Disraeli Avenue by Caroline Smailes - HTML preview

PLEASE NOTE: This is an HTML preview only and some elements such as links or page numbers may be incorrect.
Download the book in PDF, ePub, Kindle for a complete version.

index-1_1.jpg

Disraeli Avenue

Dizz–rah–el–lee Avenue

Caroline Smailes

First published in Great Britain in 2008 by Caroline Smailes

in support of the charity One in Four (www.oneinfour.org.uk),

an organisation run for and by people who have experienced

sexual abuse

Text © 2008 Caroline Smailes

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced

or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronically

or mechanically, including photocopying, recording or any

information storage or retrieval system, without either prior

permission in writing from the publisher or a licence permitting

restricted copying. In the United Kingdom such licences are

issued by the Copyright Licensing Agency, 90 Tottenham Court

Road, London W1T 4LP.

Cover design by Snowbooks Design

Internal design and typesetting by Wordsense Ltd, Edinburgh

For those who are one in four

With special thanks to:

Clare Christian at The Friday Project

(www.thefridayproject.co.uk)

Joanna Chisholm at Wordsense Ltd

(www.wordsense.co.uk)

Emma Barnes

(www.snowbooks.com/angels_design.html)

I lived in Disraeli Avenue, in between Gladstone Street

and Campbell-Bannerman Road. The neighbours all said it

dizz–rah–el–lee (four chunks) Avenue. My mother’s house was a

semi-detached on a street with 31 similar-looking houses.

They looked identical but I knew that they weren’t.

There were differences.

In Search of Adam

Disraeli Avenue

Number 9

In Search of Adam

1

* * * * *

Number 1

Martin North leaves home

9

Number 2

The making of Paul Hodgson’s legend

13

Number 3

A tarot reading

17

Number 4

The banana and milk diet

25

Number 5

Stamps for Crystal

29

Number 6

Payments for work, not yet done

33

Number 7

On me way to Bet’s flat

39

Number 8

James’ outbox

41

Number 9

Being Crystal

45

Number 10

I love Noel Ernest Edmonds very very much 49

Number 11

A potbellied pig for Christmas

51

Number 12

Details of a piano lesson

57

Number 13

A Lady Di hair-do

65

Number 14

The Queen of tittle tattle

67

Number 15

Being naked has caused an angry mob

to be on my driveway

75

Number 16

I call her Elizabeth

79

Number 17

The old man in the queue

83

Number 18

Dear Diary

87

Number 19

Loose change

93

Number 20

The Wheel of Fortune reversed

107

Number 21

I am watching you

109

Number 22

Me da and his bugle

113

Number 23

Invoices for work not yet done

115

Number 24

Probably a robbery

119

Number 25

Reciting Metro stops, unable to sleep

123

Number 26

Buy my stuff, buy me

131

Number 27

A simple love story

133

Number 28

For straight-talking advice, ask Jane

141

Number 29

Being married to Jezebel

143

Number 30

My brother Eddie

149

Number 31

My creative writing exercises

155

Number 32

Dear Father Christmas

157

* * * * *

Number 9

Thinking about wor Jude and wor Adam

163

* * * * *

Acknowledgements

169

index-10_1.jpg

index-11_1.png

Number 9

Bill and Jude Williams

Green front door

Green garage door

Yellow car.

KON 908V

In Search of Adam

Two years, six months and twenty-one days before I was born, my

parents moved to New Lymouth. From a block of flats that were as

high as a giant. My mother’s house was brand new. It was shiny.

Spick and span. There were two new estates being built in New

Lymouth. The housing estate that I was to live on and another one.

They each had four parallel streets and formed a perfect square on

either side of the main road.

On this Coast Road, there were ‘The Shops’. Dewstep Butchers was

also New Lymouth Post Office and displayed a smiling pig’s head

in the window. New Lymouth Primary School. My primary school.

