Closer than Blood: Friendship Helps You Survive

‘And here comes trouble,’ Joan added. Shirley spun around. He was striding across the dance-floor, taking in the scene – she could almost see his mind working – and looking rather more animated – or rather, tanked up – than he had when he’d left.

It had been more like twenty minutes rather than ten, but he’d come back alone, his mates having obviously decided to linger in the pub. Shirley thought fleetingly that she was pleased he’d taken his leave of them to rejoin her, but any pleasure in that was soon taken away by the realisation that he’d veered off from his route to where the girls stood and was walking towards the lad, who was now heading back to his mates.

The girls watched as he stopped dead in front of the group of lads. ‘Shit!’ Shirley said, feeling a ripple of anxiety in her gut. ‘He saw, didn’t he? And he’s going to say something to that lad, isn’t he?’ She took in the scene. ‘Oh God, and he’s on his own. And there’s bloody three of them.’

‘Uh-huh,’ Doreen said sagely. ‘Looks like it.’

‘Say something, Dor?’ Joan said. ‘He’s a Hudson, remember. I doubt he’ll waste energy on small talk. No, he’ll nut him, most probably,’ she finished, sucking the last of her milkshake up her straw. ‘Looks like it might be a lively kind of night after all.’

‘But there’s three of them!’ Shirley squeaked. ‘Why would he –’

At which point, Keith did. Just as her brand new friend Joan had predicted, he landed a body-bending punch into the hapless lad’s chest then followed it up with the promised head-butt for good measure.

She banged her own milkshake glass onto the bar and ran towards them.

‘Keith!’ she yelled anxiously. What on earth was he thinking? There were three of them! And even as she screeched at him, they were all jumping in.

Not that it seemed to dampen Keith’s enthusiasm for defending her honour. ‘You think you can chat up my bird, do you?’ he screamed at the boy, simultaneously ducking from the blows raining down and launching straight back in with his fists. But however fearless he was, he was surely no match for three of them, and Shirley decided she’d better get stuck in as well, by trying to grab the smallest of the three of them. He shook her off as if she’d been no more than a gust of wind on his back, though, and as Keith saw her stagger backwards, it only served to rile him more. Back in he went, blood pouring freely from his nose now, kicking and punching past any resistance, and beginning – incredibly – to get the upper hand, as well.

And then Bert arrived to break the fight up. Keith saw him, too. ‘You want a go as well, Bert?’ he growled, ‘go ahead and be my frigging guest, pal.’ He raised his fists just as three men in suits grabbed him from behind. Bert grinned – he’s actually enjoying himself, Shirley realised – as, while two of the men quickly and surely grabbed Keith’s arms, Bert and the third man grabbed his feet. Between them, as the three other lads stood back to inspect their bruises, they lifted him off the floor.

‘Let him go, you bleeding bullies!’ Shirley yelled, tears springing in her eyes, but as she raised her fists to pummel the back of the nearest of Bert’s henchmen, Keith spun himself around somehow, twisting his neck so he was facing her.

‘I’m all right, Shirl,’ he reassured her, winking at her as if in endorsement. ‘I’ll meet you at the other end of the car park, okay?’

She could only look on, stunned and shaken, as they carried him by his wrists and ankles to the double doors that led to the car park, looking for all the world as if they were giving him the bumps for his birthday.

Oh, God! she thought anxiously. He wasn’t about to get a beating, was he? The thought galvanised her and, with a weak smile at her new friends, Joan and Doreen, she hurried after them, just in time to experience another shocking moment as they swung Keith back in unison before launching him straight across the car park.

They were all laughing, as well, which made her furious. ‘You bad bastards!’ she screamed, elbowing them out of the way. ‘You could have killed him!’ But by the time she’d run across to him, he was (miraculously, it seemed to Shirley) already getting back up again. He must be like a cat, she decided, as he sprung to his feet, engineered to always land the right way up. He began dusting himself down. Muck and gravel stuck to him like a new suit. ‘Are you all right?’ she asked anxiously, wincing at the blood smeared on his face.

‘Me?’ he asked, as if it was a completely unexpected question. ‘Course I am, love. I’m used to that from them pillocks. Don’t you worry, Shirl. Wait till I see them one by one, though.’ He grinned. ‘Trust me, they won’t be laughing then.’

