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Authors: Keith Reilly

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BOOK: Ahoy for Joy
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There was a sort of relieved sound in the group, not quite a round of applause, but mutters of approval. For a moment it seemed like the tension had dropped, but of course that was a lie, for the wickedness of the foreplay had come to an end and the main event was about to begin.

“There look. That wasn't so difficult now was it,” said the older boy soothingly. Michael raised his eyes but the sting of his friends gaze was just too much and he dropped them once more.”

“Ok you can go then.”

Michael just stood there as if the whole thing was just some kind of pointless anti-climax and in a minute he and Paul would run off home and each get a glass of milk and a currant bun.

“Michael. It's okay. You can go. You did well. Very well indeed.”

“What about him?” Asked Michael nodding towards his friend.

“Oh he'll be along in a minute. We just want to talk to him. Don't worry. Run along now.”

Michael paused.

“GO!” the bigger boy shouted at last and Michael took off, his little legs wilting with terror, struggling to carry the weight of his body. Tears streamed down his face and felt cold as the moisture evaporated in the evening air. Cold tears of betrayal. Cold tears of denial. Cold, cold tears.

It might have been sensible to go home at that point and raise the alarm, but home was still some way off. Instead, Michael stopped around the corner. Despite the terror of his ordeal and the humiliation of his betrayal, he couldn't go. Instead he took refuge behind some bins in the street with a clear view of the playground where the group had now gathered around little Paul. They were jeering and pushing and chanting and spitting. Five boys, their limbs tense, their fists clenched and one little boy quivering with fear among them.

At last the fists raged and the blows fell on the child's slim little body. His crime? Ireland's shame. The odds, if it could be imagined that there were any, of five to one, could have been five hundred to one and they would have been no less equal. The fists raged, pummelling him to the floor before the feet were raised kicking and stamping and spitting on the child's huddled body curled in pain and torment, his screams fading as his strength and will petered to quiet murmurs.

The tears streamed down Michael's face, his fear only tempered by shame.

At last, the group pulled back a little and Michael could see his bloody friend whimpering softly in the clearing. There were shouts and screams as the boys lit off in two or three directions, the two older ones together, patting each other in a kind of buddy bonding exercise, slapping their palms in joyous celebration. Michael was just about to rush over to help his friend, when suddenly the two older boys, turned around and quickly returned to the whimpering body on the floor.

The one with the buckle scar knelt beside little Paul and grasping his curly brown hair tightly in his hand, lifted the bloodied little head off the floor. Meanwhile his friend, the good cop, carefully took aim with his foot before wielding a mighty kick to the boy's already bloodied face. Paul whimpered no more.

It was only moments before the ambulance arrived, closely followed by two police Land Rovers, apparently having been alerted by a neighbour who had seen nothing. Michael had only just gotten to his friend's side and knelt crying and shaking by the still body. A police woman gently put her arm around him ushering him towards one of the police vehicles.

“The paramedics will look after him now,” she said. “I'm sure he'll be fine. These things usually look much worse than they are.”

Paul spent the next three weeks in hospital with severe concussion and a number of wounds, mostly superficial, but the force of the final kick to his face had been so powerful, it had smashed his eyeball. The surgeon's efforts to save the sight in his left eye were in vain. In time, he recovered and set about his life within the limitations his partial blindness imposed. His parents were distraught and although there was never any plan or discussion, the two children never played together again.

The group at the playground had not touched a hair on Michael's body, but of the two, he was the more injured. The terrible screams and yelps of his friend's pain echoed day and night in his mind until his own personal terror would no longer sustain reasoned thought. In time, the only relief he could find was to crush every memory of his friend from his mind. He became subdued, perhaps in the way it might be reasonable to expect, but he never really seemed to recover. He didn't play outside any more. In any case his parents didn't want him to, but his friend was gone and he didn't look like making any new ones where they were now living.

Quickly, the subject of the beating became taboo in the household and wasn't discussed. It was not until over a year later when Susan just happened to mentioned Paul's name one day that Michael didn't appear to know who she was talking about. This had perturbed her and she had questioned him more. Before long it became apparent that, not only could Michael not remember the beating, but he couldn't remember his best friend either, nor anything at all of his early life. Not his schooling, not his Grandmother, Susan's mother, who had died a few years back. Not their old home in the suburbs, nothing. It was like his whole history had been deleted.

Susan took him to the doctor who did some examination and concluded as Branny and Susan had already established themselves that Michael was suffering from some form of amnesia, presumably brought on by the trauma of witnessing the beating of his friend. Despite this, Michael didn't seem to have any trouble remembering more recent events and was himself not particularly concerned by the diagnosis. He showed no signs of valuing anything he couldn't remember.

