I Think I'm OK Read online

  Nelson was eight years older than my mum. He had been married before and had three children, two daughters Julie and Christine and a son named Derek. Derek was the eldest of the three and was about seven years older than I. I have a vague recollection of him being in some sort of special school or children’s home. For what reason I have no idea, maybe it was just for being a twat, but to be truthful when it comes to him I really couldn’t give a shit.

  Suffice to say we were told he was now coming to live with us. I disliked him even before I met him simply because two days before he arrived I was told I would have to give up my bedroom and move in with Paul and Andy. Don’t get me wrong, I love both my brothers dearly but it was my bloody room.

  Once Derek had moved in it wasn’t long before my dislike of him deteriorated into loathing. I was now living with two people I disliked immensely.

  Andy was too young to be bothered by him but Paul and I had to put up with all sorts of shit. Punches, dead legs, sly slaps in the face and worse. These would be followed by threats of what could really happen to us if we didn’t keep our mouths shut. One of his favourite ways to wind me up was to tell me in detail what he would like to do to my mother sexually. This really pissed me off and I did lose my temper once or twice to such an extent that I forgot about the obvious consequences and tried to punch the Bastard. I would end up on the floor in pain and crying whilst he stood over me laughing and telling me what a wimp I was.

  No, no, let’s get this right, he was telling me what a werwerwerwhimp I was. He had a stutter and the fucker was Ginger so in my mind, good hidings or no good hidings I would always be two up on the turturturturtwat.

  On one occasion he made me run away from him in a zigzag fashion whilst he took aim at me with his air rifle. I was wearing ankle socks, black school pumps, a pair of shorts held up with a snake belt (weren’t snake belts great?) and one of those polo type short sleeved shirts buttoned right up to the neck. I ran, he fired. He got me in the back of my leg right behind my knee and it fucking hurt. I then had to put my hands in the air as though surrendering. The Bastard fired at me again. This time I didn’t feel any pain but the top button of my polo shirt shattered as a pellet hit it. I was convinced he was trying to kill me so I didn’t hang about for any more. I ran as fast as my little legs would carry me, at the same time crying and shouting, “Fuck off you nutter,” in response to his shouts for me to come back, whilst all the while expecting to get hit in the back of the head with another pellet.

  The air rifle nonsense happened mid-morning and I didn’t go home until tea time because I knew my mum would be home by then. When I walked through the back door (for some reason we never used the front door) there was one hell of an atmosphere. Even though there was only my mum in the kitchen as I walked in, I could feel the tension. It was as though whatever had happened in the room had created some sort of bad aura and it hadn’t yet had chance to dissipate. Similar to when you call in on friends and they are really happy to see you, both of them are chatting away as usual but you know, you just know, ‘Those two have had a row.’

  Apparently after I had legged it Derek had been firing his air rifle elsewhere. I’m not sure if it was at a neighbour or a neighbour’s property but someone had complained to Nelson and he had gone absolutely ape shit. The air rifle was in pieces, Derek was nowhere to be seen and some furniture had been damaged when Nelson had thrown Derek the full length of the room. My only regret was that I hadn’t been there to see it.

  It would be dishonest of me to try and give the impression I was some sort of model son and pupil before Derek turned up, I wasn’t. I don’t think a week went by without me getting a bollocking from someone. It probably didn’t help that even as a youngster I had a mind of my own and a mouth to go with it. I managed to get into a fight on my very first day at school simply because of my accent. If you think a Bradford accent is broad you should listen to some Barnsley folk, it’s not a different accent it’s a whole new language. I can however say that when Derek came into our lives my behaviour did get worse, though when the Bastard was around I tended to keep my trap shut. I was terrified of him.

  I could never get the better of any adult, including Derek, in a physical battle so I made a conscious effort to gain a few mental victories. Nine times out of ten I got it completely wrong but it felt to me as though I was at least fighting back. One example of this ridiculous thinking was when we had a test at school. I think the teacher may have been Miss Young.

