The Boy Who Lived With Ghosts: A Memoir (4 page)

“That’s what happens when you play with fire! Do not ever play with fire!” Miss Jones said.

Miss Jones is our schoolteacher. We love Miss Jones. She said it was Teddy Boys who set fire to the front of the school by throwing a petrol bomb through the small open window that Mr. Clegg the caretaker only left open to let some fresh air in.

“Yes, indeed. That’s what happens when you play with fire. So let that be a lesson to you all!” she shouted.

We have an open fire in our classroom and we don’t even need a fireguard. Mr. Clegg makes the fire for us in the morning and Miss Jones has taught us a rhyme to help us remember that unguarded fires are extremely dangerous around small children.

Wee Willy, all bows and sashes,
Fell into the fire and was burned to ashes.
Now the room grows cold and chilly,
For no one wants to poke poor Willy.

I have asked around but no one knows who Willy was or when he fell into the fire. I also do not know why he didn’t just climb back out because it’s not a very big fire. There is no way that I will stay in that classroom on my own because the ghost of Willy will climb out of the fireplace, all black and crispy, and pull me back into that bloody fire with him. I just know it.

“So, children. Today we will continue with our sewing. I am sure that will make us all feel better about Daisy,” Miss Jones continued.

The girls clapped their hands. I am sure they felt better about Daisy now that they could get back to their embroidery, but I was not at all happy. Miss Jones just doesn’t understand that sewing is for girls, and I do not want to embroider my name with a sunburst above it. Tommy agrees. We have been working on this project for weeks and most of the girls have already finished and started on some quilting. I have only done a
J
and an
o
and haven’t even started on the sunburst. Tommy has only done part of a
T
because he says it’s a big letter but that’s just an excuse because it’s no bigger than a
J
.

So we started the sewing class, but I stopped in the middle of my
h
and started to chew on the end of my needle because I was worried about my shoes. That’s when I saw Gloria McIntosh secretly picking a giant green bogey out of her nose and eating it. A line of snot was dangling all the way from her nose to her mouth, probably still connected to the bogey. It was therefore no surprise that I bit into the needle and the point broke off.

“Miss Jones!”

“Get to the end of the line, Johnny.”

“But Miss Jones!”

“Johnny! Get to the end of the line. You are not the only one with problems with your cross-over stitches, you know!”

“I-bit-the-needle-and-it-broke-and-I-think-I-swallowed-it!”

That was the first time any of us had heard Miss Jones scream. Even that time when a small mouse ran in front of her desk she didn’t scream because anyone should know that a small mouse is actually more afraid of us.

“Everyone take their seats! Johnny has swallowed a needle! And stay away from the fire!”

We ran down the corridor to Mr. Clegg but he said there was no way he could get a needle out of my mouth with a pair of pliers or any of his other tools for that matter so we all went to see Miss Nugent because she’s the headmistress and she would know what to do.

“Have you swallowed it?” Miss Nugent screamed.

“I don’t know.”

“Come here by the window and open your mouth!”

“Can you see it?” asked Mr. Clegg.

“There it is!”

It was stuck in my gum just above my back tooth. Miss Nugent pulled it out with her eyebrow tweezers.

“Did you do this deliberately?” Miss Jones demanded.

“No! I saw Gloria McIntosh pick her nose and eat it!”

You always have to tell Miss Jones the truth because she can read your mind and she knows if you are lying. That’s why Jimmy Grundle confessed last week that the puddle on the floor was not in fact where he had knocked over his jam jar of water for his paintbrushes but was actually where he had peed himself. It wasn’t really his fault because he had his hand up and was hopping from leg to leg trying to get Miss Jones’ attention, but she was very busy showing us how to make orange paint by mixing red and yellow together. You can also make green by mixing yellow and blue.

And last month, she made Gary Gordon admit that he was the one who had taken a shit in the boy’s toilet and not in the sit-down place. He said there was only one sit-down toilet working and someone was in it and he couldn’t hold it in any longer. We all rushed to take a look at it during playtime. Mr. Clegg was not very happy. He had to get it out with his mop.

