Lost Lad (7 page)

Ahead of his friends, Simeon decided to dry off and get dressed.  He set out to navigate the box puzzle which was peaceful after the ongoing screaming row back in the main hall.  He turned the corners, left and right and then left again, made one mistake but, eventually he recognised the cul-de-sac at the far end where they had left their clothes.

The sight which met Simeon's eyes was truly arresting.  For a moment he stood frozen to take in and make sense of the scene before him.  A big strapping well tanned youth was standing, naked, firm and confident, feet apart, hands on hips, strong and powerful, a la Henry VIII - but the kingdom of this stripling was of another time and another place.  This was Big Boy - no less. 

            Big Boy was smiling with condescension at his one time servant.  In two years of fast adolescent growth, the tyrant had filled out in all the right places and was magnificent.  The mind-blowing scene was not just the vision of this Adonis, but the stunning eroticism due to his collection of conscientious acolytes.  Possibly about seven puerile admiring attendants were busy, touching, tending and ministering.  One appeared to be stroking the inside of his leg and one at the back was caressing his bottom.  An urchin was doing something else back there in a dark recess and another in front was examining a nipple.  His scrotum was being fondled by a fair haired youth and two lads nearer to his own stature were, in turn, giving their best efforts to the one place where it counts.  Things had moved on since 1957, and Simeon, mesmerised, was unable to take his eyes off it.  The acolytes, some with protruding tongues, some open mouthed, were uttering tiny sounds and sighs of wonderment and scrutiny along the lewd paths of their sensuous journey - but, as to be expected, the big sounds came at the end. 

            Several squeals of surprise came with a powerful ejection which passed over the heads of two workers.  The only indication of this finality was a softening of Big Boy's arrogant smile.  It dissolved into a countenance controlled by the ecstasy of that special one moment which had so often been fashioned by Simeon's own hand at Mundy Street Boys School.

            Most impressive about this bizarre show to the voyeur was the total lack of fear or embarrassment.  Simeon's arrival on the scene had not fazed any of them - why?  Was it due to the cast iron protection which would be afforded by Big Boy himself?  Had he ever been afraid of anything, this youth, who simply took his pleasure at will?  

An unsettling event!  It had exited and stirred Simeon beyond measure.  Painful memories and instinct warned him to carry on and show no reaction.  He fumbled with his shirt, tried to dress, tried to hide the embarrassing effect of the previous minutes - but could hardly concentrate.  The others were quicker and filed out in front of their hulky master who was still wearing his superior handsome half smile.  Languidly he strolled towards his former slave - and then stopped!  One hand cupped the balls and the other closed round the hard secreting shaft.  Simeon stood perfectly still and looked up into that dark face.  It was a pleading look.  Again, just as in the old dark days, he was entirely at Big Boy's mercy.  Again he caught the familiar distinctive body scent of physical closeness.  He was vulnerable.  At that moment that big strapping youth had the power to inflict pain or pleasure - fortunately the grip, although locked and firm, did not, as feared, tighten.

            Simeon Hogg would remember those seconds all his life.  A myriad kaleidoscope of mixed emotions.  He hated Big Boy.  He loved Big Boy.  Smouldering eyes, unwilling to forgive a mountain of past humiliations defiantly met the cruel attractive dark eyes just inches away and he lusted a lust which would never be equalled.  The warm hands very slightly relaxed.  They become more mobile, more kind, and, during those precious seconds - gave intense pleasure.  In retrospect it could be described as a passing grope, a leisurely grope, but a short lived grope which was soon ended - much too soon - devastatingly too soon.  Big Boy moved on.  Big Boy was gone.        

Simeon Hogg was a bit better off than most of the other pupils of William Howitt Secondary Modern School.  Mum and Dad had always been generous and two incomes made it possible for Simeon to be given five shillings a day for food and bus fare.  Cycling to school released extra funds to dine out for lunch.  Having an independent spirit, he preferred to leave the campus at midday, walk the half mile up the hill and enjoy the delights of the comfortable Market Cafe.  Mr Hogg the young schoolmaster was coerced to stay, suffer the daily cacophony of clink and clatter and force down poor quality school dinners during a daily penance which was called 'supervision duty'.  Simeon Hogg the boy, (having an aversion to slugs) was appalled to hear accounts of unwashed lettuce and the occasional appearance of a slimy mollusc creeping across a plate. 

            Miss McLening the headmistress once lined up the daily chip shop and cafe brigade and put them under pressure to abandon their midday wandering habits and dine in the school canteen.  This line included the meaty and muscular Rex Lloyd.  She singled out Simeon and directly challenged his judgement: why should he reject such good value, a full meal costing just one shilling?

           
"I get choice, Miss,"
was not well received from the impudent acned urchin who stood before her august presence.

           
"Oh!"
replied She, lovely eyes blazing,
"What a pity it is not possible to go and check the canteen menu and walk out if it is not to sir's taste!!"
 

Silently standing, sensing being on very firm ground - he stood his ground, savouring the point scored.  After a regal dismissal the little group walked back to class, proud smiles quietly cheered the rebel a hero.  Mrs Cook heard the full drama from the power house of the form, Rex Lloyd, no less.  To have earned
his
good opinion was for Simeon, a big step up the ladder of prestige.

            Yet Simeon was sad to have annoyed the enchanting dark handsome lady who had become a goddess.  His eyes were always drawn to a beauty mole on the face of that charming and gracious headmistress who reigned over an all too brief magical and happy period of his life.  A woman held in great affection by all her subjects, a queen who filled the school with sunshine and love.  Love!  That was the one word which continued to re-occur.  The love from, and to,     Mary McLening permeated the very fabric of the building and hallowed the ground of William Howitt Secondary Modern School.

