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Fallen Hero
I have to tell you this. Not because I want to but to leave it out would cause you not to fully understand all which is to follow from it. I told you ages ago about my cousin, remember? He'd joined the merchant navy after having worked in a pawnbroker's. Well anyway he'd just come home on leave. He was eighteen, suntanned and as big as a house. I was eleven, going on twelve and was delighted to see him. He didn't go in for play fighting any more and so there was no chance of him hurting me as he used to. Besides, he'd changed. He was more grown-up about things. His shoulders were broad and he had a slim waist. Christ, he looked so handsome with that suntan. He told us about the places he'd been and the sights he'd seen. It was like being there. I was spellbound by his stories. I tormented him with questions and unlike before he took time to answer as best he could. When he went to get washed and shaved to go out with some girl I went to the bathroom and watched him. He stripped to the waist and lathered up his face. What a sight! He was a hulk of everything I wanted to be when I grew up. He had tattoos on both his arms. As he shaved, his magnificent muscles moved with elegant ease across his wedged back. Here, at last, was a family hero I could look up to.
He went out that night with his girlfriend and James and I went to bed. We still shared our big double bed from the old house and tonight my hero was going to share it with us. James and I decided to sleep at opposite ends. Each of us then had a chance to be alongside our big cousin. I prayed he'd sleep at my end. We tried like anything to stay awake so that we could talk with him but sleep overtook us both. I dreamt of being on my cousin's ship. He was the captain and I was the deck boy. It was a fine and wonderful dream.
My dream was broken by my hero climbing into bed. He chose my end. I was too tired to talk and was on my way back to dreamland when he pulled me in towards him. It felt wonderful as he cuddled closer. James would be furious the next day. I was fast asleep when he undid my pyjama cord but was wide awake by the time my trousers were around my knees. I became completely paralysed. I didn't know what to do. He must be asleep and think he's with his girlfriend or something. I dismissed this as I dismissed all the other possible reasons for what was going on. He put his erect penis between my legs and began to move it in and out. I commanded my otherwise paralysed body to move and it obeyed me. He was spoiling everything. God, dear God, make him stop. He was ruining everything, everything. I moved even further from him and lay on my back to protect my vulnerable backside from his continued probing. He could stop now and I wouldn't say anything about it.
His big strong arm reached out in the dark, grabbed me and pulled me closer to him. I was facing him now and he had the smell of beer. It was just like my father. He put his hand on top of my head and he began to force my head down under the blankets. He was naked and my face touched his penis. I jerked my head away in horror. Still he pushed me down and inwards towards him. I couldn't believe what was happening. It was insane. It was crazy. Nor could I believe how easy it was to cry so violently without making a noise. I know it's ridiculous but I didn't want James to wake up. Just as crazy were my efforts to pretend to be asleep. I hoped my dead weight would put him off. It was fast becoming obvious why he was pushing me down and inwards. I closed my mouth tight but still he forced his penis to it. The moment it touched my lips I burst up and out of the bedclothes like a human volcano. My silent crying was causing me great breathing difficulties and I was increasingly afraid that James would wake. My burst of energy only served to make him grab hold of me even tighter. It was just like the play fights of years ago. He was going too far. He pushed his penis between my legs with a vengeance and lunged into me. I felt dirty and guilty. It must, somehow, be my fault.
Suddenly my legs and backside were covered in all this sticky stuff and he stopped. The moment he stopped I flew out of bed and into the bathroom. I saw this white stuff all over me and my pyjamas. I peeled them off quickly and threw them on the floor. Whilst I waited for the bath to fill I used toilet paper to wipe his filth off me. I was now crying quite loud, protected though by the noise of the running bath water. The water was almost too hot but I got in and scrubbed and scrubbed. Drying myself over an hour later I still felt dirty. Why me? What was it about me that made him do that? What was it about dirty things which people seemed able to see about me? I felt dirty. Disgustingly dirty. I must have done something stupid to make him do such a thing - and that white stuff? What the hell was that white stuff? I cringed as I thought about it. What was it that I did to make him do it? Was I crazy or something? Perhaps I was just evil. I tried to say a prayer but I felt hopeless and worthless. I sat wrapped in a towel on the toilet seat and tried to make sense of it. I failed.
I went back to bed. Where else could I go? I hid in a corner of the blankets. Two hours or so afterwards I heard James getting up. It was morning. Very quickly after that my fallen hero left the bed. I pretended to be asleep. When he'd left the room I pulled all the clothes around me and tucked them in. I tried to forget, but failed. I couldn't get into my inner world either. I failed at every damn thing I tried. I was a failure. I must have dozed off for I woke with a start. My mother was saying something about the day being wasted while I rotted away in bed.
'Come on lazy bones, the day's almost gone.'
I turned over.
'Come on! I mean it.'
Try as I might I couldn't wish her away. She took hold of the ends of the blankets and pulled them off me. Jesus, I had no clothes on! I pulled them back to cover my exposed body and screamed at her to leave me alone. Then she realised.
'Where's your pyjamas?'
