Robert Swindells: Daz 4 Zoe

Larry was hunched over, moaning and holding his arm. There was still no music, and everybody seemed to be watching us. The atmosphere of resentment was unmistakable: there was a sort of murmur, and I had the distinct feeling that the crowd was closing in on us. I was fuddled with the drink, I guess, but I remember thinking, this is it. We’ll never make the door. We’re gonna die. Tomorrow they’ll find the car, and maybe a shoe.

Then I saw him – the guy I’d been looking at all night. I never saw him arrive, but suddenly there he was and he said, ‘You better leave with me. Now.’ He didn’t pause but sort of walked through us, slipping his arm through Larry’s on the way past, helping him along.

We didn’t hang around.

So this crash com and Cal’s away, i open the door a crack and luck owt and its wot i fought. Subbys. i knew ther be trubble tonite wiv them in. Stanstareeson dunnit.

i luck and i fink, sod em. They blew it 4 me. Let em get topped. Then i seen the girl. The 1 i bin watching. She luck scairt. 2 hunnerd peeple want me ded, i luck scairt. i seen her and i cant let em do it. The uvvers i dont give a monkeys abowt but i cant let em top her.

Its a tuff 1 cos the peeples real mad and i gotta be cool. i go over nice and easy. i tork soft. i tell em you better leave wiv me now, nor i dont stop neever. i grab this fin Subby wots hurting and shov frou going hello Pete, hows fings Miz Stanton, givin em the big smile. And all the time i’m finking, we not gonna make it. Somfing gonna snap but noffing does and it seems a longtime and then were at the door.

i let go the fin Subby. Run, i sez. i know thay gorra motor near. Thay run. 3 of em. Not her. Run, i sez 2 her. Peeples coming, i sez. Lucking 2 her, 2 them, 2 her. Fanks, she sez, and she kiss my cheek quick and runs, i want 2 say somfing back but i dont know wot. Peeple shoving me. I showt somfing. You nice, i like you. somfing like that, but i dont fink she hears me. A motor starts. Dazzlers com on, moving. Shes away.

After, i cant beleeve i don it. Wot am i, a Subby or somfing? i got bags ov time 2 fink about it anall, cos i sure cant go back in the Blew Moon now. Peeple stairing and muttering.

Mick. He give me this luck like i kick him in the teef and then he turns and gos back in. Evry 1 else gos in 2. i’m on my tod. i luck arownd 4 Cal but no chance. Black streets. A dog far of. Some rain. Home then. Watch the box wiv our mam.

i’m not in Dred, our mam.

That’s nice, Daz.

i seen this Subby girl, our mam.

Forget her, Daz.

Not easy, our mam. Not easy.

It must’ve been the shortest Chippy trip ever. Ned kept his foot down all the way and we were back in Silverdale for nine-thirty. Nobody spoke to me till Tabby said g’night when they dropped me off, and it took her all her time to say that. I guess I shouldn’t have hung around when it was time to go but the guy had stuck his neck out for us, hadn’t he? I couldn’t just run off without saying anything.

Anyway, their being mad at me was the least of my worries right then. The worst thing was not being able to get the guy out of my mind. I kept seeing him in that doorway, holding everybody back while we got away. I tried telling myself he was just a Chippy and Chippies aren’t like us and all that sort of stuff, but it was no use. I knew he was a hero, even if he was a Chippy. He took our part and he’d suffer for it one way or another.

And it wasn’t only that. If it had been I could have handled it, but there was something else. It was like he’d gotten inside my head and I couldn’t get him out. His smile. I only saw it once across that crummy room, but it must’ve printed itself on my eyelids or something because every time I closed them there he was, smiling. I even saw him when my eyes were open. In fact if you want the truth I wasn’t seeing or thinking of anything else.

When I got in, Dad said ‘How was Alice?’

I had just enough sense left to realise my parents might smell the booze on me and I was heading straight for my room. ‘Fine,’ I said. ‘Sends her love.’ Mum gave me this puzzled look as I breezed by but I didn’t stop.

I made plenty of noise taking off my shoes and brushing my teeth so they’d think I was going to bed, but I didn’t. Not for ages. By a fantastic coincidence which you won’t believe, my window faces south, and what I did was, I stood for about three hours looking out. You can’t even see the city from my window but I stood there anyway, gazing south and thinking about him.

You don’t have to tell me. Crazy, right? I didn’t even know his name, but by the time I got into bed one thing had become very clear.

I had to see him again.

You have to understand that it was virtually impossible for a surburbanite to fraternise with a Chippy. People lived, worked and played inside their own suburb or moved at speed between suburbs, and from newtown to newtown. The only Chippies we saw were those who had passes to come into a suburb to work. They came in the mornings and left at dusk, and they did all the crummiest jobs – digging holes in the road, collecting trash, cleaning washrooms. A few were servants or gardeners in big houses, but they had to leave in the afternoon like the rest. You let a Chippy stay the night, he’ll rip off all your stuff and maybe cut your throat for an encore. Chippies’re envious, see. Full of hate. Even the lucky ones with jobs in the suburbs. Nobody’d even talk to a Chippy except to tell him what to do, and as kids we’d cross the street whenever we’d see one coming.

So that was the fix I was in. I couldn’t get this guy out of my mind and I had to see him again, but as far as I knew he didn’t have a pass, and I certainly couldn’t hope to get invited on another chippying expedition for some time. And even if I did, who’s to say they’d choose the Blue Moon? And if they did, why should he be there? He might use a different club every night, for all I knew.

I moped. I couldn’t eat. Couldn’t concentrate. I started avoiding company, and of course Mum noticed the change in me and mentioned it and I damn near bit her head off.

Finally I did what I always did when things got rough for me. I went and talked to Grandma.

She’s one hundred and four years old and she’s still got all her marbles. That’s not all that unusual in the suburbs, of course. If she’d been a Chippy she’d have been dead fifty years. She’s Mum’s grandma, not mine, and she sees things differently. I mean, everybody else I know feels more or less the same about most things. I could tell my parents about some problem I was having, or I could talk to one of the teachers at school or I could go to a preacher, and they’d all say the same things, and I’d know all the things they were going to say before they said them. Like, suppose I told about this Chippy guy, right? How I happened to meet him and how I couldn’t sleep and all that. Well, it wouldn’t matter who I was talking to, they’d start by saying I shouldn’t have been chippying in the first place, and then they’d tell me Chippies’re not like us – they don’t have the same feelings, so it’s a mistake to get emotionally involved with one. They’d say that of course any further contact between this guy and me was out of the question, and finish by telling me I wasn’t really in love anyway – I was too young. Somewhere along the way they’d probably ask me whose idea it was to go chippying, so my original problem would still be there and I’d have a new one because I refused to give them a name.