The First Cut is the Deepest (TooWrite Story 2)

This is the second story I submitted to TooWrite, and undoubtedly the most painful. I remember the humiliation to this day, and I think you can tell from the writing that even though I'm trying to be all Wonder Years about it, I was still cut up for the young me. So much so that there is a very strong echo of this scene in the novel I'm currently writing.

I'd like to say that I was stronger for the incident, but I subsequently spent the next five years mooning over another girl and never telling her, before going for a slightly heavier reprise over somebody else throughout my time in sixth form. Whether these three knew about it, I never found out. Maybe that's why our year's never got round to a reunion.

The First Cut is the Deepest

by Chris Stanley

Everyone, everyone, no matter who they are, remembers the first time they got their heart broken. At some point you remember that horrible moment and you’re able to genuinely laugh about it, even though there’s just a kernel of hurt that will always remain. Luckily, the me now is different to the me then, although there have been times in the last twenty-odd years where I’ve wanted to step back into the jungles of my life and pull younger self up by the ears.

   The funny thing is, Katherine broke my heart, and she never even knew it.

   The year I left primary school was terrifying. By the time I reached top year at junior school, I knew my place in the world. I was an important kid, and that’s no lie. I played trumpet. I aced every test. I was all set to take the eleven plus, but the school bottled out and so I was set for the local comprehensive. My mother was a dinnerlady, I was a prefect, and I played central midfield for the football team.

   I don’t recall all of this to boast, but I want to set the scene. What I’m trying to say is that I was confident, a risk-taker. I was assured that I’d be a success, because I was one already. In a sense, I was like Adam before the fall, or more prosaically, real life just hadn’t smacked me one yet.

   What I didn’t know when I left primary school, was that I was fat. I have a photo of me taken weeks after I started at big school, and it’s me with a wide grin, in my new uniform, my teeth all over the place and my cheeks bulging with pride. What that photo won’t tell you is what happened after I stood up after the photo.

   My form was all in Whitman Hall – the photo was being taken of the whole year group as a money-making exercise. I was pleased; I’d only been in secondary education a week and I’d settled in well, making new friends. Then it all came crashing down thanks to a kid called Alan Walters.

   ‘Nice pose, fatso.’ Everyone laughed. Alan Walters was a big chap for his age, chunky and powerful. He already had spots and the gravely voice we lads craved. Even though I can laugh at it now, I felt humiliated.

   Convinced that I was hideous because of my size, I started to withdraw. I was still bullish and confident, but every day my reserves were draining. When I saw the photo, I cried, and begged my Mum not to buy it.

   ‘But why? You look lovely!’ she protested, and bought loads of them anyway.

   I knuckled down to work, knowing that I would never attract girls because of my looks alone. I made lots of girlfriends, but significantly they remained just friends, a state of affairs that dogged me well into adult life.

   Then, I met Katherine. She was statuesque and blonde. There were no statuesque blond girls at my primary school. She was the first girl I can remember who got me excited, not in a sexual way, but beyond just chatting about Saved By The Bell.

   Thing was, Katherine and me were not suited. She was outgoing, whereas I was getting shyer by the day. She seemed old, whereas my development was arrested. And crucially, I couldn’t find it within myself to talk to her.

   So, she remained an object of lust far beyond my reach, teasing me without knowing it. The bigger her smile, the bigger the tear in my gut seemed to be. The more I saw her talking to others, the more my heart ached. I’d never felt like this before, so what should I do?

   There was only one solution. Ask her out.

   This was easier said than done. When I was at primary school, I was confused by the concept of asking somebody out. The phrase suggested that you had to actually go somewhere, and I got 50p a week pocket money, and had to ask permission to cross main roads (a year earlier, I’d been badly beaten by some kids at the end of the street simply because I thought I’d be shouted at if I crossed the road without someone coming to collect me.)

   Luckily, our school used to run a club every Thursday night. It was held in the same hall, Whitman, it was 50p in, it sold Coke and sweets and played pop music. Everyone went, except me. So I asked to go, and duly dolled myself up in a shirt, slicked and parted hair, and snazzy black jeans.

   I was cool. This would work.

   I attracted a few looks when I got there, and stood in the middle of the floor swaying to Right Said Fred with a can of Fanta. I spotted Katherine, and I started to pulse with fright – how was I going to do this? She was already at the dancing round the handbag stage!

   Then the DJ decided it was time for a slow dance, and put Bryan Adams onto the decks. As soon as that damn chicken-in-a-basket piano motif rang out, it signalled the pairing off of the popular girls and boys.

   Katherine paired off with a lad called Chris Clayton, who only had one testicle (he told someone in confidence that he was born on an Army base in Germany too, and it wasn’t long before he had the inevitable nickname ‘Hitler.’) I slunk off into the shadows, watching in pain.

   The song ended. I could do nothing as I watched Clayton, wearing an oversized novelty ‘I’m Too Sexy’ t-shirt, lead Katherine to two chairs at the side, and snog her to within an inch of her life. It felt like somebody had taken my heart, sliced it open down one side, and then used it to make a fortune teller.

   I quietly put down my half-full can, walked outside to the bike sheds, waited an hour in the biting cold, and then phoned my father to come and pick me up. When I arrived home, my mother was shampooing the carpet and watching Absolutely Fabulous.

   ‘Good time?’ she asked.

   ‘Yeah, ace.’

Katherine stayed on until sixth-form, like me. Alan Walters dropped out in fourth year, after fulfilling his promise to be a total idiot. Katherine and I hardly spoke throughout our time at school, so it would never have worked, but I still remember that night when it seems like my whole skeleton caught fire. It didn’t make rejection easier, but it got the first time out of the way and kicked me closer to getting older. In a way, it was a good thing. But given the choice, I’d much rather have spoken to my goddess Katherine in Whitman Hall than a charmless pea-brain called Alan.