Ian Probert's Blog, page 11

Playing Stardust

My favourite song of all time is Hoagy Carmichael’s ‘Stardust’. A live Benny Goodman version that he recorded in his eighties was played at my wedding. Artie Shaw’s small combo version from the 1950s, which in my opinion is probably the definitive version, will be played at my funeral.

Here’s me doing a plinky plonky version on guitar with only three mistakes, which ain’t bad for me:

 
 

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Remembering David Bowie

  

At the back of the house in Bristol where I spent my teens were playing fields. At the top of the fields were swings where the older boys hung out smoking cigarettes and snogging girls. One day on the way home from the library I walked past those swings and saw two boys fighting. No punches were being thrown but there were plenty of kicks. 

The boys sported obligatory bumfluff and were wearing half mast white flares with tartan turn-ups and dangerously stupid platforms. There was a reason for the lack of punches: one kid was clutching an LP under his arm which made it impossible to use his arms and the other boy seemed to unwilling to use his own as a mark of respect. On the cover of the record was the picture of a strange looking man with a flash of colour painted across his chalky face. The youths were apparently fighting over a girl. It was the first time I’d ever seen boys of such an advanced age fight and I remember being a little taken aback at the lack of meaningful blows that were being exchanged. More verbal abuse was doled out than any damage.

That image places this random memory at some time around 1973. My first memory of the Thin White Duke. I was 11-years-old but I knew who David Bowie was: he was that weird skinny bloke on Top Of The Pops whom my dad used to hurl abuse at. And even though I didn’t own any of his records I knew some of his songs. I knew ‘Life On Mars’ and ‘Starman’ and I’d memorised the lyrics to ‘Jean Genie’ courtesy of a teen magazine called ‘Disco 45’, which printed the words to all of the hits of the day. 

***

Two whole years later I finally owned my first David Bowie single. In 1975 he re-released ‘Space Oddity’ and it went to No. 1 – his first No. 1. For some reason it was my five-year-old brother who actually bought the record. I can’t remember how or why he managed to do this and it’s certainly a claim to fame for him whenever one has those ‘what was the first record you ever bought?’ debates, but I was the real owner of that record. I played it and I played it. And I played it. I played it with the monotonous and desperate regularity of someone who only owned three records in total. And I memorised the words to its two b-sides, ‘Velvet Goldmine’ and ‘Changes’. 

Although I was not to know it at the time ‘Changes’ was/is probably David Bowie’s marquee song. Concealed within one of the singer’s more conventional arrangements was an attitude that was to define him: change. Metamorphosis. The idea that in order to progress, to grow, to make one’s way though life in a way that challenged and confronted, one had to change. 

And change Bowie did: dramatically, regularly, physically and metaphysically; in a manner that left those who admired his work trailing in his jet stream.

***

Five years later Bowie had his second No. 1. With ‘Ashes To Ashes’ and we saw an artist self-consciously highlighting the fact that he was older but with a desire to demonstrate that he was still cutting edge. And he most certainly was. The fact that the video for the song featured many of the rising stars of New Romanticism was an acknowledgment that Bowie was the Don Corleone of that movement. And the accompanying album, ‘Scary Monsters And Super Creeps’ showed Bowie to be master of the domain that he created. 

The record also provided an ideal accompaniment to my own life. I was now at art college, painting pictures that owed much to Bowie’s lessons of change. I, too, had changed. I had outgrown the life that was earmarked for me and reinvented myself. Bowie was never really a hero for me in the way that he was for many of my friends but he was the supreme example. The journey that took me from apprentice dogsbody to ‘artist’ was in no small part due to the influence of David Bowie. 

***

However, my devotion to Bowie was not blind or mindless. When he released the mainstream ‘Let’s Dance’ in 1983 I smelled a rat. Although the record certainly had polish and spawned many hits it lacked substance in my opinion. It was if Francis Bacon had turned into David Hockney and I was a more or less a lone voice of dissent. Things got worse a year later when Bowie released ‘Tonight’, which seemed a self-conscious attempt to return to former glories by giving himself a lick of paint. But eyeliner and lip gloss and songs about aliens could not really conceal the lack of moisture in his creative well.

As I came to the end of my degree in fine art I had already more or less consigned David Bowie to history. It didn’t matter much. I still had the – excuse the pun – Golden Years: I had Hunky Dory, and Ziggy and Diamond Dogs and Aladdin Sane (sic), Young Americans and Low and Heroes, Lodger, Station To Station… Each one of these a ground breaking album in its own way. And if I felt like a laugh I always had Laughing Gnome. 

It didn’t matter what the modern Bowie produced, there was a wealth of material out there to last a lifetime.

***

And things really did get worse. As the 1980s drew to a close and Bowie dallied wth the ridiculous Tin Machine I could scarcely be bothered to listen to his output. He was irrelevant. As was the awful ‘Never Let Me Down’. By now had I moved to London and changed myself again. I was now working in publishing and even though I noticed that some of the younger members of staff were playing ‘Black Tie White Noise’ I was largely indifferent to David Bowie.

***

Instead of being an innovator Bowie seemed to always be one or two steps behind the times. Witness 1997s ‘Earthling’, which attached itself to the shirt tails of drum and bass rather like the Warmington-On-Sea Home Guard putting shoe polish in their hair to look younger. Strangely enough, on a visit to France during the late 1990s I found myself in a room full of young men studiously listening to this mess of a record and solemnly proclaiming it to be the return of Bowie from the wilderness. It wasn’t. And frankly Bowie was destined never to leave the wilderness.

***

But even I was not immune to trying to believe. In 2003 I was browsing through the shelves of a dying Virgin Records in Oxford Street only to hear them playing a track from Bowie’s new album ‘Reality’. In retrospect it was an ordinary enough piece of music but I somehow managed to convince myself at the age of 41 that this was it, this was The Return. It wasn’t, and the twice-played copy of ‘Reality’ that is buried away somewhere in a cupboard remains a testament to that false dawn. 

***

And then in 2013, a whole decade after ‘Reality’ came, in my opinion, a genuinely good Bowie record. Maybe it was that ten years of inactivity that had exaggerated the loss so that any new Bowie product was sure to be gratefully received but there was definitely something about ‘Where Are We Now?’ that struck a chord for many people. Certainly it was a song that I played on more than two occasions. The sound of an ageing David Bowie no longer obsessed with the notion of having to appear contemporary saw him concentrating solely on music and melody. The end result was compelling and infused with melancholy.

***

Three days ago Bowie released Blackstar. Accompanied by nine-minute video that had some of my Facebook friends moaning about its ‘gloominess’. We can now understand why it’s so depressing. I spent this morning listening to this album in its entirety. It will take a couple more listenings  before an opinion is fully formed but on first impressions it hits the spot. Of course, because of the sad events of the last 24-hours the album’s context will always be compromised. However, for a man who knew that he was about to die it’s an impressive last word.

The strange thing is that we had friends over for food yesterday and for some reason I listened to pretty much nothing else but Bowie as I was cooking. I played – to my mind – his best music, those three albums he made in Berlin during the mid-1970s: Low, Heroes and Lodger. I also threw in a little bit of Station To Station. Later I was compelled to mention it on Facebook and called Bowie a ‘God-like genius’. 

And for a while he was.

Waterlow Park – Chapter 05

Another day another done of my defunct kids’ story ‘Waterlow Park’.

