We met twice in the same day before we realised. Not so much old friends as people who ran the gauntlet of adolescence, thrown together by geographical proximity and tormented by emotional distances. Ours was a symbiotic relationship; the only two kids on a council block in the middle of the biggest dump in Europe, possibly the world. We played together not out of friendship, but a shared desire to be away from home. I knew the places to avoid in rough games, the tender areas his father favoured. He knew that when I’d dressed myself there was a good chance I’d be going without dinner, so he’d come with me to steal food from the supermarket.
Now, 23 years later, he’s a lawyer. He visits his father in prison once a month at the request of his mother, who still doesn’t know he took the brunt of his father’s ire. I, having been shuffled between foster homes for most of my young life became, of all things, a social worker.
They took us both on the same day. My mother forgot the date of her final evaluation, which was unsurprising since she couldn’t remember to feed me without a Social Services letter taped to her bottle of Jack. She hadn’t remembered, and I didn’t know, so when the S.S. came calling neither my mother nor his father could put on their usual show. The social worker heard him and his father and thought I was being beaten. She left and came back with two police cars and an ambulance. He left with the paramedics. His father went in panda car number one. I went in number two. The S.S. weren’t into subtlety when removing children from their homes, it seemed.
As it turned out, he was under instruction to find out from me when the social worker was coming round to assess ‘that neglectful bint downstairs’ so his father could keep the noise down. What a considerate man. We sit in silence, reflecting on bitter ironies. Eventually, I speak.
“I never really liked you, Sam, but you were a good cell-mate.”
He smiles. “Yeah,” he replies, “Well I near enough hated you, but I may well owe you my life.”
He has to leave for a hearing. We don’t exchange numbers.
Ruth
My request is tardy I'm afraid, but if whatever moved you to write this is still lingering a bit in the ether then I think you should lasso the sunuvabitch and play with this more.
