PART 4(a) - AFTER SCHOOL - WHAT Now?

l AFTER SCHOOL – WHAT NOW?

l MAKING PLANS FOR JERRY

l MY DOG CAN HAVE ANY DOG IN HOUNSLOW

l THE LIFE AND TIMES OF SEPTIMUS GRUNDY

l GET YOUR TATS OUT (FOR THE LADS)

l WE COME FROM GARAGELAND

l LONDON AFTER MIDNIGHT

l VERONICA GETS SERIOUS WITH ROY

l LATE NIGHT AT THE PETROL STATION

AFTER SCHOOL – WHAT NOW?

PETER WYATT

Leave school and get a job. Sounds straightforward, don't it? First thing Monday I get down the job centre and look at the cards - washer-upper, bin-man, kitchen cleaner. Of course what I should have been doing was learning a proper, decent trade - builder, car mechanic, something like that. But I wanted money fast. 

MICHELLE BAXTER

I loved making clothes, so I thought I'd make a go at doing it for a living. There was a course in fashion design at Richmond College. Dad wasn't into it, he thought I should get out into the big bad world - be a secretary, and get bossed around by some grumpy old git. So me and Mum did a number on him.

PETER WYATT

Then I saw the card - “Want to make SERIOUS money? Do you want that FAST car? Live in the that BIG House?” I thought - I wouldn't mind. The job was selling carpet cleaning door to door. They interviewed me over the phone and I must have made a good impression because they told me I could start straight away. Then they asked if I had any mates who could do the work - and I immediately thought of Dermott.

MICHELLE BAXTER

What was a lot harder was persuading Dad to let me go on holiday in Spain with Terry. Even Mum didn't approve of that. In the end I made up a terrible lie - and told them both I was going to the Norfolk broads for a week with Samantha. I had to steal my passport out of Mum's drawer. God! I hate lying.

DERMOTT COLLINS

The first Monday after I left school, Dad pops in and says - “So what are you up today?” I said - “I dunno, get down the DHSS and get me dole sorted out I guess.“

FRANK COLLINS (Dermott’s father)

There is no way any son of mine was ever going to be drawing dole. I know what people say about the Irish - lazy good for nothing. Well we ain't. We work twice as hard, and I wasn't going to let Dermott give the bigots any ammunition.

DERMOTT COLLINS

Then I picks up me brother's geetar. Remembering what Jerkski said on Friday night - about forming a band. I spent the whole morning playing along to Rocket to Russia. Over and over again. Cobra comes around saying - “The sun is out, let's get out on the lash.” I said - ”Easy brother I'm really getting into this.”

FRANK COLLINS

So later that week I sorted Dermott some work on the site. Just carrying and lifting, going to the shops. Nightmare!

DERMOTT COLLINS

The first thing them navvies on Dads's sight get me on was the kettle detail. I ain't no mug - I made the tea so badly - they never asked me again. Then I had to help knock down a wall.

FRANK COLLINS

We started him on the easy stuff. Dust and debris everywhere - in our hair, face and eyes.

DERMOTT COLLINS

Peter told me how builders would always gee up the new lad on the site. Make clowns out of them by sending them on errands for a long stand. Make them wait in the corner and say - “There you are - you've had your long stand.” Or send them to the suppliers to get a tin of stripey paint, and they get laughed at. Well they weren't going to do that to Titus .

This builder asks me to get down the yard and get some rubber gromitts. I told him to stick his rubber gromitts up his arse - the fucking wind-up merchant.

FRANK COLLINS

The last straw was when he told one of my top men, to fuck off. He only asked him to get some rubber grommets.

DERMOTT COLLINS

The builders on me old man's site had a meeting. The shop steward then went and saw me Dad. They told him - either you sack your son, or we go on strike.

FRANK COLLINS

So I said to Dermott - “OK enough. I’ll support you for a couple of months while you work out what you want to do. But do not draw dole.”

