“What am I meant to see?”
“Life!” came the reply. “Life, Joe!” Sure enough, poking defiantly through a chink in the concrete was a tiny shoot with two even tinier green buds.
“Welcome to the Fernilee Housing Complex!” The voice was familiar, though not the form.
“Gordon?” Joe gasped.
“Aye, it’s me! Gordon!” was the reply. “Bet you never thought you’d ever see me in a suit, did you?”
Sure enough, the Scotsman holding the iron man-hole cover in his hand was dressed from top to toe in dapper navy-blue pin-stripes with black shiny imitation leather shoes and, oh horrors! a neatly pressed shirt and tie. And if that wasn’t bad enough, neatly hooked over his left arm, was a tightly rolled umbrella!
“I don’t believe it!” gasped Joe. “Where are all the trees?” He looked around him in amazement. Where lush greenery had once been, there were houses, small houses with scarcely an inch between them, as though they’d been set out with giant pastry cutters.
“Cool, isn’t it?” said Gordon, his lilting brogue heavily laced with sarcasm. “Executive housing, they call it. A double-glazed, fully-furnished, tastefully decorated hellhole. Like the new me?” he added, twirling for the boys’ benefit. “Every morning, we dress up in our smart, new polyester suits, walk past our plastic, privet hedges, and catch the train to the Fernilee Production Centre plc where we tap things into computers all day.”
“What sort of things?” asked Joe, not because he really wanted to know, but he felt he had to say something.
“I’ve no idea,” Gordon replied. “But as long as we do that for 9 hours a day, we get enough plastic vouchers to visit the Fernilee Hypermarket and get a trolley-load of delicious processed, pre-packed food. Then we come home and watch TV.”
“Wow! You’ve got TV?” cried Odi, delightedly. “I love TV!”
“That’s just as well, because you can never turn it off. It’s piped into your sitting room 24/7 without a break. Game shows, pop shows, repeats, made-for-TV movies, everlasting soaps, repeats, phone-ins, make-overs, competitions, repeats! And then there are the adverts…….an eternity of adverts day after day after day after day…..”
“Cool!” said Odi.
“But what happened to the forest?” wailed Joe.
Before Gordon could answer, a shrill female cry pierced their eardrums. “Cooeee, Gordy! Tea’s ready!”
“I know that voice!” Joe murmured and as he did, a plump young woman came flying through the door of Number 7 Fernilee Close and flung her arms round each of the boys in turn. “Joe! Odi!” she squealed. “How lovely to see you again!”
“Hysteria!” Odi grinned. “Fancy you being here!”
“Yes, fancy!” she giggled. “Me and Gordon are married now.” And she held out the third finger of her left hand so they could all admire her ring. “Fancy me, a simple little housewife!”
“In Fernilee, everyone is simple,” Gordon said flatly. “It’s the system, you see.”
“And you can’t beat the system!” his wife added, threading her arm through his. Actually, to Joe’s mind, she was looking remarkably well in her multi-coloured leisure suit. Married life obviously suited her far more than the draughty devotions of Babel.
“What about the others?” asked Odi.
“Funny you should say that,” said Gordon, “but we’re actually having a get-together this evening……”
“Just a few pizzas and a glass of Prosecco.” Wisteria explained. “Informal, you know….and you will be staying, won’t you boys? There’ll be Larch, Beech, Horse, some of the girls, of course ……”
“And Roots?” Joe asked. “Will Roots be coming?”
Gordon and Wisteria exchanged uncomfortable glances. “Actually, Roots doesn’t mix socially these days…..”
“Nah, tends to keep to himself, if you know what I mean,” Gordon continued, and Wisteria shook her head sadly. “Had trouble adapting, you know…”
“But what are we thinking, keeping you hanging around in the cold? Come in and have a nice cup of tea, then you can tell us all about your adventures!” Wisteria was not going to take No for an answer and ushered the boys into her neat, tastefully-decorated, executive home.
They had to admit, Wisteria put on a very good spread: Toasted tea-cakes, sponge fingers and gooey gateaux, all freshly defrosted, of course. Nothing seemed too much trouble for the former nunja, as though she was trying to make up for the miseries of their last encounter at the Retreat.
“I feel very bad about what happened,” she kept saying. “But then, if things had been different, I’d never have met my Gordy!”
When he could get a word in edgewise, Gordon took up the tale from when the children had disappeared.
“But what happened to the forest?” Joe asked yet again.
Gordon, to his credit, looked rather shame-faced. “Well, we did our best – no better than best, we put up a terrific fight, so much so, the sheriff and his mob were losing, had to call in the Marines…….”
“Not to mention the riot squad and the entire mounted police……” Wisteria echoed.
“Black Marias, fire engines, armoured cars, ambulances…..” Gordon warmed to his theme, his eyes dewy with happy memories. “But alas, all good things come to an end. They beat us. It took them every inch of strength and cunning they possessed, but, eventually, they beat us, good and proper. It was the worst trouncing we’d ever had!”
“Poor Gordon broke his finger!” Wisteria exclaimed.
“Aye, and a few ribs besides!” he crowed, proudly. “In fact, if it wasn’t for Wisteria here….”
“I shudder to think what would have become of him!” his wife took up the tale. “There he was lying face down in a hollow, right in the path of an enormous digger crashing through the forest at full throttle……”
“When the brave lass grabbed me by the feet and pulled me to safety! We’ve been an item ever since, me and her.” He stopped to beam fondly at his wife who gazed fondly back at him. It was all Odi could do not to stick a finger down his throat.
“Yuk!” he thought. “Fancy anyone fancying Hysteria!”
“Anyway,” said Gordon, “It seemed our days of freedom were well and truly numbered, and I was looking at a good few years’ inside…..”
