They walked to the stall doors and were escorted into the smoky darkness by the usherette and her torch. Trying not to stumble over people’s legs, they groped their way to their seats and subsided with sighs of pleasure. Settling back, they gave themselves up to fantasy. The sheriff’s posse thundered across the screen, the baddies galloped up into the rocks on the side of the valley, bullets whined and ricocheted, horses reared and fell. The good guys won.
‘That was good,’ Annie enthused as the credits rolled.
‘Yeah—’ Gwen’s accent had slid to somewhere in the mid-Atlantic ‘—sure was.’
A short cartoon came next. Tomcat chased Tweetie-Pie and failed yet again to catch him. The adverts rolled. Gwen elbowed Annie and offered a small paper bag.
‘Here—have a pear drop.’
‘Thanks, Gwennie! Can you spare them?’
‘‘Course—go on.’
Annie sucked off the rough sugar coating and let the gloriously artificial sweet fruitiness fill her mouth. Bliss.
The newsreel followed. Victims of the latest blitz on Birmingham were seen clearing up and fixing ‘Business as Usual’ signs to their damaged shops while smiling and making thumbs-up signs at the camera. Much was made of the successes in Eritrea and the huge bombing raid on Kiel.
‘I heard them going over the other night. They must have been heading for Kiel,’ Annie whispered.
‘They’re so brave, the RAF boys,’ Gwen said with a sigh.
That was quite enough reality. Now it was the big feature—a Busby Berkeley musical. Annie and Gwen were swept into a world of colour, song and dance. Time was suspended and nothing mattered but that the hero and heroine should end in each other’s arms.
The whole audience stood for ‘God Save the King’, and then shuffled out, chattering and laughing.
It was strange being back in cold, dark Wittlesham High Street. At least half of Annie was still prancing about in satin and feathers. The contrast made her feel quite light-headed.
‘That was just wonderful,’ she said, sighing.
But it was no use staying in Hollywood with your head in the clouds. There were practicalities to obey. The last bus left in just five minutes. The girls hurried to join the line of people climbing on board.
Gwen dived into her bag and produced an envelope. ‘Here,’ she said, ‘something to keep your pecker up.’
Annie took it and stared at the writing.
To Miss A Cross c/o Miss G Barker.
Tom. It was from Tom.
‘Already?’ she said, dazed. ‘I wasn’t expecting one for days …’
She stood still, gazing at the letter in happy disbelief.
‘Come on, darling. You taken root?’ a voice demanded from behind.
‘Oh, sorry …’ Annie shuffled forward to the head of the queue. She gave Gwen a quick hug. ‘Thanks ever so, Gwennie. I don’t know how I’ll ever repay you—’
‘I’ll think of something. Come and see me as soon as you can! Toodle-oo!’
‘Toodle-oo!’
Annie climbed on board and found a seat near the back. She sat staring at her letter. A night out and a letter from Tom. It was almost too much happiness for one day. Treats had to be hoarded up, brought out as rewards to herself. She thrust the letter in her pocket and sat staring out into the dark, reliving every detail of the musical.
Tom’s letter was like a beacon, seeing her through the next day when the rain drove across the flat fields and it felt more like winter than spring. Her father was in one of his blacker moods and her mother went tiptoeing around trying to appease him. Annie hummed the tunes from the film to herself and kept picturing what was waiting for her under her mattress. It was like a protective charm around her.
The wireless went off at ten o’clock to conserve the battery, and Annie lit a candle to go up to bed. She slit open the envelope while her parents were still moving around, so that there was no danger of them hearing the noise of ripping paper. Then she tore off her clothes, pulled on her nightie and jumped into bed. Now, at last, the letter could be taken out.
There was Tom’s familiar sloping handwriting in black ink.
Dear Annie
We’ve had a big bit of excitement here in Noresley. A bomber got lost on its way back from raiding Sheffield and dropped a bomb on us. Well, not quite on us. The way folk are talking round here you’d think the village had been flattened, but actually it fell on the playing fields of the Miners’ Welfare. But what a bang! It blew all our windows out, which was pretty frightening. Our Joan was screaming her head off and Mam was yelling ‘Are you all right?’ and Dad was yelling ‘Don’t move!’ and all the lights were off. Mam wanted us all to go and sit under the stairs in case it was a real raid, and Dad said that was potty because who’d want to bomb Noresley? So he and I went off to see if the neighbours were all right, which they were except for old Mrs Jackson on the corner, so we brought her back for a cup of tea. Luckily the gas was still working and by then Mam had swept up some of the glass though it was still all over the place. It sort of crunched under your feet. So we sat round the kitchen table and drank tea and cocoa with extra sugar and brandy in it because that’s good for shock. You should try cocoa with brandy—it’s jolly good. Worth having a shock for. Mrs Jackson got quite tiddly and started singing songs from the last war like ‘It’s a Long Way To Tipperary’, so it all got quite jolly, almost like a party. I hoped I’d be allowed not to go to school the next day as there was such a lot of clearing up to do, but Dad said that would be giving in to Jerry, so off to school I had to go, but it was good because everyone wanted to hear all about our bomb from us Noresley lot. I went to see the crater after school and it was massive! The Welfare was pretty well wrecked, but everyone’s getting together at the weekend to repair it and so that’s two fingers up to Jerry. (Whoops, sorry. That’s rude. But you know what I mean.)
So that’s my big news. Our house is all boarded up now until we can get hold of some glass, so it’s pretty gloomy inside, but at least the electricity’s back on again. Otherwise, it’s same as usual—school, homework, football practice, cycle club, pictures. How about you? Have you seen the new Cary Grant film yet? It’s going to be on in Mansfield next week so a gang of us are going over to see it. Has your dad been all right? I think of you a lot like you were after he did that. It makes me mad just to think about it. What does the sea look like now? Not all bright like it was in summer. Whenever I think of Wittlesham it’s always sunny. It’s quite strange when you say it’s been cold and raining for a fortnight.
Sunday. Bad news, I’m afraid. Mam says the bomb has really shaken her up and she doesn’t want to go far from home, so we’ll not be going on holiday this summer. I’m really sick about it, I can tell you. I tried reasoning with her and saying that if she booked up Silver Sands she’d have something to look forward to but she wasn’t having any. Honestly, parents! I’ll be glad when I’m old enough to join up. I’m sick of being treated like a little kid.
Monday. I’ve thought of a way round the holiday problem. The cycle club are doing a tour round the Peaks at the end of July. I’ve already cleared it with the parents to go on that, so what I’ll do is, I’ll come down to see you instead. I can put my bike on the train and there’s a youth hostel in Wittlesham. So I will get down after all! Don’t you think that’s a clever plan?
I’m going to put this in the post now.
Yours truly,
Your friend,
Tom.
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