Didn’t have time yesterday because I was busy losing my iPad Mini on a train and then finding it two hours later while meeting up with former world champion boxer Steve Collins and hopefully asking him a barrage of questions he’s never been asked before. I also briefly met up with the beautiful and charming Frank Buglioni, who is the latest in a long line of boxers whom I’ve fallen deeply in love with. A purely platonic staunchly heterosexual kind of love, but a form of love nonetheless.

All of this a day after I’d apologised to another boxer for the grevious wrong that I committed upon his 6’5″ person no less than a quarter of a century ago. But that’s another story which I’m currently writing right now with a view (possibly) to offering it to one of the broadsheets.

Anyhow, here goes:

Chapter 05

Because mum is a nurse she has to work shifts. Sometimes she leaves the house very early and comes home in the afternoon. Other times she leaves the house in the afternoon and doesn’t come home until we’re in bed. Today is Saturday morning and she’s just left the house for a double shift, which means we probably won’t see her until Sunday. Dad left earlier to go down the pub. He always goes down the pub on Saturdays and Sundays. I suppose that’s why his stomach is so big and it’s probably why he’s always so bad tempered. Mum says we’ve never got any money because he puts it in his stomach. He says he needs to relax after teaching idiots all week. Funnily enough he says that most of the people he meets in the pub are idiots.

This means that Sofia and I are alone for all of the morning and some of the afternoon. And there’s something I want to – have to – do. I tell Sofia about it:

“I’m going to count the money,” I say.

Sofia is watching a really rubbish Barbie movie that dad downloaded and doesn’t want to be dragged away from it. She says nothing.

“Sophie,” I say. “Don’t you want to know how much is there?”

“Not really, Stevie,” says a distracted Sofia, not bothering to look at me.

I get the key from my underpants drawer and go into the back garden. I try not to look too suspicious and make sure that none of the neighbours are watching from any of the bedroom windows that overlook our garden. I open the cupboard door and peer inside.

There are already a few spider webs on top of the dogshitty plastic that I wrapped the money in. I don’t know how spiders are able to get into locked cupboards. I force my fingers under some of the masking tape that I stuck the plastic down with. I fiddle about for a while and eventually pull out one of the bundles of money. Because I can’t think of a better idea I quickly stick it down the front of my t-shirt. It feels cold and damp against my tummy. I quickly lock the cupboard and hurry back upstairs.

I go into my bedroom and shut the door. I pull the money out. It’s slightly worrying that it already feels damp. Perhaps the barbecue cupboard wasn’t the best place to put it. Sooner or later I’m going to have to think of another place.

I slide the notes out of their gummed paper wrap. I spread them out on the bed. I’ve never seen so many pictures of the queen. Somebody told me that if you fold a banknote in a special way you can make the queen’s neck look like a bottom crack. I start counting. I’m very good at counting. Exceptionally good. There are exactly 200 £50 notes in the bundle. That’s makes £10,000. Ten thousand pounds! I don’t know how many bundles there are down in the barbecue cupboard but there are a lot. I pick up the pile of banknotes and fan my face with it. I’m holding £10,000 in my hands!

The bedroom door suddenly opens and makes me jump. Sofia walks in. She sees me holding the money. Her eyes widen and her mouth droops open.

“What are you doing?” she says.

“I told you before?” I say. “I’m counting the money.”

“What are you doing that for? Someone could come in.”

“Stop stressing. Dad won’t be back for hours. And mum won’t be home until tomorrow.”

“But what if someone else comes round?”

“Like who?” I say, all smug and grown-up.

But just at that moment the doorbell rings.

***

Dad has told us many times that we are not allowed to answer the front door when we are alone in the house. He’s told us that strictly speaking we are not old enough to be left alone in the house and he and mum could get into big trouble if anyone finds out. The doorbell rings again. Sofia and I stare at each other. She looks scared so I put my arm around her. “Don’t worry,” I whisper so quietly that she can hardly hear. “They’ll go away in a minute.”

We tiptoe into mum and dad’s bedroom which is at the front of the house. The curtains are always closed in mum and dad’s room. The room is dark and as usual smells a little bit of stale beer. We creep silently over to the window just in time to hear the doorbell ring for a third time. Sofia waves her hands frantically at me as I move over to the curtain and gently open the tiniest of cracks so that I can look down.

Whoever it is at the door has lifted the letterbox flap. We hear its gentle creak. I look through the gap in the curtain and see the back of a large man stooping at the front door. He has his ear to the letterbox. I hold my finger to my lips and mouth and shush Sofia. The man seems to be listening to the house. Listening to see if there is anyone inside.

This goes on for several long moments. Me looking at Sofia. Her staring at me wide-eyed through the darkness. Then she moves closer to me and puts her lips to my ear. “I need a wee,” she says.

“You’ll have to hold it,” I whisper, half angry, half scared.

Sofia shrugs, unable to hear what I am saying.

I move closer to her, letting go of the curtain. “I said you’ll have to hold it…”

As the words leave my lips a loud noise makes us both jump. Except it isn’t really a loud noise. The man downstairs has simply let the letterbox flap slam shut. Once again I put my finger to my lips and then I go back to the curtain. I lower my eye to the slit and look through.

The man has moved away from the front door now and is now standing by the garden gate. He slowly looks up and down at the house until his gaze fixes upon the tiny gap I created in my parents’ curtains. I hold my breath as he continues to look right at where I am standing. I’m close to panicking. The curtain mustn’t move. Any slight movement and he will know that there is someone in the house. This seems to go on for a very long time. I can hear Sofia’s painful grunts as she holds in her wee. And then finally, just as I’m about to think that the man might never leave, he turns on his heel and walks quickly into the street. Then I hear the sound of a car door closing and an engine starting.

I gratefully pat my heart and Sofia rushes off to the toilet.

I didn’t get a very good look at the man. Even though he seemed to stand there looking in my direction for a very long time I was too scared do anything but keep my eyes completely still and frozen. I did, however, get the chance to notice that he seemed young… Well, younger than dad. And that he wasn’t the man from the park. He was someone else.

Waterlow Park – Chapter 04

Another day. Another chapter of the aborted ‘Waterlow Park’. Interestingly, someone seems to be reading this. Had an email from a small indie publisher in America yesterday who wants to see more. Well here’s the more:

 

Chapter 04

“What’s wrong with you?” says the kid called Smitty, whom I don’t even know.

“Nothing,” I reply.

“Well why’d you keep looking around everywhere? What are you scared of?”

“Nothing.”

I don’t know Smitty’s real name. I don’t even know if he has a real name although I suppose he must have. In fact, I don’t know much at all about Smitty. Except that he isn’t a giant like all the other boys at the new school seem to be.

“Well something’s wrong. I can tell something’s wrong.”

It’s been two whole days since I found the bag of money and Smitty’s started following me home. He’s in the same class as me – 7W – and it turns out he lives just around the corner from me. I don’t know how he found this out, and I certainly didn’t invite him to start walking home with me. But here he is – walking home with me for the second day in a row. What an idiot.

“I’m telling you… Nothing’s wrong at all.”

“Well you’ve hardly said a word since we got into the park.”