DERMOTT COLLINS

Then Peter calls me, he's a got a job for me selling carpet cleaning door to door. I was like – “Oh fuck! Do I have to?”

MAKING PLANS FOR JERRY

JERRY ZMUDA

When my sister Magdalena went to University, the Zmuda household plunged deeper still into a world of gloom. Now an eternal stony silence ruled over the house as my Mother and Father barely said a word to each other. Many women get post natal depression, with my Mother it seemed to last decades, and her constant sour-face was really getting me down - “pull your socks up” - “get your act together.”  Who wants to hear all that when you're 16?

I saw a video of Joy Division on Saturday morning TV - The Music Factory I think the show was called. Joy Division wore expressions of despair and looked Eastern European. Being of Polish descent I related to that. After lunch, I dashed down to Record Scene to buy the record, and told the bloke behind the counter that I was up for going to see Joy Division live.

GRANT WILLIAMS

You’ll need a Tardis for that mate, I said. A bit heartless I know. He didn’t know the lead singer had just topped himself.

JERRY ZMUDA

I went home all upset and tried to scribble down some lyrics about it. I've still got them in an old exercise book somewhere. They go like this -

From an abandoned warehouse,

All dressed in grey,

Your song was sad,

But it brightened my day.

I want to go to a concert,

To watch you play.

But now I never will,

Now I never will.

MY DOG CAN HAVE ANY DOG IN HOUNSLOW

PETER WYATT

With this door to door carpet cleaning lark, they give you a couple of hours training, then this seedy looking geezer in a crumpled suit takes you in his car out in the middle of the sticks - they won't tell you where. I felt like I was in the mob about to do a hit. On the way there he makes us go over the sales script again and again –

“We have our carpet cleaning team working in your area. While we're here, we'd thought we'd give you a call for a no obligation, totally free quote.”

You had to memorize that and, very important, you had to remember to smile. Then they let you out, and you had to go knocking on every door in the street.

DERMOTT COLLINS

Never stuck to the script. The geezer who drove us there just buggered off so we were left to get on with it. I was knocking on the door and saying stuff like “Any chance of a cuppa?” “Your garden looks nice.” Pretty soon the locals were calling the Old Bill.

PETER WYATT

It was tough work - some people were quite nice and smiled back, but a lot slammed the door in my face. The supervisor picked us up at lunchtime and took us to some boozer. He was a bit of a geezer this one. One of these types that doesn’t seem to able to talk about anything else other than himself. He was telling us - “My dog can have any dog in Hounslow.”

DERMOTT COLLINS

Turns out the supervisor geezer is into his dogs. I joke - “Aren't we all after a few drinks?”

I said to him - “Your dog should meet my mate's dog Belzebub - he's the hardest dog in Feltham.“ I made this dog up, but he was up for it - this clash of West London dog titans. We were arranging a time and a place for the bout when the Old Bill show up, looking for the suspicious geezer who had been knocking on doors and scaring the locals.

PETER WYATT

So Dermott got sacked after the first day, while I stuck it out.

I made a sale on my second day. It was an elderly couple who were just too nice to say no. I was supposed to be happy, but I felt dirty.  I was thinking - is this my life? My future? Am I going to end up in a couple of years bragging to my sales team about my dog being hard? I packed it in on my second week.

DERMOTT COLLINS

So there I was - back at home, strumming away, learning some chords.

Was I getting good at the guitar? I dunno. Nobody else had heard me apart from Cobra, who weren't interested. The other two hadn't said anything about the band since that Friday. I was just playing to myself but I wanted to know what it sounded it like to others. Especially Angela. Would Angela really like me if she heard me play guitar?

THE LIFE AND TIMES OF SEPTIMUS GRUNDY

JERRY ZMUDA

The bad news envelope came through the letter-box in July. I nearly got there first but Mother swooped it up like an eagle.

