LITMIR.BIZ

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beads wrapped tight around my hand in case Betty appeared over the top of the partition. I distinctly remembered cursing myself for listening to Iron Maiden’s ‘The Number of the Beast’ at Alan Hale’s house, despite my dad saying that it was the Devil’s music.

      I actually hated heavy metal so I was glad to reject it in my soul, but I had looked at the album cover, and Iron Maiden’s mascot ‘Eddie’ was the template for what I expected to attack me during the night. The wife of Eddie. The dead but unavenged grandmother of Eddie. Skin deteriorated and stretched just far enough to show radical gum decay but not quite enough to look like something off of a comically crap ghost train.

      I can’t remember falling to sleep that night; it was only that complete and utter terror finally gave way to sheer exhaustion. I didn’t even egg anyone on into meeting up in ‘the cupboard’, as I’d already decided – seeing as I wasn’t actually in a horse-box – that safety in numbers was a stupid idea.

      A daft lad in a rubber mask did more for faith in the Almighty that night than all of Upholland’s outdated regimes. I prayed the entire night for God to save me from that fictitious ghost. I made deals with him, including a complete embargo on masturbation, if he would only spare me and let Betty feast on another. A lay student maybe: at least then he wasn’t losing a future foot-soldier.

      We were allowed access to television only when, and if, our head of year, Father Towers, allowed us to watch it in his room. And then for perhaps half an hour, tops. And what 11-year-old doesn’t want to watch the singing nuns tearing up the stage at Notre Dame Cathedral?

      Father Towers was one of the youngest priests there; it was his first year. He was incredibly kind and patient, but had a manner to him that was almost permanently apologetic. I often wondered if that was a past seminary’s doing, or just his nature. Either way, you could easily make him fidget with awkward questions. Kids can be quite cruel when they sense a weakness like that in an adult, and Father Towers seemed better suited to a quiet country parish somewhere – he lacked the sadistic streak needed to really make a name for himself in his new environment.

      I never had a cup of tea the entire time I was at Upholland. And I’d come off the breast and straight onto the teapot as a child. They’d make it in this huge urn, but it was thick with sugar, which made me gag. Like a diabetic Oliver Twist, but asking for less, not more, I timidly requested a little pot of unsweetened tea for those of us unable to handle the saccharine rush. Judging by their reaction, you’d think I’d suggested passing out free condoms to the more promiscuous students dabbling in homosexuality.

      And then there was the food in general. Now, in fairness, I was an incredibly fussy eater back then (if only that had stuck to this day). It was a sort of extension of the homesickness – I wanted things cooked the way my mum and dad did it.

      I was obsessed with texture and presentation. Apart from morning cereal and sausages, every other meal served there was an ordeal, although tea-time was a jam butty free-for-all. It was help yourself, and I bloody well did. It was meant as a snack before supper but it became my staple diet at Upholland. It was a miracle I didn’t get rickets.

      My attachment to sausages actually got me into my one and only fight at the seminary. There was a fifth-form prick, a lay-student, whose tan from countless summers in the South of France failed to conceal a pompous ruddiness in his cheeks – probably from generations of in-breeding. He was like a cross between Hawaiian teen-idol Glenn Medeiros and Rumpole of the Bailey. I couldn’t stand him. He awoke in me an inverted snobbery that I still struggle to control to this day.

      Anyhow, he came over to our table one lunchtime, and started lifting our sausages onto his plate with a big, stupid grin on his face. I saw red and stuck a fork in his hand, hard. He went ballistic, but I couldn’t take him seriously because he spoke like someone from Upstairs, Downstairs – honestly, you’d think he was bollocking a scullery maid at the turn of the century. He didn’t dare physically kick off in the dining-hall, but he made it quite clear that I was in for it later that day.

      Now, I was not by any means a brawler as a kid, but I had a strong sense of moral righteousness. And being as unhappy as I was, I can remember thinking, ‘Sod him, what have I got to lose?’ He waited for me outside my last lesson of the day. I think he thought he’d make me sweat and then bully a squirming apology out of me. But I just flew at him. His four years of seniority and height advantage meant nothing to me; I couldn’t care less if he did give me a ‘ruddy good hiding’.

      He obviously wasn’t expecting it, because I got a good few punches in before he swung back at me. My dad used to say, ‘It’s not the size of the dog in the fight; it’s the size of the fight in the dog.’ Well, I’d found the perfect outlet for all my discontent with Upholland and was not about to give up, even though I could feel these heavy thumps hitting the back of my head.

      My face was buried in his chest as I swung away madly at him. He pushed me away, trying to get a decent angle at which to hit me, but I just ran at him again. I was ape-shit furious, out of control. I wrapped his tie around my left hand and yanked him down so I could smash his stupid face in with my right. He ploughed into my forehead as I was looking up at him, desperate to land one square on his nose.

      I belted him good and hard, but that only seemed to make him angrier. He grabbed my hair, trying to manoeuvre me again into a perfect striking distance. I shook him free and threw punch after punch until there was nothing in front of me but red mist.

      The next thing I knew, we had been yanked apart by a passing priest and were being made to stand against the wall outside Father Samuel’s office. My adversary was fuming, but it was the best I’d felt since I’d got there. The swelling over my left eye and the headache from the blows to the back of my head barely registered. I was experiencing something very like euphoria – better than any cry under the covers in the wee small hours. Part of me had managed to say, ‘Enough is enough’ and I was buzzing off it. That’s probably why I wasn’t anywhere near as nervous as I should have been when we were ushered into Sammy’s office.

      You know in war films when you think the Nazis are bad enough, but then the SS turn up and make them look like a bunch of bed-wetters? Well, Sammy had that very same effect. He was the last remnant of the Spanish Inquisition. He was Darth Vader. He had his own terrifying theme tune that played in your head as he walked by.

      He was short but no less intimidating for that, and walked in that quick, determined manner that so many little people tend to. Behind his glasses he had keen, mean, piercing eyes that made you feel like you’d been captured on CCTV. He watched you intently, like a bird looks at a worm before dragging it out of the ground, waiting for any sign of weakness, his head tilting in a sharp, short move when he suspected something was rotten in the state of Upholland.

      That man was a human lie detector. And when he wasn’t scrutinising you, he had a way of completely dismissing you – like a crap doctor who conducts an appointment with a couldn’t-care-less tone whilst staring out of the window the entire time, making you feel unworthy of the most basic common decencies, such as eye contact. Father Sammy reserved this for the times when he knew a gripe was genuine, but had no intention of resolving the matter. He could be menacing and then instantly casual. It was like being 007 in Goldfinger’s lair – you knew he expected you to die, and he couldn’t give a toss.

      Father Sammy managed all of our finances. Our pocket-money was given to him, and he in turn would decide if your individual request was deemed worthy of releasing funds. Some kids used to hide cash in the dorms, under mattresses like teenage pensioners, but you were for it if it was found. It was claimed it was to stop us abusing the once-weekly tuck-shop facility, but really it was just another means of control.

      After all, who needed Mars Bars when you had cups of tea that would make Willy Wonka OD? No, Father Sammy was an accountant, not a spiritual guru. I had to virtually beg him for my own cash so I could send away for a calligraphy set. (Oh aye, I was hardcore! I had me some mad scribing skills going on.) You would think he suspected I was buying smack the way he questioned me. What could possibly be detrimental about fountain pens with a slightly broader nib? ‘That curve on your peculiarly detailed capital R, be it a devil’s tail? Burn the witch!’ God, it really

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