he stepped in and broke the mood that had raised storm clouds in Rachel’s eyes and set MAC…I realised I couldn’t keep calling him that. Set John on his back foot. The man himself looked surprised, and suddenly, pathetically, grateful.
“Yes, that would be nice. I have Tunnock’s teacakes with me, I always take them when I bird”
That was the first bit of personal information I had ever heard from John, I realised, and it also struck me that I had been both blind and stupid. He shared more than an initial with James. I coughed, theatrically.
“There’s some seating about a hundred yards ahead, folks. Picnic tables, like. Shall we sit for a while, enjoy the sun?”
John shuffled his feet. “There’s a semi-palmated…”
“John, I think that a sit and a talk might be more important, just this once?”
It was actually visible in his face, the struggle, obsessive need against simple neediness.
“All right, but you must share my cakes”
Terry led him away with James, and we girls followed slowly behind. Rachel was still simmering.
“We should just tell him to fuck off, Jill”
“What happened to all that sympathy from the curry house, Rach?”
I got a sharp look for that, but it was followed by a softer, more wistful one.
“I don’t know, Jill. Perhaps…perhaps seeing him through the glass, it’s easier to take him than having him pop up in front of me?”
“We’re not at work, kid. He doesn’t work with us anymore, more to the point, aye?”
Larinda gave my arm another squeeze. “He looks lost, that’s what I feel. How long was he in the job?”
I thought for a while, thinking back at some of the lectures he had given me. “Best part of forty years, I would think, if not more”
Rachel was still coming down. “Jill…he’s so small, yeah? Smaller than at work. There’s more, though, isn’t there?”
I chose my words as carefully as I could. “I don’t want to belittle anyone, aye, Karen? But everyone talks about autism as if it were one thing, and it isn’t, is it?”
Karen nodded. “I had to do one shitload of research when I met James, and Jill’s right. Stop me if you know this, but it’s actually ASD, autism spectrum disorder. There are people at one end that are effectively lost to the world, there are people right at the other who have just a bit too much of an interest in one thing”
She laughed. “Football supporters, for example. They collect everything to do with their team, they obsess about its players, and even though they all claim to love the game, some of them will only watch it when their own team are playing. Then there are birdwatchers”
I bristled a little at that. “That’s not obsession, that’s just love of nature!”
She grinned. “Indeed. In your case, that’s true. You do all that stuff with the voles and the butterflies, it’s clear it’s a whole nature thing with you, yeah? But I bet you keep a checklist of what birds you’ve seen each year. Am I right?”
She was, and she knew it.
“Aye, I do, but it’s more…it tells me what is changing in the year, like. I was over at Dunkirk, and there were fan-tailed warblers, and there shouldn’t be, so we’re looking at global warming, aye? That’s why I keep a check list. Twitchers…no, very different”
Karen laughed at that. “Now I know for sure you are a bloody woman! Gestalt, Gaia, whole-world shit, that’s what we do. Men, they focus on the bits that stick out”
Larinda laughed in her own turn. “So do I, Kaz! That’s sort of the problem with this one”
Karen gave her a long examination. “I think, whatever happens, you’re staying the course, though. I just have that feeling”
Once more, the squeeze to my arm. “I can’t be sure, love, but I sort of think she’s right. Look, we have a twitcher to sort out. Not fair to leave him with the boys, yeah? Rachel, you gonna be sweet?”
That one stood for a while, then shook herself. “James needs a good day. For him, yeah? Sweetness and fucking angelic light”
We rounded the last corner of the path to the picnic tables, and found John and James in deep conversation over James’ book, and for the first time ever I saw real softness in John’s face. He looked absorbed by the book, and as we approached he looked up, and I realised what he was doing: he wanted someone else to share his ‘discovery’ of the boy’s creation. I couldn’t get a handle on him. One moment, he was a frightened, lonely old man. Right then, he was an animated enthusiast. At work, he had been a consummate arsehole, and that still lived in him. Something was very, very wrong with him, but as he spoke and pointed with James, all I could see was something small and hidden, trying to get out. Something very, very right.
CHAPTER 35
He called us over. “This is really very, very good. It’s like a book of mnemonics, and all that James has to do now is make sure he remembers the real names of everything”
Clunk. The penny dropped, though it had been rolling around the rim for hours, ever since I saw him at the reserve entrance. That one phrase cleared any doubt away, and all I needed to work out now was where he sat on the spectrum. ‘Real names’ said so much, and explained quite a bit of his office behaviour. Whether it was Asperger, or some form of OCD, John clearly needed everything in his world to be Right, and in its Proper Place. No wonder he had gravitated towards the job of inspecting people’s VAT returns, and more than that got to the point where he also inspected other people’s inspections. To pick up on Karen’s game with the drinks, it was floccinaucinihilipilification. If it wasn’t Right, it was worthless. I had known him as a nit-picking bastard of a manager, and there he was about to do the same to James’ work.
“John, James does know the real names of what he has in his book, and what he doesn’t know already he knows how to find”
“Yes, John, I know all the real names even the binomial ones which some people say are Latin but they aren’t because they use Greek as well and this book is about mnemonics which are tricks to remember things by”
He was still looping, and Terry passed him a drink to slow him down. John nodded.
“Yes, so then we just need to add the real names to this one”
James then said something that astonished me.
“No, because that would take the fun away”
It is very difficult to explain what an amazing statement that was. Firstly, he had contradicted an adult, flatly and absolutely. Secondly, he had explained why, succinctly. Thirdly, he had used the word ‘fun’ and the one thing that always summed up his condition to me was the word ‘need’. I was absolutely gobsmacked, and couldn’t work out what had brought it on. I looked at John again, and a wild thought came to me: was he trying to nurture the older man? In some odd, filtered way, was he sensing a need in him and trying to meet it?
I was out of my depth. All I knew about their problems–and I realised that it was, indeed, their problems–came from my reading and my experience of James. I looked across to Rachel, and she jerked her head to signal a walk away. We retreated a dozen yards or so, and she hissed at me.
“He’s fucked in the head, isn’t he?”
“I wouldn’t put it quite like that, but, yeah”
“Jill, it does my head in, yeah? All those years of cuntishness, and I now have to ask myself, was he being, you know, or was it that he couldn’t help it? Sort of, what’s it called, Tourette’s?”
“No, don’t think so…look, Tourette’s is about offensive, inappropriate behaviour, aye? The compulsion to do something you shouldn’t. I think this is more about being, I dunno, unaware of what you do. Social skills, like”
“Like letting your tyres down?”
“No, I’ll give you that one, that was definitely MAC rather than lack of understanding. Suppose you’d call it a tantrum in a bairn”
“Well, it’s hard, Jill, hard to keep a hate for him, if it’s loony tunes shit rather than malice, but that’s me thinking outside my head, yeah, and I still hate him because, well, because he is still fucking MAC”
She sighed. “Times like this I could murder a fag. Should never have given up. What do we do, girl?”
I thought for a while, ordering things as well as I could. “Rach, I don’t think he can be a friend, like, too much water under the bridge. But I think we have a sort of truce. James has taken to him, just a bit, so shall we leave it at that for now? See what happens?”
“Well, OK, but…and what the fuck is a Tunnock’s teacake?”
“Where the hell did you grow up? Oh, Essex, yeah? Explains a lot”
“One joke, girl, just one…”
“Right. They’re a sort of marshmallow thing covered in chocolate. Scottish, they are, but we got them up in the North. They do snowballs, and caramel wafers, absolutely unhealthy rubbish, very 1950s. Just a thought, aye, but they must be his tartan flask”
“You what?”
“Ever see trainspotters at a station? Don’t they always have a tartan thermos with them? It’s ritual, if you see what I mean. It’s either Asperger or some variant of obsessive-compulsive. I was thinking earlier, like, how his job suited him”
She actually laughed at that. “Fuck yeah, so what does that make us?”
I grinned back. “Not the same. Look, you like making scrotes pay up, yeah? I like to see the right tax paid, but it’s a people thing. How I met Larinda, that was people stuff. Her boss failed the attitude test big style, but John, I don’t think he even sees attitudes. He just ploughs his own furrow, without regard to the consequences he can’t see”
She thought for a while, in her own turn. “So, back to the question, what do we do with him?”
“Armistice, Rach. We sit and share his teacakes, and we finish the day. If he comes along with us, we let him try, and if he decides to play MAC again, we walk away, aye? While I have some sympathy with him, he is nobody we have any responsibility for”
She nodded sharply, and we walked back to the others. Terry and Karen had poured teas out, and John had produced a paper plate which now held a small pile of hemispherical objects in red and silver foil. I handed one to Rachel, after a nod from John.
“There you go, a Tunnock’s teacake”
She unwrapped it and took a bite. “Bit bland, John”
“That is the way they should taste. They have made some with dark chocolate, but they aren’t right. James has shown me his book, and if it is OK with his parents, I would like to show him the semi-palmated sandpiper, if we can find it”
Larinda took my hand as I sat. “Rob’s already shown us a bittern and a kingfisher, John”
There was a flicker there, and I knew what he wanted to say, which would have been something about already having ticked them, why would anyone want to see one twice, but he held it in.
“They are striking birds, I grant you. Karen, is it possible to take James to look for the sandpiper?”
She nodded in agreement. “I will have to come along, though, and Terry. Won’t there be a crowd, like there was at the reception, though?”
John shook his head. “There was one at Pennington marshes last week, so most of the others have already seen one”
Bang, twitchers. I could see the others now fully understood what it was about, and Rachel was nodding in recognition.
“Rob, what we talked about earlier, with the voles and the butterflies, yeah…I get it now”
We finished the cakes and the tea, and John folded every piece of foil and put it into a pocket in his satchel, along with the paper plate. Ritual… We set off to one of the hides that he had been told was a probable vantage point for the bird, and we settled down with optics and books, and John started to reel off the names of the birds before us.
“Dunlin, snipe, redshank, little grebe, little stint…”
What? I had totally missed that one! For an instant, I was after the tick, and then relaxed. No, I wasn’t a twitcher, and the fact that I understood that confirmed that I wasn’t. Just to be sure, though, I checked the bird out. Just to be sure.
“Ah. There he is, James. Just let me set up my camera. It date-stamps the pictures, so that I can confirm when I saw my birds”
Click, repeated many times, and then he started to pack his stuff away. Larinda put her hand on his arm.
“Are you going, John?”
“Well, I have my pictures”
“What about the rest of us?”
“Pardon?”
“We have only just met, so it would be nice to chat a bit more. James is only just starting to watch birds, so it would help him if someone who really knows them could give him some pointers”
James interrupted. “Pointers are dogs, which are not birds”
“We know, son. So, John, would you help? We are having tea at a pub afterwards”
What happened to a wander around all the other bits of Arundel? I caught her eye, and she just nodded, and before I knew it John was back in conversation with James, even though that consisted almost entirely of bird names. The boy laughed at some of them.
“Rob, they are funny. Some of them already are mnemonics, so I shouldn’t change them. Redshank, that’s one”
Insight rose up, and I realised that what John was doing was a sort of substitution. If he had nothing new to tick, he now had James: twitching by proxy. I had a germ of an idea, but I had to get him away from the others to discuss it. Eventually, we ran down as the afternoon passed, and Terry made noises about getting his numb bottom off the wooden benches and onto a nice, soft, pub chair. That was when Rachel’s stomach made the most obvious of noises.
“Yeah, that was me. Tea time, I think”
We made our way out to our bikes, and his car, John still in deep conversation with James, and I called out to the others that I would catch them up.
“Norfolk Arms, aye? Just want a quick word with John”
Off they went, and I turned to him. He was nervous again, without the crutch of the boy to support him.
“So what was it you wanted, Rob? More abuse?”
I sighed. “John, I am going to try and have a sensible conversation. You were always an absolute arsehole at work, but, well, Rachel called it an armistice, like. We are both sorry for what we did when you left, but you have to understand how you were at work. I mean, letting my tyres down, what the fuck was that all about?”
To my horror, he started to cry, and it wasn’t with sobs or gasps, just a suddenly wet face.
“I’m sorry…but it’s life. You had it, both of you. I just felt angry”
“But why jealous of me and Rachel? Do you have some sort of feelings for her?”
I was astonished at the blank look he gave to that. “She is thirty years younger than me, what would I want with such a young person?”
Less than twenty, actually. “So why, John?”
He looked off into some distant world, tears still falling, and I wondered how much stress the hours with us had inflicted. “Life, Rob. I know I have a wrongness. I always have had. I have to count, list, correct and clear, and it is very odd when I stand outside myself and watch what I do. You have life easy. You are normal, no oddity, and most of the time I forget what I am, and then I have a moment, and it is not right. And even though I know what I am, I am still that person, and I still must conform to type”
“Have you seen anyone, John?”
“Yes…I have a therapist, and she tells me it is OCD. Probably”
“Probably? How long have you been seeing her?”
“Since I retired”
Dear gods, his whole life without help. “John, I had a thought while we were walking. Here, dry your face. It’s the lists for you, yeah?”
He took my paper towel, left over from lunch, and dried his face. “Yes. Twitching, you call it”
“Well, I watched you with James, and you wanted to leave, and then you realised that James might have a list, so you started on his, aye?”
“Er, yes”
“So why don’t you volunteer at somewhere like Barnes? Go round with visitors, show them stuff, work on their lists instead?”
“And that would help me how, exactly?”
I took a deep breath, because I was worried about the word I was about to use. “It would take you into the company of normal people, John. And you aren’t normal, are you?”
Well, neither was I.
CHAPTER 36
“You think I might be able to help someone else?”
“Yes, John”
And yourself, hopefully. “Look, I want some tea, like, so let’s get down the pub, aye?”
He nodded, and headed off for his car. Just then, my mobile rang. William. Clearly, it never rains in my life without becoming a downpour. I flicked the phone open.
“Hiya, Will”
“Hello, Jill, what are you up to?”
“About to head off to the Norfolk, in Arundel, with a bunch of others”
“Could I…I am supposed to be doing badminton tonight, but if I bunk off, I can be there quite quickly”
“Problems?”
“Well, just need to talk”
“I have quite a crowd with me, so we’d need to pop outside”
“Ah, better than nothing. See you in a bit?”
“Aye. You driving?”
“Yeah”
“Well, be careful, no speeding”
He laughed. “I’d need to push it off a cliff for that! Later!”
John was already on his way, so I clipped in and sprinted down to the town centre, locking my bike up in the courtyard behind the pub, where I found the others had secured a table big enough for us all. I saw that John had already attached himself to James again, and pulled Larinda off to one side.
“William’s on his way, love. Don’t know what for”
“Order him food?”
“Give it a while, aye? Half an hour should see him. I’ll grab some menus. Love, keep an eye on John. He’s falling apart”
She fixed me with a very hard stare. “What happened to ‘MAC’? I thought you detested him?”
I had. “Lass, how could I hate someone so pathetic? He’s broken, really broken. Look…he’s not what we thought he was, aye? Not at all; hating him would be like kicking a puppy”
Something soft flowed into her face. “Oh, Jill. Sometimes you just say something out of the blue, and I realise how much I love you, and why. You are such a soft cow, you know”
She paused, looking away for a few seconds. “That’s my problem. You do, you say these things, and all I can see is that you aren’t bullshitting me, you’re a bloody woman in there, and it scares me”
I stepped forward and took her by the waist. “How does it scare you?”
“What do I do? I can’t lose you, because you are you, but I am still shit-scared, you know; I don’t know if I can cope. That sounds wrong, I’m sorry. I’m here, but I don’t know if I can stay. Look…Will’s coming, let’s get a public face on, yeah? Just remember, I will do my best”
I hugged her. “What brought that on?”
“You did. What I said, yeah? Every now and then you just shove girl in my face, and you don’t realise it”
I kissed her, as gently as I could. “Pet, now you see what I have had to live through all my life. Shit, I don’t know whether to cry or smile, you seeing me as I am even when I look like this. Thank you, anyway”
There was a hint of a sniffle. “Come on, Will, yeah?”
I kissed her again. “Aye. Come on”
We rejoined the rest, and both Karen and Rachel gave me a slightly anxious look, but I gave a little shake of my head.
“Got Von’s eldest lad on his way over. Wants a chat, but I have no idea what about. If you don’t mind, can we wait a little while to order? I have an idea what he’d want, but I think, well, wait and see, like”
Terry smiled. “But those who want can still have beer?”
I grinned back, my distrust of him easing more each time we spoke. “Aye, if you are buying. Pint of Speckled Hen”
William took around half an hour, and he was looking distinctly nervous as he took in the crowd.
“Hi, Will, Larinda you know, but I don’t remember if you’ve met my old friend Karen. Terry her husband, James their son, and Rachel and John, colleagues of mine”
John looked grateful, but I realised James was closing down. Terry gave me another nod, and took him off for a walk, as his hands came together in front of his face. I wondered if we had pushed him too far for one day. Karen made her excuse, and went off to her family in a corner of the courtyard, shaded from the slanting early evening sunlight. A moment’s thought, and I realised that there was no way John could be a threat. John surprised me, just then, by popping off to get Will a coke, leaving us some privacy. Will started by clearing his throat.
“Got an offer of a place based on this year’s grades…”
Larinda was puzzled. “Bit early, isn’t it?”
Will blushed. “I, um, I’m a bit sort of good at stuff. I took two A-levels a year early”
I laid a hand on his shoulder. “No false modesty, son. What do you have?”
“Well, it’s conditional on two A’s…”
I started to laugh at that one, and Larinda screwed her face up in theatrical puzzlement.
“Look, love, he’s already done Maths and Physics, and got A-stars, so they’re basically saying ‘come on down!’ He’s on further maths and bloody German at the moment”
Rachel’s turn to be confused. “Why German?”
Will was looking even more embarrassed. “Textbooks, articles in the scientific press, lots of them in German”
“Ah!”
I asked the obvious question. “What, and where, son?”
“Astrophysics. Newcastle…”
Oh dear. I knew, absolutely, that Von would be unhappy with the place he had chosen, because of me, and I had a sudden burst of near hatred for her stupidity, for the bigotry that drove such a wedge between her and her eldest child. Sod her.
“Want Mam’s number? You, er, know about my brother Neil?”
The blush was now obvious, and the voice small. “Yes”
“Oh, Will, he’s not going to lead you to love and fulfilment, aye?”
“I know, but, well, he’s going to know a lot more about all this shit than anyone Mam knows, and, oh hell, he’s your brother, and if I trust anyone, it’s you. Would your mother, you know, be OK with it?”
I gave him my best smile. “She’s OK with her daughter, William. Look, here’s John with your drink, so just take the rest as read, aye?”
“I haven’t told you what I need, Jill”
I managed, somehow, to find an even better smile. “And do you really think you need to? Leave it with me. I trust you’ll want a look round the place first”
“Yeah, but Mam won’t let me drive up. The Uni does accommodation for that sort of thing. Suppose I’d fly up”
Rachel was busy, as John set down the drink and a bundle of menus. She held up her super-phone.
“Just been looking up the flight times. The Flybe from Gatwick gets in twenty minutes adrift of the one from Eastleigh. Ji–Rob, if you want to be up there, you can both be at Newcastle, coming and going, at the same time”
John gave me a sharp look at her slip, but I ignored him. “So, we could meet you there, show you around, and see you to your digs for the night…Oh. You cheeky sod!”
He was even redder-faced. “Rob, you were never just my Mam’s friend. I sort of had you down as mine as well”
That did it, and I grabbed him into a hug. “Always and forever, son. Always and forever”
Larinda stroked his cheek. “Want some old-woman company?”
Rachel harrumphed. “And what about me? One of the world’s best party cities, and you want to leave me out? Sods!”
I laughed. “What the hell, shall I give the old dear a ring then?”
James interrupted us. “You are William and I am James. Hello William”
I was proud of both boys just then, as William simply replied in kind.
“You are James and I am William, and Rob is our friend”
“Rob is our friend and he has skin on. He is Rob"
Two people looked puzzled at that, but I left it to settle. “Dinner time, folks. Me…sod it, they do a steak and ale pie! That and another Hen, I think”
Larinda grinned wickedly. “And that will be with new potatoes, not bloody chips, you fat cow. Bastard, I mean”
The food was good, the evening chilling down quickly, and James coming steadily back to life as he accepted William’s presence inch by inch and moment by moment. John helped, trying for more ideas for mnemonic names from one of his bird guides, and I could see the loneliness taking a step back within him. Every now and then, though, he would sneak a glance my way, and I wondered how much he had picked up from the slips. He may be odd, but he had never been stupid. I took a moment of my own to slip away to ring Mam.
“Hallo!”
“Hiya Mam”
“Hiya Jill, to what do I owe this pleasure?”
I filled her in on Will’s problems, sparing no details. If anyone had demonstrated acceptance, with what she had done for me and Neil, it was my mother.
“So, you want me to put you and this Larinda up as well?”
“Aye, Mam, and there might be one more”
“And who might that be?”
Once more, a little potted history of Rachel’s own issues.
“Aye, weel, I suppose…you be looking to share a bed with this other one?”
“If that’s OK with you”
“How else would I bloody fit yez in? Let’s see…Neil can take the settee, this Rachel lass the sofa bed in the conservatory, she’ll be safe with our Neil, aye, and William can have his bed and you two the other one, aye? When are you looking to do this?”
“William says about a month’s time. They have a special set of dates for people with early results; I think they want to try and tempt them out of taking a gap year, like. I’ll let you know closer to time, aye?"
"Now, do they all know about you, cause I divvent want to make any slips if you haven’t told them”
“Aye, they’re all in the loop. Look, I’m going to have another pint, then get this lot on the road, aye? I’ll let you know as and when”
“Ok then. And Jill…”
“Aye, Mam?”
“I love you, lass”
CHAPTER 37
William left after the meal, so as not to alert his mother, and John drove off home shortly thereafter. I had a little chat with him, just before he left.
“Rob, I think I shall look at your idea at the reserve.
It may work…look, I am not easy, I have never been easy, but you have tried to do something for a cunt that he might not be able to appreciate”
I coughed at that, but John continued. “You think I didn’t know? I am an observer by definition, Mr Carter. It goes with my own little strand of OCD. And perhaps…perhaps one day you might tell me what your problem is. May I take your contact details? I have a sort of system in my head, lists of numbers you would say, and, well, if I manage to do what I am thinking I might have…”
He trailed off, clearly looking for the right phrase.
“I might have a way of switching tracks with my life. Thank you for your generosity of spirit. I will discuss this with my therapist”
It was odd; he was closing down again, but that little beacon of rightness was still burning behind his eyes. Then, he was gone. I wandered back to the others, and Rachel immediately fixed me with a hard stare.
“You trust him?”
“No. Well, not yet, aye? I had a sort of suggestion for, I don’t know. What do they call it? Displacement activity? Sublimation? Whatever, just an idea that he might be able to feed his compulsion to tick lists by ticking other people’s lists for them, if you catch my drift. No, I don’t yet trust him, but I think there might be something there worth quarrying out. Let’s get off home, aye? You coming back for coffee?”
“You OK with that, L? I mean, you don’t want to rip her clothes off and, you know?”
Larinda laughed. “Laters, yeah, but I got all night”
She had, and she did, and…but the rest is obvious.
A month later, three of us queued our way through Gatwick security, and I found myself back in one of those little twin-prop jobs, this time with Larinda next to me and Rachel across the aisle. Miles to the South, William should be doing the same, and as we taxied out to join the queue of disparate aircraft awaiting take-off, I smiled across at Rach.
“Stop bleating, aye? She’ll be fine with you. Just remember to take your shoes off indoors. Pub tonight?”
“Yeah, will help with the nerves, I hope”
A swing, and a surge as the pilot put the plane straight into his run, and we were off, the old aircraft of the museum passing beneath us, and after a while we dug into the goodies we had accumulated pre-flight. Odds and sods of terrain came and went through gaps in the cloud, and then it was clearing as we hit Geordie airspace. Rachel called across the aisle.
“Is the air breathable up here, and do I need my thermals?”
“Cheeky so-and-so!”
Larinda laughed once more, a sound I was not only getting used to but starting to need.
“Nah, I read a guide once. It said it was only cold, wet and windy up here for three months of the year”
She paused, for the punchline. “The rest of the year it’s winter! Love, we going to see your house from here?”
“Probably not; flight path goes right overhead. Look, that’s the town, aye? We swing out to sea now, then back in to the airport”
Landing was gentler than last time, and our luggage was delivered surprisingly quickly. I rang Mam.
“We’re here, just going to find William”
“Want us to pick you up?”
“No, ta. Too much luggage, and four of us in that car; we’ll grab the bus.”
“Let us know when you get to the bus station, I’ll have the kettle on”
“Aye, be lovely. Will’s flight’s down, just going to find him. I’ll ring”
There he was at last, and off we went for the tram/underground hybrid that is the Tyneside Metro. It’s always odd, travelling the route with newcomers, because all of the sights become more vivid in the simple act of pointing them out. After the first underground section, we popped out for the Tyne crossing and its spectacular bridges, and then into the grim bit below Gateshead before the last bit to Heworth. Will had been impressed by the crossings, but the last bit left most of our party cold. Rachel summed it up.
“Like bits of Brentford, this”
“Old pit towns, crap estates, aye? We’ll be there soon”
I made the phone call, and Neil was waiting at the bus stop, his smile dazzlingly better than the painful expressions I remembered so recently.
“Hi, Nelly! This is Larinda, my other half, like, and this is William, Von’s eldest, and Rachel, my workmate”
He hugged me. “Welcome home, Jill. Will, Larinda was it? Rachel…you could do something with that hair. I could, anyway”
“What’s wrong with it? I paid good money!”
“Pay me some good money, and it would be far better. What’s she using for conditioner, one of those crappy things that coats your hair with plastic?”
I had to interrupt. “He’s a hairdresser, Rach. A good one”
Neil laughed. “No, a bloody good one! I’ll have a look when we get in, aye? Now, we’re off out to the Gardeners’ for a meal tonight, if you’re not too tired, but we might stop in the Neville for a quick one, like. Say hello to a couple of folk”
“Aye, thon’ll de me. Howay, hyem wi we”
Three soft Southerners looked at each other, winced, and shook their heads as I just grinned, cow that I was. We pulled our bags along the pavement to our street, and Mam was in the kitchen just pouring.
“Now, I take it yez aal drink tea. Neil tell ye we’re off out tonight, Jill?”
So casual, it seemed, in using my name, and so heart-warming. My mother, my brother, my family. She looked at Will.
“Aye, I can see your mam in you, son. Now, I know she’s been a bit off with the lass here, but what he telt us is that you are your own person. If that’s right, you are welcome here as you and not as someone’s son, aye? So gie’s a hug and say hello properly”
William was almost in tears, and I saw why. Von had always been one for family as a concept of being in each other’s lap, always close together for the sake of family, and here was Mam showing another way, that of seeing others as individuals in their own right and not as ciphers in a family tree. She smiled, and then picked out Larinda for attention.
“Aye, she always did have an eye for the bonny ones. Thank you, Larinda, for looking after my new daughter. And you, Rachel was it? She’s not gone into details, like, always a respecter of privacy, I brought her up that way. But she says you’ve not had it too great…”
Rachel looked around, and she appeared stunned, the classic rabbit in headlights look.
“Jill, she always like this?”
Mam laughed out loud. “Mothers and daughters, aye?”
Rachel shook her head, then grinned. “Well, ‘aye’. Look, get it out, yeah, was married, hubby had a very physical way of showing how he felt, usually with his right. Sort of made me careful, yeah?”
Mam’s face tightened, as did Neil’s, and I could see the old fears come up in his mind, the beatings, the bricks through his windows. Mam looked at him, and drew herself up to her full five feet one.
“Neil, you know that doesn’t happen, not here, aye? Rachel…how, take this as I mean it, aye? This is our home. Mine, Neil’s, Jill’s, Ian’s if he ever got off his backside to come. That does not happen here. Ever. Not now, not never. Is that understood? Is that OK? No being careful here, just being you. Welcome to our home”
She paused, the Matriarch, just for a second. “Right, Jill, you know where everyone is sleeping, so show them up, bags away, bloody shoes off, like, and back here for tea, and you can help me finish the crossword”
We settled ourselves in our respective places, and as I left Will to unpack, he looked at me with a strained expression.
“Jill, it’s OK to call you that? Here?”
“Not outside, aye?”
“Aye. Yes. She’s so different to Mam, not what I expected. And your brother: he’s the gay one?”