Was a perfect E-shaped grey building with a flat roof. Mrs Hodgson

(Number 2) told Rita that many cuckoos were put in nests on that

roof. I didn’t understand. New Lymouth Library was on the Coast

Road too. It was a rectangle. Like a shoe box. Inside the library

there were eighty-seven Mills and Boon novels and three Roald

Dahl books. There were signs everywhere. ‘Absolute silence at

1

Caroline Smailes

all times.’ The grumpy librarian liked to read her Introducing

Machine Knitting magazine. I read the first chapter of Danny the

Champion of the World twenty-seven times. I read all of Matilda

and The Twits. Thirteen times each. Brian’s newsagents stretched

across 127–135 Coast Road. Inside the shop I heard gossip being

tittled and tattled, as I stood looking at the jars of delicious sweets.

Rhubarb and Custard. Chocolate Raisins. White Gems.

Aniseed Balls. Coconut Mushrooms. Brown Gems.

Cola Cubes. Pear Drops. Cherry Lips. Liquorice

Comfits. Toffee Bonbons. Jelly Beans. Edinburgh

Rock. Pontefract Cakes. Pineapple Chunks. Sweet

Peanuts. Scented Satins. Sherbet Pips. Midget Gems.

Sweet Tobacco. Chocolate Peanuts. Toasted Teacakes.

Rainbow Crystals. Sour Apples. Lemon Bonbons.

Unable to decide. I wished that I had the courage to ask for one

from every one of the twenty-five jars.

On the other side of the Coast Road there were five really big houses.

My class teacher, Mrs Ellis, and Mrs Hughes the local librarian lived

in two of them. I didn’t know who else lived there. The children in

those houses didn’t go to New Lymouth Primary School with me.

The children in those houses didn’t play foxes and hounds around

the estate with us local bairns. I walked down that road on my way

to school. I peered into those large houses. I stopped walking to

stare in. I tried to look past the fresh flowers in the window and I

thought about all the nice smelling things that would live inside.

2

Disraeli Avenue

The Coast Road ran a slope from New Lymouth down to the

Lymouth seaside. The estate that I lived on was at the top of the

hill. As the road continued up, it travelled through a number of

similar estates and villages. Signs warned drivers when they were

leaving one village and arriving in another. My father said that the

nearer yee lived to the coast, then the richer yee were. We lived

about a ten-minute walk from the coast. I’m not quite sure what

that made us. All I know is that, when my mother was alive, my

father talked about one day living on the sea front. The houses there

were enormous. Five stories tall. They went up and up and up to

the sky. You could stand on the roof and your head would be in the

clouds. I thought that really important people lived in those kinds

of houses. People like the Queen could live there. A hacky lad in

my class at school lived in one, with about twenty other children.

His mother and father hadn’t wanted him. They, the twenty other

children and the hacky lad, lived in their mansion that looked out

over the beautiful Lymouth cove. They were very very lucky. They

must have been very very rich. They must have been the richest

people in England.

Lymouth Bay was shaped like a banana. There was a pier at each

end and three caves lived in the cliff. Just over the left pier. Sat tall

on a throne of rocks. There was a lighthouse. The most beautiful.

The most elegant. A white lighthouse. Legend had it, that hundreds

and thousands of small green men with orange hair lived in it.

I never saw them. But. Paul Hodgson (Number 2) had seen one

buying a quarter of Toasted Teacakes in Brian’s newsagents.

3

Caroline Smailes

There were one hundred and twenty steps to climb down. One

hundred and twenty steps before touching the grey sand. The sand

was unhappy. It looked poorly sick all the time. A green handrail

wove next to the steps. I never had the courage to touch it. The paint

was covered in carved initials, decorated with lumps of hardened

chewing gum and topped with seagull droppings. Yackety yack.

Hundreds and thousands of lumps. Hacky yack yack. Paul Hodgson

(Number 2) told me that his uncle caught an incurable disease from

touching that handrail. He said that his uncle’s hand had dropped

clean off. I wasn’t going to risk it.

To me, the Coast Road seemed to go on for ever and ever and ever.

I was told that it was a perfectly straight road, which travelled from

the seafront and through four villages. You could catch a bus on

the Coast Road. The road passed by my school, up the slope, close

to my house and then on through village after village into lands

that were unknown. Into lands that sounded magical and exciting.

North Lymouth. Marsden. Hingleworth. Coastend. Mrs Hodgson

(Number 2) told me that Coastend was famous for its cheapness of

tricks. A magical place.

