Bungalows, beach huts and a boy named Bob

I’m sure the sun shone every day when I was a child on the school summer break, which seemed to last for months and months.   A montage of memories includes tarmac so hot it stuck to the bottoms of my flip-flops, water fights with the kids next door using Fairy Liquid bottles, and a strange plague of ladybirds one year which made news headlines.  I can also bring to mind Sky Ray ice lollies, riding my bike round and round in front of the house in my pink shorts, and holidays at my grandparents’ bungalow in a little seaside town.

Their home was on a small (and oh so modern!) '60s development, perfect for retired people, where all the buildings were identical and had large windows overlooking perfect, neat lawns. Inside, however, the décor was just as in their previous, older, dingier house: green fabric lamp shades with brocade and tassels, antimacassars on the armchairs, dark ugly (and slightly scary) wardrobes.  My older sister and I shared the double bed in the spare room when we stayed at the bungalow.  I loved that bed because it was the highest one I’d ever slept in; it felt like a huge effort to climb onto it to get under the candy striped sheets and custard-coloured candlewick bedspread. When inside it I felt elevated, like the princess in Hans Christian Andersen's The Princess and the Pea.

I loved waking in the mornings too; the sunlight coming in through the spotless windows looked different from that at home, and the noisy calls of the gulls were a daily beckon to the beach - that special seaside sound which is still so vividly evocative now.

My grandparents had a beach hut.  Little more than a shed without windows, it smelt deliciously of seaweed, suntan oil (oil!) and the gas from a Campingaz stove which they took down there to heat water for the tea that the grown-ups drank (while I sucked on a Sky Ray).  Diligent sweeping of the hut's wooden floor could never completely rid it of sand.  An old tea-chest in the corner contained buckets, spades, plastic beakers and a pack of playing cards in case it rained.  It never did.  There was sand in the tea-chest too.

One of the last times I stayed in that seaside town was when I was thirteen - but it wasn’t for a proper holiday.  My granddad had just died so the family went down for the funeral and to stay a few days either side of it.  After a long, difficult illness, his death wasn't unexpected and the mood in the bungalow that week was a strange mix of residual sadness with a simultaneous lightness of heart.  When it came to the the actual funeral, my mum suggested I shouldn’t go, so I went off to the beach alone.  I walked up and down the front seemingly hundreds of times, happy to be by myself - until a teenage boy caught my eye.  I liked his white cap-sleeved T-shirt, the chunky silver chain around his neck and the style of his sunglasses.  It was a look that, in the late Spring of '77, gave promise of someone who might have a harder-edged taste in music. Being particularly plain and nerdy in my adolescence I was extra shy around boys but, somehow, away from home, I found a new confidence and it wasn’t long before embarrassed smiles turned into tentative introductions.

We talked very awkwardly for a while, and then went walking along the front together.  'Bob from Mitcham' and I had nothing in common apart from the fact that we were both kids alone for an afternoon at the beach.  But that was all we needed.  Stilted conversation eventually turned to rather more suggestive (although really quite innocent) banter – it was easier - and then we sneaked round the back of the cluttered beach shop with its funny little model pirate heads hanging on the wall next to a display of blown glass animals (why would anyone buy pirate heads or glass animals at the beach…?)   He took hold of my hand.  Away from public view I was pressed gently but willingly against the wall as he kissed me; he was still wearing his sunglasses.  I didn’t know much about kissing but he clearly did, and I was glad.  Sweetly, given my naivete, he didn’t try to do anything else.  We just kissed.  And kissed.

It wasn’t long, though, before I had to get back to the bungalow for the return of the funeral-goers.  I told Bob from Mitcham that I must leave and I knew we wouldn’t try and see eachother again - and that was fine.  We’d already run out of things to say anyway.  But before we parted he unhooked the silver chain from around his neck.  "This is for you," he said, handing it over.  My heart skipped a beat as I clutched it tightly and then headed back from the beach without even daring to look around.  

Back at the bungalow, a gaggle of relatives and family friends were already getting tipsy on sherry and eating generous portions of Quiche Lorraine.  There was plenty of therapeutic laughter and jollity in the way that usually surfaces once funereal formalities are over.  “Were you okay on your own today, not too bored?” my cousin asked. “Yeah I was fine,” I said as I popped a triangular cheese sandwich into my mouth with one hand, stroking the chunky silver chain around my neck with the other.  I’m sure the sun shone more brightly than usual for the rest of that week.