In the doctor's warm surgery, Martin's legs tightened around each other. When he'd sort of told his mother, Julie, she'd made the appointment. He knew she'd be waiting outside, fingers twitching, stomach burning. But this was something he needed to talk about alone, just him and the doctor. Then he didn't know how to begin and for a moment felt it was all a mistake, just a big fantasy that disappears when you turn the light on, all of it.


Rectangular plastic glasses, tartan tie, soap smelling hands, the doctor smiled professionally.

“Well Martin, how can I help you?”

The doctor, Julie said, gave away too many pills, but apart from that he was supposed to be a nice man.

“MYFRIENDSATSCHOOLHAVEGOTTWOBALLSANDI'VE ONLY…GOT ONE.”

The square middle aged head took it in; the clean hands removed the glasses, the eyes focused.

“One ball, I see, well perhaps I should have a look, jump up here on the table.”

The doctor immediately found the missing testicle, Martin's undescended right testicle.

“Well, you have two…balls…Martin…one's right here.” He pressed the bulge at the base of Martin's abdomen.

“OWWW.”

“See?”

“What?”

“I think I need to speak to your mother about your testicle, I think we might need to admit you to hospital.”

“Hospital!”

“Yes, look, don't worry, shall I call your mum?”

Martin felt his face doing the drained fish, that weird numb thing in his lips when he knew he was about to freak out. He wasn't ready for this.

The doctor turned, crossed his legs.

“Well hang on a sec, let's have a chat.”
Nervously, Martin mirrored the doctor, crossing his own legs, his fingers resting lightly on the red hot eruptions, the early acne and unpopped pimples around his face. He wore his grey, shiny school uniform. His black hair was long, abandoned, grease and dryness intertwining. His blue, dark, handsome eyes gave clue to the man he might become if his thirteen year old body should survive the endless diet of chips, milk and Mars Bars. He smelt of urine. The doctor had taken all of this in and, knowing this boy's mother, felt little surprise.

“How are you feeling, in general I mean?”

“Dunno, tired, bit sick.”

The doctor felt the memory of Julie's mental illness, her obsessions. He pictured Martin's house as a giant rubber stamp whose imprint the boy, any boy, could do little to avoid.

“It's not unusual, this ball problem, easy to fix.”

“DON'T FUCKING TELL ME IT'S NORMAL COS IT'S FUCKING NOT ALRIGHT!” Martin heard the silence outside, knew his mum heard him shout. If he didn't tell her, the doctor was going to… Christ… the whole world knowing about his dodgy gear bag. Shit, he felt his chin, the spots had split, dabs the size of pencil rubbers, blood and gunk on his fingers. The doctor passed some cotton wool.

“We should talk about your skin perhaps?”

Martin wanted to do that and wanted to tell this quack to fuck off and wanted to hug him and run out of the room at the same time. Instead he collapsed, right there in the chair, crumpled, tears and pus and blood mixing as he wiped the back of his hand across his face. Outside, he could imagine Julie crying too, licking her lips, checking her fingers, licking her lips.

The doctor moved his three-wheeled leather chair closer to Martin, placed his right hand on his shoulder.

“Tell me Martin, what is it?”
Martin wiped his mouth and nose, a sticky drying short waterfall of mucous. He borrowed more tissues, shook, doing his best to straighten up that part of his battlefield face.

“It's fucked. I haven't got any friends now. When I go outside, I dunno, I get frightened, I keep thinking…”

“What Martin?”

“I'm going to be locked up.”

“Why should that happen?”

“ 'Cos I can't think straight. I stink. I'm not normal am I?”

Martin felt sick, felt he was going to be sent to a witch doctor, that's what Julie called them, then he'd end up in the mental wards like she had…fucking hell. Suddenly he really wanted to run, regretting he'd told the doctor anything.

The doctor fought the sense of loss, his own failure, the guilt, thinking of the number of drugs he'd used on Julie, doing all he could to rein in her psychosis and the heavy, deathly depressions. He had failed - well, no - he couldn't force treatments on her, but perhaps if he'd spent more time with her, just talking, listening….

“Don't worry Martin, it's ok, I, look, perhaps you could come and see me from time to time, just for a chat.”

“Yeah, but don't-”

“Tell mum? Ok, deal.”

The boy walked into the waiting room, Julie jumped up at the sight of him.
“Martin, are you alright?”

“Yep.”

The doctor called her in, winking at Martin who as he walked down the stairs, heard his balls being mentioned.

Out on the street, he felt better. After a few minutes, in a darkened glass shop front across the road he saw the reflection of Julie, leaving the surgery, walking up the overgrown path towards him. Today, for this visit to the doctor, she had her long, thick, brown hair curled and tightened into the small bun that Martin always thought looked really painful. She wore her long black dress with the red and white roses. She was pretty, her skin was smooth, she wore bright red lipstick. Often there was that twist in her face, around her mouth, the talking she did to herself that he hated. But right now she seemed normal. Martin watched her summer sky blue eyes, her smile. She might be nuts but he knew she loved him. He didn't fight her hug, didn't care if anyone saw her brushing her fingers though his hair.

