In Cassidy's Care: 4: Last Wednesday

 4. Last Wednesday

“What a mess. What have you two been eating? Here, let me clean you up.”
Cassidy looked at Amelia and recognized goodness personified. She was kind, caring and, yes, needy. She’d simply made the decision that she didn’t need Cassidy. Fair enough. Her choice.
Her loss. He watched from a dutiful distance as she dabbed away with a damp cloth and whispered kindness into her boys.
“Who are you to be so strong?
That you can leave it all behind
Laughing in your sleep
And trusting in the kindness of the world”
Joe Henry. He loved Joe Henry.
“You best be going Peter. Last tube. Bill will be home soon from his squash night.”
Bill had haunted Cassidy’s life for over a year now and he was yet to set eyes on him. He only knew that he existed for sure because the boys put flesh on his bones: “Uncle Bill this. Uncle Bill that.” Not that they’d been given the opportunity to meet; this was the first time he’d ever got past the front door and into Bill’s lair. It was raining so hard that Amelia had dragged the three of them in off the doorstep, sopping wet, and made them all cup of ‘Oxo’.

As a mid-week treat Cassidy had taken the boys to see their first Premiership football match; a wealthy parent had offered free tickets for an evening match at Stamford Bridge; a ‘hot ticket’ too; the London derby; Chelsea and Arsenal. Perfect, as while Thomas was lukewarm Chelsea, Archie was red hot for Arsenal. Cassidy frankly didn’t give a shit either way but knew that Archie would be ‘well chuffed’, a saying that he confessed to picking up from his Uncle Bill. The promise of seats in the Director’s Box never materialized. Cassidy had hoped for air-conditioned warmth, some of those fabled prawn sandwiches and perhaps a glass of chilled Chablis. What he got instead were two hours of ‘April Showers’, a gristly pie and a polystyrene cupful of ‘Oxo’. Beef stock, for Christ’s sake. What was all that about? They sat sodden, huddled close, surrounded by Neanderthals who looked like they should’ve been ringing the bells of Notre Dame. What was all that inane chanting about? Tuneless dirges, much macho pointing and gesticulating at opposing fans, strange hand signals that mystified both he and the boys.

“Ah, the sweet smell of the testosterone”, sighed Cassidy.

The man directly in front of them turned around and glared. Christ, a fucking Troll, thought Cassidy.

“What did you say?” demanded Troll menacingly.

“I, ah, I said that we’re not having much luck in goal. We’re lacking in the, erm, goal department…” Cassidy smiled weakly and scrutinised the ads in his match programme.

Troll scowled at Archie’s Arsenal shirt and grunted “Facking Gooners”. The crowd roared, Troll muttered “twat’ and turned back towards the pitch, refocusing his bile on a skinny bald guy in black, frantically waving a flag. Waving? Most probably drowning; April frickin’ showers.

“Offsidemyarseyouwankingarsewipe”

‘Wanking arsewipe?’ Cassidy saw that one register with Archie; knew it was destined to become another breakfast time question.

The game was frenzied with much slipping and sliding. Even a bewildered and disinterested Cassidy recognized that it was a wash out, a damp squib; two teams desperate not to lose, two defenses so brutishly efficient that any offensive creativity was thuggishly stamped out. Literally. And there was too much posturing and petulance for Cassidy’s taste. Chelsea’s number 9 was particularly annoying. He arched his back theatrically whenever a yellow shirt got within spitting distance, rolling around in agony until he realized that no one was watching him. Then he was back onto his feet, straightening his hair band, and waving his arms about. And then it seemed like he was asking the referee for something to eat. When nothing was offered he threw his head back in pantomime laughter and waved his albatross arms again.

“If that big African flaps any harder he’ll take off”, said Cassidy to his cold pie. “Role models my ass.”

Troll turned and glowered again; Cassidy buried his nose deep into his cold cup of Oxo. Troll had taken his shirt off, revealing an artless tattoo that spanned his shivering shoulders. ‘Blue is the Colour’. Bloody right if it gets any colder thought Cassidy.

Number Nine swan dived spectacularly in front of goal and was dutifully admonished by the referee with more theatrical semaphore.

