Licking The Windows

Chapter Thirteen

2004-11-18T09:17:00.000Z

Monday 18th December 2000, Ryanair flight FR514, Stansted to Dinard, France. I sat toward the rear of the plane, looking out of the window. The English channel, cold and grey appeared and disappeared through the clouds. I didn’t know what was going to happen. The question of chemistry had arisen many times in our letters and it was a long way to go to find out we hated each other. I had told everyone I was going to visit Gary who now lived in Portsmouth. I didn’t want the inevitable questions and declarations of insanity. I’ve done some crazy things in my time, and this was yet another. I sat drinking my Miller Lite, two pounds for a can smaller than a standard coke. The beer cost more than the flight. Ninety nine pence each way.
My mind went back twenty two years to when I last saw Helene, how I had wished I had had the courage to kiss her then. No matter what happens I was going to kiss this girl. Number one priority. I had decided on that.
The seat belt light came on and the plane descended through the clouds. The north coast of Brittany came into view. Rough white crested waves threw themselves onto the rocks below. Everything was grey. The sea, the rocks, the clouds. It started raining. The plane banked right for the final approach. Then dropped to the runway. The cowls of the engines opened up and moved back to create reverse thrust, and sent up huges plumes of spray off the tarmac. The engines roared. As we taxied to the terminal. I saw for the first time how small l’aeroport de Dinard really was.
My heart started beating faster. My stomach tied itself in knots. I’d arrived in France I was here for three days no matter what. No matter what happened between Helene and I. Passengers started moving and reaching up to the lockers above the seats. The air was a mass of moving bags and coats. Taking my turn I got off the plane down the steps and across the tarmac to customs. Light misty rain came down and it was already gloomy, just three days before the shortest day.
Collecting my bag I went through the gate to the arrivals lounge. I looked around the waiting crowd. People greeted each other kissing and hugging. And then I saw her. Standing by the far wall with her hands behind her back. Not running toward me, not waving, just standing there smiling waiting for me to find her just like she did all those years ago. She hadn’t changed. I walked up to her.
"Hello."
"’ello." she replied softly.
"I’m here."
"Yes you are ‘ere."
"God! This is awkward.....There’s something I must do Helene."
"Yes what is it?" she said looking round, wondering what I’d forgotten.
"It’s this." I reached out and cupped her face with my hands and kissed her lips. She threw her arms round me and held me tight. "You’re shaking Helene."
"I know. I can’t ‘elp." She didn’t say anymore she just stood there holding me, her head buried in my shoulder. I held her closely, stroking her hair, waiting for her to stop trembling. After twenty five years and seven months, I finally had Helene in my arms. She was still petite and slim. Her hair much shorter. She wore a long brown coat over a long brown woollen dress and a bright silk scarf round her neck. Shewore perfume thick sweet and heavy. She looked up at me and I kissed her again. It had to be done.
"Well we can’t stay here forever." I said eventually, "where are we going?"
Helene let go of me. Wiped her eyes and composed herself. "Shall we eat? I know a nice restaurant near here at Dinan."
"That sounds good." I picked up my bag and followed her to her car. A small white Citreon AX. In the back was her small dog. Mendy. It jumped up and down at the window barking excitedly. Helen opened the car and I got in.Mendy jumped on me straight away licking my face and wagging it’s tail.
"She likes you."
We drove to Dinan not saying a word. Everyso often we’d catch each other looking across and turn away. But I had to look at her just as she had to look at me.
The restaurant was at the bottom of a steep hill almost a cliff, overlooking the sea. We chose a table near the huge panoramic windows and sat down staring at the view. We looked at each other, embarrassed with the silence, Helene laughed nervously "So!" she said.
"So!" I felt stupid, after all the months planning this trip, all the letters, I couldn’t think of anything to say. The ice had to be broken. "What shall we order?" I said picking up the menu. Helene chose a sea food dish, I chose steak.
"Ah ah! It’s a choice for a man.""I don’t like sea food much."
"You can not live in Brittany and not eat sea food. I will show you one day ‘ow good it is."
"And I’ll show you....... what shall I show you.........." I tailed off trying to think of some nice english food.
"...that the food in England is not good?" suggested Helene.
"well I don’t eat much English food. It’s all italian and indian and chinese."
"So it’s true English food is bad."
"Well you eat frogs and snails, how bad is that?"
"I never eat that." and she looked at me indignantly before laughing. From that moment we never stopped talking. In the years that followed there was never any awkward silences, we always had something to say to each other, and when we were silent it was never awkward, just a warm contentment with being comfortable with someone. Sometimes we didn’t need words, sometimes just a look told me everything I needed to know.
After the meal we walked back the car. The rain was falling like a mist. Helene opened the door and Mendy jumped out and ran around excitedly. We got in.
"What about your dog?"
"Mendy? She comes back in un moment when she’s ‘ad a run. .....So!" and she sat straight up in her seat, hands folded in her lap. Waiting. I kissed her.
Mendy jumped up at the door which Helene opened and let her in. Only to run around the car with wet paws. "I must tell you. Do not touch my handbag when Mendy is in the car."
"What this one?" I said turning and picking up her brown leather shoulder bag which had a purple silk handkerchief knotted round the strap. Mendy growled. I patted her on the head and sliding my hand down her muzzle grabbed her and gently shook her head.
"No one can do that. except me. My dog protects me. Kiss me." I move to kiss her and Mendy stood up and growled. "She doesn’t even let my ‘usband kiss me."
"That’s lucky."
"Oui she is my lucky dog."
We drove the two and a half hours to the south coast of Brittany, through many small villages and dark country roads. I looked at everything in Helenes car. her cassettes her map books, bit’s of paper, toys in the back and she sat there smiling.
"You are curious? No?"
"Inquisitive." I replied.
"What is inquisitive?"
"Curious. I like to see things. I like to look." Helen always found it amusing that I had to look at everything, I wasn’t being nosey so much as I had a desire to know as much as possible. The more I looked about her car the more I knew about this girl. I found out what music she listened to in her car. My music, tapes I’d sent her. Shopping receipts told me what she liked to eat. We finally arrived at the Hotel in her town and booked into the room she’d reserved for me. We went up the stairs. Helene, being claustrophobic, refused to use the lift. I opened the door and stood back to let her in. She stepped in a couple of feet and stopped looked round. Into the bedroom she looked everywhere inspecting the table, the curtains, TV, patted the bed, ran her fingers along a shelf and finally shrugged and said "it’s OK." as if to no one particular. She turned to me "You know I ‘ave just one hour and I ‘ave to feed my children."
I had nothing to loose. I’d come this far so I held her and said "We’d better go to bed then."
She said nothing, just looked at me carefully then turned to close the curtains. "one minute." she whispered and went to the bathroom, from where she called "Mikel. Turn off the light." I undressed and got into bed and waited. I could see her come out of the bathroom, her slim naked body silvery grey in the darkness. Quickly she jumped into bed and pulled the covers up tight round her neck.
She lay there straight on her back her hands holding the covers round her neck. She was waiting. Not saying anything. I lay on my side looking at her, trying to take it all in. I hadn’t even set eyes on this girl for over twenty years and now after just a few short hours were were in bed together. It shouldn’t be happening but it was. It was all predestined. It was as inevitable as night follows day. The bond we had all those years before had not been broken. She turned her head to look at me and smiled. I wanted to tell her so much, I wanted to share my thoughts with her, but sometimes words are not necessary. I reached over, pulled her close, and kissed her. She wrapped her arms round me and we made love.
Finally she got up a started dressing her initial shyness now gone. She turned the light on and side by side we both dressed.
"I must go ‘ome now. My children will be waiting." she said pulling on her long brown dress and wriggling her hips and pulling the creases out. "I will be back for you at three in the morning."
"Three?"
"Yes of course, I ‘ave to work you know, and you will help me."
"But three in the morning?"
Her eyes sparkled and she grinned broadly "I must have time to kiss you good morning."
"That works for me."
"No you will be ‘elping me, I don’t work for you."
"No your idea of having time to kiss before work. it’s a good idea."
"Of course I am French."
"And what am I?"
"You are my stupide Anglais...... I need the code to the ‘otel."
"Code?"
"They lock the doors and you need a code to get in during the night, we’ll get the code downstairs before I leave." she pulled on her shoes and stood up, put on her scarf and coat smoothed herself down and "ready."
I pulled a comb out of my back pocket. "Wait Helene. I need to do this." I started combing her hair, she let me, she stood with her arms hanging down by her side, "You have the apres sex look." I told her.
"Only with you." she laughed.
I walked her down the stairs to the hotels reception to get the pass code, then to her car. She got in and with a wave was gone. It was eight in the evening and it was dark, cold and quiet out on the street.