“Don't worry, it's an easy operation Martin.”

“You think so?”

“Definitely, the doctor isn't even a bit worried about it. C'mon, I'll buy you something.
*
He knew his mother's mind, with its many voices, was haunted, and that she saw evil everywhere. In the garden, in the cornflakes. She'd warned Martin about it. Sometimes, clacking his rusted bike up the street on the early morning paper run, in the fog, he thought he saw it. The way it wrapped around the tops of trees, swam beneath the road in the mud and shit. Turning the soil for the new flowers, digging a trench as deep as a grave, she'd told him…it'll be ok though, just pray and they'll go away.

Martin had supposed she was talking about the people in her head, the voice people. Once, when he was really little and it had seemed funny, he'd wanted to talk to them. Now he was too frightened. What if they were in his head too?
She made Martin and his older sister, Helen, sit at the front at Mass, up at the side altar, Our Lady's Altar. Trapped in the constant fear of Julie having one of her weird turns, they went along with it, which meant they spent whole services looking sideways at the priest or forwards at the lovely, pastel blue and cream robed statue of the Virgin Mary.
She had a system in her mind to connect with the powers in heaven. It took hours sometimes for her just to leave the house, checking heaters, taps, keys, money, the knobs on the oven, twisting them dangerously tight. Where they all sat in church was strung tightly to that song in her head. Martin didn't really care where he sat, but when the theatre began and the priest staggered through the aisles swinging his incense, his sister lost it. Every time. Her eyes rolled and THUD down she went, fainting in some kind of toxic incense syndrome. They dragged her, a wounded soldier, to the back of the church. Every single week. Martin could time it to the second, a few clicks of the swinging incense and down she'd go.
A few months before his visit to the doctor, Martin had let himself be rostered on as an altar boy. That'd been ok for a while. He kept telling himself that it would keep Julie happy. But the more he saw on the altar the shonkier it felt. Like miracle number one, wine into blood. He stood at the side altar with two dishes, one filled with red wine, the other with tap water. The priest blessed the dish of wine. That was the beginning of the miracle as far as Martin could ever make out, it was meant to happen somewhere between that blessing and when it ended up in the TABERNACLE. They blessed the wine and it started the blood journey. The priest poured it into the chalice, drank out of that, washed his hands, and then turned around like a magician.
He took it for a while, but he was up there, right on stage, and not once did he see wine turn into blood. It got to him. They'd drilled him enough to know what symbolism meant, but this priest said it was really happening. One day Martin felt the pressure, his face flushing red, that moment when he knew he was going to say or do something stupid, or brave, bring attention to himself, up off his knees, cassocks ripping-
“EXCUSE ME, I'M SORRY BUT THERE'S BEEN A MISTAKE. I DON'T THINK THE MIRACLE WORKED.”
Simple, straight down the line honesty.
There'd be a gasp, THUD, Helen hits the dirt and just as they drag her away someone does a Hollywood, comes running up the middle of the church screaming that Martin or the priest be hanged from the closest tree. Everyone starts singing 50's style, dancing and sliding across the polished floor. It's an extravaganza, clouds, curtains, dancing girls, then …STOP… with squinty nervous eyes the priest limps to the tabernacle.
But no, Martin couldn't do it. That's when he knew his days as an altar boy were numbered. That's also when he knew he had to do something about his balls.
*
A windless evening, mild expectation, a ribboned blue grey dusk. Only one week before his operation, Martin made his way to the train station. Julie was missing again. She'd been found there the time before, staring into space.

“Hey Martin, alright then?”

“Yeah, just looking for mum.”

“Go on then, haven't seen her.”

The station guard let him through the barrier.

There were four raised platforms running from a long tunnel. Martin searched, listening for any clue. For a second, looking down over the streets, he felt the strange flush. As the long twilight disappeared along the lines he sensed something, more than all of this. Then someone opened a pub door, turning to look back inside. A three second juke box laughing surge and Martin immediately knew where to find Julie.

Through rough frosted glass, he watched the figures swim. Dull lights flashed, red and blue, cymbals crashed,

wo wo wooaaa.

Julie wrestled, a new friend on one arm, a tall thin doorman on the other, each shouting their own urgent message above a sudden Elvis number. Martin waved at her from the doorway. She suddenly stopped. Her hair was loose, a few strands across her face were stuck, wet from dancing. She was wearing tight, faded jeans, a sweat soaked white t shirt. Her large nipples, powerful erotic magnets, seemed to hypnotise the men around her. She shook them away.

“What do you want?”

He recognised this tightrope Julie, ready to fall any second.

“Mum?”

One of the men turned,

“Your boy?”

“Yes.”

