Here I am, my first day in the Senior School. I find myself in one of the four lines snaking out into the boy’s playground. We have been streamlined into class’s 4a, 4b, 4c and 4d. I presume that the report from the Junior School has been the deciding factor in the placements. I make it into in 4a and believe me that was quite a relief. That went a little way in salving the humiliation of failing the eleven-plus. I recognized some of the boys, a few from the Junior School, but there were some new faces, they must have been drawn in from other areas. The Headmaster addressed us. A Mr Thompson, a stern disciplinarian and in this school he would need to be. Everything about him screamed out discipline. He was very straight-backed and very slim; he exuded authority. He moved around the school at an amazing pace. Mr Thomson always wore a long flowing black robe; it was his badge of office. He wore it with a grim determination and in it he seemed to glide, almost to float. He had one pace of movement and that was fast.
His opening address to us on that first day resembled what I had seen in war films. I was reminded of a German Camp Commandant hectoring the prisoners after some indiscretion, or insubordination, or escape attempt. The scene that was set up was no half-hearted attempt to instil discipline; it was more. It was a professionally choreographed routine, to demonstrate control, to state who was in charge and show the folly of bad behaviour and ill discipline. Many things are controllable in human interaction. But human spirit is not one of them; any success in that exercise is fleeting. I suppose you can understand the attempts to exert implacable authority in an effort to keep the school running efficiently. It couldn’t have been an easy school to run. Fortunately there are always individuals of an independent nature and spirit, who see life and their place in it from a far different angle. That old chestnut, ‘youth will out’, proved so true and on so many occasions, that is the way it is and we are all the better for it.
After the address we were allocated to houses. This was a system borrowed from the posh public schools. It was a very good Idea. There were four houses and each was named after a senior teacher. The houses continually competed against each other, academically and in sport. It did seem to breed a degree of pride, support and loyalty, which presumably was its objective.
However it’s back to my high noon and those first, but very nervous days waiting for the inevitable confrontation with Bill Parslow. I desperately hoped that it was a thing of the past with him. I was in a complete state of nervous apprehension. I really had nowhere to go and no one to turn to. I had to sort this on my own as best as I could. We didn’t have a culture of turning to our parents, or worse still, to teachers. Playground fights, bullying, pecking order battles were things we had to live with. To have turned to a teacher would have made the situation worse and that would have been a slur on me for a long, long time. There must have been five or six hundred kids at the school, so it wasn’t hard to lay low and keep out of sight and hopefully out of mind for a couple of days. I used this time to try to work out a strategy to delay the inevitable bashing coming my way. The couple of days stretched out into a week or more and there hadn’t been a situation that enabled a confrontation. I started to get complacent and relax a bit and then the roof fell in. It happened as these things often do, just when I had a growing comfort level and should have been still on guard. I have often thought about it and other of life’s traumas since. These thoughts have drawn me to the conclusion that perhaps we subconsciously allow, or even promote, endings to traumatic situations. In hindsight, one way or another, I believe I did then.
“Got you, you little bastard.”
Bill had me round the neck from behind. My worst nightmare was about to unfold, but strangely a wave of relief swept over me. This moment had been plaguing me for about six months. I struggled trying to make him lose his grip, but he was very strong. We were in a little area between two sets of large double doors. They were set up like that as a way of allowing access whilst keeping out the cold. It was an area of about three metres by three metres; an area that would suit Bill, because there was no getting away, this was it. We were on our own; it transpired we were both heading for the toilets, for him as an excuse to dodge part of a lesson and have a smoke. For me it was a safer time to visit as I thought it was less likely that I would encounter him. I think they call it sod’s law.
We struggled around for a bit; he still had me from behind. When he felt comfortable in the fact that I couldn’t get away he let go and tried to swing me around to set me up for one of his heavy punches. Now, I was no hero, or John Wayne, but the survival instinct kicked in. I wasn’t afforded the notion of fight or flight, as there was no getting away and I wanted it finished now come what may. I was going to fight hard and hoped that would mean the bashing wouldn’t be so bad. I knew he would try to hit me on the turn. Bill was a good fighter and to be fair to him, he was known to have fought bigger and older guys. He wasn’t your normal bully who only picked on the defenceless, or those who couldn’t fight back. Unfortunately I had become an enemy. I was from Mill End and a thorn in his side.
Unfortunately, my efforts against him in our previous encounter had become exaggerated in the telling and in schoolboy lore. It was a situation he couldn’t allow. I understood that it was fight or flight and flight wasn’t an option. As he turned me I quickly stepped back and his first flurry missed. I had determined to fight, so I threw two or three straight punches. It wasn’t cold or calculating, skilful or brave; it was sheer terror that drove me on. I knew I had to get his nose; in schoolboy fights that often decides it. One blow did, or it might have been a collision, but this was Bill Parslow and it would take a lot more than that against him. He roared in anger. He was like a hungry bear and I was between him and his food. His nose started to bleed. It wasn’t the pain that pissed him off even more; it was the fact that he was bleeding. We whirled around that space like dervishes, him trying to get in a finishing blow or in fact a lot of them. Then there was me, up on my toes defending for all I was worth and getting in the odd sneak punch. He got me with some real good shots, but mostly around the back of my head. I was tiring badly and he was really landing them. To his credit he did the right thing.
“Have you had enough?” he asked.
“Will that be the end of it then?” I gasped.
At the time I think Bill was in 3c, though I understand he went on to be successful in the building trades and developed properties. At that time however, he wasn’t up to instant decisions. We were facing each other off. I could see it sifting through his mind. ‘What’s the best option? Bash this bugger some more and risk the others seeing my bleeding nose, if we keep going?’ That would be dangerous, because boys would give the victory to the one who dealt out the bleeding nose, no matter how much of a hiding he got.
“Okay,” he said “eff off and don’t give me any more, shit, you got it?”
What a relief, it was over and I wasn’t too badly hurt. I knew I had to keep schtum about the nosebleed. That’s what he meant when he said, ‘don’t give me any more shit’. That was a face saving code for don’t talk about the nosebleed. If you’ll pardon the pun, the escapade must have been getting right up his nose. Anyway, all was well that ends well.