“Yes, he is. A bit old for you, though”
He actually blushed. “That wasn’t what I meant. He’s…quiet is the only word I can think of, but he wasn’t when he said about Rachel’s hair”
“Aye, Will, he got some serious beatings, one of which left him unconscious and concussed. Had a breakdown, and only just getting his head sorted, so gently, aye? He is a very good hairdresser, though”
“It showed, yeah? What’s this place we’re going to?”
“Working men’s club, just round the corner. They do good, solid meals. We’re going for a pint first, then a short walk and we’re there”
After tea and gentle interrogation by the Matriarch from Her Chair, we set off round to the Neville. I was pleased to see she was only using one stick now, and nearly as pleased to see the bulk of Jim behind the bar.
“How, Jim!”
“Whey, hello, Rob! Whe’s aal these wi’ ye?”
Rachel shook her head. “DO–YOU–SPIKKA–DA–INGLIS?”
Once more the optics rattled as he laughed. “Rob, which one of these is your lass? Hiya, Nelly”
I put my arm around Larinda’s waist. “Jim, this is Larinda, and the other lad is William, the Welsh lady’s eldest, aye? Mam you know, and this is Rachel”
Jim measured her with his gaze. “Aye, you were spot on”
Rachel looked at him, head slightly aslant. “Spot on with what?”
“I axed him if ye were bonny, and he said whey aye. And ye are. Bonny, like”
I touched her shoulder. “I told Jim about the retirement party for John, and gave you the credit for the idea, and he asked me if you were pretty. And then, being Jim, he asked specific questions about the precise nature of our relationship”
Jim grinned again. “Aye, Rob, but they’re both mazors, and so’s your mam, aye?”
Mam laughed. “Rachel, he’s saying that all three of us are very attractive women, like. And ye, Jim Forster, stop putting on the accent, like. Just cause they’re from London”
Rachel stood up into her best heels-and-cleavage pose of ultimate indignation. “Bleedin’ Essex, innit? Wudja Adam an’ Eve it?”
She held the pose for a second, then collapsed into laughter.
“Hiya Jim, I’m Rach. Pleased to meet you!”
Jim held out his hand. “Hiya, bonny lass. Same here. I’m Jim, but they call me, well, Jim. Drinks?”
I looked around. “Two white wines and three and a half scotches, Jim. We’re off up the Club for tea”
“They’ve a turn on tonight, might be a bit loud”
“Then we’ll be back here after”
“Ne worries, Rob. Rach, we have Pinot Grigio, but if you want really dry I got some Frascati in the other day, not a bad drop”
“Sorry?”
“Well, I prefer a decent Chablis, like, or a Graves”
Once more the grin. “How, just cause I’m a Geordie doesn’t mean ah’ve got ne taste! Anyways, how does this lad pull such crackin’ lasses?”
Rachel was clearly tuning into his accent, but then he was easing off from his ‘confuse the shit out of the southerners’ game. She paused, and looked round at the group.
“That one, well, she sort of had him, yeah, but us two? No secret: just by being the nicest person we’ve met, yeah”
The grin. “Aye, I’ll drink to that. Rob, these are on me, aye?”
CHAPTER 38
We finished off our drinks, and after a quick nod of thanks to Jim we set out for the Club. Rachel was smirking.
“That was clever of him”
I had to ask, and she explained.
“Look, we’re off somewhere else, yeah?”
“Yeah…”
“Licensed premises, that have lower prices than his pub, yeah?”
“Well, aye”
“And he’s just put the obligation onto us by buying the first round”
Mam started to laugh. “To sort of quote the lad, just cause he’s a Geordie doesn’t mean he’s daft!”
We were still laughing as we went through the doors of the club, and Mam took control, using her stick as a badge to clear the way to a table big enough for us. Unfortunately, there was a singleton drinker sat there.
“How, Raafie!”
“Hello to ye, Mrs Carter”
“We’s are all here to have a bit dinner, like, so can Ah ax ye to share the tyebbel?”
Will turned to me, together with the two girls, and asked “What the fu…?”
Ralph nodded. “Aye, Norma, ne problems. Whe’s aal these wi’thee?”
She paused for a second, and when she spoke again, it was clear she was enunciating for the benefit of the group.
“Whey, Rob and Neil you know. This is Rob’s lass Larinda, and his friends Rachel and William. No, bloody hell, Raafie, they are friends of Rob’s, not friends like that, ye daft sod. Rachel, Will, Larinda, this is Raafie Elliott, a friend of Rob’s dad”
Ralph smiled. “And of yours, Norma, ye knaa that. Now, Rob, Ah thowt ye had some Welsh lass, aye?”
“Raafie, Will is her son, like. Didn’t work out, but Will’s a canny lad, and he’s looking at Newcastle University. He’s stopping with us for a while, interviews and that”
Just then, Will’s phone went, and he looked at the display.
“It’s Mam. Shush all, please…hiya, Mam, here in one piece, gone out to a pub for tea, yeah? Bit noisy…No, no problems with the flight…yeah, got my luggage OK….no, I don’t think they want ties, Mam…yeah, love you too, I’ll call, they’re just bringing my food over. Bye!”
We sat down by the old man, and he gave Will a sharp look. “So, that Welsh lass and thee aren’t on the best of terms, like. She doesn’t knaa he’s staying at thy Mam’s?”
He was doing his best to speak clearly enough for the others, which was sweet, I thought, followed by the realisation that I had just thought of one of my Dad’s old drinking buddies as ‘sweet’.
“Aye, that’s the score. We’ll look after him for the weekend, get the college bit done, then show him around, let him know what a superb place we live in”
Ralph snorted. “Aye, better than that London, ah owe!”
Will finally spoke up. “I don’t live in ‘that London’, it’s Hampshire, and I’m Welsh!”
“How, bonny lad, anywhere south of the Tees is that London, but Ah’ll own Wales is a bit different, like. Seriously, lad, ye’ll like it here. There’s a hell of a lot mair than pits and dole queues. Rob, where’ll ye tyek ‘im?”
“Ach, after the session at the college we won’t have that much of the day left, so I thought just Tynemouth and Marsden, then come back in for a few beers the night”
Ralph snorted. “What, the Bigg Market? Put him reet off!”
“Na, Haymarket, mebbes, and Quayside. Bit more sensible, like. Then off back the Sunday”
Larinda pushed something into my hand, caught my eye, and smiled sweetly.
“Belly thinks me throat’s been cut, love, so hurry up and order. Rach and your bro have gone for the drinks”
The menu.. She smiled innocently at me. “Just remember, Carter, that after this weekend the gloves are off. Healthy mind, healthy body”
Ralph snorted. “Noo, Ah prefer an unhealthy mind, mesel. More fun, like”
Mam slapped his arm. “Wor lad was bad enough, but now I see exactly where he got it from”
“How, Norma! It was your lad that corrupted me! Ah was aal sweetness and light, before then!”
“Raafie Elliott, ye were a matelot, and I know for a certain fact it was ye who showed him round Bugis Street when he were a lad, aye?”
The old man grinned happily. “Memories….varry, vary unhealthy minds they had there, Ah owe!”
Will was still gobsmacked by their conversation.
“Larinda, if you listen, very carefully, and they speak slowly, it’s still incomprehensible. Rob, do they all talk that way up here? Do I need language lessons before I come?”
I had to laugh out loud when I saw the twinkle in Ralph’s eye. “Will, it’s just a wind-up. He can speak English as well as you can, he just enjoys his bit tease, aye, Raafie?”
“Whey aye, Rob. Bit difficult being a CPO if you can’t”
“That’s Chief Petty Officer, folks. He met Dad when he was on tour in Singapore., back when they both still had hair”
“Cheeky hoit that ye are, Rob! Howay, sit yerselves doon, aye? Will, indulge an aad man, like, and tell us what ye want to study”
Larinda interrupted. “Food order first, please? I think better when I’m not running on fumes”
That was quickly done, and once we were through with the order, Will started to explain, as he always did, the why as well as the what. Ralph was nodding in understanding.
“Ah was on a submarine tender, lad, for a while. Ye end up in aal sorts of places, including way, way out in the middle of the oggy. Normally, ye see nowt, cause there’s all lights and stuff where people are working, but some of the watches, like, ye get a bit shelter, and then there’s the sky…and it’s summat that landsmen hardly ever get to see, aye? So much of it, and it’s like, ye knaas, like ye could read a book just wi the starlight. So, young Will, aye? Myek an aad man a promise, like”
Will was clearly intrigued. “Promise you what, Mr Elliott?”
“Raafie, son, Raafie. If ye’re aad enough to sup, ye’re aad enough to use me nyem. So gie’s a promise, Will, that ye’ll nivvor, ivvor, lose that sense of what the stars can be just by finding oot what they actually are, like. Promise?”
Will grinned, and I realised that he understood immediately what Ralph meant. There was beauty in the world, and an education should help you see it more clearly, not rip the joy from it. Will just nodded and gave his promise, then turned to me.
“Rob, I think I am definitely going to like it here! People talk sense, even if I can’t understand it most of the time”
Larinda was shaking her head at that. “Another one lost…”
“How, Will?”
“Er, aye, Raafie?”
“Ye got a lass yersel, doon that Hampshire?”
I could see Will’s mood puncture, and to no great surprise I saw that Ralph had picked up the signals himself. He lowered his voice, pausing as the food was delivered, and glancing at my brother.
“So, ah suppose ye’re another’un like young Neil here, aye? Means nowt to me, like. Nelly’s been a good marra, looks after his Mam, aye? And ah larned a lang, lang time back…”
He paused, and took a slow sip of his pint, eyes twinkling. “The mair o yeez aboot, the mair lasses it leaves for us that prefers them!”
Rachel got that one almost as quickly as the locals, and she turned and grinned, first at Neil, and then at me.
“Yeah, and dykes, yeah, they do the same for me. Oh…”
Her own little act went on, with a voice full of woe and weariness she said, “So many men, so little time…”
I thought back to my last visit, to the delights of George Bell, and then saw Jim’s face overlaying Ralph’s. Two men, both of whom Dad had known, but one for most of his life. I had realised, that last visit, what I should have known without need of reminders, that my family had depth, and strength, and if my father had given out his friendship to other men they would have had to show him similar depths. Bell had sprouted in the dark like some sort of mould, dank and rotten to the heart, soiling whatever and whomever he touched, while Ralph had lived, experienced, seen; George had stayed in the playground and fought the same battles over and over again. A small mind had found no wider horizon than the next trip to the pub.
It actually gave me hope, for if I was to do something about my life, or lack of one, then there were people here that showed I could survive. Hope…bloody hell.
Larinda saw my change in mood, and whispered a soft “What’s up?”
“Nothing, love, just realising there are some diamonds about, aye?”
She just grinned, and tore into her food as Will prattled on about what Ralph had been able to see South of the equator, and Mam just smiled gently to herself and gave me the gift of a wink, just as the turn started up.
Now, those unfamiliar with working men’s clubs will need to understand that there is a whole world of entertainment that is encountered only in such places, but the precise meaning of the word ‘entertainment’ is open to personal interpretation and a very wide range of values. To put it another way, even Ralph winced at the singer’s voice.
“Bugger a hell, Rob, she’s new to the circuit, like, but ah divvent think she’ll get much older on it”
“Aye and you’re not wrong there. We were off to the Nev after the food, like. You fancy a quieter pint?”
“Aye, Ah’ll be generous and let ye treat an aad man to a drink. Sup up; an, ye knaa, Ah might just have some books for this lad, aye?”
He caught Mam’s look, and laughed. “No, ye daft besom, not THAT sort of book! A bloody star atlas!”
I lay in bed, hours later, listening to Larinda beside me, and thought about that word again. Hope. For me, for Neil, for Will. It was looking as if there were corners to turn at last.
CHAPTER 39
It had ended up as a happy evening, with just the one slight shadow as Will broke away to call goodnight to his mother. The soft southern ears seemed to be tuning in steadily to the odd vowels and vocabulary, and once the rough and tough Northerners had played enough of their little game of confuse-a-visitor they did their best to communicate. Communication was clearly on Jim’s mind that night, especially where Rachel was concerned, and towards the end of the night a plate of sandwiches was brought over as a welcome. Rachel sniffed carefully at one.
“What’s this?”
Ralph looked at her as if she was from Mars. “Stotty, wi ham and pease puddin’, like”
I laughed at her expression. “Sort of solid, smooth dhal, Rach. Lentils and ham stock, left to set”
“Well, what’s it taste like?”
“Well, how do people normally find that out? Have a bite!”
I finished it for her. It’s not a strong taste, but it is as regional as the accent. Jim noticed, and a little while later we were handed a basket of chunks of cooked sausage. I reached for one, and Larinda slapped my hand.
“Dinner, and that sandwich, and beer? I want you healthy, Carter! Besides, you’re not sitting stuffing your face when my glass is empty! And so’s your mum’s!!”
Dynamics…I went to the bar with Rachel, and Jim was all charm and rumble, while Will hung on to every word Ralph gave him about his times at sea and in far countries. All of that was literally foreign to the boy, as with his mother’s background ‘foreign’ clearly meant ‘suspect’, and as Ralph had always been a raconteur the mix of exotic tales and accent seemed to pull Will in. Mam sat to one side, just watching, with an odd smile every now and again, and when she rose to limp to the toilet I saw Larinda look a little worried, rise herself and follow the old lady.
Rachel was clearly flattered by Jim’s smiles, but I noticed that she seemed to want to share the joke, and it was with my brother. I could almost read Jim’s mind, just then, as rather than sensing a rival for the ‘bonny lass’ he dismissed his presence as harmless. I don’t mean that he ignored Neil, or spoke out of turn to him, but rather recognised that his presence was no obstacle.
We delivered the drinks in twos and threes to our little corner, and after a few minutes Mam and Larinda were back, the latter looking unhappy, and I realised my mother’s eyes were just a little red.
“You OK, Mam?”
She squeezed my knee, and whispered “Tell ye later, lass”
That was a moment that I knew would stay with me, where despite her distress, whatever it was for, she had made an effort to let me know how much she loved me. I kissed her cheek, and realised suddenly how late it was.
“How, people, better make this the last one if we’re off out tomorrow, aye?”
William started to giggle, and it was clear that he was more refreshed than I had ever seen him before.
“You’re like my Mam, Rob! She goes home and she comes back all Valleys, and you’re here a few hours and it’s all whippets and funny words”
Ralph was grinning. “Aye, ye never forget your native soil, aye? And it’s not the same for thee, Rachel?”
That almost broke the mood, as I saw a flicker in her eyes that told me that no, she didn’t go home, because home had always meant someone to tell her things, in ways that had cost her some of her teeth. Ralph clearly noticed on his part.
“Lass, sorry if I said summat wrong, aye? How, ye say ye’re off into the toon the morrow night, aye? Do yez fancy an old man along to spoil the fun? I’ll be doing no dancing, like, so best we find wersels a quiet spot somewhere, have a bit natter again. Norma, what about thee?”
She looked tired. “Tell ye what, lad, I’ll let thee know the morn, aye? Sup up, lads and lasses, there’s an old cripple needs her bed”
In the end, I left Ralph my mobile number, so that he could find us if things worked out, and we helped the Matriarch back to her home. She took my arm with her free hand, Larinda on my other, as we slowly made the short walk home.
“What was up, Mam?”
“Ah, nowt really, Jill, just Raafie, aye? I talk to him, and it’s like opening a cupboard, and everything of your Dad’s there, all of it, aye? I miss him, pet, I always will, silly aad fool that I am”
Larinda spoke before I could. “Nothing silly about it at all, love. It’s how it should be. Just wish I’d been lucky enough to have found a bloke like his Dad, yeah, stead of the tosser I did get. No, love, not this one, my husband!”
Rachel was clearly listening. “Yeah, look at us all, only one of us got it right first time”
She stopped walking suddenly. “Fuck, did I just say---sorry, Norma, but ‘first time’, shit! Looking at you, and these two all loved up, yeah, suddenly it looks brighter. Sorry, don’t mean to belittle you, your loss, yeah, but you can’t mourn like that less you had something really special, yeah? So you hold on to that, girl, cause the rest of us, we ain’t been there. Not yet, anyway”
Mam looked at her. “Your husband, aye, must have been blind as well as thick as pigshit. Thank you, lass. There’ll be a welcome for you any time in our home. Aye, all of yez. It tells me things, does this, things about my daughter, that she can find friends like this, and that despite having such a shadow on her life. Now, get me hyem so I can have me bit cup of tea”
Always the same, with a houseful, the need to remember where the hell everyone else is lying. I slipped out from our bed that morning and did what I needed to do, then made my way down to the kitchen to start the rituals. Once the tea was brewing, I quietly entered the living room, where Neil’s sofa was empty. Strange…if he had slipped out for a morning cigarette, I would have seen him at the back door, and at the very least he would have needed the clothes that still lay on the carpet. I moved over to the conservatory to check if Rachel was awake, and there were two heads on the pillows, which was more than a little confusing.
“Morning Jill, he’s still asleep, so bring us some tea and I’ll give him a nudge”
The next bit was mechanical on my part, returning to the kitchen and gathering cups and milk, pouring the tea, three cups only. The one working part of my mind made that decision: three cups only, find out what the fuck before anyone else woke. I carried two in, handing them to a slightly shamefaced brother and an apparently relaxed friend, and took a seat in one of Mam’s old cane chairs after I brought my own.
“And? I do not believe that you have miraculously converted my brother, Rach!”
Neil looked closely at his tea. “I had a bit of a bad night…”
She snapped out a reply. “No, WE had a bit of a bad night, yeah? Jill, he was thrashing about, and the more I lay, the more I remembered, yeah, after that chat, and your mum has all sorts of bright things to remember, and all of mine are purest shit and piss. So we both sort of woke up, and we both felt like crap, and, well, this made sense, and no we didn’t, right?”
She paused for breath, then turned gently on me once more. “Look, I know you used to do it by getting pissed all the time, but try and see this as the low calorie option. I don’t want to jump his bones…well, if he were straight, yeah, I probably would, but it made the night better. Nobody else needs to know, right?”
Neil suddenly grinned. “Like when we were bairns, and climbed in with Mam and Dad, aye? I better get up and dressed before we confuse folk”
He turned to her, and kissed her very, very gently on the lips.
“Thank you, Rachel, for doing that for me”
And then he was laughing., and Rachel looked hurt.
“No, no, I’m not laughing at you, Rach, just thinking it’s a pity you’re not like Jill, aye? All crossed-up, like. If ye were a lad, oh bloody hell aye!”
She couldn’t manage to keep her frown in place. “You lot, this family, you should be put away, you’re all mad! Jill, haven’t you got someone to take tea to while I get dressed? What? Look, he’s not interested but I am not dressing in front of a dyke, yeah? Off and take Larinda her tea”
I went back up, still laughing as I entered the bedroom. Larinda was lying on her side, head propped on a hand, and of course I had to explain my amusement. She just nodded, as quick as ever in her understanding.
“Yeah, they needed company, safe company, they got it. Some marriages, you know, that’s all they have anyway. Safety, comfort, bit of affection. Speaking of which…where’s that particular bit of affection of yours? Girl needs her breakfast while she can still get it!”
She still ate Mam’s fry-up later.
CHAPTER 40
We joined the rest a little later, somewhat more relaxed, and over breakfast we planned the day’s campaign. The morning and early afternoon for Will at the college, while three of us did the rounds of the shops, and then Neil and Mam would meet us with the cars for a drive out to the coast and an early tea. Back home, change, and into the town again for our night out.
I insisted on taking the bus over Low Fell rather than to Heworth, and to my delight it was a double decker. The old Lindisfarne song ran through my head: me and you, sitting on a bus, in the front seat at the top. The girls looked puzzled, and Will asked the obvious question.
“Why insist on this bus, Rob?”
“The views, Will, the views. Wait and you will see”
We wound our way up through old sandstone terraces, and I urged them to look behind as we went between some fields.
“See? The sea! No, don’t laugh, there’s more”
Housing estates, chip shops, Working Men’s Clubs, all went past, and then, just as we passed the hospital, I said “Look…”
Newcastle lay below us as we came down the Old Durham Road from Sheriff Hill, the football ground hulking in the foreground, but it was Rachel whose eyes lifted first.
“Oh my god, that’s gorgeous!”
North of the city, clear in the brilliant sunshine, lay the hills, patterned by cloud shadow and blued with distance.
“That’s the Rothbury hills, the Simonsides, like, and beyond it’s the Cheviots. After them it’s north Northumbria”
Will looked up from the view for a second, as the bus made its way down the bank.
“It’s Scotland north of the Cheviots, isn’t it?”
“Well, it might be now, but it used to be ours. We built their capital city; it’s named after one of our kings”
“What, Edward? Which one?”
“Nope, Edwin. King of Northumbria, till the Danes took so much of it. Edwin was killed by the bloody Welsh, anyway”
It was Rachel’s turn to stare, while Will looked slightly embarrassed,
“Jill, when exactly did all that take place?”
“Er, 633 AD. Still people up here that regard England and Scotland as usurpers, aye?”
“Fuck me, and I thought MAC was an obsessive!”
“Ach, just letting Will know there is an awful lot of history up here. What Raafie was saying, aye?”
Will was nodding, as the views were swallowed by our descent. “Yeah, and a hell of a lot of countryside and shit. I think I like this place”
“Aye, but don’t judge it by the next stop, Will”
Which is and always has been a depressing spot. The Trinity car park was still there then, relic of the original ‘Get Carter’ film, and fast food shops jostled for space with cheque cashers and ‘everything for 99p’ establishments. Not at all good, so we disappeared down the street to one of the other bridges, the High Level and its amazing cast-iron architecture, combined with more views, this time of the other bridges downstream. We stood for a while at the halfway point, as the girls took pictures, and William hugged me.
“You don’t have to do the tourist guide on me, you know. I love the place already, yeah?”
“Ah, Will, it’s just, well, I don’t come home that often, like, and when I do, and especially when I have guests, it’s all sort of fresh. Reminds me of why I love it”
“Why’d you leave?”
I laughed bitterly. “Just behind us, Will, upstream a touch, and the male unemployment rate was 96% back then. That’s why…you, well, you seem more relaxed, aye? Bit more touchy-feely”
He smiled, and there was genuine happiness there. “Your Mam, she said about finding a cupboard full of your Dad, yeah? This, for me, this is, I dunno…”
“Opening door?”
He thought for a while. “No, not that, too narrow. More like, yeah, I’m at a railway station, and there’s loads of platforms, loads of destinations, and I can have any ticket, any at all. See what I mean?”
I did indeed, and of course the image came through of trying to run for the train I wanted, the train I needed, and so much baggage with me that I couldn’t rise above a walk. Please be there, please guard, please hold the doors, I’m so nearly there…
“You OK, Jill?”
“Ah, yeah, sorry. Just thoughts, aye. Let’s get this show on the road, there’s a lad and a college to introduce”
Up St Nick’s and Groat Market to High Bridge. “Will, this is the Bigg Market, it’s where they train Arctic explorers”
“Eh?”
“The pubs are too hot to wear a coat, and if you put one down it’ll get lifted, so they all stagger from place to place in T-shirts or microdresses, even in February. Mind you, they’re feeling no pain by then, like. And up here is Grey Street”
Rachel was amazed. “This is gorgeous!”
“Aye, now it’s been cleaned. Royal Shakespeare Company up on the right, on the world’s first street with electric light”
They looked puzzled. “Look, people, the bulb was invented just down the road, like, even if it was in Sunderland!”
I turned to William. “An awful lot of original stuff from up here, Will, from steam trains to hydro-electricity and steam turbines. Real scientific history, aye?”
He was grinning, and I caught a smirk from the other girls.
“What?”
Larinda hugged my arm, linked with hers. “You are so proud, love, you came so alive just then”
“Ach, your bit’s just coming, aye?”
After the Monument I hurried them through the shops of Eldon Square. “Avert your eyes, ladies! There are shops and other snares and pitfalls along the way! Think Odysseus!”
By the time we emerged onto Percy Street Three of us were giggling almost too hard to breathe, and once I caught my breath I made the promise that we would return as soon as Will had been delivered. The boy stared at me.
“Jill, you realise that if I had had any doubts about you, they have just evaporated? How far now? I don’t know if I can survive much more girling about”
Kissing him on a busy street would not be sensible, I told myself firmly. “Just the other side of the road, son. You know where…ta”
Ten minutes later he was away with the other prospects, and I was all but hauled back to the Square by the girls. Rachel was focussed.
“Coffee first, then shops. What size are you, Jill?”
“About eighteen, now” said Larinda, “So if we see something you like, one of us tries it on to see how it looks, then get it in sixteen, yeah?”
“Eh?”
“Incentive, love. Pardon my honesty, but there ain’t a bleeding snowball’s of you getting down to twelve or fourteen, so we gets you this, and you work at things, yeah, so no cake with your coffee, none at all”
I looked hard at Larinda, who seemed to be flicking over to the other side of her dial of acceptance.
“What? So me and Rach have been talking, me and Rach and Neil, yeah? How many attempts, Rob, Jill, as a kid, aye? Shit, tissues, girl”
It took me a few minutes, and some hard stares from passers-by, but I got myself straight. Larinda kept hold of me, as did Rachel, who donated a few glares to the over-curious. My lover whispered to me.
“I know, and we’ve talked, and we’ve been pulling different ways, yeah? But it’s what I sort of said. If I can only ever have a dead or dying Rob, I’ll take a live Jill, yeah? I get up in the morning now cause I want to, not because I have to, and that’s cause of you, yeah? So woman up, and let’s spend some money we never had”
And we did…and to my surprise, not only did I end up with three new dresses (in too small a size) but Larinda and Rachel loaded up a carrier bag with toiletries, including hair remover. Oh yes, and home waxing shit. That one, in combination with the manic grins they gave each other on spotting it, gave me serious worries.
We had lunch in a place that did a rather good variety of vegetables, the girls looking pointedly at the new clothing till I gave in, and then up Northumberland Street for simple stuff like tights and knickers, with an enforced diversion to the record shops. All too soon, it was time for Will to rejoin us, and we met at the Monument before a metro ride back to Heworth. He was buzzing and bubbling with excitement.
“It is, it really is! So much what I wanted, and all the stuff in the city, yeah?”
Rachel tried to calm the flood of enthusiasm. “See some other places first, OK? They might have even better stuff”
He smiled at her, and suddenly he was almost the old William I remembered, nearly child-like in his happiness. “Oh, I know that, Rach, but it’s, well, it’s just knowing that at least one place has what I want, that it’s not a silly dream, yeah? Can I be selfish tonight?”
Larinda smiled. “We sort of came up here for you, Will, so it’s your call, aye? Shit, she’s got me saying it. What you want?”
“Well, it was what Jill said, made me think. If the night out’s going to be as over the top as she said, it won’t be fair on her Mam, will it? Better, I was thinking, if we go somewhere nicer, more quiet, keep it as a family and friends thing”
I had to smile at that one. Selfish, my arse. Will kept surprising me, but only slightly. I had always known he was a sound young man, so all that little things like that did was to extend my affection for him. Mam and Neil were waiting at the station, and to my surprise they had Ralph along with them. I ran the suggestion past the three, and Ralph looked at my mother.
“How aboot the Incline? Canny meal, not a bad pint, and they can see the Angel, aye?”
Neil was nodding in agreement. “Getting a bit old for clubbing, me, so aye, makes sense. Look, how’s about Little Haven and a coffee, then down to Marsden and some birds for Jill here..”
“Who?”
Oh shit, Neil. I thought for a few seconds, as the others exchanged glances. In for a penny…
“Ralph, it’s like this…”
I rode with him and Larinda in Mam’s car while Neil took the other two, and by the time we rolled into the car park opposite the Priory ruins, I had managed most of the story, with some edits. Ralph sat quietly throughout, and said nothing more till we were parked and walking out along the pier.
“Gillian, aye? Ah met a few girls, sort of, when Ah wes in Singapore. Aalwes felt a bit sorry for them, aye? People say they were aal on the game, like, but that’s shite. Some of them, ah owe, they were just finding a place for themselves, like, so as not te hev te be someone else, aye? That ye, Jill? Finding that place, like?”
Mam put her hand on my arm. “She has that place, Raafie. Her home, her family, aye?”
Larinda was nodding, and after catching Will and Rachel’s eyes, she said her piece.
“Jill has more than that, Ralph. She has a place with her lover, and her friends. She has more friends back South than she ever knew, so she’s not trapped, not like she thought she was. So…what about you? Has she got a place near you?”
