Oisin
gone but not forgotten
Kate's story of Eric prompted me to post this one.
Although in a similar vein, it is tongue in cheek, and has been embroidered to maybe raise a smile:
Jane's Letters
I found it difficult to make head or tail of the letter she’d handed me. I didn’t even realise that these agony aunts sent personal replies (why should I?). I thought they merely printed their responses in whichever rag they worked for. But there it was in black and white. Although it was ‘Marjorie Proops’, I guessed she would have an army of assistants sending out these things, rubber-stamping the signature on the bottom.
It began ‘Dear Worried,’ and ended something like, “…as your boyfriend is only eighteen, it may be a phase he is passing through. But, if he continues in this way, he will certainly never make anyone a good husband.”
‘So, what’s it all about?’ I demanded, passing the letter back to Jane.
Her cheeks reddened. ‘Vera gave it to me.’
‘Vera? That silly cow you work with? So what’s it to do with you? And what’s more, why are you showing it to me?’
We’d reached the end of the clay path through the old quarry workings and were sitting on a bench overlooking a pleasant area of unmown grass. Jane’s already crimsoned cheeks darkened.
‘I didn’t know what she was going to do it. I was just talking to her. You know the way girls do.’
I shook my head. ‘I have no idea of “the way girls do”. For God’s sake, I’m not a girl! You’re all a bloody mystery to me.’
There was a hint of a tear in her eye as she explained, ‘It was just talk. I told her how you always have a drink before you call for me and how, nine times out of ten, we wind up in a pub for the night.’ My eyes must’ve blazed. I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. ‘Anyway,’ she continued, either picking up courage, or a need to get the whole lot off her chest, ‘she took it on herself to write for advice, pretending she was me. I knew nothing about it until she handed me this.’
‘And you expect me to believe that cock and bull story?’ I exploded.
‘It’s the truth, honest!’
‘Cobblers! You wrote it, didn’t you?’ Vexed as I was, I couldn’t help but admire the way she was damming the flood building up behind her pretty bright blue eyes. ‘Why, Jane?’ I tried to rationalise, ‘If you didn’t like the way I’ve been carrying on, why didn’t you talk to me? Surely I’m not that unapproachable? We talk about everything, don’t we? Do we have to have our relationship, not only banded about your workplace, but the bloody Daily Mirror as well?’
‘I didn’t know she was going to do it,’ she insisted.
‘Oh, come on, Jane, I didn’t come down in the last shower. Vera didn’t write to the paper, did she? That dopey sod has trouble writing her own name. It was you. You did it!’
I was more than extremely angry. I was as mad as hell. I suppose, looking back, it wasn’t so much her blabbing about my drinking that I found offensive, it was the reference to making a “good husband”. That was really scary. Bloody hell, I was in my prime, footloose and fancy-free. Jane was very attractive and fun to be with but the revelation that she had aspirations of anything more than having a good time filled me with a deep foreboding.
The sight of her teeth clamping her bottom lip to quell the trembling, caused me to ease up momentarily. The pause made me consider if I was being unreasonable. Besides being a selfish unapproachable mongrel, was I also a sadistic bully?
No! A second of thought was enough to convince me. I was perfectly justified. There was no excuse for her going behind my back. I had always been tolerant. I couldn’t count the number of times I’d suffered the severe frustration of having to listen to her parents twittering on for hours, when all I wanted was a bit of rumpy-dumpy with their daughter.
‘I’m sorry.’ Now the tears were flooding. ‘I didn’t know…’
‘Course you bloody knew.’
‘Does this mean…’
‘It means you can find some other idiot to blab to newspapers about.’
‘Can’t we…’
‘Go home? Yes! I’ll take you that far and that’s it!’
By the time I’d walked Jane back to her house, I was on the edge of tears myself – tears of anger and frustration.
The weeks passed and I carried on as usual; out with the lads, the pubs, the clubs, the dance halls, picking up with the odd girl here and there (some of them quite seriously odd).
Then quite out of the blue, I received a letter from Jane, informing me that she was at home, recovering from a recent operation. There was no detail just that she’d undergone surgery.
