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  The Rainbow Sing

  Simon Kerr

  Weidenfeld & Nicolson

  LONDON

  To Caroline Who shows me what love can be.

  First published in Great Britain in 2.001 by Weidenfeld and Nicolson

  Copyright © Simon Kerr 2001

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior permission of both the copyright owner and the above publisher of this book.

  The right of Simon Kerr to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by him in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act of 1988.

  A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

  ISBN o 297607391

  Typeset by Deltatype Ltd, Birkenhead, Wirral Printed by Clays Ltd, St Ives pic

  Weidenfeld and Nicolson

  The Orion Publishing Group Ltd Orion House 5 Upper Saint Martin's Lane London, WC2H 9EA

  Acknowledgements

  Thanks to Caroline Chisholm, who gave me time to try and fail, and eventually succeed. And thanks to my Mum and Dad for the open chequebook, if not the 'Get a real job!' attitude.

  I also have to thank Dr Colin Edwards from BSUC, for listening as I learned, and Simon Trewin at PFD, for putting up with my maddening all-or-nothingness.

  1

  I

  The Rainbow of Hope

  If you really want to hear about it, there's a few things you should know about Project Ulster before I really kick off on the story improper. It was promoted in the throat-cutting churches and chapels of Northern Ireland with the slogan 'The Rainbow of Hope'. The pot of gold at the end of this rainbow was the relative peace of the unwild Midwest USA. And I think, though I may be wrong, that they had that Red and yellow and pink and green, orange and purple and blue, I can sing a rainbow, sing a rainbow, sing a rainbow, too as their theme song.

  Not exactly Iron Maiden is it? So did I sing their rainbow - aye, I did like fuck!

  My name, the good Prod name my parents gave me, is Wil Carson: Wil after the Father of Ulster, King Billy; Carson after being related to the saviour of Partition, Lord Carson.

  I was sold the Rainbow of Hope on the last Sunday in the pissing wet May of 1985. Yeah, it's been fifteen long years, first in Lincoln Hills School for Juvenile Offenders and then in the Green Bay Correctional Institution, but I can still say what May day it was. I was sold out on the 27th. My Ma was the Project salesman, or should that be saleswoman, or even the salesperson? Doesn't matter, it doesn't do to be too PC or people think you're weak.

  3

  Anyway, as I was trying to say, we were in the living room after Sunday lunch when my Ma stops her claw-fingered knitting, takes off her horn-rimmed NHS glasses, and comes right out with it: 'You know, Wil, I was chatting away to Pastor Good at the end of the service and well, he says you could go to America for a month Scot-free.'

  Now I was sitting right in front of the TV at the time, watching El Cid hay-bed Sophia Loren and fiddling mightily with my ucksters, so I didn't think I heard her right. 'What's that you say, Ma?'

  'The Pastor has put your name up as a substitute for Project Ulster.'

  'Do what?'

  All of a sudden she had my full attention. I don't think my Ma was used to getting anybody's full attention ever, certainly not me or my Da's, so she became a little self-conscious. She might even have blushed some when she said, 'Someone dropped out. Wouldn't you like to go on a holiday, son?'

  'You're fucking dead right I would!'

  I got a right slap round the gob for saying that, but any fourteen-year-old no-hoper from the back streets of East Belfast would have done the same thing and cursed his good fortune.

  Looking back on it, though, I think: is that what did it for me? But then I get to thinking - What is a blessing? What is a curse? What is a fortune after all? And it beats the fuck out of me. Life has always been a mixing up of the good and the bad and the me. Things I think will be good don't turn out that way. Things I dread doing I end up enjoying. I've tried reversing things, the polarity of fate, you know like turning the positive into the negative before it occurs, but nah, that doesn't work. Maybe if I

  4

  hadn't mocked my future my past wouldn't have been mapped out that way? But then how are you supposed to consider your future at the time? Or your present. Or your past for that matter? In terms of the blessings you receive or the curses? In terms of good and bad? Who the hell knows what good or bad really is? Can morality be applied to a life's chronology? The very thought is a bag of shite. We're all taught Plato's morality (wrapped up in Christianity) and I read in the prison library that Plato used to fuck young boys up the arse. I didn't make my life happen. Time made me. Place made me. Why am I supposed to regret what I did when I was brought up by God-loving, God-fearing Christians to do it? They taught me to call people Taigs, and hate those they said were Taigs, so like a good Prod I hated Taigs so much I could have killed every last one of them.

