Journey Into The Unknown!

Continued from "A Comic Aside"

The Future Never Happened Chapter VI: Journey into the Unknown!

Six.

If I'm honest I don't actually remember the bus journey into town, but
it's a trip I've made many times in my life. We probably sat in
silence, both peering out of different sets of grimy windows as the
posh houses at the edge of Gosforth went by, some of them mansion like
with great grey silent trees in front.

Reaching the traffic lights where Kenton Road meets Grandstand Road you
can see a great mass of green in front of you, just grass, no trees,
two lumps in it that we used to call 'Titty Hill', soft rounded bumps,
next to each other. This is The Town Moor, a great grassland almost at
the geographical centre of Newcastle, as if the sea of buildings had
washed around it like an island as the city expanded outwards. Not
park, not garden, but moor. At night it stands completely dark apart
from one path that cuts across its centre, orange blobs of light
receding into the distance like an illuminated tunnel. Going into town
at night you can see the lights of the town centre twinkling beyond The
Moor, making it feel as if you are coming into Newcastle from outside,
even though you weren't outside at all.

Probably that Saturday there were cows grazing. There was most of the
year. Maybe I looked out of the bus window to see a hulking bull
mounting a cow, or maybe I didn't. I'd seen it enough times on the way
to town, giggling but feeling strangely aroused.

As the bus swings round onto the Great North Road, which behind you
leads to Gosforth High street, you can see the carefully maintained
playing fields and neat Victorian houses at the edge of Jesmond,
painfully comfortable in their view across The Moor. I used to
disturbing dreams of waking up in the morning and looking out of the
window to find only flat grassland, its green-ness blinding.

Ahead the road dips into a grey concrete canyon, roadways spinning out
above, over lapping each other. One begins, curving out into thin air
then stops, as if tea-time had come and the toys had to be put away,
the game left half finished. All through the journey I can't imagine
that me or my Dad said a word to each other, everything so used to that
there was nothing to make comment on, just twenty-five minutes of
creaking and rattling and engine noise.

Accelerating underneath the canopy of roads you come back up at the
gateway to Newcastle town centre from the north, university to the
right, the brutal modernity of the Civic Centre to the left. From the
south you enter over the Tyne Bridge, the Tyne flowing a hundred feet
below, industrial revolution buildings facing you grandly. Thinking
about it, Newcastle has always tried to present its most romantic face
to the South.

The town was busy, people dragging carrier bags and children along as
if there was no difference between the two. Getting off the bus at the
Odeon and looking up Northumberland Street all I could see was people,
so many it was impossible to differentiate them, just a great tangle of
arms and coats and heads and feet. It reminded me of growing,
multiplying bacteria wriggling and spreading under a microscope on some
science programme.

Following my Dad, who set off at great speed as soon as we got out of
the bus doors, I couldn't resist the urge to look upwards, above the
crowds, to orientate myself, to not become lost and absorbed into the
mass of bodies. I remember vividly the perfect flat blue of the sky,
uniform like a great sheet across the city. Reaching toward it were the
buildings, the blue blankness accentuating the differences between
them. New mixed with old, the messy fussiness of slates and brick and
the angular simplicity of concrete and glass. I remember like a
photograph the white arch of a seagull, grounded in pale blue sky
accompanied by the white of a concrete tower, an image composed like a
diagram in a maths textbook, composed like geometry.

My Dad weaved between people, cutting across the paths of scowling
grandmothers with read forearms, shaven headed men with chests the size
of armchairs, overtook young women in shellsuits pushing children in
pushchairs and kids in Berghaus coats smoking tabs. He seemed
effortless now, perfectly adapted, perfectly fixed on his goal. I'd
never seen him like this before. It was like watching an injured
animal, now cured, being released back into the wild, racing into the
undergrowth with speed and precision. Me, on the other hand, I stumbled
and blundered to keep up, bumping into all the people my dad so easily
managed to step around.

