When the Water Falls

When the Water Falls

James E. Taylor

Copyright © 2016 James E. Taylor

The moral right of the author has been asserted.

Apart from any fair dealing for the purposes of research or private study,

or criticism or review, as permitted under the Copyright, Designs and Patents

Act 1988, this publication may only be reproduced, stored or transmitted, in

any form or by any means, with the prior permission in writing of the

publishers, or in the case of reprographic reproduction in accordance with

the terms of licences issued by the Copyright Licensing Agency. Enquiries

concerning reproduction outside those terms should be sent to the publishers.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events

and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination

or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons,

living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

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To L and M

Contents

Prologue: 1971

PART ONE

The Big Book: 1971

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

Denborough School: 1976

8

9

10

11

12

13

14

15

16

17

18

19

20

21

22

PART TWO

The Perfect Age: 1997

23

Home: March and April 1998

24

25

26

Jonathan: May 1998

27

Friends and Enemies: May and June 1998

28

29

30

31

32

33

34

35

36

37

38

39

40

41

42

Last Confession: September 1998

43

Epilogue: Denborough School: Summer 2014

44

Acknowledgements

‘Give me the boy until the age of seven and I will give you the man.’

St Ignatius Loyola

Prologue: 1971

It was the only high bridge in town and the lady was on the wrong side of the parapet, leaning back. Suddenly, she let go, almost pushing herself away from the railings, skirt flapping gently as she fell. Her neck and head hit the road first with a thud. The sound carried up to the steep path where Tom stood watching with his brother Paul. Tom gripped his Beezer tightly.

‘I think she’s dead,’ said Paul.

Tom knew his brother was right. She lay there motionless and he felt a shiver run from his belly to his knees. The young woman’s skirt was upturned across her waist, showing to the world her big white underpants.

Two people ran across from the pavement to where she lay, stopping abruptly when they reached her. A man took off his jacket and placed it over her hips. The bell rang on the door of the valley shop and the shopkeeper came out. Fragments of broken voices reached Tom’s ears. More people gathered in the road and a car stopped in front of them.

Tom buried his chin in the collar of his coat and sniffed the worn cloth for comfort. It was a clear blue day at the end of March but it was chilly. The woman had only been wearing a blouse. She must have been very cold.

Paul tugged him by the sleeve: ‘We’d better go.’

PART ONE

The Big Book: 1971

1

‘When?’ said Carol Sutton, her face etched with concern both for the woman and for her children, who had seen it happen.

‘Just now,’ said Paul.

‘From the valley bridge?’

‘Yes,’ the boys replied.

‘Oh Lord! Have they got an ambulance or police there or something?’

‘Not when we left,’ said Paul.

‘Oh, my Lord,’ she said, shaking her head.

Paul frowned: ‘You shouldn’t keep saying that.’

‘What? Oh Paul darling, there are exceptions to every rule and this is one of them.’

Paul looked doubtful.

‘Now come on, get yourselves in, coats off. Put your sweets on the sideboard till after tea. I’m just going to pop down to see if I can help.’ She did up a button on her cardigan, talking aloud to herself, ‘Not that it sounds like an ex-nurse is what she needs.’ Grabbing a jacket from one of the pegs in the hall, she opened the door.

‘I didn’t get any sweets,’ said Tom.

‘What?’ said his mother, stepping out onto Vincent Street.

‘I got a comic, a Beezer, with a special lime sherbet drink. You just add water to this packet of powder and ... ’

‘That’s lovely, Tom. We’ll have it later.’ With that she closed the door.

*

After a little while, Tom heard his mother come back. There were snippets of conversation that he could just hear from his open bedroom door but, as he moved to the landing, his mother had gone further into the lounge – where his father would be reading the paper – and closed the door behind her.

She was clearly upset. ‘Tragic’, ‘awful’ and ‘useless’ seeped through the woodwork and drifted softly up the stairs. The marginally more distant tones of his father seemed to offer some comfort for his mother’s efforts at least, but his contributions were still very restrained. Perhaps he had worried where and why she had gone? Tom didn’t know.

The noise from the kitchen was a fraction more distinct as the evening meal came together downstairs. Tom realised that the radio, unusually, was off so that the sounds were starker, crisp. He stayed in his room until he was called to the table.

