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Born Again?
One of the places I liked to walk and play in was the local park. I came alive there. The space, shapes, colours and sounds were regular mood-lifters when I was down. It was a place I could go to either by myself or with friends. Today I went to be alone because I felt alone. I felt shrouded by isolation. The old gang were gone. The old Chinaman was gone. Gone too was the tiny old house and its comparative poverty. I guess I was grieving. I walked through the park and saw, through the filter of my inner world, everything as one would see a film. It felt a bit unreal. I felt unreal as well. It was as though I was invisible.
A couple of hours later I went into the boys' toilet and straight into a cubicle. It was much as one would have expected a boys' toilet in a park to be. It was dirty. There was no toilet seat. It was damp. The walls were covered in all kinds of writing, most of which was about sex. I sat reading the dirty jokes but couldn't understand most of them. Some of them were really very funny whilst others were just plain crude. Others were simply stupid. All of them held my attention though. Scribbled on the wall were stories about sex. Male sex. As I read them I became quite aroused. That's when I saw it. There sticking out of a small hole in the partition wall was a folded piece of paper. I was intrigued and just looked at it. Whoever was on the other end of it was pushing it in and out of the hole. I pushed it back. It came back again. Weird. I pushed it back again and back it came again. I pulled it. It came free in my hand and I saw writing on it. It was a note and it read, 'How much?' I was baffled. How much what? I was still trying to figure it out when another piece of paper appeared. I dropped the 'How much?' note and read this one. It said, 'How old are you?' I was as curious as anything and kind of excited by this new game. At least I wasn't lonely any more. Whoever it was, he had my full attention. I waited for the next note which duly appeared but this time wrapped around a pencil. As I took the note I tried to look through the hole but all I could see was an eye. The note asked the first question again. 'How much?' Did he mean money? I hoped so but wasn't sure so I wrote back, in my best handwriting, 'What do you want?' This time I looked through the hole after I pushed the paper back and saw the vague outline of a young man of about twenty or so. I saw too that he had an erection. Very soon the note came back, 'I'll give you a couple of quid to see your cock.' A couple of quid was more money than I'd ever seen and just to look at my cock? What the hell. The notes began to fly backwards and forwards.
'Okay,' I wrote back.
'Okay, stand up opposite the hole.'
I kind of lost my nerve and wrote back, 'The money first.'
Miraculously the money appeared through the hole. The moment I saw it I knew what I was going to do. Pulling my pants up with one hand I grabbed the money with the other and legged it out of the toilets as quick as I could. Equally miraculously he didn't follow me as I ran through the park and then through the streets. My heart was pounding in my chest and I thought about what would have happened if I'd stayed there. I shuddered and thought of what my hero had done to me. This time though I'd won. I had the money and I didn't have to do anything for it. I was thrilled at my achievement. It was the quickest, easiest and the most money I'd ever had. I was trembling with conquest. Come to think of it, I'd have let him see my cock for that amount of money. The truth was I'd have let him see everything! But I didn't have to did I? I mean, I'd made him pay, right? The intense feelings I now had were amazingly like having a hard-on. As I thought more about things so I got one. Later, at home, I hid the money in my hiding place but checked it was still there about every half hour. It was, and each time I saw it I became excited.
The following morning I bounced out of bed full of life, much to the annoyance of James, and took a long hot bath. I found myself washing around my middle quite a bit. The duality of the sexual content and the conquest of the money began to play in my mind. As it did so I began to play with myself. I was completely aroused when James started to bang on the bathroom door.
'Come on Rich, you've been in there for hours.'
Perhaps I had. I had no idea. Later he told me that he couldn't understand why I'd taken a bath in the morning. I blushed and suspected that he knew I'd been playing with myself. I was deeply embarrassed.
'I just felt like it. Anyway it's better to take a bath in the morning.'
He let it go at that and even changed the subject. I couldn't get into what he was talking about though and my thoughts went back constantly to the episode in the boys' toilet. It was still electrically exciting. As I neared school, however, and we passed the church I began to feel as guilty as hell. The feeling was powerful enough to make James seem cleaner that I was despite my earlier bath. On the way home from school I went to confession but when I got to the main bit I left it unsaid. I just felt too guilty and ashamed. The damn problem was that the experience had turned me on sexually. It still did. I left confession convinced that I would rot in hell.