However, Michael never had a friend again. The subconscious self-protection mechanism of his mind fended off any form of familiarity and his more subdued personality didn't invite others readily into his life. Over the years that followed, he became more and more solitary. At times he seemed intense, but mostly he just seemed disinterested in what was going on around him. By the age of twelve, his parents were the only people he had any real involvement with and even that was confined mostly to the practicalities of life, like what was for dinner, or tidying his room.

Susan in particular found all this difficult to take. Michael knew little of the upset this caused his parents, but one evening he heard them shouting at each other downstairs. An argument was in full flow. Susan was yelling, “they beat his little friend black and blue, they stole his memory, they stole his personality, bastards, bastards,
bastards.
” Branny was trying to soothe her, but plainly not doing a good job, “get me away from here, get him away from here, get us away from here,” she was screaming.

“We owe money, we owe money,” his father was shouting back.

“Then tell them to get lost. Forget your bloody morals, don't pay your debts. What debt are we owed? What have these people ever done for you?” she yelled, “I want my son back, I want my son back.”

The outburst was so severe that Michael had gone down stairs and tried to comfort his mother. She hugged him closely, weeping and sobbing openly, her tears wetting the back of his shirt.

This was the first understanding Michael had that things were not quite right with him. He did try to make an effort, if only to please his mother. He tried to get on better at school and indeed, he was a bright child. He had passed the 11+ and gained a scholarship to the local grammar school. He joined the Boys' Brigade at the church he had attended with his Grandmother when he was younger. One of the officers would call and collect him each week, then bring him home after. He would do badge work and learned to play the bugle, but Michael hated it and the rough and tumble and frequent bullying his timid personality invited, terrified him.

By the age of fourteen, Michael's life had settled into a not unusual existence. He was just one of the quiet boys. Every school had them. Everyone is different and he didn't cause too much consternation. He was seen as an underperformer by his teachers. One or two took interest in him from time to time, and academically, there was the occasional glimpse of brilliance, especially in English. One teacher noted how he would have to harass the child into producing homework and he would sit in class without making a sound. Then, when pushed could suddenly make statements of profound clarity, seeming to identify underlying notes and themes within literary works the teacher himself had not considered.

But, it would always stop there. Somehow, despite these little glimmers, Michael would always settle back to a sort of dream state and no one ever seemed to know or understand what he was thinking.

Chapter 10
An Ardent Invitation

Anna and Michael had been exchanging letters for over a year and a half and during that time, Anna had been feeling a warmer and stronger connection with him with every week that passed. It was now January of 1980, the month of her birthday. She would soon be sixteen years old and perhaps with that particular milestone on her mind or perhaps as part of the natural building of their relationship, she began to acknowledge quite openly to herself the love she felt for him.

She was not an over ambitious child in this respect and had never had any particularly extravagant romantic view of her future life, but she had always considered and expected even, that she might fall in love one day, just as her parents had done before her. She had looked forward to the possibility of the strong feelings of friendship and oneness with another human being that were part of a relationship, maybe even a marriage and a future together. She had of course never considered that her love might be for a boy from far away, abroad and in another land, another culture, but it had happened that way and she was not sorry about it.

But did Michael feel the same?
Yes, yes
, she answered to herself. Deep down, she knew he loved her. Perhaps, he had never said it explicitly, but implicitly, it was woven into everything he wrote. The intense descriptions and romantic prose about nature and the world around him were always written to her and for her. She knew that much and felt confident about him in that respect. She was still troubled that he remained so insular in his approach, but she settled this in her mind simply believing him to be perhaps excessively shy. Gradually she took to considering this as a slightly negative characteristic she might be able to help with in the future and imagined the two of them in company, with her nudging him playfully in the ribs urging him to join in the chat.

However, this particular problem was exacerbated by the great physical distance between them and increasingly she wanted a closer involvement with him. If he didn't want to talk, she wanted to hug him, to encourage him, to confront the barriers. Increasingly she became no longer happy to just accept this aspect of his nature as the way he was. Once, she had asked him simply what his father did for a living and the question had been completely ignored. She wanted to challenge this and had written down her dissatisfaction in a letter to him, but had declined to send it, instead once more reverting to diary entries and stories of her own life that was her usual offering. But deep down, she wanted to have the argument, even a row if one was necessary, but she just didn't feel it could be done by mail and in the case of Michael, the flowery texts were in this sense a barrier.

