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Armitage looked forward to his visits to the garage, but only because he could slip away and run around the corner to the shop where the bell at the top of the door announced his arrival. Mrs Greenaway treated him like the son she never had. She’d raised three daughters, all now married and away. Army soon developed a deep interest in flowers. His imagination would fire as he matched the red tulips, roses and geraniums.
Within a month he was filling the shop window with his selections, within a year he was creating displays far beyond anything Mrs Greenaway could hope to match, and within two years people were coming from far and wide to have their arrangement made up by the handsome boy with the artistic touch.
He had a following.
He had an artistry.
At school, his interests were clearly defined between the things he loved and the things he couldn’t abide. He adored art and drawing, anything creative, English composition, and stories. He detested science of all kinds, physical education, and all sports. That went without saying. Sport was for the smellies.
His father was a keen rugby and football fan. He tried in vain to fire an interest in his young son in all sports, as he rolled and kicked a wide selection of balls toward him in the back garden. Armitage would cry and run away. He wanted Mrs Greenaway, he wanted Porridge, he wanted the flowers, and his painting books, and most of all he wanted his mother.
Right there, in that garden, he didn’t want his father at all.
After two years of trying, his father gave up. He even reconsidered the idea of changing the name of the business to Shelbourne and Son, so disappointed was he in his only offspring.
The following year Army discovered another interest. Classical music, and singing. Mrs Greenaway would often have the radio on in the shop and it was always tuned to the station that only ever broadcast classical music. It was never on loud, though occasionally if a piece that Army knew came on, or when the shop was quiet, Army would ask for the volume to be increased, ‘Louder Mrs Greeny,’ he would shout, ‘Louder!’
She would glance at his little face and couldn’t refuse.
At school too he had been introduced to classical music where the children would be encouraged to dance.
‘Dance to the music children, dance!’ the elderly lady would trill, usually to something like The Dance of The Sugar Plum Fairy.
Many of the girls held dreams of becoming ballerinas and would dance like courting swans. They were old hands at seven. They knew the ropes, and how to impress. Armitage had never heard of ballet, and had no idea what the girls were doing, or of what they desired to be, but that didn’t stop him. He threw himself into it, holding the centre of the floor, dancing moves that bemused everyone. They just seemed to seep out of his soul. The girls were fascinated and flocked to him, all desperate to dance with the crazy boy with the imagination of a rattlesnake.
The boys thought him a Nancy and shunned him still further. The girls weren’t sure, but they were curious. He was certainly different.
The biggest love of his life was singing.
He had a voice that could induce tingles to the spine, though no one outside of the school knew that, until one day in the flower shop a piece of music came on the radio they had been learning at school.
The shop was busy, it was coming up to Saint Valentines and there was standing room only between the remaining blooms. Without a thought Armitage burst into song. He was working in one corner, facing away from the others, building a bouquet of incredibly fragrant lilies. In the next second the shop was filled with his treble voice, pure as crystal snow.
Initially Mrs Greenaway imagined the angelic voice was coming through her tinny speaker, but no, it was Armitage. The seven or eight customers present fell silent and stared. Mrs Greenaway’s mouth fell open. There wasn’t a sound in the shop but for the radio, and Armitage’s soaring voice, as the old single decker bus came rumbling up the high street.
At the end of the song the adults burst into applause. Army was aghast, caught out, as if he had been doing something incredibly naughty. He turned and smiled at them all, flushed beetroot red, felt even more uncomfortable at that, ran outside and skipped back to the garage.
The following week Mrs Greenaway said, ‘You’re a very good singer, Army.’
‘Thank you Mrs Greenaway.’
‘Where did you learn to sing like that?’
‘At school.’
‘Would you like to sing in a choir?’
‘Don’t know.’
‘Would you like me to take you to the choir?’
‘Dad wouldn’t like it.’
‘Would you come if I asked your dad?’
Army nodded, and thought nothing more of it.
That night after Army had gone to bed, Mrs Greenaway called at the Shelbourne’s mock Tudor detached house. She wasn’t initially welcomed because Don and Donna had been canoodling on the settee. Donna was still adjusting her dress when Don brought Mrs G into the sitting room.
‘What can I do for you Mrs G? What has my son been up to now?’
‘Your son is a very well mannered boy.’
‘If you say so.’
Mrs G explained that she was in the choir at Saint Andrews church, and that Armitage was a fabulous singer. She wanted him to go to the church for a trial with a view to joining the choir, and Army had expressed his wish to be given the opportunity.
‘Has he now?’ said Donald, a little miffed that this woman knew more about his son’s interests than he did.
Donna said, ‘Are you sure you’re not mixing him up with someone else?’
Mrs G gave her a look that said everything.
‘Let me sleep on it,’ said Donald, and he did, and give him his due, the next day he popped into the florists and told Mrs G that Army could take the trial, if he really wanted to.
Mrs G said, ‘You won’t regret it,’ and promptly rang the choirmaster and fixed an audition.
The choirmaster’s name was Mr Davis and he had a spiky reputation for strict discipline. If the boys couldn’t turn up on time and behave themselves they needn’t bother coming. If the boys couldn’t attend every single practice session they needn’t bother coming either. Most of the boys were keen enough, because they would receive a small payment when they attended special services like weddings and christenings, while the lead singer would always receive a handsome fee all of his own. The competition to be top dog was hot.
The vicar was there that evening too, pottering about, mulling over in his mind the coming Sunday’s sermon. Mr Davis was well used to pushy parents who believed that their little Johnny was something special, if not the best thing since Aled Jones, better even. He would not suffer fools and regularly dismissed triallists by asking one of the better singers to immediately sing after they had finished, thus demonstrating how things could and should be done, and how woefully poor little Johnny really was. He was already in that frame of mind when he called Armitage forward. Army stepped up, his throat dry.
The entire choir were there, hundreds of them, it seemed to him. He could never remember being so nervous. He glanced around as if for comfort and saw Mrs Greeny on the back row of the ladies’ section. She smiled and nodded him on.
‘Well?’ Davies said, far too abruptly for a young child, thought many of the ladies gathered there. ‘Don’t waste my time, boy. Sing if you are going to.’
Armitage took one last look round, grabbed a big breath, and launched into Jesu Joy of Man’s Desiring.
His voice filled the church. Soaring into the void of the steeple. Filling people’s heads. Mr Davis closed his eyes. He had never heard a triallist sing like it, and one so young. It beggared belief.
As Army finished the ladies’ choir burst into spontaneous applause. Even the vicar had crept closer for a better look to see who it was who had captivated everyone. The boys’ choir applauded too, though not as enthusiastically. Perhaps one or two of the soloists had already realised that their one off fees might be in danger.
Armitage Shelbourne had truly arrived.
Donald and Donna had been invited too. They hadn’t intended to go, it wasn’t really their thing, but something deep inside Donald brought him there, and he dragged along Donna for company. Perhaps it was because he knew that Kay would have wanted him to attend. Donna bitched about it all the way there, the whole business of going. She hadn’t been inside a church for fifteen years at least, and wasn’t looking forward to it at all. Eastenders was on the television, for gawd’s sake.
Like everyone else, Donald and Donna were captivated.
How could it be that from one so young, and so slight, a voice could emanate that filled that vast church, and moved people to tears?
‘Who taught the little bugga to do that?’ she whispered.
‘I have no idea,’ said Donald, suddenly feeling dreadfully guilty that it had taken others to demonstrate to him what a talented son he possessed.
He would never underestimate Armitage again.