  To digress slightly, that would be the young Miss Young not the old Miss Young. The old Miss Young was the music teacher. It’s possible the old Miss Young was a crap music teacher; however I suspect she was a very good music teacher and I was a pathetic music student. After a minimum of one lesson per week over a period of about two years here are my musical skills.

  I hold out my open left hand palm up and I strike it with the index and middle fingers of my right hand in rhythm to me saying, “Ta Titty Ta Titty Ta Titty Ta.” Even that has lost its magic now I no longer find the word Titty amusing.

  Anyway, I would have been eight or nine and the whole class was doing a short maths test. I never had any problems with maths and would invariably come top of the class. That’s not me bragging I’m just telling it like it was. Once the test was over we got on with doing something else whilst young Miss Young marked the papers. At the end of the lesson the whole class was lined up in an orderly fashion ready to leave the classroom. As we filed out the teacher would tell us how we had done in the test. You know the sort of thing.

  “Well done Mary, you came fourth.”

  “How did I do Miss?”

  “You came seventh John; you were ninth last time well done.”

  Then it got to my turn.

  “How did I do Miss?”

  “You know how you did Steven, stop showing off.”

  “Pardon Miss?”

  “You came first, as you well know.”

  To me that was another kick in the bollocks. I would have loved to have stood and argued with her but that’s my thinking now. I would have loved to have said, “How the hell would I know I came first? The name on the top of that test paper is Steven Kenny not Doris Stokes.”

  I was just a kid, she was the teacher and as such she would always be right and I would always be wrong. So I said nothing.

  Instead, I put my head down in shame and walked out. I can assure you of this, I never intentionally came first again in any test, maths or otherwise. Petty? yes, childish? well of course, I was a child.

  I knew I wasn’t doing myself any favours but to me it was a small victory, something I was in control of. My school work had been the only thing I was given any real praise for and it seemed as though even that had now been sullied.

  I can remember the first time I received any sort of praise from my mum for school work, though it wasn’t in school and it wasn’t even verbal praise. My mum and I were climbing the stairs of some flats when I was about eight or so. Somebody had written on the wall and my mum looked at me and asked, “Did you write that?” I looked at the writing and pointed to one of the words.

  “No, if I had I would have put an A where the E is.”

  Whoever had done it had written, ‘Smithy is a basterd.’ My mum didn’t speak; she just dropped the corners of her mouth, raised her eyebrows and nodded slightly. That was praise enough for me.

  I made another pathetic stance on a school sports day. I was the goalkeeper for the school football team and was chosen for one particular sports day event. A hula hoop was placed on the field with a cricket stump stabbed into the grass in the centre of it. From a distance of around fifty yards we had to kick a football as though taking a goal kick and try to get it as close to the stump as possible. As with the Shot and the Hammer it was where the ball first bounced that counted. It turned out I was pretty good at it so kicking a ball at a stick was designated as my event.

  Our school was called Highfields and our rival school was John Street, the onl
y thing separating the two schools was a playing field so you can see how the rivalry would be high. The sports day was to be a competition between the two and it was no secret that our headmaster was desperate for Highfields to come out on top. This is precisely why on the Saturday morning of the competition, when most of my school mates were either cheering on the competitors or trying to add points to the Highfields tally, I was at Wombwell swimming baths having the time of my life.

  The following Monday morning in assembly the headmaster told the whole school the results of the competition. He made a point of mentioning that certain pupils had let the school down. He didn’t mention any names but he was looking me square in the eye when he said it. Though I couldn’t have given a flying fuck, thanks to Nelson’s keenness for manners I did at least have the common decency to try and look suitably ashamed of myself.

  My behaviour in and out of school began to get a lot worse. I would be in the headmaster’s office at least once a week for a caning across the finger tips. It finally reached a point where on one occasion whilst I was stood in his office waiting to be told to choose a cane from the wicker basket, he just looked at me and asked, “Is there any point?”

