Disraeli Avenue
Dizz–rah–el–lee Avenue
Caroline Smailes
First published in Great Britain in 2008 by Caroline Smailes
in support of the charity One in Four (www.oneinfour.org.uk),
an organisation run for and by people who have experienced
sexual abuse
Text © 2008 Caroline Smailes
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced
or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronically
or mechanically, including photocopying, recording or any
information storage or retrieval system, without either prior
permission in writing from the publisher or a licence permitting
restricted copying. In the United Kingdom such licences are
issued by the Copyright Licensing Agency, 90 Tottenham Court
Road, London W1T 4LP.
Cover design by Snowbooks Design
Internal design and typesetting by Wordsense Ltd, Edinburgh
For those who are one in four
With special thanks to:
Clare Christian at The Friday Project
(www.thefridayproject.co.uk)
Joanna Chisholm at Wordsense Ltd
(www.wordsense.co.uk)
Emma Barnes
(www.snowbooks.com/angels_design.html)
I lived in Disraeli Avenue, in between Gladstone Street
and Campbell-Bannerman Road. The neighbours all said it
dizz–rah–el–lee (four chunks) Avenue. My mother’s house was a
semi-detached on a street with 31 similar-looking houses.
They looked identical but I knew that they weren’t.
There were differences.
In Search of Adam
Disraeli Avenue
Number 9
In Search of Adam
1
* * * * *
Number 1Martin North leaves home
9
Number 2
The making of Paul Hodgson’s legend
13
Number 3
A tarot reading
17
Number 4
The banana and milk diet
25
Number 5
Stamps for Crystal
29
Number 6
Payments for work, not yet done
33
Number 7
On me way to Bet’s flat
39
Number 8
James’ outbox
41
Number 9
Being Crystal
45
Number 10
I love Noel Ernest Edmonds very very much 49
Number 11
A potbellied pig for Christmas
51
Number 12
Details of a piano lesson
57
Number 13
A Lady Di hair-do
65
Number 14
The Queen of tittle tattle
67
Number 15
Being naked has caused an angry mob
to be on my driveway
75
Number 16
I call her Elizabeth
79
Number 17
The old man in the queue
83
Number 18
Dear Diary
87
Number 19
Loose change
93
Number 20
The Wheel of Fortune reversed
107
Number 21
I am watching you
109
Number 22
Me da and his bugle
113
Number 23
Invoices for work not yet done
115
Number 24
Probably a robbery
119
Number 25
Reciting Metro stops, unable to sleep
123
Number 26
Buy my stuff, buy me
131
Number 27
A simple love story
133
Number 28
For straight-talking advice, ask Jane
141
Number 29
Being married to Jezebel
143
Number 30
My brother Eddie
149
Number 31
My creative writing exercises
155
Number 32
Dear Father Christmas
157
* * * * *
Number 9Thinking about wor Jude and wor Adam
163
* * * * *
Acknowledgements169
Number 9
Bill and Jude Williams
Green front door
Green garage door
Yellow car.
KON 908V
In Search of Adam
Two years, six months and twenty-one days before I was born, my
parents moved to New Lymouth. From a block of flats that were as
high as a giant. My mother’s house was brand new. It was shiny.
Spick and span. There were two new estates being built in New
Lymouth. The housing estate that I was to live on and another one.
They each had four parallel streets and formed a perfect square on
either side of the main road.
On this Coast Road, there were ‘The Shops’. Dewstep Butchers was
also New Lymouth Post Office and displayed a smiling pig’s head
in the window. New Lymouth Primary School. My primary school.
Was a perfect E-shaped grey building with a flat roof. Mrs Hodgson
(Number 2) told Rita that many cuckoos were put in nests on that
roof. I didn’t understand. New Lymouth Library was on the Coast
Road too. It was a rectangle. Like a shoe box. Inside the library
there were eighty-seven Mills and Boon novels and three Roald
Dahl books. There were signs everywhere. ‘Absolute silence at
1
Caroline Smailes
all times.’ The grumpy librarian liked to read her Introducing
Machine Knitting magazine. I read the first chapter of Danny the
Champion of the World twenty-seven times. I read all of Matilda
and The Twits. Thirteen times each. Brian’s newsagents stretched
across 127–135 Coast Road. Inside the shop I heard gossip being
tittled and tattled, as I stood looking at the jars of delicious sweets.