Chapter Eleven

2004-11-13T09:18:00.000Z

"How much money have we got left?"
"What you mean apart from the loose change?" Gary looked over at me squinting in the low afternoon sun.
"Well yes." I said.
Gary opened the money belt round his waist. It was unnecessary really, because we both already knew the answer. "In total. Fuck all!" He said after making a theatrical show of searching through the pocket.
"Hmmm thought so." He zipped up the money belt. We sat silent a while. Watching the pigeons and the tourists wandering about the square below. "We didn’t really think this through too well did we?"
"But that was the idea. We travel on a wing and a prayer."
"More of a prayer, I reckon." We sat silent some more. Thinking.
Suddenly Gary slapped his legs, stood up and said "Well there’s no point just sitting here. We’re in Italy with no money left. We’ve got to get back to England before we starve to death. So as I see it, the sooner we get going the better. Before we are reduced to begging in the streets or stealing. We’ve been in enough trouble already. What do you say dude?"
"Sounds good to me. A mad dash across Europe non-stop. I can see the headlines ‘Two students in mercy dash across Europe" it’ll be front page news, we’ll be famous. How far is it do you think?"
"Fucked if I know. But it’s a long walk home."
The idea of having no money was no longer a problem. It was now a challenge.
We caught a train to Venice. Stopped off, whilst waiting for a connection to Milan, to see the canals and gondoliers, bought more milk. It was all we could afford. We drank it leaning over the side of a small stone bridge that spanned a narrow canal. Later I spotted that same bridge being crossed by Harrison Ford in ‘Indiana Jones and the last Crusade’. It’s not a claim to fame, but.....
"I’ve been there. I’ve stood in that exact spot."
Back to the station we caught the train to Milan, the next train to Zurich was departing in the next few minutes so we boarded without even leaving the station.
"I’ve decided Milan is a great place." I said.
"We never saw Milan."
"That’s not Milans fault, I think we should give Milan the benefit of the doubt. I’m sure we would have loved it if we had had time to stay and visit."
"OK You’re right, it’s better to leave with a good impression than stay and get arrested again. Then hate it for the rest of our lives."
The train, the first since England we’d been on that didn’t have corridors and compartments, took us through Northern Italy and up north into the Alps and on to Zurich. From Zurich we caught the overnight train to Frankfurt.
Totally exhausted we settled down in our compartment. We hadn’t slept since Naples when we had woken early. Sleep crept upon us like a thick blanket muffling all sounds.
We woke the next morning. The train was pulling into Dusseldorf.
"Gary?"
"Yes?"
"We’re in Dusseldorf."
"You’re kidding."
"No really. Look." and I pointed to the signs on the platform.
"Shit we must have past Frankfurt hours ago, we’ve overshot."
"Overslept. Time to get off." We grabbed our bags and climbed down onto the platform. Gary was already consulting our international timetable, our travelling bible.
"There’s a train for Frankfurt leaving from platform three."
"When?"
He looked at his watch. "Now!"
We looked through the window of the train we had just got off and out the other side to see our return train on the opposite platform. Looking down the platform we saw we were miles from the gate. The whistle blew and the flag waved.
"We’ll miss it. We’ll never run down the platform in time."
"I know, so..............." Gary picked up his rucksack and boarded the train we’d just got off. "......Come on." he shouted.
"What? we’ve just got off and it’s going in the wrong ..............."
But Gary was already opening the opposite door to jump onto the tracks. I followed. Our train started to move, Gary reached up and opened the door. Trackside. A guard spotted us running alongside the train and shouted, but was too far away to stop us. We threw our rucksacks onto the train and climbed on board.
"Well that was easy." said Gary flopping down in a seat. "Back to Frankfurt."
It was early afternoon when our train finally arrived in Frankfurt. Then there was the long walk through the streets to Alans flat.
We presented ourselves at the door. Alan took one look at us.
"Christ! You two are filthy."
"Yes. We’re a bit sticky from travelling."
"A bit sticky? When did you last wash?"
"Athens. We were really clean then." It seemed stupid to say we last washed in a particular city or we last ate somewhere in Italy, but that’s how it was.
Gary went for a bath first. I sat, suddenly uncomfortable that I was filthy. I hadn;t noticed before how bad we smelt. I could feel the dirt on my face and in my hair. My filth was obvious. My embarrassment grew. Gary called from the Bathroom.
"Hey Alan, have you plenty of hot water?"
"Yes why?"
"The bath water is filthy and I haven’t even used the soap yet. There’s a scum line already."
We had two baths each. One to get the worst off and the second to actually get clean.
With our clothes washed and a few good meals inside us. We set off for England. Via Paris.
"Well this is it." said Gary when we got to Paris. We were sitting on a bench by the side of the Seine. "Decision time." he continued, "This is where we split up and go our separate ways, or we go back to England together."
"It’s difficult. I hate leaving Helene like that. I want to see her again but........."
"No money and her Father."
"More like her Father. I can get by with no money. But I don’t think I can face him again so soon."
"Fair enough, the next train for Calais leaves in thirty minutes, we’d better be on it."
We rushed to the station and boarded the train with minutes to spare.
At Calais we boarded the Ferry. An English Ferry full of English crew and people who spoke English. For a short while it seemed odd to hear our native tongue spoken around us. I didn’t know how to feel as we got on the ferry. Was our trip a success? Were we running away? Had we been defeated. No we had over come all the obstacles. We had both lost weight. But we’d survived. We’d starved and slept on trains in corridors, on seats and in luggage racks. We were tired. It seemed like we had lived on milk for a month. Now we were on the ferry we felt safe for the first time in ages. We were still in France, but being on the Ferry was as good as being home.
We arrived back at Dover. For the first time in weeks we didn’t expect to be arrested. we could relax, we were home was safe and sound. Nothing else could possibly go wrong. Everything was familiar, comforting, people spoke English. It didn’t matter what happened now. We were back in England. We caught first train to London then on to Marylebone Station for the final leg to Aylesbury. We didn’t speak much on that last journey. It was a time of reflection, personal thoughts on what we had gone through. My own regret of what had happened with Helene. We had our whole lives in front of us and it was taken from me. I didn’t even get to kiss her. Shit! That was the one thing that I regretted most. She was my best friend and I didn’t even kiss her. How I had longed to take her in my arms and hold her and tell her I loved her then kiss her. I had been waiting for the right moment, but I’d waited too long. A twelve bore shotgun saw to that. I went through the agonies of replaying moments with Helene, if only I had done this or done that. If only we had played by the rules of rural Brittany. If only they had told us the rules. If only ...... if only..... My mind was cast back to when I was only four and a family friend, a farmer, Mr Webster took me to one side and said "It’s that little if. You don’t want to be worrying about that little if, because it’s done with, you can’t do nowt about it.You just carry on. A lot of people say things about that little if but it don’t do them no good."
We arrived in Aylesbury. Gary’s house was a mere ten minutes walk.
"I’d better get home." I said after refusing his invite back to his place. "I need to sleep in my own bed."
"OK" he said, "Great trip though wasn’t it?" but he was too tired himself to be overly enthusiastic in the way he said it.
"Yeah Brilliant it’s been great." but the words fell awkwardly.They didn’t have the sincerity. I was too tired to care.
I caught the bus from Aylesbury to my home village of Wendover. It’s six miles. I was almost home. My mood was getting better with each mile. Stoke Mandeville came and went. Then Worlds End. Followed very quickly by Wendover village. The bus stopped at every stop I was geting impatient. I wanted my family. I wanted to be in my own bed. I wanted a bowl of weetabix. I was so close now I began to feel triumphant in my return, I had survived against all the odds. Everyone would be overjoyed to see me for the first time in over a month. What tales I would tell my family. I couldn’t wait. A good meal, tell my stories and then sleep in my own bed. I got off the bus outside the Rose and Crown and exhausted, I walked the last fifty yards to my house. But something was very wrong. There was no car outside. No curtains at the windows. I looked in. It was empty. Deserted. No furniture. Nothing. It was an empty shell.
"Shit! Where is everyone?"
There was a letter pinned to the front door.
"Mikel. We have sold up and moved to Peterborough. Our new address is below. Catch up with us when you are ready.........................."
"Fuck! Fuck! Fuck! That’s all I need." I could have wept. Gary was safely tucked up in the bosom of his family and I was still on the road. What to do now? By now my energy spent and totally demoralised I staggered to my friend Steve’s house.
He opened the door. "Shit! Mike you look terrible."
"I need to sleep." I said and tumbled into his doorway.
"Your folks moved last week. Did you see Helene?"
"Not now Steve." I wanted to cry. I was so tired. My spirit was crushed. I had nothing left to give.
"Come on buddy we’ll find you a bed."
I don’t remember much after that. He and his mother put me to bed and I slept fourteen hours.
The next day after a good breakfast I hitch hiked to Peterborough. All I had was an address. It took hours. Each lift getting me closer to a home I didn’t know. IN Peterborough I found my way to the bus station, which used to be the Cattle market, but which is now the site of the Crown Courts. It was all new to me.I wandered up and down the buses asking each driver in turn if they were going to Paston. Eventually one said he was going near. He’d tell me when to get off. I travelled unfamiliar streets and roads that are now very familiar to me but then weren’t. The bus stopped.The driver leant round from his cab and said "This is your stop mate. See that footpath across the road? Go through there and go straight on turn right at the end and you’ll be home."
But it wasn’t home. It wasn’t my home. It was my parents new home. It wasn’t MY home. I was a visitor. It was just another stepping stone on my journey through life.
"Oh hi Mike. So you made it here then? Give me a lift with this settee, will you, I want it put over there." said my mother. She’s always moving furniture. No one had even noticed I hadn’t been there. Or was that just a ploy? No fuss, no triumphant return. I was home.