Trust her to focus on the negative. I had achieved passes in every subject bar one - Maths. This was something of a drawback on account I was supposed to be doing Maths ‘A’ level. So there was nothing else for it - the dreaded re-sit.

NATALIE ZMUDA (Jerry’s mother)

He was whining and whining about having to do a summer job and now having to do re-sits when he’s trying to write songs. I told him that he has to live in the real world - and the real world is Maths ‘O’ level re-sits in September.

JERRY ZMUDA

Eddie Cochrane was right - there ain't no cure for the Summertime Blues. Being made to do some awful summer job at the Feltham industrial estate and now having to prepare for my re-sits. I was trying to come up with some lyrics about re-sits, as I was walking past the eerie graveyard we used to hang out in when we were 12. And then it hit me - the name of the band - SEPTIMUS GRUNDY! 

DERMOTT COLLINS

I wanted to call us the Slush Puppy Mods - but then I thought only mods would come and see us. So when Jerry came in with the name Septimus Grundy - I was up for it.

PETER WYATT

The other two were so into being called Septimus Grundy, I thought - yeah it's a bit weird, but why not? Let's be different. My Mum goes away for the week-end - again to see her mysterious boy-friend, so I said – “Come round and we'll have our very first jamming session.”

DERMOTT COLLINS

So I turn up with my brother's guitar, which of course is mine now. And I start playing and singing along, Peter is trying to keep up with an acoustic guitar playing the bass parts.

JERRY ZMUDA

Dermott is trying to take charge assuming he's going to be the lead singer. He strums his guitar and sings dead flat - “I went to a party at the county jail - caught my knob on a rusty nail.” Completely pathetic and not even remotely amusing.

DERMOTT COLLINS

Jerry looks at us, with that soppy doe-eyed look of his, saying “What do I do?” Then he gets it out. His notebook of lyrics.

PETER WYATT

The poor mite gets out his exercise book and is reading out his lyrics. Dermott starts laughing.

DERMOTT COLLINS

Unforgettable lyrics. Do you want hear them?

The Kids on the Street ain't got nothing to do,

They're just trying to live their life - what else can they do?

Yup! You can always rely on Jerkski to be a top fucking ponse.

JERRY ZMUDA

I never wrote any lyrics about Kids On The Street. Dermott made all that rubbish up - like he makes everything up. It was teenage stuff about wanting to meet girls, and having to face re-sits. Painfully embarrassing - I'm not denying it. But nothing about Kids on the Street.

PETER WYATT

I told Dermott to stop laughing, “come on let's listen to his lyrics, give the poor kid a break.” They were pretty shit though - stuff like -

Government Leaders telling us what to do,

Don't listen to them - they're not better than you.

I figured well - when you go and see a band live, you can hardly ever hear the lyrics.

GET YOUR TATS OUT (FOR THE LADS)

DERMOTT COLLINS

Cobra sez to me - “a geezer ain't no geezer until he gets himself some tats.” Cob had them all over his body, including the famous Cobra on his neck. His catchphrase - you cunt do you want a slapping? That was on his chest. He offers to take me down Hastings for a summer day out and see a tattoo artist he knows. I said - “Great - how about bringing my buddies along?“ Cobra goes - “That Peter's alright - but not that Jerry. Jerry ain't shaking with the snake.”

PETER WYATT

That was out of order. Cobra was trying to drive a wedge between Jerry and Dermott. I said I wasn't going either. But then on the day I was getting edgy about what Dermott would get up to with Cobra. So I decide to go along and be his protector.

DERMOTT COLLINS

We get the train down. The day starts off OK. Tins of beers - having a laugh - reminded me of our famous day out to see The Jam.

PETER WYATT

Halfway through the journey Cobra knocks back another beer and says - “So who's up for getting hold of some brass later on?”

I was puzzled - was he talking about adding to his coin collection? Then I twigged and I froze in horror. I was a sixteen year old boy, in love with Michelle Baxter, and I wasn't going to get hold of any brass - and certainly not share one with Cobra. 