Rhubarb and Custard. Chocolate Raisins. White Gems.
Aniseed Balls. Coconut Mushrooms. Brown Gems.
Cola Cubes. Pear Drops. Cherry Lips. Liquorice
Comfits. Toffee Bonbons. Jelly Beans. Edinburgh
Rock. Pontefract Cakes. Pineapple Chunks. Sweet
Peanuts. Scented Satins. Sherbet Pips. Midget Gems.
Sweet Tobacco. Chocolate Peanuts. Toasted Teacakes.
Rainbow Crystals. Sour Apples. Lemon Bonbons.
Unable to decide. I wished that I had the courage to ask for one
from every one of the twenty-five jars.
On the other side of the Coast Road there were five really big houses.
My class teacher, Mrs Ellis, and Mrs Hughes the local librarian lived
in two of them. I didn’t know who else lived there. The children in
those houses didn’t go to New Lymouth Primary School with me.
The children in those houses didn’t play foxes and hounds around
the estate with us local bairns. I walked down that road on my way
to school. I peered into those large houses. I stopped walking to
stare in. I tried to look past the fresh flowers in the window and I
thought about all the nice smelling things that would live inside.
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Disraeli Avenue
The Coast Road ran a slope from New Lymouth down to the
Lymouth seaside. The estate that I lived on was at the top of the
hill. As the road continued up, it travelled through a number of
similar estates and villages. Signs warned drivers when they were
leaving one village and arriving in another. My father said that the
nearer yee lived to the coast, then the richer yee were. We lived
about a ten-minute walk from the coast. I’m not quite sure what
that made us. All I know is that, when my mother was alive, my
father talked about one day living on the sea front. The houses there
were enormous. Five stories tall. They went up and up and up to
the sky. You could stand on the roof and your head would be in the
clouds. I thought that really important people lived in those kinds
of houses. People like the Queen could live there. A hacky lad in
my class at school lived in one, with about twenty other children.
His mother and father hadn’t wanted him. They, the twenty other
children and the hacky lad, lived in their mansion that looked out
over the beautiful Lymouth cove. They were very very lucky. They
must have been very very rich. They must have been the richest
people in England.
Lymouth Bay was shaped like a banana. There was a pier at each
end and three caves lived in the cliff. Just over the left pier. Sat tall
on a throne of rocks. There was a lighthouse. The most beautiful.
The most elegant. A white lighthouse. Legend had it, that hundreds
and thousands of small green men with orange hair lived in it.
I never saw them. But. Paul Hodgson (Number 2) had seen one
buying a quarter of Toasted Teacakes in Brian’s newsagents.
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Caroline Smailes
There were one hundred and twenty steps to climb down. One
hundred and twenty steps before touching the grey sand. The sand
was unhappy. It looked poorly sick all the time. A green handrail
wove next to the steps. I never had the courage to touch it. The paint
was covered in carved initials, decorated with lumps of hardened
chewing gum and topped with seagull droppings. Yackety yack.
Hundreds and thousands of lumps. Hacky yack yack. Paul Hodgson
(Number 2) told me that his uncle caught an incurable disease from
touching that handrail. He said that his uncle’s hand had dropped
clean off. I wasn’t going to risk it.
To me, the Coast Road seemed to go on for ever and ever and ever.
I was told that it was a perfectly straight road, which travelled from
the seafront and through four villages. You could catch a bus on
the Coast Road. The road passed by my school, up the slope, close
to my house and then on through village after village into lands
that were unknown. Into lands that sounded magical and exciting.
North Lymouth. Marsden. Hingleworth. Coastend. Mrs Hodgson
(Number 2) told me that Coastend was famous for its cheapness of
tricks. A magical place.
I lived in Disraeli Avenue, in between Gladstone Street and
Campbell-Bannerman Road. The neighbours all said it dizz–rah–
el–lee (four chunks) Avenue. My mother’s house was a semi-
detached on a street with 31 similar-looking houses. They looked
identical but I knew that they weren’t.
