Black soul rose by John Jones... - HTML preview

Sam

With blonde birds nest hair, clothes that never fitted right. Shirt never tucked in properly, shoes that were a size too big, Samuel Pickenham used to be the kind of boy that no matter what life threw at him, would simply accept it, pick himself up and carry on. A stray dog in the form of a boy.

A child from a broken family. Although not broken in the sense of his parents having died or split up. Simply dysfunctional. His father was one of those parents that should never have had kids. Or kid, because he liked to gamble on horses, and his wife was never strong enough to stop him. They would argue.

She would complain and complain, but not much else, sometimes receive a 21

shove or slap or threat. He was the type of person for whom his job working for a roofing firm was his whole life. Outside of work, he would gamble and drink, but the drinking was not to excess. A man with no hobbies. He sometimes approached alcoholism, but never quite got there. Gambling was his downfall, his obsession. Two or three times a day he would ‘go the bookies’ and bet small amounts of money, but they added up, and his losses outweighed his wins.

When he did win he was so pleased, most of it went on drinks for his friends, and not much else for his son or wife, and some of it back chasing that big win.

When Sam went home that day, he found his father to be slumped in front of the television, arms folded, not really watching the quiz show. His mother had told him to be careful. He’d lost a bet and wasn’t in a good mood. The last time he was in a good mood was when his horse came in, two weeks ago.

The house was a simple mid-terrace affair. Probably the cheapest house available at the time.

His mother busied herself out the back, while the atmosphere in the front room that exuded from his father could be viewed as ‘negative vibes’.

Sam didn’t care though, he was still trying to ‘settle’, to be their child. So he wandered into the front room to see his father slumped in an old, weathered armchair that he had probably rescued from a skip.

“What kind of vessel features a conning tower?” said the quiz host.

“A submarine,” said Sam. His father, a bony individual that was always unkempt, only seemed to bathe when the moon turned blue, and mostly in a state of despair, as though the weight of the world was on his shoulders. If he had a sense of humour, it was very repressed. A person who was serious most of the time, eyed Sam as he stood close by.

“A submarine,” said the contestant.

“Correct!” the host said.

His father frowned. It was probably unlikely that Sam would ever approach his father in a foul mood, certainly not to answer a quiz question.

“What are you doing?” he asked, “go away and play”.

“How much did you lose?”

“What?” his father said, “fuck off kid and go and play on the railway or something”.

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“Just curious. Never see betting shops go out of business do you?” His father slowly stood up, looming over him.

“I said fuck off and play, and don’t bother me”.

“Just wondering how much you lost,” he said with a slight grin. His father grabbed Sam by the arm and dragged him to the doorway. He shoved him to the floor in the hall.

“Fuck off you little cunt!” he slammed the living room door, and found his mother with a shocked expression in the kitchen doorway.

“Sam, why did you do that? You know better than to disturb your father when he’s in a mood”.

Sam simply sat up and looked at his ‘mother’, then got to his feet.

“What do you see in him? I mean you must have seen something once, but he’s a loser”.

“Sam!” she looked fearful at the door in case he was listening, then shuffled the boy down towards the front door.

“What’s gotten into you? Ever since you got lost in those fields you’ve not been yourself”. Just then the living room door opened and out stormed his father. He grabbed and shrugged on his coat.

“I’m going out, and he only got lost for three hours big fucking deal. Will do him good, build him into man. Or maybe he should have stayed lost I don’t care”. He then left.

“Don’t be putting bets on,” his mother called, but went ignored.

“See,” said Sam, “what do you see in him? He’s a cunt”. His mother took an audible breath.

“Sam!” she said, “language,”. Sam nodded.

“You would be so much happier without him,” he then went upstairs.

A light rain descended over the small village, and Sam wasn’t all that interested in the science lesson going on behind him as he stared out across rooftops.

23

“Sam come on,” said the teacher, “put your goggles on and blow up the balloon”.

Just then the door opened and a tutor looked in and asked for Sam.

“But I don’t need another meeting, we’ve had several”.

“Sorry but it’s not down to me” the tutor said as he took Sam out of the science class, along the corridor, down a flight of stairs and across to the nearest empty classroom which was kind of a make-shift storeroom with tables and chairs hastily piled in one corner, leaving most of the room clear to arrange plastic chairs in a circle, where the child psychologist was sat with folder and notepad.

The other chairs were occupied by the field-trip group.

“Why do we need this again?” Sam asked, approaching the only empty chair.

“What else is there to say?”

“Well, you’ve all been through a serious trauma,” said the psychologist.

“No we haven’t,” said Dorothy. “We got lost for a couple of hours, then we were found. That’s it. We’re cured, now can we go please?”.