“Stickonpenalty. Wotyoravingafackinglarfrefyatossertwat”

‘Tossertwat’? Cassidy thought of his father’s boating buddies who fished off the Eastern Arm of Cape Cod; how they loved their weekend clambakes on the beaches of the South Shore; how they cursed with humour and eloquence as they pitched their Sunday horseshoes, while clams and mussels and lobsters cooked in a pit over heated stones. Those boys could curse; the perfect words pitched perfectly, just the right side of an inviolable line. There’d be no offence taken as non was intended, for their sacrosanct oaths were laced with kindness and affection. There was no warmth from these cruel fuckers, no blue collared beauty, no ‘sing-song’, no irony; just ugliness and discord as they strung expletives together without syntax or meaning. Witless… twats.

He’d had enough. Cassidy grabbed the boys roughly by their collars and pushed them towards an exit.
“There’s twenty minutes left Dad”
“You’ve got school tomorrow Archie”
“But we might miss a goal Dad”
“Move it kiddo”
As they made their way along the Kings Road towards the tube station the stadium erupted.
“Goal” Archie scowled, kicked at a can and drifted ahead of his father.
“Go and walk with your brother Daniel.” Misery loves company thought Cassidy eyeing Archie’s pigeon toed gait. Both he and Amelia had worried that he might need ‘special’ shoes. They had seen a podiatrist who assured them that they had nothing to worry about, then tried to sell them two hundred pounds worth of prosthetic insteps. Nothing to worry about? Cassidy couldn’t remember when he’d last had nothing to worry about. The specialist was right in Archie’s case. He’d developed into a much-prized ‘leftie’, a southpaw so ahead of the pack in his ‘Sunday Soccer’ class that Coach Johnny had to hobble him. “Right foot only for you Archie” he’d shout from the sidelines, then joke with Cassidy about Daniel’s two left feet. “Shame that he’s a ‘righty’.”

As they approached Fulham Road tube station they passed a Greek kebab house and Cassidy offered an olive branch. The boys always talked in hushed tones about their classmates’ revered post match ritual of Donner Kebabs and Red Bull. They’d pass on the Red Bull but, why not a kebab? What Amelia didn’t see wouldn’t harm them.

Cassidy winced as the boys swamped slices of pressed lamb with sweet chilli sauce, more greasy gristle. At least there was salad involved with this particular culinary delight.

“Just don’t tell your mum.”

And now here he was, in Bayswater Bill’s kitchen, all high design and fine line. No sign yet of Amelia’s homely hand he noted with silent satisfaction.

“What have you been feeding them Peter?”

Daniel stood pristine but the evidence was everywhere on Archie, his face plastered with red sauce, dried tomato emblazoning his chest. Christ there was even a salad leaf stuck to the back of his neck. The boys glanced towards him, then back at their mother before bowing their heads. Amelia puckered her brow and closed one eye, as if sighting Cassidy down the barrel of a gun.

“Right, I’m off. Don’t want to miss that last tube.”

He missed the last tube but that was no biggie, it had stopped raining and the evening was now calm and balmy. As he strolled towards the nearest bus stop Cassidy thought about the ugliness at the football match. He really had to put a check on his… utterances. They were going to land him in trouble. But then some things needed to be articulated. Maybe he had a ‘special need’ but surely there were other folk who felt the same way, acted the same way. There was a term for the perennial weepers of the world: ‘for crying out loud’, so why not one for overactive thinkers. ‘For thinking out loud’ didn’t sound quite right but…. it wasn’t as if he had Tourettes for Christ’s sake, it was just that sometimes he needed to hear his thoughts, needed to give them substance. The same reasoning caused him to catch his reflection; in shop windows; strangers’ spectacles; the back of spoons; in the windows of this red double decker as it pulled up in front of him. No vanity, just the need to check that he was still there.

Cassidy sat on the top deck in a front seat from where he could monitor his journey home. The bus was empty except for a couple to his left in the adjacent front seat, nursing a baby. Cassidy watched them in the reflection of the bus window; she a pretty sparrow, hand in next-door’s pocket, a stranger looking bird. They wore matching black quilted anoraks, she clutched the little bundle to her breast, his hood was up, arms folded tightly across his chest. He wore thick-rimmed spectacles that magnified his eyes. He blinked erratically and seemed agitated; kept tapping at his mouth with his fingers. The girl took his arm. “I love you with all my heart sweetheart, love you like my baby.” She nuzzled the infant’s brow. “You’re my first and second accidents you are” she chuckled, “I’m still waiting for the third. Good things come in threes”, she added absently, leaning her head against the man’s shoulder. He chewed his cheek and whispered something about Alaska. Cassidy narrowed his eyes and leant towards their reflection.