Shirley certainly wasn’t laughing now. Did he mean the lads, or Bert’s hard men? Either way, was he totally insane? He was certainly fearless, she conceded as he brushed the last of the dust from his lapels. ‘Keith, you’re still bleeding,’ she told him, anxious anew. Had they broken his nose? Would he end up with it all bent and lumpy like his mate Titch’s? It was definitely still oozing blood. It was beginning to get dark now, and she could see it glistening by the light of the car-park security lamp.

He pressed the back of his hand to his nose and then held it away from him, tutting, before pushing a hand inside the sleeve of his other arm and tugging down a length of jacket sleeve that had obviously been tucked up inside. That done, he carefully wiped his nose with it, before tucking the sleeve carefully up again. The jacket, she realised, had cuffs that matched the collar. Or would have, had the sleeves not been six inches too long.

‘What?’ Keith was asking her, and she realised she was standing there, gawping. And, transfixed as she was by the bizarre thing she’d just witnessed, she didn’t know quite what to say. There was something so singular about what he’d just done that all her anxiety melted away. Instead, she found herself collapsing into a fit of giggles.

Keith stared at her for a moment, just like Titch had earlier, as if she was mad. ‘What’s so frigging funny?’ he wanted to know.

‘Oh, Keith,’ Shirley spluttered, ‘you should have seen your face! When those men got you, and it was just when you were going to hit that lad, and then you were, like, so surprised – so, like, “What’s going on here?” and next minute you were up in the air, and … oh my God, I’m going to wee myself if I’m not careful …’

She crossed her legs, tears of laughter spilling onto her cheeks now. What had happened here? By rights she should be sickened and terrified. And here she was laughing like a drain. What had happened here? It was the funniest, yet oddest night of her life, and she didn’t think she’d ever felt quite so alive.

Keith grabbed her arm, placed it over his, pulled her close against him, linked their fingers, and she felt the same thrill she’d felt earlier on. ‘Come on, you bleeding nutter,’ he said, glancing down at her watch. ‘Look at the time. Let’s get you home before that dad of yours sets his firing squad on me, shall we? I can’t be doing with bullet holes in this friggin’ jacket as well. It’s not even mine, I borrowed it off our Annie’s husband.’

Shirley glanced at her watch too. It wasn’t even much past nine yet.

‘But what about your friends?’ she asked.

‘Oh, I dare say they’re still in the pub. Besides, I didn’t come out with them, did I? I came out with you.’

His gaze met hers then and she thought she might melt from the heat in it. ‘But we’re all right for time,’ she said, as they left the car park. ‘We don’t have to hurry.’

He squeezed her hand and smiled at her. ‘Yeah,’ he said softly. ‘I know that as well.’

When they reached Shirley’s road, her dad was standing on the doorstep, just as he’d promised, one hand in his pocket, the other curled around something that glinted metallically in the moonlight. There was no sign of her mam – probably keeping well out of his way. She groaned. ‘Oh, God, he’s only bloody standing there with his alarm clock!’ she said. ‘Honestly!’

‘Here we are, Mr Read,’ Keith called to him. ‘Safe and sound and home on time.’ He slowed and stopped then, still a few doors from hers. ‘I better leave you here, love,’ he whispered, his breath tickling her neck. ‘If he sees the state of me he’ll probably have a fit, won’t he?’

‘Only bloody just, lad, only bloody just!’ her father boomed in response, and Shirley decided that he wasn’t a pussycat at all. Just the most excruciatingly embarrassing father in the entire world, bar none.

‘Leave it, Dad,’ she said, slipping past him as Keith disappeared into the shadows. She hurried up the stairs so as not to disturb the feeling that had enveloped her, giving her dad no chance to puncture the bubble of happiness inside her chest.

How long had they lingered? Had it been two minutes or ten? She’d completely lost track, save to know that it had been long enough. Plenty long enough to ensure she had the sweetest dreams tonight. Plenty long enough know that her mind was made up. She took off her cardigan, pressing it against her face, catching a hint of the scent of him. She’d have to tame him, no doubt about it. Oh, boy, as Buddy Holly might have said, she would definitely have to tame him. But that was fine, she thought, touching a finger to her lips, remembering his.

