“The Benches”

“The benches”

It’s what we call it. My new hang out. The bit in town, by the market where various social misfits convene, until ‘Handlebars’ the cartoon-moustached copper inevitably, moves us on.

A U-shaped den of iniquity in varnished wood, “The benches” are raised to plinth effect, enabling townsfolk to see, on grim display, the no-hopers, dead-beats and low lifes they have rejected. The foulest contents of Rochdale’s mill-town underbelly are spewed and strewn across this communal area, a casual modern-day stocks.

My horrified teachers snake past our anti-social spectacle, warning their own patent-shoed offspring of the cruel fates of those from broken homes. We are examined, exhibit-like - an open sticker book of pasty-faced Zammos - as young eyes are diverted from Special Brew cans and Rizla papers. Disgust is quickly distilled into pity and decanted as shallow smiles to this Fagin-esque tribe of truants and unsavouries.

“Oh!….Hello…Julie!”

“Hiya, Miss”

I’m 15 and this, is my new spiritual homeland.

I’m not quite sure how I ended up here, only that I’m at a place of ‘finding myself’ - although the numbers of times one does this in a lifetime, makes a mockery of this notion.

Physically, I’m somewhere between girl and woman.  A place of teenage self-loathing. I hate my freckles and fat thighs. I’m frustrated that I can’t seem to shave my legs like the other girls without hacking half my shins off, which then scab over. Très attractive….

I don’t like the end of my nose. To my over-critical adolescent eyes, it’s too wide and sometimes, at night, I lie with a clothes peg on the end of it, to try and taper it. This does not work and it just ends up red.

My hair is so ravaged from my trichotilimania (hair pulling) habit, that I am constantly shifting it about to best disguise my bald patches. I dye it with ‘Harmony, Victoria’ the tube of semi permanent dark plum hair dye that comes in a triangular box from Superdrug for 99p. I’m not yet quite brave enough to go for black, which is what I really desire, nor to use a permanent dye. My mum drills into me that colouring it black is forbidden. That it will make me look like a witch or more specifically, Grandma Ada, my dad’s mum who holds villain status in family folklore.  The day is fast approaching, when I will defy her.

I wear ‘Rimmel pale biscuit’ foundation with talc on top to make it look more goth. My lipstick colour changes. I’ve yet to realise ‘Heather shimmer’ or ‘nudes’ will never work for me. Or that black just makes my teeth look yellow. My perfume is ‘Body Shop Dewberry’ as it is for most girls my age, unless they like ‘White Musk’ or ‘Exclamation!’

So, that’s me, navigating the stony wasteland between awkward child and blossoming teen rock chick.

What of my circle? My fellow ‘bench’ misfits.

There’s Diane. She’s a 17 year old single mum to a two year old girl, Melitta.

“Ooh, they used to make coffee called that!”

My mum says, disapprovingly when I tell her.

Strawberry blonde or ginger - depending how generous you’re feeling, Diane is kind-hearted and breezy in tight stone-washed denim. She likes hanging out on the benches because they’re close to ‘Boots’ which provide free nappies in their baby changing rooms, a courtesy that is massively exploited.

Diane chats, drinks and smokes rolls-up fashioned from discarded dimps. Her sleepy little one is strapped in the pushchair, laden with Poundstretcher bags and a selection of dumped coats. Melitta clutches her half empty bottle, which acts as both refreshment and makeshift teddy bear. Her soft brown eyes and thick lashes perfect the art of pleasing strangers as a way of gaining much sought after adult interaction. Randoms talk to the child the way zoo animals are conversed with. She provides a pleasant distraction, a moment’s amusement.

“Aww, look at ‘er. Int she cute!”

But as also with a zoo animal, Melitta is confined to her drab surroundings and has no say. Her life, is to wriggle, sleep and be wheeled to Boots every few hours to be changed.

Cyril is Diane’s dad and also forms part of our unlikely alliance. In his late fifties, he smells of stale sweat and tobacco and wears a tweed blazer. He is quick witted, funny and I like him. He laughs with a Sid James cackle, his face creasing as if crafted from the same tan leather. His eyes twinkle at me as he holds his coffee he bought from the bus station cafe.

There’s just one problem with Cyril though, that has come to light recently for me, and it’s quite a big one.

Cyril is a convicted paedophile.

This appears to be common knowledge and Cyril seems to care not, that everyone knows. Does it not bother Diane, still seeing him? I ask her. Him having contact with the little girl?

“Oh no! He’s never abused us…just someone else  in the swimming baths!”

she says brightly as if that makes everything okay.

I feel a little uneasy hanging out with him, but hey, if she forgives him, y’know …..

I’m at an age I feel I know little about men, having had few good male role models in my life. I cannot fully conceive of the seriousness of his crimes.

To me, he is The Macc Lads “Uncle Nobby” - a joke figure to be ridiculed rather than feared. And obviously, me being 15, I’m invincible queen of the world and as such, he poses no threat.

‘Turkey’ is a punk from London. He adds mystique to our Northern corner with his exotic cockney accent and tales of “darn sarf”. He sports a Mohican hair do, studded leather jacket and around his neck, he proudly boasts a chain of lovebites that sit as joined circles, as if he specifically instructed someone to make them in the shape of a necklace.  I wince at this. The idea of someone requesting those hideous blotches blighting their skin in such a way…. Still, I suppose it is just another way of being punk, and to be fair, quite an original one.

