MONDAY DECEMBER 6th 1976
DANBRAY - ALL SAINTS SCHOOL : MORNING
Rain spat at the antiquated, double-decker bus as it jarringly halted outside the old school. A couple of dole-ites were blasting out a little radio upstairs, allowing the last strains of ‘Somebody To Love’ to fill the bus before giving way to the voice of Tony Blackburn’s over stimulated Radio One chatter informing the UK that “…was the latest single by Queen! They just get better and better, don’t they? And in the next half-hour as we move swiftly to Christmas, only 18 shopping days remaining, we’ll have Steeleye Span, John Lennon, Slade and Wizzard with loads of Yuletide spirit! But first, let’s keep the love theme flowing with Elton John’s latest ‘Sorry Seems To Be The Hardest Word’ from the ‘Captain Fantastic’ album – great!”
Jonn Harris reluctantly stepped off the bus as the chunky piano chords were already acoustically fading out, looked up at the heavily clouded sky as the dirty red vehicle trundled out of sight into the heart of Fallowhill’s hideous housing scheme, and reluctantly strode across the road to his school.
His facial expression mirrored his regular, Monday morning thoughts as he tried to rationalise why he was here.
The stiff, chill wind whipped at his black Oxford Bags as he tossed the old brown duffel coat higher around himself with a well-practised shrug, clutched the black BEA bag in his right hand and casually started towards the gate.
'All Saints' school stood before him as impassively as it had for the past forty odd years, the dull winter light blending with the dark and almost foreboding construction. Maybe the Art Nouveau architect who designed the monolith was a closet National Socialist but he certainly wasn’t a Humanist – the school was more like a prison camp than a temple of excellence. The building itself always looked cold and desolate despite it's periodic renovations and amendments, in fact bearing much of the Americana influence of the 1930’s that always seemed to take some 20 odd years to reach Britain. Harris had often wondered why the British always seemed to wait a score of years to embrace the concepts America had already found to be unworkable? The school was a big and awkward looking structure, like a sore on the landscape, while, paradoxically, it seemed to be an essential part of the run-down area. All that was missing was the sign over the gate stating ‘Welcome to the Wasteland, abandon hope all ye who enter’! Harris paused, looked at the building as though it were a floating stone iceberg, tugged at the lapel of his coat where his green and gold 'Monitor' badge was pinned, and started into the school past the assembled lines of faceless pupils.
He could feel the hate as though it were a physical force emanating from the horde as they stood in their regimented lines waiting in the cold to be dismissed to their classes for registration. As a member of the Sixth Year he was exempt from lining up in the stupid ritual intended to instil discipline in the masses for the first 4 years of their education and which only served to create contempt for the authorities they were almost powerless against while they were held prisoner there.
The Fifth and Sixth year were the only truly academic strata still under the elitist ‘Streaming’ education policy which had been almost universally replaced by the equality driven, ‘Comprehensive’ concept and this in itself simply served to alienate them further from the rest of the school, continuing the eternal microcosmic war of 'Us' and ‘Them’. The term ‘Comprehensive’ was a misnomer in more ways than one – there was nothing all encompassing about this hideous, ritualistic education stream.
Jonn Harris smiled to himself as he strode past them all, perversely pleased that they felt the same mutual hate for him. He was not only part of the upper school but also a 'Monitor' who found the general mass of this violent, gang ridden school a pathetic and contemptible collection of miniature humanity. Maybe this was just his reaction to the oppressive danger that was always boiling close to the surface in this town.
It was already after five past nine and, as usual, Harris was late. Entering the dingy building he walked up the bleak grey stairway slowly as though savouring the graffiti stained walls for the first time. They had been liberally scrawled and were rewritten as often as the new paint jobs were completed. Most of it amounted to feeble gang slogans or questioned the parentage of the teachers, monitors and the poor bastards who were victimised and bullied on a daily basis. Harris felt vaguely amused by the writings on the wall and at the same time he almost pitied the feeble minds who found difficulty in correctly spelling their taunts – but he never forgot how much he hated coming here. Slowly his daily thoughts were dispelled as he trudged through the faded mustard coloured main corridors and approached his registration class.
The classroom itself was actually a woodwork room on the ‘Technical’ side of the school, and it was here that he was supposed to come every morning to sign in for the attendance record - not that anyone particularly cared on an altruistic level whether or not a pupil was attending regularly for a good education - but if they didn’t, then it disrupted the smooth running of the school system… and that was quite unacceptable. With a sigh he parted the wooden, glass paned, twin sliding doors aside and reluctantly slipped in. The large desk at the front of the class was occupied by a small, middle aged, balding man with a permanent, artificial grin welded to his face.
