Dirty Old Man (A True Story) (12 page)

     “No,” I said, “it’s our little secret.”

On the drive home, we pulled into a little country lane on the outside of town. He told me to get into the back seat of the car and he did the same. I froze on the seat as he climbed in and straddled me, touching my face and hair. He rubbed his body up against mine and I sat perfectly still.

This is what it’s like to have an adult relationship then; I thought to myself.

Bernie got back into the driver’s seat, and I stayed in the back, not speaking a word as he dropped me off at my house.

He turned around to face me as he pulled onto the driveway.

     “Remember petal, it’s our secret. I’ll see you at training on Tuesday.”

I smiled at him and got out of the car feeling very confused. I could still go to the club and have my piano lessons so I’d just go along with it. I’d even be getting my own club eventually; Bernie had promised me.

I didn’t let the relationship aspect plague my thoughts too much; I was looking to the future; something I’d never been able to do before.

     I won’t lie; I used to smoke at school whenever I could get my hands on cigarettes. Because my dad had quit, I had to rely on others to provide them and as I looked quite old for my age, the kids used to send me into the shop at lunchtime to buy them. In exchange I’d take fifty percent of the packet.

     English was my favourite lesson, I loved to read poetry and hear other people reading it too. I took separate lessons for language and literature, taught by Mr Coates my favourite teacher; a very handsome teacher at that. He was in his mid-twenties and when he read Shakespeare, he sent my heart fluttering away. My English had improved because I tried so hard to be good at it.

For a short while I had a crush on him, one that would be short lived, one that would come to an abrupt jealous end quite quickly.

    
He came into the classroom one day sporting a wedding ring and my classmates asked him about it. He told us that he’d got married and would soon be off on his honeymoon.

I felt angry and cheated
even though that lovely man never gave any indication whatsoever that he was interested in me. I’m sure he’d have been mortified had he known the truth.

Because I felt my silly rejection so sorely, I decided that I was no lon
ger going to be his top student. Instead I would become disruptive, impossible to teach, rude, and make his life miserable.

He used to wear the oddest socks you could imagine, they were a strange mustard colour and we always teased him about it. I decided to go a step further and bought a few pairs from the market one Saturday.

I suppose a lot of the bullying that went on in that classroom was premeditated. Me and my friends moved to the back of the classroom to the front and we each put on a pair of the mustard coloured socks I’d bought. We rolled up our jeans and poked out legs out under the desk so he could clearly see them. We also used to shout “Sweat rings!” when he’d take off his blazer and continually talk about it until he put it back on.

Eventually we broke his spirit and he’d get angry and storm out the classroom. Looking back, I’m ashamed of my behaviour. He had a wonderful gift to teach and we threw it back in his face.

     It seemed every negative thing I said or did had a profound effect on people, I didn’t realise at the time that it was because I executed everything with a concoction of hate and pure desperation.  I had an overwhelming urge to destroy everything that was good.

I walked through the door after school and my dad shouted me into the living room.

     “I want to speak with you,” he said, “have a seat.”

     “I’m just going to take my bag upstairs.”

     “No you’re not. Sit down.”

I sat quietly on the sofa, wondering what it would be this time. I wondered if I was smart enough to wriggle my way out of it.

     “You’ve been smoking; I can smell it on you.”

I knew how to get out of this one.

     “I haven’t,” I lied, “my friends smoke and the smell must have gone on me because I
stood near them.”

     “You’re lying, I don’t believe for one second that you’d just stand around and not join in. I know exactly how your mind works. You’re so desperate to be accepted; I wouldn’t put anything past you. Drink, drugs, the list goes on.”

I’d never touched drugs in my life. There was no use arguing with him, once his mind was made up there was only one right answer – his.

     “I’m going to give you a choice,” he said with a smug expression, “if you’re not smoking then let me look in your school bag. If you’re not guilty then you have nothing to hide. Or you can choose not to let me look, I’ll know that you have cigarettes in there and you’ll be banned from training for two weeks. The choice is yours.”

He looked quite pleased with himself as he settled back into his armchair.

     “I don’t want you to look in my school
bag,” I said with my eyes fixed on the floor.

     “I knew
it,” he said triumphantly, “I fucking knew you were smoking. You’re grounded for two weeks, no training, no piano lessons and if I find out you’ve been smoking again, I’ll make you eat a whole pack of the damn things.”

     “I suppose I deserve it.” I said quietly.

I could live without training for two weeks, what I couldn’t live with was my dad discovering what was really in my school bag. There were no cigarettes, only my exercise books with drawings of my dad with male genitalia on his head. Scribed underneath were captions like; ‘my dad is a wanker’ and other colourful language. I thought the discovery of this would be much harder to explain so I took the punishment instead.

I rarely lied because as my dad used to say ‘you can lock a thief out but there’s nothing you can do with a liar’.

At first I accepted the punishment but I soon became resentful and wanted to go training again. I tried all manner of things to get my freedom back and redeem myself. I did extra chores and I went on those miserable walks with my dad but it changed nothing. He wanted to get me where it hurt.

     It was Friday morning and later, I was supposed to be at training.

I knew Bernie would wonder where I was and he’d probably be angry if he came to pick me up to discover I was grounded. So that morning when I got on the bus to take me to school, I decided not to go.

As the bus pulled up to the main stop when most of the children got on, I pushed past them and jumped off.

