One Love: Two Stories
Book 2
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Theo Montgomery had a loveless childhood, and wants to find his soulmate. Anna Cole grew up in care, and is determined to start a family of her own.
Then, one day, they meet. Two damaged souls from different worlds. Is their love for each other enough to let go of the pain of their pasts? Or will Theo and Anna break each others’ hearts?
There are two sides to every love story.
This is Theo’s.
Welcome Page
About Theo
Dedication
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Epilogue
About Amanda Prowse
About No Greater Love
About No Greater Courage
Also by Amanda Prowse
From the Editor of this Book
An Invitation from the Publisher
Copyright
I would like to dedicate both Anna and Theo to Mr Tim Binding. Without Tim’s words of encouragement and advice these books would not have seen the light of day. There are times when everyone needs someone to take them by the shoulders and gently steer them back on course.
Thank you Tim.
Thank you.
Anna and Theo are for you.
I did it.
X
1974
Theo felt the swirl of nausea in the pit of his stomach. He swallowed and looked to his right, along the length of the lower playing field, calculating how long it would take to run back to the safety of the building should the need arise. He knew that Mr Beckett, his housemaster, would be watching from his study, peering through the wide bow window and rocking on his heels with his hands behind his back. He pictured him staring, stern faced, monitoring his every move. ‘You go immediately!’ he’d said angrily. ‘And you undertake the task assigned to you. And I want you to think, boy, think about what you have done! Yours is not the behaviour of a Theobald’s boy! And I won’t tolerate it, do you hear?’
And Theo had gone immediately, trying to ignore the fear that was making him shake and the sting of tears that threatened, knowing that neither would help the situation. He stared at the dark, weatherworn patina of the wooden door in front of him. Even the thought of making contact with the infamous man in the crooked cottage made his heart race fit to burst through his ribs. He’d heard terrible stories about the cranky ogre that lived within. Theo could only take small breaths now and his skin pulsed over his breastbone. Raising his pale hand into a tight fist, he held it in front of his face and closed his eyes before bringing it to the oak front door, tapping once, twice and immediately taking a step back. The wind licked the nervous sweat on his top lip. It was cold.
There was an unnerving silence while his mind raced at what he should do if there was no reply. He knew Mr Beckett wouldn’t believe him and the prospect of further punishment made his stomach churn.
Finally, a head of wiry grey hair bobbed into view through the dusty little glass security pane.
Theo swallowed.
‘Who are you?’ the man asked sternly as he yanked open the door and looked down at him.
‘I’m... I’m Theodore Montgomery, sir.’ He spoke with difficulty. His tongue seemed glued to the dry roof of his mouth. His voice was barely more than a squeak.
‘Theodore Montgomery?’
‘Yes, sir.’ Theo gulped, noting the man’s soft Dorset accent and the fact that he was not an ogre, certainly not in stature. But he did look cranky. His mouth was unsmiling and he had piercing blue eyes and a steady stare.
‘Now there’s a name if ever I heard one. And how old are you?’
‘I’m... I’m seven, sir.’
‘Seven. I see. What house are you in – is that a Theobald’s tie?’ The man narrowed his eyes.
‘Theobald’s, yes, sir.’
‘So you are Theodore from Theobald’s?’
‘Yes, sir.’
‘Well, that’s some coincidence.’
Theo stared at the man, not sure if it would be the right thing to correct him and tell him that, actually, it was no coincidence.
The man nodded, looking briefly into the middle distance, as if this might mean something. ‘And you are here for MEDS?’
‘Yes, sir.’ He tried to keep the warble from his voice; it was his first time in ‘Marshall’s Extra Duties’, a punishment that fell somewhere between detention and corporal punishment. He was grateful to have avoided the sting of his housemaster’s cane, at least.
‘Is this your first time?’
The man, who smelt of earth and chemicals, lifted his chin and seemed to be looking at him through his large, hairy nostrils. They reminded Theo of a gun barrel, but one with grey sprigs sprouting from it. The man was old and looked more like a farmer than a master, the kind of person he’d seen up in Scotland when his father had taken him grouse shooting on the glorious twelfth. He shuddered at the memory of that weekend, having found nothing glorious about it. He hadn’t liked it, not at all, and was still ashamed of how he’d cried at the sight of the birds’ beautiful mottled plumage lying limply in the gundog’s mouth. His father had been less than impressed, banning him from the shoot the next day. Instead, he’d had to sit in the car for eight hours with just a tartan-patterned flask of tea and a single stale bun. There’d been no facilities, so he had to tinkle on the grass verge. It was a chilly day and his shaky aim had meant he’d sprinkled his own shoes. Thankfully, they’d dried out by the time his father returned.
‘Yes, sir.’ He nodded, sniffing to halt the coming tears.
‘Well, for a start, you can stop calling me “sir”. I’m not a teacher. I’m part groundsman and part gamekeeper. My name is Mr Porter. Got it?’
‘Yes, sir. Mr Porter, sir.’
Mr Porter placed his knuckles on the waist of his worn tweed jacket and looked Theo up and down. ‘You’re a skinny thing, reckon you’re up to picking litter?’
Theo nodded vigorously. ‘Yes, sir. I... I think so, sir. I’ve never done it before.’
‘Don’t you worry about that, it’s as simple as falling off a log. You ever fallen off a log, Mr Montgomery?’
‘No, sir.’
‘It’s Mr Porter.’
‘Yes! Sorry...’ Theo blinked. ‘Mr Porter, sir.’