4
Disraeli Avenue
There were differences. Thirteen had red front doors. Seven had
green front doors. Five had blue front doors. Seven had yellow front
doors. The garages matched the front doors. Except for Number
17. Mr Lewis had a yellow front door and a green garage. I didn’t
know why.
green,
red,
red,
yellow, green, red, red, yellow, yellow, green, red, red, red,
green, blue, blue,
red,
blue,
green,
yellow, red, blue, blue, yellow, green, green, red, red, red,
yellow, red, yellow.
I wanted the numbers to fit better. I wanted the colours to fit better.
It should have been sixteen red front doors. One half. Eight green
doors. One quarter. Four blue doors. One eighth. Four yellow doors.
One eighth. It was simple. The colours could look really nice. I had
worked it all out.
red,
red,
green,
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Caroline Smailes
red,
green,
red,
blue,
blue
green, red,
yellow, red, green,
red, yellow, red,
red, green, red,
green, red, blue, blue,
green, red, yellow,
red, green, red,
yellow, red, red.
I wasn’t happy with Mr Lewis (Number 17). His colours didn’t
match. Maybe he didn’t realise. I wished that I had the courage to
talk to him about it.
There was a little wall in front of the garden. A dwarf wall. A dwarf
wall for Snow White’s friends to play on. There was also a drive
for my father’s Mini. There was a garden to the front and a slightly
larger one to the back. The front lawn was just big enough to squeeze
onto it a folded tartan picnic blanket. The soil surrounding the
perfect square of grass was always packed with flowers. I watched
the flowers. I noted them all in a little lined book. It was green and
lived on my windowsill. Thorny rose bushes, coordinating colours
and then down to a mixture of blossoms. Depending on the month.
6
Disraeli Avenue
Gaillardia ‘Burgunder’.
Shiny red flower, with light yellow centre.
June–October. 30cm.
Dahlia.
Really orange and red.
June–November. 60cm.
Narcissum ‘Amergate.’
Orange outside with a darker orange
in the middle.
March–April. 45cm.
I liked to write things down. In the green notebook that I kept on
my windowsill. Flowers. Colours. Number plates. Full names.
Times. Routines. All of the first chapter of Danny the Champion of
the World. So I wouldn’t forget.
* * * * *
7Number 1
Mr and Mrs North
Green front door
Green garage door
Red car
DFT 678T
Martin North leaves home
I was the first lad from Disraeli Avenue to get into uni. There’d been
this lad Paul Hodgson who used to live at Number 2, he went on to
study law but they’d moved out of the road by then. So I’m saying
that he doesn’t count.
Getting into Liverpool Uni was fucking huge. I managed two As
and a B at A level and my mam was beyond happy. She was right
chuffed and painted my results on a white sheet, then hung it
from the front room window. It was a right sunny day and all the
neighbours slowed down to look at what me mam had painted on
the sheet. I told me mam that it didn’t really make much sense. So
she got another sheet, asked is how to spell university and then
wrote ‘Oor bairn Martin is ganin to university’ in fuck off huge red
letters. She was practically dancing around the house. I’ve made
me mam so proud.
Mam, dad and me nana North gave is a lift to Liverpool last week.
The car was packed with everything I’d need. Pans, a kettle and a
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Caroline Smailes
load of food. Me nana North had baked is pies and scones and stuff.
They all wanted to give is a right good start. My going to uni is the
most major thing in me mam’s life and I have to try me hardest not
to fuck it all up.
I’m sharing a flat with two other lads, Ginger Matt and Charlie.
They’re sound lads. We’re right in the centre of Liverpool, just off
Mount Pleasant, around the corner from the Everyman Theatre.
It’s sound being right central. We can walk everywhere and don’t
have to bother with the last bus or with hailing a taxi. Charlie’s a
private school lad. He’s right posh and his dad’s mates with Jeffrey
Archer. He’s studying French and Spanish. Ginger Matt’s a Manc
and so fucking sound. He’s writing a novel and studying English
Lit. They’re both a bit off their heads. Charlie has a never-ending
supply of pot and is determined to roll the longest joint he can. He
reckons he’s going to get in the Guinness Book of Records with it.