“I need the coast, the taste of the ocean”, the man continued. “In Alaska you can sit and count your emotions, get to understand your emotional… geometry. It’s wild and cruel, but a wonderful place…” he looked towards Cassidy and lowered his voice “Of course you need to be prepared; need to take care. You can never really trust nature, but it’ll never let you down.” The man put a clenched fist into his open mouth and ground his shaking knuckles into his teeth, a peculiar tic. Cassidy could see that, although he spoke like a sage, he was really no more than a boy, nineteen or twenty. The girl seemed older, maybe in her late twenties. She pulled his twitching hand towards her chest to calm his agitation; placing it tenderly on the back of the baby’s hooded head. She cooed and gently rocked, holding them both close, smelling their skin. She smiled towards Cassidy’s frozen reflection and he noticed that she had a hair lip.

“Investment is for fools”, continued the boy “and praying is for martyrs. And money… money is for spending. I say leave nothing behind.” The boy’s speech seemed archaic, tautly rehearsed, reminding Cassidy of an old time preacher. He sat upright abruptly, pushed the hood back off his head and ruffled his thick greasy hair with both hands. “You’ve got to live your dreams or you watch them die. You bend or you break with that simple truth.” He leant towards the baby, whispering now. “You know I didn’t want this. It was a shock to me, seeing how careful we were with contraception and all but…” he put his fist to his mouth again, and, again, the girl soothed him.

“I‘m glad that we didn’t… get rid… that salt and water method your mother swore by.” His trembling voice was almost inaudible now. “I watch her when she sleeps. I do. I breathe for her, listen to her little heart beat.” Cassidy could feel his own heart beating as he watched this strange little unit fussing over their child. Was it time for changing? Was it time to feed? This little bundle was probably all that they could ever hope for; maybe all they’d ever need. They fell into seeming sleep and there was silence, an almost biblical quality to the scene, until the boy broke the spell with another one of those odd convulsions.

“This is us sweetheart”, the girl sang out moments later, and they rose to leave. She stooped to pick up her bag, leaning so close to Cassidy that he could smell talcum powder.

He looked into her cradling arms.

Nylon hair, perfect plastic toes.

The couple shuffled past him apologetically.

Cassidy could barely breathe.

Everyman?

I might get some flack for this but...
On the eve of the Presidential debates...
It's not now about policies, or promises.
It's come down to personality; to credibility.
Bizarre given the two remaining options.
Clinton or Trump?
Whose face would you want on your dollar?
That's America's decision and America's dilemma... and the world holds its breath.
It’s unsettling that Hillary’s history of ‘glass house’ dishonesty gives folk a reason not to want to vote for her. As does her gender. It’s a sad truth that many Americans just don’t want to be told what to do by a woman.
Trump is a man’s man. Yup; Donald tells it like it is. In 'Plainspeak'. He tells us that he speaks for America’s ‘Everyman’, articulating their everyday fears and frustrations. It would seem from Donald’s words that those blue-collar concerns are steeped in bile. Trump sees himself as a heroic savior for a threatened nation, when in fact he abides in a bubble that protects him not only from domestic discomfort and from the realities of the world that he hopes to rule, but also somehow abdicates him from taking any responsibility for past actions or the very words that he speaks. He doesn’t even pay the taxes that his government might well soon be collecting.
He sets himself apart; perhaps he sees himself as a knight in shining armour as he parades his hazardous propaganda as higher truth; dysfunctionally disassociating himself from reason and responsibility.  He's more like a self appointed super hero. Trumpman's superpower is that his suit of lies renders him impervious to the sword of truth. His strengths do not feature 'apology' or 'forgiveness'. I'm unsure what his kryptonite will turn out to be but I fear that it will be a heavy fall for Donald. He's sure to take a few of us down with him. Meanwhile, his candidacy has become bewilderingly indestructible. Perhaps, for those who see his contempt for others as a strength, it's his forthright energy that appeals. He is relentless. His dumbed down 'philosophies' have been distilled into a potent and toxic hooch; an elixir that's sating the insecure and putting fire into a previously dormant underbelly. Donald's not the champion of the working man; he’s become the self-aggrandizing champion of the frustrated flat track bully, the sorry sexist, the raging racist; the champion of the closet chump, the inarticulate underachiever whose incoherent frustrations are finally being given shape, credence and a platform by Trump’s bullying, vile and vulgar rhetoric. Unstable, dishonest, self absorbed and as dangerous as a loaded gun in playground; Trump doesn’t speak for anyone but himself…

One of America’s genuine ‘voices’ has taken some flack from ‘his own’ for recently observing Trump’s world-view as ‘idiotic’. He’s not a leader of men, but he is an unwilling spokesman for the ‘little man’. There’s more genuine compassion in one of his songs than in the whole back draft of Trump’s ghost written speeches.
Whose face would you prefer on your dollar?
Come on America. 