I lived in Disraeli Avenue, in between Gladstone Street and

Campbell-Bannerman Road. The neighbours all said it dizz–rah–

el–lee (four chunks) Avenue. My mother’s house was a semi-

detached on a street with 31 similar-looking houses. They looked

identical but I knew that they weren’t.

4

Disraeli Avenue

There were differences. Thirteen had red front doors. Seven had

green front doors. Five had blue front doors. Seven had yellow front

doors. The garages matched the front doors. Except for Number

17. Mr Lewis had a yellow front door and a green garage. I didn’t

know why.

green,

red,

red,

yellow, green, red, red, yellow, yellow, green, red, red, red,

green, blue, blue,

red,

blue,

green,

yellow, red, blue, blue, yellow, green, green, red, red, red,

yellow, red, yellow.

I wanted the numbers to fit better. I wanted the colours to fit better.

It should have been sixteen red front doors. One half. Eight green

doors. One quarter. Four blue doors. One eighth. Four yellow doors.

One eighth. It was simple. The colours could look really nice. I had

worked it all out.

red,

red,

green,

5

Caroline Smailes

red,

green,

red,

blue,

blue

green, red,

yellow, red, green,

red, yellow, red,

red, green, red,

green, red, blue, blue,

green, red, yellow,

red, green, red,

yellow, red, red.

I wasn’t happy with Mr Lewis (Number 17). His colours didn’t

match. Maybe he didn’t realise. I wished that I had the courage to

talk to him about it.

There was a little wall in front of the garden. A dwarf wall. A dwarf

wall for Snow White’s friends to play on. There was also a drive

for my father’s Mini. There was a garden to the front and a slightly

larger one to the back. The front lawn was just big enough to squeeze

onto it a folded tartan picnic blanket. The soil surrounding the

perfect square of grass was always packed with flowers. I watched

the flowers. I noted them all in a little lined book. It was green and

lived on my windowsill. Thorny rose bushes, coordinating colours

and then down to a mixture of blossoms. Depending on the month.

6

Disraeli Avenue

Gaillardia ‘Burgunder’.

Shiny red flower, with light yellow centre.

June–October. 30cm.

Dahlia.

Really orange and red.

June–November. 60cm.

Narcissum ‘Amergate.’

Orange outside with a darker orange

in the middle.

March–April. 45cm.

I liked to write things down. In the green notebook that I kept on

my windowsill. Flowers. Colours. Number plates. Full names.

Times. Routines. All of the first chapter of Danny the Champion of

the World. So I wouldn’t forget.

* * * * *

7

Number 1

Mr and Mrs North

Green front door

Green garage door

Red car

DFT 678T

Martin North leaves home

I was the first lad from Disraeli Avenue to get into uni. There’d been

this lad Paul Hodgson who used to live at Number 2, he went on to

study law but they’d moved out of the road by then. So I’m saying

that he doesn’t count.

Getting into Liverpool Uni was fucking huge. I managed two As

and a B at A level and my mam was beyond happy. She was right

chuffed and painted my results on a white sheet, then hung it

from the front room window. It was a right sunny day and all the

neighbours slowed down to look at what me mam had painted on

the sheet. I told me mam that it didn’t really make much sense. So

she got another sheet, asked is how to spell university and then

wrote ‘Oor bairn Martin is ganin to university’ in fuck off huge red

letters. She was practically dancing around the house. I’ve made

me mam so proud.

Mam, dad and me nana North gave is a lift to Liverpool last week.

The car was packed with everything I’d need. Pans, a kettle and a

9

Caroline Smailes

load of food. Me nana North had baked is pies and scones and stuff.

They all wanted to give is a right good start. My going to uni is the

most major thing in me mam’s life and I have to try me hardest not

to fuck it all up.

I’m sharing a flat with two other lads, Ginger Matt and Charlie.

They’re sound lads. We’re right in the centre of Liverpool, just off

Mount Pleasant, around the corner from the Everyman Theatre.

It’s sound being right central. We can walk everywhere and don’t

have to bother with the last bus or with hailing a taxi. Charlie’s a

private school lad. He’s right posh and his dad’s mates with Jeffrey

Archer. He’s studying French and Spanish. Ginger Matt’s a Manc

and so fucking sound. He’s writing a novel and studying English

Lit. They’re both a bit off their heads. Charlie has a never-ending

supply of pot and is determined to roll the longest joint he can. He

reckons he’s going to get in the Guinness Book of Records with it.