END OF PART ONE

Chapter Ten

2004-11-10T23:37:00.000Z

I woke up on the top deck of the ferry. The sun was already high and people ran about and leant over the rails. Reaching out a hand from my sleeping bag I woke Gary who was laid nearby.
"Time to wake up."
"No it isn’t. It’s too early." he mumbled.
"We’re pulling into port."
"It’s an Island on the way. Let me sleep."
"Don’t you want to see it?"
"Seen one island, seen them all." he muttered.
"What Island is it?" I persisted.
"Corfu, Tenerife what do I care?"
"It must be Corfu."
I didn’t expect it to be so green. I scrambled out of my sleeping bag and went to the railings.The morning sun sparkled in the water. Everything was crystal clear and beautiful. It was great to be alive. Helene was a lifetime away. We had been so far and done so much.
Crowds of people gathered on the deck weighed down with Rucksacks and cases, waiting to get off. Full of envy I wanted to get off too and go and swim in that crystal clear water. But we were on a mission. A mission to get back to England before the money ran out. Staying in Corfu would deplete our scant resources even further.
The ferry docked at Brindisi later that day. Near the harbour was a small corner shop selling Pizza. Pizza in big rectangular metal trays. Sold by the kilo. We ordered two kilos of Pizza and then walked with it to a wine shop where we bought a bottle of Italian red. Chianti.
In a small piazza we sat and ate. High buildings surrounded it on all sides. Buildings with balconies and washing hanging from the railings. Old men sat on benches talking. Leaning forward on walking sticks positioned between their legs. Children ran about playing and we sat on the wall of a small fountain in the centre eating our Pizza and drinking the red wine. Full up with pizza and red wine. It was time to sleep again. We’d blown a lot of money on the ferry and couldn’t risk wasting anymore on another hotel so we walked to the Station and caught a train to Naples. We were used to sleeping on trains by now. The rythm and the movement and that, by now, familiar compartment smell, lulled us to sleep. We were used to being woken to show our railcards. We did it in our sleep. The next morning only a vague memory of a conductor remained. All conductors were the same.
The train arrived at Naples early in the morning and we decided to go straight to Pompei. It was shut. Six o’clock and aready it was getting warm, insects buzzed in the morning air. Everything was still. The long spring grass was already starting to turn brown in the sun. We kicked up and down the dusty road. Sending up little clouds of dust as we scuffed our feet. Then we lay in the grass chatting. It seemed odd to be just sitting on the side of the road, far from home at this early hour. I imagined what I would have been doing if I was at Helenes farm. Listening to the cows waiting to be milked. Waiting for Helene to come skipping out of her front door to greet us. She’d be smiling, full of life. But this was Italy, six in the morning on the side of a road. It was surreal, we were just sitting there waiting, not going anywhere, not travelling. We were just, at this place and time, being.
At seven the gates to Pompeii opened. We had the place to ourselves. We walked the streets of Pompeii, looked in doorways read the tourist information boards. But what really caught my attention were the lizards scurrying about the walls, the butterflies flitting about, the flowers growing through the cobbles of the streets, I saw life all around me. I knew what Pompeii was of course, an almost perfectly preserved town that had been buried by ash from a volcano. It was a monument to death and disaster. A time capsule capturing that moment when the town ceased to exist under an apocolyptic avalanche of burning pumice. But here was life all around me, and I marvelled at it all. The ruins meant nothing. Life carries on no matter what. Helene was gone now, my dream of Helene in ruins, life had carried on.
By the time we had finished our tour of the lizards and insects, coachloads of tourists began to arrive. A whole sea of humanity, dressed in sun hats, holiday shirts, short trousers and sandals, all chatting and laughing amongst themselves and full of expectancy and excitement about ticking off another from their list of "must do’s". And then all going to the souvenir shop to buy postcards, pencils they’ll never use and key rings. I bet they never notice the lizards.
We sped on northwards.
Rome. The centre of civilisation. Pennies in the fountain.
"Let’s see the colloseum." I suggested.
"Why?"
"It might be interesting."
"It’s a ruin. It’s falling down. How can you tell what it is? It might collapse on us while we’re walking round." I could tell he was joking.
"Philistine. What do you want to see?" I said.
"The Vatican." Gary pronounced.
"Since when did you get yourself any religion?"
"I didn’t. But you never know, we may get inspired."
"What and become born again Christians or summat?"
"How can you be born again? You never believed in the first place."
"Did you?"
"Not as I can remember, although I did go to church."
"Actually I did too. Mother and Father would send us to Church on Sunday mornings and from there we had to go to Sunday school."
"They didn’t go to Church with you then?" asked Gary.
"No they went to the evening service instead."
"You know what that was all about don’t you?"
"What?"
"The Sunday morning shag of course. Get the kids out the house and voila! ‘s’easy."
"I never thought of that. I bet they never went to church in the evening either. I bet they went to the bar."
"Now we’re getting to the bottom of it. You see religion is a tool. It always has been. In the beginning they used it to scare the shit out of people keep them under the thumb, with stories of hell and damnation, fire, floods and pestilence. Now it’s to get a shag on Sunday morning without worrying that the kids are going to come rushing in mid stroke."
"Your logic is impeccable Gary. Why hasn’t anyone else thought of that?"
"It takes a genius." he said blowing on his finger nails and buffing them on his shirt. "Any thing else you need to know about religion, just ask me. But I’ll tell you one more thing about sex and religion."
"What’s that?"
"Vaseline."
"What about it?"
"Well did you know Vaseline is the favoured sexual product of the Athiest?"
"Is it? I can guess what they use it for but why particularly for athiests?"
"well being as Athiests don’t send their children to church they have to put Vaseline on the bedroom door knob and to keep the kids out."
"OK let’s go to the Vatican. find us some religion." I said.
We walked up the steps to the Vatican and went in. As usual the Americans were there, chandelier with Pentax and Nikons. And despite the stern warning on the signs "Strictly no photography" they were using flash.
We ignored them and stood amazed in the centre of the Cathedral. Shafts of light beamed down through the darkness illuminating a statue of the virgin Mary. Even for non believers like us it was a beautiful sight. The floor was scrupulously clean and shone like a mirror. There was a hush, the only sounds were distant shuffling of feet, occasional scraping of a chair leg on the floor, the creak of a pew being sat on and the distinctive phut followed by that high pitched whine of a camera flash.
I turned to Gary "They’re really pushing their luck with that flash gun."
The Americans had no such worries, rules were there to be ignored, after all they were American. The greatest power on the earth. Rules didn’t apply to them they were exempt.
Gary nudged me "Looks like they have pushed their luck too far now. Here come the Vatican guards."
Two of the Vatican Guard dressed smartly in their medieval uniforms marched toward the Americans from a far corner. We stopped and watched, if we had been religious we’d have been thanking God that the Americans had finally got their come uppance.
We stared in disbelief as the two guards marched straight past the Americans and continued in OUR direction.
The two guards aproached us. "Bonjourno." we said smiling.
"You must leave." There was no pleasantry, no returning of our smiles or greetings.
"What! Why?"
"No photography."
What is the matter with these people. Have we got a fucking label stuck to us saying "arrest us now, we’re trouble"?
"But we don’t even have a camera." I held my hands out for them to see. "NO CAMERA!"
"No photography. We see you."
Did you fuck as ever see us.
"It wasn’t us it was the Americans." Gary pointed to the group of Americans walking across the nave.
"You must leave. Now!" .
They grabbed us and pushed us toward the door.
"I want to speak to the Pope."
"You are leaving."
"We demand to speak to the Pope." It was a ridiculous thing to say, but we were innocent. As usual, young and easy targets. After a while you learn accept the status quo. This is how it is. This is life. It’s all part of growing up. A rite of passage. You are young you are the target. You get older and things change. WE were marched to the front door and firmly shown the way out.
We sat on the steps outside the Cathedral. Things couldn’t get any worse.

Chapter Nine

2004-11-10T08:32:00.000Z

Tired, filthy and desperately hungry, our first priority, get something to eat. The station cafeteria sold sandwiches we bought some and more Milk. Still with cartons of milk in our hands we went to the tourist information desk and asked if they knew of a cheap hotel. The girl behind the desk looked at us with pity. She said she knew a place that would suit us very well, and it was not far from the Station. She gave us a map and highlighted the street corner the hotel could be found. It was all in Greek so we had to count the junctions on the map to find the hotel. Which was when we had found it in a back street, small and dusty. We asked for a room. Despite our pitiful means we had to get a good nights sleep. They had only one room left, on the ground floor, with a single double bed. We took it.
"We’ve got to sleep in the same bed. I must tell you right now I’m not queer."
"Who gives a shit. All I want to do is sleep."
We fell onto the bed and slept.
We woke up several hours later and went to reception. "Can we get a shower here?"
The receptionist bored and scruffy, looked up from his newspaper."Yes. The shower is on the first floor."
So we grabbed our towels and went upstairs to the first floor. The shower room was huge covering almost the entire first floor and tiled floor to ceiling in white tiles. In the corner sat two hippies, one playing guitar and the other flute. They seemed an anachronism in this time of punk music. They had the kaftans, the beads, the long hair and beards, and large floppy hats. The only things missing were the joss sticks and the Joints. Opposite the hippies were the showers, a line of six shower heads above a slightly lowered trough in the floor.
We stripped off and got under the showers. We stood there listening to the music and letting the water wash the dirt of days travel from our bodies.
I had my eyes shut. I washed my hair. I rinsed under the shower and opened my eyes. Two girls had walked into the shower. they were stripping off. Dropping their clothes to the floor they stepped forward. They stood under the shower heads next to us and started washing. Oh my God! They were lovely. perfect bodies and the soap running down them. I turned to the corner as I realised I was having a reaction to this sight. And the two hippies playing music just carried on.
Gary turned to me and said "When in Rome........."
"But we’re in Athens." I joked. "Rome is next week."
There were two lovely girls naked next to us in the shower, but it didn’t matter, they didn’t care so why should we? We certainly didn’t care.
They had perfect breasts. And the soap bubbles running down their bodies just stayed momentarily in their pubic region. No reason to get excited. We are all children of God. Equal in the eyes of the lord. Nothing to be ashamed of. Hell! I was nineteen. I was desperate. Lord give me strength! And the hippies played.
We had a long shower, long enough to stay and admire the scenery. Eventually the girls turned off the water above them and dried their hair. With towels over their heads, we could just relax and watch them. For two desperate nineteen year olds it was a dream come true. We stood there in our reverie, until the girls, seemingly oblivious to our presence wandered off to their room. The hippies didn’t miss a beat.
"Wow!" said Gary eventually, "Athens is a great place to visit."
"It sure is," I said still staring at the now empty doorway. "It sure is."
Now totally refreshed after our sleep and the shower. We left the hotel to satisfy another essential of life. Several long cold beers. After which we strolled up the hill to the Parthenon.
We spotted two couples of aging Americans walking at the top, the men wearing straw hats, Hawaiian shirts, striped shorts, white socks and black shoes.
Gary couldn’t resist it. "Say American huh?"
"Gee. That’s right. You guys from the US of A?"
"No we’re English."
"NO kidding. We were in London England just two weeks ago."
"Small world huh?"
"Say, do you know a guy called Smith?"
"What?"
"He’s an old buddy of mine. You must know him."
"Has he two arms and two legs, eyes above his nose and a mouth below. Yeah I know him."
"Your English humour kills me."
"If only."
We wandered off to annoy some more Americans.
We stayed the night at the hotel having two more showers in the hope of a repeat performance. But the hippies had gone and so had the girls. We hadn’t been this clean for weeks.
The next day we got bored. Itching to travel again.
"Well we’re not going back the way we came." I said. "The only way is forward."
"We’re in Greece there’s nowhere else to go other than back through Yugoslavia. Unless we catch the ferry."
"Can we afford the ferry to Italy? I really don’t want to go back to Yugoslavia."
"Then we catch the ferry." Gary no more wanted to go back to Yugoslavia than I did. We caught the train for Petras. And boarded the Ferry that was going to take us over the Ionian see and into the Adriatic, overnight. No cabin, we booked economy. Foot passengers. The sun was low on the horizon when the Ferry slipped from the harbour. We stood on deck relishing the cool sea breeze and watched Greece disappear in the distance.