As I didn’t want to confuse the girl by giving her mixed messages, I was at a loss to know how to respond. However much I’d condemned Jane for seeking the advice of her friends, I found myself doing something similar.
I was having a Sunday lunchtime drink with an old mate, Johnnie Broadlake. Out of the blue he asked if there was any chance of me picking up with Jane again. When I mentioned the letter, he suggested that I should check up on her, if only for old times’ sake. ‘She’ll understand,’ he assured me.
On my way from the pub I stopped off to by a huge box of Belgium chocolates and a nice bouquet of flowers.
Jane’s mother showed me into the living room, where I slid the chocolates on top of the piano.
Explaining that Jane was up in her room, Missus Rainsford relieved me of the flowers. ‘Oooh, they’re lovely,’ she said, burying her nose amongst the blooms. ‘I’ll get them in water and let Jane know you’re here.’
‘It’s okay, Missus Rainsford. If she’s not feeling well, I’ll go up.’
I clocked her expression but thought it was provoked by the suggestion that I go to her daughter’s bedroom. I could have told her it would’ve been far from the first time, but decided it was no time for quips and she’d disappeared anyway.
‘Jane!’ I heard her call from the hall on her way to the kitchen, ‘Guess who’s here. And he’s brought you some beautiful flowers.’
I was surprised by the immediate sound of muffled clumps as Jane made her way rapidly down the stairs. She burst into the room, all made-up, dressed to kill and breathing heavily.
She looked as pretty and healthy as I had ever seen her. Our eyes locked for what seemed an eternity while I struggled for something to say.
‘So, how’re you feeling?’ I eventually croaked, ‘I got your letter. Sorry to hear about your…’ I realised I had no idea what the problem was. I just prayed it wasn’t one of those embarrassing women’s complaints
‘Nail.’ Mrs Rainsford, said, arriving back in the room with two full vases.
‘Nail?’ I repeated, believing I had misheard.
‘Yes.’ Jane waggled a slippered foot at me, ‘I had an ingrowing toenail.
‘Terrible painful, wasn’t it, love?’ Her mother added.
‘Yeah.’ Jane smiled. ‘But it’s a lot better now.’
As she was preparing to squeeze her feet into a pair of pointed stilettos, I’d guessed that for myself.
Mrs Rainsford placed the vases each side of the chocolates, and stood back to admire them. ‘Look, Jane, aren’t they beautiful – such wonderful colours?’
The moment her mother had left the room, Jane flopped onto the settee and invited me to join her by patting the cushion beside her. ‘So how’s life with you?’ She opened the conversation.
‘Oh, you know,’ I shrugged. ‘You’re looking good.’
‘Just getting ready to go out.’
‘Oh yeah. Who with?’ I was joking.
‘Terry. He’s on leave for a week before being posted to Germany. Well, he asked me, and I’d got nothing else on, so…’ it sounded like an apology. I couldn’t imagine why she saw the need. ‘But,’ she continued, ‘I could go with you instead. Mom’ll straighten things with Terry.’ She gave her mother a little-girlie smile. ‘Won’t you Mom?’
During our relationship I had heard quite a lot about her ex-boyfriend Terry Cartwright. Our paths had crossed on a couple of occasions and he didn’t seem a bad sort.
‘It doesn’t seem fair,’ I told her, ‘I only came round to make sure you’re okay. Honestly, Jane, I think starting over would be a big mistake. You go and enjoy yourself with Terry and pass on my regards.’
There followed an awfully uncomfortable moment or two. I could see she wasn’t best pleased with me so I bade her farewell and made a rapid exit.
At the bus stop I started thinking about how gorgeous Jane looked, all done up for a night out with her soldier boy. And how she was prepared to dump him just for me.
Perhaps I had been a little hasty? Maybe I should have given the situation more thought before leaving so abruptly? The temptation to return was almost overwhelming. It was a tough decision. In the end it was the thought of having to wait half an hour for another Sunday service bus that convinced me: Despite the chocolates and flowers costing a small fortune, I decided not to go back and retrieve them.