In bed that night I couldn't get to sleep for thinking about sex. Not only did I have an erection but it was hurting and wouldn't go down. I'd tried masturbating in the bathroom but I couldn't come yet and so gave up in despair. I knew a lot about masturbation because the boys in school, including me, had made it the topic of the year. The key question was, 'Can you come yet?' I couldn't. It was infuriating not being able to come. I'd tried a number of times with a boy called Pip in school but we got nowhere. Apparently you got this thrill and then you knew you could come. God, how I wanted that thrill to arrive. I'd long since figured it out that 'come' was that white stuff my fallen hero had left on me. How I'd like to leave some on him in revenge. James turned over in his sleep and the thought crossed my mind that he must be able to come.
Not long after that James was given his own room and I found it really difficult to get to sleep in my new single bed. I missed him enormously but we had to act all grown-up about it. Besides, he was going out with girls now. Yeuk!
Pip began to hang around me quite a lot and I guess I hung around him. We talked endlessly about sex in general and masturbation in particular. We spent time together in the library looking up dirty words in the dictionary. We continued to practise our new sport together in the toilets at school. I began to loathe him and yet would look for him every day so that we could do it again. We both came for the first time during the same week. Our sessions then developed into competitions to see who could shoot the furthest. This was a variation of the earlier boys' game of who could piss highest but a lot more fun. The fun began to wear off after a couple of weeks and we began to avoid each other. When we passed in the corridors we would avoid each other's eyes. I was convinced that the other boys, in this all boys' school, could see my guilty secret. One day, on the way to school, I met Pip and we went behind some shops and had a wank. It was weird because we never spoke. We just did it. As I passed the church just by the school I felt dirty, guilty and deeply ashamed. I knew that what we'd done was a mortal sin. By the time I arrived at school I was as depressed as anything. At the school gate I stopped. I don't know why, I just stopped. Kids were pushing past me to get in, but I was frozen to the spot. Without thinking about it I turned around and started to walk away from the school. Alan May, a kid from the same class, asked me with some degree of excitement where I was going.
'Away,' was all I said.
'What? You sagging school, like?'
I half came out of my dazed state and looked at him. He was a boy I'd never taken much notice of in the past and I didn't care for him at all.
'Yes, I'm sagging school.'
'Where you goin' like?'
'Why?'
'Y'know. Where you goin' like?'
'Wherever I end up,' I said, resigned that it didn't matter a whole lot.
'Can I come like?'
'Suit yourself.'
His excited nature balanced out and contrasted my resignation.
'Where'll we go like?'
His constant use of the word 'like' was a pain and his use of 'we' was not something I wanted to encourage. I didn't answer him. I didn't have the heart to tell him to piss off and hoped he'd get tired of just walking and piss off all by himself. As we walked he chatted on in a friendly enough way and told me how much he hated school. Every other word he used was 'like'. By the time we got to the main junction, where Merton Road crosses Stanley Road, he must have said 'like' a thousand times. I told him to hang on a minute, which was another way of telling him to shut up. He got the message. We stood in silence at the junction while I allowed my thoughts to replay old games. This was one of those junctions I'd waited at many times in the past. It was a good place, you see, for skipping wagons. That is, jumping on the backs of wagons as they slowed or stopped at the traffic lights. We did this either just for the fun of it or for toggi-sugar. Anyway, there we were standing at the junction when the wagon stopped at the lights dragged me out of my thoughts. I reacted instinctively.
'Come on.'
I sprang onto the back of the now moving wagon which took Alan by complete surprise. He was legging after it and I was screaming encouragement. He made it and we both laughed with joy. That was it, you see, instant joy! Then we began to sing our heads off and jeered at the disapproving older pedestrians. All our problems were left at the junction for we were now in a world of our own, a new and exciting world. Despite this new-found joy I experienced a kind of calm which disturbed me but which I didn't allow to surface. It was as though every worry and problem I'd ever had was gone and I was heading for a new life. Our singing and laughter died after a while and we drifted into a long period of silence. Alan started to complain after about an hour or so. Mostly of the cold. He was becoming a pain again.
'Look if you don't like it get off at the next set of lights and piss off, okay!'