DERMOTT COLLINS

Leave it out! The very thought of waiting my turn on some bird while Cobra pounded away at her turned my stomach. Cobra steam-rolls you into things, but no way was I going to do that.

Then Cobra was cracking on at me about what tattoo I was going to have. I wanted the Big Bad Wolf, but he wanted me to have a snake - so I could be “shaking with the snake.” He says to me - “If you don't have a snake - it's going to be another battle of Hastings.” But I wasn't going to give in that easy.

JERRY ZMUDA

I didn't want to go with Cobra to Hastings. OK, I hadn't been invited, but I was happy to stay at home and try and write some more teenage angst anthems. I was trying to be all political, writing stuff about Tory MPs and religious leaders telling us what to do. Then I thought - when has a religious leader ever told me what to do? I was stumped, what the hell do I write about? 

PETER WYATT

As we walked down to the tattooist near the pier, with each step you could feel the heightening tension. I was squirming. It was like one of those fair ground rides – higher, higher, higher – you know inevitably it’s going to go off, any second now. Cobra was still insisting that Dermott had a snake tattoo, and Dermott was standing firm - and so he should. It was his body, it was down to him to choose what to have grafted onto him. The row kicks off right outside the tattooist.

DERMOTT COLLINS

Cobra grabs hold of me. He's shaking me - properly shaking me like a rattle. He gives me the catchphrase – “YOU CUNT DO YOU WANT A SLAPPING?” I soaked my pants.

PETER WYATT

I tried to get Cobra to let go and he turns on me. “YOU CUNT DO YOU WANT A SLAPPING?” I was about to punch the guy when plod jumps in - blows his whistle and puts his hand on Cobra's shoulder. It was time to scarper. Since that film Quadrophenia had come out - the police were always around the seaside resorts. So in the blink of an eye, more police were on the scene. Cobra was taking them all on. While me and Dermott scurried away like the Three Stooges, and sneaked underneath the pier.

DERMOTT COLLINS

We went to the pub to calm our nerves, wondering what the hell was going to happen to Cobra. And more importantly, what was he going to do to us when the Old Bill release him. Then Peter gets that serious look on his face he always gets when he wants a serious chat.

PETER WYATT

I told him that Jerry was his real friend, his proper friend - and Cobra had just shown us what he's all about. Hang out with him and you'll end up in prison.

DERMOTT COLLINS

I kept on trying to change the subject - but Peter kept bringing me back. “Jerry is your mate - Cobra is a bad influence.” In the end I just had to agree with him. But I felt bad about Cobra. I'd decided I was going to splash out and have two tattoos - a wolf and a snake.

PETER WYATT

You sure about this? Two tattoos in one day. You sure? The pain....

DERMOTT COLLINS

Fuck the pain! Coupla more beers and I won't feel a thing. Tattoos don't really hurt - they're just like sticking red hot needles into your skin.

Course when it came down to it - I was howling in pain - but I didn't pipe. My eyes were bone dry. After my orgy of agony I said to Peter – “Let's go to the nick. Chances are, that's where Cobra will be.” I needed to nip this one in the bud and make sure that Cobra wasn't going to come after us when he got let out.

PETER WYATT

Sure enough Cobra was in the cell, due up before the beak on Monday. We found out his real name - Graham Cobb. The police let us see him for five minutes and Dermott showed him his forearm all bandaged up - saying “I got it done Cob - a snake and the big bad wolf.” Cobra was so moved he had tears in his eyes. This was all too weird for me.

JERRY ZMUDA

While Dermott and Peter were having their seaside special with Cobra, I was at home trying to write down some serious heart-wrenching lyrics, but I was still staring at a blank page. I scoured the book shelf for ideas and I found a copy of Crime and Punishment. I'd seen the TV production with John Hurt a year or so before. So I thought - I'll write a song about that.