Mr Porter shook his head in a way that was familiar to Theo, a gesture that managed to convey both disappointment and irritation. Again, an image of his father flashed into his head. Theo offered up a silent plea that Peregrine James Montgomery the Third, Perry to his friends, would not get to hear about this latest misdemeanour. Theo had been a Vaizey College boy for a little over three weeks. His father had been not only head of Theobald’s House, but also captain of the cricket and rugby teams, earning his colours in his first term. His were big shoes to fill. ‘Don’t you let me down, boy!’ His father’s words rang in his ears like rolling thunder.
Mr Porter broke his chain of thought, emerging from the house with a large black bin bag and a pair of gardening gloves.
‘Here, put these on.’ He tossed the gloves in Theo’s direction. They landed on the ground. Theo cursed his inability to catch and scrabbled for them on the path before shoving them on. They were miles too big, sitting comically askew on his tiny hands.
‘Follow me.’ Mr Porter marched ahead, striding with purpose. Theo noted that his feet seemed disproportionately large for his small build, though that might have been because of his sturdy green gumboots. He wore a flat cap in a different tweed to his jacket, and a burgundy muffler fastened around his neck.
‘Keep up!’ he called over his shoulder and Theo broke into a trot, his knees knocking beneath his long grey shorts.
They continued in silence for ten minutes, long enough for Theo’s body to have warmed up and for his cheeks to have taken on a flush. It was only four in the afternoon, but dusk was already nudging the sunshine out of the way. Theo liked this time of year, when the air smelt of bonfires and at home an extra eiderdown was placed on the foot of his bed against the chill of his room.
‘Here we are then,’ Mr Porter barked as they neared the edge of the field and the narrow lane that led to the older girls’ boarding houses.
‘The wind blows a stiff northwesterly...’ He used his chunky fist to draw the shape of the wind in the air. ‘And the litter gets picked up like a mini tornado and carried along until it meets this hedgerow, and this is where it gets stuck.’ They both stared at the hedge. Mr Porter took a breath. ‘I suppose you’re wondering why it matters that the odd rogue crisp packet or strip of newspaper gets lodged in the hawthorn?’
Theo hadn’t been wondering any such thing. His primary concern was in fact whether or not his fingers would get snagged on the spiky branches. But he nodded anyway, because it sounded like a question.
‘Well...’ Mr Porter bent down and placed his gnarled hand on the top of the hedgerow. ‘Come nesting time, this rather sorry-looking tangle will be home to birds. I’ve seen blackbirds, dunnocks and wrens all making nests here, nice and cosy for their eggs. They need to do all they can to get the environment right for their little families to flourish. Do you think they want to get their heads caught in a crisp packet? Or read what’s happening in the News of the World?’
‘No, sir.’
‘Mr Porter.’
‘Sorry. No, Mr Porter, sir.’
Mr Porter blinked. ‘So we have a responsibility to pick up the litter and discard it sensibly and safely. And the headmaster and Mr Beckett both see this as a good way to punish boys who break the rules.’
At the mention of Mr Beckett, his housemaster and the man responsible for school discipline, Theo’s bowels shrank.
‘Why are you here, Mr Montgomery? What odious crime did you commit?’
Theo looked down at the damp grass and his cheeks flamed with embarrassment. He didn’t know what odious meant, but he could guess that it wasn’t good.
‘Someone, erm, someone did a pee in my pyjama bottoms.’
‘Oh.’ Mr Porter stopped dead and pulled his head back on his shoulders. Clearly this was not the response he’d been expecting. He looked at Theo. ‘Why would someone do that?’
‘I... I don’t know.’ Theo blinked. ‘Maybe they didn’t do it on purpose. Maybe they were too scared to get up in the night in the dark and so they went back to sleep even though they knew they needed the bathroom and when they woke up in the morning it was too late, it had just happened.’
‘I see.’ Mr Porter sighed and gave a small nod. ‘How did they try and dispose of the evidence?’
‘They stuffed them down the back of the big radiator in Matron’s study and when the radiator came on, it was a really bad stink.’
‘I bet it was.’ Mr Porter sniffed the air, as if considering this. ‘How did they know they were your pyjama bottoms?’
‘They had my name sewn in.’ Theo kept his eyes on the grass.
‘Of course they did.’ Mr Porter rubbed his chin sagely.
Theo kicked at the soft mud with the toe of his black shoes and scrunched up the plastic bag in his hand.
‘Well,’ Mr Porter began, ‘if you ever find out who did it, you can tell them two things. Firstly, if they’re ever going to commit another crime, best be sure not to leave any items of clothing with their nametape sewn in at the scene.’
Theo nodded. This seemed like good advice.
‘And secondly,’ Mr Porter said slowly and kindly, ‘you can tell them from me that there is never any reason to be afraid of the dark. Everything is just as it is during the day, like a room without the light switched on, and any talk of ghosties or ghouls is poppycock. Those things don’t exist. They’re just the stories some boys use to frighten others.’
Theo looked up at the man with the crinkly eyes, red cheeks and hairy nostrils.
‘Don’t you forget that now,’ he said.
‘I won’t, sir.’
‘Mr Porter.’
‘Yes. Sorry, sir.’
*
Theo made his way across the quadrangle with something of a spring in his step. He wasn’t quite sure if it was down to relief that the o-d-i-o-u-s chore was now over or the fact he’d enjoyed litter-picking far more than he’d expected. There was something about Mr Porter that he liked – the man was far from scary once you got used to him. Granted, he looked a little odd with his wild hair and peculiar smell, but Theo had found his company to be the most pleasant he had experienced so far at Vaizey College. He tried to remember what the man had said about ghosts, that they didn’t exist.