  The question threw me. If I had said, “No, there was no point,” he would probably think I was being a smart arse and decide to continue giving me the cane until I got the point. If I had said, “Yes,” then I was admitting I would eventually get the point if he kept caning me. It was like asking someone to give a yes or no answer to the question, “Are you as stupid as you look?”

  Thankfully I didn’t have to answer him. He took some loose change from his pocket, handed it to me and told me to go to the shop and get him an egg custard. Seriously, I couldn’t believe it but I didn’t argue. I was straight out of school and off to the shop.

  Going to fetch his tea break custards became a regular thing. Invariably I would be called out of Maths class to nip to the shop. So I guess I wasn’t pulling the wool over anyone eyes after all, especially not the headmaster. It is blatantly obvious to me now that he was changing tack and in doing so it shows me he must have cared enough to try something different. You are probably long gone by now Mr Wroe but thank you for trying and thank you for caring enough to try.

  By the time I was nine years old I was running away from home quite regularly. I would be away for a day or so always trying to make my way back to Bradford. I did make it there a few times and once there I would just hang about with my old friends, which shows I wasn’t as clever as I thought I was. One of them would usually tell their parents and I would get my collar felt and taken home by the Police.

  Chapter 3

  It was around 1968/69 when I made friends with a chap by the name of Spud. What his real name was I have no idea but everyone knew him as Spud. He was well known as the local, well I guess you would call him a poacher, though I’m not sure he would be happy about that. He always had a sheath knife hanging from his belt and if he didn’t have a shotgun case or a broken air rifle draped over his shoulder he would have two well-trained Jack Russell’s trotting along at his side. The first time I met him was in Wombwell Woods where he was rapidly reducing the wood pigeon population with his shotgun.

  I must confess that on that first occasion I was more than a little worried. I, a nine or ten year old boy, in the middle of a huge wood with a chap in his twenties whom I didn’t know and he was toting a bloody big gun. Luckily for me he turned out to be a cracking fella. He was the sort of person who never really said a great deal, however when he did it was worth listening to.

  He noticed my fascination with what he was doing and he gradually over the next few months taught me some of the hunting skills he possessed. Though he did let me on just the one occasion fire off the shotgun at a big chunk of wood, this almost knocked me flat on my arse and I could barely hear a word he said for the next ten minutes due to the ringing in my ears. From then on, whenever we went hunting, it was with one of his air rifles.

  He taught me how to sneak up on rabbits, where to aim for a clean and humane kill, how to gut, skin and cook them. The same applied for the wood pigeons, only instead of sneaking up on them he showed me how to spot a roosting site, then when we had found one we could sit for an hour or two, perfectly still and barely speaking. When we did speak it was in a whisper and it was usually Spud pointing out different species of wildlife to me. I was enthralled.

  To some people, probably most people, that would be as boring as hell; I found it to be thrilling and extremely interesting. Who would have thought more than forty years later that Spud’s lessons would be helping me out? When I’m skint (I’m unemployed so that is quite often) a quick trip to the Co-op for a ‘reduced in price’ stew pack, a few rabbits from the field across the road and bingo, a family of three well fed for less than fifty pence. Cheers Spud.

  Oh, I almost forgot. It was Spud who taught me one of the funniest revenge acts I ever embarked on. I am in no way suggesting anyone try this but at the time I did find it hilarious.

  The street we lived on was fairly steep and our house was at the very top. When I walked home from school I could kick my football as hard as I liked and as the ball always rolled back down to me I didn’t have to chase after it. It was on one such journey home that I accidentally kicked my ball into a neighbour’s front garden. The garden was in two sections, a lawn area to the right and a rose garden to the left. Had my ball landed on the lawn I would have just leaped over the wall and retrieved it, as it landed in the immaculate rose garden, which was directly in front of the living room window, I thought it best I should knock on the owner’s door and ask permission.