Chapter Eight

2004-11-09T19:41:00.000Z

We returned to the Station. Platform three was crowded with people waiting for the train. The people in the first carriage were still there, sitting smugly in their seats.
The crowd of people suddenly moved. No where in particular. The crowd just moved, it was a purposeful move. A sort of pulse. We looked up to find out why. A train was pulling into the platform with two more carriages. So we moved as well with the crowd. Jostling for position. Not being too pushy, but subtly getting a better starting point to get on the train. The train got closer and slowed down. Already people were climbing on board and blocking the doorways. Meanwhile on the tracks, another crowd of people were climbing through the windows from the opposite side. It was all planned. The blocking tactics and the windows. We didn’t stand a chance. We just stood and watched as sheep and goats were pushed through the opened windows, and whole families climbed in and claimed the compartments as their own. No sooner had they sat down, they opened hampers of food and drink and started eating.
I turned to Gary "We’re doing something wrong here."
"Yeah we’d better change our tactics. Stop playing the nice guy, or we wont get out of Belgrade."
Half and hour later and two more carriages arrived. Determined to get on the train we pushed and shoved. But again we didn’t stand a chance. The big guys blocking the doorways and the families climbing through the windows. People grabbed our rucksacks, and pulled us back.
"This is ridiculous. We don’t stand a chance, there’s only two of us."
There were now five carriages full, and still the crowd waiting got bigger. Finally at nine o’clock, eight more carriages arrived and were shunted into position. We ran for a door. We were going to get on this train if it killed us. Pushing, shoving and generally ignoring all our English training of politeness and reserve, we climbed aboard. But it was standing room only. In the corridor.
"At least we’re on the train." I said.
"Yeah but it’s more than a days train ride to Athens. We can’t stand all the way. There isn’t even room to sit on the floor." said Gary
"Do you want to stay in Belgrade?"
"I never said that." and he grinned at me, "We’re outa here. One way or another."
At nine thirty precisely the train pulled away from Belgrade station. Immediately people started relaxing and settling down. We found then, we had enough space to sit on the floor. But it was hot. We alternated sitting on the floor with hanging our heads out the window. In the compartment opposite us was a family. A peasant family, mother, father, grandmother and Aunty and several children. The women all wore long dark dresses and head scarves. About their feet were wooden crates containing hens. They were opening a hamper of food and passing out chicken legs, bread that was wrapped in checked cotton cloth and opening bottles of wine. I realised then, how hungry I really was. A litre of milk had not been enough.
Months earlier at "The hole in the wall" Waterloo, Gary and I had the idea of deliberately not planning our trip. We had heaped scorn and ridicule on those who had planned every day in detail and had itemised every stop and every hotel. We had decided just to go with the flow. We were not going to plan anything. I guess we were just too lazy to do anything difficult, like actually book a hotel in advance. We were going to go where ever the fancy took us. But so far that had meant sleeping on trains. Climbing onto luggage racks, sleeping in corridors and being woken regularly by people trying to pass.
We spent the day travelling south through Yugoslavia writing lyrics to songs for our next great album "Crud on the tracks", a tribute to Bob Dylan. I was the guitarist and Gary played Keyboard. But we were crap. The only gig we’d ever played in our band was at a village hall in rural Oxfordshire. We were so bad the audience rioted. Letting off fire extinguishers, and climbing on the roof, ripping slates off, and throwing them to the ground. The police were called and the show was over. "The sensational seborrheoic seven." The only punk group to feature songs from Rogers and Hammerstein. It was an angle. We were crazy then.
I thought of Helene’ "Shit shit shit!"
"What’s the matter?"
"I’ve blown it with Helene."
"What’s to blow?"
"She’s fabulous, and I’ll never see her again."
"You never even kissed her. Not one snog. So what are you complaining about?"
"She’s.........." I stopped. I couldn’t find the words to explain. Not words that Gary would appreciate or even sympathise with.
"She’s history. There’s plenty more girls to shag."
"Helene is not just a shag." I said indignantly "She’s better than that."
"Whatever."
"No, really. She’s my best friend. I feel complete when I’m with her."
"So lets get this straight. You are basing this on a few days five years ago, and three days just now, and she is your perfect girl? Get real Mikel. Did she ever do or say anything to give you the impression you stood one iota of a chance?"
"She didn’t have to. It’s just a feeling I have. When I’m with her........."
"You’re kidding yourself."
We sat silent. Swaying with the rhythm of the train. No one would ever understand how close I felt to Helene. It’s true we had never kissed or said anything to make each other aware of each others feelings. But I knew in my heart there was something.
The day turned into evening and darkness fell. We were dieing on our feet. And still the train carried on. The family opposite us were starting their evening meal. I fancied they had never stopped from their original meal. Everytime I looked in their direction the Mother was handing out some sort of morsel to one or the other of the children and family. I was getting more and more hungry. It was torture they were so close, just a sliding door separated us from food. I felt faint. I was in a daze. There was nothing to see out the windows anymore. It was blackness outside. And we were still heading South.
"Hello." said a girls voice.
I looked up. Two girls stood in front of us. They weren’t English. Just that one word told me as much.
"Why are you standing here?" said the taller of the two girls. She had long blond hair, she was beautiful and was very slim.
"There’s nowhere to sit" I said.
"We have our own compartment at the back of the train." said the other girl, slightly shorter with short dark brown hair and a cute round face.
"But it’s full."
"No we really have our own compartment. Why don’t you come and join us?"
"OK."
We introduced ourselves, the tall girl was Sidi and the shorter one Grethe. They were from Norway, doing the same as us, touring Europe on an Interail pass.
We followed Sidi and Grethe back down the train and was surprised to find empty compartments. They showed us to their compartment.
"You can stay here with us." said Sidi. "Look we can even pull the seats to make a big bed." And she pulled out the seat to demonstrate, and it came forward and flattened out to make a huge bed. Amazing. I couldn’t believe it we’d been standing cramped up in that corridor for 15 hours and for God knows how long there had been room at the back of the train. To make things better we had two gorgeous Norwegian girls inviting us to spend the night with them in their compartment. We chatted for a while about ourselves and where we were going and what we were doing. Then Grethe said "I think we’d better go to sleep now."
Oh joy! Sleep. On a comfortable bed. I couldn’t imagine anything nicer. The four of us lay down on the pulled out bed. Gary and Sidi, Me and Grethe. We fell asleep instantly.
02.00am We were woken up. The train guard was in the doorway. He had a gun in a holster. "What?"
Recognising we were English he said "You must get out."
"Why we’re sleeping."
"You must move. Now!" His hand hovered somewhere near his gun.
We didn’t argue. The four of us got up, still sleepy, collected our stuff and moved up the train. Back into the crowded corridors. We had stopped at a station. The engine at the front rumbled gently.
We all stood in the corridor. Waiting for the train to start moving again. Waiting for things to settle down again. Waiting for our place in the new scheme of things. I looked out the window the station was deserted. No one was getting off, no one was getting on.
A guard came into our carriage. Asked to see our tickets. We showed him our international railcards. He wasn’t happy and asked to see our Passports. Reluctantly we handed them over. He examined them carefully, looking at the photographs and then at each of us in turn. He handed back Sidi and Grethe’s passports, and turned to walk away with ours.
"Where are you going, with our passports?"
"They must be checked."
He stepped out onto the platform. And went over to the station master. They stood side by side as the conductor turned the pages of our passports, occasionally glancing over his shoulder in our direction, at which the station master glanced in our direction as well.
"Are you wanted by Interpol?" asked Sidi excitedly "are you in trouble?"
"We have been." I said. "In Yugoslavia, but I can’t think that that’s got anything to do with it."
"What happened in Yugoslavia?" asked Grethe
"We were arrested."
"What for?"
"Sleeping on the grass." replied Gary
"That’s ridiculous. Were you taken to the police station?"
"No we weren’t really arrested so much as kicked and beaten by the Militia." Gary explained.
"That’s worse isn’t it?" said Grethe who had now started looking carefully at us for tell tale bruises and broken bones.
"Well they didn’t know our names, that’s for sure." I said.
I looked out of the window again and the conductor and the station master had gone. I looked up and down the platform. But there was no one to be seen.
The train shook as it slowly started to pull away.
"Shit they’ve still got our passports." Panic set in.
The train stopped again and shook some more as carriages were shunted and our carriage, with our special compartment was taken away.
We sat waiting for another twenty minutes. Eventually a whistle blew. The station master stood at the end of the empty platform with a green flag.
The train started moving again. And the conductor stepped into our carriage.
"Your passports." he said. And walked off without explanation.

Now we were in the same position we were before. Standing room only.
I said I would explore the train to see if there were any seats for us. There weren’t. But at the back of the train I found the luggage compartment open and empty. I rushed back to Gary, Sidi and Grethe.
"We can sleep in the luggage compartment. It’s empty. There’s plenty of room for us. It’ll be like having a whole carriage to ourselves Not just a compartment."
So we picked up our rucksacks, and moved down the train.
"Excuse me........sorry.....can we just get past here."
At the luggage wagon, we laid out our sleeping bags and bedded down again. We went back to sleep. We didn’t even think about sex. We were too tired. But the Norwegian girls were nice to cuddle.
We woke hours later. The sun was up and we were still traveling south. I looked up and the sliding door had been closed while we slept. I got up and tried to open it. It was locked. I turned to the others "We’re locked in."
"It’s not a problem, we’ll just sleep some more." murmured Gary from under a sleeping bag.
But we couldn’t sleep anymore because the sun was up. Beating down on the single skinned metal roof of the luggage wagon, and it was getting hotter. The windows wouldn’t open. Sweat poured down our faces. It was then that I realised how dirty we were because the sweat made little clean tracks on our faces. "Do we keep quiet or do we try to get out." I said
"We’d better be quiet those conductors have guns you know."
So we sat in the luggage wagon. It got hotter and hotter.
"We are going to die in here." gasped Sidi, "it’s too hot."
"We’ve got to get out." added Grethe.
I was terrified of attracting the attention of the conductor with the gun. I’d had enough of being threatened at gun point. So I suggested we tried to find a way out. But it was impossible. As the sun got higher the temperature in the luggage compartment got higher we were being roasted alive. Sweat poured of us. The gorgeous Norwegian girls were looking frayed. Tempers were being lost. We had to get out before we died of heat exhaustion. We started hammering on the door. Shouting, screaming and at the same time terrified that we weren’t supposed to be there.
There was a sound at the door. A key was being turned. Shit! This is it. We’re dead. The door slid open and a large man, stood there looking at us sweating, and burst into laughter. We were in Greece.
"you can stay here it’s OK." he said. "it’s not a problem."
With the door open and the windows of the corridor open the cool morning air blew in. The Greek conductor still laughing went back to the rear of the train and we thanked our luck. The train had already long since passed Thessalonika in the north of Greece and we passed through Larissa and Lianokladion. We arrived at Athens about 10:00am, we’d spent just over twenty four hours on that train. Sidi and Grethe said they had a hotel booked. Goddamned Norwegian efficiency. We hadn’t. So we went our separate ways.