I'd left them on the bathroom floor and she must have seen them or else someone had put them in the laundry basket. I despised her for not seeing the obvious.
'Why aren't you wearing any pyjamas?'
I filled my lungs with air and without trying to cover myself any more I threw the blankets at her and screamed at the top of my voice, 'Because I'm not. I'm just not. I'm bloody well not! Okay? Okay? Satisfied now?'
She dropped the blankets I'd flung at her as though she'd been burnt and quickly left the room. She knew. And I knew she'd protect her sister's son. When I finally went downstairs and entered the living room my father and mother were the only ones there. I was relieved by this. They acted as though it was just another day. So much so that I began to question the sanity of the whole thing. Was I crazy or were they? Perhaps we all were. My mother broke my thoughts.
'Sit yourself down and I'll cook you a nice big breakfast.'
She had never ever made such an offer in her whole life. Why now? I knew the answer. She intended to deal with the situation by denying it ever happened. I felt even more filthy. I grabbed my coat and headed for the front door.
'Richard, your breakfast. Where are you going? Your breakfast?'
I slammed the front door behind me and I ran and ran. Later that night I was picked up by the police twenty miles away. I was sleeping on a bench in some gardens and they took me back to their police station. I was treated well and they were very kind. I kept my mouth shut as usual but nearly spoke to the policeman who came up to me and said, 'Has someone been doing things to you?'
I looked into this man's wise eyes and told him the whole story. The only problem was I didn't say a word. I told him with my eyes. He knew. He went off and brought me a cup of tea. It's still my favourite drink to this day. As I sat there my thoughts drifted back to the first time I'd had tea in a police station. Silently, I mouthed those remembered words, 'You know little fella, if we don't find out who you are we'll have to put you in a home.'
Perhaps this time they wouldn't find out who I was and I would be given a new home. My thoughts were becoming crazy again and I thought I would crack up completely. I mean, I knew my parents were my real parents but I couldn't shake the idea that somehow I had other, better parents who were looking for me. It was daft having such thoughts and they got me nowhere. But damn it, they persisted. Once again, they found out who I was and I was taken home in a police car. My fallen hero had gone back to sea and I was pleased about that. I hated him so very much but I hated myself even more.
I gave up all attempts to gain affection from either my mother or my father after that episode and relied instead on my inner world of beauty. My father had stopped trying to hide his sherry and whisky bottles and was increasingly hiding in them instead. We had a lot in common after all. I hid inside my head and he hid in a bottle. What a crazy family.
My father's drinking was getting worse by the day. How he functioned at work was a mystery to me for he could drink so much. He rarely seemed to eat and constantly reminded my mother that his mother had been a wonderful cook. He still flung his meals into the back of the fire when he arrived home drunk. He would then sit in his chair by the fire and drink even more. It was whilst he was doing this one Sunday that I think I saw him for the first time. That is, I saw his pain. He talked with massive aggression about his job -he was foreman in a building firm. I grabbed the opportunity to listen. He cursed the owner of the firm for being a Tory money-grabber. I asked him a few questions but his answers were given as though to himself. He was broken and sad. The thing he hated more than anything else was having to work for and be obliged to a Tory. For the first time in my life I felt pity for him. Sat in the chair was the saddest and most lost person I'd ever seen. It was as though, when I looked into his eyes, I could see my own son crying to get out. Tears filled up in my eyes. The sixteen-stone giant was nothing more than a lost child crying for affection. For a moment I felt his pain merge with my own and I think, at that moment, that I loved him. I went over to his chair and sat on the arm close to him. I had to speak to him. I just had to.
'That stuff's going to kill you, you know.'
He adjusted his huge frame and looked at me, then put his arm around my waist.
'Yes... Yes you're probably right son...'
This was the first time he had ever called me his son.
'Then why don't you stop?' I implored him.
He laughed. I heard only crying.
'You've no idea son ... no idea...'
'Tell me,' I pleaded.
'One day.'
'I wish you'd stop. I wish you didn't drink. It just makes you unhappy. You know?'
'I know.'
He very gently removed his arm from around my waist and gave me a tender push off his chair.
'Go on now. Go on.'
I stood in front of him afraid, somehow knowing that this moment could never and would never be repeated. His pain was enormously sad. Tears filled up in my eyes and I unashamedly let them fall.
'Please stop. While you can,' I begged. 'Go on now. Go on,' he said again.
I knew he was telling me that it was hopeless.
'You could you know. If you really wanted to. You could.'
'One day. Go on now. One day, you'll understand and...' He didn't finish.
I turned and from the corner of my eye I saw my mother, tea towel in hand. How long she'd been standing there I don't know. She too had sensed the moment and her eyes were full of tears also. With a movement of her head she told me to leave them alone. Praying that here was a chance for our family to break through I picked up my coat and left them with each other.
I found myself walking. Just walking and lost in thoughts of the possibilities of having a healed family. A family without booze and violence. If I ever loved my father it was this day. I prayed for him and for us all. I think this was my first real encounter with hope.
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