‘Poppycock!’ he said out loud, liking the word.
‘What was that, Montgomery?’ It was Magnus Wilson, also a Theobald’s boy, two years older and a whole head taller, who called across the walkway.
‘I... I’m...’ Theo knew what he wanted to say, but nerves again rendered his tongue useless.
‘“I’m a faggot” – it’s quite easy to get out,’ Wilson yelled, and the two friends either side of him, Helmsley and Dinesh, laughed. ‘Where have you been? You weren’t at tea,’ Wilson asked in a manner that told Theo he expected an answer.
Theo felt anger and fear ball in his gut like a physical thing. He wanted to shout back, but he didn’t have the confidence or the words. ‘I’ve been doing MEDS,’ he whispered.
‘Ha!’ Wilson laughed. ‘With Porter, the old homo? Where did he take you? Up the back alley?’
His friends snickered.
Theo shook his head. ‘No, but near the back alley, to... to the hedge.’
The boys’ roar of laughter was deafening. Theo had no idea what was so funny and now he was embarrassed as well as frightened. He wanted to cry but knew that was the worst thing he could do. Instead, he bit the inside of his cheek until it hurt. The taste of iron and the seep of blood into his mouth was the distraction he needed.
‘Heard you pissed the bed, is that right?’ Wilson said.
‘No! It wasn’t me!’ Theo kept his eyes down and willed his heart to not beat quite so loudly, for fear of them hearing it. His legs swayed, as if they belonged to someone else.
‘Good afternoon, gentlemen,’ Mr Beckett offered crisply as he swept by with his hands clasped behind him and the cape of his black robe billowing, bat-like, as he moved.
‘Good afternoon, sir,’ all four boys said with their heads lowered.
‘Prep should be your main focus at this time of day, not loitering in the quadrangle. So off you go!’
The three bigger boys jostled each other as they ran off towards the dorms.
I want to go home. I just want to go home. Theo closed his eyes and concentrated on not saying the words out loud. If he did, he’d probably land himself in more trouble than he could cope with.
*
It was now Thursday, the day Theo longed for. This was the day each week when just before bedtime he was allowed to call home. Having waited all day in eager anticipation, he lined up outside his housemaster’s study along with the other boys in his year. One by one they were called in and handed the telephone. It was, as ever, ringing by the time it was deposited in his hand, giving him less opportunity to plan what he wanted to say. Actually, this was a lie, he knew exactly what he wanted to say, but he was more concerned about what he could say while under the watchful eye of Mr Beckett, or Twitcher, as he was known among the boys on account of his left eyelid, which blinked rapidly and seemingly with a will of its own.
‘Perry Montgomery.’
The booming sound of his father’s voice answering the call sent a stutter to Theo’s throat. He wanted to be brave, wanted so badly to make his father proud, but it was hard when he was fighting back tears and what he really wanted to say was, ‘Please, Daddy, let me come home! I hate it here and if you let me come back, I promise I’ll be good. I’ll try harder not to cry on the grouse shoot. I miss you so much! Let me come home!’
But of course he would never do this, especially not with Twitcher sitting only three feet away.
‘Daddy, it’s me, Theo.’
‘Ah, Theo old boy!’ His father sounded pleased to hear from him and this alone was enough to lift Theo’s spirits while at the same time causing more annoying tears to gather. ‘One second. I’ll fetch your mother.’
And just like that, his father was gone.
Theo wanted to talk to him; he always wanted to talk to him. The trouble was he never had anything of interest to say, and even if he had, his father didn’t have the time to hear it. He remembered summoning up his courage before walking out to the garage in the summer, determined to talk to his dad. The sight of him holding a chamois leather in his big hand, preoccupied as he buffed the paintwork on his pride and joy had left Theo flustered. ‘I... I...’
‘For God’s sake, spit it out!’ his father had yelled, and Theo had turned on his heel, embarrassed, and hotfooted it back up to the safety of his bedroom. He’d sat on his bed and stared at his tiny, sausage-like fingers, wishing that he could be grown-up with big hands like his father’s, certain that when that time came, when he had hands like his dad’s, he would know exactly what to say.
Today was no different. In fact, trying to think of ‘chitchat’, as his mother called it, was even harder with an audience. He pushed the earpiece close to his head and could hear his father’s voice. He pictured him standing in the lamplit hallway as he called into the dark recesses of their grand Edwardian house. ‘Stella! It’s the boy on the phone!’
Theo knew his call was being timed and he cursed the silent seconds while his mother made her way to the phone. Hurry up! Hurry up!
Finally, he heard the rattle of her charm bracelet.
‘Mummy?’
‘Hello, my darling!’ she breathed. ‘How lovely to hear from you!’ She sounded surprised and he swallowed the urge to remind her that it was Thursday, of course she was going to hear from him! But he knew that it would be a waste of time as well as a waste of words. ‘What did you have for supper?’ She always asked this.
‘Erm, we had steak-and-kidney pie, but I picked the kidney out, although one bit got through and it was yucky.’
‘Oh, Rollo, that’s Daddy’s favourite! Don’t tell him or he’ll be very jealous!’ she trilled, before screaming loudly, ‘Waaaagh! Oh my good God – I called you Rollo!’ This was followed by a series of great gulping guffaws that lasted many seconds.