THE END
Although in a similar vein, it is tongue in cheek, and has been embroidered to maybe raise a smile:
Jane's Letters
I found it difficult to make head or tail of the letter she’d handed me. I didn’t even realise that these agony aunts sent personal replies (why should I?). I thought they merely printed their responses in whichever rag they worked for. But there it was in black and white. Although it was ‘Marjorie Proops’, I guessed she would have an army of assistants sending out these things, rubber-stamping the signature on the bottom.
It began ‘Dear Worried,’ and ended something like, “…as your boyfriend is only eighteen, it may be a phase he is passing through. But, if he continues in this way, he will certainly never make anyone a good husband.”
‘So, what’s it all about?’ I demanded, passing the letter back to Jane.
Her cheeks reddened. ‘Vera gave it to me.’
‘Vera? That silly cow you work with? So what’s it to do with you? And what’s more, why are you showing it to me?’
We’d reached the end of the clay path through the old quarry workings and were sitting on a bench overlooking a pleasant area of unmown grass. Jane’s already crimsoned cheeks darkened.
‘I didn’t know what she was going to do it. I was just talking to her. You know the way girls do.’
I shook my head. ‘I have no idea of “the way girls do”. For God’s sake, I’m not a girl! You’re all a bloody mystery to me.’
There was a hint of a tear in her eye as she explained, ‘It was just talk. I told her how you always have a drink before you call for me and how, nine times out of ten, we wind up in a pub for the night.’ My eyes must’ve blazed. I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. ‘Anyway,’ she continued, either picking up courage, or a need to get the whole lot off her chest, ‘she took it on herself to write for advice, pretending she was me. I knew nothing about it until she handed me this.’
‘And you expect me to believe that cock and bull story?’ I exploded.
‘It’s the truth, honest!’
‘Cobblers! You wrote it, didn’t you?’ Vexed as I was, I couldn’t help but admire the way she was damming the flood building up behind her pretty bright blue eyes. ‘Why, Jane?’ I tried to rationalise, ‘If you didn’t like the way I’ve been carrying on, why didn’t you talk to me? Surely I’m not that unapproachable? We talk about everything, don’t we? Do we have to have our relationship, not only banded about your workplace, but the bloody Daily Mirror as well?’
‘I didn’t know she was going to do it,’ she insisted.
‘Oh, come on, Jane, I didn’t come down in the last shower. Vera didn’t write to the paper, did she? That dopey sod has trouble writing her own name. It was you. You did it!’
I was more than extremely angry. I was as mad as hell. I suppose, looking back, it wasn’t so much her blabbing about my drinking that I found offensive, it was the reference to making a “good husband”. That was really scary. Bloody hell, I was in my prime, footloose and fancy-free. Jane was very attractive and fun to be with but the revelation that she had aspirations of anything more than having a good time filled me with a deep foreboding.
The sight of her teeth clamping her bottom lip to quell the trembling, caused me to ease up momentarily. The pause made me consider if I was being unreasonable. Besides being a selfish unapproachable mongrel, was I also a sadistic bully?
No! A second of thought was enough to convince me. I was perfectly justified. There was no excuse for her going behind my back. I had always been tolerant. I couldn’t count the number of times I’d suffered the severe frustration of having to listen to her parents twittering on for hours, when all I wanted was a bit of rumpy-dumpy with their daughter.
‘I’m sorry.’ Now the tears were flooding. ‘I didn’t know…’
‘Course you bloody knew.’
‘Does this mean…’
‘It means you can find some other idiot to blab to newspapers about.’
‘Can’t we…’
‘Go home? Yes! I’ll take you that far and that’s it!’
By the time I’d walked Jane back to her house, I was on the edge of tears myself – tears of anger and frustration.
The weeks passed and I carried on as usual; out with the lads, the pubs, the clubs, the dance halls, picking up with the odd girl here and there (some of them quite seriously odd).
Then quite out of the blue, I received a letter from Jane, informing me that she was at home, recovering from a recent operation. There was no detail just that she’d undergone surgery.
