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The Killer

Every child in school went to the killer, and they had the scars to prove it.

By Eric HarveyPublished 3 years ago 7 min read
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The hairs stood up on the back of my neck, I had just turned on Solid Gold radio and Matt Monro was singing ‘Walk Away’, it was a song that had always conjured up strong images for me every time I heard it, memories of Sunday and ‘Two Way Family Favourites playing on the transistor radio which sat on the windowsill of our kitchen, I sat back and could actually smell the roast beef and hear the vegetables simmering on the gas stove, I could see my sister sat there, her arm in plaster and all the messages written on the cast, and I remembered the Killer.

I was twelve years old, and it was the Summer of 1964, I know it sounds cliched, but the summers back then always seemed longer and hotter, this was how I always remembered my childhood days, can’t seem to recall many wet days during the long school holidays, although, I’m sure there were.

Trevor and I sat in the kerb lazily picking out lumps of tarmac from the road in the cul-de-sac where we lived. We had known each other since birth, our mothers were best friends, and our fathers drank together every night down the local.

“What shall we do today,” I asked, not really expecting a response, ginger haired Trevor was a lad of few words. I looked at his face, he was already starting to burn in the heat of the morning sun, we needed to get in the shade.

“Dunno.”

“We could go to the shop, get some cardboard and go grass sliding.”

“We did that two days ago on Tuesday.”

“How about we walk over to Habberley Valley?”

“Did that last Wednesday, you’ve got a terrible memory Rob.”

Then I had a rush of inspiration, “Norris has asked everyone to meet over the warren at midday, why don’t we go and see what he’s up to?

Norris was the school eccentric, no matter what he got up to he needed an audience, his last venture a few weeks ago was making bombs from sugar and weedkiller, he was particularly good at it too, he started off small with bits of copper pipe, the idea was to flatten one end of the tube, drill a small hole in the centre fill the tube with the mixture, then flatten down the other end. That was the most dangerous part, one spark could ignite the thing, but Norris never seemed worried.

It all went well but he got more and more ambitious, he eventually graduated to scaffold tubing and intended to blow down an old wall, but the day he started hammering down the last end of the large full tube there was no audience, we had all made a run for it. All we could hear from a safe distance was the clang, clang, clang of hammer against metal. But he emerged holding the tube and eventually he did blow down the wall.

“Don’t really fancy that, Norris is a bit of a nutter.”

That was the problem with Trevor, don’t get me wrong – he was a great mate – but he had no sense of adventure like most of the kids our age, his idea of living dangerously was running across the road to the ice-cream van, but he was grossly overweight and even a trip to the shop tired him out. In short, Trevor was boring. He was known as the ‘Ginger Whinger’ at school because he was forever complaining about something, he tended to stay in the house a lot, but his mother had a word with my mother, and I was asked to entice him out more.

“Oh, come on,” I said, “Could be fun.”

Trevor reluctantly agreed and we headed off.

The ‘Warren’ was a series of fern covered hills and dales and was basically our playground, the grass slide was a particular favourite, it went down quite a way with Pete the Poles pig farm at the bottom, there was also a ramp on the left which had to be avoided at all costs - unless of course, you wanted to be dining with the pigs.

Quite a crowd had gathered when we arrived at the designated spot, Norris was stood with a huge coil of thick rope on his shoulder.

There was an elm tree which stood halfway up a dirt bank. Half the kids on the estate watched as he climbed the tree with ease. he carefully edged his way along the branch thirty foot up in the air, took the rope from his shoulder and wrapped it around, tying it with a hitch knot, then slid down it, within seconds he was back on terra firma.

He held the rope out “Who’s first?” There were no takers,

“All you have to do is swing out to the left in a sort of an arc, then come swinging back in avoiding the trunk of the tree at all costs.”

“No volunteers?” Norris said. “Suppose I’ll have to test it then.”

A crowd of us stood and watched with bated breath as he ran along the bank and hurled himself into fresh air, he went round in the expected arc and a few seconds later landed with both feet safely back on the bank narrowly avoiding an impact on the tree trunk.

“There you go.” He said “Easy, right, who’s next?”

Everyone stood in complete silence, but then Trevor stepped forward.

“I’ll have a go.”

“You sure Trev? It takes some skill to miss that tree.”

“Give me the rope, I’ll show you how to do it.”

But no-one knew until that day that there was a hidden danger in that simple act. His portly frame scurried across the dry ground throwing up clouds of brown dust as he threw himself into the air, it was already clear at this stage that he wasn’t taking the same line as Norris. He was halfway round when it happened.

The rope had snagged on something, Trevor came to a shuddering halt, his body wobbled like a jelly being ejected from a mould and he plummeted to the ground producing an earthshattering thud which scared all the birds from the trees.

Everyone stood on the bank open-mouthed for what seemed like an eternity, Norris was the first to scramble down the dirt bank, and the first to arrive at the limp body of Trevor. With no thought for anything broken, he shook him vigorously.

“Trev, Trev, are you ok? Have you broken anything; can you speak?”

We arrived just in time to hear Trevor utter the word he would become famous for…

“Awesome, that was awesome.”

He tried to stand up but collapsed again, “I may have broken something vital.” He whimpered.

We used a homemade go-cart in an attempt to get him back up the grass slide bank to safety, Norris and I pulled on the rope while two lads pushed from behind, he really was a dead weight. We were halfway up the grass slide when Norris noticed how black Trevor’s leg was going.

“Wow, look at that, it’s really bruised.”

It was a few seconds before we realised that the two stupid lads holding the rear had let go to take a look, Norris and I felt the rope slip through our sweating fingers. I’ll never forget the image of Trevor wedged in the go-cart and heading backwards at great speed down the grass slope. He was ok if he could stay on the grass slide, but he veered off to the left and toward the notorious ramp, there was a series of oohs aahs and ouches before the cart hit the ramp and it became airborne with Trevor holding on for dear life.

By the time we got to him he was being licked on the face from an exceptionally large pregnant sow in a pigsty full of wet dark mud, at least that’s what we hoped it was.

We managed to haul him back out and the cart too, by the time we got him to the top of the grass slope the mud was baking in the heat of the sun and he was beginning to set fast.

They got him to hospital and his whole leg was put in a cast.

The swing in the Warren was nicknamed ‘The Killer’ as every child on the estate tried to emulate Trevor’s trick, there were kids everywhere with arms or legs in casts. The police cut it down twice, but it mysteriously appeared again next day.

It was over eight weeks before a triumphant ‘Awesome Trevor’ returned to class, but he had a great following as the first lad to discover the killer swing.

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About the Creator

Eric Harvey

I am a grandfather of four and a father of four, I am 69 years old and i live in Kidderminster , Worcestershire in the heart of England. I have been happily married for 48 years.We lost our youngest daughter Vickie to Leukemia 7 years ago.

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