If you'll consider Trump you'll consider anyone.
Me? I'm hoping for Hillary to surprise us all but...
Why not Bruce for President?
The choice is actually yours…

It's time for you to find some reason to believe.

In Cassidy's Care: 3: Last Tuesday

3. Last Tuesday

The next morning Cassidy prepared breakfast for his boys. He also needed to prepare them for bad news; their beloved ‘Grumps’ had passed away the night before. He looked at the box of cereal in his hands. ‘Cheerios’. Who says Americans don’t do irony, he thought.

“What’s ‘irony’ Dad?”

Cassidy rubbed his forehead. Breakfast was always ‘Question Time with Archie’.

“It’s like insincere wit, sarcasm. The Brits are experts at irony Archie. I can’t even spell it.”

Daniel looked up, tilted his head, said ‘I. R. O. N. Y.’ and returned his attention to the back of the cereal box.

“Dad?”

“Yes Archie?”

“What’s a ‘cactuscunt’?”

Cassidy choked on his Cheerios.

“Where did you hear those words Archie?”

“Isn’t cactuscunt one word?”

“Archie!”

Bloody Bill I’ll bet, thought Cassidy. He knew that the term was applied to dry old spinsters, but wondered if it had been a fresh insult leveled at him.

“It wasn’t Uncle Bill Daddy” Daniel protested, “and he’s not bloody…” Both boys looked at each other and bowed their heads.

Cassidy steadied himself.

“Where, Archie?” he said in as even a tone as he could muster.  “Where and in what context?”

“What’s ‘context’?”

Cassidy lost momentum, wasn’t sure that he wanted to pursue this.

“It means ‘situation’ or ‘circumstance’ Archie. Like this moment in the kitchen”

Maybe best not give the words too much attention.

“You, me and Daniel sitting here eating breakfast, that is the context to our conversation.”

Archie wrinkled his nose, puzzled.

“Now, finish your cereal kiddo. Less talk, more walk.”

A seamless deflection, thought Cassidy. Best to let that one slide, although he doubted that he’d heard that particular term for the last time. Daniel and Archie were persistent and pretty worldly; they too had developed edges, the influence of Amelia, the benefits of a ‘broken home’.

And what a shitty term that is.

“Dad, you cursed.” Cassidy winced; he was making a habit of thinking out loud. Daniel side eyed him disapprovingly; since Amelia’s departure his first son had become Cassidy’s conscience and moral mediator keeping both he and Archie in check and on track. Archie chuckled into the canary yellow sleeve of his Arsenal shirt. Cassidy noticed that Archie always wore the team’s away strip when staying at his apartment; now that was fucking irony. He’d be wearing it the next night when Arsenal visited Stamford Bridge to play Chelsea. The boys didn’t know it yet, but Cassidy had wangled tickets. That might soften the blow.

“Listen you two. You know that your Grandpa has been poorly? Well last night, in his sleep, peacefully, no pain, with Granny Annie by his side he….”

“Grumpa Harry’s dead?” chirped Archie.

“He passed away”

“So he’s dead?”

“Correct Archie.”

“Will he go to heaven?”

“Absolutely. He was a good man. Good men go to heaven.”

“Dad?”

“Yes Archie?”

"Did Grumpa curse?"

"He taught me everything I know Archie"

"And cursers can get into heaven?"

"As long as they know that they shouldn't curse and say sorry in their heads after they've done it" parried Cassidy. “Sometimes it’s ok to curse. It all depends on the… context.”

"Dad?"

"Yes Archie?"
“Can we have pancakes for breakfast?”

In Cassidy's Care: 2: Last Monday

2. Last Monday

It had been a tense and testing week for Cassidy. 3 a.m. early last Monday, his neighbour’s latest lover (in a long line of latest lovers) had threatened him with a butter knife. Cassidy had been awoken by Monty’s screams.

