Authors: Calvin Wade
“
You pay for the hot chocolates out the machine when we get out
then
”
, he said.
I was OK with that. They were 9p each. Mum had saved me
£
1-24.
From midday, I was impatient to leave and at one o
’
clock, I literally
pushed Jim out the door. We were far too early, Town Green train
station was only two minutes walk awa
y, the train came five minutes
later, the train journey was less than ten minutes and the walk from
Ormskirk station to Park Pool was only five minutes too, so after a quick
change into our trunks, we were in the pool by half-one. The
“
big
”
pool.
The
“
little
”
pool, as Jim predicted, was full of young mothers and under
twos. We agreed we would change pools at five to.
Jim started annoying me from the start. We went to the deep end
and were doing various jumps and dives into the pool and Jim kept
saying,
“
No, Richie, you do it like this
…”
and would then do the crappest dive or biggest belly flop, get out
and say,
“
See!
”
Jim
thought he was ten years older than me rather than ten months
younger.
My blood, at that stage, just bubbled occasionally under the surface.
Jim was relentlessly antagonising though.
“
Do you know why the little pool
’
s so hot?
”
he asked, just after
correcting my starjump.
“
No idea. To keep the babies warm?
”
“
I doubt it. I reckon its something to do with boiling the water to
disinfect the pool. Look at how many babies there are in there! Weeing
away happily no doubt. In half an hour
’
s time we will be swimming in
a pool of piss
and shit probably!
”
I was already nervous. Now I was angry too. I was going to strangle
him in a minute. He continued,
”
I can
’
t believe you have arranged a date in there!
”
For a ten year old, Jim had an annoyingly smug manner. I knew he
was jealous too. No girl with boobs would agree to go on a date with
him. As we clung to the side of the deep end, we began to verbally
joust.
“
Shut up, Jim. At least I
’
ve got a date.
”
“
When I get a date, I
’
ll take her somewhere decent. Not the
babypool!
”
”
Like where, Jim? Like our bedroom so she can help you glue bits
on to an Airfix model?
”
“
At least there
’
d be no babies in our room, wetting themselves. Unless
you were there! Does Rachel Cookson know you
’
re a bedwetter?
”
In our teenage years, Jim learnt when it was time to back off. He
would still light the fuse, but would make sure he was standing a
thousand yards away by the time I exploded. At ten, he was standing
right over the firework, peering down as it sizzled underneath, saying
“
It
’
s not going off! It
’
s not going off!
”
I mentioned earlier that prior to important football matches I
struggled to sleep. What I didn
’
t mention was that, when I did get to
sleep, I would sleep very heavily, so heavily that sometimes I wouldn
’
t
hear my bladder calling and I would wet the bed. As we shared a room,
Jim knew this. Him mentioning this now, just before my first ever date,
was below the belt.
“
Shut it, Jim!
”
He wouldn
’
t listen.
“
Maybe you need to give me another tenner or I
’
ll tell Rachel
Cookson why you have to go in the bottom bunk!
”
This was the final straw. As soon as he finished the sentence, I let
go of the side of the pool, bent my right arm straight back, clenched
my fist and catapulted it straight into his smug little face. I caught him
square on the nose.
“
Owww!
”
he yelped.
He was about to hold his nose, then thought better of it and lunged
at me instead. He was a rubbish fighter and not the greatest swimmer
either, so we sort of thrashed around manically, trying to stay afloat whilst
wrestling and throwing in a few weak punches. Halfway through our
synchronised brawl, Jim
’
s nose started bleeding. We kept on wrestling
though, oblivious to the fact that we looked like shark attack victims. A lot of kids around us got out to watch and eventually the DJ of the
disco swim turned the music off. The first time we became aware that
our water wrestling had become a spectator sport was when we heard
the shrill sound of a whistle.
“
You two! OUT!
”
We looked up and about fifty kids were watching us, as well as a very angry looking lifeguard.
“
Out!
”
We clambered out sheepishly and were then frogmarched out the
pool with my left ear in the lifeguard
’
s right hand and Jim
’
s right ear
in the lifeguard
’
s left. The lifeguard took us to the changing rooms,
gave us the biggest rollocking I have ever had, about safety in the water
and told us that he had worked there for fifteen years and had yet to
witness anything quite like this. He als
o said that if he ever clapped
eyes on us in the next fifteen years, he would strap us to a rock and
throw us to the bottom of the deep end. Needless to say, for the rest of
our childhood, we didn
’
t return. Twel
ve months later, Mum booked us
in for swimming lessons and we paid Helen to phone up, pretend she
was Mum and cancel them. Mum booked them and we cancelled them
about four times before she told them they were
“
hopelessly inadequate
”
and booked us in Skem baths instead. Twenty years later, when I took
my own kids swimming at Park Pool, the first thing I did before I got
in the water, was check that lifeguard wasn
’
t still there!
