What He Would've Done

And the wind carries me on. Wahey! Up over the footbridge that takes me from where I was and drops me where I want to go. The wrong side of the tracks. You got that right. Grass is always greener? I wouldn’t be too sure about that. But would you look at me go. Arms stretched out wide. My best blue Adidas hoodie blowing in the wind, looking like a pair of wings. I’m practically flying. Up into the sky. It’s greyer than normal. Grey as the water after you’ve done the washing up.

The rain strikes me off the road. It comes driving from the right and crashes into my face. My poor wee hat was no use at all. Whoosh! It just blows right off my head. I might be able to catch it if I run but Whoosh! It goes soaring over a fence and into a garden that doesn’t belong to me. But the flowers are quite nice. Maybe I’ll own it one day. I peak over the fence and shout ‘Hat! You get back here this instant!’ the way my Dad used to shout when I would run away. But the hat just sits there. I say ‘I’m going to give you until the count of three’ the way my Dad would’ve done. ‘One. Two. Three.’ But I know it’s no use ‘cause the hat can’t count. So I leave my wee hat sitting there even more red than before against the dull green grass. It looks like the grass is bleeding. Like it fell and hurt its knee the way I did the other day. I wonder if I should get it a Bugs Bunny plaster same as what I got. ‘Goodbye then, Mr Hat,’ I say. ‘I suppose you don’t want anything from the shops then?’ I say, the way my mum always says when I don’t want to hold her hand and I would just stand there with my arms folded ‘pulling a face’, as she would say.

I’m away off to the shops to get bread and butter ‘cause I used the last of them with my toast. When I lick my lips I can still taste melted butter dripping on the soggy toast. I like it soggy ‘cause it tastes good with a glass of milk. I made a bit for my Mum too, but she didn’t eat it ‘cause she mustn’t like it the way I make it. She just sighed and her lips threatened to jump off her face from lack of use. ‘No, lips!’ I would shout. ‘You’ve still got so much to live for!’ So I made my Mum a cup of tea just the way she likes it and the lips came back to life. ‘Thank you dear,’ she says. ‘I’ll just take this upstairs while I have a wee lie down. Would you be a good wee pup and fetch us some bread and butter.’ ‘Woof woof!’ I says and she gives me the money and I grab my hat and jacket and off I go. She’s been lying down a lot since she got back from the doctor and he says, ‘There’s nothing we can do,’ with that sad, sympathetic eye like he was staring at an injured bird. ‘I’m sorry,’ he says and Mum grabs my hand and gets in the car and drives home, crying all the way. And I sit there good and quiet. But I don’t think Mum notices. It was like she had blinkers on and she just gallops on home faster and faster.

I scurry out of the cold and the wet and into the shop and shake like a stinking wet mongrel. The shop-keeper gives me a look and I’m sorry I did it. I grab the cheapest bread and I Can’t Believe It’s Not Butter and give them to the man:

‘It’s terrible wet today, isn’t it?’

‘You’re telling me.’

‘Don’t you have a hat or something?’

‘Had one, but the wee bugger flew away on me.’

‘Awk, that’s a shame now.’

He puts the things in a bag and hands them to me and I give him the money. Exact change, if you don’t mind.

‘There you go, young sir.’

‘Thank you.’

‘And tell your mother we’re all thinking of her.’

‘I will aye.’

It seems like everyone’s been thinking of Mum this past week or so. Every time I tell my Mum she says ‘I wish it helped any’ and carries on watching the telly. She pretends she doesn’t care but I can see by the look in her eyes that she wants help. ‘Why can’t you comfort me like George did?’ her eyes say. ‘Say something to help like George would’ve done.’ But I can’t ‘cause I don’t know how to act like Dad. He was really smart and funny and could always make things better. And I know my Mum didn’t like it when he was gone ‘cause two lines formed like rivers down her face when she said goodbye and each new tear was like a boat sailing round the winding riverbank. And I thought of the boat tears as I wound my way home. I knew I couldn’t go back without the hat. Mum would be mad if I came home with the bread all battered, but I wanted the hat. I remember my Dad pulling it over my ears as we went to play football in the park in the middle of winter. I like it ‘cause it still smells like his fingers. Cigarettes and petrol. We played for ages until my feet were blue and my head was sweating under my hat. ‘Don’t take it off,’ he said, ‘in case you lose it.

I jumped the fence. Wahey! I flew over the fence just like my hat and glided to the middle of the garden. ‘It’s going to be alright,’ I says. ‘This is going to heal right up.’ So I took my hat and put it on my head sopping wet. It felt like a Giant was sucking the top of my head like I was a hairy lollipop. I bent down and took the Bugs Bunny plaster off my knee. It only stung a little. I put it on the grass where it had been bleeding and hopped the fence again. Wahey!

 But I land on the loaf. Squelch! And I catch my hoodie on the fence and it rips. Part of the right sleeve vanishes taking one of my Adidas stripes away. I don’t have time to care though. I look at my invisible watch and decide I’m late. Very, very late. So I leave the bread and butter sitting in a puddle and I run home. This time the wind is against me and I’m afraid I’m going to fly away. So I hold on to my hat with both hands and make my legs heavier. I think they are made of steel and will never let me fly away. I close my eyes tight like the doors of an airplane and splash in every puddle on the path. I know I will be cold in the house but I don’t care. I will curl up in a ball and shelter myself in a cocoon of blankets and I won’t come out until I’m big and strong like the ‘man of the house’.

When I get to the house I make-believe I’m a fighter-jet coming in to land. Whoosh! I take both my hands off my hat and head straight for the door. I put both my arms out like wings and swerve from side to side. But my hat flies away again and I catch it before it gets too far. My plane is out of control. It’s lost a wing and is coming in to crash land. Bang! I slam against the door and try the handle. But I’m too late just as I thought and the door is locked. I knew this would happened ‘cause it happened last time. So I left the front window open just a bit. And a pile of blankets sitting on the sofa. I somersault through the window like an Olympic gymnast. Ta-dah! I curl up in my blankets and hide myself away with the telly still on from earlier. The sound of shooting from the telly is in time with the pounding raindrops trying to break the window. My mum will be upstairs for a while. Then I’ll tell her what the man in the shop said and what happened to the bread. I’ll wait to tell her the bad news. I’ll wait.