Ralph gave a snort. “Bloody women, aye, ye aalwes close ranks against us poor men. Ah will tell ye this: she is her bloody father’s daughter, like! He was aalwes a soft bugger, too generous wi’s time and love. And this one heor, she’s ever been a perfect match. Norma, divvent take this wrang, aye, but ye should have gone wi Rob, aye? Ye’ve been lost on yer own. Ah divvent mean I wish ye deed, like, just…ach, ye were born for each other and it hurts te see ye pine”
He took a few minutes to stare out over the water, as Neil and Mam let their cigarettes burn down in time with his. W left him to his thoughts, while I pointed out the sights and gave out some trivia, and wondered what he was thinking.
“Gillian Carter…”
“Aye, Raafie?”
“Thy father was the best man Ah ivvor knew. What else can Ah de but try and be as good, aye? Ah can nivvor match him, so, shite, gie an aad man a hug hello, aye?”
That I did, and there were tears, and for the first time I saw how strong the love can be between men, for it was so clear how much he felt his own loss. I held him for a while, till he broke free.
“Bugger a hell, girl. Howay, a cuppa at the Grotto, then up the hill te the Angel and dinner, aye? Norma, Ah think Ah need te get a bit merry tonight, aye, so wad ye mind if we stopped by te see him before Ah get too far gone”
Mam just hugged him, and at the garden of remembrance I watched the two of them, her between Neil and Ralph, as love was shown and memories honoured.
CHAPTER 41
Marsden is still a lovely place, a chaotic jumble of sea-stacks and tidewrack, sand and pebbles, with the deafening sound of kittiwakes screaming their name in case they forget it. We spent a while skimming flat stones, and exploring the caves under the Rock before returning to the Grotto terrace, where Mam, Neil and Ralph were ‘hevvin’ a bit tab, like’
I could never get my head around the fact that she was still here, still smoking, and Dad, whose only real excess had been exercise, was gone. The important fact, though, the vital one, was that she was indeed still here. Larinda held my arm in hers, as we walked with Will and Rachel.
“Nice here…”
“Aye. See that little cave, just along there?”
“Yeah”
“When I was young, when I had had too much, I would ride out here and sit there, watch the sea, build a little fire. Gave me a chance to get my head a little straighter, like”
She looked up the cliff, and I just nodded. “Aye, I thought of that a lot as well. Not good times, but I’m hoping for better now”
Rachel took my other arm as we moved off the firm tide-washed sand onto the loose shingle below the terrace. “And that word, mate? Hope, yeah?”
I slipped my arms free and hugged them both to me. “Aye, hope. Not had a lot of that, yeah, but things seem to be changing a bit”
They both giggled at my understatement, and it was as a laughing trio that we rejoined the others, and I saw the creases by Mam’s eyes as she smiled. Ralph was looking out at some distant marine point, and I wondered whether it was memories of Dad or his shipping days that held his thoughts just then. He shook himself, and smiled.
“Tha knaas, Jill, Ah remember up at Little Haven, when ye were a bairn, and Rob, thy Dad, like, took ye to see a ship that was blaan ashore there…so many, many years, aye? An’ ye’ve had this monkey on thy back just as lang. Bugger a hell, lass, how do we help?”
That love between men, it was apparent not just how much he had cared for my Dad but also why the elder Rob had cared for him. He was almost tearing up, I realised, and that would never do.
“How, a bit chilly here, aye? Time we were off to the tourist trap”
Up in the lift to the car park, and a last look out over the top of the rocks, and then we drove inland to the Gormley sculpture that dominates the approach to Newcastle and Gateshead, an immense standing figure with wings the size of a 747’s, and tucked almost underneath it, next to a riding school, a pub and restaurant, the Bowes Incline. They had a table, and they had beer, and so Ralph was happy. Rachel insisted on getting the drinks in, and I settled down to more tour-guiding.
“The name, Will? Cable railway. Full coal trucks go downhill, cable round a pulley pulls the empty ones back up. No energy involved apart from a brake on the cable. Pity the coal owners didn’t think more of their workers, like. Long story, not here, aye? Food…”
Rachel laughed out loud at that, and leant over towards Mam. “We’ve got her on a diet, yeah? Been good all day, apart from that breakfast of yours. Shall we let her loose for tonight?”
When my mother giggles, she loses about sixty years of her age, and she looked over to me and asked, “How do you get such good friends when you neglect your Mam so badly?”
It was a good night, as these things can be, and we kept the booze down to a trickle as two of us were driving, but the food was a delight and the company beyond complaint. Eton mess for pudding brought a sharp look from Larinda, but I didn’t care at that moment. I could actually see the possibility of a new life ahead. In the end, we made our way home, and of course had to finish the night off in the Nev, which seemed to be largely at Rachel’s instigation. I dropped back with her as we walked round from the house.
“You sneaking about, Rach?”
That brought a grin. “Well, if I never come back, I can at least flirt. He seems nice…”
“He is nice, Rachel, as far as I can see. He never gave me any shit at school, like, but he has a brother, and that one was always a bastard to me. Trouble is, I’ve been away so long, sort of lost touch, so if you want chapter and verse on him and his women, I can’t help you”
She nodded. “Yeah, and if he’s single, at our age, is it because of his faults, yeah, or whatever woman he was with? That the brother you were telling me about, the one who got kicked out of the Army? You do realise that was probably the reason he beat you up?”
“Don’t care, lass. Serves the fucker right”
“Jill Carter, just when I thought you were the soft, caring one!”
“Aye, mebbes, but it’s a bit bloody different when the person in question has been beating you up most of your school life. Bit hard to reach out and be fluffy, aye?”
I got her arm in mine, then, which seemed to be happening a lot. “Jill…look, I have a real problem with men, yeah, and you know that, but it doesn’t cancel out the need. Like that sleeping with your brother, yeah? That’s fine, that’s comfort, that was what we both needed, but there’s more…”
I laughed, wryly. “Aye, a shag is always nice”
“Jill, I could get a shag any time I wanted one, yeah? It’s not that. Well, it is that, to an extent, but it’s more sharing stuff, more, well, LIFE, yeah? Men have hurt me, one really, really hurt me, but, you know, I still want one of my own. Like I never learn, girl”
“No, I know what you mean. Nobody’s ever complete on their own, not if they’re normal, aye?”
“No man is an island, entire of itself…”
“And which of us is a bloody man, aye?”
We were still laughing as we entered the pub. Jim straightened up behind the bar as Rachel appeared, and there was a smile. Neil looked across at her with a raised eyebrow.
“I was never into bears, Rach, he’s just so not my type”
She grinned back, and made sure she went with him to get the beers in. Jim nodded from the bar at me, then made an odd shake of his head over towards the gents’ toilets, before switching his smile to ‘stun’ for Rachel’s benefit. I realised what he meant when the toilet door opened, and out came his brother.
It was like Bell’s appearance, an ogre from my past, but one that looked as if the intervening years had beaten him down. Unlike George, though, he was still slim and fit-looking, but the rage I remembered as burning in his eyes had gone. His stare was at distant things, and flicked across me without recognition. Neil knew him, though, and there was venom in his voice.
“Ah look, it’s John the puff!”
Jim growled at my brother. “Not here, not now, aye? Ye of aal folk should understand, aye? Not here, not now. And not ever if he’s wi’ me”
Oh, shit. I could recognise that look now in the older brother, his life folded, crashed and burned on things he had never had a choice in, and I realised Rachel had been right. I had turned my pain and despair inwards, slicing myself away piece by piece, and John Forster had thrown it outwards. If I hurt, I’ll make sure I’m not the only one. Which of us was in the worse state? I looked around our table, and it was obvious, and Rachel’s words came back: soft, caring. Fuck it, be true to yourself, Gillian. I rose and went to the bar.
“How, John”
“Rob? Rob Carter? What do ye want with me?”
The accent had slipped, the English taking over from the Geordie in him, but I could still hear that voice, the one that had taunted me so regularly just before each attack. Wind it back, girl.
“John, your lad tells us you have had…problems, aye? Explains a lot, when I think about it”
Pause. Deep breath. “Look, I ran into Geordie Bell the other night, aye? He was an arsehole at school, and thirty-odd years later he’s an arsehole with a red nose, aye? No change. Ye…look, thirty-odd years ago. If ye’re still that arsehole we knew, then I am more than happy to tell ye to fuck off and die, aye? But I think ye might have learnt a bit, so…shit, if ye need to talk, that’s us, aye, Raafie and Mam and my friends. Your call”
I looked over the bar, and Jim was staring, muscles working in his jaws, and then John just turned and went straight back to the toilets. Jim watched him go.
“Rob, thanks, aye? He’ll be back, once he’s dried his eyes. He might be a puff, like, but he’s still a man. Sorry Ah had to hev words with thy brother, but that one’s mine. Now, that Rachel lass…she single?”
“Are you, Jim? She doesn’t play games, that one”
“Ach, Rob, ye knaa Ah wes aalwes sweet on that Wendy Charlton?”
“Curly hair, fat arse?”
“Cheeky hoit! Aye, well, we got together, like, and then she moved away, and came back, like, and that was when Ah was working in the quarry at Springwell, aye? And she’d got off wi’ some lad ower Northampton way, and he gans off wi’ someone else, like, so there’s Wendy, and she’s got a bairn by the bloke, aye? Three years aad, and she caals her Elizabeth Gemma, and how, Rob, she was bonny, even if her dad were a darky, aye?”
Smiles, with shadows, and I was trying to second guess the outcome, because it wasn’t going to be good. Everything was past tense, everything was closed.
“So, Ah teks them both on, aye? Never stopped…never stopped loving Wendy, aye, never. And I’ve not got much, but it’s theirs, and we find a flat with an extra room for the bairn, and it’s good, and Ah’m being a dad, like…”
John was back. “It’s OK, kid. Look, go back, have a cup of tea, aye? I’ll hold the bar for a while. Gan on”
Jim disappeared through the private door, and John turned to look at me. “Thank you, Carter. Rob. I think it’s time we went back to the start, aye? I’m John Forster and I was a cunt. I’m now John Forster and I’m a puff. Not much to choose from, aye?”
“Hi, John, I was Rob Carter and I was a victim. I’m now Jill Carter and I’m a woman”
Why the hell had I just told him that? I hadn’t had a lot to drink, he was certainly not a close friend, WHY? His eyes crinkled a little.
“Fuck me. I always did wonder if you were like me”
“I am, sort of”
He looked across at the table. “Which one?”
“Larinda, on the left. Your kid has his eye on Rachel, the other one”
“And I thought I had a shitty deal. Look, I better tell you about Jim, save him breaking down, aye? It’s Christmas, the presents are ready…”
He paused, just for an instant, then it all came out in a rush of words.
“Cold snap, aye, he goes to work, she puts the heating on for the two of them, cheap boiler, shit flue...”
I knew what was coming, right away, and John’s voice took on a dreamy tone, his eyes like Ralph’s were at the beach, staring into the past and the distance.
“And when they die like that, aye, they always look so healthy, so happy, so alive…and that would have been his first Christmas as a dad, like, and the presents were all there, all ready for the big day, wrapped…fuck it, Jill, Rob, what do we have to do before this life gives us some breaks? I think I will take you up on that offer, aye? You OK, Jim?”
His brother was back, and clearly realised John had finished the story. “Aye, kid, aye, Ah hev te be, aye? Gan on, Ah’ll cope here. Thanks, Rob”
John winked, just for me. We went over to my little group, and he smiled at them.
“Can we perhaps have a fresh start, like?”
CHAPTER 42
He sat down, and nodded round the table.
“Some of you know me, like, so let’s get that bit out of the way. What we are talking about is over thirty years ago, and I don’t know about people changing, but me, it’s more like waking up. What I was…I think these two lads…this lad and this lass know what I was”
Neil turned a very hard stare on me. “What the hell do you think you’re doing? Why tell him, of all people?”
I sighed. “Look, at some point, if things go right, then it’ll be a bit obvious, aye? And…I think John has said all that needs saying there, like. Thirty year wounds, they are allowed to heal up”
Neil was still clearly unhappy about it, and for a few seconds I wondered if it was protectiveness towards myself or a sort of resentment that some true outsider was now party to his family’s Big Secret. Change the subject.
“Mam, John has just filled me in on what happened to his brother. You didn’t think, you know, it might have been something to tell us, like?”
She shrugged. “I didn’t think, pet”
She looked meaningfully over at John. “It’s just, that name, aye? It was always one of the names that meant bruises, or a torn shirt. Not the sort of name to bring up in polite conversation with a bairn I hardly ever saw any more, aye?”
The man in question nodded. “I can understand that. I wasn’t exactly mammy’s little darling back then, was I? It’s like Jill says, though. Thirty-odd years, aye? And I am not trying to be funny, like, but our Jim and me, we’re chalk and cheese. I was surprised this one hadn’t heard, like, about our Jim. He’s not like me, he’s a good lad, so please don’t lump him in with what I did. So, as I said, can we perhaps have a fresh start?”
Rachel stuck her hand out. “Hi, I’m Rachel, I work with Jill”
John grinned and reached out to her. “Aye, our kid mentioned you. I see what he meant, too”
She laughed. “Shows that there’s nothing in a name, yeah? We got a sort of friend called John down South, and he is as different from you as can be imagined”
She looked over at me with the word “friend” and it set me thinking. What exactly was the other John to us? There had been a seismic shift in viewpoint there, it was true, but like Forster, Wilkins still carried a freightload of old hurts with him. I also found myself sticking on my own word, “us”. What were we? Survivors, in the end, each of us scarred from contact with the world around us, needy and hurting, and once more I felt a surge of emotion and recognition of what the little group really meant to me and my life. Larinda must have seen it pass over my face, and reached under the table to take my hand.
“John, yeah? I’m Larinda, dunno what the word is these days. ‘Partner’ sounds too much like a business, and ‘girlfriend’ is for twelve-year-olds. I suppose, what, ‘hers’ works, yeah?”
Mam laughed. “I like this one, Jill, I can talk to her, aye? Sorry, Will, not meaning to speak ill of your Mam, like”
Will just nodded. “I know what you mean, Mrs Carter”
“Norma. It’s Norma to ye, lad, when you’re about to go off to college and that, aye?”
I explained. “John, I used to see Will’s mother, and she has what could be called issues with what I am, and her parents are the same, like. So we don’t exactly get on”
Will was on my heels at that. “Yeah, she’s right, and it means I have my own problems”
John nodded. “Aye, what with you being gay and that? Sorry, always had a really strong gaydar, and I’m guessing all of these lot know already. Why do you think I picked on these two so much? I was wrong about you, though, Jill, wasn’t I?”
“Er, no, if you think about it”
“Ach, you know what I mean. So, Will, what brings you up here? College, they said?”
“Yeah, I’m looking at astrophysics courses at Newcastle Uni”
John snorted. “I could tell you a story about the Poly…”
“They already told me. City Uni etc, yeah? Yes, I’m gay, and it’s odd telling that to a stranger when I can’t tell Mam. Very odd feeling…but what I wanted was to get a long way from home, somewhere I could see about being a bit more open, yeah”
John understood. “And somewhere you’d have a bolthole if it went tits up, aye? Sorry, Mrs Carter”
“Norma, from now on, aye?”
“Aye. Ta. So you’d have Norma here, and Neil as well? Aye, back-up, support, like”
“Yes, and maybe a bit of advice from Neil, as well”
Another snort from John. “Aye, as long as it doesn’t involve introducing you to every bloody club on the scene!”
Neil shook his head. “I sort of went off clubbing after the last couple of attacks. I take life a bit quieter now, if you see what I mean.”
“Aye, I do. I went a bit wild myself, like, when they kicked us out the Army, but with our Jim, and Mam’s health, like, I sort of gave up on all that”
Larinda asked the obvious question. He sighed.
“Dementia, aye? She’s still there, sometimes, but she loses days. We gave up about six months ago and she’s in a home over Ponteland way. Both of us have to work, and it wasn’t safe. She’d try and do things, and then she’d forget, and, well, it’s proper care there. Took us a while to find the right one, like, but it still feels…feels like failure, aye? I should be able to care for my own Mam, not have to hire someone else”
Mam was clearly taken with that bit. “Aye, and two of mine are so far away they can’t do anything when I need it, aye? I have to rely on my youngest here. When I had my hip done, it was just our Nelly around”
“Aye, Norma, but no disrespect, like, but you are so far from demented it’s scary!"
Ralph coughed. “Aye, lad, should hev seen hor when she were a young lass, like. She were a dancer, so Ah waddent be quite so sure she wasn’t demented then, what Ah saw of hor, Ah owe!”
“Cheeky bugger, Raafie! Ah, John, back to what we were talking about, aye? If ye’re a big enough man to talk as you are, then here’s my hand on it an’aal”
More flickers in his face, and I wondered exactly how viciously life had turned on him. There were all sorts of things I had read about women like me, where a whole life had been built around an illusion of ‘normal’ masculinity, only to start falling apart as the reserves of strength drain with age, and I could see that in John. The school bully, proving his machismo in attacking anyone who might not be as properly masculine as the unwritten rules of adolescence required. The closet homosexual, pushing it further by entering an infantry regiment, a hard man’s unit at that. And then the failure, and the shame, at being found to be exactly what he had spent his youth attacking. I wondered; was it just a quick fumble, simple sex, or was it something bigger, some affection that his loneliness had finally found? It was odd; I would never forgive him for what he had done to me so often, but I could almost understand it, despite the different routes we had chosen to express our pain. Internal, external.
Raafie brought me back to Earth. “How, my glass has emptied itsel’ “
John rose. “I’ll get these. Rachel, want to gie’s a hand?”
“Why me?”
“Cause it makes our Jim smile, that’s why, and I like that”
One remark, and I realised that whatever the past had been, I actually liked this man. He had made no attempts at self-justification, merely apologising for what he had done and explaining the reasons. Other men might have pleaded special consideration, attempted to diminish their guilt, but not this one. Hands up, fair cop, can we start afresh? Will watched him go to the bar with Rachel, as Jim’s smile returned.
“Jill, was he really that nasty?”
“Oh aye, Will, absolutely. Skinhead, the works. Went off to the Army, and I had dreams, aye? Almost prayers that some arsehole from the IRA would take his head off in Belfast. I hated him, really hated him, and he knew that, and he knew what to shout, how to get me shitting myself even without touching me, aye? But look at him now. I think he broke”
The boy looked over to the bar, where Rachel was in a different pose to what I remembered, head back, tits out, but not the arrogant stance she used to slap people down. This was more flaunting than threatening, I saw, and I wondered where her thoughts were taking her. Jim was beaming, making a big show of how it was his bar, his pub, and John was just leaning on the end, watching and smiling. Will turned back to me.
“Don’t think he’s broken now, Jill. I think he could be one of the good guys”
CHAPTER 43
They were soon back, and John went for the throat, as if he had been weighing it up as the other two flirted.
“Will, where’s your Mam from?”
“Valleys, up around Ponty, that area”
“In English? Bit more detail?”
“South Wales, Pontypridd area”
“Chapel?”
“Oh god yes, her side of the family is very much that way”
“We talking religious arguments, or just ‘because!’?”
I saw where he was going. Was Von, was her family, the sort that argued over doctrinal points, or sheep? If the former, then there was always a slim chance that they could be swayed. If it was unthinking obeisance to whatever the church had decreed, then we were stuffed. John was still talking.
“Here’s my take on it, like, and understand it’s just my view, how I feel. I knew I was that way when I first started looking at lasses, aye? They never did it for me. Before any of you start, I wasn’t like him in the corner there, Neil, I wasn’t into clothes, or colour matching or jumping puddles, I just preferred lads. I look at it now, and I think, shite, it should be no different from whether I like marzipan or not. Matter of taste, aye? But the world isn’t like that, it’s a bit short of common sense, aye?”
Larinda laughed. “Yeah, common sense is a bit bleedin’ rare, innit?”
“Aye. So, Will, what you will be thinking is that you’re at fault. We all do, it’s the way society sets us up, aye? Jill here’s got it a lot worse, of course, but we’re talking about thy problems for now. Look, your mother, she’s not going to suddenly see the light, change her views, so you need to skate carefully. I think you’re more like me than Nelly here, am I right? No urge to lisp and flap your hands about?”
Will laughed. “I have never understood that bit, yeah? If you fancy guys, then surely…”
Larinda had the tissues, as usual. He had collapsed so suddenly it was shocking, and even though I knew he was under stress it came as a real surprise.
“Sorry, people…just, look, this is the first time I have ever been able to talk openly, really openly, yeah? Even that day out at Arundel, that wasn’t like this. I mean, you all know here, and you’re all so cool with it, yeah?”
John sipped his pint. “Exactly, Will. I get the feeling that apart from the two crumblies there, we all have a bit of history, so it’s a bit glass houses, like. The point I am getting across is that while you need to be a bit careful, like, make your own mind up. You are what you are, and it won’t change, I can tell you that, so just get on with your life and try…”
He looked me hard in the eye, and there was shame there. “Try not to hurt others just cause you have some of your own pain, aye?”
Memories slithered out again at that, and I couldn’t help the sharp glare that I gave him. He took a bigger mouthful, and looked back, head cocked.
“Aye, I was, wasn’t I? And when I left the Fusiliers, like, this was a bit too handy for a while. I get the idea you might have been down that road as well, aye?”
He turned to Will once more. “There are a lot of people that can look like friends, lad, and things as well, like the happy juice here. Rob, Jill, I said I do get the feeling…aye? Aye, I see. Will, I think these ‘uns, aye, I think they aren’t that sort of friend. Look, how long are you all up for?”
Mam spoke up, and I realised she had been listening very, very carefully, but for once laying aside her role as matriarch. “They’ll gan back on the Monday morn. I was thinking of a proper Sunday dinner, but at tea-time, like, so they can get another bit look around. Thought we’d head on over to the Waal”
Larinda muttered something that sounded a bit like “In English, please” and Mam put on her best grammar school girl accent.
“One thought that one may perhaps venture a sojourn in the area rich in architectural remains of the Roman Imperium, don’t you know”
Rachel laughed. “Dame Celia Molestrangler, and I claim my five pounds! Ralph, if you can pull off Binky Huckabuck…no, forget it. You are all bloody philistines. I give up!”
She tried to pull a face, but then started to giggle, which was odd coming from her, and then I got the rest of the joke.
“Julian and Sandy, bugger a hell. Rach, I do not think any of these three, aye?”
She snorted, which was more like her, and raised a hand to cover her face, and then I realised that one other person had now got the joke. Mam nodded.
“Round the Horne? Jill here used to be devoted to that. So was her Dad, used to be sat listening to that, and Family Favourites, while some skivvy made their Sunday dinner. Now, who might that skivvy have been? Oh, it would have been me! That is what makes me realise how serious this is. My…girl here grew up tight through all the usual shite with housework, aye? And she still wants to join the club…ach, howay, Norma. Those of ye who haven’t heard, aye, it was radio comedy, had a couple of poofters on it. That the joke, Rachel?”
Rachel nodded sharply, suddenly entirely serious. “Yeah, that’s exactly what I was thinking. That’s what the prejudice is, the silly walk, the floppy wrist, and it’s not, it’s what John says, Will, it’s marzipan, or marmite, or garlic, yeah? I mean, there are even people who don’t like curry!”
Larinda was in again, playing tag with my friend, her friend now, clearly. “Yeah, and they don’t have no special sermons in church, chapel, thingy, about condemning the godless who eat not of the tandoori”
Ralph was laughing now, as the joke sank in. “Aye, blessed be the tikka, for it cometh wi’ minty yoghurt, like!”
Neil just smiled, shaking his head. “Sorry, I still like me bit camp, like. Each to their own”
Will grinned, tears almost forgotten. “I can drink to that! Whose round is it?”
Mam grunted. “Nobody’s, because if we are going to go out tomorrow, you are not doing it with a thick head. You can either stay here and fuddle yourself, or have a ride out the morn, but not both, aye?”
She looked at Rachel, then over to the bar. “John, thy Jim, aye? Does he get days off?”
The grin was back. “You asking him round to dinner, like?”
“Whey aye, and why not?”
“I think he might just find someone to look after the place tomorrow, aye? How, Jim! Ye’re out tomorrow, aye?”
Jim came over to our corner. “Aye, and?”
“Mrs Carter here will do you a proper Sunday tea, aye, and…aye, you up to driving tomorrow? Mrs Carter, he has an eight-seater, save you a bit drive, like, pay for his dinner”
Jim rumbled a sort of agreement. John just nodded. “So we’re all canny, then. Now, sup up, beauty sleep to have, and I have a pint or two to sup. What time, Mrs Carter?”
“Norma. Ten OK? Come round earlier if you want, Jim, and I’ll do ye a breakfast. Howay, yeez lot. Jim’s right, full day tomorrow, and some of us have to do the cooking tomorrow”
We formed up to leave, and as we moved towards the door John just raised his glass and nodded, and I saw his lips form the words “Thank you”
The next morning, I came down to find Jim already tucking into the fried breakfast that Mam was feeding us all in a sort of cookery relay. He looked up at me, a little wary.
“John telt us it aal…”
“Aye, well, I’m still me, like. Just looking to change a few bits round the edges”
“Ach, ne worries. Look, can we just hev the day oot, like, and see hoo we gan on?”
I found myself smiling at that. “And you’re nervous as all hell about Rachel, like? Too much to deal with all at once”
“Aye, sort of”
“Well, she’s down in a bit, like, so we’ll sit her at the back of the bus to keep you from getting distracted”
“Aye, well, thy Mam should get in the front, like, wi’ hor leg an aal”
“You are giving up the chance of a bit crumpet next to you while you drive?”
“Aye well, she’s not as scary as thy Mam, like”
“Oh, Jim, you really, really don’t know our Rachel. Trust me, she can be bloody scary”
He mopped up the last of his beans with a bit of toast. “Aye, and ye knaa what? If Ah’m lucky, like, Ah might find oot”
“Ah, Jim, as long as you don’t hurt her, aye? Then I’d have to kill you, yeah?”
He burst out laughing. “That’s exactly what thy lass, Larinda said tiv us! Bugger a hell, are ye two ever well matched!”
CHAPTER 44
Bodies surfaced, and Jim took a turn in the kitchen with Mam to make sure the breakfasts flowed. Larinda eyed me critically.
“You do know you will be on lettuce leaves and water for the next two months, after this?”
“I can’t say no to my dear mother, can I?”
She stuck her head through the serving hatch. “Didn’t stop ye when ye were a bairn, did it?”
Outnumbered. We were soon on the road in Jim’s people carrier, once more sweeping past the Angel of the North on the approach to what had been the Scotswood Bridge. There had been a short but sharp argument between Rachel and Neil about shoe styles, and she had been persuaded in the end to take some flats, on the basis that sitting drinking a coffee while the rest of us walked out would be antisocial. In the end, it was Jim who sorted the argument.
“Aye, they’re canny shoes, like, why not keep them for tonight?”
The old Rachel peeked out, as her head went back and her folded arms lifted her breasts.
“You asking me back for coffee, then, Northern oik?”
“Whey, ah thowt ye’d aal be back, like, for a pint after. I keep a few bits of drink at my place, like”
John was right. She did make him smile, and as I watched my friend I knew for sure that it went both ways. Slowly, Rachel…
Over the Tyne, and out on the A69 as far as Heddon, the first bits of Wall showing up in the oddest urban spots, before our switchback over the main road onto the Military Road and the climb out of the valley. Small talk, wide views, and the Vallum ditch starting to show to the left. Rachel had ended up sat next to John, and they were soon deep in conversation about what was what, and why. John surprised me with his knowledge, and he caught my look.
“What? I was a squaddy, and it’s military engineering, aye? See, Rach, all that crap about a wall to keep the Scots out, it’s rubbish. Same people both sides, like, so what it was was a chain of signal towers and small forts to protect the communications across the Tyne Gap. The important thing here was the road, not the Wall”
There was a grin, and I almost saw the bully of my youth. “We’re quite proud of our local tribe. The Briganti; same word as ‘brigand’, says all ye need to know, aye?”
Down into Chollerford, up the other side and there it was, as I always dreamt in my moments of homesickness: the ground slanting in tilted plates, their steep edges to the North, skies immense above.
“Jim, can we have a stop by Brocolitia?”
“Aye, er, Jill, how far?”
“Next car-park, after the Carraw, aye?”
The wind was strong as we stepped out, but it was warm enough, and I led the way round the edges of the turf banks that marked the old Roman fort, the ground sweeping down and away to the South, round and across to the tiny rectangular remains of a soldier’s comfort, the temple to Mithras. I left it to John to explain, which he did with gusto, and mused on how odd the old Empire was. If they liked it, they swallowed it; religions, customs, dress, foods, and yet remained forever themselves, even in some odd part of the far North, where their soldiers, who were largely French in this area, had built a temple to a Persian deity while worshipping a Roman emperor. It chimed with me as I looked at Will, who was clearly enthralled by the place. Would that his mother could show some of that acceptance.