Theo waited until it passed, then whispered, ‘Yes, you did.’
‘Oh good Lord above!’ she shrieked. ‘How could I possibly have called you Rollo? I am a terror! Although that’s quite funny in itself, if you think about it, as Rollo is a terrier!’ She howled loudly once again.
And Theo had to admit that if time were not of the essence and if there hadn’t been so much he needed to say and reassurances he needed to hear, being called by the dog’s name would indeed be very funny.
Help me, Mummy! Please help me! Read my thoughts: I want to come home, I am so sad here. Please, please let me come home! Theo screwed his eyes shut and hoped that his pleas might float through the ether and reach her. He liked to think they had this psychic link that stretched all the way from his school in Dorset to the family home in Barnes.
‘Darling, I’m still chuckling! I only made the slip because Rollo is on my mind. He’s been a bit of a scamp, let me tell you. He got out of the garden and caused absolute havoc in Mrs Merriton’s rabbit run. Created quite a stir. He was only playing, of course, but the poor rabbit looked fit to have a heart attack. I told him, “No sausages for you, naughty Rollo”, and do you know, he looked at me as if he knew he’d been a bad boy. So of course that melted my heart and I gave him some sausage anyway, but don’t tell Daddy! He says I spoil him.’ She whispered the last bit.
‘I won’t tell Daddy.’ He felt a small flicker of joy at this shared confidence.
‘Anyway, very much looking forward to seeing you for exeat, only a few weeks now.’
Twitcher stood up and tapped his watch face. Time was up. Theo felt the pressure to say something, to get something across, anything! ‘I saw a hedge...’ He took a breath. ‘Where... Where birds lay their eggs and it’s very important that we don’t let crisp packets gather in it or they might get their heads stuck.’
‘Theo, you’re such a funny little thing!’
He thought about his mum’s parting words as he lay under the taut white sheets on his bed later that night. I am a funny little thing, but I don’t want to be. He turned his face into the pillow. Unseen in the dark dorm, he was finally able to give in to the tears he’d kept at bay all day.
* * *
Theo regularly hid during lunchbreak. Not literally – there was no climbing into small spaces or standing still behind cupboard doors, although he’d considered both. No, his hiding was subtler than that. He became adept at loitering and looking purposeful, reading and rereading noticeboards slowly, as if engrossed, stooping to painstakingly tie and retie his shoelaces, or sitting endlessly in a toilet cubicle while killing precious time, willing the clock to go faster. And if he had to move on, he walked with a resoluteness to his step and an expression that suggested he had a mission on his mind. This was all very exhausting, but it was unavoidable because he had no one to talk to and nowhere to sit. Try as he might, he couldn’t understand how all the boys in his house and all the girls in his form had friends who they could talk to, sit with and eat with, or even just read next to in silence. How come he didn’t have one single friend?
What’s wrong with me? It was this question that haunted him.
Walking across the quad, he spied Wilson and his cronies, Helmsley and Dinesh. All three were in their games kit, coming from the squash courts to the right. His heart jumped and his palms began to sweat at the prospect of an encounter. Averting his eyes, he broke into a light jog, pretending he hadn’t seen them as he made his way along the field. He carried on jogging until he found himself outside the crooked cottage where Mr Porter lived. The man himself was sitting on a bench attached to a slatted table similar to the ones he’d seen in the garden of the Red Lion pub, where his parents took him sometimes for Sunday lunch when he was at home.
Theo stared at Mr Porter and hesitated, trying desperately to think of a reason for being there, uninvited, in front of his path during lunchtime.
Mr Porter looked up briefly before returning his gaze to the fiddly task that seemed to be occupying him fully. ‘How good is your eyesight, Mr Montgomery?’ he called out.
‘It’s good.’ Theo glanced up the field to see if Wilson had followed and breathed a huge sigh of relief that he hadn’t. His gut muscles unbunched.
‘In that case, you can help me with this.’
Theo clenched and unclenched his hands, unsure whether it was okay to enter Mr Porter’s garden.
‘Well, come on then, lad, you can’t help me from all the way down there now, can you?’
He didn’t need telling twice. He walked up the short path and stopped at the table, on top of which he saw piles of small, brightly coloured feathers, shiny glass beads and thin strips of wire.
‘What... What are you doing?’ he asked softly, wanting to know but not wanting to be a nuisance.
‘I’m making fishing flies. Do you know what they are?’
Theo shook his head and took a step closer.
‘You can sit down.’ Mr Porter nodded at the bench on the opposite side of the table.
Theo sat on the edge, feeling the rough texture of the untreated wood against the underside of his legs. He watched, fascinated, as Mr Porter took feathers into his nimble fingers and bound the ends with an almost invisible twine. He worked slowly and carefully, wrapping them into little bundles.
‘That looks like an insect.’
Mr Porter sat back and shook his head. His expression this time was one of surprise. ‘Well, I didn’t realise you were so smart.’
Theo’s face split into a smile. He let the compliment slip under his skin, ready to warm him on a cold night at the end of a bad day.
‘That’s exactly what it’s meant to look like – an insect! This “fly”, as we call it, bobs on top of the water and will help me catch game fish, like salmon or trout. It tricks the fish into thinking they’re getting a tasty bug.’
‘But really they’re getting this fake bug!’
‘Exactly.’ Mr Porter winked.