Chapter seven

2004-11-08T16:08:00.000Z

Late that evening we arrived in Belgrade. Desperately tired and hungry. Bursting I descended into the dark dank depths of the stations toilet. Standing at the free standing urinals, I let go. But something was not quite right. I was standing tip toe in an inch of water. I looked under the facility and noticed the down pipe was emptying straight onto the floor at my feet. I was standing in one inch of piss. A mop appeared between my legs. A little old women, dressed head to toe in black, was trying to mop the liquid from where I was standing.
"Mop somewhere else." I said. But she didn’t understand. For Chrissakes the whole floor was under one inch of water. Mopping round my feet was going to make no difference at all except to push little waves of piss over my shoes and into my socks. I started hopping from one foot to the other, but it just made things worse.
I looked to my left, and a man was in the corner looking at me over his shoulder with a big grin on his face. He had a round sweaty face and thin greasy black hair combed toward the back of his head. His clothes were dark, grubby and loose. Ever so slowly he pulled at his hard on. The old lady continued to mop and the man in the corner masturbated. They were not concerned about each other.
For Chrissakes! How long does it take to empty your bladder? The mopping continued round my feet and the man in the corner gave me his lascivious grins. I splashed my way to freedom. They were welcome to each other.
I got back to the platform "You wouldn’t believe what I just saw."
"We must eat." said Gary.
"Yeh but you’ll never guess what’s going on down there."
"Where?"
"In the toilets."
"There’s some guy down there."
"Yeh? So?"
"He’s wanking."
"No!"
"Yes and there’s this little old woman in black mopping the floor."
"That’ll be his Mother. She probably brings him along to work so she can keep an eye on him. Anyway I was wanting the toilet but I think it can wait now. Let’s go eat then find a place to sleep."
"Where do think?"
"There’s a youth hostel in Belgrade, we’ll go there." said Gary folding up his travel guide.
"You know where it is?"
"It’s on the map. It’s not a problem."
"OK but first we’ll eat."
So we left the station and walked out and into the streets of Belgrade. We found a small shop with no front window or door opening directly out onto the street. Piles of newspapers were arranged on wooden crates. Behind a glass case full of cakes pasties and pies, stood the owner. A large grey haired man. Seeing us he immediately turned and raised his hand toward the shelves of cigarettes behind him, we hadn’t even spoken, he just assumed we were going to ask for cigarettes. Gary waved a hand "No No cigarettes. Food." and he pointed to his mouth. The owner shrugged his shoulders and pointed to the glass case in front of him. We chose something. We didn’t know what it was but it looked safe. A sort of pasty. A local delicacy. He picked up two of the rectangular flat pasties and dropped them into white paper bags. We paid, turned and walked away with our prize. A flaky pastry outer which when bitten, revealed some unidentifiable white goo inside. They turned out to be the most disgusting pasties we had ever eaten. They went into the bin.
By now we were tired, dejected and traumatised. We headed for sanctuary, the youth hostel. Somewhere we could feel safe and secure. Far away from the Militia and others with guns and surrounded by others of like mind to ourselves. Traveling innocents. It was just before midnight when we arrived.
We rang the bell at the counter. A small man in a suit appeared from a doorway and positioned himself behind the counter. He looked at us carefully slightly puzzled.
"We need a room."
"We are full. No more rooms." He said.
No problem, we’d never been turned away from a youth hostel in our lives. Even full ones. We’d slept in armchairs, on the floor. It never mattered.
"That’s OK we’ll sleep on the chairs" I said.
"No you will leave, we have no room." said the hostel Manager looking officious.
Remembering English youth hostels, I said cheerfully. "NO. It’s OK we’ll just sleep on the floor. We don’t really need a room."
"No you must leave." he wasn’t about to be cheerful.
We were so tired. We could not go anywhere else. "No! We’re not moving. We are going to stay here sleeping in these chairs." Gary said determinedly.
We turned and flopped down in two armchairs in the reception area of the hostel. The manager was not pleased." You can not stay here. The hostel is full. I will call the Militia."
"Do what you want. We’re not going anywhere. We must sleep." I said defiantly.
He called the Militia.
A few minutes later we heard the sirens of the militia, and not wanting to tangle with them again, decided to leave. Quickly. We were not going to get involved with the Yugoslavian Militia again. We made our way to the station. There was no where else to go. We lay our sleeping bags on the concrete platform and went to sleep.
I was woken early next morning by screaming. I looked out from my sleeping bag. Over night twenty more people had lined up along the platform by our side, like a battle zone, long lines of body bags with corpses in. At the opposite end of this makeshift dormitory, the station caretaker was cleaning down the platform with a high pressure hose. He was wearing a black waist coat over a white shirt with the sleeves rolled up, his jacket hung from a hook on the wall behind him. The people closest to him were getting soaked. He seemed to be taking delight in his work. Leaping out of my sleeping bag, I shook Gary to wake him.
"Get up quick!"
"What?" said Gary sleepily.
"Get up. For Chrissakes!"
"What’s happening?"
We managed to clear our bags from the ground just as the water hit. The air was filled with screams and shouts of abuse at the station cleaner, who, when all the sleepers had risen, turned off the water, threw the hose into a corner and walked off. Lifting his jacket off the hook as he passed and slung it over his shoulder, he was whistling.
It was five AM. The sky was blue, the sun just coming up. It was going to be a hot day. Aching from sleeping on the concrete we walked along the now newly cleaned platform to the ticket office and checked the time table on the wall. The next train to Athens left at 9:30AM platform three. Four and a half hours to wait. We walked to platform three. There was a single carriage already there. It was full.
"This can’t be the train to Athens."
"No, it must be an earlier train to somewhere else."
"But one single carriage?"
"Who knows? Perhaps they’ll bring more carriages later."
We walked to the end of the carriage. In a slot, by the far door, was a board that read "Athens".
"This is it?" I said in disbelief. "One fucking carriage. I don’t believe it.""Look on the bright side." said Gary, "at least we don’t have to sit in that carriage waiting for another four and a half hours before we even get moving. We can go for a walk, maybe get breakfast somewhere, we’ve plenty of time."
"Shit! Breakfast. When did we last eat?" I said, suddenly remembering I was hungry.
"I’m not sure. I don’t think we can count last night as having eaten. So I guess we last ate in Germany or did we have something in Switzerland."
"We had a beer in Switzerland that cost us an arm and a leg. We could have eaten or had a beer. We couldn’t afford both."
"Another one of life’s bitter choices." said Gary philosophically.
We walked out of the station and into the grubby streets of Belgrade. Over flowing rubbish bins lined the pavements and old newspapers drifted about. It was so depressing. Everywhere we went, we were eyed with suspicion. Maybe we were getting paranoid. They’re out to get us. One way or another.
By seven we had found a small shop that was just opening. We went in. Behind a small glass counter they displayed the same disgusting pasties we had tried, and failed, to eat the night before. Our hearts sank. We couldn’t recognise anything that may be even vaguely edible. We were hungry, very hungry, we had last eaten properly three countries ago, and God knows how long ago that was. Two days perhaps, we’d lost count of time. Time for us had no meaning. Days and nights merged, nothing was real we hadn’t slept properly since Germany. It was like a walking dream or nightmare
Lack of sleep and hunger was making us hallucinate, hearing voices. More than once I turned to Gary when he had called my name and he would be nowhere near and I would stand there quietly and still be hearing the same voice echoing round my head calling my name. I knew it wasn’t real.
"Mikel." it was real this time, solid, not the ethereal whisper I’d been hearing. "Mikel What about this?" I looked up and Gary was pointing to something in a cold cabinet.
Milk! At last we had found something.
"Mileko." I said in my best Yugoslavian. "Deux, dos, zwei, two.....Shit! Gary what’s two in Yugoslavian?"
He didn’t need to answer because naturally, without thinking I had held up two fingers and was given two "Mileko".
We stepped outside the shop with our Mileko. Opened the cartons and drank the cool fresh liquid. Heaven.
"See Yugoslavia isn’t so bad is it?" I said, feeling good about myself now I’d filled up on milk.
"It’ll be a lot better when it’s behind us." Gary replied, wiping a milk moustache with the back of his hand.

Chapter six

2004-11-08T08:37:00.000Z

We were on a train speeding west toward Paris. It was still early and it wasn’t until we past Rennes, that we finally spoke.
"We’re not going to let this ruin our holiday are we?" asked Gary."We’ve still got another three weeks."
"Hell no! I said." But inside I was still sick to my stomach. After this how can I ever visit Helene again? So in an effort of bravado and self delusion I said "To hell with Monsieur le Cam. We going to hit Europe and have fun."
It was a long way from "The hole in the wall" Waterloo, where several months earlier we had met to plan "The great British trans-Europe expedition." or "Operation, lets tread boldly". We had sat at a small round beaten copper topped table. Gary laid a large map of Europe over it.
"OK where do you want to go?" I said.
Gary studied the map carefully and finally said "Zagreb. We’ve got to go to Zagreb."
A train thundered overhead.
"Where the fuck is Zagreb?" I said.
"Here. "he said pointing to a place just west of Belgrade, or Beograd as it was named on the map.
"What’s there?"
"I don’t know."
"So why Zagreb?"
"It sounds a great name." and he said the word over and over "Zagreb. Zagreb Zagreb."
"So you’re basing our whole trip on the sound of a name?"
"Have you a better idea?"
"Well......." I was struggling for an idea. I knew everyone else did the usual thing of visiting famous places. Seeing the sights. Doing the tourist trip. But somehow I didn’t want that. I wanted reality. I wanted to see Europe from a different angle. From the inside. I wanted to see the things that other people didn’t bother with. I wasn’t interested in famous places or culture. I wanted to see the people. And, so did Gary. "..... it’s a great idea."
"Good so where do you want to go?"
"I’d like to visit Helene."
"Why?"
"I haven’t seen her in five years that’s why."
"But she’s history."
"Since when?"
"Since five years. Come on. Why go to France when you have hundreds of girls here you can shag?"
"But those hundreds of girls aren’t Helene."
"She probably fat and ugly by now. You haven’t seen her for five years. How do you know she’ll want to see you?"
"I just know. That’s all."
"OK we’ll go and see Helene. Then we’ll go to Zagreb."
We sat and drank our beer quietly . The Hole in the wall is a dark pub, but cosy.
After a while I asked "How much money do you think we should take?"
"A hundred each." came the quick response.
"Will that be enough to last us the month?"
"If we’re careful." Gary said taking another swig of beer.
"Why a hundred? Why not two hundred?" I enquired between mouthfulls of beer.
"Because, that’s all I’ve got."
"Can’t argue with that."
We hit Paris. And despite our high flown ideals of avoiding the tourist traps, we saw the sights. Notre Dame, Monte Marte, with the pavement cafés, street artists and cobbled streets. We went to La Place de la concorde, then walked along Les Champs Elysées looking at al the shops. Shops that were way beyond our budget, but even so we window shopped. Our as the French say " Leche les vitrines," licked the windows. At the end we stood under the Arc de Triomphe. It was getting late and we looked up to the darkening sky and saw a search light flashing to south. We turned to investigate and soon caught glimpses of the Eiffel tower through the gaps in the tall buildings. It had to be visited. Over the bridge on the Seine were street traders with blankets laid on the pavement covered in miniature Eiffel towers. Later that evening we wondered where we would sleep. We had not planned anything. No hotels, no youth hostels, nothing. So to get some sleep we went to the train station and got on a train bound for Frankfurt. We slept in our seats.
The next morning we woke up in Germany. Shell shocked and crazy we made our way to Garys brothers house in Frankfurt. Luxury. He had a first floor flat. Nice and cosey. Real food and a bed to sleep in. Garys Brother, Alan, was a teacher. He taught English in a German school. He was short with light brown hair and a moustache. He was quite serious and listened carefully to our tales of the journey so far nodding occasionally. his wife Mary, an american, was petite and slim with short blond hair. She was laughed nervously and fidgitted about her chair, when we got to the part of our story with the shotgun, she put her hand to her mouth, Alan just sat and nodded. "Yes, carry on." as if he was a police inspector listening to a confession.We stayed the night there and next day, promising to come back, we left for Switzerland. We boarded a train. By midday we were in Switzerland.
We stood by the side of lake Geneva. We’d been to a bar and the beer was incredibly expensive. One hundred pounds suddenly seemed totally inadequate.
"This is not good." I said to Gary. "We could blow the whole lot in one day. When’s the next train out of here?"
"Three hours." replied Gary consulting our European train time table.
"We could be broke in three hours staying here."
"So what do you think we should do?"
"We’ll busk." I said getting out my mouth organ. I threw my hat on the pavement and started playing. I only knew a few tunes.
We collected a few francs.
"Do you know we must be the only people in the world who have left Switzerland with more money than they arrived with."
We got on a train to Yugoslavia. Next stop, Zagreb!
Europe is a big place, we spent the rest of the day travelling through Austria. Marvelling at the beautiful scenery, the snow capped mountains and green valleys. The sun started to set casting huge shadows and turning the white tops of the mountains to glow like fire. Finally all we could see was faint dark shapes and we fell asleep. The next morning we were still moving across the flat plains of Yugoslavia. For hours we stood with our heads out of the windows, watching the world go by, until our hair was stiff. Mile after mile of fields and more fields, the occassional hamlet, cars at level crossings, waiting patiently for our train to pass.
At midday the train pulled into a station.
"It’s Zagreb!" shouted Gary. "We’ve got to get off here."
I didn’t argue. I was so tired. I would do anything to get off the train. We’d been travelling for nearly twenty four hours.
We didn’t get far from the station. We found a park where students were sitting on the grass. We sat on the grass near them. We could hardly think we were so tired. We lay down on the grass in the sun and fell asleep almost immediately.
I woke up suddenly. Someone had hit me like a cricket bat on my ribs. I doubled up in pain. I opened my eyes to see two Militia men standing over us. Armed with machine guns. One of them kicked me again.
"OK! OK!" I screamed. "I’m awake."
The other was kicking Gary. The students were all gone, we were alone. It was late afternoon. They shouted at us. I didn’t understand a word. They kicked our rucksacks. Then one of them picked up a rucksack and threw it. We were kicked again.
"We’re English" I screamed. "Nous sommes Anglais."
But they were not to be argued with. Being English was not special. It held no immunity. I remembered my passport it said "Her Brittanic Majesty’s secretary of state requests and requires in the name of her Majesty, all those whom it may concern to allow the bearer to pass freely without let or hindrance............" Bollocks. We were being crucified. The beating didn’t stop. We were frog marched to the railway station. We were told to leave in no uncertain manner. Zagreb. A great city. A great sounding name. I could say that name over and over again. Such mystery. All our plans and expectations at "The hole in the wall" destroyed. So this is Zagreb? Didn’t they know we had planned our whole trip around visiting Zagreb? Doesn’t that mean a thing to them? The whole point of our being there was because Gary had said it sounded a great name. For fucks sake. Give us a break here. We come in peace. So shaken, bruised and terrified we left for the second time at gunpoint. And we were still innocent.