We’re out every night and I’m spending me money far too fast. The
Guild’s a laugh and there are thousands of fit birds wearing hardly
any clothes. I’ve shagged two lasses already and I’ve only been
here a week.
Early this morning, I reckon it was just after two. We’d left the Casa
before closing and were having a few tins in the kitchen. The kitchen
has huge windows and looks out onto Oxford Road. Charlie managed
to pull a lass by shouting out to her from the window. The silly tart
came up and let him shag her before he chucked her out. We were
laughing about that, so I reckon it must have been about three when
10
Disraeli Avenue
we heard screams. Charlie was first to see and ran straight out the
flat. He’d had first aid training and even though he must have been
stoned, he seemed to know what to do. Ginger Matt had some lass
straddling him on one of the kitchen chairs. He was on a promise.
I stood at the window and saw her lying, curled up on the road and
there were already a few people screeching around her.
The taxi driver was out of his car and was looking down on her. I
could see that he wasn’t right. He was lighting a fag when he puked
all over his shoes. Charlie was on the floor giving the lass mouth
to mouth. I could only catch glimpses of him through gaps in the
crowd. Another lad, who I kind of recognised from downstairs, was
in the phone box, must have been calling for help. Charlie came back
up to the flat with the lass’s blood all over his face and t-shirt. He
told us that she was dead and then he went and got himself washed.
It turned out that her name was Laura. Well that’s what a copper
said when he came to get statements from us all a bit ago. She was
a fresher and studying English Lit, must have been in the same
lectures as Ginger Matt. She was pissed after a night in the Casa.
She’d been in the phone box calling her boyfriend who was still
back home somewhere in Wales. The copper said that she’d been
giving the lad shit. The last thing that she’d said to him was fuck
off. Then she’d staggered out from the phone box and straight onto
the road. He told us that she’d died on impact, and although Charlie
had done his best, well there was really nothing that he could have
done to save the lass.
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Caroline Smailes
And now it’s pissing it down outside. The cars are going up and
down the road, over her blood and it’s as if nothing has happened. I
reckon there’ll be flowers by the side of the road at some point and
a few people will come and stare at the spot. And maybe that’s a
good thing, because at least if there are flowers people will wonder
and ask questions and the poor lass won’t have died without anyone
noticing. She was eighteen years old and she died after saying fuck
off. I’m not going in to uni today. None of us are. We’re all going
out to the Guild to get pissed. I was going to phone me mam and tell
her about Laura, but I don’t want her to worry about is. I guess what
I’m learning is that life is too fucking short and that I shouldn’t
waste any of it.
12
Number 2
Mrs Hodgson and Paul
Yellow front door
Yellow garage door
Red car
GYS 606S
The making of Paul Hodgson’s legend
Mam and Sam had met through a dating agency. It’d been advertised
in the local Guardian free paper and we’d had a laugh about it. My
nana was the one who made my mam fill out the form, because she
reckoned that my mam needed a man about the house. My mam had
been to see Mrs Curtis from number 20 for a tarot reading, she was
holding out for a ginger bloke, on a horse in a field full of pumpkins.
My nana told mam that she was holding out for a pile of crap and
that she had to make her own future, that no one got anything by
sitting on their arse waiting for the world to come to them. So mam
got the form and, although we took the piss out of her, she filled
it out and sent it back with a postal order for £15 (meet your ideal
man within six months or get another six months free).
Sam was mam’s first date. He had no kids and was divorced,
because his first wife had shagged his best mate. Sam’s a decent
bloke. He’s a teacher at the local college, earns pretty good money
and treats my mam like a princess. Nana likes him and I do too. I
can’t really fault him as a person, but his dress sense is shit.
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Caroline Smailes
We moved in with him three months after mam met him. He
lives on the new estate, in a canny posh detached house with three
geet big bedrooms. Mam was a bit stressed about leaving Disraeli
Avenue. It was more to do with her independence than anything
else and I think that my dad leaving all those years ago made it
difficult for her to let go. My nana helped out and gave her a good
talking to and then we moved in with Sam. We’d been here just over
five weeks when my dad turne