Aaron Connor (4 page)

There was a collective chuckle
among the audience. Even I laughed. It was corny but funny all the
same.

“
Our drama
students” said Mr Derry, in his posh Shakespearian voice, “have
worked unbelievably hard on this year’s piece. It was a hard
subject, the sinking of the Titanic, but all of the facility in the
Drama Department, feel that it has come out extremely well. So,
without further ado, here is 11BW’s drama piece”

Mr Derry disappeared from the
left hand side of stage. On came the drama class afterwards. They
were all dressed in black. The class brought on large black wooden
boxes to use as scenery. The style of drama they were studying
meant that they had to use the boxes for as many uses as possible.
At one point it was a balcony, then the captain’s desk, then a
lifeboat and so on. Blimey, the acting was awful. It was like
watching the mental health hospital’s annual production, performed
by the ward of patients who believed they were Daleks.

At the end they all lined up
and bowed. The audience applauded like they’d just seen The Beatles
play for them. I remember sitting there, listening to everyone
cheer on that rubbish we just saw, losing my faith humanity. Maybe
it was just me. Maybe I was just being a miserable sod.

Mr Bertgill came back on with
the expression of a man who’s about ready to blow his brains out
with boredom. His eyes flickered as if he was half asleep. Everyone
knew what this meant: the Head Master’s been at the whisky again.
He must have hid the bottle backstage somewhere. This wasn’t the
first time he’d come out drunk, so we weren’t surprised by the
whole thing.

“
Right
everyone” he said a little louder then usual and slightly slurred,
“You can go home now, because I’m going to Mars with David
Attenborough!”

With that he slumped off stage.
Not to be seen again by myself, as this would have been my last day
at St.Ians. It would be a lie if I said I wasn’t happy about
leaving. I had enough of Teachers and bullies alike making me feel
like a wad of gum they’ve just stepped in. I was ready to go. Even
though it would have been better academically for me to stay on, I
didn’t have the grades to do so. That’s not to say that it affected
my eagerness to get out of the place. To move on and plan my next
move, whatever that would turn out to be.

Finally the school bell rang
and we all filed out in the same way we came in. I made sure I was
at the back of the line, to avoid contact with Simon as much as
possible. I shuffled out of the hall, climbed up the stairs into
the foyer and went outside to meet up with Lizzie.

When I came out onto the
playground I saw Lizzie already waiting for me. She stood at the
bottom of the stairs, looking as pretty as ever. I walked down the
stairs and met up with her. When I got there I noticed something
interesting going on at the other side of the playground. I could
see some younger boys, who seemed to fancy Lizzie, pointing towards
her and thrusting violently. It was funny, but I was in no mood to
see the humour in it. I just looked on at them coldly.

Just to annoy the boys, I put
my arm around Lizzie and we walked away together. I quickly glanced
over Lizzie’s head to get another look at the boys. They looked
rather disappointed. They were dreaming of getting laid by a pretty
girl. I burst that bubble real quick. Just like the millions upon
millions of bubbles, containing hopes and dreams, that are burst
everyday.

CHAPTER THREE

We walked out of the school
gates and down a thicket path with streams of dim, cloudy sunlight
shining through the gaps in the branches. The ground was covered in
the remains of used condoms and littered pieces of gum. It was
quite cold, being that it was always cold in England at all times
of the year. That’s one of the annoying things about weather in
England, it’s completely unpredictable. It doesn’t care whether its
winter, spring or summer, it’ll do whatever it wants. It was
towards the end of July and it should have been sunny, but no, it
was freezing cold. A little bit out of order, but we can’t exactly
control the weather now can we?

Anyway, we were walking along
and for the whole time we were rather quiet. This was because we
were completely wrapped up in our own thoughts. Both of us were
failures in the eyes of the Powers that Be. I only got the one GCSE
in Art and Lizzie got the same in Maths. We were both thinking
about what to do next. Find more schooling? Try and get a job? What
was to be done with failures like us? Nothing, that’s the answer,
sod all and maybe the occasionally trip to the job centre.