“I’ve got nothing to say…”

Smitty doesn’t know the reason why I’ve got nothing to say but I obviously do and it’s freaking me out quite a lot. It’s because we’re walking through Waterlow Park and I can see the bushes where I found the bag of money. Standing only a couple of feet away from that spot is a man. A really big man dressed completely in black. And he’s looking right at me.

He wasn’t there yesterday. And he wasn’t there the day before. In fact, nobody was there yesterday or the day before when I walked home from school. Just when I was beginning to think that whoever the money belongs to had forgotten all about it.

I turn away. And then I wait a few moments and try and get a sneaky look at the man. He’s still staring at me. I quickly turn away again.

“Look at the size of that bloke,” says Smitty.

Another sneaky look. He’s still watching me.

“What bloke?” I say.

“That bloke’ says Smitty pointing right at the man.

“Stop it!” I say, grabbing hold of Smitty’s arm and pulling it to his side. “Stop pointing at him – it’s… It’s… Stupid…”

Smitty looks at me with a puzzled expression on his face. From the corner of my eye I can see the man still staring right at me. He also has a puzzled expression. I think.

Without realising it, I increase my walking pace. Smitty, who is really fat and really unfit is soon out of breath and struggling to keep up with me. We get closer and closer to the man. So close that I can see his grey eyes. He’s old and craggy and sunburned like he’s been under the grill for too long. He has grey bristles growing out of his chin. He’s wearing a woollen hat and a black jacket. He looks really weird, although actually to other people he probably looks quite normal. He’s so close that he can hear us talk. Except we’re not talking.

“So anyway,” I say, attempting to remedy the situation, “School’s really boring, isn’t it…”

“Huh?” says Smitty.

I try to wink at Smitty but I’m not getting any better at winking. “I said: school’s really rubbish, isn’t it?”

“What?”

“OMG. I said: school’s rubbish! It’s rubbish, isn’t it?”

“If you say so,” shrugs Smitty, looking at me really oddly.

We walk past the man. He smells of some sort of weird perfume or aftershave. As we pass, his head swivels around to follow us. Quite blatantly. He doesn’t even pretend to be looking at something else. I’m wondering if I even saw him smile a little. A really evil little smile. It had to be.

***

I eventually shake off Smitty and hurry home. I’m covered in sweat, partly because of the walk and partly because of the man. Sofia’s waiting for me. Her school’s closer than mine and she always gets home before I do.

“I just saw someone,” I pant, hardly able to get the words out.

“Congratulations,’ says Sofia. “I saw at least… Let’s see… Probably about a hundred people today.”

“No – idiot! I mean I saw someone in the park.”

“Really? Shall I call the newspapers?”

“What?”

“Shall I call the newspapers and tell them that you saw someone in the park? Do you think it will make the front page?”

As well as using big words and constantly finishing people’s sentences, Sofia can be very sarcastic.

“Somebody standing near the bushes…”

“The bushes?”

“…The bushes where I found the you-know-what.”

Sofia goes white and quiet for a moment as the penny drops. She reduces her voice to a whisper. “You mean the money?” she asks.

“Yes! The money!” I reply. “He was standing right next to where I found the money. And he was watching me.”

I describe the man’s appearance to my sister. And as I do so I remember more detail. “He had sharp pointed shoes. He had a leather leash wrapped around one of his hands.”

“Do you mean a dog lead?”

“I dunno. A leather leash. He kept looking at me and Smitty.”

“Who’s Smitty?”

“I told you yesterday. He’s a stupid fat boy in my class. He wants to be my friend. He keeps walking home with me.”

“Oh… Well maybe you should speak to him.”

“I do speak to him. I keep telling him to go away.”

“No. Not Smitty. The man in the park. If he’s there on Monday speak to him.”

“Why would I want to do that?”

“Because it might be his you-know-what. It might belong to him. He might give you a reward.”

Waterlow Park – Chapter 03

  

I was wrong: yesterday’s response was even more underwhelming than the day before. All I got were a couple of likes and a typo pointed out to me. Still, out of sheer bloody-mindedness more than anything else, here’s chapter 03 of Waterlow Park.

Ian

PS I’m writing this on a Logitech iPad Pro keyboard, which is very swish but takes some getting used to. Mistakes are likely.

Chapter 03

“Money!” yells dad. “The whole world is trying to take your money!”

Dad’s in a shouty mood. He’s just come back from work and he needs to get things out of his system. He’s always in a shouty mood.

“Do you know I got out of the tube and five people asked me for money?” he continues, although everyone in the room is pretending not to hear him. “There was an idiot selling the Big Issue, an idiot playing an accordion, some idiot woman who looked like a zombie smoking a cigarette, an idiot standing at the bus stop and some idiot who tried to sell me a poxy idiot flower. What’s the world coming to?”

In dad’s world everyone’s an idiot except him. People on the telly are all idiots. All pop singers are idiots. All politicians are idiots. Me and Sofia are definitely idiots. Everyone.

“Calm down Tony,’ says mum. ‘Think of your blood pressure.”

Mum’s a nurse. You can tell by the way she’s always talking about health. Dad teaches people how to use computers for a living. He hates his job. He hates the people he teaches. He says they’re all idiots. 

“I am calm Janie!” shouts dad. “It’s just that I’m surrounded by…”

“…Idiots?” says Sofia.

“Yes… That’s right, Sofia,” says dad like he’s never heard the word before. ‘IDIOTS who want your money!”

Mum and dad don’t often have a lot of money. This is probably because whenever they do they go out and get rid of it as quickly as they can. Mum spends it clothes for us but dad mostly drinks and smokes it. Don’t get me wrong – we never go hungry. We both have mobiles and proper clothes and trainers and things. Well not proper – not with proper names like the ones that the kids at school wear. But we’re always aware that the we have to be careful. The last week of the month is always a bit of a struggle for everyone.

“How was school today?” Now mum’s talking, she trying to get dad to stop going on about idiots. “Anything interesting happen?”

Sofia and I look at one another, probably guiltily. There is a silence, which forces both mum and dad to stop talking and stare at us suspiciously.

“I got put in the golden book for spelling,” says Sofia, breaking that silence.

“Very clever darling,’ says mum. “And what about you Stephen?”

“I had a nondescript day.”

“Hark at him and his big words,” says dad.

***

After dinner mum and dad have a row. Sofia and I are not sure what starts it because any little thing is enough to get dad and mum arguing. We go upstairs and put our fingers in our ears as mum screams at dad and dad shouts at mum. Their voices are loud but muffled enough to hide what they are yelling about. We hear the sound of breaking glass and Sofia starts to shake so I get her to clean her teeth and put her to bed. Then I get into my pyjamas and go to bed myself. I hide under the sheets and read an Avengers comic by torchlight. Later, mum comes into the room and kisses me on the forehead and I pretend to be asleep. She’s been crying. She’s always crying.

Waterlow Park Chapter 2

  

I had such an underwhelming response to my posting of the first chapter of ‘WATERLOW PARK’ that I’ve decided to post chapter two on the basis that things can only get better.

Only joking, folks. Hope you enjoy it as much I enjoyed cooking a Christmas dinner for six people the other day. Totally stress free.

Chapter 02

“I’m definitely against this! I’m really most definitely against this!”

Sofia is definitely against my plan. She tells me this several times in her favourite whiny voice but I think I manage to get her down off her high horse a bit. 

“Firstly, they mustn’t know because it could get them into trouble,” I explain.