At the Market Cafe, Simeon chose from various items on toast costing 'one and something'.  'Something and chips' went into the two shilling mark, add three pennies for a cup of tea.  The cafe had two halves.  To the right of the central corridor was the snack bar and to the left a quieter dining room for meals.  Above the clatter of pots, cutlery, comings and goings and the continuous hum of conversation, the young diner could hear and enjoy melodic strains which travelled across the two rooms and passageway.  The music came from something very un-Heanor, something new and different, something rather like Simeon's dream car: a space aged, push buttoned chrome and gaudily illuminated cabinet called a 'jukebox' which needed to be fed a threepenny bit for one play, a silver sixpence for two plays, or five plays for a silver shilling.  Fascinated eyes watched a mechanical arm lift selected popular 7" 45 rpm records and place them precisely on an automatic deck.  As the needle fell into the lead groove, an anticipatory delicious electronic 'thud' would precede the ecstatic sounds to follow.

            For the teenager in the next room munching through his beans on toast (or whatever) - this was the birth of real music.  The charts of 1959 and 1960 were the very epicentre of his musical experience.  Simeon Hogg would spend the rest of his life worshipping at that shrine of talented excellence.  He will, forever more, listen with nostalgic reverence to the lush orchestrations and sexy boyish voices which sang out through that small window of creativity.  Marty Wilde, Bobby Vee and Adam Faith crystallised and defined his fresh green hopes, inspired his dreams and fuelled his fantasies.

One day he was entranced by what seemed like a sweet sounding choir of angels ascending and descending the scale, complemented by a resonant twangy bass guitar.  Into this euphonious mix came, exactly at the right time, a deep masculine voice with just a hint of the sexy adolescent croak so typical of this new young genre.  He could easily have been mistaken for Elvis but, these dulcet tones were a touch lighter and, for Simeon's taste, with great respect to the King - better.  This sensuous singer had composed both the music and lyrics for this beautiful work which lasted barely more than a precious two minutes.  After such an orgasmic audible experience, in complete contrast to the hateful pious dirges of just a stone's throw away; this new music now became an important part of his life at William Howitt Secondary Modern School.

            During the following weeks, the same record was played every day.  Simeon struggled to hang on to those illusive, hypnotic notes, above the ambient din of the busy Market Cafe.  A few occasional words were discerned -

           
" ... and in the evening, by the moonlight ... "

He knew not the name of the singer nor the song title to be able to ask for it in a record shop.  A pointless exercise not possessing a record player, let alone the expensive seven shillings needed to purchase.  Eventually the time came when, nervously, this scruffy youth entered a shop and held the precious vinyl disc, with its grooved integral encoded magical music, bearing the legend - "Maybe Tomorrow".

            Later, in that same store, examining the sleeve of a prized long playing record, he stood very still and looked.  He peered long and hard into the stunningly handsome features of his teenage idol - Billy Fury: a typical image of the popular culture of 1959.          

Chapter 5

The Golden Oarsman

The long hot summer of 1959 slowly and reluctantly cooled into a blazing, bright red and yellow sunny autumn.  Cycle rides clung to life until finally, cold, fog, frost and early murky damp nights forced an end.  Christmas saw the leaving of pupils who had already turned fifteen.  Into the power vacuum, ascended a new crop of those high ranking lads who already held status by virtue of physical size, competence and prowess on the sports field, together with sheer force of personality and popularity.  So by January 1960, it came to pass that Scott North, the handsome, flaxen haired, record-breaking athlete from the 'B' class, became the new King of the School.

This new status quo in top management had little relevance in the chatty, cheery classroom of Mrs Cook where Simeon continued to develop and prosper, savouring the agreeable flavour of daily life. 

            It was gradual, little by little, imperceptibly at first, but Scott North started to notice the dark haired pimply associate of Rex Lloyd who was forever spreading sunshine with his funny voices and infectious laugh.  This was the consolidation of a totally new personality and a million miles away from his previous existence of living death in a never ending series of 'Mundy mornings'.  A few witty words were occasionally tossed at Simeon's 'John Silver' within the accepted good natured framework of working class youth culture.

           
"That parrot needs oiling!"

Such comments were an important form of 'lads together' communication.  Communication with a complex hidden agenda.  Scott was telling Simeon that he enjoyed the show, but more important, was the fact of public approbation.  Simeon had been lifted in the eyes of the others, and over the days and weeks which followed, steadily but surely, Simeon Hogg became a friend of the mighty Scott North. 

The hard cold winds under the grey skies of early spring had no discouraging effect on the bubbling boy who enthusiastically jumped on his Palm Beach Raleigh bike every morning, eager to get to school.         Among his many physical accomplishments, Scott was a keen cyclist and made frequent excursions up, and into the hills of Derbyshire, sometimes with other lords of the school and sometimes alone.  He was fast and it was said that he could keep up with any bus.  Simeon reflected that buses made frequent stops, but was wise enough to keep those thoughts private.  In the week after the Easter holidays, the weather was looking very promising and Scott caused a flurry of excitement when he turned up one morning on his brand new, gleaming BSA 'Golden Wings' 10 speed racer.  In this rather grimy mining community, Heanorians were not well endowed with income or material possessions and it was very unusual to witness this level of opulence.  Admirers, including a curious teacher, asked questions and paid genuine compliments.  The handsome top calibre machine and its tall well built powerful owner were a good match.           

This little moment of respectful appreciation was rudely and loudly interrupted by Carol Bestwick violently agitating her old [probably Victorian] clanging hand bell.  She was completely indifferent to this particular gathering of approbation, being one of a minority of girls who were well able to resist the renowned 'pulling power' of Scott North.  Big and well built, the mighty Carol was enjoying her few moments of power and importance, enthusiastically proclaiming the start of the school day.