when they beat me up, I didn’t resist enough for it to be fun for them – like when I undressed, I suppose I should have refused or struggled. But this time I fought back because you couldn’t just let someone drown you.
I started to get out, but Wingate pushed me in again. It was very very cold.
‘You get out when I say so,’ said Baynes, snarling so much the words seemed to come out not through his mouth but through the pus of his cheeks.
I was shivering, in paroxysms, but managed to stay in. It was better to stay in than try to get out and have to fight, so they would have an ‘excuse’ to touch me.
I plunged my head under the water voluntarily. There were two reasons. One, I hoped it would give them sport or entertainment, so they’d let me go – they’d be satisfied.
Two, the physical shock took away the pain of being.
Still, I had that tiny radio beneath the bedclothes with its earphone like a deafie’s. Radio Luxembourg, 208 metres in the medium wave. Terrible reception, but that dodgy signal was my connection to a better place. The Horace Batchelor Infradraw Method . . . Keynsham, K.E.Y.N.S.H.A.M, Bristol . . . But there was laughter, and, boy, I liked those songs. God. ‘Penny Lane’. It wasn’t a song, it was a book, it was a world. The Yardbirds, Sandie Shaw – and Dusty Springfield with that crack in her mid-range that sent a shiver up my back as I lay curled beneath the grey woollen blankets. Amen Corner. This was something to hang on to. Simon Dupree and the Big Sound, the Beach Boys, ‘Wouldn’t It Be Nice’. Oh yes, it certainly would. I’d read an article in a magazine about California and about the canyons above Los Angeles with their wooden A-frame houses (whatever they were), pet cats, dirt roads, girls with long hair and guitars, soft drugs and kindness and open house and everyone sleeping with everyone else in this heavenly soft climate and dreaming of it all on such a winter’s d-a-a-ay . . .
‘Toilet.’
I was so lost in ‘California Dreamin’’ that I almost had a heart attack when I heard Wingate’s voice and felt a thump in the small of my back that had the hallmark of Baynes’s superfluous violence. I pulled out the earphone and stuffed the radio down between my legs as I sat up in the iron bed.
‘What is it?’
‘Get out of bed.’
Wingate turned the light on.
‘What’s this?’
‘It’s a radio, Wingate.’
‘Are you in Remove year?’
‘No.’
‘So why have you got a radio?’
‘And why are you listening to it after lights out?’
‘Let’s have a look at it, Simon.’
‘Whoops, John, you’ve dropped it.’
‘Oh dear, I think it may be broken. Careful, Simon. Oh no, you’ve stepped on Toilet’s radio. It’s all broken now.’
‘Maybe I could – oh dear, I’ve dropped it again.’
‘Never mind, it wasn’t much of a radio, was it? I expect Mrs Toilet got it from a cracker.’
‘I expect she can get another one when Toilet gets into the Remove.’
The cold bath became a regular event. My genitals shrivelled when I heard the late-night footfall outside my door.
It maybe doesn’t sound so bad, but a cold bath on a winter night . . . Ever tried it? I don’t know where Chatfield got its cold water from, but it felt as though they had a pipeline to the Baltic.
Sometimes it would just be Wingate on his own. But usually there’d be others. Bograt Duncan was keen.
They just stared. They lounged on the duckboard bench and stared. I wondered if they wanted to touch. Wingate liked to hold me under. Baynes liked a struggle, so I didn’t offer one.
Hood merely gazed on, impassive. He smiled a bit. Hood was the only half-human one of the three; he was not grotesque to look at, but with his blue eyes and open smile, quite normal. He alone retained some pretence that this was all fair game, that it was part of normal life. For instance, it was Hood who told me that pouring a bucket of water over my bedclothes was an old
I started to get out, but Wingate pushed me in again. It was very very cold.
‘You get out when I say so,’ said Baynes, snarling so much the words seemed to come out not through his mouth but through the pus of his cheeks.
I was shivering, in paroxysms, but managed to stay in. It was better to stay in than try to get out and have to fight, so they would have an ‘excuse’ to touch me.
I plunged my head under the water voluntarily. There were two reasons. One, I hoped it would give them sport or entertainment, so they’d let me go – they’d be satisfied.
Two, the physical shock took away the pain of being.
Still, I had that tiny radio beneath the bedclothes with its earphone like a deafie’s. Radio Luxembourg, 208 metres in the medium wave. Terrible reception, but that dodgy signal was my connection to a better place. The Horace Batchelor Infradraw Method . . . Keynsham, K.E.Y.N.S.H.A.M, Bristol . . . But there was laughter, and, boy, I liked those songs. God. ‘Penny Lane’. It wasn’t a song, it was a book, it was a world. The Yardbirds, Sandie Shaw – and Dusty Springfield with that crack in her mid-range that sent a shiver up my back as I lay curled beneath the grey woollen blankets. Amen Corner. This was something to hang on to. Simon Dupree and the Big Sound, the Beach Boys, ‘Wouldn’t It Be Nice’. Oh yes, it certainly would. I’d read an article in a magazine about California and about the canyons above Los Angeles with their wooden A-frame houses (whatever they were), pet cats, dirt roads, girls with long hair and guitars, soft drugs and kindness and open house and everyone sleeping with everyone else in this heavenly soft climate and dreaming of it all on such a winter’s d-a-a-ay . . .
‘Toilet.’
I was so lost in ‘California Dreamin’’ that I almost had a heart attack when I heard Wingate’s voice and felt a thump in the small of my back that had the hallmark of Baynes’s superfluous violence. I pulled out the earphone and stuffed the radio down between my legs as I sat up in the iron bed.
‘What is it?’
‘Get out of bed.’
Wingate turned the light on.
‘What’s this?’
‘It’s a radio, Wingate.’
‘Are you in Remove year?’
‘No.’
‘So why have you got a radio?’
‘And why are you listening to it after lights out?’
‘Let’s have a look at it, Simon.’
‘Whoops, John, you’ve dropped it.’
‘Oh dear, I think it may be broken. Careful, Simon. Oh no, you’ve stepped on Toilet’s radio. It’s all broken now.’
‘Maybe I could – oh dear, I’ve dropped it again.’
‘Never mind, it wasn’t much of a radio, was it? I expect Mrs Toilet got it from a cracker.’
‘I expect she can get another one when Toilet gets into the Remove.’
The cold bath became a regular event. My genitals shrivelled when I heard the late-night footfall outside my door.
It maybe doesn’t sound so bad, but a cold bath on a winter night . . . Ever tried it? I don’t know where Chatfield got its cold water from, but it felt as though they had a pipeline to the Baltic.
Sometimes it would just be Wingate on his own. But usually there’d be others. Bograt Duncan was keen.
They just stared. They lounged on the duckboard bench and stared. I wondered if they wanted to touch. Wingate liked to hold me under. Baynes liked a struggle, so I didn’t offer one.
Hood merely gazed on, impassive. He smiled a bit. Hood was the only half-human one of the three; he was not grotesque to look at, but with his blue eyes and open smile, quite normal. He alone retained some pretence that this was all fair game, that it was part of normal life. For instance, it was Hood who told me that pouring a bucket of water over my bedclothes was an old
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