Mr. Walls looked up at Harris. A larger smile spreading across his face as the youth entered the classroom and stood in front of him.
"Aaah, good morning, Harris", he quipped almost jovially, "finally decide to vacate your bed, did you?"
With another mental sigh Harris looked at him sincerely and prepared to concoct another unbelievable story which he would then reiterate straight faced, but he was denied that minor pleasure as the teacher stared at him.
"Don't bother, Harris, I'm quite sure that the bus was held to ransom by Black September on the way to school" Walls sneered.
Flicking his hair back, Jonn Harris smiled slowly. "You must have heard Jack DeMannio’s report on Radio Four this morning, sir!” There was a special emphasis on the ‘Sir’, barely concealing the deep and abiding contempt Harris seemed to have for Walls.
Spreading his smile wider and straining it further, Walls returned to marking the school register, a task, which he never seemed to tire of. Harris gazed back at him pitifully as he strode reluctantly to his seat. He wondered what kind of person could find solace in executing such a mediocre and tediously unimportant task as the ‘Daily Register’ – had this man ever been young with dreams and hopes? In his head Harris laughed at the man who was so like the rest of the school, perhaps Walls’ diligence in school duties was to compensate for something missing elsewhere in his life.
Kicking a wooden chair back slightly Harris sat down beside Dave, grunting their ‘hellos’ to one another at exactly the same time.
"Walls really loves you, man – deep down! Jesus Christ, I fucking hate Mondays!" Dave said, throwing a piece of Cadbury’s chocolate wrapper onto the clean swept floor.
He was an attractive, tall, black haired youth whose height was accentuated by the fact that he was relatively thin. His face looked as though he was always in discomfort of some kind, mainly due to his angled eyebrows, while his mouth was formed in a near permanent smile exposing his friendly, toothy grin and abundant teeth. His vague resemblance to Donny Osmond was fairly apparent but his friends rarely commented on it unless deliberately trying to annoy him. Dave's angular face was of a generally good complexion and almost rosy cheeks, marred only by a couple of spots which he valiantly fought against the moment he detected any burgeoning blemish. Pushing at his father's old blue RAF coat Dave tugged at his hair, which always looked newly brushed whether it was or not, and gazed around the room. As it was coming towards the Christmas break the attendance levels fell away and the barren classroom was just over half-full.
Harris surveyed the room as he did each and every morning, it was pretty dismal and the shadows from the low wattage lights hung like spider's webs in every corner. Walls had absolutely no rapport with his class, their motivations and behaviour were an utter mystery to him, and neither party ever endeavoured to establish any détente, resulting in an ongoing subdued conflict. The teacher was sitting at the front of the class smiling inanely and surveying his flock as if to try and see what they were thinking. Harris felt sick just being in the place, never mind having to look as Walls’ ‘Baron Sardonicus’ like artificial grin. Dave sat glumly picking small pieces of plastic from his cumbersome dark briefcase and flicked them quickly onto the floor in a repetitive motion. The antiquity and sterile atmosphere of the place always got to them at the best of times never mind on a Monday morning. Harris looked at Dave from under his mop of brown hair and yawned slightly before he spoke.
"Shit – I’m creamy crackered today! It must be old age kicking in, the weekends are really burning me out! Oh, fuck… it’s Zoonie for the first two periods! Christ, Mack, I can't bear to go to physics this morning… do you think we could sag off and go up to ‘Big Lyons’ room and get started on Friday’s posters?”
"That'll work! Four doors along from physics? Doubt it! Especially since we've not been to Zoonie's class for a couple of weeks now, I think he's beginning to get a bit pissed off with us. You know him, he's always on the lookout for a chance to get us tossed out of his class".
“Surely not, the Prelims are done and there’s only ten or twelve school days until the end of term! You’d think the Spasti-Cat would be glad we haven’t been there – he doesn’t want us around and we don’t want to be there! That’s a marriage made in heaven, to me!”
"Yeah, thing is though it'll be half empty and that’s the only thing he hates worse than us. I think we have to submit to the inevitable, it’s ‘Newton's theory of Kinetics’ or ‘Newton's theory of Kinetics’ for the next two periods… God rest our souls!”