Lizzie rested her head on my
shoulder. She often did this when she wasn’t quite feeling herself.
She was quite small, even though she was the same age as me, so she
was just about the right height to place her head on my shoulder. I
rested my head on hers affectionately, as I knew just how she felt.
We kept on walking in silence, as our affectionate gestures said
more then words possibly could.

Lizzie and I were neighbours,
which was convenient being how well us two got along. That’s where
our friendship started. We first began to see each other when our
Mums would get together for a cup of tea and let us play in the
garden. Sometimes my Mum went over to Lizzie’s and other times
Lizzie’s Mum came over to our house. Either way this meant we saw a
lot of each other and were soon BFF (Best Friends Forever). We even
got some bracelets which said so, that we still wear to this
day!

We saw a lot of the other
students walking by as they headed home. They walked around us like
we weren’t even there. The better off students would pass and look
at us as if disgusted before walking on. It was a pain in the arse
to hear so many blokes talking about how well they did in their
exams. Others were talking about plans they had for College and
some were even talking about University! Must be nice to have it
all planned out, then again how boring would that be?

We saw Simon Grant walk by and
he was now accompanied by his full gang. The gang were kitted out
entirely in the iconic black hoodies. One boy by the name of Adam
was riding on a bright yellow Moped. That baby was beautiful!
Imagine the scrambler bike Steve McQueen rode in The Great Escape,
now imagine it being yellow and that is exactly what Adam’s bike
looked like. I loved it so much. That nasty brute Adam didn’t
deserve such a thing. Of course I had no say in the matter as it
wasn’t any of my business. The gang walked along and turned a
corner towards their usual spot, which was the car park of the
Outdoor Recreation Centre.

We came out at the other side
of the thicket. We walked through the Churchyard, through the busy
town and started to walk through the market. St.Ians was famous for
its Monday Market and I was never really sure why (before you ask,
I also think it’s odd that our school year ended on a Monday).
Whenever I walked through the Market, it was just full of useless
junk that no one would want

We also went past another
famous landmark of St.Ians: the pubs. St.Ians has an unbelievable
amount of pubs: The Black Heart, Nelson’s Foot, The Seven Husbands,
The Little John, The Golden Badger, The Tap-dancing room, The
Pilot, River Tavern, The Strawman, The Man’s Arms, The Royal Pine,
The Drawing Room and The Cyclopes. Each place had unique
characteristics and tended to different kinds of people.
Intellectuals go to the Tap-dancing room, football fans go to the
Man’s Arms for the large television and musicians go to River
Tavern to perform. Sixth Formers with nothing better to do go The
Drawing Room, where there always seemed to be a Sixth Form party
going on (when I say party I actually mean a games night including
sessions of: “how far can you chunder” and “bet which girl will get
their boobs out first”).

In fact, we were so well known
in our beer guzzling ways that we even appeared in an episode of
Binge Britain. This was a programme that was on the television not
so long ago and would document binge drinking culture throughout
the UK. Each episode was dedicated to a different location. These
locations included London, Manchester, Liverpool, Edinburgh,
Glasgow, Belfast, Cardiff and many other large cities. Nonetheless
little St.Ians found its way onto the programme, officially stating
to the nation that St.Ians has drinking problems.

Oh St.Ians, you’ve brought me
up on a diet of violence, drinking and wavering tension between the
lower and middle classes. We like to think that we’ve moved on from
the class system, but we know very well that it’s still there and
causing many issues in society. The main issue is the hateful way
that people like me are treated, just because we were brought up
differently to them. I don’t think I should go too much into
politics and that. I don’t want to annoy you with my political
views, the last thing I want is you shouting at the book and
sending the publisher “stern letters”. I think it’s best to keep
this book as neutral as possible.