"Howay man, keep up."

Nothing that my Dad could have bought me could have made up for taking
me away from my comic. "But where are we goin'?" I shouted after him. I
hoped that whatever it was, it wouldn't take long.

My Dad turned to look at me, a smile playing across his lips. "You'll
see."

"But Da, I need to go with Mam&;#8230;"

"Divvn't be daft man, y' Mam'll dee withoot y', she's bin shoppin'
since before yee were born."

We went into Eldon Square, the white tiles grimy underfoot, the
artificial lights yellow, making all the people look ill and tired.
Passing from Northumberland Street into the shopping centre a hot wall
of air blew down on you, creating an invisible wall between the outside
world and the artificial covered world inside. To me this seemed as far
from the luminous city or the future as could be. Eldon Square had
replaced shopping streets with covered malls that felt like tunnels
even though the majority of the centre was one or more levels above
ground. Only a few bits of it had natural light, the rest was lit by
fluorescents that made it feel like a basement. It was as if the
architects had not been able to see quite far enough ahead, all they
could do was copy the worst of the street in more up to date materials.
Almost trotting in my Dad's wake, I felt sweat run down the inside of
my arms and prickle on my forehead. The air felt warm and moist, as if
I was breathing other people's breath, random faces swimming towards me
as I hurried to keep up. Clusters of shoppers drifted in and out of the
chainstores, constantly moving under the artificial canopy, like a
river moving through the channels of glass frontage and tiling. It felt
like there was no room to breathe. The inside of Eldon Square, with its
browns and creams, packed with sweating groaning people, misery on
their faces, seemed trapped in time, all crushed together in a space
that didn't fit them anymore.

In the future there'd be space to live, I thought.

I wanted to grab my Dad and ask him what about my comic and where were
we going, a resentful anger burning slowly in my chest. I suppose the
sheer singularity of my dad doing anything with me stopped me from
saying what I was thinking, that I was dimly aware that day was
something important, to him at least.

Abruptly we came to a halt, a tiny island in the crowd.

"Here we are, son."

Trainers lined one wall; tennis rackets hung like trophies on the
other, dummies in tracksuits and jogging bottoms stood guard at the
entrance. He'd brought me to a sports shop, he'd taken me away from the
future, away from my Mam, and brought me to a sports shop. He'd brought
me somewhere I could have come with my Mam any time. I felt betrayed,
ignoring the expectant smile on his face as he stood unmoving as the
crowds flowed around him.

"Well son, Ah was lookin' at y' the otha day and Ah thought t' mesel 'I
knaa what that lad needs'."

"Aye?"

"Aye. So Ah though t' mesel 'I tell y' what Jimmy, why Divvn't wu gan
into toon on Satda an' get it for him? It's something all the other
lads his age'll have, so why shouldn't our Tony?" There was a life to
his voice that I've never heard again. "I'm surprised y' haven't
guessed what it is yet."

When he said that I felt a flicker of hope, deep inside me. Finally, I
thought, he's given in. After all, what was the only reason people went
to sports shops?

Trainers. Finally he'd given in and decided to buy me some proper
trainers. The amount of kickings I got at school because of my Gola and
the amount of hours pleading that seemed to last forever. Finally both
were over. Finally my dad had shown mercy, finally admitted that it was
important to have the right name on your trainers. Despite myself,
excitement rose inside me, spilling out all over my face. Maybe for the
first time, me and my dad were smiling at each other. I remember going
to say something and him shushing me.

"Nah son, divvn't say anything yet. Wait'll we get inside." Years of
resentment were dropping away. For the first time I saw the laughter
lines around my Dad's eyes, saw the youth behind them. Me and my dad
were laughing together. I even forgot about my comic.

"Come on son," he said, resting his hand on my shoulder, "lets get this
owa with."

Continued in 'The Future Never Happened Chapter VII: Best Mates'