Chapter 1

She was gorgeous, everything I could ever dream of in a girl, at least physically. She was Lorraine Hartley-Smith, my boss’ daughter. The ‘i’ in her double barrel must be pronounced ‘eye’ as she couldn’t possibly have the most common name in England. Lorraine was my age, 18, and would visit her father’s office fairly regularly, usually on a Friday afternoon. I was once told it was to collect her allowance top-up after she’d returned from yet another shopping trip. Whether her personality matched my ideal was an unknown, though extremely unlikely, as she never deigned to acknowledge us mere workers. Still, the visual stimulant helped the day pass pleasantly.

I was to discover those personality traits that I admired in girls were severely lacking in Lorraine, when she was noted arriving that morning with her father, a first that I was aware of. I was called into Mr. Hartley-Smith’s office about twenty minutes later.

“Ah, David!” He began, “Lorraine needs to be at the hospital by 11:00 this morning. Unfortunately I have a meeting that I just can’t get out of, so I would like you to take her. Naturally, you will use my car. You then need to wait for her before taking her home ... and god help you if you damage my car.”

My first thoughts were ‘why can’t she drive herself’, ‘why doesn’t some other family member take her’, ‘why didn’t he just drop her off and let her wait’ and finally ‘why me’. I could guess the final one, after all, as an Admin Apprentice, I was the youngest member of the office staff so that, to management, automatically meant I was the least productive. I also noticed that there was no suggestion in his statement, just instructions.

“Right, finish what you’re doing and be back here by 10:20.” I was told.

At the appointed time, I approached his secretary Mrs. May, whose desk was just outside his office door. She rang through and I was told to go in. As soon as I entered the room he handed me his keys, if somewhat reluctantly. As Lorraine stood up to leave I was able to see why she couldn’t drive herself as her left foot was heavily bandaged. This bit of news had been missed by our usually very observant rumour mongers.

I had little idea what car Mr. Hartley-Smith drove as he always arrived after me as well as leaving before. A quick look at the keys showed a Jaguar symbol, so that should be easy enough, I thought, as no one else in the company was likely to be able to afford one of those. The trip to the car was slow, as expected with Lorraine’s injury. Also, not too surprisingly, it was done in silence.

There was only the one Jaguar in the car park and I received no comment from my passenger as I tried the key, so my guess was right.

Once we were on the move I made the mistake of trying to converse.

“How did you hurt your foot then?”

The look I received actually shocked me. It was if the car itself had spoken. “You do not talk to your betters unless I specifically ask you to.” She said with total disdain.

‘Fine’ I thought, ‘and good luck at the hospital with that attitude.’

When we reached the hospital, she told me to drive straight to the door, an order I happily ignored, driving into the car park instead.

“Are you deaf as well as stupid?” She shouted. “I told you to go down there,” pointing to the road leading to the main entrance.

As she had asked a direct question I decided to answer, but only the actual question, not what she really meant. “No,” I said, then after a pause, continued, “I am not deaf.”

“Why didn’t you drive me to the door?” She shouted, her anger quite satisfying to me.

“Because that road is for ambulances only.” I stated, pointing to the sign and only just refraining from asking if she could read.

Normally, in this situation, I’d have offered to fetch a wheelchair or offer support on the short walk. In this case I did neither. The look I received suggested that Lorraine was too stubborn to ask.

Whilst she hobbled up to reception I sat down for what I expected to be a long wait. I had been here on numerous occasions with friends and family, as well as a few football related knocks of my own.

I smiled to myself when Lorraine sat down as far from me as possible. It was over an hour before her name was called. An hour which included three visits back to the reception to berate the staff. To her, she couldn’t understand why SHE needed to wait. Surely the others couldn’t object if she was treated immediately. Naturally, the staff couldn’t understand why she felt superior. I couldn’t prove it but I had an idea that she was made to wait a bit longer than necessary.

When she finally returned I could see a fresh bandage on her foot but nothing else to signify anything had been done.

She had hobbled to the door before she realised that I was not following.

“Let’s go,” she hissed loudly at me.

I stood up and noticed a few sympathetic looks as I made my way over to her.

She was obviously in some pain and I was about to relent and offer to help when she shouted, “some use you are. You’ll be looking for a new job by this time tomorrow.”

When we got back to the car I just sat behind the wheel, saying nothing and making no effort to move.

“What are you waiting for, imbecile?” She screamed. “Take me home.”

“I don’t know where you live.” I stated simply.

“Then why didn’t you ask?” Her scream rising an octave.

“Because I was instructed not to speak unless spoken to,” I answered calmly.

The berating the NHS staff had suffered paled in comparison to what I endured on the 35 minute trip to her home. In fact, on the trip back to the factory after dropping her off, I thought for a moment that I had gone deaf.

To some, this experience would have been a shock, but to me it was what I’d expected from the girl. Not just Lorraine, but any girl. Throughout my eighteen years I’d found girls to be toxic and the toxicity increased in proportion to the attractiveness.

This all started before I was even born, twenty-two minutes before, to be precise. It happened at The Limes Maternity Hospital, almost on the border with my home town of Newcastle and the neighbouring city of Stoke-on-Trent. My Newcastle, not to be confused with the far larger city in the North East, was a small market town in the English county of Staffordshire. That time was when Susan Powell, my twin, arrived into the world. She was born at 11:52pm on December 31st 1949. That meant that although we were twins, I was born in a different decade. It also seemed to be that, to my parents, I was an afterthought. They certainly treated me that way throughout my life. Susan hated me with a vengeance and did and said everything to cause me trouble.

She was my father’s princess and he just knew that princesses never lied, so that if she said I’d done something, then it must be true. Naturally, she said I did numerous things, all of them wrong. My mother never took my side, even on the odd occasion that she had seen what really happened. The only person ever to believe me was Granddad Reg, my mother’s father. Unfortunately he lived in another county, so I rarely saw him.

Growing up, I was usually to be found with a book in my hands or a football at my feet, or when I was lucky enough to have a few pence, I would be found at our town’s swimming baths. There was a lot of civic pride in the Olympic size pool, something our city neighbours didn’t have. The latter two activities were preferable, as it meant that I was out of the house and away from my sister’s influence. She was far too idle to come to me, except on the very few occasions my father sent her to get me. Then I’d get a real ear bashing all the way home. Although reading could be done behind my closed bedroom door, I wasn’t allowed to lock it, so regularly had to suffer my sister’s interruptions as she invented some excuse to berate me. As we got older these, fortunately, occurred with less frequency, as I learned to ignore her and refuse to rise to the bait.

I suppose I should thank Susan for helping me become a better footballer, swimmer and reader. In fact, my reading became so prolific that, having read all our local library’s fiction that caught my imagination, I started on factual books. This would pay dividends later at grammar school.

Grammar school was the only time I can recall my father siding with me over Susan. She had no interest in education and didn’t even take her 11 plus examination. I did, and not only passed but was accepted into my first choice of school. By then we had moved just across the border into Stoke-on-Trent and a semi-detached house Hartshill. It had two large bedrooms and one box room. No guesses which was mine. To be honest, I didn’t believe I would ever actually attend Hanley High, especially after my sister’s objections that I shouldn’t be allowed to attend. Her reasoning being that the expense would be better spent on her. My father actually disagreed, so it was that I got a good education.