outside gatecrashed relentlessly; via the cracks in the window frames and under the sills, through the vents and the spaces between the floorboards.
Then suddenly, with a contemptuous, twisting whip, and dragging a clutter of cans and rubbish in their wake, the winds deigned to change direction, offering Sandra some respite. As the fibres of her body and soul seemed about to relax, drunks materialised in the streets outside, spilling into the soundless void, filling it with their screams and chants. The wind and rain were now dead, so they could come home. But those vendors of misery always seemed to stop outside her door, and there was one particularly persistent guy who had inadvertently taught her every verse and chorus of
Hearts Glorious Hearts
over the last few months.
It never used to bother her, all this noise. Now she was the only one, Sandra Birrell, a mother, a wife, living here in this place, who didn’t sleep at night. The boys slept like logs; sometimes she’d go through to check on them, to marvel at their peace, and how they were growing up.
Billy would be away soon, she just knew it. Even at sixteen, he’d have his own place within a couple of years. He looked so like her husband in his youth, even if his hair was closer to her blonde. Billy was tough and private, he had his own life and guarded it closely. She knew there were girls hanging around, but she found his lack of expression hard to deal with, even when she marvelled at hisunsolicited kindnesses, not just to her, but to relatives and neighbours. You would see him, in a garden over in the pensioners’ war houses, cutting the grass, refusing point-blank, with a stern shake of his close-cropped head, to take any money in return. Then there was her Robert: he was a rangy wee colt, but growing fast. A dreamer, without Billy’s busy sense of purpose, but also unwilling to share the secrets in his head. When he left, what would be there for her and her man Wullie, slumbering deeply next to her? Then what would she be? Would after them be like before them? Would she be like Sandra Lockhart again?
It seemed crazy, but what had happened to Sandra Lockhart? The pretty blonde who was good at school, who’d gone to Leith Academy when the rest of her family, the Lockharts of Tennent Street, had all went to D.K. — David Kilpatrick’s, or ‘Daft Kids’ as the locals cruelly called it. Sandra was the youngest of the clan, the one child from that parish-booted band of wideos who seemed to be going places. Vivacious, bubbly and spoiled, she had always seemed a bit too big for those boots, continually appearing to look down on everybody in the tenemented streets of the old port her family came from. Everybody, except one, and he lay next to her.
The drunks had gone now, their voices tailing off into the night, but only to herald the return of the flagellating winds. Another ferocious blast and the window bellied in like Rolf Harris’s wobble-board, briefly teasing her with the possible drama of fracture, the one event that would surely waken her dozing husband beside her and force him to act, to do something. Anything. Just to show her that they were in this together.
Sandra looked at him, sleeping as soundly as the boys next door. He was fleshier now and his hair was thinning, but he hadn’t let himself go like some, and he still suggested Rock Hudson in
Written on the Wind
, the first proper film she’d seen as a girl. She tried to think about how
she
looked, and she felt her flab and cellulite, the touch of her hands on her body bringing both comfort and revulsion. She doubted if she put people in mind of Dorothy Malone any more. That was what they had called her then, ‘The Hollywood Blonde’.
Marilyn Monroe, Doris Day, Vera Ellen; she’d hinted at them all with one hairdo after another, but none more than Dorothy Malone in
Written on the Wind
. What a joke. Of course, she’d never known about this moniker at the time, at the Cappy concert
Then suddenly, with a contemptuous, twisting whip, and dragging a clutter of cans and rubbish in their wake, the winds deigned to change direction, offering Sandra some respite. As the fibres of her body and soul seemed about to relax, drunks materialised in the streets outside, spilling into the soundless void, filling it with their screams and chants. The wind and rain were now dead, so they could come home. But those vendors of misery always seemed to stop outside her door, and there was one particularly persistent guy who had inadvertently taught her every verse and chorus of
Hearts Glorious Hearts
over the last few months.
It never used to bother her, all this noise. Now she was the only one, Sandra Birrell, a mother, a wife, living here in this place, who didn’t sleep at night. The boys slept like logs; sometimes she’d go through to check on them, to marvel at their peace, and how they were growing up.
Billy would be away soon, she just knew it. Even at sixteen, he’d have his own place within a couple of years. He looked so like her husband in his youth, even if his hair was closer to her blonde. Billy was tough and private, he had his own life and guarded it closely. She knew there were girls hanging around, but she found his lack of expression hard to deal with, even when she marvelled at hisunsolicited kindnesses, not just to her, but to relatives and neighbours. You would see him, in a garden over in the pensioners’ war houses, cutting the grass, refusing point-blank, with a stern shake of his close-cropped head, to take any money in return. Then there was her Robert: he was a rangy wee colt, but growing fast. A dreamer, without Billy’s busy sense of purpose, but also unwilling to share the secrets in his head. When he left, what would be there for her and her man Wullie, slumbering deeply next to her? Then what would she be? Would after them be like before them? Would she be like Sandra Lockhart again?
It seemed crazy, but what had happened to Sandra Lockhart? The pretty blonde who was good at school, who’d gone to Leith Academy when the rest of her family, the Lockharts of Tennent Street, had all went to D.K. — David Kilpatrick’s, or ‘Daft Kids’ as the locals cruelly called it. Sandra was the youngest of the clan, the one child from that parish-booted band of wideos who seemed to be going places. Vivacious, bubbly and spoiled, she had always seemed a bit too big for those boots, continually appearing to look down on everybody in the tenemented streets of the old port her family came from. Everybody, except one, and he lay next to her.
The drunks had gone now, their voices tailing off into the night, but only to herald the return of the flagellating winds. Another ferocious blast and the window bellied in like Rolf Harris’s wobble-board, briefly teasing her with the possible drama of fracture, the one event that would surely waken her dozing husband beside her and force him to act, to do something. Anything. Just to show her that they were in this together.
Sandra looked at him, sleeping as soundly as the boys next door. He was fleshier now and his hair was thinning, but he hadn’t let himself go like some, and he still suggested Rock Hudson in
Written on the Wind
, the first proper film she’d seen as a girl. She tried to think about how
she
looked, and she felt her flab and cellulite, the touch of her hands on her body bringing both comfort and revulsion. She doubted if she put people in mind of Dorothy Malone any more. That was what they had called her then, ‘The Hollywood Blonde’.
Marilyn Monroe, Doris Day, Vera Ellen; she’d hinted at them all with one hairdo after another, but none more than Dorothy Malone in
Written on the Wind
. What a joke. Of course, she’d never known about this moniker at the time, at the Cappy concert
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