Part 1

There is a song by the Pet Shop Boys. It starts like this, “When I look back on my life, it’s always with a sense of shame, I’ve always been the one to blame.” I heard it on the radio the other day, and I knew all the lyrics. I was making a coffee at the time, staring out of the window, looking at a world that used to be marvellously different.

It was the same city, bathed in sunshine, and brighter than the one I remembered. The skyline had changed. Now there were swish tower blocks, lots of cranes, and flatness where industry once thrived.

I look at this landscape every day, and each time I feel sadness, and remember something from the eighties.

The three of us were sat on a wall at Duke Street, smoking fags, and passing a can of Kestrel lager back and forth. An old man struggled along the other side of the road, relying on his walking stick. Suddenly, he fell forward, the stick flying into the road and almost getting run over by a passing bus. For a second or two, he was motionless, then made feeble attempts to lift himself off the ground.

We sat and watched with childish amusement. And then, with compassion or guilt, we crossed the road to help him. Andy and Jack grabbed an arm each and lifted him upright while I retrieved his battered old stick. “Up you get, Grandad.”

The old man composed himself and eyed us guardedly.

“Don’t try it on with me lads. I took a bullet in the leg, and I’m ready to shoot some bastard for it.”

“Calm down Grandad,” said Jack, “We’re only trying to help.”

The old man pointed his stick at us. “Aye, that might be son. But I must be on my guard around here.”

“Fancy a swig of lager?” Andy gave him the can and the old man took a mouthful before stuffing it in his coat pocket.

“You lot with the Mooneys?”

“Never heard of them,” I said. “Who the fuck are the Mooneys?”

The old man stared at us and rested both hands on the walking stick. Then he looked up and down the street and seemed satisfied that we weren’t a menace. Slowly he made towards the wall and sat down.

“If you’re not with the Mooneys, then who are you with? You’re not with the Park lads because I’ve never seen you before.”

“We’re the Geisha Boys,” Jack said proudly. “That’s what our mates call us.”

It was true. The lads on the flats had called us ‘Geisha Boys’ because we’d once been in a fight with some posh boy at Crazy Daisy in town. We were sixteen and had slipped past the bouncer and drank as much lager as we could steal off people’s tables. A lad, wearing a dazzling white tee-shirt with ‘Geisha’ across the front, had clocked us and offered us all out. Jack chucked a pint of lager at him, and the lad had responded by smashing a pint glass and threatening us with it. We piled in, throwing wild punches, and kicking him, until he was a bloody mess on the floor. It had happened so quickly that by the time we ran up the stairs and into the street the bouncer hadn’t realised something was amiss. Afterwards, we were famous on Park Hill, known as Geisha Boys, which we liked because we thought it made us sound tough.

The old man shook his head. “Never heard of you. Do you know Sam Garvin?” It was our turn to shake our heads. “He’ll have all three of you if you’re not careful.”

“Nobody fucks with the Geisha boys,” I said. “Tell him we’ll take him on anytime.”

“See that over there?” The old man pointed towards the flats. “That’s the alleyway where Spud Murphy shot me from. Got it in the leg. Sam showed him that nobody messed with the Park Brigade. He cut him with a knife, and he’ll do the same to you.”

There was no alleyway, only the block of shops beneath the flats. Jack caught our attention and circled his finger around his ear, and we knew that the old man was cuckoo.

 “I’ve got a gun in my pocket,” said the old man. But he pulled out the can of Kestrel and had another swig.

And that was how we had left it that summer day in 1982. The old man had limped up Duke Street and disappeared into the New Inn. Only afterwards, did I realise that Andy had lifted his wallet.

Now I am back where it began.

There is a lot of concrete, and I can’t remember this much. It’s been thirty years, and London has been the place I’ve lived the longest.

“I’ve found the most fabulous place for you to live,” said Megan. “Near the city centre, near the station, and the apartments are retro modern.”

I knew straight away, as only a Sheffielder would, that she was talking about Park Hill.

When we lived here, it was on its knees. Not quite. But eventually it would be. The people moved out and it stood empty for years. For better or worse, it’s listed status allowed it to survive.

It was February when she called me at my Kensington flat.

“How are you?” asked Megan.

“Not good, but thanks for asking.”

She hesitated and seemed to choose her words carefully.

“Have you seen him?”

“No, and I don’t want to.”

Megan was referring to Scott, my lover of ten years, now my ex-lover.

Good looking Scott. The best thing that happened to me. Reliable Scott. I was lucky to have him.

But there turned out to be another side to him.

Cheating Scott. The one I discovered had been sleeping around for years, and that was the end of it all.

“I hate to bring this up but writing magazine articles isn’t the way forward. Remember you have a book deal.”

Megan was right. I had to write novels. The first couple flew off the shelves, the third bombed, and Megan, as my agent, had been the one to pick up the pieces with the publisher.

“You need to score with the next one. Write about your time growing up, your family, the people you met, your adventures. But for Christ’s sake, make it good.”

And that is the reason why I came back, and it’s all very different, but the past remembers me.

Last night the ghosts crawled out of the walls and interrupted my sleep. Embedded into Park Hill are the memories of my parents, hard-working servants of the city, sent into early submission. And my younger brother, Adam, who’s still around, but living somewhere in Scotland.

And my best mates – Andy and Jack – came too.

Everybody came last night, exactly as they used to be, and it was only me who had changed. And when I woke, I realised I’d changed a lot.