Chapter Sixteen: VE Day, 1945
When they entered the NAAFI, Arty had to choke back his tears. The place was packed to full capacity and all of them turned and applauded, raising their glasses in his direction. He was completely astounded by the reception, not to mention perplexed. After all, what was he but a wounded ground technician? Thankfully they quickly resumed their drinking and chatting, a few chancing a brief hello and promising to come back after. After what? That’s what Arty wanted to know, but whenever he looked at Jim and Jean, they weren’t looking at him.
This continued for a further half an hour, at which point Captain Taylor banged on a table to get everyone’s attention and the room instantly fell silent. “Thank you, all,” he said. “I’m not going keep you from the festivities for long, however, I’d like to formally welcome back Sergeant Robert Thomas Clarke, Minton’s longest serving airman.”
The room buzzed briefly with mutterings of welcome back. The captain looked directly at Arty.
“Sergeant Clarke. Were it not for your quick thinking and evasive action, we would have lost many more lives, not just on the day of your tragic accident, but throughout your time here at Minton. Your conduct is, without exception, exemplary, and this year, on Monday, the twenty-sixth of March, you demonstrated gallantry, risking your own life to save another. The young airman in question, along with the five others you were training that day, successfully joined their crews and flew in several missions, contributing to the victory of the Allies. They sent this message to wish you well.”
Captain Taylor withdrew a letter from his breast pocket and shook it open. He cleared his throat and adopted an overly formal stance as he began to read aloud.
Sarge. Sorry we can’t be with you today. We were hoping to come down to Minton and take the Wellington out for a spin…
The captain paused while everyone laughed and groaned at the joke, which was in appallingly bad taste but funny nonetheless. Arty chuckled away, holding onto his belly, just in case.
…Unfortunately our group captain is even more of an old fart than Taylor.
The room erupted. Taylor took it on the chin and, once they’d settled down again, read through the final part of the letter.
Joking aside, we’re glad you’re all right, Sarge. We just wanted to thank you for everything you did for us. Our eyes have seen the glory and we lived to tell the tale— It’s all thanks to you, Sarge. Have a spectacular day and get well soon.
The applause exploded, and Arty put his hands over his face, wailing like a baby. He felt the warm comforting pressure of Jim’s palm on his shoulder, and he laughed through his tears.
“Come on, darlin’,” Jim murmured, “the captain ain’t done yet.”
Arty gave his eyes a quick wipe and moved his hands away. Captain Taylor advanced and drew to attention in front of him.
“Sergeant Clarke, it is my privilege today to award you this medal, for your distinguished service to His Majesty’s Royal Air Force.”
The captain leaned down and pinned the medal to the flap of Arty’s shirt pocket and then stepped back and saluted. Arty returned the salute as best he could in his chair, and once again the NAAFI filled with the sound of clapping and cheering. People came over to shake Arty’s hand or hug him, offering their congratulations and moving to make way for others. All the while Arty was aware of Jim’s concerned, watchful gaze, but there was nothing to worry about, for whilst Arty was touched by the reception and delighted with his Distinguished Service Medal, he thought the whole affair was a little over the top when he’d only been doing his job.
When things settled down a little, Charlie came over with a couple of pints and handed one to Arty.
“How are you doing, Art?”
“All right, I think,” he said, still a tad overwhelmed by the attention. He took a large mouthful of beer, swallowed and moaned in pleasure. “I needed this.” He drank some more and nodded his thanks at Charlie. “How are you?” he asked.
“Getting along,” Charlie replied curtly. Jim and Jean were standing together just a few feet away but out of earshot. Charlie nodded at Jim. “Nice of him to go and fetch you today.” The remark was cutting, but before either of them had a chance to say more, the rest of their friends came over to join them.
Arty put tackling Charlie on the back burner and focused his efforts on being jolly. He was, in fact, in good spirits, but the other men were uneasy around him, not knowing what to say or where to look. To them, Arty Clarke, ace technician and dancer, was no more, but Arty wasn’t giving up that easily. He was under no illusion about his condition. He’d nearly died; he’d have to relearn to walk, and he’d likely never dance again. But he was still alive, the war was over, and he had a life ahead of him with the man he loved. Paralysed or not, Arty refused to follow in the fated tyre marks of Sir Clifford Chatterley, remaining ‘strange and bright and cheerful’ whilst Jim romped in the woods with the gardener. No, that would not be Arty’s future.
Arty and Charlie’s friends hung around for a while, becoming more at ease the more beer they consumed. Arty didn’t much fancy his chances with Matron if he were to return to the hospital drunk, so he gracefully declined the offer of another drink. The men wished him well, and went back to propping up the bar, leaving Arty at the mercy of the WAAFs, who came over in pairs and threes, admired his medal, giggled at his jokes and moved on. All the while Charlie sat there looking miserable, and it was a good hour before they were on their own again.