He had never asked her to visit Northern Ireland. Already she knew so much about the place and was inspired by the visions in her mind of jocular characters and endless rolling hills. She was also not unduly put off by the negative press the small province received, but there had been no invite. She had of course thought to ask him to visit Holland, but was somehow waiting for him to make a move, or send some other explicit sign. But she acknowledged as well that he had really made all the running in the relationship, so this next stage was perhaps required to be her initiative. This played on her mind a little and on further consideration, she wondered if he resented that he had always had to push things forward, while she just relaxed and allowed things to progress in a way that suited her, with little conscious effort or exposure of her emotions.

She had taken to talking to Grietje and her other friends about Michael, indicating playfully that there might be more to the relationship than just pen friends. Generally, they had been encouraging, engaging in the romantic excitement of a love conducted from afar.
Enchantment by mail
, one friend had described it, where elaborate poems disarmed the girl's defences leaving her swooning in the wake of his charm. This was not so far from the truth, and Anna saw no reason to resist, but considered her friend's enthusiastic encouragement as potentially unreliable. They were after all like her, young and prone to romantic notions and emotional overreactions. In the end, she felt her mother to be a more sober confidante.

She did feel awkward though. Neither her mother, nor father had met Michael. All they knew in a first-hand sense was the writing on the envelopes that arrived every week. Anna herself had only ever met him that one time in Morecambe and she felt just a little vulnerable about this.
How could you form a relationship with someone you had met only once?
But, she felt she could answer that. It was all about the letters. Not that she was volunteering to let either parent actually read them for they always seemed so personal to her, but at the same time, she couldn't really see a reason why they shouldn't, aside from the fact she felt indisposed to let them. There was however, nothing incriminating in them, even overtly personal. They had been key in the development of the relationship, but the letters did not express love, or at least not specific love. Love was in everything he wrote, but it was never aimed directly at her.

She longed to tell him how she felt. She longed to look into his eyes and to utter those words, so personal and so divine. She longed to speak of that which would trade the deepest senses of her own vulnerability for her trust in him. But, more than anything, more than the sparkle of the highest stars or the glories of heaven, she longed to hear those words herself. She longed to hear his declaration of love for her. She longed for him to validate her own amorous emotions. She longed to drift into that reciprocal state of mutual devotion, no more as friends, but now as lovers in whom each could depend. With each letter, that arrived, it was that simple message of love that she awaited with increasingly earnest expectation.

Adrie had been a little surprised by Anna's sudden confession of love, which she described quite bluntly. She knew of course that the two young people were quite involved with each other through their correspondence, but hadn't progressed the thought much in her own mind. She was however much more enthusiastic about the prospect of Michael visiting than Anna had envisaged. Anna had described the invitation and the visit she hoped would follow, rather unemotionally as an opportunity to see if there was a long term future for their affections and her mother agreed entirely with this sentiment. Besides, she, Anna's mother, was now interested to meet the young man herself. After all, her daughter was not like her sons, who had leapt with enthusiasm, sometimes at the most unlikely of life's opportunities. Anna was different. Despite her young years, Adrie greatly respected her daughter's judgement and understood quickly that she saw something quite wonderful in the Irish boy. Furthermore, she had described her planned invitation in an almost formal and business-like fashion. This was her way and she had carefully and unemotionally explained the situation, but she had also lit up when asked to tell a little more about him. She smiled and the pale blue eyes her mother had looked upon since she was born flickered and sparkled as she described the poems and texts.

Words, like
quiet
and
thoughtful
were not hostile to a mother's wishes for her daughter's significant other, so she saw Michael already in a positive light. However, she had insisted that Anna would talk to her father as well, but in principle, she agreed that the young man should be invited to come.

Anna's father was a taxi driver and always worked nights, preferring the peace, solitude and quiet to the busy traffic and congestion of the daylight hours. With his early morning finishes, breakfast had become the most important meal of the day as this was often the only time the family would all eat together.

Typically he would arrive home at around 6.00am complete with fresh bread from the bakers, still warm from the ovens, which he would place in a basket in the centre of the kitchen table. It would emit a warm, homely aroma that would quickly fill the small house. For the rest of the family, the smell was a subtle but familiar alarm call, waking them to the new day. Then he would peel fresh fruit slicing apples and oranges, peaches and grapefruits and placing the pieces into individual bowls for the family members.

The fresh fruit emitted another aroma milder than the first, but one that sweetened the scent wafting around the house. For any family members who happened to venture by the kitchen during preparation, the smell of the fruit was indeed an indication that the clock was ticking and the day was beginning. He would then carefully lay the table, placing a selection of cured meats and cheeses on wooden platters, together with a large jug of yoghurt to compliment the fruit.

Finally, he would place a handful of coffee beans of a variable quantity, reflecting his mood, into the grinder and press the start button. With its grating noise and the familiar pungent aroma released from the crushed beans, any in the household not yet arisen from their slumbers by the milder previous wake up calls would immediately recognise that they were late and would now start the day entirely on the wrong foot.