The conversation over tea started uncertainly. Tom realised all too well that the normality of home-cooked Friday fish and chips, a highlight of the culinary week − at least in the boys’ eyes – couldn’t help but be affected by what had come before.

‘Lovely fish and chips, darling,’ said Malcolm Sutton in a reference to the meal which was such a rare occurrence that it simply confirmed the strangeness. Tom saw his mother shrug and smile before drawing him into the fringes of the game with the subtlest of winks. But the levity was awkward, inappropriate, and Tom knew that his parents were building up to something. And so it was that, however briefly, Tom’s father sought to address the issue: ‘Sorry business this afternoon,’ he said, in a way which hinted that brevity was, indeed, the key.

‘Yes, yes, really shocking,’ offered the boys’ mother. ‘Are you two all right? Must have been dreadful to see what actually happened.’

Both boys nodded and looked at one another but neither spoke.

‘Such a waste. Desperately sad,’ continued Carol Sutton.

‘Yes, desperate,’ added Tom’s father, reaching for the salt.

‘Do you want to talk about it? I think we need to … ’ his mother’s eyes were caring, anxious.

Yes, that’s what Tom really needed − salt.

‘I’m fine,’ said Paul in a way that seemed to Tom to reflect his older brother’s composed brilliance at almost everything that had to do with the insides of one’s head.

‘Tom?’ his mother asked him directly.

‘I’m fine too,’ he parroted, now holding the salt cellar.

‘Hmm.’ Tom’s mother looked at him and Paul doubtfully. ‘Okay, well it may take a little time for it to sink in. If either of you want to talk about it later − at all − then you must. Please. It’s only natural to be really unsettled when you see something so shocking and when the shock wears off, you may want to chat. Both of you. Talk to me or Dad, it doesn’t matter who, does it darling?’

‘No, no. That’s right, you must,’ said Malcolm Sutton looking up from his plate and nodding faintly.

‘Okay, then, but we mean it, boys.’

‘Hmm,’ added their father.

A few seconds of silence followed before he wrapped up proceedings: ‘Yes, this really is very nice, darling.’

*

At bedtime, having settled Paul first, Tom’s mother came in to see him.

‘Same goes for you too, Tom. Rest of your prayers in bed please. I know how you two can go on. Get yourself snuggled up. Are you sure you’re all right now?’

‘Yes, Mum.’

She knelt down. ‘Well, as I said to Paul, just say an extra prayer for that poor girl.’

‘Yes, Mum.’

‘Night-night, darling.’ His mother tucked in the blankets a little, kissed him tenderly on the forehead and left.

Tom lay squarely on his back and put his hands together. Whilst he prayed quite a lot at bedtime, he knew from experience that his brother could keep it up for considerably longer. He’d sneaked into his room and disturbed him still at it often enough. So once Tom had said his usual five Our Fathers and five Hail Marys, a prayer to St John to guarantee that no one died in the night and a blessing each for his mother, father, brother, grandparents and himself, he set out to make a difference on the poor girl’s behalf and just maybe say more prayers than Paul in the process.

When Tom woke up the next morning, he was pleased with the efforts he could recall making before falling asleep. It helped to put it to the back of his mind.

*

Saturday afternoon was considerably warmer than the previous day but wet. Their mother was going shopping, but before she did so the boys helped her clear the dining-room table and lay out an old plastic tablecloth.

‘Right. Fetch your aprons, Tom. And Paul, you bring the tray over. Carefully.’

Tom went to the pantry and took down the faded paint-stained aprons and brought them back. Paul had lifted the tray from on top of the brown cabinet in the recess by the chimney breast. He placed it cautiously on the table.

‘All right. I’ll leave you to it. Don’t make too much mess and don’t get anything on the carpet.’

‘We won’t,’ said the boys as one.

Five minutes later she called goodbye and then put her head round the door, chestnut hair falling across her cheek. She tucked it behind her ear: ‘Bye. Enjoy yourselves.’ She smiled at them.

Tom’s expression had already assumed an air of seriousness as he set about glueing but he saw Paul smile back, as if on both their behalf. ‘Bye,’ they replied.

Paul had finished glueing his Hawker Typhoon together the previous weekend and was ready to start painting. This was the first time they had made Airfix models and Tom had not got on quite as well as his brother.