With my adrenalin pumping from the fight and the rollocking, my
thoughts did not return to Rachel Cookson until we were turfed out the
front entrance. Just as we hit the pavement, Ormskirk Parish Church
bells tolled for two o
’
clock and Jim
could not help himself saying,
“
The Bells! The Bells!
”
I administered a quick kick between Jim
’
s legs but did not stay
around long enough to see whether he shouted
“
The Balls! The Balls!
”
,
as I was running around Park Pool, into Coronation Park, to the glass
window round the back, where you could see into the swimming baths.
When I peered in, all I could see were a load of happy teenagers in the
“
big pool
”
and a lifeguard who was blowing his whistle more than a
referee in a Merseyside derby. My date had finished before it had begun.
I went back round to the front, picked a tearful Jim up off the pavement
and headed home.
Halfway to Ormskirk train station, we started scrapping again.
Once again, it was Jim
’
s fault. Nursing a s
ore nose and aching testicles,
you would have thought he would think before he spoke, but he just kept
opening that smug gob! I was walking to
the station distraught, I knew
I probably wouldn
’
t ever get a chance for a date with Rachel Cookson
again and for all I knew, maybe no girl would ever touch me with a
bargepole if they thought I had deliberately stood Rachel up. I decided
I would try to repair the damage at school on Monday with a grovelling
apology, but just as I was deciding what to say, Jim still dabbing his nose
with a tissue, piped up with a,
“
I still want that tenner, Richie
”
.
Jim
’
s nose bled worse second time around!
Patience was not a virtue I possessed. I couldn
’
t wait until Monday
as Rachel would have had to spend fort
y eight hours trying to figure
out what had happened to me, which just wasn
’
t right. I woke up on
Sunday morning, full of remorse, not fo
r my three separate attacks on
Jim, he deserved more than he got. He knew it too, because when we
got home, Mum spotted that his nose was bloodied and he said he had
been looking for his train ticket in his pocket and had walked into a
lamppost! My remorse was for letting Rachel down.
The tenner I had refused to give Jim was now put to use (part of it,
anyway). I took that crisp, brown and pink note out my moneybox and
headed down to Mitchells Mace, the local convenience store and bought
Rachel a box of orange Matchmakers. I then trudged the two miles to
her house, in the pouring rain, only to find that she wasn
’
t in. I had
forgotten her family were churchgoers, so would no doubt be out until
lunchtime. I managed to find a pencil in my jeans pocket, scribbled,
“
Sorry Rachel
”
on the Matchmakers box, left them in the porch and
headed home. At least on the way home, the clouds parted and the sun
came out, so I was able to dry off in the sunshine and started to feel
good about myself again.
On the Monday at school, Rachel and I kept an embarrassed
distance apart. I discovered from third party sources that Barry and
Rachel had witnessed the concluding scenes of the ear grabbing incident
from the safety of the little pool. Rachel had also arrived home from
church on Sunday, to find a box of melted Matchmakers in their sunny
porch! Apparently, she still thought I was
“
nice
”
but had decided I was
probably
“
too immature
”
for her. No doubt she was right!
It took me another three years to arrange another date, again it
was a group event, this time with Emilia Laudrup. Her father was
Danish and the boys nicknamed her
“
Danish Dynamite
”
, she was a
real sweetheart, fair haired, blue eyed and had the boys wrapped around
her little finger. It, therefore, appeared to be a major triumph when she
agreed to go to the Astra cinema in Maghull with me to see
“
Mask
”
.
When I arrived at the bus stop to meet he
r though, she had invited half
the girls in our class and Katie Robertson sat in between us during the
film. The gap between Emilia and I turned out to be a blessing as I
cried my eyes out when Rocky Dennis died at the end! We didn
’
t date
again, although I did phone her up a few times to ask, but it was in that
uncomfortable phase when my voice was breaking, resulting in my tones
varying between Olive Oi
l and Barry White, so I had lost my nerve well
before popping the
“
date
”
question. I soon gave up on Emilia Laudrup
and two further unsuccessful years followed. All in all, it c
an safely be
said that before I reached sixteen, my love life was either non-existent
or a complete disaster! I remember thinking on my sixteenth birthday,
though, that the tide was turning. For some bizarre reason, the image
of King Canute sitting on his throne, on the beach, as the incoming tide
splashed around him, now springs to mind!