  No sooner had I opened the garden gate than the house owner came storming out, his face looking like thunder. Without saying a word he picked up my ball and stabbed a small sharp kitchen knife into it and then he threw the rapidly deflating ball in my direction. By the time I had caught my ball, watched it die, and decided which swear words I was going to shout at him, the neighbour was back indoors.

  I didn’t tell my mum or Nelson about this incident, I reckoned I would be seen to be in the wrong anyway so I just kept quiet, however I did tell Spud. To get my own back on the miserable neighbour I followed Spud’s instructions to the letter.

  Leaving it a few weeks in order to throw suspicion away from me, it was around seven in the evening when I walked the hundred yards or so to a two acre field where the Elliot’s kept a herd of cows. I found the sloppiest cow pats I could and parcelled them up in the two newspapers I had taken with me. Hurriedly making my way to the Ball Murderer’s house, I crept up to his back door and placed the parcel on his doorstep. I then took out a box of matches and set the parcel on fire before knocking on the door and running as fast as I could, out of his garden, across the road, over a wall and hid behind a bush.

  I parted the bush just in time to see the miserable sod stamping on the parcel in his slippered feet trying to put out the flames. That would have been enough for me but for some reason he had not noticed the cow pats and the flames were proving difficult to douse. He then drew his leg back and kicked at the parcel with all he had. Sloppy cow shit flew everywhere, up his legs, onto his shirt and I’m sure he even got some on his face, though to be honest by now I was curled up on the floor with my hands clamped over my mouth. I thought my sides were going to burst as I could hear him trying to swear at the top of his voice but the profanity was constantly being interrupted by his need to heave and prevent himself from vomiting.

  I’m not sure why or how my days out with Spud ended but they did, and life at home carried on as normal with me forever getting myself into trouble, though I never did anything which would have meant social services could have dragged me off. I guess I should say I never got caught doing anything to warrant being carted off.

  I’m wondering if I should confess to this. Can you be arrested and charged, at the age of fifty, for something you did when you were ten? Ah sod it, there’s worse to come anyway.

  One ev
ening, not long after we had gone to bed, Nelson woke both Paul and I. He told us to quickly run into his and mum’s bedroom and look out of the window. From the window the view was one of an open field, at the far left hand corner of the field a new Pub was being built. I believe it was called The Periwinkle. Nelson seemed to think, and I guess rightly so, that two young boys like Paul and I would love to watch the many fire engines which were attempting to douse the raging blaze that was once the almost completed Pub.

  For about five minutes we watched, suitably enthralled and making all the noises you would expect. Paul and I were on the same wavelength. We didn’t have to say, “For fucks’ sake don’t mention the fact that we were in the cellar of that Pub about three hours ago.” So we didn’t.

  We didn’t have to say, “Don’t mention the fact that it was too dark in there so we wrapped some cloth around wooden posts and lit them so we could see.” So we didn’t.

  We said, “Wow,” and “Cor,” and “Blimey.” Then we went to bed, eventually went to sleep and spent the next month or so arguing over which one of us hadn’t extinguished our torch properly as well as worrying ourselves shitless. That was around 1969. Paul and I did eventually pluck up the courage to confess all to our mum, around 2005.

  Not long after the perishing of the Periwinkle we moved back to Bradford. Nothing about my behaviour changed; apart from when I ran away I now headed back to Wombwell.

  I do not recollect what I had done to prompt it but I was hauled up in front of a high ranking police officer. I was told I was too young to go to court, which was why I had to see The Chief Constable, but I couldn’t in all honesty say what his rank was. The meeting was held in an office at Bradford Town Hall. There were three of us present, Nelson, the police officer and myself. I think the idea was to give me a right bollocking, let me know about the sort of places I could end up in if I didn’t change my ways and scare the bejesus out of me. If any part of the meeting had created the desired effect I guess I would only be writing a couple more lines and saying thanks for reading this. That’s not going to be the case.