I never really know what to say to punks. They have always had the effect of slightly scaring me whilst making me feel rather dull and irrelevant. How could one not feel plain next to someone with tattoos, piercings and spiked hair? Turkey, I conclude, makes me feel like a pigeon.

Pete is one of the bench regulars I bond with. He is a troubled, sandy-haired musician with an unusually large head. His eyes sit anxiously as flickering blue pips in his face - a puckered red balloon. Pete refers to himself as ‘Christopher’ because he prefers the name.

A sensitive man of pout and poetry, Pete is obsessed by Prince.  So much so, he wears purple all the time. He quite likes - fancies-me, I think, and sometimes I go round to his flat.  He lives a short walk away in the ‘Seven Sisters’, Rochdale’s landmark highrises. To schoolgirl me, they epitomise glamour. There is an intercom that buzzes, a concierge, and I love that I can see the whole glittering world from up there.

Pete is 22, but he feels safe.  I do not think it strange he wants to hang out with a 15 year old girl. In many ways, I feel more mature than him as it is clear he has a lot of emotional problems, he’s a delicate petal.  He tells me he wants to form a band and I am to be one of his backing singers, I guess like ‘Wendy and Lisa’. We talk naively of songs we’ve written, of ‘one day’.

Many of my new bench friends drink heavily. There is a Kwik Save - “Kwiks” - in close proximity, so anyone that way inclined, need not go without. We all put in our orders to the nominated shoplifter-du-jour, namely whoever looks most respectable and has a large coat.

“What d’you want, Julie?  Concorde? Thunderbird?”

“I’d quite like a red lip gloss actually. Can I have a lip gloss instead?”

Twenty minutes or so later, the chosen one emerges, victorious, opening up the long felt-like coat, a triumphant thieving Santa, to pass around today’s goodies. My ‘Charlie’ cherry lipgloss is dutifully delivered, a street-spin on ‘Avon Lady’.

From time to time, we all pile into the showrooms in ‘Pioneers’, a local department store. We locate a *living room* at the back of the shop floor, where hardly anyone goes, with a nice comfy sofa, and we settle there, our gang, chilling….

For a little while, until a bored shop assistant discovers us, it’s our front room, on our terms, so long as we ignore the ‘now only £399!’ signs crudely encased in polythene. We leaf through the selection of magazines on ‘our’ coffee table, take shoes off to sink weary feet sink into the plush rug and enjoy the welcome cloud of cushion plumpness beneath our heads. We imagine this harshly lit haven as our own home; a sanctuary in which we can truly be ourselves and be accepted….for all our sins.

One day, an artist turns up at the benches with a sketch pad. An older man, whom I deduce from both accent and manner, hails from wealthy roots. His spider-veined face rests upon a ruffled white shirt and cravat, his clothes conveying he still fancies himself as a bit of a romantic. Somewhere between a jovial Falstaff and bohemian Augustus John, he boasts about the famous people he has known and sketched. The Marquess of Bath is mentioned several times and I confess, all I really know about the fella is that he lives in a safari park and likes shagging about.

“Anyway…..Julie….I’d be honoured if you would sit for me….that is….if I might sketch you. Your bone structure…...Well, would you mind?”

Me;

“I don’t have to pay do I?”

No-one has ever drawn me before. I take pleasure in this, my first portrait, albeit by a washed up has-been. I hold my neck high as he attempts to pencil my pinned up hair and capture my indifferent yet defiant expression. Before he hands it to me, rolled, with the drama of ancient royal scroll, he signs his name boldly as if I should know who he is. Did people once know who he was, I wonder….

There’s something about an autograph that people attach a strong sense of self to, rather like a handshake. They literally ‘make a point’ as ‘i’s are dotted and attempt to swirl and lift the final swoop of the hand with passion and command. I contemplate my own signature. The one that I’ve practised for so many years on my old school rough book…..

“Come on! You lot know you’re not supposed to be here”

It’s the familiar voice of Handlebars, arriving on cue, a looming Lancashire Officer Dibble.  It’s a game and he plays his part, he wants no trouble but has to be ‘seen to be doing’ - moving the undesirables along. His cherry jowls wobble as he gestures his stiff uniformed arms out to shoo us away.

“Go on now….clear off….these seats are supposed to be for people who need a rest…”

He blasts.

But doesn’t he know there are different ways people ‘need a rest’?

Doesn’t he realise that Diane goes home every evening to her bleak, damp bedsit with only her young toddler for company?

Doesn’t he see that Pete finds much needed socialisation and support for his mental health difficulties on these benches?

Does he not know that I am so unhappy at home, that I stay out here in town, until the very last bus, every day, just so I don’t have to be there?

Does he not know that without this place, without these unlikely connections we’ve made, we would all suffer greatly?

He smiles knowingly and we smile back, thankful for the blind eye he so often turns, grateful we can come back tomorrow and do the same thing, for the most part, without hassle.

And for this bunch of delinquents, it’s a decent compromise.