After about fifteen minutes I had something written down -

Hey brother have you heard the word? 'Bout St. Petersburg?

I'm not mad, I'm not crazy,

I have decided to do in my landlady.

When she's gone I won't have any fears,

Because I owe six months arrears.

Complete rubbish. I know that now. But I felt the exhilaration of creativity, I thought I had found my voice. Please remember - I had only just turned 16.

DERMOTT COLLINS

When we got back Peter made me phone Jerry and apologize for not inviting him down to Hastings and letting Cobra call the shots. Jesus - Peter was like your old man sometimes.

JERRY ZMUDA

I knew Peter had made him call, but I appreciated it. Peter always knew about doing the right thing. 

WE COME FROM GARAGELAND

PETER WYATT

Jerry had his ‘A’ levels, but you could tell he was only doing them to keep his Mum happy. All three of us were teenagers thinking - where the fuck do we fit in this world? But when we got together to do the music, everything fell into place. It wasn’t about wanting to see our mugs on the cover of Smash Hits or anything. Just playing along and improving each day was an end in itself. The hours whizzed by.

DERMOTT COLLINS

All that time spent out of work, laying about on my back-side had started to pay off - my guitar playing was really coming along. It was a real nice feeling to be able to pick up me guitar and knock out a riff and not have to stare at my fingers as I tried to find a chord. Peter had bought a really cheap second hand bass and was doing alright. And Jerry well, he was still fucking hopeless at singing and guitar.

JERRY ZMUDA

I was having real difficulty singing and playing the guitar at the same time.

DERMOTT COLLINS

He couldn't do both at the same time. Couldn’t do one at a time neither. He was dragging us down like a dirty great big bottle of Domestos round our necks.

PETER WYATT

So the line up was me on bass, Dermott on guitar and Jerry singing and strumming the occasional chord. We needed a drummer, so we put a notice up in Record Scene.

GRANT WILLIAMS

Peter came into the shop with a big smile on his face, asking to put a notice up. I said to them – “You serious about this band lark?” They’d even given themselves a name - Septimus Grundy. I said - “Change it. It sounds prog rock - like Jethro Tull.“

PETER WYATT

Only one person called. Stuart Martin.

BUCKLE AKA STUART MARTIN

I’d been drumming in a band that played R’n’B covers. I was younger than most of them by nearly ten years and I wanted to do something young and fresh. I saw the notice in Record Scene and I thought I’d give it a go.

PETER WYATT

We didn't tell him that he was the only drummer we were auditioning. 

BUCKLE AKA STUART MARTIN

They’re holding auditions in this lock-up garage. So I knew right away it wasn’t some big time outfit. We jammed along to a few Jam and Clash songs - and it was pretty clear that I was a lot more advanced musically than that lot. I mean Jerry didn’t even know how to hold a guitar. I should have been auditioning them.

DERMOTT COLLINS

Buckle may have been a bit fat - but he was fucking ace. Hearing my guitar with his drums underneath gave me a top fucking buzz  - geezah!

PETER WYATT

He was shit hot and he knew it. After a couple of songs - I just offered him the gig then and there. He asked - “Don't you need to audition other drummers?”

“Fuck the other drummers,” I said, “you're our drummer!”

BUCKLE AKA STUART MARTIN

I said I’d think about it. But only because I didn’t want to tell them to their faces I thought they were no-hopers. But I went home and played the Clash’s first album - the track Garageland came on. We’d played that at the audition. I started thinking - those boys have got spirit, they’re what punk was all about. I’ll take the job, and being older, more experienced, I’ll take charge.

DERMOTT COLLINS

I was made up to hear Buckle had taken us up. I could see him clicking with us instantly. I'd already given him a nick-name. Buckle as in Fatty ArBuckle. Of course I told him it was because he was wearing a belt with a big buckle.

