Room For Two - #1 A story in the first person 928 words

Happy childhood memories, people love recalling them, recounting them to friends. I don’t.

There must have been happy times and I’m sure there were, it’s just that they weren’t strong enough to hold on. The ones that did, the ones that kept their place were far from happy.

We lived on a low rent council estate in north Lancashire, on the outskirt of town, at the end of the bus route. From here there was no further to fall, no more stops on route to the basement. So here we were, me, John my twin brother, baby Pete, Dad and Mum. Six years old and our world seemed as it should. We didn’t have much, but neither did anybody else. No one locked their doors and as kids we were free to roam from house to house without question, games often spilled from one to another.

Imagine for a moment what it would be like as a six year old to have a game of tig or chase and your playground was every room, cubby hole and back yard of every house in your street, to us the world seemed like a playground, open, accessible and waiting to be discovered.

Things did change, people moved away others arrived, but that was as normal as a game of hide and seek. Friends came and went, families moved from area to area, one estate to another. Some chased work, others followed family. Some moved to stay one step ahead of the pursuing pack of creditors. Others ran in the night because they had to.

Then one night it was our turn.

We were allowed the freedom of the days, but not the nights. At night the young were expected to go to bed at a reasonable time no questions. We would play in our bedroom after supper until Mum came up to tuck us in. Sometimes it would just be a warm voice from the bottom of the stairs telling us it was time. Then one night no one came to tuck us in. No one called up a friendly reminder. But we silently turned of our light and climbed under the covers and listened.

In the dark I grasped at the wool blanket and pulled the scratchy cover tight around my ears, it didn’t help. I was getting to hot, slowly stretching out I emerged back in to the world. John lay still, his eyes fixed on a distant ceiling. The noise was closer now, louder ,angrier. The air above the blanket was cool and after a few breaths I turned to John, he didn’t look back. His whole being was locked on what now raced up the long stairs towards us both. The sound invaded my small frame, seizing hold it pushed down freezing me to the spot. Cramps began to grip my arms and legs, held rigid against the approaching frenzy. Pulling up my knees, curling them to my chest I tried to relieve some of the pain. It didn’t help, perhaps stretching out might. As slowly and quietly as I could I pushed my feet away and stretched out pulling on the heavy blanket as I did. This brought a reaction from John who grasped the retreating edge. Turning angrily towards me, ‘don’t’ he snapped. My reply was lost as the door to our dark room slammed open and in rushed the bright cold light of the un-shaded bulb hanging from its cord on the landing.

But the light brought in something else, something hot and angry. We barely knew the faces rushing up on us. The shapes were Mum and Dad, we knew that. But we didn’t know them as we saw them now. The two people in our bedroom were a long way from being Mum and Dad. They stood at our bed, shouted words merging together, impossible. Two voices, one single stream of pain, anger and resentment aimed at each other the two of us now reduced to ammunition, fired in burst to cause maximum damage. It may have lasted seconds or minutes, then the noise coalesced to form one sentence, one question.

‘Who do you want to stay with me or her ’?

‘Who do you want to stay with me or him ’?

‘Well who ’?

Without hesitation or doubt.

‘ Mum.’

The next moment the light was gone. Still in our bed. Still holding the blanket tight, hot, itchy and damp. Crying, panting for breath.
We had answered the question and the strangers had left us alone in the dark. The single bulb still burned behind the closed door. Voices still raged at each other.

Then a second door slammed.

We knew that one, front door.

A single voice, outside.
Mums voice, distant and hurting.

No one came back to tuck us in for the night, no face round the door. No warm voice calling good night, Nothing.

The next day we climbed out of bed as silently as we had climbed in that night, got ourselves ready for school, not a word exchanged between us. But no school that day.

Instead we sat close together and stared at the front window. It was cold so we sat fully dressed in our school uniforms with our coats on. We couldn’t see much through the window, Mums net curtains hung to keep out prying eyes clung to the glass fixed in place by overnight frost.

We just sat, no one spoke to us and we spoke to no one. Not even the large policeman stood in front of the window.