The Whistling Wind Chapter 13: It Happens.

It was like a freshly made snowman with a cold, uncaring concern. I told her, ‘It was over between us.’

Cruel, I know that now. I was unsure if the child was mine, and I had just met another woman, Beverly Carter. Beverly lived in Longsight with four other sisters, a lovely mother, and a niece.

She worked for a company in Ardwick, and we met at a packed house party a few weeks earlier in Moss Side. Beverly had a soft persona like a bed of red petals.

Her soft hands reflected a generous heart; she was beautiful and had a subtle manner in her personality and a laugh a minute.

When we first encountered each other, Beverly stood alone in the packed house. I offered her a drink, which she was more than happy to accept; we danced the dance, talked the talk, went for a walk and strolled in the Recreation Park on Great Western Street.

The warm, crisp summer air came with the whistling wind in the bright dawn light. The gentle breeze blew in her Nubian hair, and her perfume smelled of a sweet rose, or was it fragrant lavender oil?

We exchanged numbers, kept in contact, and later became close friends. At eighteen, my father asked me, ‘Can I come to your house to see your mother?’

He intended to start a relationship with my mother; all kids wanted from their parents was to be together, which he played on. We walk into some relationships that we want to run away from. Who said society is correct to say, ‘One should work on a relationship.’

You tell them that when they’ve been beaten up, used, and abused. After many times, my father asked, I thought, ‘There could be a chance.’

Subsequently, I approached my mother; she was against the idea but came around to my way of thinking. My mother added, ‘It was okay, as long as you were there.’

When my father came to my house, I left them both talking at the front door while I watched TV in the living room. A few moments passed when I heard my mother’s cry of agony, pain, and distress, ‘Ah, oh my God, FITZROY.’

I dashed out, horrified, as if I were running out of a house that was on fire, to see my mother covering her head and face with both hands. My father’s hand was raised to hit my mother; I ran over to my father and gave him a right-hand punch to his left cheek.

As I did that, I began to push my father away from the front door and down the garden path. My father turned around and ran out onto the road.

I gave chase to see one of his legs reach out to kick me. I caught his foot, pushed him to the floor, gave him four kicks to his head, one for every member of my family, and warned him away from my mother’s home.

Then I felt a sudden jolt forward, a firm grip grabbed hold of my body, engulfing my arms like a big, bad grizzly bear. It was Charlie Monroe, my mother’s neighbour, a doorman for the big city clubs and pubs, embracing my body from behind.

He whispered in my ear, as if he were the silent whirl of the whistling wind, ‘Calm down, Fitz, calm down.’

I was in control and composed; to calm the situation, Charlie held me firmly, picked me up, and swung me away from my father, similar to a construction crane.

It did not give me much comfort doing that to my father, but I could never see my mother feel pain from anyone inflicting misery, harm, and distress.

That summer, when I met Beverly, the first woman of three ladies I’ve had the pleasure of living with, and my longest relationship to date, eleven years on and off. My relationship with women isn’t meant to be a kiss-and-tell.

Life isn’t much of a life unless it revolves around sex and the one you love; it’s just a part of my life. There have been many women I have loved as lovers; I’ve loved every one of those loves in different ways.

Women who know I’m with my queen, women who have a king. It makes me wonder, and then I conclude that some women and many men lie to themselves.

They often go against what they believe is a natural, paired love. Something we deny when the statistics suggest society is not naturally conforming to what we think within Christian, Islamic, and many other cultures that endorse marriage values between two people.

Instead of concentrating their love, concerns, and responsibility on the child. My son was born on December 19, 1985, and by January 2, 1986, my mother told me, ‘It’s time you leave home; you’re not contributing enough of your wages.’

By now, I’d already done one or two government schemes for little or no money. I worked in the catering industry as a canteen cook and a commis chef, which was part of the training.

At the same time, I was participating in the Youth Training Scheme and the Youth Opportunity Program at the University of Manchester. Still, I was receiving benefits when my mother said, ‘I must leave.’

I was starting a new catering job in the morning, and my mother wanted all of my wages. At the time, my benefit was the only source of income I had: £49 every two weeks.

What my mother was asking for sounded unreasonable, so I left.

Upon leaving my mother’s home, I walked, lost in my mind. The whistling wind churned around my thoughts like a whirlwind of confusion, and I was as penniless as Charlie Chaplin.

I carried a brown leather suitcase with little inside. Just a few clothes were all I had, and I had nowhere to go.