Paul opened up a tiny tin of paint. Tom accidentally strung a spidery thread of glue across from one hand to the other. The smell was infectious, but this strand was annoying. He wiped his hand on his apron and tutted.

‘Do you want a hand before I start painting?’

‘No thanks.’

‘Are you sure?’

‘Yes, thanks.’ Tom had been allowed to choose the Spitfire, which they had both wanted, when some persistent nagging of their mother about buying models had finally paid off. Paul had given in over the Spitfire, thought Tom, to ensure she didn’t change her mind. And Tom still wanted to do it all by himself. He squeezed too much glue onto the cockpit glass.

‘I’ll go and get a cloth,’ said Paul. Tom pulled a face. The older boy went off to the kitchen from where Tom could hear the click from the cupboard under the sink opening then closing, followed by the rush of tap water.

Tom couldn’t attach the glass to his model. It would only stick to his fingers. Paul came back into the room and put the damp cloth in the middle of the table, slightly to Tom’s side.

‘Flippin’ heck!’ It was making Tom cross.

‘Hang on a minute,’ said Paul, separating Tom’s fingers from the part. Tom was about to object but he thought better of it. Paul put it in place, then wiped his hand and smoothed away some of the excess adhesive on the Spitfire with the edge of the damp cloth. Tom rubbed the glue between his fingers until it became hard and then nibbled it off with his recently arrived two front teeth before calmly spitting out the bits.

Paul looked at him and then in the vague direction the glue spit had gone. He raised his eyebrows. Tom raised his in reply.

‘What about me glueing what’s left and you sticking?’ asked Paul.

Tom wanted to start painting and this wasn’t such a bad idea. He mulled it over: ‘I’ll glue, you stick.’ He preferred glueing and, besides, Paul was the better sticker.

‘Okay but be careful.’

Paul closed the paint tin that he had opened and pulled an end dining chair round next to Tom. Side by side they finished off Tom’s Spitfire.

They started painting; Tom concentrated on the fuselage that he’d glued last week.

‘Very impressive. If I’d known you’d work this well together I’d have bought those things myself,’ said their father, standing at the half-opened door.

‘You can always buy us some more,’ suggested Tom.

‘Just finish those two for now and then we’ll see.’

Paul and Tom shared a knowing glance. Their mother’s ‘we’ll see’ almost always meant yes, eventually. Their father’s ‘we’ll see’ almost always just evaporated.

*

With the changing of the clocks, the loss of an hour’s sleep the following morning seemed to make everyone drowsy and the rush to get organised – orchestrated by their father − worse than usual. But once morning mass was over, whilst his mother got on with the task of preparing the lunch and his dad settled down in the lounge with the papers, the rhythm of a normal Sunday seemed to be returning. Tom, though, made the short walk to the bridge.

He didn’t ask permission nor did he mention it to Paul, who had disappeared to his room. Unlike his brother, it seemed, Tom still felt very uncomfortable about the events he’d witnessed late on Friday afternoon but he wasn’t sure what more he could do about it. He had said all those prayers on Friday night, which had helped, and he didn’t have any specific questions he wanted to ask anyone but he did want another look.

The view from the bridge railings unnerved him, so he took the path down to the valley shop and didn’t stop until he reached the bottom. With the shop to his right and the grassy bank behind him, he faced out onto the road where the woman had died. There was no sign she had been there. No evidence. It was the flat, grey valley road, looking like it did when he’d bought his Beezer and like, no doubt, it would look again tomorrow.

It bothered him. It wasn’t that he wanted to see something awful, like blood − that would have been worse − but he did want something to show that she hadn’t been, well, forgotten.

He turned around and looked at the grassy bank. Daisies and buttercups littered the green, sloping carpet. He gathered a handful of long-stalked, shiny buttercups and then added a few of the prettiest daisies. It was a messy-looking collection, so he separated them out again and laid the buttercups and daisies in two groups, side by side, close to the bottom of the bank. That was better.

He stepped a yard to the side, which allowed him to look first at the bank and then into the road, drawing an imaginary line connecting the one with the other. Then he walked to the top of the path and onto the bridge. This time he did peer down through the railings. He could see his flowers. His work was complete.