We passed through the Market,
out of the Town centre and walked on by some housing areas. We
walked along down pathways, past the Police Station down Pig Lane
(brilliant init?) and were soon walking by Northfield Primary
School. This was where I used to go as a kid. In fact, both me and
Lizzie went to this school as kids and had a lot of fun there.

That was the last place where I
could remember being innocent. Having a clean mind and not worrying
about sex, murders, diseases and such dark aspects of modern life.
Playing within the confines of that wired fencing, I could see the
world as a beautiful place full of opportunity, love and adventure.
I wish I could go back and tell little old me not to get too
excited, as my expectation out lived the reality.

We passed on by, went over the
road and came to some traffic lights at the main road. This was the
long route to get home, as it should only take a few minutes
normally. I and Lizzie have discovered that its best to avoid the
routes that Simon and his gang takes, just for our own safety,
which meant that we had to take this longer route. At least it kept
us fit. It’s much better then going down the quick route, to have
the boys beat me up and grope at Lizzie’s bum. Hasn’t civilisation
progressed so much over the years? Mmmm . . . sarcasm is hard to
put down in words, oh well, I’m sure you get the message.

The symbol of the walking man
lit up bright green. The cars stopped and we crossed the road. When
we come to the other side we turned to the left and carried on
walking. We went past houses, gardens, corner shops and crossings
until eventually we made it to our two houses.

They weren’t anything
particularly special. The two houses were conjoined into one large,
white square. The windows were few and perfectly square . . . and
that’s about it really. Lizzie lived on the left side and I lived
on the right. We went our separate ways as Lizzie walked up to her
front door and went inside. I walked up to my front door, but I
didn’t go inside straight away. I had a lot on my mind.

My exam results were in a brown
envelope in my bag. I was trying to decide whether to show my
Mother the paper or not. She was an over protective woman, the kind
that’s so over baring that she’s just plain mean. I know she meant
well, but she could become nasty and went ballistic easily.
“Ape-shit” I believe is the right term to describe it.

After a few moments of thought,
I decided to keep the envelope to myself. There’s no point starting
an argument when I wasn’t in the mood to have one. Sometimes in
life, its best to keep some things secret if it’s for the best.
That’s the only instance in which I could encourage lying, as
sometimes the truth can cause more trouble then its worth.

I entered the house and closed
the door behind me. Inside everything was a basic white. The
council who owned the house limited you on what you could and
couldn’t do, so we just went for the basic whitewash and tiled
vinyl floor. The house was always clean as Mum was always home and
liked to fill the time between clients.

My Mum was a home hairdresser.
Her clients would come to the house at their pre organised
appointments and have their hair cut in the living room. The
clients were mainly older women who liked having their hair cut by
my Mum. They could chat and gossip about celebrities while watching
Loose Women on the television. There was always a trash mag handy
that the women would read during their appointment. So most of the
conversations were sparked off by something they’d read about some
talentless pleb’s love affair, or something daft like that.

When I came in I could hear my
Mum in the living room, clicking away with those scissors. I peered
into the living room to see who it was today. There were rarely any
new clients, so over the years I had come to know them all quite
well. Today was Barbara.

Barbara was a lovely lady no
older then thirty-five. She had bleach blonde hair, long pink
finger nails, a huge pair of fake breasts and she was always
covered unevenly in fake tan. She was originally from Essex before
moving down here with her husband Richard (who was from St.Ians)
and has been a client to my Mum ever since.

She was a beautician at the
local parlour in town. It was a massive black building, opposite
the pound shop, that had windows covered in posters of glamorous
models. You know the kind, the ones where you stare at them and
think: “She must be hungry”. Barbra worked in there and did nails,
hair, tanning, piercings and such like. She had the ability to cut
her own hair but enjoyed my Mother’s company, so she came here
instead and gossiped until the sun went down.

She was flicking through the
pages of a magazine. My Mum was standing behind her cutting
expertly at her long blonde hair. I walked past the room, as they
hadn’t noticed me and I wanted to hide the test results in my room
before Mum had the chance to see it. I climbed up the stairs, past
the banister and walked into my room.