“You fucker. You’ve fucking killed me Claude, you fuck”

Armed with a single leather slipper (left foot) and an early morning erection, Cassidy charged upstairs into the darkness with only his dressing gown for cover. As he reached the communal landing, a hooded figure blundered past before turning on him.

“Want some? Want some?” lisped the livid stranger, apparently Claude.

Cassidy hit the light switch and his bleary eyed bravado evaporated. It might have been but a butter knife but Cassidy definitely did not want some.

“Come on big boy, you gonna frisk me or fuck me?” drawled Claude, eyeing Cassidy’s now gaping gown. His eggy eyes popped and then narrowed; there was a smell of whiskey and stale sex. Cassidy pulled himself and his gown together. He felt naked and vulnerable without his glasses.

“Just go”, he said in a voice that was an octave higher than it should have been, and stood impotent, squinting as Claude’s sorry hooded ass stumbled down the stairs. Cassidy tied a double knot in the belt of his dressing gown and tentatively pushed open the door of Monty’s apartment. Monty sat bolt upright on a sofa, clutching at his right side.

“The fucker’s killed me”, he wailed.

There was an odd gurgling sound. Cassidy thought of his boys with plastic straws, clearing their coke bottles of that last holy half-inch.

Lungs.

Not good.

“Hold it together Monty, I’ll call an ambulance.”

“I am holding it together. Literally. Look”

Monty raised a bloody hand from his satin pajama jacket. Even without his glasses Cassidy could see an ugly gash leering up at him, pink and frothy.

“Did you meet Claude? Isn’t he a charmer? From New York… one of yours Peter... I mix him a Manhattan and the fucker stabs me”

“He did that with a butter knife?”

“Uumphh” Monty started to roll onto his side.

“Stay with me Monty” Cassidy’s mind raced. He searched out the bathroom and returned with a towel, rolling it up into a ball.

“I want you to press this against the wound, Monty. Pressure’s the thing here.” 

Thank Christ for compulsory first aid classes he thought and reached for the phone.

911.

Nothing.

“Is your phone working Monty? I’m getting nothing from 911?”

“That’s because you’re living in London you prick” guffawed Monty before dissolving once more into that ghastly gurgling.

Cassidy reddened. He always knew he’d be found wanting in an emergency. Amelia had always maintained that it was a blessing he’d led an uneventful life.

“You’ll be crap come the revolution”, she had said just before testing her theory.

I love you, goodbye…

Bitch.

Cassidy; crying out loud again...

“Up yours” muttered Monty.

Later that morning Cassidy sat at his desk in the lower school lab, eating a stolen doughnut. Second graders were easy pickings. He liked the kids, liked the school. He was ‘Head of Department’ now, admittedly a department of one, but the title was worth an extra eleven hundred a year, even though it did come with a few extra curricular responsibilities. He also got to teach Daniel and Archie daily, so that was good.

“Teaching’s good” he said to his reflection in the monitor screen and heard his father’s voice. He pictured him on the porch of the family’s beach house in Cape Cod, poking at his plants with a rusty trowel.

“That’s good. Teaching’s good”, Harry had said when Cassidy showed him his college application forms.

“One more teacher means one less delinquent.”

His father could be an acerbic old ass but Cassidy recognized his approval.

As he prepared his first class of the day his mind fixed on the early morning’s events. An ambulance had arrived 17 minutes after he’d finally hit 999 and with Monty en route to hospital (and after changing into a more supportive jogging suit) he’d started making his statement to the police; a statement that he finally signed at the local station in Maida Vale four hours later.

It transpired that Monty had met Claude the week before “somewhere in Old Compton darling” and after a couple of dates had invited him home “for nookie and a nightcap”. Monty had caught him rifling through his drawers.

“He only got the Rolex, my worthless inheritance, all that my father left me. Tight arse.” Cassidy had walked beside Monty as the medics stretchered him down the stairs, towards the ambulance. “Lovely crocodile strap but never kept time.” He grasped Cassidy’s hand tightly. “Over wound, beautiful and useless. A bit like Claude really” he guffawed and then grimaced. “Sorry Peter, you Americans don’t do irony, do you?”

As Monty disappeared headfirst into the ambulance his bluing feet hung pitifully over the edge of the stretcher and Cassidy hung his own slippers over the clawed toes of his injured friend.

