Not going
shopping...
My school was a bit on the rough side, a secondary modern
stuck in the sticks where bullies ruled, some of them teachers. I would watch
out for their swooping shadow menace and keep my head down. They would circle
the schoolyard like skuas, and if we were lucky we’d just lose a few cigarettes
rather than our teeth. The ultimate insult was to be called queer and it came
with punches, hair pulling, spit and segregation. Sometimes violence would
erupt, and the grey slabs of the yard would be marbled with blood. A nose bleed
was generally used as an excuse. The irony was that many of the young men branded
as queers were not gay at all. Just to be a little effete, wear glasses or be
caught reading a novel instead of a comic was enough to be rounded up at my
school. Academic aspiration and achievement was a cause for suspicion whilst
sport and progressive rock was king. There was no underground, velvet or
otherwise at my secondary modern.
To my eternal shame I stood back and watched the carnage
in my desperation to be invisible. Rather than stand alone and be noticed I
opted for the side with power and joined the baying crowd, a coward, but not
the only one. In my defence all I can say is that I never physically hurt
anyone but that’s a pretty feeble stance to take. Regrettably I was no fearless
and defiant Martha P. Johnson. There was a feeling even then that I didn’t
belong anywhere or have a corner to fight despite realising I was a bit queer
myself. To my peers I was just a regular bloke with a good sense of humour; a
court jester with a weight problem.
Ian Knot was the toughest boy at my school and he lived in
my village. This meant many awkward minutes avoiding eye contact whilst waiting
together at the school bus stop. At first he viewed me with utter contempt but over
time we became friends of sorts because I made him laugh. However with an
audience in tow his contempt would spring back like a field gate. One day the bus
was late and adopting the look of a James Dean brought up on black pudding and
strong tea, he pulled out a crumbled pack of Players No.6 from his pocket. With
one precision swipe a match was struck and cigarette lit in one swooping
movement. After several deep drags the cigarette was offered to me and I didn’t
dare refuse. It tasted quite disgusting and Ian laughed as I coughed and spluttered;
my eyes smarting and red. An intense rush of blood and wave of nausea engulfed but
I persevered so desperate was I to belong somewhere.
The next day one of Ian’s courtiers summoned me to a
corner of the schoolyard where his gang gathered before assembly each day. I stood
in their horseshoe as Ian introduced me to each of his clan as little fat Hill. I had a new name and
identity. The pincer of my new family closed in like a fly trap as I swore my
allegiance to each of them in turn, finishing with Ian. He gestured to the
pebble dash wall that circled the yard like a sandpaper sheath. ‘Go on then, you know what to do’ he said. There
was no going back so I did as every other member had done before me. I raised
my arm and dragged my knuckles down through flint shards until my skin tore and
burst with blood. I would wear the scabs proudly for weeks as a totem, my
wounds indicative of my new status and invincibility.
When I was 16 I watched ‘The Naked Civil Servant’ with
Doreen Alice sitting opposite me. We were both completely transfixed by the
show which brought colour into a world of 1970s brown and beige. Looking back I
think my mother felt Quentin’s pain and courage so deeply because she too had
been ostracised and singled out. In her case for being an easy woman knocked up
by some Yank from the Criterion Pub. She’d also shared Quentin’s love of bright
red lipstick, Cuban heels, dark alleyways and a man in uniform back in the day.
I applaud her for getting what she wanted in the bleakness of 40s Britain, no
doubt with a pair of nylons and a few brandies for good measure. We have
nothing to take from this life but our memories and spots of light. I saw Quentin
more as a beacon of beautiful otherness lighting new pathways and possibilities
like some wartime Bowie. Although I would never have the desire to dress up or
possess the cheekbones of either, I would always be on the outside whilst on
the inside. I realised that queer could be power and strength after all.
'My mother protected me from the world and my father threatened me with it' - QC
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