I don’t for a moment think that my finding a big bag of money in the park could get mum and dad into trouble but I must admit it sounds plausible. Especially when I lie and tell Sofia about something I saw on the BBC web site about what happened to somebody else’s parents who also found some money. “…And they got sent to prison for four years,” I say. “It’s called ‘money laundrying’ or something. It’s a terrible crime.”

Sofia looks at me suspiciously for a moment and mumbles some words, asking for names so that she can Google them later. But then I see tears begin to well up in her eyes. She’s only nine is Sofia. It’s easy to forget sometimes when she comes out with the big words and all that but she’s only a little girl. She’s still at junior school. I get all big brotherly and put my arm around her. “Don’t cry Sophie,” I say, knowing that she hates it when I call her that. “I ain’t not going to let that happen.”

“That’s a double negative, Stevie,” she sniffs through the tears.

‘Don’t call me that!” I say.

Sofia laughs. She can do that can Sofia – one minute she’s crying and the next she’s laughing.

 Back to the plan: “Secondly, we have to find a way of hiding the money until we decide what to do with it.”

“Why don’t we just tell the police?” she asks.

“Well… Yes… We could do that…” I say. “And we probably will do – definitely will do – in the end. But first let’s try and find out if somebody’s lost the money. You never know there might be a reward.”

“That’s true.”

“So where are we gonna put it then, Sofia?”

She thinks long and hard. “Well we can’t put it under the bed. There’s too much money and mum would notice it sooner or later.”

“True,” say I.

“And I can’t think of any cupboards that we could use to store it in… Except… Except…”

“Except?”

“Well there’s the barbecue…”

The barbecue! She’s brilliant is my sister. Sometimes she’s brilliant.

***

In our house we have a small garden at the back with a few plants and a green pond. The pond has exactly thirteen goldfish in it. Last week there were exactly fourteen goldfish but one died and dad had to fish it out with his bare hands and put it somewhere. He wouldn’t tell me where. Next to the pond is a brick barbecue that the person we bought the house from must have built. We’ve only used this barbecue three times in all the years we’ve been here. Mum and dad never invite friends around. On either side of the barbecue is a cupboard. One of the cupboards is used to store coal for the winter. The other is empty apart from a carton of fish food which dad won’t use because he says it encourages algae to grow in the pond. (This is probably why our fish keep dying of starvation.) That’s where we can store the money!

We move fast: give or take delays on the Northern Line we have exactly one-hour-and twelve minutes before mum and dad get home. Sofia and me get some plastic shopping bags from the kitchen and stuff as much money as we can into them. We carry the bags money downstairs into the garden. Paper can be a lot heavier than it looks and we are soon sweaty. I flick through some of the stacks of money and notice that there’s nothing there but £50 notes. I’ve never seen a £50 note before. Whoever this money belongs to has separated the notes into equal sized bundles and fastened it with gummed paper strips. I think about counting the notes in one of the bundles but decide against it. The clock is ticking.

I stack the money neatly inside the cupboard while Sofia goes upstairs for some more. It takes about fifteen minutes for her to bring down the rest of the money and she’s panting like a dog by the time she’s finished. By some strange coincidence the money fits into the cupboard exactly. There isn’t an inch to spare. “It’s like the cupboard was built to hold our money,” I say. Sofia and I look at each other knowingly, both of us realising that it’s taken only a matter of hours for ‘the money’ to become ‘our money’. We don’t mention my slip of the tongue. 

I get some sticky tape and the dog shitty black plastic sack. I carefully tear the sack open and spread it wide so that I can use it to totally cover the money. Then I stick it firmly in place with the sticky tape. Soon it looks like a solid block of black plastic. Finally, I close the cupboard door. From my pocket I pull out a padlock that I found earlier in dad’s kitchen drawer full of batteries and screwdrivers and super-glue. I lock the padlock and hide the key upstairs in the back of my underpants drawer. 

It’s done. The money is gone. Nobody will ever find it. 

I think. 

All we’ve got to do now is decide what to do with it.

A difficult new year

Happy new year to all those people who occasionally hit the ‘like’ button on this blog. A double happy new year squared to those who actually comment.

For my first post of 2016 I’m dipping into my ‘abandoned but not forgotten’ vault. What follows is an aborted children’s story that I began in late 2013 and worked on a little bit early the following year. I was very excited about it at first but like a lot of things I do the work was eventually abandoned after I sent it out anonymously to a couple of agents and got zero response.

It sort of pretty accurately reflects my state of mind at the moment: in that a small publisher has agreed to republish my 1999 book ‘Rope Burns’ along with a sequel that I’m provisionally calling ‘Dangerous’. The problem is that I have only four months left to write a complete book and I’m not sure that my heart is entirely in it. To write ‘Dangerous’ I have to get back in touch with a lot  boxing contacts whom I haven’t spoken to in 25 years. This started promisingly enough but I’m running into a brick wall in that far too many people aren’t as interested seeing in me as I am in seeing them. If I’m going to revisit my past and produce something worthwhile then it has to be good.

In the meantime, here’s chapter 01 of ‘Waterloo Park’. It’s for the 13+ age group. I’d be happy to hear any comments you have about it. Even bad ones.

Cheers and beers.

Ian

WATERLOW PARK

Chapter 01

“OMG! You’re in real trouble! You’re going to HAVE to give it back!’

That’s Sofia talking. She’s always so annoyingly sensible. She’s my sister. She’s younger than me by two years and a day but always SO sensible.

“Don’t be stupid… I haven’t done anything wrong. Let’s not be hasty. Let’s think about it for a bit…”

That’s me talking. Stephen Dawkins. Older than Sofia by 731 days and six hours and not sensible at all.

“How much is there?” she asks.

“I dunno. A lot. Thousands and thousands and thousands I think.”

“OMG! Is it real money?’

“Course it’s real money, idiot. It’s got the Queen’s head on it and all that.”

“Yes, but it could be counterfeit. Forged. We did about that in school.”

“Don’t be silly. Feel it.”

Sofia feels the money. She picks up a brick of tightly bound notes and cradles it in her tiny little white hands and feels its coldness against her cheek. She sniffs it. She runs her stubby nails down its side. “Well it feels real,” she says eventually, still unsure. “Where did you find it again?”

“Waterlow Park,” I say for the umpteenth time. “I told you: I was walking home from school this afternoon – got it down to 1.1 miles – and I noticed something in the bushes near the duck pond. It was a big black plastic sack full of this… Money.”

Sofia pulls a face as if she’s in pain. “Well it must be somebody’s money.” she says. “People just don’t leave sackfuls of money lying around in bushes. Perhaps it was a surprise for someone.”

“You’re not listening to me are you, stupid? I told you I looked around and there was nobody about at all. It was raining and the park was completely deserted. Apart from some old biddy giving bread to the ducks.”

“Maybe it was hers?”

“I don’t think so. She had one of those walking frame things…”

“Zimmer frame?”

“Yes, that’s it. She had a zimmer thingie and she was moving at about ten miles a year. She wouldn’t have been able to even pick up the money.”

“Well how did you manage to pick it up? It’s very heavy There’s a lot of it.”

