Tuesday 27 June

Tabor and Zither, but my heart is no longer in it. Mum is furious about the Television. There was a bit of sardine sticking to the Volume Control which I had overlooked, but Mum hadn’t, and she put two and two together and said the cost of repair would have to come out of my earnings. Then, when I got to school everybody was sniggering at me. It seems that Antony has been going round informing everyone that it was he who wrote the steamy letter with S.W.A.L.K on the back of the envelope – “for a giggle.”

It is my fault for mentioning it to Garnham, in strictest confidence (he has the beginnings of a dark moustache, so naturally I thought he would understand.) Word seems to have got around, all the same. I braved it out, of course, pretending that I thought it was a huge joke as well, although I felt as though I had been hit in the tummy with a sock full of wet sand.

Thank heaven I haven’t posted my reply to “My Darling Girl.”

Monday 26 June, 00:15am

Back door still open. Remembered to lock it behind me. Comfortable bed beckons. O Rachel (or Brenda)!

Oh Joy!

zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

Sunday 25 June, 5:30pm

I am very hungry. Mum is still in her room sulking. I made a sardine sandwich from what was left of my lunch and turned the television on for company.

I think I am emotionally over-excited, what with the pressure of exams and domestic crises and everything, but I’m afraid that when Aled Jones started singing Amazing Grace I threw the sardine sandwich at him. And the plate. I think it was the plate that broke the protective glass in front of the picture rather than the sardine, but I fear Mum is in no mood for reasonable explanations, so I phoned my friend Antony (who is in the cathedral choir) seeking a sleep-over.

Antony used to be really friendly until he got involved with the cathedral people. Now when you ring him you get his Answerphone message: “Thank you for ringing Antony. I will try to find time to return your call, provided you say who you are, but you must understand that my duties in the Cathedral are onerous and very demanding of my time, so please do not waste it on trivial matters. Kindly leave your message after the Beep.”

Unfortunately the Beep occurs in the middle of the word “Onerous” (“taxing; demanding” – Collins English Dictionary) and the tape has run out before you have time to say anything. So I am going to sleep in Dad’s shed instead, but I did have the presence of mind to leave a note for Mum:

“Urgently summoned to meeting at Antony’s. May have to stay over. Do not worry.

Love, Barry.

PS Sorry about leaving the washing-up. Will explain broken TV on return – severe hailstorm. Hadn’t realised you didn’t close kitchen window before taking early night.

PPS Have shut window for you.”

Have brought torch; have brought letter from Rachel (or Brenda). Floor a trifle uncomfortable, but what is true love if it cannot endure a little hardship?

Have found new pimple on thigh, possibly insect bite. It is very itchy and is stopping me from sleeping. And who knows what other creatures dwell within these wooden walls in the dead of night and crawl silently in search of Human Flesh across the same floor as the one that I am about to enter sweet slumbers upon?

Sunday 25 June, 2pm

I must say that I am very surprised that in the olden days they allowed the Song of Solomon to go into the Bible at all! I bet Saint Paul tried to get it banned when he got involved in writing the New Testament, which is basically about a lot of letters that he wrote in early AD. I read it from start to finish. I will have to read it again, more slowly, because unfortunately I quite forgot to look out for the names of musical instruments. There are parts of the Song of Solomon that I will have to ask Rachel (or Brenda) about when eventually we become better acquainted.

I was about to start on Solomon again when Mum came home from the 10:45 service. She was in a bad mood. The Vicar has asked all the flower ladies if they would sit together at the front, because of the importance of their job. Mum says they do the flowers in shifts, so she didn’t know any of the other ladies, and what was worse, Mrs Ramsbotham was asked to sit with all the other ladies who have Communion brought to them on account of their legs, so they were unable to converse.

So it was perhaps not a good moment to ask Mum about the computer I need for my IT (I have an important exam on Thursday, the result of which will determine my future career prospects.)

I tried to explain to her that it was not the fault of the computer that Dad went off to live in Mallorca with the lady from the check-outs at Aldi. The computer is a wonderful tool, I told her, like the typewriter or the electric telephone, but it is only a tool, and that’s when she burst into tears.

“Just like your dad”, she said, and went to her room and slammed the door, so after a quarter of an hour I decided to get my own lunch (a quick repast of sardines on toast – rich in Omega oils and therefore very good for the brain.)