“You all lost your memories and had to be told your names. It affected you all on a much deeper level”. Sam sighed and folded his arms.

“Okay,” said the psychologist, Theresa, late 50’s who seemed like she had been in no other job. “Ian, tell me how you felt when you knew you were lost out in the fields”.

“Isn’t this all in your notes? All we’ve answered is how do feel? How do you feel? We felt, you know, lost”.

“I’m trying to factor in your state of mind when you realised that you went off course”.

“Factor in? what does that even mean?” Dorothy asked, but wasn’t answered.

“You’ve experienced behavioural changes since the incident, so we need to understand the context of your mind when you realised that you were off course”.

There was silence for a few moments, the children glancing at each other, trying to supress smiles.

“Jordan, tell me about what it’s like at home”.

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“Well I have a mother,” he said, pausing.

“Yes, but how is it at home?” He shrugged and sighed.

“Well my father doesn’t get along with his brother because of some stupid argument they had years ago. Children in adult bodies. Pair of plonkers both of them”.

“Jordan, language” she said.

“…and my brother is a bore. Has a boring pet tarantula called Tommy”.

So one by one, the psychologist went around them asking about their home life.

“Okay… and finally Dorothy, what’s it like at home for you?”

“Well, I’m one of six. My ‘mother’ had two kids each with three fathers, so fuck knows who my Dad is”.

“Dorothy! language please,”

“…and the man she’s with now, is the world’s worst hippy. Smelly scruff, just lazes around smoking all day and spending his fraudulent benefits. So yes, my home life is somewhat dysfunctional. I’m the youngest. Two I’ve not met yet…I mean not seen in a while ‘cos they live with their Dads. One doesn’t live with us, and well, you know, my sister seems to be the type whom you could call a black sheep. The weakling. Gets picked on by an older brother. Tried picking on me but I told him to fuck off”.

“Dorothy!” she said, the psychologist breathing in audibly, scribbling notes.

“I don’t think he’s gonna be picking on me much…more than he used to. Look, is this some form of cognitive behavioural therapy? You know where it’s all talk talk talk and waffle, and not much actual action. Tell me about your feelings.

Why do you think you do that? Write down how you felt at this point. Rather than actually confronting anything”.

As she spoke, the psychologist slowly looked up at her.

“…and how I’m going to deal with my trauma of being lost and what it means for my future wellbeing”.

Theresa said nothing, but looked curiously, wondering perhaps, that this was not how an eight-year-old usually speaks. In fact, she thought, none of them really speak like children, so something must have clicked in their minds when out in the fields. Yet, a traumatic event could not give you more knowledge, but she 25

had heard stories where people have had head traumas and have spoken other languages where they could not before.

Still, something here wasn’t right. They didn’t seem like ‘normal’ school children.

“Alright,” she said, scrawling the word ‘medication’ on her pad.

“Before you go back. I thought we could try some mindfulness meditation. It can help calm the mind, especially after the event you have been through”.

“Yay…” said Sam with deadpan sarcasm.

Afterwards, Theresa stood up and gathered her belongings.

“Alright children. Thank you for your input today. We’ll do this again at the end of the week. Now back to class”. She then left the room, but the ‘children’ all sat looking and grinning at each other, except Sam, who was glaring at Dorothy.

“Dorothy,” he said, with concern in his voice, “did you see the look on her face when you started talking about therapy? I think she may have suspected something. We all need to speak like kids”.

“I know,” said Ian, “but it’s harder than you would think. I’m fucking gasping for a cigarette”.

“Well this is a rather extreme way to quit,” said Glenn.

Dorothy nodded. “I agree,” she said, “I shouldn’t have said it. But I can’t help it.

It’s hard being a kid,” the others muttered agreements.

“If she suspects something, then she might start digging, ‘cos she’s a psychologist and can get into our heads if we’re not careful”.

“She did suspect something,” said Chantelle, “but I reckon she was just confused. Thing is though we need to remember to act normal. Normal kids that went through some trauma ‘cos we got lost. Now we’re all better, so they don’t suspect anything”.

“Yes come on folks. Act like kids”.

“Thing is though,” said Boyd, “If she doesn’t think we’re cured and better, then she’ll keep probing and trying to fix us. We’ll never stop being in therapy and we might even have to go for brain-scans and things like that, which means other people will get involved and they’ll never stop trying to get into our 26

heads. We need to stop this before it gets out of hand. I think we should be okay until the next session though”.

“Yes, next session,” put in Chantelle, “we have to look as though we’re cured so we don’t need any further therapy”.

“If not,” said Boyd, “she fucking dies”.