John called out to his brother. “How, Jim! Norma here can’t walk too far, aye, so how about we pop up te Winshields car park? Then we can have a bite at Twice Brewed”
He looked over to me again. “Look, I spent a long, long time coming up here, aye? Place to think, place to try and work out what I was”
Larinda smiled at that. “Like that cave on the beach, Jill? Marsden, yeah? John, she used to ride out there, she told me, make a little fire and watch the waves, yeah? Same sort of thing, innit?”
John nodded. “Aye, sort of. You’ll see what I used to do, like. Keep your eyes to the right, that’s Sycamore Gap coming up. From that shite film with that bloke with no chin, Costner, aye? Never did fancy him, and he was shite at Robin. Gets off a boat in Sussex and five minutes later he’s here talking to Morgan what’s-his-face”
I had to rewind those last few sentences. My lover, casually using pronouns for me that I had once only dreamt of hearing. My school bully, talking about men he fancied or didn’t with no hesitation to his speech. John clearly noticed.
“Aye, Jill. Spent a long, long while trying to work out what I was, fish or fowl, like, and when it came to it, I thought, whey, if I’m a fish I better start swimming. I think your lass here is a bit like me. If you spend all your life waiting for something better on your plate, you end up starving. That right, Larinda?”
Mam interrupted, calling back from her Seat up front. “Aye, John, and that’s what I thowt as well. My flesh, my child, you never throw that away if you’re a mother…sorry, Will, I didn’t think, like”
He sighed. “Sorry not needed, Mrs Carter. What’ll happen will happen, and John here, yeah, he shows me it can work. John…did you have problems, you know, at home, when people found out sort of thing?”
John twitched slightly. “A bit, at first, like, settled down quite quick, ye knaa”
There was a rumble of laughter from his brother.
“Aye, especially after ye brock Geordie Bell’s nose!”
That set me off, and John joined in the laughter. “I hear ye had a little chat with him too, Jill?”
Suddenly, there was a wave of silliness in the car as Neil launched into a truly awful version of the Randy Crawford song, “You might kneed somebody”, as I am certain he wanted me to hear it, and we swept into the car park only for it to die abruptly as my family and friends caught the view, and their breath, at the same time. Peel Crags, Sycamore Gap, Crag Lough and its cliffs, and the line of the Wall marching above the black depths as small white clouds swept across a sky the size of Australia. Larinda took my hand, as Rachel reached forward to squeeze my shoulder.
“Fucking magic…sorry, Norma, but it is! I mean, the ride up was pretty, but this is gorgeous!”
“Aye, Rachel. My Rob used to bring me up here, when we were courting, aye? Always seemed to be raining back then…but he had a bike, with a sidecar, and, well, we…sorry”
Neil went round and opened her door, held his mother for as long as it took to settle her, then helped her down onto the tarmac as the rest of us stepped out, and I took my place ate her other side, and she took a hand each.
“No, you two, not the place to mourn, aye? Celebrate, even if it’s wi’ a bit cry. He did well, thy Dad, he gave me two bonny bairns, three if ye count thy brother, so let’s have the good bits, aye? Now, I will have mesel a bit tab, while the rest of ye go for a walk out and get me some pictures, aye?”
We walked out across the grass as she sat with Neil in the front of the car, and it was all I remembered, and more, as I shared it with people that I knew mattered to me and who I knew cared for me in turn. John showed us the routes he had climbed on the cliffs over the still pool of Crag Lough, and curlews wailed overhead. Jim took Rachel’s hand, and John just winked at me before whispering “She makes him smile, I said, and I like that”
I was surprised a second or two later, when Will took my free hand.
“Thanks again. Sounds silly, but all of this, the sky, you people; I think life might just end up being good after all, yeah?”
I gave him my best grin. “Seems OK from here, lad! How, I think it’s dinner time, aye?”
We wandered back to the car park, as school parties crested the ridge and tourists snapped pictures of themselves beside THAT tree, to find Mam serene in the car, as befitted her status, and Neil dozing in the lee of the wall. She smiled at me, and there was contentment there.
“Dinner, then? My treat”
There was a swirl of argument, based on the fact that she was doing everything else, and she just held up her hands for silence.
“I am not talking about a full meal, because I will NOT be slaving away this after if ye have all pigged yoursels out here! A sandwich, bit cake mebbes, aye? Then back hyem”
And lunch…Jim muttering almost quietly enough to himself. “Could de wi a decent cellarman, this place, like” as Rachel snorted and squeezed his leg.
We were fish, it seemed, and we were finding out how to swim.
CHAPTER 45
Larinda’s head lay on my shoulder as the twin prop droned South, Rachel snoring gently across the aisle of the half-full plane. We had seen Will off on his own flight home, and there had been tears on all sides. I fully understood how he was feeling, for while I had found acceptance both at home and where I lived, he only had us anywhere near him, and one brief glimpse of the promised land to show him what could or might be.
We had returned happy and windswept from the National Park, memories and electronic equivalents full of pictures, and Mam had indeed pulled out all the stops for the dinner. Jim saw the funny side when she realised that she had forgotten to top up her supply of potatoes, and so he walked round to his pub for a bag, which apparently needed two people to carry. John just smiled at me as they left. Good food, better company; I have to say that, because the one drawback of Mam’s cooking is that she likes her vegetables ‘properly cooked’, as in boiled to death. A small problem, compared with the day’s delights.
To nobody’s surprise, after a team effort “No, sit down, old woman!” with the dishes, we ended up back at Jim’s pub, where the evening rounded off with a quiet, slow, comfortable drink. It seemed that the earlier fencing had sorted out the group’s dynamics, and people seemed comfortable with each other, apart from Jim himself and my friend. It all came to an end, though, when I heard a small sound coming from my left, and realised Mam was snoring. Too much in one day, clearly, and to my astonishment, and deep gratitude, Jim waited till we were clearly finished before touching her lightly on the shoulder.
“Time for your bed, Norma”
With that, he casually scooped her out of her chair, and with a pang I realised exactly how old, how small, she was. He insisted on carrying her all the way round to our house, like a small child in his arms, till we arrived at the front door.
“Can ye put us down now please, Jim”
“Can ye manage the stairs?”
“Aye; look, lad, just…only one man has ever carried me like that, aye? And that was ower the threshold of our first place…so, please, aye?”
.
I suddenly understood how she was feeling, and took her hand as Jim put her down.
“You OK, Mam?”
“Aye, I am that. Just, aye, again…Look, a busy day, lots of emotion, and yeez are all off the morn, so let’s say a goodnight, aye, and a real thank you. Jim, ye’re a canny lad, and that’s a fact, and I do thank you. You know where I am, and this door is open, aye?”
She nodded to the rest of us, and we withdrew, Rachel apparently needing to check something outside for a few minutes. Mam was dead on her feet, though, so I helped her up the stairs to her room, and was met on the landing by my lover.
“Bedtime, you. The rest are settling down, so let’s leave them to it and get a bit of time to ourselves, yeah?”
And so we did.
A lighter breakfast the next day, and a stack of sandwiches was waiting in the kitchen, divided into four bundles. Two cars saw us to Heworth, and there was emotion as we left. Mam was determined.
“How, Larinda, you look after my bairn here, aye? I shall be checking up! And you two…Rachel, Will, what I said to Jim last night, aye? The door is open, whenever you need, so I will see you again, aye?”
I put my hand on Rachel’s arm. “Rach, don’t get her wrong. That wasn’t a question…”
So off to the airport, with a last view of the bridges, and farewell to Will at the boarding gate. We waited while he phoned Von, before the hugs and the tears and the separation.
I realised I had fallen asleep myself only with the thump of the wheels going down, and after an interminable walk we were finally off the plane and in Gatwick’s South Terminal. Larinda had a coin in her hand.
“Right, you two, heads we get the train, and tails this one splashes out on a cab, yeah?”
There was a cough behind me, and I turned round to see the other John.
“I have my car…”
Rachel slipped straight into her usual stance, head back and arms folded. “And what exactly are you doing here?”
He looked awkward, clearly well out of his comfort zone.
“Em, I knew when you were going and when you were due back, so it was just a matter of finding out what time the flight came in. I thought I owed you something, and this would be a small thank you”
Rachel turned to me. “How many flights come in each day, Rob?”
“Three or four, I think”
“So do tell, John, how you knew we would be on the afternoon one?”
He blushed slightly. “I didn’t…”
Rachel dropped out of her attack stance. “You…you’ve been waiting? Since when?”
“About seven thirty. I am retired now and it allowed me time to look at some of the aeroplanes”
Her voice was softer. “You have been here nearly seven hours, watching each arrival?”
“Just those from Newcastle. There are some with British Airways as well, in the North Terminal…”
He shook himself, courage gathered. “Look, you have all been very kind to me when I have been nothing but unpleasant to two of you. I felt, I wanted to do something to repay that, so I have my car, and I have waited, and I shall deliver you home if that is what you wish. What you will accept. If that is all right”
Larinda once more showed me why I loved her, why she was so different to Von. She could have asked around, to see how we felt about the lift; she could have been effusive in her gratitude. Instead, she simply put her bag down at my feet.
“Give me five minutes, John, while I get some fresh milk from Marks’. Want some, Rach?”
Translated, she meant that we should simply treat it as a normal fact of life, and make him less nervous. Rachel nodded.
“I’ll come with you, girl. Might have some treats there for later”
John slumped as they moved off, relief evident. “I have the car in the short term car park”
Shit. That must be costing him a fortune. “John, we should give you something towards the cost”
He stiffened up again. “No, Rob, or whatever it is the others call you. You have made a difference in my life, and you have done it despite our past, so that is an end to it. They will be back soon, so I will say this now, between us. There is something wrong about you, something I have not worked out fully. Wrong…that is not the best word. I am not the most social of creatures, but I am nothing if not an observer”
Ah. “Not now, eh, John? Maybe, some day. Have you spoken to the WWT yet?”
His face brightened. “I have indeed, and they will take me on. I get the promise of a sweat shirt and a badge, which may appeal to others, but it at least shows that I have some minor authority”
“John, as far as I am concerned, you are a major authority, on birds, that is. Here come the girls. Can you make me a promise?”
“What would that be?”
“What you have done today is kindness itself, but a touch, well, beyond normal, aye? Next time…just ring and ask. It’s what friends do”
One word, and he clearly felt it. Friends. The girls’ return distracted him, fortunately, and we were soon at his car and loaded. Larinda kept up a prattle of inanity that was obviously designed to break the mood, and when she mentioned the other John and Jim, he laughed.
“So you have two pairings of friends with the same names, then? How peculiar”
Rachel giggled, in a slightly embarrassed way. “Trust me, John, they couldn’t be more different! What’s in a name, yeah?”
He laughed, and it was such a normal sound. “And which of them is it that has caught your eye, Rachel?”
Larinda slipped in “Well, the other John being gay…”
I looked across at Rachel, and she was simply smiling, and something I should have realised leapt up and danced in front of me. Jim was different. Her experience of masculinity had largely been as a punchbag, a woman who needed to be Told, as that nasty joke had it, and she had seen Jim cry for his lost love, accept his puff of a brother as being nothing more nor less than a brother, and in dancing attendance on Rachel he had stepped aside from his own interests whenever someone else’s came up.
What had it really meant to her, watching what should have been the same sort of person she had married, the same macho arsehole, simply pick an old lady up like a child in order to see her safe home to bed? Just like John, she was learning to see, and the world was looking better for it.
John dropped us all off at my place, and phone numbers were exchanged with a promise to have a proper meal again, and John asking me to pass on his best to James. That was one thing that didn’t surprise me, to be truthful, for I suspected that John did see a lot of himself in the boy.
He drove off, and I sighed. “Work tomorrow, girls. Rach, you want to take the spare bed? Go in together, give them all something to talk about?”
“Yeah, if that’s OK with your other half here”
I laughed. “My place!”
“No, not any more. Way you two carry on, it’s definitely your plural place, yeah?”
Larinda picked up her bag. “Yes indeed, girl, so get in, and get changed”
She stonefaced our open mouths.
“Told you, she don’t get away from me, whatever she is. I saw more girl in one weekend that in the whole of the fifth form hockey team, so I might as well start getting used to it. So in, and change. Rach, you know where the kettle is”
“Oy, ain’t I the guest here?”
“Yeah, but if she’s gonna be in a skirt, I’ll still pick it for her!”
CHAPTER 46
I thrashed a little in the morning, trying to get the nightdress to ride down rather than up. I don’t know why, but every time I wore one it ended up around my waist. Nothing to do with Larinda’s designs on my body; simply some odd set of mechanics at work.
Work. Arsebollocks. I stumbled out as Larinda snuffled away in her sleep, and ran into Rachel as she filled the kettle.
“Nice nighty, mate”
“Yeah, from Evans, they actually make things my size. Em…I did it over the internet, the ordering. Can’t exactly walk in and try it on, can I?”
Rachel slipped into one of her stances, this one the head-cocked listener. “Funny, yeah? We both seem to have spent our lives in a box looking out, wondering why all the other buggers have got the pretties, yeah?”
I poured the water into the pot. “Got my pretty, Rach!”
She slipped an arm around my waist. “Yes, Jill, you have, and fuck me if you haven’t fallen on your feet. She’s hurting, you know?”
I ducked my head. “I know, kid. I don’t have any choice, though. That’s the shitty bit; I could almost give it all up, aye, be a bloke, just for her, aye? But that’s the word. Almost. One day, sure as eggs is eggs, I would break. Not fair on the lass, is it?”
“Ticking time bomb?”
“Aye, sort of”
I thought for a second, and it came to me. “Bomb, aye. Blows me up, but lots of that yank thing, collateral damage, like”
I leant against her, the warmth, the comfort, her own need. “Rach, I don’t have any choice any more. We can discuss the ins and outs, like, but it’s more the hows and whens now. I look around…I mean, I look at the people we know, aye, and apart from James, how many of them, of us, are at the end of most of it? We can do something, aye? He can’t, so who’s better off?”
“Very thoughtful this morning, girl”
“You know, that still gets me, aye? ‘Girl’…no, what I meant was that we still have a bit of a choice in things, like, and James doesn’t, he’s stuck in that place he was born, and us, we still have our options, and it would be a real shame, it would be an insult to James if we just, like, sat and whinged. Larinda’s doing her best, aye indeed, and you, you’ve got the hots for Jim, haven’t you?”
She pulled slightly away. “And your point is?”
“That you have kept a sense of hope, aye? I had been going that way, and she sort of dragged me out of it, and then she gets her own hopes shot down…and back she bounces. Shite, I’m getting this all confused, so I’ll just say that those of us with choices left owe it to them without to grab them and make the best of it”
“You think James is without choices?”
I took a few more seconds. “No, I don’t. I think he has choices, and he proved that with that bird thing he put together. It’s just that his world is all focus, all tunnel vision. That’s what I don’t know, whether he is like us, looking out and seeing what he can’t have, or whether it’s so foreign to him he can’t see it, that bee purple thing”
She pulled away from me a little as she made the tea, then turned round to catch my eyes with hers.
“Very, very serious this morning, love”
She handed me a cup, and I took another short pause as the steam warmed the tip of my nose. What a cliché, the mouth covered to hide the nerves.
“It’s a realisation, Rach. What’s that word? Epiphany? I need to go and sort myself out properly, I’ve realised that, and it’s going to be shitty, but not AS shitty, aye? As shitty as it would be if I did nowt”
Her eyes widened. “You mean you have really decided to dive in? You told that woman in the bedroom yet?”
I sighed. “No, not yet, but…she must know, aye? She knows what I am, she’s said so”
Rachel put her cup down and stepped forward into a soft hug. “Yeah, but, you know, she can know or guess all the shit in the world and it still needs to come from you, yeah? You owe it to her”
“Yeah…look, need to get sorted, aye? Work calling”
She sniffed. “Gillian Carter, you remember one thing: all that crap you just said about time, and seizing it when you’ve got a chance, a choice, yeah, and the same goes for her. Give her that time, that choice, too. Only fair”
I had to laugh. “Bloody choices, and mine makes itself”
“When’s your next shrink visit, Jill?”
“Next week”
“Well, you need to tell him all this, yeah? That you want to go full-tilt slice and dice”
I winced. I might not have been overly fond of my bits, but the idea of sharp blades anywhere near me was not high on my list of favourite things. “What makes you think that?”
“Oh, for fuck’s sake, isn’t that what this whole conversation was about? You are not talking about living in drag, I can tell. You are taking Larinda’s toy away, aren’t you?”
“I need to talk to him first…”
“Bollocks do you if you mean discuss it, you need to make a bloody declaration! Look at you, standing there, going to go for it, but not if it involves actually doing it”
“I’d have to do a year, Rach, at least, yeah?”
“And you thought it would or could just be given to you in a bag or a bottle? You’re like a bloody teenager---no, fuck it, a kid running away. You have it all planned out, gonna walk to wherever the fuck with your schoolbag full of jam sandwiches and a gamekid or whatever the bloody thing’s called, and you get a hundred yards down the road and it rains and, well, you know the rest!”
How had that happened? I was the one making the declaration of intent, and then Rachel shot me down. The sad thing was that she was right; I had spent my life with earnest intentions of transition, and every time I had stirred myself thus far I had crashed and burned, failure and inadequacy just making my self-hatred stronger. She was cutting right into my core with her words, and yes, she was right, absolutely so. She softened her tone, seeing my reaction.
“Girl, no big deal just now, yeah, but speak to that shrink, and then you need to make that choice because I need you to help you with my own, yeah, and James, and Odd John, yeah, and Larinda too, they need you to make yours because they ain’t got anywhere they can go but after you”
“Larinda…”
“Larinda is stuck, hook, line, sinker, yeah? And you bloody well know it. Now, drink up”
“Bit sort of pushy, Rach?”
She grinned. “Back to work, innit? Got to get the nasty face on before I get in, your family left me out of practice. Seriously, my opinion, for what it’s worth: speak to her, but go where you need to, not where you think you can. There’s two of you, works better than a solo”
She suddenly went back into her stance. “What size shoes you take?”
“Eight and a half or so, aye?”
“Shit. What’s the point of having a BFF if I can’t borrow her shoes!”
I seized my moment, and grabbing two cups made my escape to the bedroom, where Larinda was now sitting up.
“Took you long enough!”
“Yeah, well, Rachel wanted a bit of a rant”
“About you, or about that northern gorilla she fancies?”
“Well, both, like”
“And she’s telling you to get yourself up to speed, yeah?”
I could feel myself blushing. “Yeah, she is”
She put the cup down, took mine from my hand and set it on the bedside table. “Come here”
CHAPTER 47
The week went by as weeks do, but each day was one closer to my meeting with Alec. Larinda seemed to be avoiding the subject, but each evening she insisted I ‘dress for dinner’, and I noticed that she was pushing my diet firmly in the direction of health.
I realised what she was doing in regards to my appearance: putting her toes into the water, trying to allow her perception of me to adjust. There was no repeat of the dressing up bedroom disaster, but we made love regularly and as often as two middle-aged people could manage now that the initial urgency had dissipated, and naked. It seemed that while she accepted Jill more and more in her life, she had to stay outside that particular room.
I rode over to Alec’s little place with thoughts chasing themselves in circles as I pedalled. He had a different cardigan this time, one with holes in the elbows, and it left me once again wondering what his own little problems might be. Healer, shrink thyself?
“How are you today, Jill?”
“Sort of at that crossroads, Alec. Life is a bit insistent at the moment, a bit pushy”
“Friends or family?”
“No, not really. They have helped me clear my thinking a bit, like, but it’s more my own self that’s pushing, aye? Ticking clock…biological clock, indeed”
“You feel in a hurry?”
“Every day you’re in this place you’re two days nearer death”
He raised an eyebrow. “Ron Angel? Don’t look so surprised, I’m a folky. Bad fiddler, worse singer. So you are still seeing your life receding?”
“It’s a mix of things, Alec. You know I want this…”
“Do I? Do you?”
“Yes, to both, I think. Look, it’s not just me. My…partner is also pushing”
“Why would she do that?”
“I have no idea. She’s straight, aye?”
“No, Jill. Please think about that question”
Oh. “Alec…I do believe she loves me. I know I have to do something…two days nearer death, aye? She sees that…fuck, she does love me, doesn’t she?”
“Explain, Jill”
“It’s like Rachel said. She sees what I really need, what I must do, and she puts me first”
“As you were doing with your mother, yes?”
“Aye, Alec, exactly. You’re trying to make me look at things properly, aren’t you?”
“So you think you weren’t?”
Shit. I should have known this sort of thing wouldn’t be easy. “Yes, Alec, I see what you mean. She wants me to be happy, and I can’t be if I get no chance at being myself, like”
“I think it’s more than that”
“Aye…you know where I was going, don’t you?”
He sighed, a little emotion showing. “Yes, I do. Flensing, that’s what I call it, peeling away the baggage till you can make your exit cleanly. You’ve stopped that, so I can relax a bit, but what worries me here is that no man–or woman–is an island. I treat you, fine, but you extend outwards through your loved ones, and if I don’t consider that bit, it will fester and corrode”
“What do I do, Alec?”
“Ah, shit, Jill, you want me to tell you? That has to be your decision. All I can do is show you some maps. Look, here’s a snippet. I am reasonably happy with your self-diagnosis. It’s something some therapists forget, that in cases like this the only person who truly knows is the patient, because they are living it. So, what I would like you to do is see your GP and get some bloods taken”
Bloody hell. “You putting me on hormones, Alec?”
“Nope, not my job nor my decision. What I want to do is refer you to the gender clinic at Charing Cross, and let the real experts there poke you about. I would keep on at you about your self-harm issues–don’t look surprised, I am far from dense. The quack can do all the necessary build-up with your bloods in case they do decide to go forward with you. There is one big question, though, isn’t there?”
I nodded, for I had seen it trying to hide and knew I had to drag it out. “Transition…”
Alec gave his own nod. “Indeed. You will at some point have to face up to coming out properly. Not indoors, not to a few friends, but to the world, and that is where I need to keep an eye on you. Even without the hormones, there will be mood swings, moments of depression or doubt. It’s a big thing, and I am more than sure you will have read everything you can on it already. That’s my own fear, Jill”
“Like that girl you mentioned?”
“No, Jill. Mel was on her own. No friends, not where she lived. She didn’t fail, she was murdered”
There was a little glow of hatred and anger in his eyes, but he shook himself before continuing.
“No, Jill, not that. You have moved beyond suicidal intentions, I believe, for now, but unless you have the support I am now trusting you have those thoughts may return. That’s my worry”
He started to put his notes away, and I realised we had spent far more time than it had seemed. I started to pull my gloves on, and Alec looked up from his seat.
“Jill, the two of you are well-suited, very well indeed. You each put other people before yourself. Just remember: this is an instance when you need to put yourself first, just this once. If you don’t, she won’t have you at all. I think, from what you have said, that she sees that as clearly as I now do. Treat her softly, yes?”
I pulled my jacket on and stood up to go.
“Alec, you should come over one evening, have a meal with us, like”
“Ah, that I would indeed like, but not allowed, not at all. Professional rules, you see”
Shabby, and so tired. He made me look at my life, at my own choices, and as my eyes opened I saw things that I was, perhaps, not meant to. It wasn’t just the dead girl that dragged at his soul, and I had a sudden vision of a club for those who cared. Me, Larinda, Alec, all closing our lives down for the sake of others. Give it time, girl, give it time, and one day, maybe, we would be able to share a glass and hopefully a laugh.
Larinda was home later than usual that evening.
“You got the kettle on, lover?”
“As soon as I heard the key, pet, I value my life too much to fail on that one!”
Sometimes, a joke speaks more truth than the greatest philosophers ever manage. She stuck her head round the kitchen door after kicking off her shoes.
“You’ve gone all silent…hell, tears?”
“Sorry, love, just suddenly realised something, and it sort of got to me a bit, aye?”
She took me in her arms and kissed my eyes, where the tears hung ready to fall. “Speak, love”
The words were there, logjammed in my head. “Like, just, that joke, aye? Value my life? Session with Alec, it made me realise what I have, what I could have, shit, what I intend to have, aye? And there’s you there, and I value you, and it just sort of came home that you are my life, right here and now, and I am so bloody lucky, aye?”
I paused for what thought I could assemble. “And Doctor Devereaux, aye? He just looks so dead, so threadbare, and he’s still doing stuff for people, for me, aye?”
“Alec Devereaux? His brother works at my place. Just getting himself up to speed again…oh, you wouldn’t know, would you? His other half passed away six months back. Nasty case of blood cancer. State Lee was in I am astonished his brother can speak never mind work. Why didn’t you say who it was?”
I wiped my eyes with the back of my hand. “Sort of awkward, pet. Even though we both know what it’s all about, going to a shrink is still a bit sort of shameful, aye?”
She laid her head against my shoulder. “I know, love, I know, but partners, yeah?”
“Did you know his wife at all? He seems to have stopped taking care of himself a bit”
“His wife? We never met, but I do believe he was called Frank”
“Ah. I’m a bit dense, aye? Suppose I must be a bit self-absorbed in there. Not surprising”
“Listen, love, you pour the tea. I have a bit of underwire tit, so I will go and do the getting into something more comfortable. There’s a pressie for you on the settee. Back in two, yeah?”
I put the water into the pot, and went into the living room just as Larinda emerged wearing a nighty. There was a box on the settee, plain black,
“Go on, it won’t bite, though I might if you’re very good”
I slipped the lid off, and there were two artificial, prosthetic, false, whatever the word is. Breasts. I picked one up, surprised at the weight, and heard a snigger from Larinda.
“You’re feeling a right tit now, love!”
She took a step towards me, and held my hands.
“How would you like to feel a proper one?”
CHAPTER 48
The phone rang at some stupid time in the morning, even more stupid than I had set the alarm for.
“Mglwmffh?”
“Jill? William. Just sneaking a quick call, wanted to let you know. Provisional acceptance at Newcastle”
That woke me up, and with me, Larinda, who grunted awake beside me.
“Who is it, love?”
“Will. Got accepted at Newcastle”
“Brilliant! Tell your mum?”
“Later, love. Will, Larinda says brilliant, aye? Want me to let Mam and Neil know?”
“Please. Got to run; will speak when I can, yeah?”
“You know where I am, son”
“Thanks, Jill. You…look, without you, I don’t know, yeah…”
“Go! Fill me ion on details when you can talk, aye? Bye!”
I settled back down against my lover, and then realised the alarm was about to go off.
“Sod it. Want tea?”
“Yeah, love. Been thinking…what would you say to me getting a decent bike to ride to work?”
“Bit out of the blue, that”
She giggled. “Saw a couple of cyclists the other day, yeah, and they were a couple who were cyclists as well, if you get my drift”
“Yeah…”
“Well, the kit would have been identical, but he obviously did a lot more on the bike, cause hers was all shiny new, yeah, and his was all washed out. And it got me thinking…”
“Always dangerous, that”
“Yeah well, I was thinking it would be nicer to ride in, get fitter, yeah, and then I had a bit more think, and…”
She tailed off. “This has never been easy for me, but you know that. I get swings and roundabout stuff, I look at you and you’re bloke, look back and you’re girl, and the bloke is slowly losing. You know…you know I have chosen my place, yeah, and it’s beside you, so I started thinking, what’s that trick? Where you get a sheet of paper and write all the pros and cons out, yeah?”
“Aye…”
“Well, lost all my other dress-up dollies decades ago, and if we are getting cycling stuff…and all the other crap, then you can be my own dress-up doll”
“You what?”
She grinned. “Well, p’raps better put it this way: if I am going to have a girlfriend, then I reserve the right to vet what she bloody wears, OK?”
I had to laugh at that, especially as I rather liked what she normally wore, as well as the contents, of course. We seemed to be settling into some sort of life together, one that would allow me to have the life I wanted and needed for myself. How she would react if or when surgery came along…
“Jill?”
“Aye?”
“Could you hang fire with the tea for a bit? Fancy some breakfast, I do”
I was only five minutes late for work.
That day’s delights were a small builder and a CTN, the latter on one of the less friendly retail schemes. Why? D would have worked, even B with his till, but no, he wanted to be flash, and of course he stuffed it up nine ways from Sunday. We could, of course, have visited him when he first opened up, but hey, that would involve using staff with no obvious number to put down as a result. The builder, though…look, hint to the wise, if you are going to do off-record work, don’t be so greedy that you claim back the cost of materials delivered to places where you have no work recorded as being in progress. One for the serious misdeclaration boys, in the end. Same old same old. I got the usual questions about how I slept at night as I wheeled the bike past the builder’s Range Rover, and bit back a reply that would have involved explicit sexual references, and then on the other, that would have donated sexually explicit suggestions.