When he reached home, there was activity in the kitchen, inactivity in the lounge and silence from upstairs. He didn’t say anything about what he had done not because he wasn’t proud of his tribute – he was – but he really shouldn’t have gone down to the valley on his own without telling someone first.

*

As Tom finished his breakfast in the kitchen on Monday morning, the Saturday Evening Post slid onto the floor from the sideboard when his father brushed past on his way out. Tom picked it up. He hadn’t seen it before but now realised that in a town of that size, Friday’s drama had been a big story. It surprised him, when he thought back, that his had been the only flowers. He read down past the headlines into the first column of words: ‘What’s sui … cide’?’ he asked, pausing before deciding that the ‘c’ in the middle of the word would be soft rather than hard.

‘Sorry? What? Let me see,’ said his mother, looking over from the sink. ‘Oh. Suicide, Tom.’

‘Yes. What is it?’

His mother turned round, wiped her hands on a tea-towel and then rubbed them again slowly on her hips: ‘It’s when someone kills themselves because they are really really unhappy for some reason. But you must never ever do anything like that because we love you and God loves you too.’ She paused. ‘If you ever feel sad or unhappy come and see Dad or me and it will be all right.’ She bent towards him and reached out to touch his shoulder as if to confirm the importance of what she had said.

‘What if I’m at school?’ Tom reflected that he could be unhappy at school sometimes and it might be a while on such days before he got back home.

‘Well, just say a couple of prayers and it’ll be fine till we see you.’ She smiled and stroked his hair back from his forehead. Paul came downstairs, ready for school.

‘And you? Are you all right, darling?’

‘Huh?’ Paul looked at her questioningly. ‘Yes thank you, why?’

‘Well … just checking.’

2

Now that Paul was nine and Tom seven, they walked to school on their own. It was a good twenty minutes through their Derbyshire town, in the opposite direction to the valley.

Leaving home, they crossed the road before turning right onto the High Street, where the route took them past the Bull Inn and led into the wide open space of the Square. Stall-holders, already set up for market day, were adjusting their wares under canvas shelters and making early sales in a stream of chatter, many with the comfort of closely held mugs of tea.

As the town-centre trail narrowed again it took the boys out of the Square. Guarded on one side by Marks & Spencer and on the other by Woolworth’s, the road then headed down past the council offices and the fire station.

The brothers passed Sketchley’s on the corner and came round into the bottom of the street with the damp-darkened slate roofs, which brought St Joseph’s into view. Despite the fact that they were nearing school, Tom felt cheered by the brightening of the sky. And, even more, of course, on this last Monday of term, by the thought of the Easter break.

*

Tom’s class stood by their places.

On Mondays, Sister Agnes sometimes went round asking what they’d done at the weekend. She didn’t ask everybody, she just picked on people. Tom wasn’t normally keen on that session but he had at least done a good deed on Sunday, if he was called upon.

‘This morning, we’ll say the Our Father,’ said Sister Agnes sharply, standing in front of her large brown desk. She was chewing the inside of her cheek. Never a good sign. Tom knew that it meant she had got out of bed on the wrong side.

Sister Agnes was small, Irish and getting on. In her habit and boots, she was still only a whisper taller than Simon Kelly, the lankiest and longest-serving boy in the class. She was razor thin too and her eyes were the steeliest grey.

‘Our Father, who art in Heaven, hallowed be thy name … ’ The children followed Sister Agnes’s lead and forged on when she lapsed into stern silence as she sometimes did. This time she was on the move, walking up the middle of the classroom, heels rapping the floorboards hard, the palms of her hands still pressed together in prayer and her head bowed.

Tom could hear the scrape of her boots as she reached the back of the classroom and turned, just as the prayer was near the end and everyone asked to be delivered from evil. The recital finished. ‘Speak up at the back! Just because you are at the back, doesn’t mean you don’t pray properly! Loudly and clearly from now on. Is that understood?’

‘Yes, Sister,’ came the chorus of voices from every row in the room.

‘If I have to come back here tomorrow, there’ll be trouble.’

No one wanted trouble. That was for sure.

‘Now then, quickly, what did people do at the weekend? Let me see.’ The question had come, even before the register and Tom could see the benefit of cheering his teacher up, even if he couldn’t see her face lighten. Tom