Chapter Five

2004-11-05T18:58:00.000Z

We woke next day. The sun was already up and we lay in our sleeping bags blissfully happy.
"It’s been great hasn’t it?" I said.
"Yes I’m glad we came here first. It was a good idea of yours."
"How’s your blisters?"
"OK. Boy you sure did scream didn’t you?" Teased gary
"That bloody stuff stung like hell."
"You wimp." We were back to insulting each other.
"I notice you didn’t want the treatment. You were quick to refuse." A cow lowed outside, then another. "What time is it?"
Gary fumbled for his watch. "It’s eight o’clock." he said.
"The cows should have been milked by now."
"They’re probably having a lie in, after all we did put away a fair bit of wine last night."
"Yes old Monsieur Le Cam is probably nursing a hangover right now."
"Well he deserves a lie in every now and then. Everyone does. It’s a basic human right. To be able to lie in and slob about all morning, once in a while."
We lay back looking up at the roof of the tent, the sun beating down on the walls was making it start to get warm inside, but that was OK we’d get up when we started to sweat.
"You know. I really love it here........"
There was a rustling outside and someone came to the tent and started unzipping the flap a little.
"Bonjour." I called cheerfully.
"I ‘ave a note for vous." it was Nelly.
"A note? Who from? What’s it for?" But she was gone already, running back to the farm house. I opened the piece of paper and read it with disbelief.
"Father has gone to the bar to get drunk. He says if you are still on the farm when he gets back he will kill you. He has taken his shotgun. I have lost my honour because I was alone with you in your tent until midnight. I’m so sorry. You must leave. Helene."
In the space of thirty seconds my life had changed from perfect happiness to terror.
"What does it say?"
I handed Gary the note and said nothing, I still couldn’t believe it. How could it end like this? We were innocent. We’d done nothing. I went over in my mind all the previous nights fun and laughter trying to find a reason. But there was none.
"It’s not fair." I said, I got up and quickly dressed.
I went to the farm house and called. Madame Le Cam came to the doorway.
"What have we done? We’re innocent." But she didn’t understand. She just shook her head sadly and pointed to the road. I ran back to the tent. "It’s no good we’d better leave."
"What did Helene say?"
"I never saw her. She must be locked in her bedroom."
We stripped out the tent and packed it away not bothering with the usual niceties of folding it properly.
Fully packed we walked to the farmhouse again. Madame Le Cam was still in the doorway, watching us leave, it was obvious she didn’t want to speak. I looked up at the upstairs window. Helene was there, clutching the curtains, tears rolling down her cheeks. It would be the last I saw of her for twenty years.
Gary and I never said a word as we trudged down that country lane toward Morlaix. The sky was still blue the sun was still hot, but the joy was gone. What we thought of as purely innocent laughter had been misinterpreted as something sordid. Through our ignorance we had betrayed their hospitality. The knowledge that we knew we were innocent didn’t help. We felt branded and no amount of explanation would change anything.
Half a mile down the road we heard the tractor. It was Helene’s Father coming back from the bar. "Shit! What do we do?"
"Hide."
We threw ourselves into the nearest ditch, the long spring grass sheltered us from view. For what seemed an eternity the tractor got closer and closer. We dared not even breath for fear he would hear us. As he got closer, we could see the shotgun slung over his arm. He was weaving back and forth across the road. He’d obviously had a skin full. As he passed by we could the look on his face, pure, black, anger. Our hearts pounded as he chugged by.
As soon as he rounded the corner we ran. Running, stumbling and desperately unhappy, we got to the station and caught the first train Eastbound. We didn’t care where it was going as long as it took us away.

Chapter Four

2004-11-05T18:17:00.000Z

But now there was more. I was nineteen and no longer a naive fourteen year old. Helene was no longer the little girl of twelve years old. She was beautiful. Seductive. She was graceful in her movement. The way she walked. The way she ate. This was not a girl who should be on a farm. She was better than that. I wanted to hold her and kiss her and tell her I loved her. But she was my best friend. The aftermath of our first innocent meeting was still with me. How could I touch this girl? I could kiss her and spoil our friendship. I couldn’t do that. No matter how desperate I was. What if she didn’t feel the same way? So we talked and played games just like before and I was happy just to be in her presence.
All that day we played boules, football or just sat in the long spring grass talking. We ate meals with the family, drank wine and revelled in the perfection that is country life.
The next day we got up to find everyone preparing to leave the farm.
"Where are you going?"
"We’re going to make the hay." said Helene.
"Can we come and help?" I asked.
"No, you don’t have to you are on holidays."
"But we’d like to. To show our thanks for your hospitality." I looked at Gary and he nodded.
"OK." she said. "we’ll go to the fields."
We climbed on the tractor and headed for the field. Apart from the tractor there was no other machinery. Just the tractor and the trailer. The hay was all in lines up and down the field. Helene’s cousins were already at the field waiting, pitchforks in hand. They looked surprised when Gary and I picked up a pitch fork each and set to, tossing the hay onto the trailer while one of Helene cousins arranged it. We worked solidly for hours Helene’s father driving slowly up and down the field and us boys with the pitchforks either side gathering the hay. I hadn’t even noticed that Helene had disappeared. Until someone shouted "Dejeuner" and I saw Helene and her mother walking across the field toward us with baskets. We collapsed in the hay. It was like a scene from a Stella Artois advert.
Helene and her mother had brought bread, cheese and red wine. But no Stella Artois. It was midday and the sun was fierce. The red wine made me sleepy. I thought "I love this life." We’d done about two thirds of the field by then and I turned to Helene and said "We’ll soon be finished."
She laughed "No, we have to do another field after."
"Oh."
"It’s the field of a neighbour, she is told old to make hay."
Gary and I fell about laughing. Helene looked puzzled and I explained what "Making hay" meant in English.
She laughed "She’s vraiment too old for that as well."
Dinner finished we went back to work. It wasn’t easier, but after several glasses of red wine we didn’t care anymore and the field was soon finished. So we went to the next field belonging to the little old lady. We arrived at her farmhouse on the tractor and was introduced as "Les Anglais". She gave us wine. We stood in front of her house, her yard was just dried mud, trying to make conversation and dutifully drinking the wine offered. Then we made hay. It was a much smaller field and quickly finished. Helene had disappeared again. Gary and I rested a while next to the tractor waiting to be told we were going back to the farm. But no. There was a third field to do. on a third farm. Again we were introduced as "Les Anglais" and yet again given more wine, before and after.
Finally we had finished and exhausted we went back to Helene’s farm. My hands were agony. I wasn’t used to physical labour and I had blisters all over my hands. I went into the kitchen.
"Helene. Look at my hands." I held out my blistered hands for Helene to see. As a student I wasn’t used to hard labour and my hands were soft. No callouses.
"Pauvre garcon. let me see. Et tu Gary?" Gary held up his hands they were similarly abused. "I ‘ave something for that." she said. She went to a cupboard and got out a small bottle. "I’ll put some of this on your ‘ands."
"Will it help?" I asked.
"Bien sur." she said. And she took the bottle and upended it onto a piece of cotton wool. Then gently taking my hand she dabbed at my blisters. It was cool and soothing for about a millisecond then..............
"Aaaargghhhhhh!" I screamed. It was Iodine straight onto raw flesh. I pulled my hand away shaking it in the air, blowing it.
"Oh Mikel" she said taking my hand again. "it’s good for your hands"
It was at that moment, in some perverse way, I knew I loved this girl more than anything.
Gary quickly said "Actually my hands aren’t so bad after all."
"You don’t want the medicine for your ‘ands?"
"No I’ll be OK. I’m sure." said Gary.
Tears were rolling down my eyes with the pain of the Iodine and I realised that Helene was still holding my hand. Her mother called her and she let go.
She was needed to help make dinner. They had decided to hold a dinner party in honour of "Les Anglais". The front room, normally unused was thrown open and dust sheets pulled off the best furniture. Helene and her sister Nelly cleaned and dusted the room. They polished the ten foot chestnut table, opened the shutters and cleaned the windows, and laid the table for a banquet. A short while later the local farmers turned up to meet "Les Anglais". As guests of honour we were seated at the top and bottom of the table. Rabbit stew was served with even more red wine. We were treated royally and not allowed to help at all.
So with the dinner table full of family, friends and "Les Anglais" dinner was eaten wine was drunk and toasts proposed.
"A Les Anglais"
"Vive La France."
"Vive L’Angleterre"
Each toast an excuse for another drink. We never felt happier in our lives. I felt like a king for a day. We were offered bread which we tore of the loaves following the example of the others, carved chunks of cheese from a selection on the table. We laughed and joked with our new friends. Helenes mother grabbed my hand and lifted it up to show the farmers,then related the story of the iodine. Everyone laughed. It was ten o’clock when the guests started leaving, shaking hands and thanking us for our help. It was late for rural France but still early for us. I looked at Helene when everyone had left. "What do we do now?"
"Everyone is going to bed, it’s late." she said.
"But it’s only ten o’clock. Let’s talk some more."
"But my parents will be trying to sleep we’ll disturb them."
"We can talk in the tent."
So Gary, Helene and I walked across the farm yard over the gate and climbed into our small ridge tent. Where we sat laughing and joking for another two hours. Trying to translate English jokes into French and Helene trying to Translate French jokes into English. The jokes were terrible but the translations hilarious.
At midnight Helene announced she had better go to bed. We were suitably tired so we agreed. She left with a smile and scampered off to the now completely dark farmhouse. Gary and I settled down into our sleeping bags.

