I roll into the short stretch of tarmac beside the school, pull on the handbrake and letting the brightness of the day seep into my van, watch the next generation taking shape. Every grubby kneed boy with grey socks crumpled round his ankles is a miner in the making, sporting the same resigned hard bitten look that trawls in and out of the pit yard at the change of shifts. Their barracking and jeering voices resound against the school walls and ricochet around the schoolyard as they posture, dangle and drape; acting out adult themes with undersized feet in oversized shoes. The girls look on in conspiratorial groups, their faces already swathed in burgeoning maturity, subtly dictatorial and inoffensively judgemental; still learning the ways their mothers are so practiced in. They scan the posturing rabble assessing future husbands, decrying their availability with indignant sweeps of dismissive hands over colourful skirts.
“’Ere Joy gives us a kiss.”
“Come ‘ere and I’ll give you a thump.”
“Well show us yer knickers then.”
“Naff off Mickey or I’ll tell me mam.”
Mickey makes a tactical withdrawal into the sniggering arms of his peers and Joy smirks to the conspiring group beside her, suspending her fragile weight on the bars on the steps to the school room door. Enough said; in time Joy will show her knickers while Mickey fumbles with maturity and responsibility and the pithead wheels turn on relentlessly until joy is buried under the needs of a new generation.
But it is not my place to think such dour thoughts. Happiness reigns here in the schoolyard, in grubby knees and unfettered smiles. My own voice once sounded among them; I had my own Joy for a while, though I never made her my wife. This small rambunctious gathering will one day become my customers, if there is a God and he is kind. One day I will carry my suitcase to Joys’ door and mistake her for her mother and I will know that life goes on, and so must I.
Hope For The Tally Man
