The Ned Wood Archive

Victims of a Love that Lost a lot in the Translation

I must be getting used to it.  I decided on the ride up to London that Mary was beyond me.  I enjoyed being around her, even though I really didn’t know her that well.  Maybe she enjoyed my company, but that was it for her.  I hadn’t done anything wrong, I wasn’t used to being treated this way, but then why should I get everything my way.

That night, Lil was having an end of term party.  Some of the old guys from school would be there.  I could let myself go.  

When I got to Lil’s place, I thought I’d put it all behind me.  I had enough time to get over it, because the guy who gave me a lift dropped me off at Clapham Common, which is miles from anywhere.  At least he dropped me off at the tube, but I still had to work out where I was and then get across to Ealing.

Billy reminds me of Mary.  I walked into Lil’s place and saw his landlady and stopped in my tracks.  Susie and Paulie, her girls run up, treating me like an old friend, soon distracting me.  Susie is the eldest, she must be getting on for seventeen.  Paulie is fifteen.  I thought she was Polly, but I had it explained at length that Paulie, which is short for Pauline is a far better name than Polly, on account of it is more boyish.  Anyway the way this other guy from Leigh or somewhere that stays with them says it, it sounds more like Polly than Paulie.  They’ve both cut their hair, both pretty short.  I’m sure Susie’s wasn’t black last time I saw it.  On her clear white cheek there’s a strange spot, like a dimple with a pin prick at the centre.  Billy tells me later that she came home from school one day with a safety pin in it.  It didn’t stay in long mainly because it hurt so much.

 “Don’t Listen to the Old BAAAAAAG”  says Susie, stressing the last word to make sure we all know this is a pet name not an insult.  They are both more confident this time.   They’ve aged a lot in five weeks.  I guess.  So have I.

Susie hangs around me all evening.  Stupid guy that I am, I don’t realise what’s going on until late that evening.  I’ve just got into bed, in the same room as a couple of the other guys.  We’re just about to turn the light out when Susie walks in.  She sits next to my bed and talks and talks.  I grab the sheets under which I’m naked.  I’m embarrassed. I’m too tired to even talk back, I just wish she’d go away.  Eventually she gets the picture, I maybe even nodded off in front of her.

The following day we were all like zombies.  Lil took me into town, which was getting busy for Christmas.  We went to see some film or other and the shops which were jazzed up for selling stuff.  Every so often we’d see somebody dressed or looking a little different.  That evening we went down to Chelsea.  Lil drove, and we took the girls so they could show us the sights.  We went cruising along the Westway,  level with the tenth floor of the flats, south through Shepherds Bush over to the World’s End, up the Kings Road, then after we’d had a bite to eat, we went across town by way of Oxford Street to Camden and Chalk Farm, where we saw the Roundhouse, which is, as you know, a famous RocknRoll venue.  After that we went round Regents Park, down to Euston Road, under the Westway to Portobello Road then back to Ealing.  All over the place, Susie and her sister would point out folk dressed in weird gear.  Folk dressed mainly in blacks, black T-shirts, black leathers, black hair, black makeup.  Or girls in skirts, so short they’d be no more than belts, and outrageous fishnet tights.  Or folk of both sexes with suits, short hair, and skinny ties.  Every so often we’d see some girl who’d really gone to town with blasts of bright colour: in her hair, in the make-up on the face, or in her clothes.  A lot of the stuff looked home made.  None of it looked like you’d see in Southampton which was all flares and tight shirts or sweaters.  London was full of weird mythical creatures.  Angels up on Primrose Hill or down on Hyde Park Corner.  Amazons walking the streets of Chelsea and Kensington.

Back at Lil’s place we grilled Susie about it but got nothing concrete from her – it seemed her mother got on to her about it too often, so she’d developed an attitude about being asked.  Maybe she was more hungover than the rest of us.  Still.  Maybe her self-inflicted dimple was bothering her.  Whatever it was, something was happening, something weird was going down out there.