Chapter Three

2004-11-04T14:15:00.000Z

May 1978.
Gary and I stood outside Morlaix station. Rucksacks on our backs and sweat pouring off us and we hadn’t even started walking yet. It was hot, the sky blue and we didn’t really know where we were going. After five years I was back in France again. This time I was no longer a naive fourteen year old, I was nineteen and had been writing to Helene on and off for the last five years. She was my penfriend, my confidente, I told her my secrets and now she was seventeen.
I’d been planning this for Months, ever since that night in "The hole in the Wall", Waterloo, when Gary and I had started planning our trip round Europe. I’d written to Helene asking if she’d like me to visit her. She replied immediately saying she’d love it, and her parents would too.
Stepping outside the station was like going back in time, everything strangely familiar yet new. not exactly the same but mostly the same. I looked up and down the row of shops where five years earlier I had allegedly asked an old man if he had fallen on the ground. I said the words over in my mind "Etes vous tombez par terre Monsieur?" I’d said that phrase so often in my mind over the years that it had now become my own. I might as well really have said it myself. I mused a moment on who could have been the real culprit. Dave, Bob, Smithy, Stevey, Dan or me. Well it wasn’t me.
"Where exactly is Helene’s farm?" Gary woke me from my reverie
"I don’t know exactly. But she said it’s near the village."
You know which village don’t you?" sarcasm entered his tone a little.
"Of course I do." Do you think I’m stupid or what?
"So when you say near, is that north of the village south or what?"
"I don’t know. We’ll have to ask." I admitted to myself I didn’t really know, but then planning this trip was not a priority. We’d especially decided against any real plans, it made it more of an adventure.
"You’ve really planned this in detail haven’t you?" the sarcasm continued, "How far is it do you think?"
"It’s about an inch on the map." I countered, two can play at this game.
"Idiot!" Funnily enough we never fell out. Gary and I were best friends. We argued but it was never vindictive just verbal jousting with each other. We made a point of insulting each other regularly.
After consulting the Michelline guide, we started walking. Past the boats on the river that runs through the centre of Morlaix, their wire rigging clicking on the masts in the breeze, past the Boulangerie, Pattisserie, Electrodémanager and all the other shops, up the hill past high walled gardens and houses with shutters closed. Then out into the country.
After miles of walking down endless country lanes we came to a village and we’d only walked half and inch according to the map. We needed to fill up with water. We went into a small village store.
"Bonjour." said the shop owner. A man in his late fifties, rubbing his hands together at the expectation of a sale.
"Bonjour. Un grand bouteille de l’eau s’il vous plait."
"Vous etes en vacance?" he enquired.
"Oui. Nous visitons ma amie Helene Le Cam."
"Ah Le Cam!" his friendliness turned to interest.
"Oui."
"C’est Louis Le Cam non?"
"Je crois." I said. I think so.
"C’est mon Frere."
I turned to Gary "This is Helenes Fathers brother for Chrissakes. That’s a bit of luck."
"Ask him how far it is to her farm." Gary pushed me forward a bit more.
I asked.
"Mais non." he said "Je vous conduirai la dans ma voiture."
"Shit! he’s going to take us there in his car."
"Great it’s too hot to walk much further."
"Merci bien." I said enthusiastically "Vous etes tres gentile."
He called his wife to look after the shop for a while and took us outside to his car, and we squeezed ourselves and our rucksacks into his "deux cheveaux" a Citroen 2CV.
He took us down more roads the further he drove the more grateful we became, it would have been a very very long walk. One inch on the map? Hell! That would have been a life time of walking, especially in that heat.
As we pulled into the farm yard there was a large stone built house on the right and an abandoned 2CV by the side, this I later discovered was the hen house. In front was a ramshackle barn and and on the left another barn and fields.
Helenes uncle, Henri, tooted the horn and Madame le Cam appeared in the doorway, wearing a 1950’s floral dress that was almost completely covered by a pinafore. Helenes father came out behind her wearing an old jacket and brown corduroy trousers tied up at the waist with string. He strode over to meet us as we got out of the car, and shook our hands. He turned and called Helene. Then went to greet his brother kissing him on both cheeks. They hugged.
Helene came skipping out of the house to meet us, tall, thin, with long brown hair and big brown eyes. She kissed us on both cheeks, smiling, her eyes sparkling with happiness. At once I felt that same feeling of peace and happiness as I had felt all those years before. Helene was older now 17 years old and a young woman. She was beautiful.
Her little sister Nelly and her little brother Christophe stood in the doorway peering out at us shyly.
Nelly was gypsy like, six years old with a mass of long curly brown hair, with bits of straw stuck in it. Christophe was slim and wore a grubby orange base ball cap with Massey Ferguson embroidered on the front. They were both wearing hand me downs that were obviously either too big or small.
Monsieur Le Cam went into the farm house and came out carrying bottles of beer we were presented with the bottles and shown where we could pitch our tent. Just the other side of the gate, behind a log pile, opposite the farmhouse, barely twenty yards.
I looked at Helene. She didn’t move. She just stood there smiling. I smiled back at her. We didn’t have to say anything. It was just like all those years before. I was so happy to just be in her presence. She didn’t belong on a farm. She was not a farmers daughter, she was a Princess. A Princess who had been abducted as a child and sent to live with poor farmers. She was special. I couldn’t stop looking at her.
We busied ourselves putting up the tent, under the watching eyes of Helenes brother and sister. Helene was wearing an Elvis sweatshirt and jeans.
"Do you like Elvis?" I asked.
"Non."
There was a shout from the farmhouse. Dinnertime. Bread and cheese, some cold meat and of course vin rouge. Simple but more than adequate. Conversation round the table was very simple as neither of Helene’s parents or her brother or sister spoke a word of English. By the time we had finished eating it was late. We were tired. Gary and I said "goodnight" , "Bonsoir" and went to our tent.
The next morning we were up early and exploring the farm. Monsieur Le cam came out of the farmhouse completely dressed. He took off his flat cap and jacket and hung them up on a the pump handle of the horse trough in the farm yard. rolled up his sleeves and plunged his arms into the cold water splashing it over his head and neck.
With wet hands he smoothed his thinning dark hair back over his head put on his cap then his jacket, waved at us and walked to The barn where he pitch forked hay into wooden racks on the far wall of each of the stalls. Then he went to our gate to let the cattle through for milking. They had been waiting patiently. It was the same routine every day of the year. He didn’t have to call them they just knew. He opened the gate and they followed him to the barn. We heard a motor start up and watched as one by one he placed the four suction cups on each of the four nipples of each cow. He moved quickly and methodically from one cow to the next. The cows just stood there eating the hay. Each of the cups pulsated gently and the white milk flowed through the glass portion of the cups.
"Mikel! Gary!" Helenes voice was calling us.We came out of the barn to meet her.
We said our hellos but then we had a question, a delicate question.
"Ou est la toilette?"
"La bas." she said waving her arms in the direction of the fields.
"No you don’t understand. Toilet. La toilette. Where is it?"
"La bas. C’est vrai!" That’s right there was no toilet. Not even squares of newspaper hanging on a string. We improvised. Years later Helene explained that her father didn’t own the farm, he rented it, he wasn’t going to spend money on improvements for the benefit of his landlord. he was of the opinion that the landlord should pay for it. The landlord would have none of it and argued that if they wanted proper indoor toilet facilities they would have to pay for it themselves. so it was stalemate.
It may have been primitive, but it was for those few days, paradise. I couldn’t have been happier. Perfect weather. Lovely countryside. And my Helene.