“Thanks old boy.” Monty’s voice echoed dolefully from the darkness within, “You’re a good egg. My extremities were beginning to feel rather chilly.”

He’d wondered if he’d ever see Monty, or his slippers again.

Finishing his doughnut, Cassidy brushed sugar from his tie and eyed his emails, noticing one from his oldest brother Tom. “Urgent. Ring home. Dad not good.”

“Dad’s had an episode; a stroke they think. He’s gone into a coma”, explained Tom two hours later when Cape Cod finally awoke. “They don’t think he’s going to make it.”

“Jeez. How’s Mom?”

“Annie’s OK; sitting by his bed, shouting at him to wake up and stop milking it. Keeps asking him what he wants for supper.”

In Cassidy’s Care: 1. This Sunday

 “I show you doubt, to prove that faith exists”

Robert Browning

“I hope you live a life you’re proud of.

If you find that you are not,

I hope you have the strength to start all over again”

F. Scott Fitzgerald

“We shall not cease from exploration


And the end of all our exploring


Will be to arrive where we started


And know the place for the first time”

Taken from ‘Little Gidding’ by T. S. Elliot

“Where some have found their paradise

Others just come to harm”

Taken from ‘Amelia’ by Joni Mitchell

1. This Sunday

Cassidy’s eyes stung.

His throat ached.

He could barely swallow.

Something had happened.

A memory briefly recognized and then moved beyond.

Behind him, and yet…

He stood like dawn, on the edge of something.

Reaching.

Searching for a word.

He pursed his lips.

Nothing.

“Will Mayfair Mac still go to heaven Dad?”

Thankfully Archie was sitting on Cassidy's shoulders and was unable to see the single tear snaking down his father’s gaunt grimacing grin. Daniel, his eldest, caught his eye and tugged his hand. Cassidy tugged back and then, with Archie still on his shoulders, sat down on the park bench. This was now a part of their Sunday morning routine; Archie on Cassidy’s shoulders, skinny legs dangling like knotted rope. Cassidy sitting.

Daniel ripping Velcro, pulling off his brother’s trainers, reaching into the Arsenal rucksack for his cleats, his football boots; carefully sliding them onto Archie’s restless feet; pulling them on with the leather tongue; pulling tight before looping long laces under the sole and back; pulling tight again; making two loops, bunny ears, painstakingly concentrating on tying the perfect double knot. Cassidy loved the way that Daniel cared for his little brother, admired his attention to the detail; a man after his own heart.

He and his boys had four hours before the three o’clock curfew.

Another two hundred and forty minutes in Cassidy’s care, then back to their mother in Bayswater.

He'd met Amelia right here.

Nine years and thirteen months ago, to the day.

Thirteen months since the ‘last supper’.

Thirteen months separated, including ten days divorced.

Cassidy had accounted for that.

“I love you, goodbye”, she had said, waving papers, stiffly shaking his hand. Civil, cordial even, but he knew that he was now on her list; things that she was better beyond: capers, clowns, Cassidy and his bloody cactus.

He couldn’t remember exactly when he had stopped loving her, or she him.

Had he ever really loved Amelia?

They first met in this park, on this very bench.

Nine years and thirteen months ago, to the day.

Cassidy was new to London then. He’d recently taken a position at a large international school in the north of the city. Lower School computers. After ten lazy years in a sleepy Connecticut primary, he was hungry for advancement and adventure, keen to taste the wider world. He’d stay in London for two years, no longer. Appetite sated, he would move on, onwards and upwards. Cassidy was a creature of comfort and settled easily into his London life; he started to feel at home in his rented bachelor pad; he’d even brought himself a cactus for company. After a successful first term he had returned to Cape Cod for a family Christmas and was now back and well into his second semester.

At weekends his early morning jog took him out of the cramped basement flat in West Hampstead, up through Swiss Cottage and St Johns Wood, before he hit the northern slopes of Primrose Hill. He was learning to love the parks of London. That bright winter morning he followed the central path leading to the brow of the hill. From there amongst the dog walkers and kite flyers, he could look down upon the possibilities of the city. He always paused at the same park bench; leant into it to stretch and stare and reset himself for the return journey.