“I hate it when you’re right, Macklin!” Harris laughed.
The other smirked back and then shrugged in response as they both surrendered to the inevitable.
By the time the 9.15 period announcement bell rang and disturbed them, the more diligent members of the class promptly exited, escaping the silence of Walls daily ‘fifteen minutes of fun’. Collecting their bags, the reluctant pair tardily slouched unenthusiastically towards the wooden doors grinning mindlessly to each other as they went. Walls tractor beamed across to them a special kind of smile designed to stop them in their tracks.
"Aaah, Harris, Macklin, two of the ‘Fantastic Five’ - no, sorry just the ‘Fantastic Four’ now, isn't it? Can I have a few minutes of your precious time to discuss your missing comrade, Mr Rosser?"
Harris looked at the terrace Tory with mental horror and open contempt.
"Well, actually we've got to get to Zoo… eh, Mr. Laiden's Physics class, wouldn't like to be late and miss some of the illuminating lesson, sir!" he said half heartedly.
Walls grin fell slightly as he assumed his "down to business' approach with them.
"Don't worry about it, Harris. Now, Rosser's your good friend, isn't he?”
Neither of the youths responded, they just stared blankly at him.
The stony silence irritated Walls, Monday morning, apparently, was a pain for him too.
"Look," he said, "Rosser has been off for the past two weeks and I want to know why."
Dave smiled innocently. "Perhaps if you ask Rosser himself, sir, he'll tell you!" he said, his slight Brummie accent showing through.
"Don't be witty Macklin or I'll have you up for six!” Walls said forcefully.
The pair blatantly grinned at the thought of five feet three of Walls trying to belt the six foot two Sixth year.
Harris looked inquisitive and sincere as he suggested his response. “Surely such a penalty would be self defeating, sir? After all, isn’t violence merely the sign language of the inarticulate?”
Walls sighed and continued in what he considered to be a more subtle vein. “Look, if Rosser isn't back at school before the end of the week, I'll see to it that he doesn't come back at all – School Captain or not! This establishment can do without the likes of you clowns."
Dave and Jonn agreed with him monotonically and slowly walked out the door. As they left Harris peered back across his shoulder with a smug smile.
"By the way, Mr Walls… Rosser won't be back until New Year. I believe he's bruised his ribs from a fall at, uncannily enough, the Kelvin Hall Circus, …sir!" he said walking out of sight.
He and Dave simultaneously raised their fingers in a 'Harvey Smith’ influenced, gesture of praise to the teacher.
Dave chuckled aloud as they waded into the milling corridor throng.
"What a dick! He seems to really dislike us for some unknown reason!” Dave grinned.
'Yup - Finestkind! I'll worry when the little turd starts to fall for us! Tory toss-pot! More to the point, how was your Saturday with Polythene Pam?”
"Fine!"
"Fine? Fine is what you say when your mother asks how the food is, not your assessment of a well-crafted piece of tail like Pam! I'll try again, Sport… How was your Saturday with the teenie terror?"
Dave laughed and pushed Harris into the wall as they walked, "It was fine, good, pleasant, entertaining, happy-making! Is that better?"
Harris looked back suspiciously, "Not really, doesn't tell me any more than I already knew. Can't have been too exciting if there's no dirt to dish!"
"Will I tape it for you next time?"
"Fuck, no! I'd hate to think how toe curlingly, cringing with embarrassment that'd be. Especially with me having to go through it all and tell you how much you're getting wrong!" he laughed.
"Yeah, right - Tell me, Oh, Master!"
“I bloody well might, you won’t be laughing then!”
“You don’t think so?”
Harris looked back with a pitying glance. “No, between Kinsey, Hite and myself… most of the options for sexual behaviour and perversions are pretty well covered. You sure you don’t want some tips for making Pam into a guaranteed ‘HEK’?”
Dave laughed. “I’ll do my own home entertainment kit manufacturing, thanks!”
“Okay… but don’t come crawling back to me when she starts asking about ‘G’ spot gratification!”
“I won’t. Speaking of which, has anybody heard from Rosser? The bastard’s missed two rehearsals so far.”
“Gave you more time to play with Pamela, didn’t it?”
The tall youth laughed. “Want me to start on the Christene thing again?”
“Fuck off! It’s no wonder she stays away from you deviants, all you ever do is bleat on about Christene and Harris, Harris and Christene, how’s Blondie?”
“Hey, at least I don’t ask what her flumpies are like – unlike Rosser!”