‘I’ve never been fishing. Apart from with a net in a rock pool, but I don’t know if that counts,’ Theo mumbled, wary of saying the wrong thing. ‘I caught a starfish once, well, half a starfish. It was dead.’
Mr Porter shook his head sympathetically. ‘Sure it counts. But what I do is very different to rock-pooling. I like nothing more than to stand on a riverbank, or in the river itself, feeling the flow of the water, and watch the sun dappling the surface with light, birds fluttering overhead – and with a flask of tea and a sandwich or two in my pack. That’s where my happiness lies.’ Mr Porter smiled and closed his eyes briefly, as if picturing just that.
‘Do you catch many fish?’ Theo found it easy to think of what to say because he was interested.
‘Nope. I hardly ever catch a fish. Truth be told, I’m not as keen on the catching bit as much as the standing bit.’
‘It... It...’
‘Spit it out, lad!’ Unlike his father, Mr Porter issued this familiar instruction in an encouraging voice and with a crinkle-eyed smile. This had the opposite effect to normal and instead of clamming up, Theo continued calmly.
‘It seems like a lot of trouble to go to if you don’t catch any fish – couldn’t you just buy some from the shop?’
Mr Porter leant back and laughed. Slipping his fingers up under his tweed cap, he scratched at a bald patch on his head and Theo saw that the skin there was a shade or two lighter than his face. ‘Well, yes, I’m sure I could buy some, but shall I let you into a little secret?’
Theo nodded.
Mr Porter looked at him and spoke levelly. ‘The best thing about fishing is the stillness, the quiet. And the one thing I have learnt, possibly the most important lesson of all, is that when you’re still and quiet, that’s when your thoughts get ordered, when your mind sorts out all of its problems and when you’re able to see most clearly. Don’t ever underestimate the value of stillness.’
Theo digested his words.
Mr Porter placed his hands on his greasy lapel and turned it over to reveal a delicate turquoise-and-gold-feathered fly with a blue glass bead attached to a safety pin. He ran his fingertip over it. ‘I wear this here to remind me of just that. If ever my head is too busy or the world feels like too big a place for me to find my corner in it, I run my fingers over this and it reminds me to seek out the stillness.’ He looked directly at Theo. ‘Do you understand what I mean by that, lad?’
Theo nodded, even though he only half understood.
‘Now, if you want to help, sort these feathers into piles for me. Group them by colour.’ He tapped the tabletop with his square finger.
Eager for a job, Theo swung his legs over the bench and began pulling the little feathers apart, grouping them into colour-coordinated piles. It was fiddly work.
‘When did you learn to do this?’ he asked in his high voice.
‘In the war. I fought some of my war in Italy and that’s where I learnt to fish.’
‘Did you fire a gun?’
‘No, we just used rods and bait same as everyone else.’ Mr Porter chuckled.
‘I didn’t mean to fish – I meant to get the baddies.’ He blinked, unsure of whether the topic was off limits, as it was with Grandpa, who’d been in a place called Burma and had, according to his parents ‘had a terrible war’. This phrase intrigued him, as he couldn’t picture a war that was anything but terrible.
Mr Porter paused what he was doing and stared at him. ‘That’s the thing, Mr Montgomery. I did my duty for King and country and would gladly do so again.’ He straightened his back and tilted his chin. ‘But as for “baddies”, as you call them... I only saw people. People in all shapes and sizes, but people just the same. War is a terrible thing and sometimes you might think you’ve got home scot-free, might think you’ve got away with things, but you haven’t. You never know what’s waiting for you around the next corner or even at home. There is always a price to pay. It’s as if fate waits in the wings to rip the heart out of you and it’s then you realise your war will never be over.’
Mr Porter took a big breath. It was only when he continued making his fly that Theo took his cue to continue chatting.
‘How did you know who the baddies were then? How did... How did you know who to shoot?’ He looked up, wary of entering unchartered territory.
‘As I said, I didn’t do much shooting, but the enemy, if you will, were pointed out to me by my commanding officer long before I ever set foot on foreign soil and before I met a single one of them. I was told to identify them by the uniform they wore. But therein lay the problem.’ Mr Porter leant in, and Theo was thrilled at the possibility that he might be sharing a secret. ‘I considered my commanding officer to be a baddy. I was unsure of his judgement – he was no more than a boy himself, just a few months free of his mother’s apron strings and a bit of a bully, and yet he held my fate and the fate of many others in the palm of his young hand. That made it hard for me to trust him. Whereas some of the fellas who wore a different colour uniform to me, baddies if you will, well, close up, they had similar faces to those of my mates. We were all as scared and desperate as each other.’ He let this hang. ‘And let me tell you this, Mr Montgomery, those that didn’t make it home were mourned by their families just the same, goodies and baddies alike.’
Mr Porter gave an odd little cough and his eyes looked misty, so Theo knew it was time for quiet. And that was all right with him. He was happy to have somewhere to sit and someone to sit with, though he would have found it hard to fully explain how or why Mr Porter’s garden felt like a refuge from loneliness.
The two worked in silence until the sound of the school bell echoed along the field.
‘That’ll be the end of lunch then,’ Mr Porter muttered without lifting his eyes from his fishing flies.
Theo gave an involuntary sigh. ‘I’d better go back up to school.’
‘Here.’ Mr Porter pulled a slim navy tube from his jacket pocket and handed it to Theo.
‘What is it?’
‘What does it look like?’
Theo scrutinised the object in his palm. ‘A pen!’