Miss Jones said it’s been a very difficult day and we could all go home early, so I walked back home from school with Emily. It’s only a mile and we have to hold hands but only to cross the street because I am not holding hands with a girl. You absolutely must look both ways and listen before you cross but a few weeks ago I forgot and was run down by a man on a bicycle. He picked me up and told me to watch where I was going. Luckily, he missed Emily. Nana said it was also lucky that he was on a bike and not driving a bus.

Anyway, I’m home now and Mum has seen my shoes, which I had completely forgotten about and for some reason she started crying, which made me very sad. So I have decided to grow her some daffodils.

They will make her think of the sun and then she will be happy again. As soon as he gets home, I will ask my dad where I can buy some daffodil seeds.

8

T
wo men came to live in our house today. Nana calls them “The Irish,” and they dig roads in all weathers, which is something only Irish people will do because they had a famine. That’s what happens when you completely run out of food because locusts ate the crops. If there is no food at all then you end up eating anything including rats and worms and dirt. I would not want to eat rats but I did eat a worm once and Mum made me spit it back out. I also ate some dirt.

The Irish are going to be our lodgers, which means they are going to live with us and pay us money. So now, Margueretta will have to sleep in the tiny room that’s at the back of the bedroom that I share with Emily. Margueretta said it should be me who has to sleep in there because she’s the oldest one and I’m much smaller and it’s only big enough for a small bed and it doesn’t even have a window.

We have a window in our bedroom but no curtains and Dad says that’s so we can watch the moon and the stars at night and dream of Heaven. I like to dream of Heaven but mostly I dream about that thing in the corner of the cellar with the bulging green eyes. It makes me scream and sometimes when I scream, nothing comes out but I keep screaming all night long. Screaming and screaming. But no one comes.

Emily always dreams about the baby Jesus because she held him when she was Mary in the Nativity play. They put a blue scarf around her head and she looked so much like Mary that we all wanted to touch her. Some of the girls cried to be so close to the Holy Mother. But I didn’t cry because she was really my sister.

I wanted to be Joseph or a lamb but I had to be Wee Willy Winky with a candle to light you to bed. Miss Jones put me in a man’s shirt for a nightshirt and it was obviously a very stupid thing to do because it was far too long and I tripped on it and fell off the stage into the audience. And it was a real candle with a real flame. Luckily, I fell on top of the flame and the shirt put out the fire.

And that is why you must never ever play with matches or candles.

Dad told us that if we lay in bed and stare long enough at the night sky, we might see an angel.

“And that angel might come down and bless you and that would be the most wondrous thing you will ever know because an angel is a messenger of God.”

I have been staring and staring at that dark night sky. I’m sure I’ve seen an angel. I know it had to be an angel because Daddy said they shine with the most beautiful heavenly light and you will feel warm inside, warm like a cup of hot chocolate in your tummy. It was a light like I had never seen before and I felt the warmth inside me, the way Daddy said I would.

In the morning, when I told my mum that I had seen an angel she laughed.

“Next time you should make a wish and maybe you should wish for your dad to come home and get the stove working!”

So I wished.

Margueretta flicked my ear and said it wasn’t a real angel—it was just a star. And she said wishes never come true anyway. But I still wished.

And she was wrong because Dad did come home and he finished knocking out the fireplace in the kitchen and put the stove in there and it was working again.

But Nana is still angry at my dad because of what happened. You are supposed to have the chimney swept if you are going to knock out the bloody fireplace in the kitchen and put the stove in there so all the cooking smells can go up the chimney. And if you don’t have the chimney swept it should not be a surprise if the steam from the bubble-and-squeak loosens the soot
and it all comes tumbling down over the frying pan and your nana. Dad said she looked like a Black and White Minstrel.

She didn’t think that was funny. But she couldn’t catch him to hit him over the head with the frying pan because her legs are too short and my dad can run really fast. And she had soot in her eyes.