Rachel was in the office when I got back, pacing by the tea-urn in her familiar stance. She checked the corridor as I came in.
“Jill, would you do me a favour, bit of advice, yeah?”
“What have you done and where are the bodies buried?”
“Cheeky fucker. Look, I was thinking, got the weekends all sort of free now you’re so loved up you ain’t got time for your mates…what are you doing?”
I handed her the paper I had been writing on. “Number of the pub, Rach”
“Oh for god’s sake, girl, you don’t think I came away without his number? We’ve been talking most days since we got back, yeah? Was just, you know”
“Would it be a good idea to invite him down? Well, that’s not the question, really, is it?”
“Well, what is?”
“Could he get a manager in for more than just the one evening is one of them, aye?”
“Well, he says he can, done it before for holidays and shit. What did you mean ‘one of them’?”
“One of the questions”
“Stop teasing, you cow. Spill”
“Nothing much; just wondering how the office would react to you coming in on the Monday walking like John Wayne after a weekend of non-stop shagging”
“You bitch, you can talk!”
Comfortable laughter, friends indeed. How could I have missed picking up on so much?
“Rach, got some news. Will’s been provisionally accepted for the Uni up there. Looks like we’ll have quite a few reasons to go up there again”
“Yeah…your Mam? Neil? They OK?”
“Aye, much better as they go on. Neil seems to be getting out more, less cowering. I think the thing with John, like, opened the world back up for him.. Mam, she’s just about completely healed now, she’ll be off dancing one of these days. Ah. Bolt hole?”
She gave me a twisted little smile. “That’s the thing, girl. I would love to have him down for the weekend, and I would love to go up there, but, well, my history ain’t exactly been wonderful, has it?”
I gave her a hug. “I have room, if that’s what you want. Bring him down, stash him at mine, but no instructions, aye?”
“Pardon?”
“When you are in the middle of your sixteenth shag, we don’t want to have to listen to you telling him exactly what to do. Look, I understand your caution, Rach, but Jim, well, he’s a canny lad, never, ever did me any harm”
She gave me a very flat look. “My last fella did enough harm for ten blokes, yeah? I just need…shit, I just need somewhere I can lock the door, be safe, yeah? Just till I know if I have to, you know?”
“Aye, I know. Look, Larinda and I may be off to the reserve this weekend again, meet up with James and his parents, aye? Want to tag along?”
“Arundel or John’s place?”
“The latter, I think. Be the Sunday; give the girlfriend a chance to look at some bikes the day before”
“Bugger me, you an evangelist or something?”
“No, just makes sense, like. Saves petrol, keeps her fit”
“Well, forget any ideas about me on a bike in London, Carter. Drivers round here are crap enough, ten times worse there. Sunday sounds good, I’ll try and find something sensible that doesn’t involve lycra. Larinda OK with the shiny stuff now?”
I laughed. “She says she will be picking the cycling kit from now on. Just had a thought…”
Rachel twitched. “That sounds dangerous. Seriously…ah, you are thinking of going as yourself, yeah? And what about John?”
“Guilty, pet. That was my thought. Just…it will be up in London, and he might not be working, and, well, I just feel the need to stretch out a bit, aye?”
“Well, if you do, I have your back, but talk to her first, right? You don’t drag her along, you travel together”
Sunday morning dawned slightly grey, but it was dry, and there was a chance of sun later, but that wasn’t what was on my mind. Larinda had done her best, and the weight of her gift was distracting enough that I nearly forgot about the other…aspects.
We had made sure my legs and arms were smooth before settling on a pair of baggy shorts and one of my brighter cycling shirts. Larinda had found a sports bra to fit me, which would prevent any unwelcome departure of my two front passengers. She had also spent a little while doing things to my face and hair.
“Trust me, Jill, with the bit of weight we have got off you, and the fact that most men will be staring at your chest, you will be fine”
“And if I am not?”
“It’s London. Full of weirdos, and far enough away to be safe, so it should be fine. Look…you have to take the plunge sooner or later, and this will be with five friends around you, five people who love you, girl. Here”
“Pink cycle gloves?”
“Yeah, we match now. Shorts, shirts and gloves. Well, only the gloves really match, but you know what I mean”
“Yeah, yeah, yeah…oh fuck it, come on”
For the first time in my life I left my house in make-up, with a pair of tits inside my shirt. The sports bra helped, but there was a definite pull at the straps and a very slight restriction to my breathing. As the one who already had a ‘decent’ bike, I had all of the equipment in my panniers, and we were soon at the station. Thank the gods for automatic ticket machines, which meant that I didn’t have to try and talk my way through a human being while dressed so oddly. Rachel joined us at the next stop, and merely raised an eyebrow. It wasn’t till we were just about to get off at Clapham Junction that I heard the first comment.
“Daddy, why has that man got lady bumps?”
The sliding doors cut off the reply, probably fortunately. One more train, along to Barnes, and then the short ride down to the reserve. James, Terry and Karen were waiting at the entrance, just before the little bridge, and we waved as we swang round to the cycle sheds. Offload, change shoes, walk over…
James looked at me, and I could see his mind derailing. He gave his greeting, his declaration of their identity, to Rachel and Larinda before turning back to me. He seemed absent, just for a minute, and then his face cleared.
“You are Jill, and you are Gillian, and you only have two names”
CHAPTER 49
“Hiya James. You are James and you are my friend, aye?”
He smiled, which was always a highlight of my life. Karen saw, and smiled with him.
“Out in the open, Jill?”
“Aye, for today. Brought the support crew, like, but it is still a little off. We sort of thought London, you know, all used to seeing oddities, all strangers. Just wanted…”
Words failed me just then, and I had to think for a few seconds. What exactly was I doing here, in a bra with plastic tits and a painted face?
“Karen, it was, well, impatience? I had to do something, anything, just to get it moving. I couldn’t stay the way I was, and it seemed like a good idea. Shit, it seemed like a good idea right until we left the bloody house, that is. Now, I’m not so sure”
She hugged me, which seemed to be the central theme of my life at that point, and smiled again. “You look good, honest. You look a bit chunky, can’t avoid that, but the chest helps, and more than that you’re in a group, so not alone, yes? Hell, girl, you should have realised that years ago. Never alone, got me? Now, brought all your usual kit? We splashed out on some of our own; James has really got into the way of this stuff. Come on, in we go. James has his book, right, son?”
“Yes, I have two books. One is mine and the other is mine, but it is not mine because it is the Collins Field Guide that they gave me as a present when I joined the Trust so now I have my own card for free entry to all of their reserves in the country”
He was gushing, nervousness clearly in play. I smiled back at him. “Shall we go to the Tower or to the Wildside first, James?”
“If we go to the Tower it will be through the restaurant and then you can have a cup of tea after all the train journey you have done”
I gave Terry a sharp look, and he grinned. “We are having a good day today. Son, thank you for thinking of our friends, that was kind. Tea and cake, everyone?”
We made our way into the reception area, and my appearance didn’t seem to draw any interest. Perhaps it was the fact that my membership card was simply swiped through the machine without a look, but we were in and I was still nervous. Round the corner to the café, with the Frankie Howerd ducks calling just beyond, and I settled down with a ‘pot for one’ and a slice of carrot cake. Karen leant forward for an inspection.
“Who did your face?”
“My better half there. She also found the gloves”
Karen nodded. “Nice job. More is less, all that stuff. Give the public something to focus on, like the gloves, and they see what they want to”
Rachel joined us after her short bus ride, just in time to catch up on the cake front, and she proudly showed us her own ‘free gift’ copy of a bird guide.
“So I got mugged when I entered? No worries, I love this place, it’s just so, dunno, not London? And I got these”
She opened her rucksack to reveal two thermos flasks and a container of milk. Terry just smiled.
“Marry me? I know it’s illegal, but I am sure we can plead some special sky-pixie rule to let us be as one before Heaven and the holy tea-pot”
Karen slapped his thigh as James giggled. “Dad, you are married to Karen and it is only allowed to be once”
Karen humphed. “Spoken for, you are!”
Larinda grinned wickedly. “Yeah, and so is she, if she’d admit it”
Karen clearly sensed blood. “Do tell…” she purred.
Larinda shrugged. “Nothing much to tell. We went up to see Jill’s family, show William around, yeah, and she met this northern monkey. Well, when I say monkey, I mean gorilla. Nice guy, though”
Rachel was actually blushing. “With my history with men, I hope to be a little luckier. Sod it, I deserve to be. He IS a nice guy, though, so far. I’m happy, you know, to give it a bit of a try-out”
Karen put on her most angelic expression, just as I took a sip of tea, and said “Sort of suck it and see?”
Once I had cleaned myself and the table, we agreed tacitly not to explain the joke to James.
It was colder now, and we ambled along towards the Peacock Tower a flight of parakeets went screaming through the trees as some monstrous airliner droned over from Heathrow. How they stayed up, god only knew. The sand martins were gone, along with the Cetti’s, but at the top of the Tower we got our view out over the marsh and lagoons. Snipe were there in abundance, and geese, as well as a nice mix of wintering ducks: teal, widgeon, the usual shovellers and gadwall, plus a few shelduck. James spent a contented half hour devising names, including ‘pop-up’ for the dabchick, and then the lift doors opened to admit another group of birders, led by a very familiar man in a green sweatshirt. His eyes found Rachel first, and he brightened, but then his gaze travelled on, and came to rest on my face, then my chest, and once more rose with apparent effort to look me in the eye. Karen stepped in.
“Hello again, John! You know Rachel of course, Terry and James, and Larinda, and you should remember Jill here”
It was a surreal experience. I could actually see the thoughts follow each other through his mind, each setting a little twitch off round his eyes, and then he nodded.
“Karen, hello. Nice to see you all again. Hello, Jill, this is my guided group for this morning. Have you seen anything of note?”
James nodded. “Hello John. I have seen pop-ups today, and Frankie Howerd ducks”
One of John’s group was listening, looking puzzled. John thought for a few seconds. “Pop-ups…Jill, would that by any chance be a dabchick?”
“Spot on, John”
He turned to the five or six people with him. “James here is making his own bird book, based entirely on mnemonics. He has come up with alternative names for some birds, based on jizz and field marks, or on song, or on a combination. Anyone worked out what a Frankie Howerd duck is?”
There was silence, and then one of them started to snigger. “Tell me it’s an eider drake…”
John just nodded and said “Ah-OOH missus!”
The woman who had worked it out laughed happily. “That is inspired! What a wonderful idea, son!”
John smiled. “Yes, it is, and he is a very sharp lad. Now, when we are away from children I will explain his name for the Cetti’s warbler”
James, however, had drifted behind his father, and his hands were up before his face. Too many people, too much attention. John saw, and I realised there was true empathy there. Whatever position he occupied on the spectrum, he was still aware enough to see distress in another. He shepherded his group over to the other side of the central pillar and got them set up overlooking the other small scrape, then came back round.
“Jill…we can have lunch today? I will be here”
I nodded. “Good to see you again, John. We are going to have a walk over to the Wildside, then grab something hot. I am sure we will see you on the path, aye?”
“Aye. Yes. Jill…you were right; this is what I needed. It grounds me, as I believe the expression is”
“John, you have a group to lead. The grounding should be with them. We will see you in a little while, OK?”
“OK. In a little while”
We hurried James away from the crowd and off to one of the quieter sculpture areas, where he started to recover his equilibrium.
“Friends. You are all friends. John is a friend. John has too many people to be friends with today”
Terry nodded. “We’ll go past the Frankie Howerds and see if there are any others about, hey, son?”
“Yes Dad. Jill and Rachel and Larinda and Karen will come too. There will be six of us”
Six there were, and it was quiet at the end of the network of paths, which helped James settle down enough to start recovering.
“What was that bird, Jill, Gillian?”
That was a green woodpecker, James”
“It sounds like laughing. I will call it a laughle”
I laughed myself. “James, it already has another name, and that is ‘yaffle’, because of the call, aye? Which one is better?”
“I will call it a yaffle too, then. I can’t be right all the time”
Terry blinked, and then grinned, as James slid seamlessly into one of the most normal phases of behaviour I had ever seen from him. It lasted all the way round the wilder part of the reserve, as we watched small birds on the feeders as rats attempted to grab their dropped seeds. Back to the café again, and there was a real chill in the air now. Rachel’s flasks had been emptied, to much appreciation, and obvious effect, and I needed a visit when we arrived at the central complex. It was Karen who grabbed my arm.
“No. Not the gents’, love, not today. Come with us”
What should have been bloody obvious needed pointing out, but it did demonstrate one thing: I had relaxed at last. We each found a cubicle, did what was needed, and then Karen helped me readjust my warpaint before we joined the others again. Larinda just nodded.
The dish of the day was lasagne, and it was a treat. Not because of any startling expertise in their kitchen, but rather because it was warm and we were not. John joined us rather quickly, and I suspected he had been hovering nearby just to be certain, as I now realised was one of his odder habits.
“Well, Jill. A lot explained here, and a lot of questions. Am I enough of a friend to be included in what they call ‘the loop’?”
James looked up from his plate, and stared right at John, in a way I had never seen him do before.
“Jill is Gillian and has two names. Jill and Gillian were Rob, but that was a Robskin that she wore and it had to come off. Wearing two skins hurts. Taking one off hurts. Jill that is Gillian that was Rob is my friend. She hurts. Other people shouldn’t hurt her more. I…I…I will hurt anybody who hurts my friend and Jill and Gillian and Rob are my friend”
CHAPTER 50
John looked a little nervous at that, and I realised that he too had been shocked by the boy’s directness. He took a couple of deep breaths, and a glance at me, before replying.
“Jill is a friend and I will not hurt…her if I can, James”
James just nodded and went back to trying to separate the layers of his lasagne so that he could eat the parts separately, and John pulled over a chair.
“You seem to have formed quite a regular group. I am going to assume…no, I am going to ask, is this a real thing? No, I know it is real, I mean, I am observing it, but…please explain. This is no recreational activity, is it?”
Karen answered before I could. “No, John, no recreation, no hobby. My son said it exactly as it is. All the same person, one who needs to emerge now. Chrysalis, butterfly, yes?”
I caught just the slightest flicker of a smile from Terry at the phrase she used for James, and I saw again how wrong I had been to doubt him. There was love there, deep and abiding, and they were clearly right for each other, despite his history. Chalk another one down to the stupidity and pig-headedness of Rob. Perhaps Jill would be a better person, I thought, before reminding myself that I was one, not two, and always had been. Chrysalis, butterfly, or rather some large and ugly moth, but Karen had caught the process exactly. I looked up at our odd…friend.
“John, this is me. This is the real me. This is who I have always been and who I should have been born if the world ran with any justice or mercy, aye?”
He looked at me steadily, and I realised that he was doing his observation thing, checking me for salient points, field marks as birdwatchers call them. Did I pass? Was I fowl or its homophone? It was like watching some sort of machine produce an object: I could see the gears turning, see something emerging, but not what it was.
“Jill, then. Jill. This is not something I am familiar with; I prefer a little more order in my life”
That was surely an understatement, and Rachel snorted in amusement. John wasn’t finished, though.
“Jill, I know I am rather difficult at times, but I will say one thing, so please let me finish. I have said that I prefer order, and that has always been my way. As you know, I have been speaking to somebody more professional than yourselves, and she is leading me into a better understanding of the reasons for that. I am not right in my own head is the answer, but that does not mean that I am wrong there, just differently aligned. It has taken me a very long time to see that, and it has resulted in some historical dislocation…I mean, in the past, I have not managed to deal with other people in a fully productive way”
Rachel was covering her mouth at that point, and I wondered if she was actually enjoying his discomfort. So much water under the bridge. John looked at her, and sighed, then flicked his eyes towards James, and Terry caught the glance.
“How much tea have you had, son?”
“I have drunk six cups, Dad”
“Do you want to go to the toilet before we carry on, then?”
As the boy left, Terry turned to John. “You want to say something about my son, don’t you? But you have the manners to do it while he’s out of the way, so you are capable of learning”
That struck me. In a way, his comment was a direct insult to John, and it was clear the older man himself realised it, but his only physical reaction was a nod.
“Yes, that is what I am. Your son is autistic, clearly, but you help and support him, you care for him and you have more patience than I have ever known, both of you, Jill, the other girls too”
‘Other girls’. Oh my. He spoke on.
“James is autistic, I am autistic. Or, rather, I am on the same scale of illness, disorder, unconventional manner of thinking, call it what you will. The more I talk to Sally, the more I see what I do to others. She leads me through role plays, and then we analyse what it is I do wrong. She says…she has told me that if I can learn to recognise what she has called invisible differences in flying rats, I am capable of learning alternative means of dealing with people”
I gave him my best smile. “That sounds good, John”
“Yes, but it is learned and conscious behaviour, rather than instinct and empathy. I know now not only that I am different, but that I always will be. That is not a good thing”
Karen put her hand on his forearm. “No, John, it isn’t. What it is, in truth, is a better thing than it was. Look at Jill, there. Jill, what’s it like being a man?”
Bingo. “I have no idea. I have never been one”
“So how did you learn to behave like one?”
“Learned and conscious, Kaz. That and necessity”
She turned back to John. “See what I mean, John? She had to learn how to pretend, play a part all her life, and none of that came by instinct. Look around her, John. How much love is there here? Love for her? Love that came to her even as she played that untrue role?”
He had dropped his eyes at that, but looked up again. “You think, if I practise, I could do better?”
Rachel was laughing aloud now. “John, MATE, think of how you were in the Tower just now, yeah? Not only did you make James’ day, but you saw clearly enough to realise when he was getting out of his depth. The original you, I am sure, would have kept trying to show him off as your new toy, but no, you saw the thing he does with his hands, and you took away his stress. That was human, John, that was loving, yes?”
He started at that word, but she had him. “Look, just think, about this girl here. Everything she has ever had to do in public has been an act, up till now. She cares for others, and many people think that is a girl thing, yeah, but it isn’t, it’s a people thing, a human thing”
Terry had reached out to take his wife’s hand as she continued her little lecture. “Look at James, and the way he reacted when he saw you, the love that he brought out even though his ways of expressing it are lost. Why should you be different? Why should you be the only one to lack that humanity? You don’t, you know, you show it all the time. We just need to help it come out. Sod it, I want cake. No, John, no”
He had risen immediately, and I guessed it was to go and buy the cake she had asked for.
“That is not how it works, my friend. We say what we would like, and then we ask about, and then we decide. Slow down, think, and be a friend among friends, yeah?”
My lovely woman, the one my own blindness had let walk away from me; I could see why Terry loved her, but I had always seen that. What I saw now was why I loved her myself, and I felt my eyes go a little moist as I realised how amazing my luck had been, letting one wonderful woman walk out of my arms only for me to fall straight into the arms of another. Terry saw, and gave me a wink, one that said something like ‘Ah, that’s my girl!’
John held his silence for a moment. “Well, we are all friends here, then. Shall I get a round of teas in while someone else sorts some cake out? Ah, here is James again. Do you want tea and cake, my boy?”
“Are you a friend now John?”
The older man just smiled. “Yes, I believe I am, now”
“Then I shall have another cake, please, and that will be two cakes for me and nine cups of tea today”
“Shall we see how many types of cake there are?”
“This morning there were seven, and I would like chocolate fudge cake please Mum”
Karen jerked at that. “Where did that come from, James?”
“People are not just names. They are like the birds, they each do things and you are Karen and you do Mumming. I see Jill and she girls. Can I have coke and not tea please?”
And so we had teas, and cakes, and as John had finished with his voluntary duties we walked out into the chill, a group of friends on a cold day with lives to build and share.
CHAPTER 51
It was the start of things, and to my surprise I wasn’t rushing into things the way I had assumed. Larinda and Rachel had got Jill out of the nest, and all of the stories I had read on that particular website had been full of the same trope, the same repeated concept: that once the plunge was taken, the ‘new’ woman never looked back. That wasn’t true, and, in fact, without constant prodding by my lover and my friend, Jill would have remained a purely domestic goddess. Things came to a head after our first Christmas together.
“You don’t really expect me to go through bloody Debenhams in a skirt?”
“Well, I am not bloody cycling there and back, girl, and I doubt Rach will!”
“Aye, but, you know…”
“Crawley is far enough away for you to be safe, and the shops are better than the Belfry has ever had! Skirt on, face on, tits in! Move!”
I couldn’t help it, and started to laugh. Larinda frowned.
“And that is funny how, exactly?”
“Sorry, pet, it was just a mental picture, aye? When you get all bossy like that, I just saw you then in a leather corset and boots rig, aye? With a whip?”
“Well, there is an Ann Summers in the Martletts…”
There was a definite twinkle there, and she added with a broader grin “…matching outfits?”
I looked over to Rachel, deliberately misunderstanding Larinda’s suggestion, and got an even broader grin from my friend.
“Yeah, he might just go for that. Nice stockings, decent make-up job, posh perfume, handcuffs, girl never knows her luck!”
It struck me, just then. We were laughing and joking as any three people would, but more than that it was as three women. My appearance was slowly changing, as weight came off and a much better diet did things for my skin, but it wasn’t that. It was as Larinda had said: I was now coming across as a girl, my learned and camouflaging behaviour steadily being discarded, and up till then she had stayed the course. She seemed to be learning to put aside her sexuality to an extent, to see beyond whatever image I was portraying, see me as the man---the person she loved. At some point, I knew, there would be another crisis, but for now she was steady, and sure, and always there for me.
She grabbed the car keys and threw me a ready-filled handbag, and we were off, all of us, despite my arguments, in heels. I mean, the two of them practically lived in them, and I did have some nice ones now, but it was still odd to be wearing them in public.
“Shut it, Jill! Look stupid, odd, yeah, two girls out of three in nice shoes and the other one dressed down, yeah?”
“Aye, Rach, but I’ve not walked that far in them for years!”
“Then you’ll just have to do the link-arms bit, my girl. Stop complaining or you won’t get any cake”
“You are evil and nasty and cruel”
“Yeah, yeah, yeah. Toss you for sitting in the front?”
She won, but in the end let me have the seat on the basis that Larinda wouldn’t want to stoke HER leg. We parked right on the roof that day, and Rachel wandered over to the rail to watch the planes approaching the airport.
“Jill…”
“Aye?”
“I haven’t said anything before, but, well, New Year’s Eve…”
“Yes. When is he coming down?”
“I know it’s not normal, yeah, to want to have somewhere to hide”
“Rachel, that was just ‘yes’. I don’t think you’ll need to hide, like, but the answer will always be yes. Want one of my kidneys? Same answer. I owe you, you and this old dominatrix here”
Larinda slipped an arm around my waist. “Jim? You having him down for the weekend? What about the pub?”
“He says John will be about, and he’s got a relief manager, so it’s all covered, and he said that it would be nice for once to be on the other side of the bar and outside a few beers and---“
“Rachel…”
Larinda’s voice was calm, but slightly amused. “Slow down just a little, yeah? We know, we’ve both been there, I was like that when we first met, so breathe a little between the words. Helps”
“Sorry…look, coffee and cake first, or sales?”
I grinned. “Coffee first, then sales, then coffee and cake, then sales, then…”
Rachel looked back and forth at the two of us. “Then drop me off and screw like weasels the rest of the day? Sounds like a plan”
I had to laugh. “And you don’t plan on doing the same come the weekend?”
There was a really evil grin there now. “I rather doubt the word ‘weasel’ will bear any relation to what he’s like, Jill! Anyway, if the answer’s yes, then I’ll get a couple of towels for your bathroom. I do believe your shower’s big enough---oh, Larinda, you naughty girl! I meant for him, not for shagging in!”
The girls had been right, in the end, and I felt as if I was breezing through the sales. I ended up with two new pairs of winter boots, one flat and the other heeled, a lovely calf-length skirt that I got to try on rather than order on spec, plus odds and sods of daily wear such as tights. The sort of things I wouldn’t normally wear through in my purely domestic incarnation, but that I would need to replace far more regularly as I changed over. And once again, that realisation: this was actually happening, it wasn’t a game. I was finally out of the blocks, and even if I got a few sideways glances, and the odd glare of hatred, this was now my life. I was still, though, book-ended by two friends, both of whom I loved, and that made all the difference. You can bear an awful lot if you have friends around you, not just because they are there to share the load but because they give themselves to you as a reason not to fail under it.
We sat in Druckers, three middle-aged-ish (sorry Rachel) Ladies Who Shop, and had café latte and cake, shop bags resting like pets by our heels. Larinda’s gentle stare took in all of me in one slow sweep.
“You are actually happy, love, ain’t you?”
I smiled back. “How could I not be? This is almost everything I have ever wanted, everything I knew I would never have, so as I said, how could I not be happy? Look at me: a girl, just about, with someone I love, someones, that is”
I took both of their hands. “We had Christmas yesterday, aye, but if you see what I mean, this is Santa for me. It works, like, far better than I ever dreamt it might. I know there’s a lot left, aye, but, well, it’s like I’m at some hotel, all I have to do is wait for the lift and it’s up to my room”
Larinda was a little moist in the eyes at that, and Rachel seemed to have some make-up imperfection that needed a quick fix. Larinda put away the tissues.
“When do you next see Alec?”
“Week after New Year’s”
“Well, that’s decided, then. Jill goes, not Rob. Let the dog see the rabbit thingy, OK?”
I had to try and change the subject. “But I’ve seen your Rabbit…”
“No distractions, or I won’t get that leather rig you were on about. No, I think it’s time you got right out of hiding”
She looked across at Rachel, who had a little frown of concentration.
“Might not be quite so easy, Larinda. I mean, I can’t have her back all the time, and even if we get the office on side, there’s still the traders, and fuck knows how they’ll react. It’s…look, Jill, don’t take this wrong, yeah, but look at you now. How do you feel? Girly enough?”
“I always feel girly, Rach, that’s been my problem, like”
“No, no. I mean, how do you feel you look? We’ve stuck you in heels and a skirt, and what do you wear on a control visit?”
Suit and cycle clips. Ah. I nodded. “Aye, won’t be as easy to, what’s that word? Present? It won’t be as easy to present in trousers”
Larinda snorted. “Could always get that corset…might make the cycling a bit harder!”
Rachel nodded. “We need to work on your diet, so that cake is your last for a while…shit, it would be the holidays, you’ll be doing more pigging out in a few days. After January, then, we get down to it, the three of us. And that reminds me. We have an evening out in five days’ time, so what do we need? Trapping kit!”
Larinda was back to full humour at that. “Don’t you mean seduction kit?”
“Nah, none of that crap. Done the seduction bit; all I need to do now is get him horizontal. And, er, sort of vertical…”
Watersheds, we climb to meet them, and then we cross. That was the last day I wore anything other than Jill’s clothes for anything other than work, and Rachel was doing the digging on that one. It would come, in time, for good or bad, but I felt it would be mostly good. First, we had a weekend to get through.
Three of us, three Ladies Who Await Passengers, myself in my new winter boots, the ones with the heel, and that gorgeous new skirt, the tailoring actually giving me reasonable hips, and I could feel Rachel’s hand trembling in mine. The automatic doors opened, and half a house stepped through them. His eyes flicked to me, to Rachel, and back to me.
“How Jill! Howay here and giz a kiss before that one tyeks aal the others!”
He walked over to me, and I found myself hugged, gently, and his stubble rasped my cheek as he kissed it softly. He whispered in my ear “And noo Ah can see whe ye are, lass. Pleased te meet ye”
And so we went back to our house, and changed, and Karen and her husband and the son who had adopted her joined us, and we girls became Ladies Who Drink and Dance Around Handbags, and we got very, very drunk, and Rachel and Jim stayed attached to each other by a variety of means throughout the evening.
And I couldn’t remember ever being happier.
CHAPTER 52
They weren’t that noisy, in the end, but I found Rachel slightly out of sorts the next morning. I had just filled the kettle to do my wifely duties, and she joined me in the kitchen. Her hair was all over the place and, to be blunt, she really needed a shower, but there was a slight edge to her expression.
“You OK, Rach?”
“Jill…he cried, yeah? We sort of, well, you know, and yes it was good, and then, just as I’m settling down again, all wrapped up…I could feel them on my neck, tears and stuff. How do I compete with someone who’s already bloody well dead?”
I couldn’t say anything sensible to that, so I just waited, as the kettle warmed. She stared into space for a second or two, then shrugged.
“I can’t, can I?”