He shut up. I'd made up my mind that I was going to go wherever it was that the wagon was going. This was not going to be one of those times when the police picked me up twenty miles from home. We'd already gone at least fifty miles and I had a whole new life waiting for me. Alan was welcome to come along or get off. It was his choice and he'd made it. I suspect the only reason he stayed on was because he didn't want to lose face. He should have got off.
A couple of hours later the wagon pulled into a market in a place called Oldham. The driver switched off the engine which was our signal to get off and out of sight smartly. Alan was relieved and I was disappointed that we hadn't gone much further. We stole some food from the stalls and laughed at the accents of the people. Alan began to mimick the Oldham accent, which according to him was all 'Ee-bah-gum', and I fell about the place. He had remarkable talent but mistook my laughter for intimacy and began to speak to me as though I was his best friend. I had no best friend. He got the conversation around to going home and I called him chicken. He was deeply hurt and sulked for a long time. Long enough for me to regret having said it to him and for me to suggest that perhaps it might be a good idea to skip a wagon back home. This lifted him and he told me that we could always do it again some time. Yes, that's true, I thought, but not with you. We looked around the market for a wagon which had a Liverpool address and found one. We waited until it started to move out of the market and jumped on the back. After about ten minutes or so Alan began to panic.
'It's goin' the wrong bloody way!'
'It doesn't matter,' I called out to reassure him. 'But we could end up anywhere like.' 'It doesn't matter.'
But it obviously did to Alan who kept on and on about it. 'It could be goin' anywhere,' he insisted.
The thought warmed me. Anywhere was a better place to be.
'Richie, let's get off this one and get another. Okay, Richie?'
It didn't make much difference to me so I agreed and he stopped panicking and thanked me. We agreed to get off at the next set of lights. That calmed him down. Fifteen minutes later the wagon hadn't stopped. It was fairly flying through green light after green light. Alan began to panic again.
'What're we gunna do now like?' he demanded to know. 'Look when it slows down next time we'll jump it, okay,' I called. Anything to shut him up.
The wagon slowed and Alan jumped onto a grass verge, rolled over and sprang to his feet.
'Richie! Come on! For fuck's sake jump.'
I jumped!
Absolute blackness. Time stopped. I saw myself in a bed. My parents on one side of it and a priest on the other giving me the last rites. Then a kind of voice was saying, 'You do realise that you are dying, don't you?'
'But I'm only a kid!' I complained.
'Yes I know.'
'I don't want to die. I'm too young to die.'
'I know exactly how old you are.'
'I don't want to die!'
'But you've thought about it quite a lot.'
'That's different.'
'Different?'
'Yes, different. I mean, I was just thinking about it.'
'Different or not you are dying and will soon be dead!'
'I'll make a deal with you.'
'A deal?'
'Yes.'
'Go on.'
'Give me my life back and I promise to try to do something good with it.'
'Something good?'
'Yes, just give me back my life please.'
'It's a deal!'
The blackness was filled with light and I felt as though I'd just been born again. It was weird beyond belief. I was now in bed looking up. I could see my parents' faces. They both looked terribly upset. I tried to speak but I couldn't. Their faces came closer and they spoke very gently to me. I couldn't make out what they were saying. I saw the priest and he was putting this oil and stuff on my forehead and was praying. My mother's voice broke through and I could hear her telling me that I'd had an accident and that I was a good boy and I'd be alright. It was like that time when she told me the same thing after I'd stolen the milk and my father had beaten me. I tried to speak. She put her fingers to my lips and the priest carried on giving me the last rites. I wanted to tell him to stop. There was no need, I'd made a deal. I wasn't going to die. I wanted to tell my parents this too but I couldn't speak. I knew that I was going to live and that I had to do something useful with my life in return. They thought I was going to die and I couldn't help their pain. It was crazy and weird and enchanted.
A couple of days, or was it months, later I'd recovered enough to speak and was told that as I jumped my foot had caught the moving wheel which dragged me down and under the wagon. My face was badly torn about and I nearly lost my right eye. I was packed in sandbags because I had so many broken bones. A priest came with two nuns and they gave me the last rites again. I let them do it but told them that there was no need. I was going to live. I'm sure they didn't believe me.