LONDON AFTER MIDNIGHT

JORDI KNOWLES (Angela’s brother)

Dermott would call me up every couple of weeks to find out if there was any news on Angela. He even gave me a letter to pass onto to her. All I knew was that she was staying in a series of squats in London and she didn’t have a phone. She’d call me from a pay phone from time to time, and I met up with her in the Chelsea Potter one Saturday afternoon and passed Dermott’s letter onto her. I have no idea what it said.

FRANK COLLINS

Angela Knowles phoned one Saturday afternoon and left a message for Dermott. It was - 'be at the Dead Kennedys concert at the Music Machine, Camden on Monday night.' Dead Kennedys? I didn't like the sound of that one bit.

DERMOTT COLLINS

After months of not hearing anything at all about Angela, I went ape-shit when Dad told me she called.  I kept telling myself all the way on the train to Camden Town - “She must like me if she wants to meet up.”

JORDI KNOWLES

What Angela was up to in squat land, I could only guess. Thieving? Drugs? Sex? More than likely. I didn’t want to know. Mum was still heart-broken but we hardly ever talked about her. I wanted so much for my sister to come back home, but I knew that would never happen now.

DERMOTT COLLINS

I turn up at the Dead Kennedys concert - and surprise, surprise it's full of punks. Leather jackets, studs, crazy colour hair. Smuggling in little bottles of Vodka under their jackets. I was wearing my Ramones T-shirt and Harrington. I'd put soap in my hair to make it stick up, but I still felt out-of-place. The place was an old music hall from the good old days that had gone downhill. It's massive, so I just walk around and around through the crowd, trying to spot my Angela.

PETER WYATT

I'd offered to go with him to the concert, because I quite fancied seeing the band who did Holiday in Cambodia. But he said he wanted to meet Angela alone.

DERMOTT COLLINS

I went near the front to watch the support band - UK Decay, I think they were called. And there she was, right near the front. She looked at me, dashed over and hugged me. I smelt her smell again, I'd forgotten she'd had her own smell, unique to her - not like BO - smelly but nice. Then she introduces me to her friends. All punks - all squatting in London. I told her about Septimus Grundy - I thought she'd be really impressed, but she just patted me on the back. Then the Dead Kennedys came on and it all went loopy. I was grabbing hold of her - determined never to let go.

GRANT WILLIAMS  (Record Scene Manager)

I was at that gig. Working at Record Scene you get loads of record company freebies. Punk was creatively dead at this point, but the Dead Kennedys were amazingly good, really tight sound. I caught sight of Dermott at the gig, I dived behind a pillar.

DERMOTT COLLINS

During the set she shouts at me  - “Where are you going later?”

“Dunno. Catching the last train I guess.”

She shouts back - “No you're not. You're coming to a party.”

“Sounds good to me, where?”

Over the loud music I got her to repeat the address five times - it was a squat in a place that sounded like Great Witch Field Street. I was going to a party with Angela after midnight. I was the happiest teenager in the world. I were grinning from ear to ear, something you don't often see at a punk gig.

GRANT WILLIAMS

The Music Machine was a good venue for punk gigs. The stage was quite high so a lot of that spitting didn’t reach the performers. Although some still managed. The punks were trying to rush the stage from the very first number.

DERMOTT COLLINS

Each time a punk got on stage the security would either push them back or grab them and take them to the side. It was quite funny watching this all happen until I saw Angela up there. This bouncer came up to her, and she tried to knee him in the nuts. The security went berserk and it took two geezers to turf her off stage. In a panic I went to the side of the stage spluttering - demanding to know where the bouncer had taken her.

PETER WYATT

I told Dermott if anything happens or you get stranded in London, get to a payphone and give us a call. I'll get Mum to come and pick you up.