As I didn’t want to confuse the girl by giving her mixed messages, I was at a loss to know how to respond. However much I’d condemned Jane for seeking the advice of her friends, I found myself doing something similar.
I was having a Sunday lunchtime drink with an old mate, Johnnie Broadlake. Out of the blue he asked if there was any chance of me picking up with Jane again. When I mentioned the letter, he suggested that I should check up on her, if only for old times’ sake. ‘She’ll understand,’ he assured me.
On my way from the pub I stopped off to by a huge box of Belgium chocolates and a nice bouquet of flowers.
Jane’s mother showed me into the living room, where I slid the chocolates on top of the piano.
Explaining that Jane was up in her room, Missus Rainsford relieved me of the flowers. ‘Oooh, they’re lovely,’ she said, burying her nose amongst the blooms. ‘I’ll get them in water and let Jane know you’re here.’
‘It’s okay, Missus Rainsford. If she’s not feeling well, I’ll go up.’
I clocked her expression but thought it was provoked by the suggestion that I go to her daughter’s bedroom. I could have told her it would’ve been far from the first time, but decided it was no time for quips and she’d disappeared anyway.
‘Jane!’ I heard her call from the hall on her way to the kitchen, ‘Guess who’s here. And he’s brought you some beautiful flowers.’
I was surprised by the immediate sound of muffled clumps as Jane made her way rapidly down the stairs. She burst into the room, all made-up, dressed to kill and breathing heavily.
She looked as pretty and healthy as I had ever seen her. Our eyes locked for what seemed an eternity while I struggled for something to say.
‘So, how’re you feeling?’ I eventually croaked, ‘I got your letter. Sorry to hear about your…’ I realised I had no idea what the problem was. I just prayed it wasn’t one of those embarrassing women’s complaints
‘Nail.’ Mrs Rainsford, said, arriving back in the room with two full vases.
‘Nail?’ I repeated, believing I had misheard.
‘Yes.’ Jane waggled a slippered foot at me, ‘I had an ingrowing toenail.
‘Terrible painful, wasn’t it, love?’ Her mother added.
‘Yeah.’ Jane smiled. ‘But it’s a lot better now.’
As she was preparing to squeeze her feet into a pair of pointed stilettos, I’d guessed that for myself.
Mrs Rainsford placed the vases each side of the chocolates, and stood back to admire them. ‘Look, Jane, aren’t they beautiful – such wonderful colours?’
The moment her mother had left the room, Jane flopped onto the settee and invited me to join her by patting the cushion beside her. ‘So how’s life with you?’ She opened the conversation.
‘Oh, you know,’ I shrugged. ‘You’re looking good.’
‘Just getting ready to go out.’
‘Oh yeah. Who with?’ I was joking.
‘Terry. He’s on leave for a week before being posted to Germany. Well, he asked me, and I’d got nothing else on, so…’ it sounded like an apology. I couldn’t imagine why she saw the need. ‘But,’ she continued, ‘I could go with you instead. Mom’ll straighten things with Terry.’ She gave her mother a little-girlie smile. ‘Won’t you Mom?’
During our relationship I had heard quite a lot about her ex-boyfriend Terry Cartwright. Our paths had crossed on a couple of occasions and he didn’t seem a bad sort.
‘It doesn’t seem fair,’ I told her, ‘I only came round to make sure you’re okay. Honestly, Jane, I think starting over would be a big mistake. You go and enjoy yourself with Terry and pass on my regards.’
There followed an awfully uncomfortable moment or two. I could see she wasn’t best pleased with me so I bade her farewell and made a rapid exit.
At the bus stop I started thinking about how gorgeous Jane looked, all done up for a night out with her soldier boy. And how she was prepared to dump him just for me.
Perhaps I had been a little hasty? Maybe I should have given the situation more thought before leaving so abruptly? The temptation to return was almost overwhelming. It was a tough decision. In the end it was the thought of having to wait half an hour for another Sunday service bus that convinced me: Despite the chocolates and flowers costing a small fortune, I decided not to go back and retrieve them.
THE END