That February morning the bench was occupied, a lone figure silhouetted by the pallid sun as it rose over the distant marshes of East London. As she turned towards him he saw sun splashed pigtails and the grain of her hair, all burnt copper and straw. He thought of Andrew Wyeth’s studies of ‘Helga’, an impression reinforced as the keening sun kissed her pale broad features; large ochre eyes, wide set beneath heavy unkempt brows, high cruel cheekbones, a generous mouth, kind and vaguely amused. She simply said “Hello handsome” and that was that. Cassidy sat down beside her and followed her finger as she traced the eastern marshes, the Isle of Dogs, the skyscrapers of Canary Wharf, past the Post Office Tower and beyond towards the Houses of Parliament, her steady slender hand finally fluttering over the leafy hills of Hampstead, where they would meet later at the Holly Bush for a ploughman’s lunch and pints of real ale.

And her name was Amelia.

‘Amelia’ was Cassidy’s favourite Joni Mitchell song. How weird was that? He loved Joni. The song now assumed a fresh resonance and he sang the words to himself whenever he was troubled. ‘So this is how I hide the hurt as the road leads cursed and charmed.’  He felt horny every time he thought about The Cactus Tree Motel’s ‘strange pillows of wonderlust’; Amelia crashing into his arms…

They married forty days later at a registry office in Holborn and within two years had two sons.

Cassidy had always been at the centre of things, a dragon slayer, the master of his own destiny, but now his first waking thought would never be of himself again. With a young family in his care, lofty ambitions were grounded by duty; he took his parental responsibilities seriously and acquiesced willingly; the boys were in and of his blood.

Daniel and Archie.

D ‘n’ A.

Nice one Cassidy.

He was now in a world beyond himself, living in someone else’s film. No longer the protagonist, Cassidy now assumed the role of bit part player; his life became one of subsistence; father, provider, and protector. There were inevitable dramas; a litany of tiny victories, a derby of defeats, which Amelia took badly; they diminished her. Amelia liked order. Defeat came as second nature to ‘Punch Bag Pete’; what didn’t kill him made he and his family stronger: a peanut allergy, an orthodontic procedure gone wrong, a new air filter and wheel bearing needed for the ‘Cassidymobile’.

Defeats? He would laugh them off, sing in his thin reedy voice, “Amelia, it was just another false alarm”.

Cassidy paraded as ringmaster, knowing all the while that Amelia was the real master of ceremonies; mistress of emotional geometry; dynamic and well balanced; her slender grip sure and steady while his big clammy hands shook. How easily things slipped; they let go of their own imaginings and relaxed into a domestic bliss. And so began the gentle fall, a creeping shift towards contentment, a big circus of small dramas, which soon declined into drudgery, their intended life of surprises somehow became a trudge. There were heated arguments in the early years as salvage seemed possible, but then came recognition and disappointment. Daniel and Archie watched on bemused and bewildered as their parents’ passion diminished; two party clowns, too tired to fight, laughing wearily as they put their faces into each other’s pies.

Maybe they sought humiliation to better rescue and reset themselves. Maybe this was a part of the process of adult survival. Maybe Cassidy thought too much, talked too much, still telling the story of his life, but now in the third person.

As the fourth person…

Was this vulnerability part of his charm?

Could you be charming and know it?

Didn’t that make the charm an affectation?

Wasn’t charm akin to innocence?

Once you recognized it as one of your virtues was it was not gone, the spell broken?

Cassidy knew now to keep these questions to himself. Once he and Amelia would lie naked and spent in silvery moonlight, discussing anything and laughing at everything. When the laughter stopped so, it seemed, did the care. There was no spite or unkindness, just an imperceptible removal of intimacy; they simply ceased to adore each other, merely endured as functioning parents; the boys the sole focus of any affection.

Still, there was always the refuge of music.

Cassidy loved music.

Sometimes you didn’t have to understand everything. You simply accepted an invitation to inhabit the world, the possibility, of a song.

“I wish this pain would just go away

I wish that dogs had wings”

Marc Jordan.

He wasn’t sure why the thought of flying dogs made his faltering heart swell, but Cassidy loved Marc Jordan.

He stopped loving Amelia when she stopped loving him.

Tit for tat, just like that.

Was it really that simple?

Sure, but no less real.

Cassidy got lazy, Amelia got sad.

She developed an edge, became less understanding, less forgiving. She withdrew all understanding and would now chastise him for his feckless nature, his prosaic platitudes. “Christ Pete, this isn’t art, this is life.”