I don't know to this day if I had that conversation with some mystical being, God perhaps, or with my own inner imagination. I do know, however, that it was real and that, whatever it was, it saved my life. I've tried, through a whole series of failures, to keep my side of the bargain ever since. Some deal, eh?
Within no time at all I'd recovered enough to be taken back home by ambulance. But the journey from Oldham to Liverpool took its toll and within a couple of hours of arriving back home I was in the local children's hospital. The house was packed with relatives and well-wishers and a bed had been made up for me in the living room. I searched through the faces to find James. He was pushed to one side and told not to get in the way. I had to wait for all the fuss to die down, and only had a moment with him shortly before they took me off in another ambulance. His beautiful blue eyes said all there was to say. How lucky can a brother be? He explained later that he had not been allowed to come to the hospital to see me. Nor was he allowed to visit me in the children's hospital. There was only one thing for it. I'd have to get well real soon and go to see him. That's precisely what I did too. I got better and went home. That's when I heard about Rosemary, his girlfriend. He was so proud of her. I told him later that fourteen seemed a bit young to be going out with girls. He laughed and told me that she was special and I'd find out for myself soon enough. When I finally got to meet Rose I liked her instantly. She brought the best out in James and he was becoming all grown-up. He even started to call my father 'pop'. My father put up only token resistance and the new name had the effect of humanising him somewhat.
I missed a lot of school. Even when I was allowed back home I had to spend much more time in bed, which irritated me after a short time. I longed for the return to school. I was curious to find out from Alan what had happened to him after the accident and to see what kind of reception I'd get from him and the other kids. My mother kept me from going to school for quite some time. 'Doctor's orders!' she insisted. I would plead with her to allow me to go to school and she would explain that my bones needed time to heal properly. Once she said, 'It's a miracle that you're alive.'
I could only respond by saying, 'Yes. I know.' But I don't think she understood that I really did know it was kind of magical and enchanted the way I could survive things.
'You must have a very special guardian angel.'
'Yes, I guess so.'
Then my day arrived. I was to be allowed to visit the school. It was still by appointment and only to see the headmaster, but it was better than nothing. It was wonderful. I made my entrance quite deliberately at the wrong end of the school. This, you see, gave me the opportunity of passing down the central corridor and seeing into each classroom. Of course I could also be seen. At the end of the corridor I prepared for the most dramatic walk of my life. I'd left the walking stick at home. This way was far more dramatic. I saw myself being spotted by the kids in each classroom as I made the most of my limp. A senior boy in the corridor told me that the whole school had been praying for me twice a day. Fame at last, I thought. It was better than ever I could have hoped for. I had centre stage and I was going to make the most of it. Can you blame me? The headmaster, coming out of his office to see what all the fuss was about, saw me and greeted me with the kind of warmth usually reserved for old friends. He sent the prefect to fetch my form teacher. We had tea and biscuits together and I felt like a human being among equals. So warm was the welcome that I began to feel slightly, but only slightly, guilty for overdoing the limp. We talked about the accident and once again I was told that it was a miracle that I was alive. On the way out I had no choice but to maintain the same limp I'd arrived with. I felt deeply ashamed. I decided that by the time I was allowed to return to school full-time my limp would be gone. It very nearly was too. A miraculous recovery indeed.
When I finally did get back to school the headmaster had assigned a boy to look after me for a couple of weeks. As things turned out, this was the best thing that could have happened to me. His name was Laurie Clarke. He was an altar boy and he very quickly enrolled me there too. He did his job well, never allowing me to be pushed by the other kids or to carry anything. He'd meet me at the corner of the street each morning, walk me to church where we would serve at the altar for morning mass, walk me to school, carry my books, explain to the other boys all about my accident and how it was a miracle that I was alive. He was quite a charmer. He was there whenever I needed a hand. He even invited me to his youth club. It was a church-run club not far from home. I went mainly to repay him for his kindness. He introduced me to all his friends and told them all about the miracle. It was getting embarrassing. Then, halfway through the evening, when we were all sat on the steps outside the club I saw this boy. He was my age and was just getting off his bike. His healthy colour and thick black curly hair made him look like one of those Greek or Roman statues. He was greeted warmly by everyone. I was struck dumb. Laurie introduced us. His name was Mike.
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