‘Ah, appearances can be deceptive! Look.’ Mr Porter took the fake pen from him and twisted the lid until a beam of light shone from the nib. ‘It’s a torch. I thought you might be able to give it to that boy you know. The one who you thought might be afraid of the dark. You see, with this in his possession, he can get up in the night and go to the bathroom without fear and that might stop him pissing in your pyjamas.’ He gave a small chuckle.
‘We’re... We’re not allowed torches.’ Theo ran his fingers over the gift. He felt torn, desperately wanting to keep it but painfully conscious that it would be contraband.
‘Of course not – that’s a rule I’m perfectly aware of. But that’s not a torch, is it? It’s a pen!’ He smiled.
Theo rolled the marvellous gift in his hand. ‘Yes! It’s a pen.’ He beamed. ‘Thank you.’
‘You are most welcome.’
Theo swung his legs out from under the bench and started to walk up the path. Turning back, he called over his shoulder, ‘Mr Porter?’
‘Yes, Mr Montgomery?
‘It... It was me.’
‘What was you?’
‘It was me that pissed in my pyjamas and hid them behind Matron’s radiator.’
Mr Porter looked startled. ‘Well, I never did! But here’s the thing: you never have to lie to me, and I will never lie to you, how about that? Deal?’
‘Deal.’ Theo twisted the pen cap and smiled at the thin stream of light that shone into his palm.
Theo had just finished another unsatisfactory Thursday phone call with his mother and was making his way from Mr Beckett’s study. He was in a world of his own, struggling with the latest wave of homesickness and desperate for his first exeat, when quite unexpectedly Twitcher grabbed the top of his arm, pulling him back into the room.
His housemaster bent low and spoke directly into his ear. Theo could smell his piquant breath; he tucked in his lips to avoid inhaling it.
‘I have to say, I find it quite troubling that you can never think of anything informative to share with your parents, Montgomery. Listening to your weekly call is painful. Your father was head of house here! He’s a good man, paying a small fortune to turn you into a Vaizey boy, and yet you don’t have the courtesy to let him know how the 1st XV are doing or that the quadrangle race record was broken by Danvers only last week? These things matter, especially to an OVB.’
At the mention of the Old Vaizey Boys, Theo’s insides curdled. His father held regular and horribly loud dinner parties for other members of this esteemed club and the deafening noise of their reunions always floated up the stairs to his room. He had spied on them through the keyhole once. They were all dressed in dinner jackets and bow ties in their old house colours, and they were banging their palms on the white tablecloth and belting out a tuneless song about port and knickers, taking it in turns to swig the dark red wine from a silver cup.
‘But I think that’s the problem in a nutshell.’ His housemaster’s booming voice pulled him back to the present. ‘I don’t think these things matter to you.’
‘I... I...’ Theo’s mouth was having trouble catching up with his brain. This happened sometimes.
‘Tell me...’ Mr Beckett let go of his arm and walked towards the study window, which had an unusually good view along the field and all the way down to the crooked cottage. ‘Why do you hang around with the ground staff?’ His eyelid twitched as he clasped his hands behind his back.
Theo shrugged. ‘I don’t know, sir.’
‘Let me put it another way. What is the nature of your relationship with Porter, the groundsman?’
‘He... He’s my friend. Sir.’
‘Your friend!’ Twitcher guffawed. ‘Good God, man, don’t you have any friends your own age?’
‘No, sir.’ He felt his cheeks colour at the admission.
Mr Beckett stopped dead and turned, an expression of disbelief and disdain on his face. ‘None at all? Not one?’
‘No, sir.’ Theo’s shame wrapped around him like a heavy cloak, dragging him down.
Twitcher took a deep breath and spoke over Theo’s head, as if he were invisible. ‘Do you know what I think when I see a boy who, in a school of over six hundred pupils, in an environment where friendships flourish on and off the sports field, and where connections are made that can last a lifetime, still finds himself on his own?’
‘No, sir.’
‘I think it can’t possibly be the other five hundred and ninety-nine or so who are at fault. The odds are simply too high. I believe there has to be a reason for your isolation, and do you know what that reason is?’ He lowered his eyes to meet Theo’s.
‘No, sir.’
‘Weirdness.’
Mr Beckett was silent for a second, letting the horrible word with all its negative connotations sink in. ‘I’ve seen it before and will no doubt see it again. You have a weirdness about you, Montgomery, and weirdness is something that the other pupils, in fact all humans, fear more than anything. It’s like a disease and, believe me, it’s contagious. That’s why weirdos stick together in toxic little huddles, backs to the wall, eyes wide, waiting to see who might be picked off next.’
Theo wanted badly to cry, but doing so in front of Mr Beckett would be asking for trouble. Twitcher did not like weakness. On or off the field.
‘Do you want some advice?’
‘Yes, sir.’ Despite his housemaster’s hurtful words, Theo looked up with genuine hope, feeling a flash of excitement that there might be a cure for his toxic condition. Because what Theodore Montgomery wanted more than anything in the whole wide world was not to be weird!
He wanted a friend, a proper friend of his own age.
Mr Beckett leant in closer. Theo cocked his head so he could take in every detail of the advice that just might prove invaluable.
‘Stay quiet and stay out of sight. Become invisible. Go to ground and try not to take root.’
*
It was a strange thing, but as Theo turned his face into his pillow that night and waited, he was surprised to find that there were no tears. It was almost as if this wounding was so deep, so visceral, that he was hurt in a place beyond tears.
I’m weird. Weird. The word tumbled around his head until sleep claimed him.