DERMOTT COLLINS

I was yelling at the bouncer – “Tell me where she is.” He grabs hold of me and throws me through a side-door. I look around and I'm in this dark alleyway. “Angela?” I cried out pathetically. I run round to the front of the venue, desperately looking for her. The gig finishes and I'm going up to strangers - all punks - “Do you know Angela Knowles?“ “Have you seen her?“ Some tried to help - others just laughed. Then I remembered the party in the squat in Great Witch Field Street. I ask about that. This girl tells me I probably mean Great Titchfield - that's Central London, it's down towards the Post Office Tower.

So I head for the Tower, panting heavily, I'm Desperate Dan, running down this main road with the Post Office tower in the distance ahead of me, slowly getting closer, when this geezer pulls up in his car. “You seem lost Boy.” He says rolling down his window - “Jump in I'll give you a lift.”

He's about 30 - and asks me if I've been to the punk gig. I tell him all about Angela - and what she means to me, and I say I want to go to this squat party in Great Titchfield Street. He tells me instead “I know where your Angela will be. I'm taking you to Soho.”

GRANT WILLIAMS

The last train to Walton went at midnight - but there were trains all through the night going to Kingston, so after the gig I grabbed one of those, trying not to fall asleep, and called a cab at Kingston.

DERMOTT COLLINS

“So you know Angela?” I asked. Yes he nodded, I was suspicious - but I was clutching at straws. He takes me down to this real seedy basement bar in Soho, I look around and there's six people in there - all geezers and none of them Angela. I shout at the geezer – “She's not here - and you don't know her.” He gets me to calm down and buys me a beer. It tastes funny, he's put whisky in it. Then he puts his hand on my leg. I punch the guy square in the mush. He grabs me by the collar of my harrington, five other guys bound over - it's looking bleak for our Dermott. Time to remember some Bruce Lee. I kung fu kick the biggest poof and he goes down, then I double punch another - I then make a dash for the fire exit door. I crash through them - I'm free. But what about Angela? I was desperate to find her so I make my way to that Post Office Tower.

PETER WYATT

It's 3 AM. Mum is home for once. The phone rings, eventually I pick up. It's Dermott - he's stranded can we pick him up? Mum doesn't want to go. I insist - it's Dermott - he's family.

DERMOTT COLLINS

She wasn't there. Or was she? I saw some blonde girl snogging in the corner, it could have been her - but I didn't want to see. I waited and waited, in this burnt out squat - ankle-deep in wasted punks all over gaff. London after midnight felt scary, weird. Eventually I get to a payphone to call Peter. I wait outside in the freezing cold and eventually this car pulls up - I saw this man inside smile at me - but when I saw it was Peter, I knew I was safe.

VERONICA GETS SERIOUS WITH ROY

PETER WYATT

Mum comes home one evening. She's quiet for a bit, then she goes to me - “There's a man I want you to meet, he's called Roy.” I knew she had a boyfriend but she'd never mentioned a name. This was serious.

ROY HOOKE (Veronica’s boyfriend)

Boy was I nervous. Do I try and come across all wealthy and successful? Or do I try and be one of the lads? Or a bit of both? It was hard enough trying to win the trust of Veronica, but now her teenage son?

PETER WYATT

So she wants to go out to dinner, and I said “OK but I want my buddies along as well.”

DERMOTT COLLINS

I felt sorry for this geezer Roy. Peter was glaring - and me and Roy were trying to lighten things up. Talking about football and the telly. Roy talked about what he used to listen to when he was our age - Rock'n'Roll. He saw Billy Fury play the Walton Hop and it was the best gig of his life. He'd also seen Johnny Kid and the Pirates. I was getting into all this music myself - Eddie Cochrane and all of that, so I was jabbering ten to the dozen with him. He offered to lend us some of his albums - while Peter just carried on glaring.

ROY HOOKE

I wish it had been Dermott I was trying to win over. He was an enthusiastic, gregarious soul who loved classic rock’n’roll. But Peter just glared at me as if I was the Yorkshire Ripper. It made Veronica very uncomfortable.

PETER WYATT

Why was I giving Roy such a hard time? Dunno really. It certainly wasn't out of loyalty to me old man. It just didn't feel right.