I put an arm over her shoulders. “I don’t think you have to, pet. I think, well, she’ll always be there, like, part of him, aye? Both of them. John says it nearly broke him. Look…I’m guessing here, OK? He’s a canny lad, is Jim, and he’s probably lying there now wondering how he can apologise. It’s like Mam and Ralph, I think”
She grinned, almost her normal self, and I nodded. “Aye, I do think there’s a bit of crumbly-bonding there, but all the time that goes on, Dad’s in the room with them. Not competing, like, just someone who helped make both of them who they are now, like. Look at Wendy that way, if you can. I know you’re fond of Jim, so think on. Like me, aye? Part of me is my Dad, part is Mam, even Von has some responsibility. Same with you, and your ex. That’s why you are on neutral ground, aye?”
She slipped an arm around my waist and squeezed. “How the fuck did we never see what you are, girl? Not learning girly, are you? Just covered it up too well”
I kissed her cheek. “Had to, kid, or I’d have died. Look, take him his tea, give him a cuddle, and we’ll see about a walk out for breakfast, aye? Oh, and by the way, I don’t know what he has been doing to you---sod it, I’ve got a bloody good idea what it was---but you really need a shower. You smell a bit much of randy man meets horny woman, aye? Towels in the airing cupboard”
She grinned, brighter at last, and off she went with their teas and a mutter of “walking like John Wayne, dead bloody right”. I watched her go, and Karen joined me with her own teas to sort out.
“She OK?”
“Physically? Smells like she was well and truly looked after last night. Just a couple of issues from their pasts to sort, should be fine. She’s sort of learning what trust is about”
Karen nodded. “Yeah, I get that one. Well, we’re all here for her, and I hope she knows that. Anyway, changing the subject quite deliberately, you were well out of it last night. Remember it all?”
I could feel myself blush slightly, as I knew where it was going, pushed along by her impish grin, and then she produced her mobile phone.
“Oh shit, Kaz, you didn’t…”
“Oh yes, I have pics, especially from around ten past midnight”
“Oh bugger a hell”
“Who exactly were they, Jill?”
The music, the dancing, the handbags. Rachel and Jim had got themselves into a corner of the bar where they each seemed to be trying to resuscitate the other through mouth-to-mouth, and James was dancing happily by himself with his father standing watch. Karen, Larinda and I were all shaking that booty thang, or whatever the current slang is, and I was feeling very little pain apart from in my toes, as my feet suffered in the heels I had chosen. I wasn’t exactly drunk, but certainly buzzing, and the clock was ticking down to midnight. I felt a bump against my backside, and looked round to see a couple of men dancing near us, one of whom had just pushed his backside against mine. Well, it was sort of traditional, and as one of them tried similar tactics on my lover I turned and danced with Mister Bottom. No touching, no groping, just happy flailing, and then we were into the final seconds, and of course I had to turn back to my saviour, the woman who completed my life, and we saw in the New Year in as traditional a manner as possible. When we broke for air, I heard a sort of shouted whisper in my ear, along the lines of “Phwooar!”, so I turned, and my man was there and…shit, I had ended up snogging some man, his hand on my arse, and I realised that Larinda had done the same, just for a several of seconds, before I drew back and reclaimed her.
And Karen had the pictures. She made a point of showing me, lips locked, hand squeezing my bum, the bitch.
“How the hell did I never see you for what you are, woman?”
“That’s what Rachel said, just about”
“So what did he say?”
Memories…”Something about going back to his place and seeing what came up. Blokes, think they can cure a dyke by waving their cock about”
Karen turned serious. “Have you listened to what you are saying, love? Everything, now, no pretence, no façade, yeah? I am a bit worried. How do we put the genie back? You’ve got work and stuff, can’t just swan into work in kitten heels”
I nodded. “Aye, that one’s got me a bit worked up. It’s…it’s like I ‘m reborn, just now, and I don’t want to see Rob in the mirror again, ever, and that can’t happen. Well, bugger it, it can happen, it is happening, aye? Just, well, not as sharp as I would like. Mixed emotions, lass, really mixed. What I see is…look, this is me, aye, from now on. Me at the shops, me at home, me out for a ride, all of that. It’s just work, like. I need to find a way of letting them know”
She refilled the kettle, which was handy as Larinda joined us.
“Where’s my tea, woman? Morning, Kaz”
“Morning, Larinda. Just sorting Jill’s life out for her, and I have the photos from last night”
“Oh shit. We didn’t, did we?”
“Yup, lots of tongue sandwich. It is traditional, after all”
“Yeah, well you didn’t, did you?”
“I sort of had Terry hovering, so, well, you know. No, not me”
“Yeah, well, mine turned out to be a gin drinker, could taste it, yeah? What about yours, Jill?”
“Er, beer, I think, and busy hands on my arse”
Larinda chuckled. “I got my tit groped. Well, it would have been rude if he hadn’t, yeah?”
She looked at my open mouth. “What? Look, it’s you I came home with, girl, and, well, it’s sort of going to be you I always come home with, or to, yeah? Just…look, this last couple of days, yeah, I just have to ask myself why I didn’t see what you are before. What’s so funny?”
I tried to explain, that I seemed to be getting that comment from all directions, but I was laughing so much it was all a bit mixed up, so Larinda stopped it dead by kissing me rather firmly and nicely. She took a step back to look at me.
“Yeah, I get it. Just one question, love, and that is, well, why? Blokes, you, yeah?”
Why indeed? I thought for a while, trying to get it into some sort of order in my own mind before attempting to find the right words.
“Look, pet, all I can say is that I got more than a bit carried away, aye? You lot got me so happy, so FREE it just…Listen, all anyone has said to me today is that they can’t understand why they never saw the girl in me, never realised what I was. I’ve spent all of my life hiding, like, and this last couple of days it’s all been different. I’m not playing some script out any more. I’m not having to remember to fart, or walk around as if I’m a foot taller than I really am, aye? The clothes…that’s me, that’s what I wear, not something I bring out of the wardrobe every now and again. I’ve got shoes, you know, had them for years, they still have shiny soles, never been worn outdoors, and now, sod it, now I’m fucking dancing in them while some bloke gropes me!”
I paused for breath, for thought. “Look, both of you, and good morning Terry…look, I was out, I was me, and girls, even some dykes, it’s New Year, and I was so caught up in it, and I knew I was safe with you all around me, and I just thought fuck it, maximum girl, aye?”
Terry nodded. “Yeah, and snogging blokes is a bit different. I mean, for starters, OW!”
Karen turned back to us, shaking out the hand she had just slapped his behind with. “Jill, my dear, all a girl like you needs to know about men is when to put them in their place. I’ll send you the better pictures, yeah? Let’s get sorted; all that nocturnal activity has left me with an appetite...oh, you dirty-minded tarts, DANCING!”
An hour later, and we were on the street, snuggled up in two pairs and a triplet. Karen and Terry sandwiched the boy I thought of more and more as their son, who was having a god morning despite an initial listing of all the possible ways of cooking eggs he knew, and we headed off to the little Italian café that always opened on New Year’s Day to offer hangover cures. We sat as a family would, and we smiled, and ate the bacon, and Jim’s tears were forgotten. I drifted off for a while, thinking of the man I had been kissing just a few hours before, and I felt another realisation dawning in me. I had kissed a man. Not ‘another man’, just ‘a man’, and it meant nothing more than any other NYE kiss would have. Jim’s kiss to my cheek, now, that meant the world to me, for that was a real man showing what he thought of me, what I was, and doing it with charm and grace. The beery man the night before, that was just what girls did. What I did.
What I was.
CHAPTER 53
Alec didn’t bat an eyelid when I walked in. One small remark, that was it.
“I was wondering how long it would take you”
He was, if anything, looking shabbier than he had before Christmas, and I had to ask myself how he had managed during the holiday period. That was a time that had always hit Mam hard, and I could tell Alec was no different. He made a short note, then looked up as I took my seat.
“How far out are you now, Jill? Work?”
“No, not yet. That is one I will have to think about, and, no, I have done nothing with the banks and stuff, my name, all that. Just…looks like Larinda is accepting me this way, and I‘ve had the last week and a bit to get out and around, like. Starting to feel more normal than, well, ‘;normal’, if you see what I mean”
“Seeing what you mean is what I get paid for”
Was that a joke? Perhaps there was a little life left in him after all. He continued with a few soft questions about the season’s events, and when I described the snogging session he almost smiled..
“A man, Jill? Why would that be?”
“I tried to explain that to the others, my friends, like, but I suppose it all came down to just being a woman on a night out”
“Validation? Having a man fancying you, makes you feel more real?”
I thought about that one for a few seconds. “No, Alec. I don’t really think so. What I am is in me, it’s what I’ve always known, aye? What I am wearing, they aren’t clothes to make me feel more girly, they are things to give a clue to other people. I am still me whatever I wear. That kissing, that man, that’s just what women do, Look…all I can say is that you have actions and reactions, like, and if we say that an action is done to get a result, while a reaction is done because of what you are, then it was all reaction, aye? Not making an active choice to show how female I am, just doing what comes naturally”
He was nodding at that, making his little notes.
“You know what must come next, Jill, don’t you?”
“The real life test? Yes”
“I always prefer the term ‘experience’ rather than ‘test’. It gives a better description of how I see the whole thing. It’s one thing dipping your toe into the water, but the whole thing is a different stripe of lobster. Gives you the chance to back out before, you know”
I looked at Alec in a little surprise at that. He wasn’t normally quite so forthcoming with the humour and flippant remarks, and with what I knew of his background…some time later, as our session came to its end, I had to find out.
“Alec, can I ask you a question?”
“What about?”
“It’s…well, Larinda, my partner, she works with Lee, so…”
“Ah. What do you want to ask me, Jill? Oh”
He smiled ruefully. “I see what you are wondering. This physician can’t heal himself, but he knows a pharmacist who can help. I started on happy pills last week, low dose, just enough to…just enough to let me sleep a little. I know what your experience of them was, but I still have to work”
He started to laugh. ”I don’t know how ethical it is, but I am seeing Sally when I ‘m not seeing my own patients. Odd thing: I think it gives me more empathy”
He looked away through the window for a few long seconds, and then turned back to me.
“Decision time, Jill. We have bounced round this from all angles, and it was clear to me from very early that you more than tick the boxes. Now, once again unethically or not, and I don’t really care for meaningless rules, I have a proposal for you. Firstly, we need some decent blood work done on you, and then I shall write a report for your GP. The next question is a formal one. I can refer you to the GID clinic at Charing Cross today, if you want me to”
I thought about that one for a couple of minutes, and Alec just waited quietly.
“Alec, can I please confirm that one with Larinda? It’s not just me, aye?”
There was genuine warmth in his smile then. “I would have expected nothing less of the woman I have come to know”
Shit. Tears, tissues…I had to ask.
“And this woman…once you do that thing, does that mean you stop being my whatsit, my doctor?”
“Sort of”
“Then please, if you have the time, we would like to have you round for dinner, aye?”
Again, that wistful smile. “Not likely to be good company just now, Ms Carter”
“Let us be the judge of that. We’ll probably have a couple of other friends about, and none of us is actually free from our own problems, like. Just one thing…”
“Yes?”
“No bloody cardigans or holey elbows, aye?”
The laugh was rather stronger that time. “Jill Carter, you are such a bloody woman!”
I grinned back. “Funnily enough, that was exactly what I have always wanted to hear. But if you are worth your salt, you already knew that. That your formal diagnosis, then?”
“How is it you would put it? Bugger a hell, aye”
I hugged him. He didn’t mind.
That night, wrapped in my lover, I talked it through, and I could tell the pain was rising in her, but she was straightforward in her answers even though her body seemed to have reservations.
“It’s a simple choice, lover, isn’t it? I either have the girl I love, alive and well, and in our bed, or the man I love goes into a hole in the ground. That’s about it, isn’t it?”
I snuggled into her breasts. “You make it sound like blackmail, love”
“Not meant that way, not at all. Just, facts, yeah, got to face them. There ain’t really no choice, yeah? So…if that’s going, let’s see if I can’t do it by bloody erosion. Roll over…”
A few days later, I rang home.
“Mam…I’ve got the go ahead to see the proper clinic up that London, aye?”
“Aye; you happy about that?”
“I think you know the answer to that one”
“Well…then you do what you have to do and I will be there, aye? But, Gillian Carter, there is one thing I would like”
“Aye?”
“I would like to see a picture of my daughter. Mothers do, it sort of goes with the job, like”
I smiled down the phone, as if she could see. “Aye, old woman, I’ll get Larinda to take some shots and mail them to you”
“Less of the old woman, young woman! Want a word with your brother? He’s beside us now”
“Aye, gan on”
“How, Jill?”
“Hiya Nelly. Mam passed you the word?”
“Wrote it down for us as you spoke, aye. What does all this add up to?”
“Well, Alec sends us to a blood doctor, for some more checks, like, and then I go and see the specialists up in London. They do their bit, I get a second opinion from another one, and then I am off on the RLE”
“Pardon?”
“Real life experience. At least a year living full time, then we see if I want to go for, you know”
“Nip and tuck?”
“Aye, basically. Some of us never go for that. Enough to be seen as what they are, like”
“And you?”
“Ach shite, Neil, I really don’t know. If I was on my own, like, it would be a no-brainer, I’ve never wanted those bits, but with Larinda, aye? Not an easy one. We’ll just have to see how we go, is all I can say. Look…what are you up to in a fortnight? Fancy paying us a visit?”
“That Will be there?”
“Ah!”
“Don’t be so daft, he’s far too young for me. I just feel…I feel a bit like an uncle with him, aye, or mebbes an older brother. Just be nice to help him avoid some of the crap that’s waiting for him, and if he’s coming up here in the Autumn, then I want to know him a bit better beforehand, like”
“I’ll let him know, kid. As long as he can make an excuse for his mam, that is”
“Fine. I’ll look at train times, aye? Here’s your Mam back”
“Gillian Carter, you invite your brother down and you don’t ask me? I think some priorities need addressing, aye?”
That warmed me. All the time I had been in the South, she had never visited me. Partly it was because of the distance, and then Dad’s health began to fail, and then it was her health as my excuse and my slow suicide as the real reason.
“Nelly to carry all your bags then?”
“Er…”
What was she hesitating for? “Er…Raafie will help with them”
“Norma Carter, you naughty girl!”
“Whey, neither of us is getting any younger, like, and, well, he’s a canny man and…”
Her voice trailed off for a second or two. “And he has a lot of your Dad in him, and about him, like, and I’ve been very lonely since…”
Neil came on the line again. “Give her a minute, lass. Now, I suppose you’d want Jim down too? He’s pining already”
I smiled. My little dinner party was getting out of hand. “Look, I’ll ask Rachel, aye, but I think we know the answer. With all of this lot coming down, I think we’ll have to eat out, and I’m going to have to think about sleeping arrangements, aye? You got any others to add?”
He laughed. “A bit daft, mebbes, but how about Jim’s brother?”
I returned the laughter. “Look, why not just put up a poster in the Nev and invite the lot?”
“No. This is a celebration, aye, almost a birthday. Birthdays should have enough people to make it special but those that come should be close enough to keep it that way. Now, I’m going to take a little old lady–OW!---and make her a cuppa, aye? Let us know when you want us down”
“Will do. Love you…”
“And we love you too, just try remembering that next time you feel stupid”
I hung up, and then dialled another number. Answering machine.
“Alec, it’s Jill Carter. About that meal…”
CHAPTER 54
They flew down in the end, and it was a serious crowd at the airport. Rachel and Larinda did the driving, as well as the accommodation, but in the end I had given up on the idea of having so many people around one table and booked a corner of the Dysentery, the inevitable nickname of the Dynasty Chinese restaurant. Will had called a favour in from a friend, a pretended sleepover, and would be on the train for the meal. Mats, sleeping bags, spare beds, we finally found enough nooks to fit everyone in, helped by that fact that several were sharing.
That was one delight from the start: Rachel’s confidence seemed to heave returned, and Jim was sleeping nowhere else “but right on top of me. Or under. Or behind. I’ll try them all out…”
The one who seemed happiest, though, was Ralph. Not being prurient, I had no idea where his journey with my mother was going, nor where it had already been, and it was, I suppose, a fair assumption that physicality would hardly be rampant, but they were clearly happy with each other, and that truly warmed my soul. The only thing that dampened our mood, of course, was the fact that VAT had gone back up, and we would end up paying just a bit more for our meal.
That led to another decision: who was going, me, or, well, me? I had been at work before the arrivals, and so I met them in trousers and jacket, as Rob, and, to be honest, I thought Mam had looked slightly disappointed. Larinda and I had played with the camera, trying to get as flattering a shot of me as she could, and five or six had been mailed to ‘the old woman’. Neil had rung me shortly thereafter, describing her mixed smiles and tears, and yet there I was, dressed as a man.
They came off the plane, out of the door, and Jim…Jim still insisted on kissing my cheek, and it was the oddest thing: I was in drag, and yet I felt fully, completely female at that point. John just looked, then smiled.
“I hope you don’t expect me to enjoy the beer down here. I know what it tastes like, aye?”
I just hugged him welcome, which actually came surprisingly easily.
“Come on, people, let’s get on the road, and I can get comfortable”
And so it was. While we left the others to distribute clothes and chattels around bedrooms, I got out of my work kit and into what I felt better in. Larinda ran an eye over my choices.
“No. The cream blouse, the brown wool skirt. Nude tights for today, OK? And clean undies. I like a girl in clean undies”
“Pardon?”
She flushed. “Well, I like this girl, and preferably naked, but you know what I mean”
I kissed her. It seemed right. “You OK?”
“Yeah” she sighed. “Just slowly getting my head around things, but as long as it involves you, then I will be fine. Come on, you have a mother to embarrass”
A mother who was apparently sharing a bed. That was embarrassing enough for me, never mind her. It seemed my one remaining parent would continue to surprise me. She turned as I walked in, and smiled, but her eyes were wet.
“That rig doesn’t exactly gan with the slippers, lass”
Her attempt at a joke fell with the first of her tears, and then she was in my arms, along with my brother and then Ralph.
“I didn’t know what to think, at first, like, and then I thowt, well, he’s not gone, she’s still here, and it was different, aye, when ye were still, well, Rob; and then I had the pictures, and….ach hell, Jill, ye’re real, aye? And my son’s not gone, is he? Just, never been, aye?”
“Aye, Mam…”
My own tears were there, and all I could do was repeat the words, how sorry I was. Larinda stood off a little way, then stepped forward with the tissues that she always seemed to provide. She pulled Mam to her and kissed the top of her head.
“Two of us, love, missing the man, yeah, but we’ve got the girl, so all’s well, nothing to mourn”
We gathered ourselves, and I noticed that even old Ralph was damp in the eye. Larinda sorted us in the end.
“Bloody good job she hadn’t put her face on, innit? Come on, there’s some crispy duck with my name on it, and she’s got a shrink to cheer up”
The restaurant wasn’t too far, and we walked as a family to the entrance. “Party of thirteen, in the name of Carter”
Larinda put her hand on my arm. “Fourteen, love”
That was when I saw the other John sitting in the takeaway area.
“I just thought…”
I kissed her. She just thought that someone needed a friend; so typical of my lover. His eyes widened slightly, but then settled into what I knew would be a steady inspection of every part of me. That was John. No longer MAC, just a middle-aged man in need of a life. The waiter coughed.
“I have a Carter, but it’s a party of sixteen”
Eh? “Larinda, you rang to add John, yeah?”
She nodded, and the waiter smiled. “Your friend, he said add two more, you would understand”
“What, John there?”
“No, man called Alec”
Sodding hell, bringing his own reinforcements. Ah well, it was supposed to be a celebration, and as I walked over to shake John’s hand (and wonder how the hell we would avoid confusion) Karen and her men arrived. And we found our table, set into a small side room and ready with chopsticks and vegetable ‘flowers’ in iced water.
“Hello, you are Jill today and no skins”
“Hello James, and we have another James today who is not you”
“There are two James here”
“And two Johns. We need to find a way of telling them apart. We need another name”
That other John was listening, and stepped forward. “Hello, I am John, and that is my James, my brother James, but he is Jim, and I am Fossy”
“Why is your name now changed?”
“It hasn’t changed; that’s just what they called me in the army. Hello, I am Fossy, and that is Jim”
“I am James”
He seemed to be in a steady mood, which was good, and I was pleased we had the small room, as the stress would be reduced. I shook hands with John, odd John as I still thought of him, and he smiled.
“She is a good woman, Jill, and I am pleased that she thought of me. And now I see what I should have seen so many years before. I am supposed to be a trained observer, no?”
“Aye, John, but just a little limited in your focus up to now, like”
He smiled. “Point taken, and thankfully so was your suggestion about the reserve. You have made a difference, Jill Carter”
I leant forward, as any woman would, and hugged him, and it was returned. Credit to you, John. Humanity calls.
“You want drinks?”
The waiter was hovering, as we sorted out our seats, and Will came in, grinning away.
“This is like playing truant, Jill! Looking gorgeous, by the way!”
“Flattery is welcome, Will, but it won’t get you into my knickers, aye?”
We made the rest of the introductions as pints of lager and glasses of wine or soft drinks appeared, and Ralph sighed happily.
“How, that teks us back, like. Tiger beer…taste of Singers. Smashin’!”
Rachel was grinning. “Do you think the waiters get special courses? I mean, they always sound the same, but their customers…how the hell are they supposed to understand you lot?”
John–Fossy, remember that---grinned back. “You seem to understand wor kid OK, at least from the way he’s been smiling since that trip down for New Year”
She folded her arms and lifted her chin. “Not at all. He has learnt to understand me, that’s all that’s important, and follow MY instructions”
Dead pan, Terry just said “Like ‘take me now, big boy’?”
“No, darling” said his wife, “Harder harder, faster faster, surely?”
Napkins; no need for Larinda’s tissues. Just then, the waiter appeared, with Alec. Someone had worked him over was my first thought. Hair cut, shirt–rather a nice lavender one–ironed, trousers cleaned, and face shaved properly. He was smiling, and holding what was obviously a card in an envelope.
“Jill, hello! Looking good, girl. I took a small liberty, if you don’t mind. I sort of thought I’d be a bit out on a limb, so I invited two of my friends…”
John was looking past him. “Sally! What are you doing here?”
I was now confused. “John, how do you know friends of my therapist?”
“Er, because she is actually MY therapist. This is very strange”
The woman in question wasn’t the biggest person in the world, and had a slightly tired look to her, and her husband matched her in stature. He made up for it, though, in presence. That was the only word that came to my mind. He was in balance, his movements sure and precise, but his eyes…they looked at you, and not only into yours, but through them. Then he smiled, and I began the round of introductions.
Sally and Stewart McDuff were their names, and after a bit of negotiation about John and Alec’s pronouncement that he had had no idea that the man was coming, Sally just smiled and ordered a double vodka and orange.
“Got the chauffeur tonight, so I can let my hair down. Mr Wilkins, this is reverse patient-doctor confidentiality, OK? If I act like a tit, you don’t tell anyone, and I won’t tell them about that embarrassing tattoo. The one you don’t have”
John actually smiled, as Alec apologised again. Karen was on form, though.
“Here’s a suggestion, boys and girls. Just to save ourselves from involuntary admissions, let’s just go for the ‘eat till you puke’ buffet, yeah? And I want first go at the duck”
Larinda slapped her arm. “Oy, me dibsies first!”
And so it went, right up to the point where Stewart looked straight at Fossy and asked the question.
“Pongo or bootneck?”
CHAPTER 55
Fossy (remember that, Jill, I told myself) looked shocked, and for the first time in all the decades I had known him there was a hint, a suspicion, of fear. There was a perceptible pause before he answered.
“Why do you ask, Stewart?”
The hard little man looked at his wife, who nodded slightly, and then leant forward, resting his arms on the table.
“Just curious. Sal and I have sort of grown into her work, and she’s had me on a few courses to get my own certificates. Helps bring a different perspective to things, sometimes. And that can be vital, right, love?”
“Aye, but what makes you think I might have been in the Forces?”
The rest of the chatter had stopped, and all except James were paying close attention, and I saw that Jim Forster’s was in very sharp focus indeed. Stewart smiled.
“If I can’t pick out a squaddy at thirty paces by now…yeah, squaddy. Not a bootneck…PBI, no?”
Fossy sighed once again. “Why, Stewart, why do you ask?”
“Ah. Not good, mate? Been there. Tell you what, you answered my question, so I’ll let you have some of your own, OK? Right, Sal, be off and bring me at least half a duck, and get something for yourself while you’re up”
I actually laughed out loud at that, and got a don’t-even-think-about-it nudge from Larinda. Jim visibly relaxed, and turned to his namesake for some quiet chat about the number of side dishes on the menu. Fossy sighed again, and slumped.
“I was a Fusilier, for a while. Did a stint…you were there, weren’t you?”
Stewart’s smile was a little twisted. “A few places, mate, some better than others. Doesn’t go away, does it?”
“Thought so. Look, not now, aye? Another time, later, maybe, but not here, please?”
He looked away for a second, then back at Stewart. “Is that what you meant by courses and shared work? The night horrors?”
I realised that my friends were totally absorbed, even Jim, though he was making a big play of talking to or at or with or through James. Sally and Alec, though, their eyes were like missile sights, locked on everything the two said. It was Alec who broke the silence.
“Yes, John, Fossy, spot on. Perhaps…shit, Jill, would you really mind if I had a chat with our friends here? Not official, but I just feel that we need to clear the air a little or this will be a crap evening, and you deserve better. Gents, the gents’, please”
Three down. Jim started up, and Rachel pushed him down into his seat. “No, love. A few minutes”
There was a tic to his mouth at that, and when I replayed what she had said, I had to wonder. Terry suddenly demanded the finest spring rolls known to humanity, and he wanted them here, and he wanted them now, and there was a little bit of laughter, and five minutes later the three were back, and it was smiles, and softer looks, and I saw Sally reach under the table for her husband’s hand with a look of utter and complete devotion in her eyes. The conversation was lighter from then on, and to my delight my shattered little man was suddenly acting as if the weight of ages that had bent his shoulders had taken a walk for the evening.
“How do you know John?”
I was buried in a plateful of seaweed at the time, so it took a little while to answer.
“I worked with him, Sally, we both did, Rachel and me”
Sally smiled. “Either of you responsible for his nickname?”
Rachel sniffed. “Employee confidentiality, Sally!” she said haughtily, before collapsing in giggles.
“Sorry, John, mate, and you are a mate now, yeah, but you really were a right cu– sorry, all, but it has taken us all a while to get to know him properly, and that didn’t happen in the office, yeah?”
John smiled, in the most natural way, and nodded. “Yes, and it has taken me a while to understand that. Sally here is…efficient, but hardly painless. Things have come out, but rather than that I would like to put more things in. More food? James?”
“I have had six plates so far, John”
Almost all of rice and nothing more, but it was still a lot. Karen gave Terry a look, and he just smiled and made a calming gesture. Leave him, he’s OK for now. And a seventh plate of egg fried rice was delivered to him. After the initial confrontation, it had become a truly enjoyable night, and towards the end Stewart and Fossy started to loosen up, and some rather salty anecdotes came out from behind curtains, or perhaps from under rocks. Practical jokes, foolish or downright thick officers, eating competitions involving the most unlikely substances…whatever had been said had opened up the ex-soldier like a sardine key. It was Rachel, though, that brought the evening effectively to an end. I don’t know exactly what she and Jim were doing to each other under the table, but my mother was actually giggling watching them, and Neil just sighed theatrically.
“I hope you two wash your hands before any more finger food”
And it was time. Even James could fit no more in, and so we bade him and his parents good night and trotted along to my place for the last of the evening’s social bonding. I noticed the pairings forming up as we walked: Mam leaning on Ralph more than she actually seemed to need; Will and Neil deep in conversation; Rachel and Jim each almost inside the other’s clothing; Sally and Stewart AND John arm in arm; Alec and Fossy more animated and vocal than I remembered seeing; and me, in my heels a little unsteady, but with the woman I now knew I loved more than anyone before or since keeping me in a straight line.
She opened the door, and I put the kettle on as Rachel…how the hell did she know where we kept our drinks? Gin, vodka, whisky, white wine, in separate glasses for different people, and it was good, and we were friends together. What was more, at no point did I feel that I was playing a part, not like I had all the long years that lay wasted behind me. I had put on a quieter Hawkwind disc, Ambient Anarchists, more mood music than space rock, and even Mam seemed, well, not to actively dislike it. Then Larinda lowered the tone with some ‘Bread’ from her own collection, or rather her part of our collection, and it rose up and slapped me in the face, once more, how much I loved her. Perhaps the alcohol had found its voice, but I didn’t think so then, and I don’t now. I caught myself looking at her, and then Mam looking at me, and there were no words, none necessary.