And then, thirteen months ago, with the boys in deep sleep, she had prepared a meal to celebrate the ninth anniversary of that first meeting, a date that they valued more than their wedding anniversary for some reason. The Last Supper: a beautifully simple dish of linguine with Parmesan, pine nuts, butter and sage. Purple sage of such intense flavour that Cassidy had asked Amelia where it was from.

“It’s from a friend…” she tucked a loose strand of hair behind her ear. “A friend from work. Bill grows it himself in this tiny garden in Bayswater...” he lost her eye for a beat, and he knew.

Tiny garden.

Purple sage.

Bayswater… Bill.

The Last Supper.

For Cassidy that was their moment of separation.

He couldn’t forgive her.

She had diminished him.

He demonized her.

Once he’d been a dragon slayer, now the dragon was burning his French fucking toast… For a while and “for the sake of the kids” they expertly avoided each other in the small basement apartment; their lives disconnected.

And then they just… separated.

So, life no was longer a travelogue of ‘picture postcard charms’ then.

Cassidy didn’t dream of 747s.

That was travel.

Cassidy wanted escape.

He’d got the urge for going.

Amelia beat him to it.

Time was a concertina; the essence of a failed marriage in the time it took Daniel to tie the laces of his brother’s boots. From “hello” to “goodbye”; vital edges to the arc of their love, a rise and fall that had brought him meandering back up this hill exactly nine years and thirteen months later. Back to the source, back to that bright moment, back to this park bench.

Archie fidgeted on Cassidy’s shoulders sending his glasses flying. Daniel picked them up and carefully wiped the lenses on his shorts before dutifully handing them back to his father.

“So, will Mayfair Mac still go to heaven, Dad? 
Archie squeezed his knees together and Cassidy’s ears sang.

In Cassidy's Care: Intro

Miracle Mile's last album was 2013's 'In Cassidy's Care'.

It's genesis is perhaps worth repeating; it might even lead you to the album for the first time. I have a few spare copies...

The album is based on the story of a friend in need. 

I wrote letters to him. 

The letters became a story. 

The story became songs. 

The songs became an album.

I'm going to post a chapter a day.

‘In Cassidy’s Care’ details the trials of the titular character’s ordinary life, charting the small dramas that inform Cassidy’s fall and final redemption as he recognises his victories and losses and learns to hold them close. If you don’t come to care for the man, at least maybe you’ll learn to whistle his tune…

We’re all connected by our unravellings; a recognition that can be a comfort of sorts. A good friend (let's call him 'Cassidy') was having problems. His life was as disheveled as his appearance; he was coming apart at the seams. He needed to speak about this dishevelment but wasn't taking advice. My sympathetic gaze was met with the blank stare of a man marinating in misery. What to do? I thought about writing him a letter. No one writes letters these days so maybe that correspondence would resonate; he might take notice. So I wrote out his story, detailing things as objectively as possible, that he might better see his predicament and move beyond it. But oddly, as I kept writing, this letter to a friend became something else; a work of fiction. I had a title; 'In Cassidy's Care' and soon the thing had its own momentum. I used Cassidy's situation and personality for the narrative and found him a great point of reference; he never let me down. It was no surprise when I found myself writing songs that related directly to the predicaments of the Cassidy character. I presented Marcus with those small dramas and he developed the musical landscape in which our hero now abides. Small dramas indeed, his story is as mundane and relevant as yours and mine. 

Beyond fiction, thanks to Cassidy for letting us hang the fabric of this fiction so loosely on his bones. He's still disheveled but you'd find him a much happier man these days; in fact, if you knew where to look, you wouldn't recognise him at all...

Reviews for the album were kind:

The Hat Club: October 1st: Blue Rose Code

It's that time again.
The Hat Club
October 1st
Blue Rose Code (aka Ross Wilson)
His new album 'And Lo! The Bird is on the Wing' is securely atop my 'Album of the Year' pile.
Whilst I've admired the previous Blue Rose Code releases the bar has been significantly raised here.
The tin would probably read: Emotional, heartfelt folk with a gentle touch of jazz.
Regardless of the beautiful sonics there's no over polished parade here. It's all genuinely engaging: moving storytelling with a modicum of misery and a hatful of hope. My album of the year thus far.
And Ross Wilson is playing The Hat Club in Beaconsfield on October 1st.
I'll be on the front row. 

Why not join me?Guests are welcome.
Late bar.
£10
As ever all takings go directly to the artist.
Why not come down and swoon along with me?

Here's a taster. You can always judge a man by the knitwear he sports...