We still haven’t had the chimney swept, so that’s why The Irish have to have fish and chips from the shop for dinner tonight. But they shouldn’t get used to it because you can’t have fish and chips from the shop for dinner all your life. We are not made of money, you know. And Nana says they can have a drink of whisky and a wee song on her gramophone.

Oh, stop yer tickling, Jock!
Dinna mak me laugh so hearty or you’ll mak me choke!

Nana likes to sing along to her records and she holds her apron up when she dances. She dances the Highland Fling with me because I am her Scottish soldier. Round and around and around we go. And when the record stops, she puts her hand down my pants and grabs my willy.

“Stop yer tickling! What have I got hold of here? Ha! Ha! Stop yer tickling, Jock! What have I got hold of here?”

That made The Irish laugh. It makes people laugh if someone puts their hand down your pants and grabs your willy. So Nana played another record and put her hand down my pants again to make The Irish laugh some more. I like it when The Irish laugh. The old one mostly smiles and smokes his cigarettes but the young one laughs and slaps his leg and asks for more whisky. His name is Sam and Margueretta danced with him because I was getting far too much attention with Nana singing the tickling song and grabbing my willy.

Sam twirled Margueretta around so that her short dress flew out and we all could see her knickers and her skinny white legs. And he stroked his big hands through her long blonde hair and held her up close to him like he was
her boyfriend even though she’s only nine. Then he rubbed his hands on her legs all the way up near her knickers.

Mum says Margueretta always wants to be the center of attention. Anyway, my sister has never seen an angel and she’s wrong because wishes do come true.

9

T
he electricity is off tonight. Margueretta loves it when the electricity goes off because it’s so dark in our house that no one can see what she’s doing to me. And she’s angry tonight because she had to look after me and Emily outside the pub while the grown-ups were inside singing and laughing. I’ve never been inside the pub but I like the inside. I look at it through the door when it opens. It smells of smoke and sweet things. It’s warm and bright on the inside.

But we were on the outside. And Margueretta ran off and left us there and a big man came out of the pub and was sick all over the pavement, which wasn’t very nice because some of it splashed onto Emily and me. His sick was all brown and frothy and it ran down into the gutter and floated away under the street lamp. And then he wiped all of the snot and sick onto his coat sleeve, which you are not supposed to do because that is what hankies are made for. But I never said anything.

And now we’re home in the cold and dark and I don’t know where any of the grown-ups are. I just know I’m going to be in the cellar soon.

Margueretta knows all about the thing in the corner of the cellar. She was the one who told me about it in the first place. She said they had to cut him down after he hanged himself because they couldn’t undo his tie. And then they dragged him into the house and dumped him in the corner of the cellar with his eyes bulging out like marbles. And he’s still there. Waiting for a chance to come out in the dark. His name is John and now he wants to get inside me because my name is John too and I’m still alive and he is
dead. Margueretta says I will never escape from him because he always knows where I am.

I’m sure I’ve seen him behind me. There’s a dark shadow following me sometimes and it’s much bigger than me so I know it’s not my shadow.

There’s another reason Margueretta likes the dark. She says she can see things that no one else can see. And our house is full of bad things—like the thing in the cellar and the people who are inside the walls of my bedroom knocking to get out. One day they will kill us all in our beds. One day. And then everyone will be dead.

She wants to twist my hair tonight but there’s still not enough of it for her to get hold of. So she’s twisting my ears instead. She says she will make me pray to Jesus to save me from the thing in the cellar. I’m not telling her that I already do that. And because I wouldn’t beg her to stop she’s locked me down here again.

She says death is waiting for us. And so is the Devil. He wants to come inside our heads and make us do bad things. Then we will be sinners and burn in a lake of fire. We can’t stop the bad things from coming inside our heads. No matter how hard we try to think of good things and even Jesus will not be able to save us.

Margueretta’s head is full of bad things. And those things talk to her. That’s what she says.

10

I
t’s a good thing that I have learned my address, in case a policeman wants to know where I live. This afternoon I was in a very dark boiler room with Emily, and Margueretta turned out all the lights and locked the door when she left us there. She also said that the boilers were going to blow up in five seconds, which is not very long. So we both took turns screaming.