  I'll tell you something else for nothing - I hated them Taigs a fuckload more later on that pissing Sunday. Right after the evening service, the stiff-lipped ol' Pastor told my Ma and me, 'Now, Wil, you know what the Project is?'

  'Nah,' I said. 'Tell us.'

  The Pastor cleared his throat like he always did prior to preaching. 'From what I've heard, which I'll admit isn't much at this late stage, it's about the Americans bringing you to America to teach you about peace and reconciliation, son.'

  I said, 'Right?'

  'They want to help us take the gun out of our politics, son.'

  I said, 'They do, do they?'

  'Yes. They want to help us stop the youth of today becoming involved in paramilitary groups.' I said, 'Aye - you're kidding?'

  5

  But he wasn't. He looked deadly serious. I had to choke back a laugh.

  'And if you're going, Wil,' the Pastor went on, 'you'll be going with nine other god-fearing Protestants your own age.'

  At that point I cheered and punched the air. That sounded great!

  Then he added, 'And as I understand it, given the conditions of the Project, ten Catholics.'

  'Taigs?' I spat the word out.

  'Wil!' said Ma.

  'Ten Taigs!' I said again.

  The ol' Pastor corrected me, 'Catholics, son. Catholics.'

  I thumped my Bible on my thigh and walked away. 'No way,' I said. 'No way, Jose!'

  Ma chased me out of church. 'Don't be like that, Wil!' she shouted.

  I looked back in anger. It's funny, I can still see that moment. She was small, frail under the cross - the gold cross hanging over the church door. If she'd only known her own wee son was imagining her martyr carcass nailed up there. The Crucifixion of St Ma, Jesus H Christ, forgive us our trespasses.

  'You should have told me the catch!' I yelled at her. And I stomped home the long way through our estate, by myself, in the pissing dusk. It was always pissing down on me - and that isn't just me projecting my mood on to recollections of the weather.

  I mean, I was so gutted at losing out on that trip. And yet, thinking about it objectively, or as objectively as any individual can get, what did the loss of the American Dream mean to me then? A lot and not a lot of nonsense.

  I would never see the Hollywood sign on that hill.

  6

  I would never be driven or drive in a pink Cadillac.

  I would never gorge on burgers.

  I would never see a Van Halen concert.

  I would never see naked sorority girls' tits and arses and beavers like in that movie Porky's.

  I would never be given an American Foot
ball helmet as a souvenir of my trip.

  Worst of all, I would not be able to boast I'd done or got any of these things to my schoolmates at Belvoir High when I came back.

  All thanks to them ten faceless Taigs!

  7

  2

  The Freedom of Ulster

  Over the last few days of May, Ma tried her best to turn my head with stories of how peace and reconciliation was a good Christian aim and how Happy Days was made in Milwaukee, but I wasn't listening. I'd busied myself with other stuff and, as usual she ended up spitting these words into my face: 'Why can't you just listen to me for once, you stubborn little brute?'

  See, what with Ma trying to be so middle class, she didn't realise I was an up-and-coming member of the Belvoir Brigade of the Third Batallion, The Ulster Freedom Fighters: UFF for short. The reason she didn't know is that I was careful, and rightly so: she would have killed me if she'd found out, or at least kicked me out of the house. And then I would have had to go live with my Da and his Ma in the badlands of Armagh and that just wasn't on. There were too many fucking Taigs down there.

  I honestly did think about going public at school, for the terrorist kudos, you know, like to fit in better but, nah. It would have found its way back to Ma on the rumour machine somehow. I took the advice of Al the alco, my CO: 'Aw fuck, you don't want to come out son. There's too many Taigs out there. Even one knowing who you are and what you do is too many. Keep the balaclava on and the head down.'