I smile and try to wink but I’ve not quite mastered winking yet. This is where I was clever. This is where I used that devious little brain of mine. I try to sound as cool as possible – like this sort of thing happens every day: “Well I had to use my head,” I explain. “You can’t have people seeing me lug a big sackful of money through the park – can you? So I dragged it to another place – you know that clump of trees behind the playground with the climbing frame and the jumpy thing? And then I covered it with leaves and dog shit…”

“I’m telling!” Sofia immediately interrupts my story and crosses her arms. She’s such a prude is Sofia. “You’re not allowed to use that word!”

“Oh all right,’ I say. “Dog poo if it makes you happy. I did this so nobody would touch it. Then I rushed home and got my backpack.”

“I did wonder what you were doing with your backpack,” says Sofia. “I knew you were up to something.”

“It took thirteen separate trips for me get all that money into my backpack and then back here,” I say, a little too proudly I think. “I had to be careful, you know. I had to make sure that nobody noticed me. And nobody did.”

Sofia frowns again and shakes her head. “So you’re telling me that you decanted all that money from the sack into your backpack and carried it back here thirteen times? You’re mad.”

Sofia’s such a brain-box. She’s always using big words like ‘decanted’ but this time it’s me who’s the clever one. “Well I could hardly carry it through the streets could I? People would have smelled a rat.”

Sofia holds her nose and stares over at the black plastic sack which still has traces of the dog shit I rubbed on it. “Well I can smell more than a rat,” she says.

***

It was a normal day like any other when I found the money. I can’t really say any more than that. It was raining a little. The sky was grey, I suppose. The grass was wet and I was making my way home from school. I’m eleven-years-old and I go to William Ellis Boys School in Hampstead. It’s only my second week at the school but I’m guessing that it’s still pretty unusual to find a big bin liner full of money hidden in the bushes. I only found it because I was trying out a new route. I have an app on my phone that records exactly how far you walk and draws a line on a map that shows your route. I’ve been trying to find the quickest route to the school. On the first day I walked exactly 1.3 miles. On the second I walked exactly 1.21 miles. And it was only because I was trying to shave as much as possible off the distance that I ended up walking close to the bushes and spotting that bag of money. Today I walked 1.1 miles, which I don’t think I’ll better.

***

“What’s mum and dad going to say?” asks Sofia.

This is where I get annoyed. I don’t normally get angry and things but sometimes you have to if you need to make a point. “Mum and dad aren’t going to say anything…” I say in a loud voice – not shouty like dad – just loud.

“…Because mum and dad aren’t going to find out,” says Sofia. Sofia has an annoying habit of finishing everybody’s sentences.

“They’re definitely not going to!” I say.

And with that I/we hatch a plan.

Red Christmas – a tale of torture and woe

PART 1

It was Christmas morning in London. That is to say it was raining fiercely and there wasn’t a flake of snow to be seen this side of the South Pole. In households all over the city ugly ungrateful brats were busy tearing open lovingly gift-wrapped packages and tearfully complaining about what was inside them. In other words it was a normal Christmas morning. Well, normal for anyone whose name happened NOT to be Johnny McKenzie, otherwise known as Johnny Nothing.

“Why do I never get any presents?” thought Johnny to himself as he dragged himself out of bed with a shiver.

“Brrrrrrr! It’s cold!” thought the shiver.

The other occupants of the rat-infested council flat that Johnny called home were all asleep as he and his shiver made their way downstairs into the living room. It had been a busy night for Johnny’s parents, the loathsome Felicity MacKenzie and her useless lump of lard husband Billy. As well as drinking several gallons of something that tasted like cheap lager they had found in a skip, the grisly pair had also been laying a trap for someone. Someone whom you might know very well indeed…

On Christmas mornings in most people’s homes you might expect to find a nice juicy Christmas tree covered in twinkling lights with a fairy perched on the top. Not so in Johnny’s home. Here, there was no Christmas tree. No twinkling lights. And there was no sign of a fairy with a giant pine tree stuck up her bum. Instead, there was a sweaty old man with a straggly white beard squatting in front of the gas fire making curious gasping noises. Sort of like this: “Gasp… Gasp… Gargle…”. (Did I mention that he occasionally made gargling noises?)

The man was dressed from head to toe in a red all-in-one body suit with furry cuffs. On his wrinkled liver-spotted old head there was a really stupid looking hat. He looked ridiculous. I’m not joking – he really did look like a complete pillock. Moreover, someone had tied him up with rope and gagged him so that he could scarcely breathe. Johnny recognised the stranger instantly.

“Are you… Are you… Santa Claus?” Johnny asked in astonishment, prising the gag away from the old man’s mouth.

“Who do you think I bloody am?” spluttered Father Christmas. “Barrack Obama?”

“Not really…” said Johnny, fairly sure that this was not the president of America sitting in his living room.

“Untie me!” yelled the tied up stranger. “There’s going to be hell to pay – I can tell you!”

For a moment Johnny thought he was dreaming. “Am I dreaming?” he murmured, as if determined to play along with my description of what was happening.

“No you’re not bloody dreaming!” said Santa, as if determined to undermine my description of what was happening. “And if you don’t get these ropes off me I’ll have your guts for garters!”

Johnny frowned a little, as you do. He rubbed away a bit of that scummy stuff you get in the corner of your eye every morning (for a moment he considered eating it but changed his mind and wiped it on his pyjama trousers instead) and took a closer look at the stranger in the living room. It was not every day that you got sworn at by Santa Claus.

“Are you really Father Christmas?” he asked.

“Yes,” replied the old man irritatedly, as if he was totally fed up of answering that question. “Now will you please untie me.”

Johnny dropped to his knees and began working at the ropes that bound Father Christmas. Whoever had tied them had made a good job of it.

“No offence,” said Johnny. “but I thought that Santa Claus was just a made up person.”

“Oh… I’m real enough all right,” grumbled Santa. “Who do you think delivers all those presents every Christmas?”

“But you’ve never delivered any to me.”

“I most certainly have.”

“Well I’ve never received them.”

“Of course you haven’t – your bloody mother has always nicked them before you’ve had a chance to lay your hands on them.”

Right on cue the sound of an extinct woolly mammoth could be heard descending the stairs.

“Talk of the Devil,” groaned Father Christmas, as Johnny continued to struggle to untie him.

“Johnny stop untying him right now!!” ordered the hungover voice of the extinct woolly mammoth as it entered the room. “That silly old scrote is my prisoner!”

I suppose it’s fair to point out that it is a little cruel to compare Johnny’s mother, the delightful Felicity MacKenzie, with an extinct woolly mammoth. You have my apologies for doing so. Because woolly mammoth’s – even though they were big and hairy and smelly and prone to accidentally squishing any cavemen who accidentally got in their way – were actually quite cute. Baby woolly mammoths were particularly cute; and quite tasty on the barbecue, too, I’m told.

The same, unfortunately, cannot be said of Felicity MacKenzie, who was neither tasty nor cute. In fact, she was the opposite of tasty: quite rancidly tasteless, if such a thing is possible. The sort of human being tastebud equivalent of Brussel sprouts marinated in fart juice. And she was also the opposite of cute, which I make as being ‘etuc’, quite a meaningless word in actual fact.

She was so fat that she exerted her own gravitational pull. She was so ugly that when she was born her mother slapped herself. She was so mean that she won’t even allow me to finish this senten

Back to the story:

“Why have you tied me up!” yelled Santa Claus. “What do you want from me?”