Chapter Two

2004-11-02T13:13:00.000Z

From then on I sought out Helene at every opportunity. We sat together for hours, not saying much, just being together. One evening our relationship began to attract the attention of a couple of Helenes classmates. Two boys. They came close and started making jokes. I didn’t understand what they were saying but they were laughing fit to burst and Helene as usual sat quietly, not saying a word. After a while it became obvious that the two boys thought I wasn’t trying hard enough with Helene. I should be snogging her by now. What’s the matter with les Anglais are they too scared? They decided to give me some help. One of them grabbed my hand, the other grabbed Helenes blouse, pulled it up, whilst the first one pushed my hand inside to touch her breast. I pulled my hand away quickly. I was livid. How dare they do that to my Helene. How dare they make her seem dirty? I was embarrassed for her. The two boys laughed and looked at me scornfully "Eh Anglais!" and made a sign. They walked off. Helene was tucking her blouse back in. She never said a word. They were beneath her. She was too good for them. It was never mentioned again.
For the next couple of days whenever possible I would look out for Helene and I’d find her somewhere just standing there watching me run around looking for her. She always stood still not trying to attract my attention, but always watching. it seemed to amuse her to see how long it would take me to find her this time. When I finally saw her in the crowd she still didn’t move, didn’t come toward me, she waited for me to come to her.Hands held behind her back and shifting her weight from one leg to the other and back again and smiling.
"There you are."
"Yes here I am." she’d say.
Our last full day in France was the day of the Fest noz. It was the french version of a local disco. It was optional. We could either go to the Fest Noz or stay at the school playing basketball. I asked Helene if she was going.
"Bien sur." she said.
I signed up for the evening trip to the Fest Noz. I looked at the sheet of paper. My name stood solitary on the white page. I was the only one.
"Looks like you’re the only taker for the Fest Noz then Mikel."
I turned, my teacher was standing behind me. "It seems so Sir."
"It’s not the sort of thing I expected you to sign up for." he was looking at me carefully. Perhaps he’d seen me sitting with Helene, perhaps not, perhaps he was fishing for something, perhaps just playing, I wasn’t sure.
"Well I just thought it was important to get into the spirit of the place. After all I can play basket ball anytime I like in England but I wont be able to go to a Fest Noz again."
"You do know what a Fest Noz is don’t you?" he asked possibly thinking I had finally lost my mind.
"Yes Sir. It’s a dance Sir."
"Hmmm well that’s most admirable of you. I must say this is a refreshing turn around on your part from earlier in the week."
"Yes Sir I’m determined to try harder and really make the most of our time here in France." I could bullshit for England. I wondered if he could tell. I didn’t care. The only thing that worried me was that I would not be allowed to go by myself if I was the only one.
That evening I stood waiting at the main gate of the school. The teacher arrived with four other boys. "Four more for the Fest Noz." he said. I wondered if they had been coerced at all into going. But we all marched on up the road toward the hall where the Fest Noz was going to be held. The hall was big and modern by French standards with small walls out the front, surrounding a large paved area, on which French youngsters sat, talked and smoked Gauloise. We went in, paid our money and got the backs of our hands stamped in purple ink.
Inside the hall the ceiling was high and chairs were arranged all round the sides facing inward. At the far end was a stage where "Jacques et ses Accordionaires" were setting up.I looked around for Helene. She was sitting by herself in the corner. The others of my party were not interested in me and were talking amongst themselves. I was not one of their group I wasn’t part of the gang. So no one bothered when I wandered off.
"Bonjour Helene."
"Bonjour Mikel." I loved the way she pronounced my name, My-kell. I had begun to hate the English pronunciation of my own name My-cull, it sounded so dreary compared with the way Helene said it. Years later people would ask me how I felt when she spoke to me with her French accent. I would just say "Well it works for me."
Jacques and his accordionaires struck up a lively tune. The hall was still virtually empty, it was a warm evening and most of the people were still outside.
Out of duty I said "Would you like to dance." and was relieved when Helene said "No not yet."
So I said "Shall we go outside?" I felt awkward, exposed we were just the two of us in the corner of this huge hall. I would feel more comfortable in the crowd. Helene stood up and we walked across the dance floor toward the main door. More exposure. Halfway across there was a shout. "Going to show us how to dance Webster?"
"Still trying your luck with the pre-teens then."
"What do they say Mikel. Are they making the jokes again with you?" I said nothing, she went on "peut etre you should not with me be."
"Be with me." I corrected.
"Ah oui, be with me." she repeated.
"It doesn’t matter."
"But they make joke with you."
"Are you angry?"
"No but I am sad for you."
"Don’t be sad. I’m happy to be with you. Tu est ma amie."
"Tu est mon ami aussi Mikel."
People started slowly moving into the hall and the dancing started. We sat for a while longer on one of the low walls. Not saying much. Listening to the music as it drifted out of the doorway. At that moment England was a million miles away. A distant memory. I wanted to stay there forever.
"There you are." I looked up and there was my teacher. "We’ve been looking all over for you."
"Why? What’s the matter?"
"It’s time to go the dance has finished."
"What already?"
"What do you mean already? It’s ten o’clock."
I turned to Helene. "I’ve got to go now."
"Je sais."
"We didn’t dance."
"Le prochaine fois peut etre." The next time? I was going home the next day. Shit! Where had the time gone? I couldn’t remember saying anything or doing anything so how could three hours just go by so quickly?
On the final day. We gathered in the courtyard of the school with our bags. A coach was waiting to take us to the airport. Desperately I scanned the crowd trying to see if Helene was there. I saw her at the back standing and watching me. As I caught her eye she smiled. She’d been standing there doing nothing just waiting for me to see her. Not pushing herself forward. That’s typical of Helene. The other boys were excitedly climbing onto the bus. I hadn’t got much time. The teachers were shaking hands at the door of the bus and some of the boys were shaking hands with some French boys. Again I was alone in wanting to say goodbye to Helene. I had to go to her. I made my way to the back of the crowd, all the time she didn’t move but just stood there smiling at me.
"We’re leaving now." I said quietly. She nodded. "Can I have your address so I can write to you?"
Immediately she held out her hand and gave me a little piece of square ruled maths paper, on which was already written "Helene le Guen, Goas Ven .........." We just stood there looking at each other. I didn’t want the moment to end. I didn’t know if I would ever see her again. After all I am English and she is French. And at 14 years old things like that seem impossible. We didn’t even kiss goodbye. People were looking. I ran back to the bus and climbed on board to further torment.
Back in England Father came to pick me up from school. I ran to the car clutching my precious piece of paper with Helennes address on it.
"Guess what? Dad." I said, "Guess what?"
"What? Did you have a good time?"
"I met a girl?"
"Hmmmm."
"Her name is Helene Le Guen."
"Hmmmm."
I shut up. I never spoke of her to Father again for a long long time.

Chapter one

2004-10-30T16:18:00.000+01:00

"Etes vous tombez par terre, Monsieur?" Shrieks of laughter.
The voice came from a cassette recorder on the desk. The boys all sitting on the desks feet on the chairs, crowded round.
"That’s fucking you Mikel."
"It bloody well isn’t."
"It fucking is. Who else speaks French with a Yorkshire accent?"
"I don’t speak French with a Yorkshire accent." I protested.
"You were born in Huddersfield weren’t you?"
"No I were born in Wales. I just grew up in ‘uddersfield." more laughter.
"’uddersfield? That’s definitely you. You should have seen him asking this poor old boy if he’d fallen on the ground. The old boy must have thought he was mad or summat."
"But it wasn’t me. I don’t remember any old man, or saying that."
"You don’t remember eh? Mad, and losing your mind."
I sat quiet. I definitely hadn’t been the one on the tape because I hadn’t said a word of French all day. My confidence was at an all time low, without making a fool of myself trying to speak a language I didn’t know, or barely knew.
I was 14 years old and on a school trip to France. We were staying for the week at a French boarding school in Morlaix North Brittany It was half term for the French so most of the French children had gone home for the break.
We had spent the afternoon walking around Morlaix in groups, carrying a cassette recorder and interviewing unsuspecting French people. Asking questions of them, Where did they work? What did they do? It all seemed seemed so pointless to me. This wasn’t real conversation this was just asking a prepared question and not standing a hope in hell of understanding the answer. So I hadn’t asked any questions. But now here I was accused of asking an old man if he had fallen on the ground, in a Yorkshire accent. I was going to have to live with this for another five days in France.
The teacher walked in "Settle down boys."
"But Sir. You must hear this?"
"What’s that Morgan?"
"It’s Webster Sir. On the tape. He asked an old man if he had fallen on the ground."
"Webster!"
"Sir?"
"Haven’t you anything better to do with your time here in France than to ask damn fool questions."
"But..........."
"If you can’t take this seriously. I’ll give you something to take seriously."
"But........"
"The other boys are working hard on their French.........."
"Are they hell!" I thought
"......and you think you can just muck about. Well I’m telling you this.............."
The teachers voice drifted away, he was still talking but it wasn’t getting through.
"...........Ok boys that’s it for today. Off you go to dinner." There was a mad dash for the door. "Not you Webster."
"Sir?" I got another lecture. How I was in the priviliged position of being here in France. How I should make the most of this wonderful opportunity to improve myself. How I was an ambassador of our country and I should conduct myself accordingly. It was all so pompous. I missed first sitting at dinner and found myself having to queue with the French for second sitting. I slipped onto the end of the queue next to a young girl. She had long brown hair and big brown eyes. She said nothing but just smiled. I smiled back and stood there idly bouncing my dinner tray off my legs. Every so often looking at her standing there. The queue moved. I let her go first. She collected her food and wandered off. I watched her move carefully through the tables, carrying her tray.
"Et vous.............Monsieur?" The dinner lady was staring at me as I turned round.
"Pardon." I pointed to the same things the girl in front of me had.
I took my tray and followed the girl. She was sitting with her back to me.
"May I sit here?" She looks up questioningly. "Can I sit with you?"
"oh oui." she says.
"What’s your name? Comment t’appelle?"
"Helene." she said quietly. That’s the thing about Helene, or Hell- en as it sounds in France, she is always quiet and calm. When everything around is going crazy she doesn’t panic, doesn’t fluster or bluster, or make an issue of it. Her calmness was like an aura around her. It spread to me. I was fourteen years old and liable to fits of impulsive behaiviour. But in those first few seconds I felt her calmness, her tranquility. I felt peace.
The boys had already finished their dinner and were putting away their plates and cutlery, and stacking the trays. They jostled past me.
"Found a new girlfriend Webster? Bit young isn’t she?"
"Cradle snatching now? Can’t find a real girl?"
"Ete’s vous tombez par terre Webster?"
"What’s the matter couldn’t find a girl with tits?"
I looked at Helene. It’s true she was young. It’s true she was as flat chested as an ironing board. But they didn’t see what I saw. They didn’t, couldn’t, feel what I felt. They weren’t close enough to be inside Helenes invisible aura of calm and peace.
"They make joke with you?" she asked.
"It’s nothing, C’est rien." I tried to make light of it, but it was obvious I was the butt of the joke in any language.
"They make joke with me?"
"They said you are trop Jaune."
"Too much yellow?" she looked at me puzzled. "Pour quoi?"
"Non. Trop jeune. Too young."
"Oh But I have 12 years. It’s not important."
"No it isn’t."
We sat silently eating our dinner. I couldn’t stop looking into her eyes. Each time she caught me she just smiled and looked away again. We finished dinner and put away our trays and stepped out into the courtyard of the boarding school. It was a big square with tall buildings all around. We had nicknamed the place Colditz. Some of the boys were playing basket ball, others table tennis and a few more playing cards on one of the tables around the edge of the courtyard. I motioned to Helene to sit down at one of the tables. I could hardly speak any French, her English was no better. So I suggested we play cards like some of the other boys. She agreed, and we spent the next few hours innocently playing cards together. Not for one moment did we ever imagine that thirty years later we would be sitting together once again watching each others children in exactly the same situation playing games together, none of them knowing the others language.