* * *
There was a burble of excitement all through the school: everyone got to go home for three whole days and they weren’t due back at school until Monday. Theo had packed a day ago and now sat by his bed with his tan leather suitcase at his feet and his eyes glued to his watch, waiting for the minute hand to tick again, each cycle taking him closer to the comfort of his father’s car and escape. His leg jumped and his heart raced; the moment could not come soon enough.
And then, like a vision, there she was, standing in the doorway – his mother. Her floral scent permeated the air, red lipstick shone from her pale face and her impossibly long dark eyelashes fluttered upwards. She looked... She looked beautiful. Soft, pretty and familiar in an environment that was none of those things.
‘Theodore!’ She giggled in her high-pitched way, which sounded to him like the tinkle of glass.
At the sight of her, his reserve disappeared and he ran into her, gripping her tightly about her waist, inhaling her smell with his head buried against her chest.
‘Darling! Now that’s quite a welcome. How lovely.’ She patted his head before easing him away by his shoulders, turning the whole embrace into something a little embarrassing. ‘Come on, Daddy’s in the car. We don’t want to keep him waiting, do we?’
Theo lifted his small suitcase off the ground, letting it bang against his skinny leg with every step.
‘If it isn’t Mrs Montgomery!’ Twitcher called from his open study door in a loud, happy voice.
‘Well, hello you!’ she shouted back.
Theo shrank, not sure if his mother or indeed anyone was allowed to talk to his housemaster in such a fashion. Apparently she was forgiven, as Mr Beckett trotted out from behind his desk and held her in a tight hug, smiling in a way Theo hadn’t seen before. He noted with a twinge of envy that their hug lasted at least twice as long as his had.
‘So good to see you!’ Mr Beckett beamed.
‘You too, darling.’ His mother gripped Twitcher’s forearms with her dainty hands and stared into his face.
She called him “darling”! Theo looked over his shoulder with trepidation, checking no other boys were around to witness this. But he was the last to be collected, so he was quite safe.
‘So are we seeing you at Le Mans? Tiffany has had the house redecorated apparently and is very keen for us all to go and admire it. I’ve been assured that the plumbing actually works now!’ His mother spoke with her hand resting on Twitcher’s chest; it was a gesture so intimate, it made Theo’s heart race and his stomach flip. He thought he might be sick.
He wanted to hurl his suitcase to the floor and shout out, ‘He’s mean to me, Mummy! Don’t be happy to see him! He says I’m weird, and I hate it here! I hate it! Please don’t be his friend. Be on my side!’ But of course he didn’t, because he was seven and he had neither the confidence nor the wisdom to know when to shout.
‘Do you remember the great bathroom fiasco?’ his mother continued. ‘Poor Gerry, he’s still mortified, by all accounts. I have this image of him running onto the veranda starkers and with a scalded bottom! I shouldn’t laugh really.’ She hid her mouth with her hand and laughed anyway.
‘God, don’t remind me. I still haven’t recovered from last year!’ Mr Beckett bellowed and the two laughed like old friends.
‘Oh, please don’t be boring, Becks, I’m counting on you. No one, but no one makes a Manhattan like you do.’ His mother dipped her head and spoke with lowered lashes.
‘Stella, you know that where you are concerned, flattery will get you everywhere.’ He winked. The phone rang on his desk. ‘Duty calls,’ he shouted as he made his way back into his study. ‘Love to Perry!’
‘Of course. Come on, Theo.’ She walked ahead and clicked her fingers.
As he skipped to heel, he wondered if once again she might have got him confused with Rollo the terrier.
He waved at his father, who’d parked the shiny dark blue Aston Martin V8 across two parking spots reserved for staff. This was another reason for Theo to feel anxious.
‘Mind the paintwork!’ His father winced as he approached with his suitcase. He sprang from the car, placed his lit cigarette in his mouth, popped the boot and lifted the luggage with such ease that Theo’s arms seemed to weaken in protest.
His father ruffled his hair as Theo climbed into the back seat. He liked the weight of his dad’s palm against his scalp and could feel its heat for a while after. The car smelt of leather, cologne and cigarettes and Theo hoped he wasn’t going to be sick.
‘All set?’ his father asked, looking at him in the rearview mirror. His mother buckled up in the front and twisted the chunky green glass bangle on her wrist.
Theo nodded.
‘God, I bloody love this building!’ His father beeped the horn and whooped as they drove out onto the lane. ‘Spent the best years of my life here, and when I come back, it’s like coming home! I don’t want to wish your life away, Theo old son, but I can’t wait for you to feel like this!’ He beeped the horn again.
His mother turned round and pulled a face at Theo. It made him smile, but it was a fake smile. He knew he was never going to feel anything other than hatred for the whole place.
His mother ran her arm along the back of the leather driver’s seat and toyed with the lick of dark hair that curled at his father’s neck. ‘I saw Becks. He’s moaning about last year’s Le Mans hangover, sounded like he might be wimping out of the trip. Can you believe it?’ she drawled, reaching into her clutch bag for her cigarettes.
‘Tell him to man up! For God’s sake.’
‘I did, more or less. He’s such a darling. He won’t miss it, of course. I think he’s teasing, fishing for compliments.’ She lit her cigarette and in a well-practised motion flipped the gold Zippo lighter. It closed with a loud thunk.
