James Kelman - Kieron Smith, Boy

But then at nighttime it came into yer head and ye saw the dark outside the curtains, it just came in yer head. If there were spirits, maybe they did not walk. How come they walked. They just would fly. That was all they needed was air because they were not flesh and blood with the thickness of bodies. They were wisps. Spirits were wisps and just in the breeze, floating this way and that, and it did not matter how high up ye stayed.

Spirits of yer loved ones, there was a space in between, after they breathed their last and before they got to up above. They had to spend their time on Earth to see ye were okay. That was Guardian Angels. If ye were going wrong and ye needed a guiding hand, so maybe ye had relatives that passed on, they were there to help ye. Oh see your path ahead it is straight and narrow.

Once they went up to Heaven that was them and ye would not see them again, no even if they were spirits. My grannie said, Oh son ye just pass to the other side.

But if the other side was not Heaven. If it was the bit in between, ye had to go there first, and then pass over after. In that first bit ye saw humans walking about but ye were a spirit and could not touch them. Yer spirit was suspended. So ye were dead and floated about and did good tasks, ye had to. Ye did not get to Heaven until ye finished them. Maybe ye had lived a bad life. No too bad or it was Hell. But just ye were not good enough for Heaven so God gave ye tasks and once ye done them that was you. Maybe if it was Fate or else whatever it was but ye could not get to Heaven till they were done, so yer spirit wandered the land maybe helping people, or if it was bad ones ye were haunting them. Imagine that, it was bad people and ye were to haunt them. Ye would even quite like that, hiding up closes and jumping out. Ye saw that it in ghost pictures. But it would be strict and serious till after a certain time it was okay, another Angel came down to tell ye or whatever it was, ye just knew deep down, if God said it inside yer head. So then yer time had come and now ye done the real pass over and it was up to Heaven. Ye got it in Hymns as well, Oh when we pass over, if we reach the other side, it is the far shore.

Protestants believed it as well as Catholics, then if the spirits talked to ye in Seance meetings where people brought back the dead. My grannie knew an old lady who went to them. Oh who is there, who is there. They all held hands and one person called out to the spirits. Identify yourself. Who are you who are you? Oh I am a spirit of the dearly departed and it is okay it is a beautiful place on the far shore we have guiding lights to lead us

It acted like magic but it was not magic. But there was a lot of fakers about. But some were true and a spirit came back if it was to tell ye something that was going to happen if ye did not watch it. Something horrible. It had to warn ye and was trying so hard to reach ye, if it was a special spirit from beyond the grave, Oh save me save me.

But then if evil ones were watching, just walking beside ye. Sometimes ye felt it going down the street, one was walking beside ye. Oh who is that? If it is a ghastly presence. People said that in books, Oh I felt it, it was a ghastly presence. And ye passed a close, Oh if they grabbed ye and pulled ye in.

But evil spirits do not murder ye. They cannot. Else they always would. If they did then you would be a spirit as well so you could fight them back. They would be scared of that. But when they killed ye they would escape. It is a split second till yer spirit leaves yer body. If ye could just get fast out it would be okay, but ye cannot. So then they escape and ye have to go looking for them. But how do ye find them if it is all just floating in the sky? Ye are doomed until ye do. Oh I am in torment, I cannot pass over until the Evil One is found.

Then ye find him and what do ye do because ye cannot kill him back, no if the two of yez are spirits, because that just makes more spirits, if spirits have spirits, or else if ye tell God on him. Except God knows already.

And if it is your own spirit, is it good or evil. Ye do not know until ye are dead. Have ye done good deeds? Good spirits come and help ye do good deeds so ye will become a good spirit yerself and go to Heaven.

Ye wanted to do good deeds. I thought about it in bed or what, sitting on the train, Oh imagine I am walking down the street and an old blind man is there and cannot cross over for the busy traffic. I will just run and help him. Or a wee wean is lost, so I would go into the woods or round the streets and there I find it and take it home, Oh it is Kieron Smith.

I done it if people locked themselves out, I just climbed the balcony, opened the window and let her in, except if ye got caught it was a doing off yer da and a row off yer maw. Oh Kieron I do not care if you are helping somebody, they should know better than to ask ye to climb a building, that is just an outright disgrace.

But if the woman was in sore bother cause she could not get in her house. Maybe she had a pot boiling or a frying pan burning. Chip pans caught fire, all the burning oil so then the house burned down. A woman up the next close to my grannie threw a basin of water on the chip pan and the burning oil all came out and went all everywhere and burnt the flesh off her bones. So if it was going to be a fire and ye stopped it, so it would be a good deed. Even if yer maw said it was not one ye would know it was. Then maybe another day ye were walking down the street and ye felt a presence, the wind blowing like a whisper and it is the breath of a good spirit floating beside ye, Oh well done, that was good helping that poor woman, you were brave going up the ronepipe.

Because sometimes it was slippery. I thought that too, if a good spirit was going with ye, maybe if it was granda, he had just passed over and was climbing with ye so it would not go wrong, just helping with yer grips. But what if it was a bad spirit? I used to think that. Oh what if it makes me put my foot in the wrong place. Or else my foot got jammed in between the ronepipe and the wall and I would topple back over, all my body except just my one foot stuck in. And I would be flapping my arms and just seeing my foot come out inch by inch till then I was falling. Maybe a bad spirit would make me do it. Or lift off my fingers if I was going up a tree, one floated up to get me and if it was reaching high and came to my fingertips and just lifted them off one by one by one, or if it was a ronepipe and ye were getting to the very top and the spirit just blew the wind and knocked ye off. So yer granda would be there, his spirit would come to yer rescue, maybe a breath of wind or a hard blowing wind, to stop ye hitting the ground heid first, ye would land one foot at a time, nice and soft, or else in a big pile of sacks and just get up and walk away, Oh that was lucky, and it would be, except if it was him, yer granda.