“What do you think I want, you stupid dosser?” smiled Felicity. “I want all your presents and you’re going to give ’em to me! But before you do so, it’s time for an advertising break…”

END OF PART 1

ADVERTISEMENT

She was an evil woman was Felicity. I’m not kidding – she was really evil. More evil than Margaret Thatcher ever was – well maybe not. You can read all about her (Felicity not Margaret) in my lovely smelly book entitled: Johnny Nothing. It’s available from all half-decent book retailers in ebook and paperback formats and has a really nice yellow cover with scratchy bits on it. If you’re reading this before Christmas why not click on one of the links below and you and/or your beautiful ugly child can find out what happens when Johnny’s uncle dies and leaves him a fortune only for Felicity to steal all the money from him and go on a really long shopping spree. It’s quite exciting and all that.

 

PART 2

Felicity MacKenzie was rummaging through the large sack of presents that lay beside the still tied up Father Christmas. Beside her was a blobby heap of beer belly and builder’s crack clinker named Billy MacKenzie. If you don’t already know, he was Johnny’s dad and Felicity’s husband. As usual he was unshaven and smelled of Victorian urinals and dog breath.

“This is no good!” scowled Felicity, throwing a box of Lego across the room. ‘We want expensive gifts. Something we can flog on eBay!”

“Stop opening my presents!” urged Santa. “They’re not for you!”

“Or what?” growled Billy MacKenzie.

“Or… Or… I’ll get very cross,’ said Santa, which wasn’t really much of a threat because he was still tied up and – let’s face it – however cross he might be, Santa Claus is never going to be that scary, is he? He’s Santa Claus for goodness sake!

“I’m ravenous,” said Felicity. ”’Ere Santa – you got any food in these parcels?”

“Even if I knew the answer to that question there’s certainly no way that I’m telling you.”

“Oh la-de-da.” said Felicity, which doesn’t really mean anything but people still say it from time to time.

As Santa looked on, the horrible pair continued opening the presents in his sack. Books, CDs, socks, after shave, strange looking adult toys that required batteries, and boring games like Cluedo and Monopoly were hurled to one side.

“Should you really be doing that?” asked Johnny, who had kept quiet while all this was going on.

“Mind your own business!” said his mother, spitting out a mouthful of perfume that she had hoped might be whisky. “And get me some food you little brat!”

Johnny went into the kitchen and rooted around for something to give to his mother. Apart from a small piece of cheese that was growing a quiff, the fridge was lukewarm and empty. There was nothing in the food cupboard either. There was no sign of a turkey and all the trimmings waiting to be cooked like you might find in other peoples’ houses. The MacKenzies never bothered with Christmas dinner. They usually went to the pub and if they were feeling generous they would bring home a packet of crisps for their son.

Johnny went back into the living room to give his parents the bad news. Before he could speak, however, Felicity MacKenzie let out a hoot of triumph, whatever that sounds like. “Hold on a minute,” she announced, looking over at a very unhappy Santa Claus.. “How did you get here?”

“I beg your pardon?” he replied.

“Are you stupid? I said: how did you get here?”

“Is that an existential question or do you mean into your flat?”

“Whatever!”

“Well down the chimney, of course.”

The fact that there wasn’t a chimney in the flat didn’t seem to deter Felicity MacKenzie. “No I don’t mean that you fat old imbecile!” she said. “I mean how did you get here? How did you journey to the flat?”

“Why on my sleigh, of course.”

“On his sleigh!” yelled Felicity in triumph. “And where is it now?”

“Why, it’s still parked outside.”

Felicity MacKenzie pulled herself upright and began to cackle. “Billy,” she said, “go outside and fetch our Christmas dinner.”

Billy looked confused. “Whatdoyoumean, Fliss?” he asked.

“I’ve got a special treat for us all today,” said Felicity, licking her bulbous trout lips. “…Roast reindeer.”

“Lovely,” said Billy. “But before we eat have we got time for another advert?”

 

END OF PART 2

ADVERTISEMENT

I’m not one of those writers who’s always harping on about their books. In fact, when asked at parties I often tell people that I’m a tax inspector. Sometimes I tell them that I’m a murderer. What I was going to say, however, is that if you’re enjoying the story so far you might want to to go and download the first three chapters of Johnny Nothing from the iBooks Store or from the Kindle Store. They’re free, of course. And if you end up liking them there’s another thirty or so chapters for you to read. Hold on, what’s that nice smell?

PART 3

Although when pushed she could just about rustle up a Pot Noodle, Felicity MacKenzie would be the first to admit that she wasn’t much of a cook.

“I’d be the first to admit that I’m not much of a cook.” said Felicity macKenzie, as she sat at the head of the dining table. There. I told you so.

Nevertheless, she had made a surprisingly good job of Christmas dinner. Delia Smith would have been proud. Delicious odours of cooked meat wafted around the flat like clouds of tangy loveliness making Johnny’s tummy rumble like a long extinct volcano. Hold on… If it was extinct it wouldn’t be rumbling. Would it?

“Shall I carve?” asked Billy.

“Please do, my darling husband,” said Felicity, putting on her poshest voice.

While Felicity and Billy sat at either end of the dining table Johnny stood in the doorway to the kitchen looking on in horror as his blood soaked father began cutting the Christmas dinner into succulent slices. Still tied up on the floor was Santa Claus, who was weeping profusely.

“Stop crying you big baby and have a bit of dinner,’ said Felicity.

“But… But… You’ve murdered… My Rudolph…” cried Santa.

“Oh stop fussing,’ said Felicity. “Do you fancy a slice of nose?”

Billy MacKenzie had been uncharacteristically efficient with Rudolph. First he had dragged the whimpering reindeer into the flat by its harness. And then, using a carving set that he found in Santa’s sack, he had set about slaughtering the animal.

First he had cut Rudolph’s throat, collecting the gallons of blood that gushed from the wound in a tin pot that he used for soaking his feet. “We can use this for black pudding later,’ he had said cheerfully.

Then he had neatly sliced the still warm and trembling carcass into smaller portions, passing a leg over to his wife which she swiftly popped into the oven with a bit of garlic. The whole exercise was over in less than ten minutes. However, the mess this created was terrible. Everywhere you looked there was reindeer blood: on the walls, the ceiling, the curtains. Most of the blood was on Billy, who looked even redder than Santa Claus. It was a red Christmas.

“Tuck in,” urged Felicity.

END OF PART 3

ADVERTISEMENT

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When the room smells fresh so do you

Next time you vacuum you know just what to do

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Do the shake and vac and put the freshness back

Do the shake and vac and put the freshness back

(Sorry about that. I had to sell this advertising spot to someone else.)

PART 4

Dinner was over. Felicity and Billy McKenzie slumped into their chairs in front of the telly, stuffed to satisfaction and watching as the Queen gave her annual speech.

“Philip and I would like to thank everybody for giving us all of your hard-earned money so that you can help to maintain an oligarchy that is thousands of years old and patently unfair to all but the select few,” she said. “It keeps us in jewels and Corgis and helicopter rides and makes sure that you, my subjects, have no hope of ever achieving anything with your lives unless you go on the X-Factor or Big Brother or Strictly or some other asinine turgid nonsense…”

“I love the queen,” Felicity said dreamily, as her stomach struggled to digest the unexpected influx of reindeer matter. “She’s always so honest to her people.”

“Yes, she has a lovely turn of phrase” agreed Billy.