Eventually, much later, perhaps three in the morning, Rachel and Jim excused themselves, and like a double planet span out of the door towing their satellites, the brother, two shrinks, one marine commando and a very happy little birdwatcher.
Mam had already crept off with her gentleman friend, and never was that a truer phrase. That just left Will and Neil, and Larinda disappeared long enough to find our spare duvets and my camping mats, and then she simply turned and kissed me so deeply I nearly fell onto their bedding. She whispered into my ear.
“If I ravish you now, will I still get breakfast?”
I don’t care–well, I do, obviously, deeply---how female my mind is, but my body, oh yes, it responded in as male a way as possible, and the sight of her and me in lip lock put a grin on Neil’s face and left Will’s jaw on his chest. She dragged me out…and some time later it was properly morning, and some time after that she let me shower.
I found myself singing, some old Geordie song or other, and then I realised it wasn’t just an echo in the cubicle but my mother, singing with me from the kitchen, and then Neil joining in, and I was so happy I had to stay in the shower till the tears stopped.
Rachel was over at ten, with a few bodies in tow, or at least two brothers. One looked almost goofy in his smiling daze, and the other just relaxed. That was something that came in ambush to me: John Forster had never been relaxed, not as I had known him. The tension of the violent bully, the careful defensiveness of the failed shirtlifting soldier, they were what I was accustomed to. That morning, though, he was unlocked, unbound.
“Aye, Jill, that was a canny night---shut it, you two, I could hear. No, I mean those two lads, they know, aye? I haven’t had that for years. Even the other one, the old lad, he’s not stupid, is he?”
“John is far from daft. Just a little wrong, aye?”
Fossy nodded. “Aye, lass. Wrong choices, a bit, but more, well, skewed away from the world?”
I gave him my own nod. “So what was it about the other two?”
He looked off into his own private distance. “Alec…well, let’s say Alec’s gaydar is working well. That broke a bit of ice, in the end. I know what I am, Jill, but I don’t normally get to talk about it in a casual way. No. Casual’s not quite the right word. Normal. Conversational. What’s on the telly sort of thing, not ‘what’s it like when you…’ shite. And Stewie…”
That brought me a flat stare, a stare with a hint of pain in it. “I kept a lot hidden, me, hidden from you, from Jim, from everybody, almost from me, aye? Then, well, I saw what real bullies are, and real men, and fuck it, I didn’t want to play any more, aye? Stewie, he’s been there, he’s seen the same shit”
I realised he was suddenly getting close to tears. “That’s new, Jill. That’s important. Perhaps you can understand, you’ve been there too. Hiding all that time, playing that game, matching the arseholes sin for sin, and there’s nobody but yourself and a glass to talk to. You’ve had enough, I’ve had enough. There’s more…”
He stopped to dab at his eyes.
“Jill, there’s a world out there, and it’s ours, aye? Let’s go and grab it by the balls before it gets away. Is there more tea in that pot?”
CHAPTER 56
William shot off home, and the rest of us went up to London in the end. I mean, it had to be done. It was cold, but clear, and I decided that if we were to give Mam a chance to see ‘the sights’ she wouldn’t appreciate a lot of walking, and so I splashed out on one of the bus tours. These allow you to hop on and hop off at any part of the route, so as long as where you want to go is on the same circuit they function as a sort of bus pass for the day. There was also a ride in an open-plan boat, past the White Tower, with a skipper who informed us that the “Emergency exits are---well, wherever you like, really”
That day made it very clear to me how close the older pair had become, and while he was away in the gents’ at some Covent Garden café where we had stopped for a “proper cuppa” I asked.
She just smiled. “Lass, I am too old for that silliness, aye? But, just, well, having somebody warm to cuddle, someone that warms the heart as well, like…ach shite, you know exactly what I mean, you two, aye?”
And ‘lass’ it was, too. Something had clicked in me, and each day I was away from work I was myself. No longer just round the house, or out with friends, I was Jill. Jill in the street, in the supermarket, in the corner shop and almost everywhere else. The only places that I was submerged were the bank and at work. I sometimes felt the stares, especially when the beard shadow was most obvious, but there was so much life in what I was now living that I almost floated above the nastiness that may have bubbled beneath.
I had chosen flat boots over leggings for the day, with a long tunic over the problem area, and a seriously warm fleece jacket, though not as warming as my companions. We did the rounds, listened to the inaccurate descriptions from the tour guide (when did Trafalgar move to the Med?) and just enjoyed being out together. Fossy was still relaxed, and every now and again I caught Jim looking at him, and his face would soften. He caught my own stare once, and gave me the slightest of smiles, but a real one. So much damage. Such healing.
That seemed to be the key, really. His brother had suffered so long alone, and what he had been slowly dying inside for was that simple, vital phrase “I know”.
“So what are you doing on Monday?”
Larinda’s voice cut through my dreaming.
“What do you mean?”
“Work, love. This is all fine and good, yeah, out with us, but you are going to have to think about the next step. You’re sort of half-in, half-out, and you’ll stuff up walking tightropes. You can’t just walk in like that, can you?”
Rachel nodded. “No way. Leggings don’t cut it in the office, nor at the traders. You need some sharper stuff, girl”
Neil laughed. “Aye, there goes the credit card. Did you plan on eating for the next six months?”
Larinda looked hard at her. “Are you suggesting that she just goes in like that? No warnings? No preparation?”
Mam chipped in. “For what it’s worth, I haven’t seen her happier in years. This explains so much, that right, Raafie?”
“Aye, ah owe. How, Jill, de ye hev a sort of office day, like? When ye divvent gan off te see some business, like? Be better deein’ it that way, aye?”
Rachel was nodding energetically. “Spot on, Raafie. Jill, when’s your next office day? What have you got booked for tomorrow?”
“Er…it is an office day”
Oh shit. “Rach, yourself, aye?”
“Couple of bailiff runs in the afternoon, not a thing in the morning. Fuck it---sorry, Norma. Go for it, girl! Jump, splash, get it done, yeah? Look, Larinda, what are your plans for lunch? Get her in, get her out, watch her back?”
My lover had real concern in her eyes, and I think she saw how hard the idea had grabbed me. To lose the Robskin, as James called it, to be myself always, out, visible. I felt my legs trembling. Think, girl.
“Rach, help me out here, aye? Who do we have to watch?”
“Dunno…Look, with Alec on board, there’s sod all they can do to you based on the change, yeah? It’s not going to be the lads, bunch of pussies, I think, but a couple of the girls might cow up a bit. Shit, got an idea…”
We finished our round of sights with a round of shopping, and for the first time in my life I was in Liberty’s trying on bloody shoes and other delights rather than trying to guess my size over the net. We had tea in their café, as the boys sighed in frustration at the lack of husband chairs and I assured them that I was almost shopped out.
“Just one more thing, from round the corner, aye?”
Rachel’s idea: a small voice recorder with a decent-sized memory, and small enough to fit in my bra. We made our way back to Victoria by tube, and Mam just murmured as she sank into the seat on the train “Any chance of some proper food tonight?”
She can be adventurous, and she is amazingly accepting for such a conventional woman, but her tastes in food have always been truly British. Overcooked meat and vegetables boiled to mush. We ended up in a carvery, and it wasn’t till the very end, as two old people sighed happily, that I realised how simple their pleasures were. Plain food, filling meals, and company. That was a quiet night, much earlier to bed, and in the morning we reassembled at the airport for our farewells. Rachel and Jim made quite a scene of it, and his brother was surprisingly emotional as they left for security. He nearly broke my ribs in a hug, and whispered some broken words about how much he had done to me and Neil, how much he had to set right, and that set me off.
“Don’t be so bloody stupid, John. This is now, this is us, and we are different people, aye? Now bugger off home, and just promise…promise you’ll be back, aye?”
“Promise. Got to go”
They were off, then. I’m a girl; crying’s allowed.
It was a damper morning, and I wore the long coat that I had found in, of all places, the local supermarket, over a plain cream buttoned blouse and a dark tailored skirt to mid-calf. Black court shoes with a moderate heel, a long cardigan in beige, and simple nude tights. As dressed down as possible, the only irritation being the hard lump under my left tit. Larinda had laid out the clothes the night before, settling on the simple elegance that she loved, and I had made sure the recorder was fully charged before setting out. No bike, not today. I winced as the damp started to mark the sides of my shoes, and realised that there is a world of difference between wearing nice things around the house and exposing them to the delights of the immaculately swept footpaths of Redhill. And rain.
Rachel was waiting just round the corner from the office. It was almost enough to make me laugh out loud, as her posture changed on seeing me. Head back, arms folded, this was the Rachel I had known for so long, and it was odd how I had never realised how insecure she had been. Tits out, head up, look-at-me-you-wankers-and-despair, that had always been the impression men took away from her. It had never been true, though; what her pose meant was “I’m frightened, and I’ll bite”. Jim, though…he had seen to her core. I just prayed for them, that if it ever fell apart, the distance would save it from being too painful to bear.
“Morning, pet! Miserable weather, ruining my shoes!”
“Get used to it, girl. Looking good–Larinda’s done good stuff with the face”
“Er, oy, that was me, you bitch!”
She grinned. “Yeah, yeah, don’t get touchy. I’ve got enough crap in my bag to do any repairs”
Her voice softened. “Was odd, last night. Sort of getting used to him in the mornings…what’s that song? Wreckless Eric?”
“ ‘Whole Wide World’? Aye, I see what you mean.. Early days yet, Rach”
She sighed deeply. “Yeah, Jill. Look, it’s not just the shagging, right? There’s a lot more to him, to us, than that”
“But the shagging’s Ok?”
“It’s…I keep forgetting, you’ll never know, will you? Let’s just say it works for me. Got the secret squirrel thing?”
I nudged a breast. “In here”
“Turn it on, then. Ready for your close up, Mr De Mille…”
Heels on the lobby floor. The swipe of a key card into our accommodation. Muffled sound of those same heels on the carpet tiles along to my own room. Door open, handbag on desk. Key in the drawer as the PC warms up. Eyes down and focused on the task in hand. A cough.
“Can I ask who the hell you---oh fuck me!”
CHAPTER 57
This was it. I had prepared as best I could, with the ‘carry letter’ Alec had insisted on drafting before he left at the weekend, the ‘spy tit’ as Larinda had christened it working, and the best preparation and presentation I had been able to manage that morning. I looked up.
“Morning, Graham. I’m on an office day today”
“But…shit…”
“Coffee? I’m making one”
Graham Thorpe, another control Officer, was standing open-mouthed in the doorway. He had a file in his hand, and one by one the loose pages were slipping out and falling like autumn leaves. I couldn’t keep up the pose.
“It’s a long story, mate. Pick your bits up and I’ll get a brew, then I’ll talk you through it, aye?”
“You…oh hell, you must be crapping yourself if I have this right. Shit. Oh, just get me a white one, no sugar”
There was nobody else in the little kitchen, thankfully. I had picked the Monday as my office day because most staff would be out, and it normally allowed me to get more work done without the constant interruption that gossip brought. That Monday it also meant I had time to find my feet before the deluge.
I have no real passion for cosmetics. My skin is old enough that a lot of the stuff would just look silly, and I have always seen that heavy foundation stuff as making a girl look plastic. I knew there would be beard shadow, but that would be eradicated one day, and so I stuck to simple touches. A couple of colours round the eyes, mascara and some lippy did all I wanted. It had been good enough to fool blokes in the night club, but then again it had been dark, and they were on the way to being drunk. Graham, though…I carried the cups back into our office, where he sat trying to put his bits of paper back into order. Setting the drinks down, I took my seat, and he watched as I automatically swept my skirt forward to sit.
“That bit sort of answers it, Rob. I was wondering if this was some odd, early, April first crap, but no, it’s you, isn’t it?”
“It’s Jill, Gray. Here, have a read, this should tell you most of it”
Alec had been most insistent. “Think about it, Jill. You are in the bogs, doing what you need to do, and some silly woman complains. What do you do? I mean, you like your skirts and they hardly fir the dress code for the gents’, do they?”
Fossy had been listening to that one, and he and Neil just shared a look. Alec caught it, and started to laugh, and that was a sign of his, their, healing that I had been longing for.
“Yeah, yeah, I know, but I was never into cottaging! You two are beyond words sometimes!”
That Monday, though, Graham was poring over the letter, brow furrowed. He carefully folded it and placed it back into the envelope, all without looking at me, then his eyes rose to meet mine.
“You poor fucker. This why you split up with that Welsh bint?”
“Siobhan? Aye, more or less. We had a discussion, and she sort of threatened me”
“And that new piece? The one with the grin?”
That surprised me. I would have expected him to have commented on her possession of tits, or legs, or an arse, but a grin? That was looking more deeply at a woman than I had expected him to do.
“Larinda, aye?”
“Yeah, that one. She knows, obviously, if you’re shacked up together. She OK with, well, ‘Jill’?”
His fingers made quotation marks in the air, and I sighed. “She is going to have to be, Gray, because this is what I am”
Rachel chose that moment to cease hovering just outside the door and enter, carrying her own drink. “Jill, what are you doing about seeing the AD? Needs to be done, girl”
Gray shook his head. “Might have known you’d be in on this. I thought you two, you know, were playing hide the sausage”
I suddenly found everything extremely funny, and they let me laugh myself out and waited in slight but obvious puzzlement. Graham raised an eyebrow. “You want to share that?”
“Graham, the only sausage-hiding Rach is doing involves some Northern gorilla, and as for me, well, it’s a bit well-hidden right now, aye?”
“Fuck me, if MAC had known…”
That one set Rachel herself off, and we needed the tissues, and the repair kits from our bags, and Graham just watched, shaking his head every so often in negation. A decision sparked behind his eyes.
“Look, er, Jill. The union man is out today, but if you want, you know, with the AD, I could come in with you…”
“Thanks mate, but Rachel has already---unless, Rach, better mob-handed?”
She nodded. “Yeah, like steaming, too many for him to pick one out”
I picked up the phone. “Penny, is Mr Asher busy at the moment? No? Can I pop in for a bit? OK, in ten? Ta!”
I looked across at the other two. “Well, aye, we have coffee to drink and I have the shakes to master”
Rachel snorted, and Graham looked at her, and then he was off again, and I just caught the word ‘mistress’ before he was lost. Rachel sniggered a little, but in the end she sat patiently with me as Graham recovered.
“Gray…”
“Yes?”
“MAC, yeah? John? He does know. We actually see quite a lot of him now. Had dinner with him at the weekend. He’s, well, he’s sort of seeing the world a little differently now”
That was neat. She had described his problem exactly, but without revealing anything personal. Graham’s eyes were wide.
“You are being sociable with that little shit? After…”
His voice trailed off, and he sat looking from me to Rachel and back again. Shaking his head, he muttered something about buying a lottery ticket, given the way the world had upended itself, and then stood.
“Come on, girls. We need to go and see Brian”
Down the corridor we trooped, and I tried to keep my eyes forward as we passed other rooms, but there was the odd eruption of swearing, or a murmured ‘wasn’t that…?’ from three or four. Rachel took charge.
“Thank you, Penny, we know the way”
She opened the door, behind which the big boss was working on some file or other. He didn’t look up.
“Take a seat, Rob, be with you in a sec”
Graham popped the door open, shushed Penny quietly, and brought another chair in. As he sat, Mr Asher lowered his pen and sat back rubbing his eyes.
“Right, then, what---Jesus bloody wept, what the hell is this?”
Rachel held out a hand. “Letter, Jill”
“Jill? Oh, thank you, Rachel, is this….”
His eyes fluttered over the letter, mouth moving as its import became clear.
“May I take a copy? Thank you. Penny!”
She was at the door, looking like a rabbit caught in headlights.
“A copy, please. Now, Rob---“
“Jill”
“Jill, fine, OK, Jill, but could this particular bombshell not have arrived subsequent to a warning? Allow us to decide what course we are to take with you?”
Rachel’s head was back. “And what course is there to take other than to carry on as normal, Mr Asher? I do believe the guidance is quite clear”
“Yes, Rachel, but…”
I held my hand up. “Please. This is hard enough. Look, boss, you’ve read the doctor’s letter, aye? You know the score. What you might not understand, like, is that I don’t really have a choice in this particular dance. I’ve taken the dance in question right up to the edge, and I am trying not to go over. This was my decision, mine alone, but I have enough good friends around me that it ended up being a sort of consensus thing. Put simply, I had to do this one day. I can’t hang around on the edge of the water dipping a toe, I’m a coward, aye? So I had to do it quick, like ripping off a plaster, or a wax strip”
I saw Rachel wince, and I shared her pain. Well, once a month or so I actually shared it, but she knew what I meant. I pressed ahead.
“Look, I would have dithered and worried and skated all around the issue, but my partner, my friends, they saw better than me. Get in, get it over with. That’s what this is”
Asher steepled his fingers. “I see. And you know that there is no way that you can put this particular genie back into its bottle?”
“Aye, I do. That, with all due respect, is the whole bloody idea. Now, what next?”
CHAPTER 58
“What next? I suggest we prepare some sort of announcement”
I looked at him, wondering if he meant that I should make a tour of the various offices and cubicles. He was typing, though.
“I am drafting an e-mail for general distribution, and I am going to add a reminder that the Department has some very strict rules on diversity and equality, not to mention bullying. Here is my position, Mi…ss Carter. I do not like this at all. This is disruptive and abnormal, but I am as bound by the rules as any other staff member. I will not, CAN not, offer you my best wishes, but I can assure you that the niceties and the rules will be respected. Do we understand each other?”
“Aye, boss, I think we do. What do you need from me?”
He looked me up and down. “Perhaps…perhaps just a little less girly in the clothes tomorrow? Ease your way into skirts rather than trying to do ‘Roman Holiday’?”
“You what?”
“Audrey Hepburn, for god’s sake. Look, one other thing. What have you done so far with your name? I am not going to piss about with your ID or staff records unless or until it is all kosher. That is why I ask you, how serious are you?”
I sighed. “As serious as I could ever be. This is me, this is who I am, aye? This is the end of pretence, OK?”
He sighed in return. “As you will. If you are going to swear a deed poll or make a statutory dec, can I have a copy for my file? Oh yes, and stay out of the ladies’ for now. And the gents’. Use the sick room”
That was apparently that, but as we left I saw his head drop into his hands. Penny was waiting as we came out.
“Please, Rob, what is all this?”
I put a hand on her arm. “What does it look like, kid? And it’s Jill, not Rob any more”
“It looks like you are in for a lot of grief”
I smiled. “Already had that, Pen, already had that”
The three of us walked back to my own little room, the trip a gauntlet of questions from other colleagues as we went. I fobbed them off as best I could, sticking to the basics, and then went to my computer.
“Rach, lunch out today? Red Lion?”
“Suits me”
I drafted my own global e-mail, ‘I will be at lunch next door from twelve thirty if there are questions to be asked’, and sent it round the building. The internet was next.
“What’s that thing he mentioned, Rach? Stat dec?”
“Statutory declaration. Here…”
She took over the keyboard and soon had the necessary forms on a website. Five minutes later they were completed.
“What’s that printer number? OK…done. Now, Jill, before we do this, ring your other half and tell her, yeah? Just in case she feels left out”
Larinda answered on the first ring.
“I was waiting, love, shitting myself about how it’s gone”
“Seen the boss, and it’s all official now. Set up lunch in the pub, if any of them want to ask any questions, like. And Rach has printed off a name change thing, needs a couple of witnesses to sign”
“Can’t be me then. Look a bit off with the same address, yeah?”
Graham coughed. “Want me?”
I turned back to the phone. “Got Rachel, love, and one of the lads has just offered”
“Offered what exactly, girl? Don’t you go off chasing no blokes. Only two people getting in your knickers, and that’s me and you!”
“Aye, but one’s a bloke, and as for Rachel, Jim’s a lot bigger than me!”
Rachel guffawed, and Larinda clearly heard.
“Tell that slapper with the tits that it’s quality, not bulk weight, yeah? And Jill…”
There was quite a pause. “Jill, look, you come home safe, right. You are my girl now, I mean that”
She hung up, and I wondered exactly what she had meant. Her girl…after the initial disaster with the ‘sexy’ knickers, she had clearly been doing her best to come to terms with me, me as I should have been from the start. I still woke in the night, wondering exactly how much she could take, and despite her protestations, I knew it was hard. She was as straight as she could be, and yet she had been presented with the slap in the face of falling in love with someone who was not what she had thought. If, if she could keep that in mind, stay the course, then I really had to reconsider how lucky I was. Rachel beside me, my family, the Forsters, even John, all had simply adjusted their view of me and carried on. I thought again of the girl Alec had mentioned, that Sally had known, and shuddered.
Come on, Jill, shake it up, conjure a smile.
“Right, boys and girls, I suggest we get a bit of work out of the way, and then it’s pub time. See you at twelve fifteen, lass?”
Rachel nodded. “Yup, got to be done. Laters!”
I pulled up my schedule for the week. “Graham, can you remember when we used to do all this ourselves? Book our own visits, speak to the trader, have some bloody flexibility, aye? Sodding computerised bollocks…”
There was just a snort from the other side of the room, and then, very softly, “Well, that answers one question”
“Aye?”
“You are definitely still yourself!”
I grinned back. “No, I am only just getting to be that, marra, but the me inside is still the same. Just better dressed, aye?”
“You are going out on visits dressed like that?”
“Well, I can hardly do it naked, can I?”
He laughed, far more naturally now, and waved a mug at me. “Another?”
“Aye, go on, I’ll share my biccies with you”
“You allowed biscuits?”
“Not really, but what she doesn’t see and all that. They were in the shop round the corner, and had my name on”
“You’ve changed your surname as well, to McVities?”
And he was gone at that. I felt my strength wobble, just slightly. The morning had rushed by, and it had been as if I was in a stream in spate, all my movements dictated by the current, and suddenly I was alone, in my office, in a skirt and mascara, with a baying crowd waiting for me in less than two hours.
Sod it. I had to do this, or the rest of my life wouldn’t be any life at all. Buckle down. You have four letters to write, girl, four to print and post. Do that, focus on the job, get it out, exposed, looked at, and hopefully bloody forgotten. Nine days wonder, that’s what I was hoping for, one quick freak show and done.
Tea came, biscuits vanished, and Rachel reached across my keyboard to the mouse. File–save as---
She struck an odd pose, all shoulders, and grunted something in as deep a voice as possible. “Show time…”
Coat. Bloody handbag (I was sure I’d leave it somewhere some day). Door. Pavement (click of heels, oh my, how that would have entranced me way back when). Pub. It actually fell silent as we entered, and I felt the need to break the spell.
“Dry white, Rach, got to do full girly, aye?”
I turned to what seemed a sea of faces, trying to pick them out as individuals so that I could at least gauge their reactions before I spoke, but I was overwhelmed. Deep breath, yet again.
“Some of you may have been wondering why I called you here, but I bloody well doubt any of you are right now, so I shall plunge in. This is me, the person you all thought you knew wasn’t me, and the real name is Jill, thank you and goodnight. Ta, Rach”
I raised the glass to my lips to cover my shakes, and turned away, though I knew that wasn’t the end of it. “Rach, what you having for lunch? My shout, aye?”
“Was just going for the ploughman’s, yeah?”
“Pickled onions?”
“Well, one of us won’t be doing no snogging tonight, so she can, yeah? You, my girl, on the other hand---“
“Who’s…she snogging?”
It was Lisa, a plump girl from the Registration district. Rachel turned her most angelic smile on her, and I swear I saw her eyelashes bat.
“Why, her girlfriend, of course, who else?”
Lisa blinked three or four times, then shook her head. “If you…when…shit, times like this, do the announcement thing after work so I can get pissed, OK? We still have the afternoon to get through. Ah, sorry, what I meant to say was, hell, just not a problem with me, all right? Bit of a shock, is all”
Rachel looked across at me, then turned back to Lisa. “So, surprised?”
“Well, shit, yeah! And then…I can’t put it into one sentence, Rob, Jill, but, well, YEAH, OK? Makes sense now. Hell, you were never thick enough to be a man”
She was blushing, and I got a hug, one of those lightning-quick ones where the hugger is too embarrassed to stay longer, and then the inquisition began in earnest. How long, why, was I gay, when was I having it cut off, all the usual rubbish, but what I actually noticed were the ones who never came over, didn’t ask questions, just looked, and that was when I began to worry. This was public, this was a form of solidarity, but once we were away from the big group some of the silent watchers would be the ones to keep my eyes on. I had always known it would never be an easy road.
A hand took mine, fingers interleaving with my own, and I turned to see my lover beside me. She smiled and kissed me on the lips.
The road ahead eased as she did so.
CHAPTER 59
That was the start of so much, that lunchtime, and for the rest of the day, and about the next fortnight, I endured the steady flow of colleagues past and into my room under a variety of excuses who wished to see the freak. Nine Days’ Wonder is the phrase, and that was what I felt, and once nine days were up I hoped to be allowed to settle down and get on with it. The next hurdle to present itself was my first control visit.
I had been assigned a small furniture shop for my first day out professionally as Jill. And I dressed the part. Yet another bloody cream blouse, with some grey trousers and matching jacket, but Larinda’s double present giving a hint as to who I was. Platform pedals meant flat shoes, and loafers are loafers, but I wore ‘footsy’ nylons rather than socks. It is all about perception. The trader did a sort of double-take as I walked in.
“Er…Mister Carter?”
“Mizz Carter, Mr Khan”
“This is very…irregular. Do they normally allow such…clothing when you are at work?”
“Mr Khan, if you wish to say something offensive, please do so in words rather than in significant pauses. This is not exactly atypical of how women dress, aye?”
“Yes…Mizz Carter, but you are surely not a woman?”
I was caught between two stools just then. I didn’t know whether I should abuse him or cry in shame and frustration, but just then his wife, who was also, it seemed, his bookkeeper, general dogsbody and cleaner, started saying something to him in whatever language it was they shared, and after a brisk exchange she spoke to me herself. As she opened her mouth, she turned to him and snapped off a rebuke, in English.
“Husband, I am not speaking to a strange man, this is a woman, so shush!”
She stared at him long enough for him to turn away, and then looked at me again.
“We have this thing where we are from, the khusra. This is…please, if I wrong you, I am apologising, yes? It is the woman who is not a woman, but is a woman, but her body is…I am not good with this, I am sorry. But I understand, AS DOES MY HUSBAND, that sometimes God does things that are perhaps not the way we would wish, so, if this is what we are seeing today, then I welcome this lady to our home and to our shop, and SO DOES MY HUSBAND”
The subtext of that was very, very clear. He played ball, or she didn’t, and he was still young enough to be concerned about who played with his own balls, or at least kept him warm in a crappy Redhill winter. The rest of the visit was a piece of cake, and I quickly realised that Mrs Khan was a woman who not only understood the concept of morality, but tried to bring it to life. There are moments in my job where I have found ‘moral’ people whose concept of honesty is to find a reason to justify each and every non-business claim they can. She was different, and for only the fifth or sixth time ever I found myself arguing with a trader that no, it WAS a legitimate business expense and YES they could claim it. I worked out that her ‘honesty’ owed her three hundred quid. Not a huge sum, but better than a kick where it hurt. Her husband kept out of the way, but if that was a sample of my future professional life, I might just survive.
As I came out, I rang Larinda.
“And how…?”
“I was read, and hubby got a bit off, like, but his wife told him his fortune, nooky-wise, and, well…look, love, this is important, aye? I know I can never, will never be able to walk into anywhere and be seen as anything other than a bloke in a frock, but, well, I knew that, always knew it. It’s just…it’s just that I can now see myself living the life I was meant to, aye? And with you, hell, anything must be possible”
There was quite a long pause at the other end. “Jill, you do realise how hard this is for me? I’m a straight girl, straight as they come, yeah? The only thing keeping me going is that I love YOU, right? Not your cock, not your hairy bits, not your bank balance, but you, the man, the person, the woman, the fuck knows what. You talk about that shopkeeper, and it’s like I’m the one there. Shit, I have to be blunt here. I would have really preferred someone who was---look, take it the right way, yeah? I would have really preferred someone who was normal, but I look at it now, and that person wouldn’t be you, and I prefer you, and, shit, I think you know what I mean”
I couldn’t answer, and then her voice came back, this time with the specific tone of voice I knew came when she was making a joke, or being ‘naughty’
“Jill…when they cut it off, yeah? Do you think we could, like, have it stuffed and mounted? You know, so I could, well, mount it?”
“Love, I think the trick is to leave it on, but sort of inside-out, aye?”
“Bugger. I shall have to make a mould of it then, like that groupy, the plastercaster girl”
I laughed. “Lass, you are seriously odd at times!”