  8

  The Belvoir Brigade used to seriously terrorise the Taigs near our estate. I say near, because no Taig in his or her right mind would live on it. I mean, we were what I reckon is the first Heavy Metal song - Eddie Cochran's Something Else - when it came to intimidation and there wasn't one of us over eighteen.

  The week I rejected Project Ulster we were tasked with clearing a place name of Kimberly Close of three unwanted Taig families. You see, Taigs in your street lowered the property values, so it was their own neighbours that wanted shot of them. The Kimberly Close Prods paid the UFF protection money to do the job because they didn't want to get their hands dirty. We were to be their hands, the Hit Squad. We didn't mind getting our hands dirty, or bloody for that matter. Only problem was, there was four of us, and there must have been forty of them Taigs, women and kids included.

  On the Monday me. Wee Sammy, Brian, and squad leader Rick the Prick started with the family on the corner and, tins hissing like snakes, sprayed their house with all sorts of red, white and blue acronyms during the first night: things like FTP (Fuck The Pope) + IRA, UFF, and what have you. Sure enough, they got the message and packed up the next day.

  The other two families though were made of sterner stuff. We tried the territory marking shite on Tuesday: no deal. We bricked their front windows Wednesday, when Coronation Street was on. Thursday, we mitched off school and burned their cars in broad daylight: no dice. That forced Al the alco into it. He met us at our regular RV, in other words behind the school bikesheds, and tache and tats shaking in a fit of the pre-liquid-lunch DTs, he ordered the petrol bombings at four o'clock that morning.

  You see 4 a.m. is when most people die of natural

  9

  causes. They say it's down to circadian rhythms. The human body isn't on the ball at that time, it wants to be asleep. So four's when SAS Troopers choose to attack enemy sentries. It's the real witching hour, when people can die of unnatural causes too.

  I snuck out at three and joined the boys by the woods, dark and deep (Ma was a heavy snorer). We flitted down Finaghy Road keeping to the shadows. When we got to Kimberly Close we simultaneously lobbed two Molotov cocktails into each Taig house. Our targets - the upstairs bedroom windows. Why the upstairs? - because the Taigs'd have to get downstairs and out the front door sharpish. House clearance. Minimal damage. Mission accomplished and all by the beginning of June.

  I regret to say two young girls were burned but everyone got out alive.

  Ethnic cleansing. That's the term for what we did all right, and we have it in our everyday language thanks to those other good Prods, the Serbs. I wonder how many Serbian boys thought they were doing the right thing in Bosnia? I know I was fooled into believing what I was told way back then, but this is now. And I told you - even though I didn't have to - because I want you to know that I've done some things of. . .well, dubious virtue, in the name of the Father. I had dirty hands even at fourteen.

  I'm not a guilty man because I wasn't a guilty boy, but like I say, I have my regrets.

  Yeah I do.

  And I know what I'm about to ask you is hard, but try not to judge; try to understand. I was young. Older men, all father figures, exploited my youthful innocence and exuberance. In a patriarchal society the son must act in a way that pleases the Father or the Big Brother or the

  lO

  animus or whatever you want to call it. There is no other choice but loyalty.

  My Da was the patriarchal animus of Ulster if ever it was personified. Woe betide me if I went against his will. He was furious fast with his fists. That was why Ma'd left him and took me with her. They were separated now and heading for divorce but she wasn't averse to using him to coerce me into doing things. And Ma wanted me to go on the Project so she phoned Da—

  What do you know, the first Saturday in June there was Da on our doorstep looking singularly pissed off - as usual.

  Ma let him in without the regular slanging match. That was a bad sign. It meant he had come especially to give me a talking to.

  Now Da was a big bigot. Six foot one was the height he claimed he was but he was more likely less than six foot: his side of the family always had to exaggerate and elaborate on the truth (except me that is). It wasn't my Da's height that made people say he was big. It was more because of his big-boned, sinewy width and girth. And then there was his beer belly - it hung there like he was pregnant, like he could give birth to another son, a better one, at any minute.

  We went into the living room, him and me.

  Ma took to making the tea.

  'Bout ye, son,' said Da. He sat down on the couch.

  'Hanging together, Da,' I replied and kerplunked down on the floor in front of him.