The speech finished and the couple reluctantly got to their feet when the National Anthem was playing. Then they sat back down again to watch a Bond movie with a Welsh bloke playing Bond. After that there was a Dad’s Army repeat which led to the inevitable Christmas snooze followed by a Two Ronnies repeat, a Morecambe and Wise repeat and Jurassic Park 3. It was a great Christmas day. If you’re American and reading this you won’t have a clue what I’m going on about. But do I really care?

In the morning there was only one more thing to think about. The remaining bits of Rudolph had been stuffed into the fridge and under the sink and in the bath and into various cupboards. The presents that had been pilfered from Santa’s sack were already on eBay. (Although Felicity wasn’t particularly hopeful that they would make that much money from their ill-gotten gains – all of Santa’s presents seem to have come from the Pound Shop.) It was just a question of what to do with Santa Claus.

Santa Claus. All over the world that name had suddenly become hated overnight. This was because, apart from a couple of isolated regions in the south of England, no presents had been delivered anywhere else.

Santa Claus. Millions of parents were left wondering how to stop their children’s desperate tears. “But it’s not our fault,” said mothers and fathers everywhere. “It’s that evil Father Christmas who’s to blame.”

Santa Claus: you could almost swim in the wave of bitter disappointment that washed over the globe.

Santa Claus: What a smelly old rat!

On television, newscasters told tales of the hated devil named Santa Claus. Police and politicians were interviewed, universally condemning this once loved figure. A warrant for Santa’s arrest was issued by Interpol. In many countries the death penalty was reinstated in anticipation of Santa’s capture.

On boxing day there was knock on the MacKenzie’s front door. “He’s in here,” said Felicity to a man waving an identity card. Early in the morning, Felicity had called the police and told them that she had apprehended a familiar looking intruder.

“Get him boys,” said the man, and at once a dozen or so police officers bundled into the council flat.

“I caught him killing a reindeer,” said Felicity. “So Billy banged him on the head and we tied him up.”

“Thank you madam,” said another man. “You’ve done a great service to the nation.”

Santa was handcuffed and taken into police custody. Three days later he was sentenced to death without trial. The Home Secretary’s triplets had caused such a fuss when they discovered they had no Christmas presents that he had vowed to get an instant revenge.

At the execution a jeering crowd threw rancid Christmas puddings at the cowering figure of Santa Claus. Some hurled chocolate cherry liqueurs. As his head was placed into the noose, Santa was asked if he had any last words.

The old man hunched his shoulders and coughed. Then he replied: “Yes I do, actually.”

The crowd grew silent as the man known as Father Christmas or Santa Claus or Saint Nicholas uttered his final words.

“What an ungrateful bunch you are,’ he said softly. ‘For thousands of years I’ve been making and delivering presents for you all and never once have I received a thank-you for my troubles.

“Despite living in a freezing cold draughty house in the North Pole with no-one for company save for a couple of imps and a reindeer with a genetic nose impairment you’re still not satisfied.

“Despite having to sit on rooftops for most of December waiting for your little brats to post their Christmas wish list up the bloody chimney I’ve never got so much as a ‘ta very much, mate’.

“Despite having to listen to endless crappy Christmas records by the likes of Slade and Wizzard and Bing bloody Crosby you still want more.

“Despite depositing millions of gifts into your kids’ stockings for longer than I care to remember, it doesn’t stop you from hinting to them that it was actually really YOU who bought the presents.

“So goodbye and good riddance you ungrateful mob. In future YOU can fish around in red hot coal embers retrieving your semi-literate kids’ note to Santa. YOU can spend literally minutes on Amazon ordering your brats’ myriad requirements, complete with personalised message and reasonably competitively priced gift wrapping paper. YOU can take delivery of the parcels, a couple of days later, signing for them, unpacking them and then hiding them under your bed or in a cupboard somewhere. YOU can wait until your kids are asleep on Christmas Eve and then creep into their bedrooms and carefully place their gifts at the foot of the bed. And YOU can sit and watch while they open those presents believing that are not from you – their bloody parents – but from some mythical, sleigh-driving deity from the North Pole.”

There was a murmur among the crowd as the spectators took in Santa’s words. Then a crescendo of voices rose up and almost to a man began chanting the same words:

“LET HIM…” they cried, thinking of all the hard work they would have to do if Santa was allowed to go to the gallows.

“LET HIM…” they chanted, wondering how their lives might change without this universal figure of kindness and joy.

“LET HIM…” they chorused, trying to imagine what life would truly be like without Christmas.

“LET HIM… DIE.”

THE END

Nice to see you?

It was twenty-three years ago when I last saw him. His eyes were closed and an oxygen mask was strapped to his mouth. His magnificent muscular torso was a tangle of tubes and sensors. He lay on the bed like a sleeping baby. The slightest of frowns pinched his forehead as if he were dreaming the longest dream. A dream that would last for a Biblical 40 days and 40 nights before he would finally awaken to discover that his life had been ripped apart. That he could never be the person that he used to be.

In a windswept hotel on the outskirts of Essex I sit at the rear of a vast banqueting hall and wait to see his face once more. I’m wearing the suit that I wore on my wedding day and for the last three funerals that I attended. You could say that I’m not a suit person. It hangs loose on my body on account of the large amount of weight I’ve lost in the past couple of years.

‘You’ve put some pounds on,’ says a gor blimey voice, ’You used to be a skinny fella…”

The voice takes a seat across from me at the table and I recognise its owner. It’s also been more than two decades since I saw him and he’s lost his hair – although I’m not one to talk – and grown grotesquely fat. No comment.

‘You look like you’ve lost weight,’ I lie.

The other man rubs his swollen beachball of a beer gut and stares at the floor. ‘Yeah… I’ve been working out…’ he says without a trace of irony.

The stranger from my past withdraws to the bar leaving me at the dinner table to gaze at other faces. In the far corner Nigel Benn is charging 20 quid a shot to be photographed with time-ravaged fans. The former world champion boxer looks trim and wears a stylish striped jacket that would probably look ridiculous on anybody else. He grins and waves a weary fist at the camera. The middle-aged car salesman standing next to him follows his lead for posterity.

On the table closest to me I spot Alan Minter in a bowtie. I doubt you’ve heard of him. A lifetime ago I’d been an 18-year-old waiter serving wine at an event not unlike this one to a bashed up Minter, who had just lost his world middleweight title. Back then I’d been in awe of Minter but now it’s only sorrow. His position at the outskirts of the hall – almost as remote and desolate as my own location – serves as a barometer for just how much people have forgotten his achievements. He’s at the back of the queue now and others have moved forward to take his place.

The speeches begin: on a long table at the front of the hall a smiling Nigel Benn is surrounded by other refugees from days gone by. A retired boxer named Rod Douglas sits close to Herol Graham, the man whose punches put an end to his career. To his right is former world featherweight champion Colin McMillan, as well as an assortment of other ex-fighters whose blurred features remain hidden in the shadows. But I’m not here to see these people. Although they all in one way or another belong to my past I’m here to see only one person. I know he’s coming because the organiser of this tribute to Nigel Benn tipped me off and invited me along. Everybody else seems to know he’s coming, too; it has to be the worst kept secret since someone let it slip that smoking is bad for you.