“No, love, I am just very, very confused. Look, just make me a promise, yeah? Don’t ever change who you are, cause then I’d be lost”
I spent the rest of my day thinking about that conversation. So much of what I was doing was so utterly selfish. The suicidal thoughts, the long years of collapse into the bottle and solitude, what was that all about? Look at Alec, what he had been through, Jim, Neil, even bloody John Forster. For fuck’s sake, James and John, both pairs, they had endured more than I had. Was my lot in life so much worse than anyone else’s? I was alive, I had much of my health, and most importantly I had not only good friends but a partner, a lover, who was quite simply the best thing that had ever happened to me since birth. Did I need more?
The answer was sitting there like a grinning imp. Yes, I did. For good, bad or the purely selfish, I had to go to my grave at the very least as the person I had to be. I realised that this was what Alec had warned of, during one of our sessions, the doubt, the uncertainty within certainty, and with a leap into empathy I knew that I was feeling almost exactly as Larinda did, that what I needed, what I yearned for, would wound someone I loved.
I rang Alec. I could see no alternative. Whatever incoherent crap I gave him still seemed to make sense.
“Jill, let me get this clear with you. You are terrified you are hurting Larinda, yes?”
“Dead bloody right I am!”
“Jill…sod it, this isn’t me being professional, yeah, this is me talking to a friend, to…to a woman I love as a sister. Shut up, my turn. You need to realise this therapy game can be two-way, yeah, and you have done as much or more for me as I may have done for you, so take a compliment for once”
He paused for breath, but I was left speechless. “Look, Jill, I understand suicidal ideation, so does Sal, so does Stewie, and that’s because we have all been there. Well, not Sal, as far as I know. You know what the worst thing about that shit is? The waste. People who, if they had just given themselves a few months or years, might have seen a different world, or perhaps a different self. You, people like you, you can’t do that, because the different self never happens. John, my John…”
Oh. Another pause, and then he picked up again. “John has hidden most of his life, and it nearly killed him. He has the option of coming out, and he has, and he can make a go of a life. You can’t, but, and I will be brutal here, Larinda can. That is what you really, really need to get your head around. If you are certain about your gender then you can never, ever relax, it will always be that fabled pachyderm standing between you and the telly. And the truly shitty thing is that Larinda will know it, and all the time she is with you she will be hating herself for what she has made you do”
“So you are saying…”
“Shush, still my go, you rang me, yeah? Short form: Larinda will cope, or she won’t, if you switch over. If you don’t, neither of you will. Got me? If we are all lucky, you will cope together. If we aren’t, then, it’s like a divorce, and better than a fucking funeral”
Yet another pause. “Jill, none of that is from my professional chair, OK? Just, well, I care. I can’t really put it better than that. I’ve been there, seen it, but they don’t have a T-shirt for it, yeah? Speak to Sal, some time when she is off guard, ask her about Mel. Realise this, you are so bloody lucky in who you have about you, we both are, but neither of us has been very observant. Look, go home, see Larinda, do whatever you do to make yourselves feel happy and loved, and count your damned blessings, right?”
After we finished, I started to do just that, and all he said slowly sank in. There was one word, shining in the middle of it all, and that was ‘love’. I set off home.
CHAPTER 60.
And so it went. I got up, I shaved as well as I could, Larinda did what she could to make the best of my face, I went to work, I got abused or not as the day passed, and a few kids would point in the street. There seemed to be some sort of armed truce in the office, where I had some true friends that I had always recognised as such, and to my gratified surprise quite a few more that I hadn’t spotted.
It seemed that in my despair and self-imposed isolation I had aroused nothing worse than pity in many of my colleagues. There were some, though…the main complaint came via the boss, and it was, of course, about the toilets. That was always the sticking point, and I had known it would be, so I sighed and used the medical room. No big deal, I thought, but I noticed that Mr Asher was very tight-lipped about who was making the complaints.
Each day was an adventure? Bollocks was it. Each day was just like the slogan, SSDD, and it was indeed the same shit. No matter how well my lover did my face, no matter how neat my clothing, I still felt the weight on my chest and knew it was fake, still felt the visits to the medical room toilet as the act of a man. Rachel summed it up one lunchtime, as we sat in the kitchen eating some sandwich or other from round the corner, ‘coloured chunky paste number 16 on wholemeal’ or something.
“You are bloody impatient, aren’t you? You want it all yesterday, and you’ve only had this bit a fortnight. Slow down, woman!”
“Aye, well, it’s like bloody Moses across the river; I can see where I should be, but I’m not getting there”
She choked on a piece of sandwich. “You are taking the fucking piss! Look at you, in your bloody M&S blouse–“
“Debenhams”
“Whatever. The shoes are Dorothy Perkins, I went with you, remember? Take one off, just indulge me, yeah? Now turn it over”
I did as she asked. “What now?”
“Look at the sole. What do you see?”
“Getting a bit scuffed, bit of bloody chewing gum I hadn’t noticed”
“And do you not see? You never had that before, you never wore them outside, yeah? Your main worry now is that they might get wet, not that you’re bloody well wearing a pair of poxy heels in public. You’re NORMAL, girl! What more could you bloody well want? No, don’t answer that, it probably involves sharp blades in tender places”
I looked at her under my fringe as I ate, knowing she was right. “What do you suggest, pet?”
“When did you last speak to Alec? I mean, in his office?”
“Couple weeks, like. Seeing him day after tomorrow, as it happens”
She laughed again. “I was about to tell you to talk to him, but that’s what you are supposed to be doing, yeah? Just get him to say where you are, give you something to work from. We having curry this Saturday?”
“Sorting my social life for me, Rach?”
“No, just sort of got a couple of guests for the weekend. Sorting my own social life, innit?”
“A couple…oh, am I going to wind him up on Wednesday!”
Suddenly, she lost all her playfulness. “But gently, Jill, yeah? Early days, and they’ve both had a load of crap. Gently, yeah?”
Two days later, I was at Alec’s door in what would have been my lunch break, and I nearly laughed aloud as I entered.
“And the joke is?”
“Not a joke, Alec, not at all. You’ve been looking in the mirror, and it shows”
“And?”
“Playing the analyst as ever, Alec? OK, then. You are taking better care of yourself since…you seeing him this weekend, then? Ah, that’ll be a yes, then. How many for that curry?”
He grinned, and there was comfort in his smile, more calm than I had ever seen. “Back to you, we both have a clock ticking. Where are you, Jill?”
Sod it, I’d get to play on Saturday. “Alec, in limbo. Rachel pointed it out on Monday: this is now normal for me, as much as I could ever have hoped for, aye? It’s just, underneath, I’m still Rob. I mean, I’m lighter by far than I was, the place you sent me for the electrolysis is slowly making a difference, but it’s all cosmetic”
“You’ve got the carry letter with you?”
“As ever”
“And you know the way to Charing Cross?”
Oh. “Er, yes, just been waiting for the referral”
“This thing?”
He held out an envelope. “It’s next month, just as the daffs will be coming in, but up there it’ll be coughing and wheezing, all that traffic”
I held the envelope as if it might explode. “This is it?”
“This is it, yes. I have finished my diagnosis, if you want to call it that, but I still want to talk to you, still a lot to get straight. And, well, I would still want to talk to you anyway; friends, yes?”
I couldn’t help it and the tears were as girly a thing as any sexist would have expected, and of course we hugged, and after a while that was far too short we took our leave.
“Saturday then, Alec? You and John?”
“Sally should be along as well. Oh, before you go, do you want this? I spoke to your GP and they wrote this out for you”
It was a prescription. Shit. My stomach churned. This really was ‘it’.
“I checked with Addison’s, and they’ve got the stuff in, so you can pick it up on your way back to work. Look…”
He came over to me as I stood by the door, and put the paper into my handbag. A firm hug, the smell of some aftershave or other, one more symptom of his recovery.
“Jill, this isn’t cosmetic, not really, this is you, and if you choose to go down this route then I see no real problems. You have friends. You have family, and a bloody good one from what I see. I am always here, Sal’s about, even Stewie knows what he’s talking about, and that woman of yours is pure unalloyed gold”
“That’s my worry, Alec; she’s not gay”
“We shall see, Jill. I don’t mean we will change her sexuality, that’s utter crap, in my view. What you can do, though, is realise that this is a slow process, and that gives her time to think, and time for you two to see how you feel. Look…”
He checked his watch. “Minute or two yet. There was a case a while ago, two butch lesbians to all appearances, decided they were actually transgendered so started the process, the therapy, the counselling. Turned out one of them was a butch lesbian, one of them was a straight man. So only one of them transitioned, because only for him was it appropriate. That is what people like me are here for, to filter, to bring out the reality from behind the wishful thinking.
“Now, they are still friends, as far as I know, but no longer lovers, because they are wrong for each other and, to be honest, always were. I know others, though, where a husband and wife are now, well, wife and wife, and it’s worked well. You won’t know, until, yeah? So take it as it comes, and just keep that love you have up there in front of you. Now piss off to work; I pay your wages, you know!”
One joke, and the mood broke. “Hang on, pal, you work for the NHS, so I pay your bloody wages as well, aye?”
He grinned. “Damn it, busted. Saturday, then?”
“Saturday it is!”
I walked out of his office and onto the street, and Addison’s was there, sign glowing bright and terrifying. Into my handbag, and straight past the prescription to my mobile. Larinda answered in her best work voice.
“Your boss about then?”
“That is correct. How may I help?”
“I am holding a prescription for the hormones. What do I do?”
“If you would please…he’s just gone. Got a few seconds only, so listen. You are you, and I love you, and I realise that Jill is you in ways that Rob never was, and Rob or Jill, you will die if you don’t, die inside or die in real life, yeah? So you go in there, you get them, you swallow, and we deal with whatever, yeah? WE deal with it, together? Got me? Anything else?”
“Saturday evening curry is on. John will definitely be there”
“Jim’s John?”
“I rather think Alec’s John”
“Oh the randy little fucker straight down the High Street past the Belfry centre and third on your left. Thank you for your enquiry, sir. That appointment is confirmed”
Click. I put the phone back, and withdrew the piece of paper. The pharmacist was a small Chinese woman, and as she handed me the little paper bag twenty minutes later, she smiled, and whispered.
“About time. We’ve all seen you around, in the shop here, so we know. Good luck, girl”
I wandered back to the office almost dazed. That was confirmation of something I had been suspecting since that first trip to the reserve, that people could see what I was, and after the first impulsive curiosity they just didn’t care. Big world, things to do, people to see, oh a tranny, what’s for lunch?
Kettle on, then. Cup of tea. First dose. Swallow.
Goodbye Rob Carter.
CHAPTER 61
“So that is sixteen pops, with all the trimmings, and then a lamb pathia…”
I wondered what was going on. Me girl; curry order man’s job. “Oh, and six Kingfishers and a bottle of the Piesporter”
I looked at Larinda, puzzled. “How the hell can you drink that sweet crap, pet?”
She raised an eyebrow. “And what do you normally drink when you aren’t having lager, eh? Beer-flavoured soup, innit, so why the lager?”
“Well, decent ale would taste crap with curry”
“Yeah, well, you ever drunk decent wine with curry?”
Oh yes, out of three-litre boxes, dry and white, my attempt at slow suicide before I met you, my love. “Aye, I see what you mean”
Jim was laughing at that, and dust was falling from the light fittings as a result.
“Whey, man, aal the beer tastes like shite doon here, curry’s irrelevant!”
I looked over to Rachel. “Did he just use a four-syllable word, Rach? Something you haven’t told us about, some new experimental drug, aye?”
“Shut it you---ah, we can has drinkohol, at last; my throat’s dying of sobriety. Chaps, girls, before we get all curried up, can I suggest something: a toast, to a new life, for an old friend. Jill!”
They agreed and drank, and then I had to return the favour. “Look, all of you, this…this is a big thing, a very big thing, but I am looking round this table, and I could single out folk for a reply, but that’s not it, aye? You lot, all of you, it’s all down to you and your support. So, sod it, it’s maudlin, but let’s lift a glass to friendship, aye?”
And they did, and we had our poppadums with the mint raitha, mango chutney, onion salad and lime pickle that tradition demands, and as we ate I had a chance to look round the table. It was not exactly a revelation, more of a confirmation. Rachel’s nerves seemed to have evaporated in the warmth of Jim’s smile, and that was ever turned her way when he wasn’t laughing at some poor joke or other. Alec was more animated than I had ever seen him before, and John, who had always seemed a little like a faded photograph, was coming into colour.
I looked over at the McDuffs, and Sally was just laughing with the rest. Stewie, though, was quietly watchful, and I realised that he was still on his first pint. He caught my eye, and just gave a nod and a smile, and at that I decided I would hold back on my own drinking. Something had changed his mood. We carried on through our ice creams and coffees, and of course the minty chocolates. John broke the silence as we sipped.
“How, it’s a Saturday night, and I think we have a bit to celebrate, aye?”
I looked over. “Aye, and what have you in mind?”
“I am reliably informed there is a pub nearby…”
“Divvent get carried away, wor kid. Ah telt ye what Ah thowt o the ale here”
John just grinned and leant over towards his brother. “Just one word, Jim: Belhaven”
“Bugger a hell, hoo far away is it and where’s me coat?”
Alec laughed out loud, something I had never seen before. “Pavlovian response, oh my!”
The pub was in the next street: the Four Feathers, which was perhaps a joke about an old film, and the décor was based heavily on Welsh culture in peculiar collision with the Sudan of General Gordon. A sort of Caertoum. As that joke hit my mind, I realised that I was indeed ecstatically happy. Larinda had my hand, my friends were around me in number, and even though I could see I had more hurdles ahead of me than a steeplechaser I knew, utterly and completely, that I could clear them with ease. That memory of a cardboard box of wine, a dirty plate on the floor beside me as I hammered my ears with Hawkwind and tried to find some sort of salvation by proxy in the stories on that site; that memory was of another life, another person. This was now, this was me, out in Crawley, out of my shell.
Jim was straight up to the bar. “Fower pints o’ the Belhaven, marra, an’ whatever these lasses want, like”
The barmaid looked about twelve, green-dyed hair and a nose ring, but the expression she turned on Jim seemed to suggest that he was the odd one. “Yew wot?”
Alec took John’s hand as he went to step forward. “Let me, love. Darling, he wants four pints of that hand pump stuff there, and whatever these four ladies want, though I rather assume Jill, yes? She will have another of the ale. Rach? Larinda? Sal? Two dry whites and a vodka and orange, ta”
He stepped back, and I collared him. “ ‘Love’, eh? You been busy, Alec?”
He looked abashed. “Sort of slipped out, but, yes, we seem to be heading that way. I shall have to be more careful”
I gave him a wink. “I think you were already being very careful, Alec, you devious old bugger”
That brought a happy smile. “Oh yes, if I am very, very lucky!”
“Down, boy, you are supposed to be my bloody therapist! Come on, there’s seats over there”
Happiness, happy times, good friends. I gave up on my thoughts of sobriety, and the beer did what beer does, and so I had to let things run their course, in a manner of speaking. As I exited the ladies’ a hand grabbed the front of my blouse and a nose went up against mine.
“What the fuck are you doing in the fucking ladies you fucking tranny queer?”
Everything crashed and burned, all at once. This was reality, this was the wider world I would have to live in, not the cosy circle I had ridden in so far.
“I’m not a tranny”
I am queer, though…thoughts running wild in my head as I awaited the first punch.
“Let her go, now”
“Fuck off, shortarse!”
Stewie was just to my right, and there was something in his eyes, something darker than midnight. “Bit of advice, sonny. Never, ever tell me to fuck off, OK? Now, let her go. Last request”
Something moved just behind him, and then John was standing there rubbing his hand. “He had a friend, Stewie. Jim should be out of the bogs in a bit”
“No worries, mate. Now, sonny, hands off her”
The man got out part of what was going to be “I told you to fuck off” or its friends, but Stewie did something with his hands , and then something very violent with his head, and the resulting noise left me feeling sick. I noticed that John had his back to both of us, and understood that he had absolute confidence in Stewie; he was just making sure nobody else was interested. That was when Jim appeared, and as he took in the scene I expected him to react in a way completely different to what he did do.
“Any mair, lads?”
Stewie looked down at the one on the floor, as Larinda grabbed me, and John looked round. “Don’t think so, kidda”
“Reet then, time for the filth”
He reached into his pocket, pulled out his mobile and dialled, and then with a rueful grin handed it to Sally. “They’ll understand ye better, hinny”
“Police, please. Thank you. Assault, and I would like it referred to as a hate crime. Four Feathers, High Street, Crawley. No, I don’t know the postcode. Two assailants, both are injured. No, no injuries to the victims---Jill, you OK? No, no injuries. Thank you”
She gave her phone number to the operator just as one of the two men stirred, and I realised there were a small group of customers showing a more than keen interest in the events, just as the bar staff came over.
“Wossup?”
Stewie was icily calm. “Man on the floor attacked the lady here. Man behind me, also on the floor, wanted to join in. All sorted now”
“Would you please leave, then?”
“Nope. Waiting for the old bill, You got any CCTV here?”
“Yeah…oh, right, yeah”
She was gone again, still clearly on her own planet, and I gingerly felt round my neck where his hands had wrenched me about. That was when I suddenly realised that I had no strength, anywhere, and I almost fell onto Larinda, Jim catching me and putting me on a bench seat. He turned round, glaring at the crowd, especially the more closely attentive ones. John noticed.
“Now, my brother here is feeling a bit left out, so if anyone else wants to play, feel free!”
One of the women raised her head. “Fucking queer!”
John smiled. “Not at the moment, it’s too public. Later if I’m lucky, aye?”
Alec moved across to him, and though he was trembling, he made a brave show. “I think you’ve just got lucky, John”
There was a bustle from the doorway, and two coppers were there, one tall and balding, the other a short and well-endowed woman. She was the first to speak.
“Fuck me, Stewie, what’s gone on here?”
“Muppet one, here, decided to attack my friend there. It was clearly done as a consequence of her transgendered nature, so we’d like it recorded as a hate crime. When I removed his hands from her neck, muppet two over there decided he wanted to play, and he met my friend from the Fusiliers there. Some of these others have made homophobic remarks. Good to see you, Kirst, Nev”
“Yeah, could be better circs, OK? Nev, you take sleeping beauty over there, and I’ll handle the whiner”
As ‘Nev’ moved the unconscious one into the recovery position and ’Kirst’ radioed for an ambulance the woman with the mouth decided to have another go.
“What about them? They fucking hit them, broke his nose! Bunch of fucking poofters!”
Kirst smiled, and that wasn’t a nice thing to see. “This is your one warning under the Public Order Act. Any more foul language or incitement to hatred will not be tolerated. Do you understand me? Put it another way, Sherry Matthews, you eff or blind or queer one more time and you go to see my hubby down the nick. Got me? Good, so zip it”
She called over to Sally. “Sal, darlin’, this one of Naomi and Albert’s gaffs?”
“Think so, Kirst”
“Right, oh look, there’s the cavalry”
Four more policemen came in, and there was the flashing of blue lights outside. Kirst nodded to the first. “Hiya Ted, just got to nick this one…”
She rattled through some list of words about arrest and questioning, and left the crying thug with two of the officers, while the other two went to the bar. There was something of Stewie about her, a poise that spoke of confidence built on experience, and it became clearer to me as she came over.
“Hiya, what’s your name?”
I sighed. “Which one? You know what I am”
Sally snorted. “Jill, remember the old line, some of my best friends are…well, some of Kirst’s definitely are, isn’t that true?”
“Fuck, yeah. Sal will tell you later. First, any injuries?”
“Scratch from his nails, I think, when he grabbed me, probably happened when Stewie stepped in”
“Lucky boy. Stewie’s obviously settled down a bit”
“Eh?”
“If the fucker can cry, he’s still breathing”
I realised the pub was less full than it had been, as the little support group had decided to leave. Kirst hadn’t finished.
“Look, love, you are shaking. If you want to proceed with this, we will need a statement, down the nick be best, yeah? You up to that? This your sis?”
Larinda was kneading my shoulders from behind. “No, I’m her partner. Jill, love, this is something that you should do. No running any more, OK? Kirst, is it?”
“Or Kirsty, or Ruth. Sergeant Armstrong. And Nev is constable Chamberlain”
Larinda held out her hand. “So far, you have been sweetness and bloody light, but Jill here is a bit shaken. Is there a chance of somewhere quiet down there?”
“Rape suite. Fluffier than a fluffy thing, that place, if you don’t mind the associations. Hang on, twatfeatures is waking up. You OK, Nev?”
“Yeah, Ruthie, just cuffing. I’ve put in a call for Doc Khan”
“Yeah, can you let the others know that the crier has got skin under his nails? Get yours off in the van soon as, then”
And so it went, and I was left astonished. What had happened to the old-style coppers, the ones who would simply have looked at me and asked, rhetorically, what I had expected dressed like a woman? There was a second van, and then a ‘carrier’, which turned out to be a minibus, to take the rest of us down to the police station, and it went on, and I had tea, and my statement was written down sat in soft chairs in a peaceful room. An Asian doctor examined me, and took a swab of the inside of my cheek. Everything was so, so gentle, as Larinda sat holding my hand, and I sat with the button from my blouse in my other hand, the one he had torn off, and I simply wanted to curl up and die.
CHAPTER 62
It was all too much. That was the short form, but the longer story was far worse. Kirst was there, my statement was taken, and all the time I felt like a piece of rubbish chucked out on the roadside. Who was I bloody kidding? I had splashed around in the happy little pond of my friends’ approval, and now I was out in the real world, and it had teeth.
“Jill?”
It was another fucking copper, some butch dyke with dark hair and oddly pale skin. Butch dyke–oh you hypocrite. But, then again, how can you be a dyke when you have a cock?
“Aye? What now?”
“Kirsty gave me a call, Said I might be able to help. I will tell you now, me and ‘im indoors were planning an evening in before she rang, aye? I’m Sergeant Johnson, Annie to friends”
Welsh, for fuck’s sake. What the hell was she doing in Shit City? “Look, I have given my statement, my partner here” (I squeezed Larinda’s hand)” is with me, OK? What can you do?”
Larinda squeezed my hand. “Lover, calm down a bit, yeah? Jill, look, I may be wrong, yeah, but…Annie, was it?”
“It is”
“Annie, can I guess that you are one of the friends the other sergeant, the short one, spoke about?”
“I suppose, yes, knowing Ruthie, yes I am”
“Jill, bloody well wake up, Annie here is…on the same journey you are”
Oh. All at once it was obvious. “Sorry, I got a bit…I just didn’t expect it to get so personal, like. So right in my fucking face”
Annie sat in one of the other chairs. “They’ve brought you tea, aye? I wouldn’t touch the Inspector’s coffee, it’s a bit potent. Look…I can’t and won’t sugar any pills, that wouldn’t be helpful. Who is your therapist?”
“Alec Devereaux. He’s one of the witnesses”
“And you had the McDuffs out with you as well. That was fortunate, aye? Stewie’s a bit…competent. Now, Ruthie has taken your statement, Nev and her are working through the others, so that’s the investigation in hand, and Doc Khan has done the business here, aye? That’s not what I am here for. Your man is a bit stressed himself, so all I am here for is as a sympathetic ear”
A civilian support worker came in, and she just nodded as he asked “Tea, Sarge?” and I looked at her; I could see what she was, but it was no more than a relaxed woman sitting by me, and I could suddenly see why she was there. This was what life could be; this was the other side of the Jordan. I had to ask.
“How? How did you get…shit, the word I want to use is ‘accepted’, but that sounds rude. They just seem to take you as, well, you know”
She smiled, and at that was almost pretty, a flush in her pale cheeks. “Just never gave them a choice, butt. Take me or leave me, aye? And round here, there’s a sort of history with girls like us”
Larinda nodded. “Alec was talking about some girl what died. Friend of Sally’s, yeah?”
There was a look in the sergeant’s eyes that was as old as sin. “That she was, and she didn’t die, she was killed”
“You knew her?”
“No, not really. Just…just recovered her body. Not the best day in my life, aye? Now, that is why we take these things so seriously, and why I am here. Neither Sally nor your man are out of the loop, so I am here to sort of fill in. After rape we offer a counselling service, so if you want we can look for someone else for you, or I can listen. I do a lot of that”
I looked round the suite, ate the soft colours and gentle textures of the walls and furnishings.
“But I haven’t been raped”
Larinda squeezed my hand. “Oh yes you have, love, as good as. Annie, true, yeah? Take away her humanity, make her a thing rather than a person, yeah. Jill, I got me a book the other day, and it’s a bit poncey, but he uses a word, ‘repudiation’, right, and it covers all this shit, all the hate, the violence. She’s bloody well right, it is rape”
Every now and again my lover could still surprise me, and each surprise simply brought into clearer view the depth of her love. The copper was nodding.
“Aye, indeed, that’s what it is, making someone less than a person. Jill, you are feeling that now, aye? Worthless, not real?”
I have felt that all my life. Back to the stages I had planned out? No, not with Larinda in my life. Circular thoughts span round me, memories of waiting for Siobhan to move away so I could leave the whole thing behind, and all that time Larinda’s hand in mine. That was the difference between my old days, the days of Rob looking through the bottom of a glass every night, and this person sitting in a skirt in a rape suite. An image came to me, that of a small boat in big seas, paying out a sea anchor to keep its head to the waves, so as not to broach, founder, sink…
Annie just sat in silence as I thought it through. “I can’t tell you what to do, Jill, all I can do is let you see that the world is not as shitty as it seems. People are better than you realise, and I think from the way you are dressed, and where you were, that you were starting to discover that, aye?”
John Forster. John Wilkins. Terry. I had hated them all, at one point, and the first for over forty years, and yet there they were, not just in my camp but actually fighting my battles. I noticed she had a set of rings.
“Your wife, she accepted you?”
That brought a complete change in her mood, and she laughed happily. “I’m definitely straight, girl! Hubby’s at home with the boy”
The laughter came back, and then she stopped, cocking her head to one side and grinning. “I was about to say ‘but some of my best friends are etc’, and in my case that would be absolutely true, so take it as read, aye? Look, this is a crossroads, watershed, whatever bloody metaphor you want, aye, and I can talk, listen, whatever, but the next bit is up to you. You can roll over, give up, die as the woman all of us can see here, or you can live. If you roll over, then turds like the ones who attacked you win, and that is not fair on you, aye? And there’s more”
She paused, serious once more. “Aye, there is more. You’ve given us a statement, and I am assuming–no, I am hoping, trusting, that you will be willing to go to court over this. Because the other side of things is that if you give up your chance at life, or don’t go through with the prosecution, either or both, then those people have won, and they will feel bolder, more willing to make someone else an unperson, aye? The last time they won, a girl died. Not again, not on my watch”
Larinda leant into me. “No. It don’t happen like that. She does what she needs to, but I go to court, Stewie, John, Sal, all the others, they go with me, and we put those fuckers away. By the way, did they get hurt much?”
Annie smiled tightly. “The one your Geordie mate hit lost a tooth. Apparently, looking at the CCTV, it was his boyfriend who stopped him putting the boot in. I think he might have tried to kill him, otherwise. Stewie’s, well, he has a broken nose and cheekbone”
Larinda nodded. “Good, and good that Alec stopped him, save him from stupid lawyers, yeah? Boyfriend, you said? It’s that obvious?”
Annie smiled. “Holding hands; bit of a clue, that. Jill, I am not going to ask you to decide now, but I think your partner here has said what I think. Ah, tea…thanks, Ted”
Larinda looked a little nervous. “Annie, can I ask a personal question?”
“He’s straight”
For the first time ever I saw Larinda truly embarrassed. Annie smiled again. “Look, everyone assumes, aye? Can I guess that you are straight too?”
Larinda sighed. “Yeah. I am, she’s not. Bit of a hurdle thingy, that. How did yours cope?”
“Eric? Slowly. We had a few hiccups at the start, but bless the man, he just kept his eyes on who we were and not what, aye? And then of course, we had the option of getting it sorted. You’re in a bit of a situation, aye?”
“Aye. Er, yeah. Just, look, Jill, lover…this is all hard work, yeah? But, well, I know we don’t really know this woman, but I think she’s kosher as, so….oh fuck. Look, what I am trying to say is that you have done things for me, things no man ever did, and I don’t mean the shagging, yeah, I mean treating me as real, and that’s what all this is about, innit? Those twats, they tried to make you unreal, and you ain’t, and it’s never been clearer to me than it is now, and I love you, and I don’t give a shit what you keep in your knickers. Well, I do, but that’s not the point”
She turned on her seat, moving slightly away from me.
“Gillian Carter, what I am trying to say is, shit, will you marry me?”