“What’s up?” Arty asked.
“Not a lot,” Charlie replied, frowning into his beer.
“Hm,” Arty sounded doubtfully. “I think I might know what it is. We need to talk, Charlie.”
“About?”
“Jim and Jean.”
Charlie shrugged. “Not much to say, is there?”
“Actually, there is. Look, can we go outside?” Arty set his pint on the table in anticipation. Charlie followed suit and pushed Arty’s chair towards the door. As they passed Jim, Arty gave him a nod to confirm all was well.
“Will here do?” Charlie asked, stopping a few feet from the door.
“Bit further away, if you wouldn’t mind.”
Charlie obliged and steered Arty to the end of the building, put the brakes on and stepped around in front of the chair. He sparked up a cigarette and leaned against the wall, facing Arty without looking at him.
Arty clasped his hands in his lap, squeezing them tightly together as he tried the rally the words into a sensible order, for whilst he’d been thinking about telling Charlie for some time, he hadn’t really considered the nitty-gritty of what to say, and he was stumped. The prospect of losing his oldest friend, particularly over something that had no bearing on their friendship, was once again making a coward of him, but there was no getting out of it. It had to be done, for all their sakes.
“There’s no easy way to tell you this,” Arty began. He waited for confirmation that Charlie was listening. It came in the form of a fleeting glance. Arty continued, “First off, Jim and Jean are not engaged to each other.”
“They’ve broken it off?”
“No. They were never engaged to start with, nor even together.”
“Funny, that, seeing as they sent each other love letters every week for God knows how many months.”
“Yes, well the thing is, Charlie, those letters—”
“I have it on good authority,” Charlie interrupted.
“You mean Betty from Jean’s office?”
Charlie’s cheeks reddened, and it made Arty laugh, easing a little of the tension, which was as well; his legs were aching, and he could feel the blood pulsing in his groin.
“Betty wasn’t lying to you about the letters,” Arty confirmed, “but…she may have been slightly misled.”
“The letters were forgeries?”
“Oh, no. The letters were real, but Jean was corresponding with Jim on someone else’s behalf.”
“Whose?”
“Mine.”
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Charlie’s eyes widened, and he swallowed so hard Arty heard the gulp. Charlie took another draw on his cigarette and held the smoke in for a good half a minute. His face started to turn purple and he let the breath go. “You—” he said, the realisation cutting his words dead. He dropped the cigarette and shoved his hands in his pockets.
“I’m sorry I deceived you, Charlie. I think the world of you, and I don’t want to lose your friendship, but I’d rather that than get in the way of your happiness.”
Charlie nodded mutely, still staring past Arty. If he’d been on his feet, Arty could have forced him to look him in the eye, made him promise not to do anything drastic until he’d had time to digest the news. As it was all he could do was watch his friend and hope for the best.
A few minutes passed in this stalemate, and then Charlie moved past Arty, turned the wheelchair around and pushed it back towards the NAAFI. “I appreciate you telling me the truth,” he muttered.
“I owed it to you,” Arty said.
They returned to their table, where Charlie wordlessly passed Arty his pint and turned away. He was angry, Arty could see that, and it was understandable. Arty would have felt just the same if he’d discovered Charlie had been intentionally deceitful.
“Want another?” Charlie asked, waving his now empty glass at Arty. His own glass was still half full, and he shook his head.
“I’m all right, thanks.”
Charlie strode away to the bar. Arty pinched the corners of his eyes and stifled a yawn: the day was not yet half over and he was already exhausted. He opened his eyes again and blinked a few times to clear them, catching sight of Jim in his peripheral vision. Jim gave him a questioning thumbs up, and Arty returned it. Charlie had taken the news better than he’d anticipated; only time would tell if they were still friends, but it looked promising, as Charlie now returned with his full pint and sat down again.
“So Jean’s single, I take it?” he asked.
Arty smiled to himself; everything was going to be all right between them, in time. “Yes, she is,” he confirmed. “I can also tell you she likes you and she knows how you feel, but she’s an independent woman.”
“Yeah,” Charlie agreed with a frown. He smoothed the glass with his hand. “That was the part I couldn’t work out—why she’d gone with Johnson after telling everyone she wasn’t interested in love and marriage.” He laughed quietly and shook his head. “It makes perfect bloody sense now. Or not sense, because…” He finally looked Arty in the eye. “It’s a sickness, isn’t it?”