A whisper from the table: ‘Michael’s here…’ And all at once I can stand it no longer. I climb to my feet and quietly exit the hall. Standing listlessly at the foot of a smartly decorated staircase are two tough looking bouncers. I ask them if they’ve seen Michael and they gesture towards a small corridor to the left of the staircase.

I find myself outside one of my favourite personal indulgences – a disabled toilet. I try the handle. It’s locked. But just as I’m leaving, the door swings open and a large middle aged black man with glasses and greying temples appears. We look at each other for a long moment and I gently say: ‘Michael… It’s so nice to see you…’ My voice is trembling and I’m already weak with emotion.

The man in front of me is slightly taller than I and wearing a freshly-pressed grey suit. He stretches out a huge hand in my direction and cocks his thumb towards me like Paul McCartney greeting his fans.

‘It’s so nice to see you,’ I repeat. I take hold of that giant hand and gently stroke it like a fragile flower.

‘It’s good to see you, too,’ says Michael. ‘Listen, I gotta go now… We’ll talk later.’

He shuffles past me with obvious difficulty into the darkness of the banqueting hall. Heads begin to turn as someone guides Michael slowly towards the top table. The man with the microphone stops talking. It takes several seconds before people begin to understand what is happening.

Back in my seat I watch as Nigel Benn wraps his arms around Michael. Vanquished and victor reunited. A quarter of a century ago Michael had bludgeoned Benn’s exhausted body to the canvas on a memorable night in Finsbury Park but now the pair are caught in a lover’s embrace. The sight is surreal and invigorating and life affirming. I’m breathless and dizzy. Our brief reunion has been so simple. So ordinary. In the days leading up to that moment I had been nervous, restless, full of questions. Would Michael remember me? Would he want to see me again after all this time? But it had all seemed so natural. It was more than I could ever have hoped for.

Still more speeches. Food is served: simple but edible and I make decorative chit chat with the strangers at my table. But I yearn to tell somebody about the miracle that has just occurred. About how Michael and I were once friends. About how he was a young boxer and I was a young writer and somehow we formed a partnership that meant something. About how I went to visit Michael on the night of the of the injury he sustained during a world title clash with Chris Eubank and was warned off by his girlfriend: even though it was I who had introduced her to Michael she still saw me as nothing more than just another journo, come to get his pound of flesh from the stricken figure in intensive care. About how I decided that the best thing I could do was keep away from him, let the ones who loved him do what they could. About how I stopped writing about boxing from that day and never returned.

At last a break in the proceedings and I find myself walking up to where Michael sits alone for a moment or two. We look into each other’s eyes and once again he extends his fist and once more all I can say is: ‘Michael… It’s so nice to see you…’.

Michael looks at me. His face is fatter than it used to be. Ancient scars run like dried up riverbeds above his left eye and across his chin. His hair is sprayed at the edges with white, like fake snow.

And I’m all choking up again: ‘Michael,’ I say. ‘I just want to thank you. You’ve made such a difference to my life.’

And it’s true. When I first met Michael I was penniless and struggling. Because he believed I was able to make a small mark as a sports journalist and then a writer. I owe him a debt that I can never repay.

Michael looks at me strangely. As if he feels a little sorry for me. ‘You’re too emotional,’ he says, his speech slurring. ‘You shouldn’t worry about things so much.’

‘I know,’ I agree. ‘The older I get, the more emotional I become.’

Then Michael moves his head a little closer to mine. He says: ‘I can see that you have the spirit in you…’

Alarm bells ring and I remember that Michael and his family were always religious. I interrupt him: ‘I’m sorry,’ I say, ‘but I’m an atheist. I don’t believe in God.’

‘Neither do I,’ says Michael, either lying or de-converted by his near death experience. ‘But I can see you have the spirit in you.’

‘I’m not sure about that,’ I say.

‘I love you,’ says Michael.

Did he just say that? Did he just say he loved me? My shoulders droop and I think about all the wasted years. I think about the contribution I could have made to Michael’s rehabilitation. I think about what I could have done to help him regain his health. To repay just a little of what he had given to me all those years ago. The regret overpowers me. The sense of betrayal sickens me.

‘I love you, too,’ I say. And suddenly everything is all right. We’ve taken two wildly different routes to arrive here at this hotel in Chingford on a sticky October night but here we are. I’ve watched him live out his life in the media. Seen him on the news collecting his M.B.E. Listened to the crowds cheer as he completed a marathon that took him six painful days of walking. But we’re here now. I’m 53 and he’s 50. There’s still time to rekindle our friendship. There’s still time.

Michael Watson frowns at me as I gently hold that once violent fist of his in my own. ‘What’s your name?’ He asks.

***

Chuffed that this was made Story Of The Week over at ABCtales. For anyone interested it’s a taster of a book I’m currently writing, which I may or may not be able to finish. If I do complete it, the book will be published in 2016. It’s the rather unlikely sequel to this: http://www.amazon.co.uk/Rope-Burns-Ia... which will also be republished in 2016 if things go according too plan. Which at the moment they aren’t.

 

Come to Archway With Words

On Friday 16 October I’m going to be reading excerpts from my kids book ‘Johnny Nothing’ to a press-ganged group of children as part of the annual Archway With Words Festival. Do come along if you want to be deafened by a horde of screaming ten and eleven-year-olds.

It’s also worth mentioning that there are still tickets available for most of the other acts and personalities appearing.

ArchWay With Words Part Three – a 9 day odyssey of fiction, science, comedy, history, poetry, puppets and singing!

ArchWay With Words 2015 has an illustrious line up of ‘superstar authors and spellbinding speakers’. There’s headliners galore with National Treasures Joan Bakewell and Phill Jupitus, Booker winner Ben Okri and the hugely popular and cool historical novelists Jake Arnott and Tracy Chevalier.

Esther Freud, Joanna Briscoe and Matt Baylis lead the literati and there’s another terrific showing for science featuring Simon Singh returning with his original Enigma Machine, Professor Peck of the Antarctic Survey talking about polar biology and the Professor and stand-up comic Sophie Scott on the ‘Science of Laughter’.

As usual AWWW will be showcasing the prodigious local talent with writers Penny Hancock, Callum Jacobs, Heather Reyes and Caitlin Davies all speaking on the first day, but the programming net is thrown very far this year with the finale headed by New York performance artist and recent Fringe First winner Penny Arcade, in a session with punk pioneer Viv Albertine.

This year’s Spoken Word offer features the hottest London talent and is spectacularly headlined with a rare performance from Linton Kwesi Johnson. Biography is well represented too with talks on Alexander McQueen and John Peel, and special interest subjects are clue-cracking with a Times cryptic crossword setter, recordings from the urban hubbub with the London Sound Survey, ‘Hot Feminism’ and experts on the history of protest in the Capital, and London’s best swimming spots including the Thames.

We hear from playwrights Tanika Gupta and Diane Samuels, with the latter undertaking a huge creative writing project that will culminate on the 2nd weekend at Archway Market, on a day of fun with storytelling from Spud & Yam, a performance from a sitar maestro and three booksellers on hand to assist with your reading needs. With 35 events in all, this is another spectacular feast for your mind from AWWW.

AWWW2015 takes place from October 10th – 18th in Archway Methodist Church, Hargrave Hall, the new ‘Bomb Factory’, the nightclub above the Tavern and the Library. Tickets are available at archwaywithwords.com and this year Archway Library will be the very conveniently located box office. Brochures can be found in shops, restaurants and venues.