We’re out every night and I’m spending me money far too fast. The

Guild’s a laugh and there are thousands of fit birds wearing hardly

any clothes. I’ve shagged two lasses already and I’ve only been

here a week.

Early this morning, I reckon it was just after two. We’d left the Casa

before closing and were having a few tins in the kitchen. The kitchen

has huge windows and looks out onto Oxford Road. Charlie managed

to pull a lass by shouting out to her from the window. The silly tart

came up and let him shag her before he chucked her out. We were

laughing about that, so I reckon it must have been about three when

10

Disraeli Avenue

we heard screams. Charlie was first to see and ran straight out the

flat. He’d had first aid training and even though he must have been

stoned, he seemed to know what to do. Ginger Matt had some lass

straddling him on one of the kitchen chairs. He was on a promise.

I stood at the window and saw her lying, curled up on the road and

there were already a few people screeching around her.

The taxi driver was out of his car and was looking down on her. I

could see that he wasn’t right. He was lighting a fag when he puked

all over his shoes. Charlie was on the floor giving the lass mouth

to mouth. I could only catch glimpses of him through gaps in the

crowd. Another lad, who I kind of recognised from downstairs, was

in the phone box, must have been calling for help. Charlie came back

up to the flat with the lass’s blood all over his face and t-shirt. He

told us that she was dead and then he went and got himself washed.

It turned out that her name was Laura. Well that’s what a copper

said when he came to get statements from us all a bit ago. She was

a fresher and studying English Lit, must have been in the same

lectures as Ginger Matt. She was pissed after a night in the Casa.

She’d been in the phone box calling her boyfriend who was still

back home somewhere in Wales. The copper said that she’d been

giving the lad shit. The last thing that she’d said to him was fuck

off. Then she’d staggered out from the phone box and straight onto

the road. He told us that she’d died on impact, and although Charlie

had done his best, well there was really nothing that he could have

done to save the lass.

11

Caroline Smailes

And now it’s pissing it down outside. The cars are going up and

down the road, over her blood and it’s as if nothing has happened. I

reckon there’ll be flowers by the side of the road at some point and

a few people will come and stare at the spot. And maybe that’s a

good thing, because at least if there are flowers people will wonder

and ask questions and the poor lass won’t have died without anyone

noticing. She was eighteen years old and she died after saying fuck

off. I’m not going in to uni today. None of us are. We’re all going

out to the Guild to get pissed. I was going to phone me mam and tell

her about Laura, but I don’t want her to worry about is. I guess what

I’m learning is that life is too fucking short and that I shouldn’t

waste any of it.

12

Number 2

Mrs Hodgson and Paul

Yellow front door

Yellow garage door

Red car

GYS 606S

The making of Paul Hodgson’s legend

Mam and Sam had met through a dating agency. It’d been advertised

in the local Guardian free paper and we’d had a laugh about it. My

nana was the one who made my mam fill out the form, because she

reckoned that my mam needed a man about the house. My mam had

been to see Mrs Curtis from number 20 for a tarot reading, she was

holding out for a ginger bloke, on a horse in a field full of pumpkins.

My nana told mam that she was holding out for a pile of crap and

that she had to make her own future, that no one got anything by

sitting on their arse waiting for the world to come to them. So mam

got the form and, although we took the piss out of her, she filled

it out and sent it back with a postal order for £15 (meet your ideal

man within six months or get another six months free).

Sam was mam’s first date. He had no kids and was divorced,

because his first wife had shagged his best mate. Sam’s a decent

bloke. He’s a teacher at the local college, earns pretty good money

and treats my mam like a princess. Nana likes him and I do too. I

can’t really fault him as a person, but his dress sense is shit.

13

Caroline Smailes

We moved in with him three months after mam met him. He

lives on the new estate, in a canny posh detached house with three

geet big bedrooms. Mam was a bit stressed about leaving Disraeli

Avenue. It was more to do with her independence than anything

else and I think that my dad leaving all those years ago made it

difficult for her to let go. My nana helped out and gave her a good

talking to and then we moved in with Sam. We’d been here just over

five weeks when my dad turne