Harris laughed. “Well, Captain Savage hasn’t been around enough to ask anyone anything in the past few weeks. And, on reflection, you’re right… it’s been good to get peace from the ‘Man, she’s got a serious rack – I’d be feeding off that, if I were you, Harris’!”
They laughed to one another as they ambled through the busy, ugly corridors to the rear of the school.

After a protracted journey around the back of the main building they entered the other wing of the school, the new extension, only recently completed that summer and still smelling virginal. The physical warmth of the building contrasted with the apparent cold impression of the plastic walls. They reached the physics class a mere fifteen minutes late. Laiden spoke to them without even turning from the blackboard, "You're seventeen minutes late, where have you been?"
“Mr. Walls kept us back, sir! …Said he’d square it with you!” Dave said slowly.
"I'll check on that later, Mr Macklin, and I'm sure your zest for this class made you rush across here as fast as your bony legs would carry you. The frequency of your attendance here leaves some cause for concern, if it doesn't become more regular there'll be trouble.”
"That's pretty similar to what I told Diane last month." Harris muttered with an amused grin on his face.
"Did I hear you say something, Harris?” the Physics teacher inquired.
"I very much doubt it, sir!" he replied, walking with Dave to the back of the class, nodding to the grinning, blonde haired ‘Mars’ as he passed. They both sat down at the clean woodlike benches, on their plastic stools, withdrew their books and prepared themselves to be bored for the next hour and ten minutes. They weren’t likely to be disappointed.
"So, what did you get up to in the end, Jonn? Spending more time with beautiful ‘Blondie’?” Dave asked quietly to avoid disturbing Zoonie.
"Have we not been here less than five minutes ago? What is it with you lot? Why do you all think something’s going on? I told you, she's just…"
"… a friend, yeah, got it! I wish my friends all looked like that instead of how bloody ugly you, Palmer, Storey and Rosser look!"
"Hey, you missed the main ugly, Sport - you!"
"Up yours!"
"Double back, Mack!"
The voice from the front of the class was aimed directly at them.
"Bad enough being late but also having the bad manners to continue your conversation while I'm trying to clarify the concept of calibrating inertia to you, Macklin and Harris, shows a lack of enthusiasm you’ll undoubtedly see manifesting in your prelim results. May I continue?"
The two youths didn't respond but did have the courtesy to let him proceed, simply mouthing 'wanker' to one another with a smile.

Most of the class were there in body only, paying attention singularly when spoken to, but this was a satisfactory amount of interest for some teachers to feel that they were doing their job – at least validly enough to score their salary at the end of the month. Sometimes there were even those who took an interest in their work, whether student or teacher. Brian Daniels was a good example, a brilliant sciences student with an obsessive fixation on Einstein the way some kids adored Bowie or Led Zeppelin… this trait tangibly manifesting in his uncomplicated choice of apparel. The spectacled science fiend followed the Einstein theory of fashion and had a wardrobe apparently full of grey trousers, black jumpers, and blue anoraks - since this was the absolute extent of sartorial variety he had shown in almost six full years at the school. He was paying attention to the man in the white coat at all times because one day he too would probably become a man in a white coat.
Dave fought off the claws of boredom in class by drawing a flock of seagulls, silhouetted against a setting sun on the back of his science folder, fitted between a mass of neatly inked band logos accrued during the previous months. Harris, on the other hand, simply slid into some bizarre dimension in his own head, disappearing into deep thought that had little to do with science.
Harris’s awareness that there were a mere six months of schooling left until their freedom became official was becoming something he had begun to consider more and more – not because he had any great plan, but because he felt that something should have been gained somewhere along the course of the past five and a half years, something more significant than observing that sexually segregated schools weren’t a good idea. He could find nothing that his education had provided him with except for an arena to meet his four friends, which was in itself something good but not exactly what the 1950’s school regimen legacy was designed to achieve.
Harris’s general pessimism made him question their future, they were living in the Post-Heath era of a Socialist governed, amended free market economy where everything was up for grabs, at least in theory… and every time he tried to look ahead he merely saw darkness and depression. The machine wasn’t working any more, there were more flaws than functions… and like the rest of the country this town and school had more than its' fair share of them.
Outside the windows the drizzle continued and inside so did the droning drivel. ‘Zoonie’ chatted away monotonically, without any real interest in a subject he had long lost any passion for and the pupils reciprocated the compliment.
This was how they lived and how the system worked.