“Oh, 5 years at least!” Wisteria nodded. “With time off for good behaviour, of course.”
“As it happened, we were given a choice,” said Gordon, “Being sent to prison for the rest of our lives or being let off with a caution.”
“We decided the caution was best,” Wisteria explained.
“Well, naturally we chose the latter,” her husband agreed. “And, in return for our promise to keep the peace, we were given these houses……”
“Along with jobs, shopping centres, schools and general facilities.”
“Not to mention public transport…..although we do have our own car these days,” admitted Gordon.
“No, it’s a People Carrier, my darling,” Wisteria corrected him, “with power steering and low-level emissions, naturally.”
Joe’s eyes had widened with dismayed astonishment. He didn’t know which was harder to believe: That Gordon could settle down so tamely with Wisteria, or that he’d ever give up his ideals for a life of routine and domestic ‘bliss’. As though reading his thoughts, Gordon became defensive. “You can’t beat the system, you know. It always gets you in the end. Besides, I’m too old now to be swinging through trees, the damp was getting to my joints.”
“There’s something to be said for warm slippers and a nice hot bath every evening,” Wisteria reasoned.
Joe said nothing. He was pleased for Gordon, if that was what he wanted, but he couldn’t help feeling sad for what had been lost. Suddenly, the hum of distant traffic was rudely interrupted by another sound, the melancholy wailing of a mouth organ.
“Quick, Gordon! Shut the window!” cried Wisteria. “I can’t stand that horrible noise!”
Gordon marched obediently towards the window but, before closing it, hollered loudly. “Roots Man, give it a rest!”
At the very mention of the name, Joe leapt to his feet and followed Gordon to the window. “Roots!” he shrieked as he peered out. Sure enough, standing on the corner of Beech Avenue was the lonely, wiry figure of his beloved best friend!
“There he goes again!” groaned Wisteria. “Every other night he’s out there making a nuisance of himself.”
“Get a job!” bawled Gordon and slammed the window tightly shut.
“But that’s Roots!” said Joe, reeling with shock. “I thought he was your friend!”
“Not anymore!” said Gordon “Oh, we’ve tried. When he returned here at first, we were forever inviting him round, cooking him meals, washing his clothes…..”
“Darning his socks,” Wisteria chipped in. “Cutting his hair, cheering him up…..”
“…..but it wasn’t any use. He’d just sit there accusingly, as though we were to blame for his trees being chopped down. Anyway, I couldn’t handle it anymore, so I told him to go….I mean, it got to be embarrassing…..”
“Go and sort yourself out, he said,” Wisteria added. “But all he does is mope around, glaring at people….”
“And playing that dratted mouth organ!” Gordon growled. “Pack it in, Roots! You’re not impressing anyone! Hey….Joe! Where are you going?”
Joe was running out of the house, calling at the top of his voice.
“Roots! Roots! It’s me, Joe!” Having reached the spot where Roots stood tapping his feet in time to his music, the boy gazed up at him, gasping for breath. Only then did Roots turn towards him.
“Hello Joe, my old son,” he said breezily, “What are you doing here?”
“I came to find you!” Joe replied.
Roots smiled wryly. “Well, here I am,” he sighed. “Not much to look at, am I?”
True, he was thinner than Joe remembered, and his hair was limp, and his shoulders drooped as though the troubles of the world were hanging on them, and there was a sad, defeated expression on his face. But he was still Roots, and Joe felt overjoyed to be with him again.
“I’ve missed you, Roots!” he cried. “And now we’re back here where the forest was, only now it’s gone and it’s all because of me and I’m so, so sorry!”
“Here, hang on Joe, you can’t go blaming yourself…..”
“Yes, I can!” shouted Joe. “If it wasn’t for me, the bad guys wouldn’t have come here in the first place and the trees would still .e alive!” Heartfelt sobs wracked his whole body.
“Awww, sack this for a coach-load of pensioners!” exclaimed Roots. “Less of that crying, Joe lad.” Roots could cope with most things, but tears and heartfelt apologies were beyond him. “Tell you what – would you like to see some magic?”
Joe sniffed. “I don’t like magic.”
“You’ll like this…..only you must promise not to breathe a word to anyone else. Promise?”
Joe nodded miserably.
“Follow me,” said Roots and set off along the road, beckoning to Joe.
From the window of Gordon’s house, Odi was watching. “Hey Joe! Come back, there’s a really good movie on!”
But Joe wasn’t listening. Instead, he traipsed after Roots through perfectly paved streets until they reached a large superstore garishly decorated with posters advertising the latest offers of the week.
“Are we going shopping?” asked Joe. Roots didn’t answer him; he just continued towards the back of the store where huge bins were kept for rubbish. “My dining room!” he said, cheerfully. After looking to make sure nobody was watching, Roots pushed one of the food bins to one side, revealing the concrete beneath.
“Look, Joe!”
Joe squinted at the spot to which Roots was pointing.
“Look closer!” urged Roots. In the corner there, just by the wall.”
Joe bent down to get a better look, but still couldn’t see what Roots was so excited about. He looked up at Roots and shrugged, bewildered.
“What am I meant to see?” he asked, bewildered.
“Life!” came the reply. “Life, Joe!” Sure enough, poking defiantly through a chink in the concrete was a tiny shoot with two even tinier green buds.
“It’s a tree!” rasped Roots hoarsely, tears welling in his clear, blue eyes. “They can chop down the forest, but trees will never stop growing, not while Roots is here!”
“Wow!” Joe leaned over to touch it reverently. “It must be the only real plant left in Fernilee,” he said, sadly.
“No!” cried Roots. “If this has survived, so will others. You can’t stop things growing, Joe! There’s so much power in the earth nothing will stop them. It was made to grow and flourish, no matter what we humans do. Life will always win in the end!”