Theo stared out of the window, watching the hedgerows whiz past. He pictured the wrens, blackbirds and dunnocks that would make them their home when the time came and hoped they wouldn’t get their heads stuck in an old crisp packet or a strip of newspaper. He patted his pocket to make sure his trusty pen torch was where he could find it.
As they left Muckleford and continued along twisty Dorset lanes, heading towards London, Theo listened to his parents chatting and laughing and playfully slapping each other’s hands away from the radio dial. He liked being in their company but he wondered if he should cough, remind them that he was there. Just as he was considering this, his mother turned to him.
‘Have you had supper?’
Ignoring the growl of hunger in his gut, he smiled at her, not wanting to be any more trouble than he already was, interrupting their busy lives to travel down to Dorset and bring him home. ‘I’m fine,’ he lied.
‘Thank God for that!’ She giggled, resting her hand on her husband’s thigh. ‘I’m not sure what we have in?’
‘You are a crap wife! The crappest!’ his father yelled in jest.
‘Don’t listen to your father, Theo. I am an exceptional wife! I can’t help it if cooking and food shopping and all that stuff bores me rigid.’ They both laughed. ‘Ooh!’ She raised her index finger to indicate that an idea had occurred. ‘I think I have some cheese in the fridge and a tin of crackers in the larder – that’ll do. We’ll make a meal of it, bottle of plonk, none for you, Theo, but some of Edith’s chutney... We could even eat by candlelight!’ She laughed, turning to him briefly before reaching for another cigarette.
It felt like an age before the car pulled into the gated driveway of their grand red-brick home in Barnes. No longer laughing, the three had travelled for the last hour in silence, his father gripping the steering wheel with white knuckles.
Now his father tutted as he alighted from the car. His face was thunderous, his anger coming off him in waves. ‘Out you jump,’ he instructed, his tone curt and his eyes blazing.
Theo clambered out on wobbly legs. The fresh air was a welcome tonic.
‘I’m very sorry, Daddy.’
‘So you said, and it’s not your fault, but a bit of notice would have been nice and no amount of sorrys is going to get rid of that bloody smell.’
Theo looked at the dark stain on the pale brown leather where his vomit had splashed. ‘Shall I wash it for you?’
‘No!’ his father barked. ‘For God’s sake don’t take a scourer, or detergent or in fact anything to the leather, you’ll only make it worse.’ He ran his hand through his hair.
‘He’s only trying to help!’ his mother called across the wide bonnet.
His father pinched the bridge of his nose and Theo knew he was angry with him. The whole horrible journey home had burst the happy bubble that had filled him up all day. He’d been so excited about coming home, but now he felt nothing but awkward and embarrassed, and rather than enjoying his exeat, he was already dreading the drive back to school, knowing that the combination of cigarette smoke and winding roads might have the exact same effect on the return journey. The only thing he was dreading more than the drive back to school was arriving there.
His mother climbed the steps to the front door and as she put the key in the door he heard Rollo’s bark.
‘There he is! There’s my baby boy!’ she said in a baby voice that sent a tingle of envy through him. ‘Look! It’s your brother! Theo’s home!’ She lifted the lithe Jack Russell and waved a paw in Theo’s direction.
His father jogged up the steps in his brogues, bent forward, kissed Rollo’s nose and muttered something to his mum. The occasional word floated down to Theo and made his tummy hurt. ‘Fucking smell... vomit!... bloody expensive... idiot!... what the fuck is wrong with him?’
Theo went inside and climbed the stairs. Ignoring the stabs of hunger, which seemed almost insignificant now, he sat on the end of his bed. The pale green and pink floral carpet he’d always hated had been vacuumed ahead of his visit, but the place was still thick with dust. The room had been decluttered. Gone was his collection of Matchbox cars, which had once filled an entire bookshelf, and his Rupert the Bear annuals were missing too. There was a new reading lamp, a mahogany sideboard and a flowery chair that he hadn’t seen before. These items had probably been brought up from the basement, where his grandpa’s furniture was stored.
He unbuckled his suitcase and pulled out his pyjamas, red-striped and edged with white piping. They smelt of school and because of that he was loath to put them on. He’d forgotten that his bedroom could be quite noisy with the traffic on the road between their house and the river and the shouts of people returning home from the pub. It would take a bit of getting used to after the quiet of Vaizey College and all that countryside.
He slipped between the cold sheets and laid his head on the flannelette pillowcase. He liked its soft bobbles; they comforted him and reminded him he was home. Curling his feet up under his bottom to try and get warm, he reached into his discarded blazer for his pen torch and, twisting it on, fired shafts of light up towards the ceiling. A thousand million particles of dust danced in the beam; he disturbed them with his fingers before settling into the dip in the mattress where the springs had gone a little slack.
‘What’s that you’ve got?’ his mother asked from the doorway.
‘It’s my pen torch. My friend gave it to me.’
‘Oh, Theo, I’m so pleased you have a friend! Well done you. Is he nice?’
‘Yes,’ he whispered.
‘What’s his name?’
‘I... I don’t know.’
His mother snorted her laughter. ‘You don’t know his name? You are a funny little thing.’
You don’t need to keep saying that to me. I already know!
‘I don’t want to go back to school, Mummy.’ He switched off his torch and toyed with the silky edge of the wool blanket.
‘Yes, you do! It’s a wonderful school, with wonderful opportunities for you.’
He stared at her and for the first time her full smile had the opposite effect to the one intended. Instead of reassuring him that things were okay, he knew that even though she might be listening, she didn’t actually hear him, and that made him feel invisible.
‘I hate it there.’