Arty shrugged. “So they say. Though if it is, I’ve had it all my life.”
“You can get treated for it, I’ve heard.”
“Yes, but it’s not like measles, or a broken leg, is it? It’s more like…I don’t know. Being born with brown hair instead of blonde.”
“You’re telling me you were born that way?”
“Well, I certainly didn’t choose it, but I’m not sorry, not any more. I don’t want to be cured. And in any case, the treatment is nothing more than a hair tint, if you know what I mean. It only conceals what’s underneath.”
Charlie’s face gave away the hard thinking going on in the background. “Forgive me, but it’s all new to me, this,” he said and returned to silently pondering while he drank his third pint, at the end of which he wandered off to buy another. He returned with one for each of them, although Arty was not yet done with his first.
“How did you know?” Charlie asked. “That you were a…” He tilted his head to imply ‘one of them’.
“Well, I—”
“What I mean is I’m not going to wake up one day and realise I’m one too?” Charlie asked.
Arty chuckled. “Somehow I doubt it. How d’you feel when you see a beautiful woman?”
“You know…” Charlie tutted at himself. “No, you don’t, do you? I, er…how to explain? I might notice her shapely figure, or her pretty eyes, the curve of her lips, or maybe the way she moves, or speaks—all of those, really.”
“Right,” Arty said. “And the same’s true for me.”
“But not with beautiful women.”
“Precisely.”
Charlie returned to thinking and supping until another pint was finished and immediately went in search of a refill. This time his trajectory was prone to veering off course, but he made it to the bar and stayed there a while, chatting to other airmen. Jim came over to Arty and sat in Charlie’s seat.
“How you holding up?”
“Fine. Charlie’s getting hammered.”
“You told him?”
Arty nodded. “He’s taken it well, actually, other than getting hammered, of course.”
“He’s not alone in that today.” Jim glanced over to where Charlie and his friends were laughing loudly and eyeing up the WAAFs. Charlie looked over to where Jim and Arty were sitting and met Jim’s gaze head-on with a glare. Jim turned back to Arty and raised an eyebrow.
“I can see this coming to blows,” he said.
“Don’t involve yourself,” Arty warned.
“I’m gonna do my best not to, but if he starts something…”
“Jimbo!” Charlie shouted.
“Great,” Jim muttered to Arty and then turned in Charlie’s direction.
“Want a drink?” Charlie called.
“Sure, thanks,” Jim accepted. “Jimbo. Jeez. Guess it could’ve been a whole lot worse.”
Arty laughed and shifted uncomfortably. “Sorry, but I need to relieve myself.”
“No problem, darlin’.” Jim wheeled Arty out to the toilet block and stopped the wheelchair next to a cubicle. Arty held onto Jim as he walked him into the cubicle, unfastened Arty’s pants and lowered him onto the toilet. Once he was satisfied Arty was securely seated, Jim stepped outside and pulled the door to. A couple of other men came in and used the urinals; Arty was having to concentrate hard to pass water, but he eventually managed it and called Jim back in so they could repeat the procedure in reverse.
When they returned to the NAAFI, Charlie was once again sitting at the table with a three-quarters-full pint glass, two full pints next to it.
“Yours, gents,” he said, his voice noticeably slurred.
Jim picked up one of the glasses and tapped it against Charlie’s. “Thanks, bud.”
Charlie watched with the intensity of a would-be poisoner as Jim tipped the glass to his lips. Jim swallowed down his beer and smiled warmly at Charlie. “Think I’ll leave y’all to talk awhile,” he said, excusing himself to give Arty and Charlie space to speak further.
When Jim was far enough away, Charlie grumbled, “I still don’t like him.”
Arty nodded. “Fair enough.”
“Sorry.”
“It’s fine.”
“It’s not. He’s your…whatever he is, and I’m your best friend.”
“If you don’t like him, you don’t like him.”
Charlie frowned heavily. “No. It won’t do at all,” he said.
Arty was too tired to get into more deep and meaningful conversation. Indeed, much as it pained him to say so, he was looking forward to returning to the peace and quiet of his hospital bed. As it turned out, Charlie was too far gone to pursue the matter, and so Arty did the rounds to say goodbye and Jim drove him back to the hospital. Matron was off-duty, so the nurse helped Jim get Arty back into bed, gave him a dose of pain relief and it was ‘lights out’.
The next day, when Jim came to visit, Arty was still a little the worse for wear, but not so much that he missed the black eye Jim was sporting.
“Don’t ask,” Jim said, holding up his hands.
“Did you hit him back?”
Jim laughed, wincing at the same time. “You should’ve seen Socks and Soot this morning…”
Arty shook his head in dismay.
* * * * *