     “Where are you going?” Lindsey asked, “Are you bunking off?”

     “So what if I am?” I shrugged.

     “Can I come with you?”

     “No you can’t.”

     “Well, where you going?”

     “Well, I’m not going to school that’s for sure. I don’t know where I’m going, here and there.”

My friends looked at each other, almost willing somebody else to jump off with me.

     “You’ll get grassed up you know, all the geeks are watching.”

     “I probably will but they’ll just have to deal with things when I come back pissed off won’t they?” I raised my voice so they could hear, “I’m going to enjoy my day off, see you keen beans later.”

     “Enjoy your day off Ferris Bueller.” Lindsey laughed.

I watched the bus pull off and I headed towards Bernie’s house. I knew Barbara would be at work and Bernie didn’t work Friday’s. Underneath my brazen exterior I was a bundle of ner
ves. I had to tell Bernie the reason I wouldn’t be at class that evening, I was sure he’d be pleased to see me. I was worried that if I didn’t tell him in person, he’d think it was something he’d done wrong.

     In spite of my terrible eyesight, I was able to make out the bonnet of his blue sierra poking out from behind the bushes as I drew closer. I didn’t know what I was going to say when he opened the door. I’d skived off school so I could quickly give him what I thought was an important message. I believed he was the only real friend I had, and I needed his help to escape from my family.

He looked almost horrified as he opened the door.

     “Aren’t you supposed to be at school?” he said, “Does anybody know you’re here?”

     “Nobody knows where I am, except me, and you now.”

     “You’d better come in before somebody see’s you on the doorstep, because then we’ll both be in trouble.”

Bernie made me a drink of coffee that tasted suspiciously like alcohol. He said it was an Irish coffee and it could calm my nerves. I drank it regardless of the fact that it burned my throat on the way down.

     “So why have you bunked off? You know your parents will go mental when they find out don’t you?”

     “They’ve grounded me because my dad thought I had cigarettes in my school
bag.” I went on to explain the whole story and he laughed.

     “I hate to be the one to tell you this, but your dad’s mentally ill.” He scoffed.

     “There’s a counsellor at school that I talk to quite a lot.” I said.

     “Counsellor?” Bernie interrupted, “what have you been saying to him? You haven’t mentioned me have you? For god sake Moll, if you mention me then that will be the end of everything,” there was an unmistakable panic to his voice.

     “I haven’t mentioned you at all,” I lied, “only my dad and the way things are at home.”

I had told the counsellor about Bernie but only to say how much he’d been helping me. I liked talking about Bernie to people. The school counsellor had only ever replied that he thought it was good I had a positive influence in my life.

He relaxed his tone a little and suddenly seemed less uptight.

     “It’s just that, if people find out then they’ll split us up. You’ll be put into care and I won’t be able to teach you anymore which would be a shame because I plan to make you an instructor soon so you can run your own classes.”

My face must have lit up; he knew I always wanted to teach my own class.

     “I
f I can’t teach you anymore, there would be no point in me sticking around here. I’ll probably end up moving away and that would be the end of that.”

     “I don’t want that to happen.” I said.

     “You just need to be a little careful who you speak to then petal, there are a lot of narrow minded, spiteful people out there who can’t bear to see other people happy. People like your parents, people like your counsellor at school.

     Bernie’s phone rang a while later and we instantly recognised the number, it was my dad.

     “No Jim, I’ve not seen her today,” said Bernie, “what time did she go missing?”

He paused while my dad spoke, though I couldn’t hear what was being said.

     “Give me ten minutes Jim and I’ll help you come and look for her okay?”

He paused again.

     “It’s no problem, see you soon.”

He hung up the phone and turned to me with a serious expression.

     “I don’t know what you’re going to do but your dad sounds furious. They’re out looking for you.”

He climbed out of bed naked and walked towards the wardrobe to get himself some clothes out. We hadn’t done ‘everything’ but there wasn’t much he hadn’t asked me to do.

He sat down on the edge of the bed and pulled back his long greying ponytail using his red
Afro comb.

     “So what
are you going to do? You know you need to go home at some point don’t you?”

     “I will go home, but I don’t know what I’m going to say when they ask me where I’ve been.”

     “I don’t know what to suggest petal, I’m not condoning lying but maybe you could tell them you skipped school because of bullying? You’ll have to find somewhere to hide out for a bit while I go over to your house.”

I shrugged.

     “If you tell me where you’re going to be, I can try and keep them away from the area you see, and I’ll convince your dad to take it easy on you when you go home.”

     “Can I stay here for a bit?” I asked, “they won’t find me here will they? Barbara won’t be back for hours yet and I’ll make sure I’m gone before she does.”

I was desperate, the weather was terrible outside. The wind had picked up and the rain was thrashing the windows. I couldn’t have picked a better day to skive off.

     “Absolutely not, I’m sorry petal but just supposing she comes home sick or something, what will she say if she see’s you here?”I can’t stress how important it is that nobody finds out about us because they just won’t understand.”

     “I’ll go and sit in the park around the corner for a couple of hours then I suppose.” I said.

     “Come on Moll, don’t be like that. It’ll be over soon, you might have to put up with your dad raving at you for a while but just remember what a moron he is and you’ll be okay.”

I followed him downstairs and he opened the front door to let me out. He walked carefully down to the bottom of the drive first to make sure nobody was about.