The Fourth Year

September 1969: I was now in 4A1, Mister Fisk’s form. I really didn’t know what to make of my new teacher, one of the younger males on the Upbury staff. That he was stylish was plain to see, as the cut of his clothes set him apart from his colleagues. And he had to be sporty because I’d seen him in a black tracksuit from time to time, and he’d organised the Wembley trip in the first year. The most striking thing about him though was his jack the lad personality. A poor fit, I thought, for a Religious Education teacher but what did I know? I was the class Catholic, the outcast that sat in the canteen when everyone else did RE. With no familiarity of Mister Fisk or his methods I waited, like an anxious new kid, for a friendly word that would acknowledge my existence beyond a name on the register and make me feel I belonged. When that friendly word never came I felt excluded and as disappointing as that was, it was no great surprise.

My brother Mike started at Upbury. Unlike our brother Dave, who needed little guidance when he started at Upbury the year before, Mike needed someone to lean on.

On a bright September morning, me Dave and Mike were up early enough to forget about the bus and walk to school together. All was fine when we got to Livingstone Circus and all was fine when we crossed the bottom on Napier Road. But then I heard someone shouting.

‘Hoi you… dusty light bulb!’

 Across the road a speccy four eyed kid of about my age, possibly older, had just come out of the newsagents with a younger boy. As I didn’t recognise him or his uniform and I wasn’t even sure it was me he was shouting at, I ignored him.

‘Yeah you! Go and eat your reggae brek!’

I stopped to stare at him when the penny dropped. Was my skinhead haircut really so different from my usual crew cut? I didn’t have it done to make a statement, claim an identity or put myself in the firing line of a big mouth who was asking for a fat lip. Bemused, I shrugged it off and walked on. Fighting wasn’t in my nature anyway.

I assured Mike we never had any bother with other kids. Twydall kids at Upbury Manor crossed Napier and Woodlands territory daily, yet we rarely encountered kids from those schools. We were too early for them in the morning, and they were long dispersed when we came home. 

After school I took Mike to the bus stop down near the Plaza cinema, imparting some big brotherly knowledge on the way.

‘It’s not much further to walk. Catch the bus here and it’ll spare you the scramble at the depot, and the confusion of not knowing if the bus is going in the right direction.’

Though two lads propped against a garden wall appeared to be waiting for a bus, my brother and I got in line behind the only person at the stop – an old lady. A minute or so of quietly minding our own business passed. Then my ears pricked up.

‘We know what that school’s like, don’t we? Yeah, we know what that school’s like.’

I clocked the lads leaning on the wall. Nappywashers uniform, third years, by the look of them. The bigger kid was doing all the talking, answering his own questions when his mate didn’t reply.

‘Upbury Manor, yeah, we all know what that school’s like.’

I ignored him.

‘I’m glad I don’t go to that school.’

Mike looked at me expectantly. I knew what he was thinking, but besides having no wish to get involved in an unseemly incident in front of an old lady, I had no inclination to do anything that might spark an inter school feud. But the mouthy git wouldn’t let go. He just kept chipping away, running Upbury down.

‘Yeah, everybody knows what that school’s like.’

Enough. With the honour of Upbury at stake I calmly took three steps towards him.

Bop!

A single punch between the eyebrows did the trick. The look on his face was priceless. Not another word was spoken.

Me and Mike joined the free-for-all at the bus depot for a few days, avoiding the Plaza, just in case. As for Big Mouth, I never saw him again.

Were people becoming more competitive and aggressive? I wasn’t sure, but people seemed only too ready to put others down. Perhaps I was growing up and seeing the world for what it was. Even the playground seemed a harsher, crueller place. It wasn’t just the pulverising of the back of someone’s hand in a game of knuckles, or the zapping of someone with a miniature transformer. These were symptoms of something that ran deeper. And that disturbed me.