How do I explain to Mum that my chances of passing my IT exams are minimal if I do not have access to something more up-to-date than Dad’s old Sinclair Spectrum, which also nestles secretly in my satchel, next to the letter from Brenda (or Rachel)? Mum doesn’t realise that dad was a genius – he had worked out how to get Broadband on his Spectrum, which is how he met the lady from Aldi. When he left us to live in Mallorca he left me the Spectrum, of which he had no further need, with a strange note that said “this is also your escape route.”

If Dad is even mentioned Mum throws her hands in the air and bursts into tears and wails “Aldi!”. I think it was the shame – she wouldn’t have minded so much if the lady had worked on the check-outs at Waitrose or Marks & Spencer or even Sainsbury’s – but Aldi!

I’d just started on the Task again when Mum came downstairs.

“By the way”, she said, in a very unpleasant tone of voice. “The Vicar announced in the Notices that the Church requires the services of a good albeit inexpensive carpenter to extend the choirstalls. I had a word with him afterwards. He will probably be in touch with you.”

I think Mum might have hissed, if it were possible to hiss while enunciating the words “By the way...”

Sunday 25 June, 6:12am

I think I might be in Love. They do say that Absence Makes the Heart Grow Fonder, and obviously Rachel (or Brenda) is broken-hearted because I am no longer there glaring at her in a masculine way every Sunday. I am going to write to her to apologise and say I probably wasn’t glaring at her in particular, and then I had a brilliant idea when I had to get up to use the toilet a few minutes ago. I shall write A.M.T.H.G.F on the back of the envelope! It would be a hint that her affections are reciprocated. And I do not need to say “Dear Madam” – I can just start by saying “My Darling Girl”!

Since I am up now (”with the lark!”) I will get on with the Task – with renewed vigour. I shall resume with the Psalms, because of their beautiful exotic poetry, and then I think I will venture into the Song of Solomon, for surely King Solomon must have had musicians to beguile him when he wasn’t being called upon to resolve matrilineal disputes or polishing his collection of e.g. Amethysts and Carbuncles and Lapis Lazulis from his extensive network of mine-workings. I do not think they had Radio 3 or even gramophones in BC, let alone CDs or MP3 players, so Solomon probably had to make do with live music.

Saturday 24 June

I am in turmoil, and I was trying to study for the IT exam next week! The girl in the choir – Rachel or Brenda, I think her name is – has sent me a letter with S.W.A.L.K written on the back of the envelope. I looked S.W.A.L.K up in the big dictionary at home – it means Sealed With A Loving Kiss, which is apparently an example of an Acronym, a word I had not encountered before, not even in my James Bond book. I cannot of course reveal the contents of the letter because of the Laws of Privacy, and I am very annoyed that she forgot to sign it, because I am not actually sure what her name actually is. Luckily the post came when mum had popped out to the shops so I was able to conceal the letter in my satchel for later consideration. I would like to reply, but I am worried that “Dear Madam” might not be the best way to start. Rachel (or Brenda) mentions something in her letter about Facebook. I shall have to find out who wrote it and see if I can borrow it from the library.

Wednesday 21 June

English today. I do not understand why we have to waste time learning about English. It is, after all, our own native language, well most of my class anyway, and even Naziz speaks it fairly well. I have been speaking it for as long as I can remember so I think I can claim to have acquired some knowledge of it along Life’s Way. I think though that it is some of my teachers who need to take GCSE English, for their spelling is abismal in the main. In fact the teacher who is the best speller at my school is Simon, and he teaches woodwork! Mind you, he has probably had lots of practice writing secret letters to Miss Smith when he should have been attending to his educational duties.

There was a spelling error in Question 2 of this morning’s exam – accomodation instead of accommodation. I am writing to the Exam Board about it, also about the attitude of the invigilator when I pointed it out to him. He was quite rude to me, which upset me and may have caused me to lose concentration, as I also mentioned in my letter. I expect that the marker of my paper will be informed and instructed to make appropriate and sympathetic allowances. I should have told the Exam Board that the marker need not, however, make allowances when marking my answer to Question 1 (it was about the Gerund and it had a lot of boxes to tick, most of which contained the wrong answer, but I expect the Exam Board know that already) because I had answered Question 1 before the invigilator chose to make an issue out of a perfectly innocent observation.