ROY HOOKE

What do you do when somebody’s son makes it clear they don’t want you to carry on seeing their mother? But I wasn’t going to stop seeing Veronica - my intentions were honourable. And a man isn’t meant to be alone - even at 42. I was getting over a painful separation, losing custody of my two children - I needed companionship. Female companionship.

LATE NIGHT AT THE PETROL STATION

PETER WYATT

The whole Mum seeing some geezer bit had really wound me up. I felt the need to break away, get myself some independence. Get a good job and then buy myself a motor. No decent job was on the horizon, so I wound up a cashier at the Apex all-night petrol station in Feltham. It paid alright, it'll do for now. 

JERRY ZMUDA

Peter was not his normal happy-go-lucky self as Christmas '80 was coming up. I went over to see him at the petrol station - it was daunting. Round the back you had the kids off the estate hanging around. At eleven’ o’clock the pubs shut and it's armagideon time - with all the drunks making for the petrol station like moths round a flame - shouting and whooping, swaying around. Buying crisps and Mars Bars and stuffing their inebriated gurning faces. I asked Peter whether he'd seen anything crazy or amusing in his time working there. He says blankly – “Nothing - nothing at all.” Then this guy walked up and gently tapped on the glass. Peter turns and explodes with rage. I never heard him shout like this before. 

“Fuck Off. I said Fuck. I won't tell you again. Where's my box of Toblerone you cunt? Don't you dare piss on my forecourt. I'll give you a slap you'll never forget!”

This job at the petrol station was bringing out Peter's dark side.

PETER WYATT

The Sunday morning before I'm at the petrol station listening to a tape of Greg Edwards' Soul Spectrum. This geezer taps on my glass - he's got a wild look in his eye and he's talking in a strange rasping voice.

“Ere mate - you've got let me come inside and have a piss.”

“No mate.”

“I know you've got a khazi in there.”

“Yes I have, but it's not for the public.”

“Come on mate - I'm desperate for a piss.”

“No - you live over by the flats don't you?”

“I won't get there in time - I gotta have a piss.”

So eventually I unlock the door and let him in. I started serving a customer and next thing I know - the geezer grabs a box of Toblerone and runs out the back door. He didn't even go for a piss.

DERMOTT COLLINS

Peter was working at the petrol station most Friday and Saturday nights. We went over there most of the time, what else did we have to do? But I loved Sundays afternoons the best - that's when we got together for our jamming sessions.

PETER WYATT

I was working like a mother-fucker at that petrol station. Well I call it working - you're really just sitting around most of the time counting and re-counting the stock. But I was putting the hours in. Pretty soon I had enough money to buy a car.

DERMOTT COLLINS

He bought it out of the Exchange and Mart for two hundred barr. A real pussy magnet. Every morning he'd find a dozen cats sitting on the bonnet.

PETER WYATT

Yes it was a shitty little rust bucket which cluncked every time I changed gears. But it was my first car. I was so excited and I felt I was finally going places.  But I was about to bite the hard concrete of reality street.

JERRY ZMUDA

We were at the petrol station listening to John Peel when a bright purple Ford Capri pulls up. Inside is Michelle Baxter - with Terry South in the driving seat. Peter dashes out, all out to impress, and Terry and Michelle were smirking at him because he was working at a petrol station. Peter then showed Michelle his car, and she and Terry burst out laughing because Terry was driving a considerably more expensive car.

TERRY SOUTH

We weren’t laughing at him because he had a shit job and a shit car. But what do you do when some geezer who’s after your bird comes up to her and tries to impress her with one hundred pounds worth of scrap metal? We weren’t being nasty - we just couldn’t help it.

PETER WYATT

The laughing - they were both laughing. It echoed in my ears as I went to bed that night. I was determined to get even.

To go to Part 4 (b) Life & Times of Septimus Grundy click here.