This particular morning, it was Anna's sixteenth birthday and her spirits were high. It was mid-January and outside a heavy frost had settled on the cobbled streets. The frozen condensation had decked the trees and shrubs outside which were now lit by a pale blue glow from the last of the moonlight and the occasional street lamp that kept the winter darkness at bay. A few tracks already ran across the road surface, including those of Anna's father's car, but there were also foot prints and the narrower lines of cycle tyres which criss-crossed each other back and forth in elongated figures of eight as the riders sought stability at the start of their journeys.

Inside it was
Gezellig
, (beginning and ending with the soft ‘G') a word commonly used in the Dutch language that can most directly be translated as
warm and cosy
, but also contains elements of homeliness, friendliness, relaxation and peace. Anna and Geert, together with their parents gathered together to eat, as they did every morning. On this occasion, cards and presents were also handed over to the smiling girl who her father quietly observed, was fast becoming an attractive young woman. She seemed in buoyant mood and having discussed Michael with her mother the previous evening, and as she in particular was the centre of attention, it seemed as good a time as any to announce that there was increasingly a significant other in her life.

Geert was the only family member, besides Anna who had met Michael. His opinion of the young man was mostly indifferent, but the eager look on his sister's face encouraged him to enthuse a little and he described Michael as a polite and interesting youngster. He described the BB camp with a little colour and jocular charm, mildly mocking the eccentric rituals, but emphasising too that it seemed a credible Christian organisation that had no doubt supported the healthy upbringing of the young men. Geert was in any case, not unhappy about his sister's liaison considering that it seemed far more likely to be a relationship of value than just youngsters experimenting with intimacy for the first time.

However, it was Geert who had emphasised a fact their parents had quite missed for Anna had also been affected by Michael in a more pragmatic way. This was not simply in the very positive demeanour she had been displaying in recent months, but also that her command of the English language which had, almost from the beginning, been superior to his own, was now quite exemplary. He had noted this himself recently, while during a trip they had made together to the local supermarket. They had met an English couple, just some tourists visiting the area, who sought some advice about what cheeses to buy. Anna's vocabulary and diction was now so very perfect, that the couple had asked if she was indeed English herself.

Anna's father was perhaps the most reticent; the natural protective instinct of the patriarch coming to the fore, but this too was mild. He wanted to know where Michael would sleep and what they would do all day during the long summer recess, for Anna's request was that he should stay not just for one or two days, but for a matter of weeks if possible. He did note though, that his daughter, who really asked for very little from him, studied diligently at school and of whom he was as proud as any father could be, had everything really rather worked out. He concluded that whatever misgivings he might have, he knew the only course he could reasonably follow was to give the idea his blessing.

With the formalities over, the family split from the table, each to follow the day's activities they had in store. Anna's father would now sit outside, reading a book and smoking his pipe in the small veranda at the back of the property, enjoying his ‘evening' while her mother and Geert headed off to work. Anna set her cards on display on the mantelpiece and with the small pile of presents in her arms she returned to her room, quietly satisfied that her little mission had been accomplished without too much fuss.

She settled at her desk and read through the pages of the latest letter she had already written but left uncompleted. To this Anna added a further short paragraph.

“Dear Michael,” she began for the second time in the same letter, “this morning, I have been discussing you with my parents and of course with Geert, who you have met already. In view of my strong feelings for you and the way in which our relationship has been developing over the past eighteen months or so, I feel more and more that I would love to see you once more. Your letters and especially your poems are fine and exciting and tender and loving, but I yearn to see you again. I have asked my parents if you could stay here for a while during the summer, so that we can get to know each other properly. They have both agreed and are excited to meet you, so I do hope you will be able to come.

As always, I look forward to receiving your next letter, but this time with extra hope and expectation,

Love Anna.”

There. She sat about considering her words carefully. She had used the word ‘love' three times in the paragraph. Firstly, she would
love
to see him, depicting an enthusiastic prospect relating to him, using the potentially emotive word indirectly. Secondly, she had said his letters were
loving
, indicating the view she took that for his part, of course the letters were loving, but since they were sent to her, then there was in fact some emotion of that nature directed at her. Finally, she had written,
love
Anna, a general term of endearment of course and widely used, but it maintained the theme of quietly courting some declaration of emotion from him. Deep down, she felt he loved her, she knew he loved her, but she also wanted to be
told
he loved her. That was in any case part of the reason for the invitation; that their relationship might progress further in a way that such declarations might be made by both parties.

BOOK: Ahoy for Joy
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