  'I hear you've been offered a chance to go to the US, son.' Da was always straight to the point, no messing.

  'Aye. But I'm not going.'

  Da stared hard at me. He had dead eyes, hard dead

  II

  blue eyes that'd lost all hope, all life of their own. 'Why'd that be?' he said.

  'The Taigs. They're taking Taigs with Prods. It's some jiggery-popery or other.'

  Da seemed to take an age to consider this protest. It had merit to the big bigot in him, no doubt. But he had a job to do, and he would do it for peace of mind or Ma would deny him that for ever. 'Your Ma says you'd be staying with a Prod family. A Presbyterian Reverend no less.' Da sounded suitably reverential. See, he professed to being religiously religious but it seemed to me his belief system was based solely on the all-day Sunday worship of Guinness. He didn't go to church but claimed he didn't need to; his father had brought him up the right way, you know?

  'Da, I'm no Presbyterian,' I said after a bit.

  'Listen, son. Never look a gift horse in the mouth. So what if it's got a few rotten teeth. It's free and you can pull them out later. Get it?'

  'I think so. Da.' I got the jist, though my interpretation of the analogy was a little more extreme than his. Gift horse -pulling teeth - beating up Taigs - you know? Yeah, that horse he gifted me would become a twisted symbol for both my Freudian destrudo and libido all right. At the end of the Project it twisted into an iron horse called Suzi. And then it warped into a deer of all things?

  Da said, 'Good, so I'll bung your Ma some pocket money for you and you'll go.'

  Woe betide me.

  I Hed earlier when I was talking about loyalty, or rather didn't tell the whole truth in that context. Sorry, it's all too easy to do. There is another choice to loyalty. Excommunicat
ion. Group death. The removal of approval, and with it the protection of others. But that is not

  something a fourteen-year-old could rightly be expected

  to choose, is it?

  13

  3

  Rocking the Gift Horse

  I found myself going to my first meeting of the Projectees the next Saturday. The ol' Pastor was late collecting me, and he drove me to this barbecue wing-ding down at Crawfordsburn Beach like Meatloaf's Bat Out of Hell.

  He quickly handed me over to the Prod counsellor who went by the name of Kate. She was small and round, and with a small voice, called together all those hangers-on who weren't eating, paddling or playing football. Like Ma would have done, she introduced me as the new boy: 'Everybody say hello to Wil.'

  I went red like I always did when I was meeting new people, then all-over crimson; the colour was a deep mix of impotent rage and embarrassment at her mollycoddling.

  The Taig counsellor, Ciaran, a tall scarecrow of a man, was the first to shake my reluctant red hand of Ulster. Now, I had never knowingly touched a Taig before, let alone shaken the hand of one. Contamination. I wiped my hand on my jeans right after so he saw it. And I saw the anger flare in his eyes, along with something I now know was pity because I too pity my young self.

  I stood there for a moment on my own. Then this huge man-boy came up to me. 'I'm Michael,' he boomed with a well-broken voice. I looked up at him. He had a Prod

  14

  face - no tell-tale cyclops eye (at the time I was made to believe in eugenic mythology). The sun made a halo round his big bourgeois head. Michael was six foot three at the age of fifteen. A fully mature male. I think he meant to make me feel small and weedy (I'm six two now, but at that age I think I was about five six). I didn't much like Michael but I didn't much hate him either. He was just the kind of Prod I could never be; life had blessed him with too many gifts; he didn't have to fight for his place in any of it.

  Of the succession of other milling Prods and Taigs that bothered to introduce themselves to me, girls and fellas, nobody made much of an impression. Except for the obvious Taigs, who obviously made me sick. Then, way down the pecking order I met Phil. He was a Prod too. A small Prod too. I liked that about him instantly. I also liked the Iron Maiden T-shirt he was wearing - The Trooper. That, and his long black mop confirmed him as a Metaller. He must have seen I was wearing a Van Halen 5150 T-shirt and that I had long black mop and that I was a Metaller too. He grinned that infectious mischievous grin of his as we shook hands: Wil and Phil. I knew I had a friend for this trip - if not for life.