She couldn’t wait to get started.

Chapter 5 (#ufa6136de-ceb5-5303-ac0c-961130b740c2)

Shirley clapped her hands over her ears, but it was no good. She could still hear them. So she went across to her record player and turned the volume to ten. But that was no good either. Elvis did his best, being the teddy bear he was, but the sound was still floating up the stairs, even so.

It was Saturday tea-time, and as per usual, her dad had been up in the village for a few pints with his friends. Which always led to the same result as soon as he got home – the 100-question routine from her mam the minute he’d walk through the door. Who had he been sat with? Which ‘sluts’ were in the Albion drinking without their husbands? Did any of them remind him of the geisha girls he must have been with during the war?

It was relentless and Shirley was fed up to the back teeth with it, so though she’d been happily downstairs, helping her mam bake some cakes, she had no choice but to take herself off up to her bedroom and leave them to murder each other with words till the time came to go to meet Keith.

She lay on her bed and tried to tune her mind back to the music, thinking both about what it must be like to have Elvis Presley singing to you personally and how it had felt when Keith had done exactly that. But it was difficult and was steadily becoming almost impossible; was she imagining it or was the row getting even louder than usual?

It seemed to be, and when she heard her own name keep coming up in the mix, she gave up trying to enjoy a ‘peaceful’ Saturday afternoon to find out what they were arguing about instead.

She sat up then went over to take the stylus from the record, and as she did so she heard a smash from downstairs. They were in the ‘breaking crockery’ stage now, then, which meant they must be in the kitchen. She padded out onto the landing, where she could now hear them plain as day.

And it seemed she’d come to listen at the perfect moment. ‘She’s the talk of the bloody Albion!’ she could hear her dad yelling. ‘Gallivanting over to that scummy estate to see him! Him whose family are the scum of the earth, Mary! Everyone knows it! They’re a bad lot – a bad lot, and no good will come of this. What with one brother in and out of borstal all the time’ – she heard the scrape of a chair being moved, then her mother shouting, ‘So you keep bleeding telling me!’, then her dad again, ranting on in the same tone – ‘and another one a bloody jailbird. And where does he make his money? Out of gambling and mucky women, that’s how! And let’s not forget he’s also a murderer!’ the chair moved again, and she hoped her dad was sitting on it, not about to throw it. ‘Is that what you want for our daughter, Mary? Is it?’

There was a silence – doubtless temporary – and Shirley gripped the newel post at the top of the stairs, trying to take in what she’d just heard. What on earth was her dad talking about? A murderer?

It had been three weeks now – well, more accurately three weeks, six days and twenty-one hours, since Shirley had been on her first date with Keith. Three weeks in which she’d had her eyes opened to what she’d only ever heard and seen in the movies before, her heart feeling like it was turning somersaults inside her chest whenever she thought about him, the flutter in her tummy when he smiled at her and, as of three days ago, something else, too – to how the ‘other half’ lived.

Shirley didn’t really look at it like that, even if her snob of a father did, but there was no question that Keith’s background was very different from hers. Shirley knew she was well off compared with most of her friends, and always had been – she was bound to be, after all; with both her parents working and her an only child they never had to worry about where the next penny was coming from.

She knew that – knew the difference between her life and Anita’s, but going with Keith to his parents’ house on the Canterbury estate had been like nothing she’d seen before. It had almost been like entering another world.

Keith had met her in town at lunchtime and they’d gone to see Clark Gable in a film called Band of Angels, which was currently showing at the Odeon. Shirley loved the cinema and she particularly loved Clark Gable, who’d always reminded her of her dad. Keith had treated her, as well. He’d just got a new job at Fox’s dyers on Manchester Road and now he was getting a regular wage, he said he wanted to spend it on her.

‘Oh, that was so lovely, Keith,’ Shirley said when they emerged, blinking, into the brightness of the July afternoon. ‘And so romantic. I’m so pleased Sidney Poitier helped them both escape so they could be in love for ever.’ She sighed contentedly as she slipped her hand into his as they walked. He squeezed it, then led them diagonally across the road – not the way to walk her back to Clayton, as she’d expected.

Shirley was confused. Keith was going out with his mates tonight to celebrate his new job, hence them going to the matinee performance. Hence him then taking her home.