Dance music began. The crowd in the pub screamed, the dance floor filled. Julie smiled, swayed. Just slightly, her eyes rolled. A hand reached for her, she disappeared. Martin let the pub door close and waited. He knew how it'd probably go: her refusing to come home with him, saying what was wrong with him…can't I go out and enjoy myself from time to time?

It still confused Martin though. For all he knew it might be the Evil Woman voice talking. He could never really know. If it wasn't Evil Woman it might be Jane Mansfield, Grace Kelly, Jackie Kennedy….

He sat on a wall, watched the pub door.
*

Martin felt the panic, his gut tightening, the trapped ball exploding, about to explode, any second.

Operation.

He woke, vomiting and farting. When the anaesthetic wore off and no one seemed to be around he checked to see who, what, he know was. It was a mess. A few days later he tried walking up the ward but they'd stitched his scrotum to his leg, to the inside of his thigh, to give his missing ball a bit of breathing space. He walked like a geisha. When they cut the cord he felt the air gushing through, the sounds of waterfalls, just a quick walk up the ward and he couldn't help himself, the orchestra winding up, he felt it, really felt it, he was Julie Andrews and he was skipping across the top of a mountain side THEHILLLLSS ARE ALIIIVVVVEEE WITH THE SOUND OF MUSIC…total euphoria. A boy with two free balls, starting to run.
*
Dawn and night stretched apart, an elastic band of mist and fragmented city sounds. Train wheels over track rivets, empty milk bottles, rubbish trucks. One month after his operation they walked quickly, dry breath, to the end of their street. Gentle chemicals massaged the anxieties that rode, even so early, through Julie's mind. They were late for Mass but she didn't seem to care. For the first time, in years, Martin had taken a morning shower. They'd done a deal: if he'd have his operation, washed everyday, she'd take her medication.

“Hang on Martin.”

At the top of the hill they reached the wide open spaces, the vegetable allotments. Julie wanted to stop.

“Mum, we'll be late.”

“Who cares?”

Relieved to hear this, Martin halted, resting the dirty laundry basket against a bench.

“Why don't we go to the laundry first, then Mass?” She smiled at him.

“Ok, why not.”

They sat on the bench overlooking a gradually sloping urban farm about the size of one and a half football fields. Neat rows of mostly well kept beans, potatoes, cabbages, beetroots, weeds and herbs all growing behind a fence.

“I love it here.” Her voice was soft.

“Why don't you get a space mum?”

“I'm in the queue.”

“I didn't know that.”

“As long as no one bosses me around.”

“If they did you could poison their plots.”

They laughed.

“Mum….”

Julie was standing, brushing fluff and dust from the back of her dress.

“Come on then Martin, time for the washing”

“Ok.”

They took the road past the community centre with the ripped Self Defence for Women poster hanging off its notice board, down through an alley, ignoring dog shit, condoms, then out into the main street, to the laundry. Martin didn't know why he suddenly felt nervous, maybe because Julie was getting well and he didn't want to upset her. But he came out with it as they passed through the alley.

“Mum, I don't believe in God anymore.”

She was ahead of him, watching for broken bottles. The squeaky rusty trolley wheels, the train and traffic noise rounding the alley walls. Maybe she hadn't heard. She said nothing.

As usual, they were alone in the laundry. Martin unloaded the clothes and the sheets from the basket into the round tub. She'd heard him.

He flicked through the magazines, held up one of the fashion glossies.

“Want this?”

She smiled, shook her head.

“You don't have to, it's up to you.

“Sorry?”

“God.”

Martin blushed, glad but scared to be disappointing her.

“I used to mum, but…I don't know, it's not real or something.”

“How long have you felt like that?”

“Dunno, while.”

Julie sighed and then laughed softly,

“I know how you feel.”

“Yeah, but-”

“God? Something about it. Some days I hate him, it, blame it for all my voices. But then other times it helps.”

“Why should it?”

“Don't know.”

They're silent. Julie speaks.

“Do you think I'm alright, better now?”

“Definitely.”

“I know it sounds silly, but I miss it a bit.”

“What?”

“Checking everything, going over and over, it's me, part of me. I even miss…them…sometimes.”

“The voices! I thought you hated them.”

“Did I? Maybe.”
Her stare unsettled him. Her eyes, clear, beautiful this morning, seemed to freeze. She turned away.

“Some of it the doctor says is chemicals. I can't say for every reason why, exactly, but I…”

“What?”

“I'm frightened, I worry about things I've done. Will God punish me.”

Martin, like most sons, couldn't picture his mum ever doing anything that bad. She turned to him again.

“When I was twelve the Germans were bombing our part of London so we were sent to go and live in a small village called Denny, in Scotland.” Julie laughed, put her hand on Martin's knee.

“Honestly, right then I loved God so much; I wanted to be a nun.”

“You, a nun!”

“I know, anyway, that meant, I decided, that I had to go to church every day, the early mass before school, so I had to catch the first bus. But one morning I couldn't find my purse so I had to walk home. It was still dark but I decided to take a short cut through the woods.”

“Not very safe.”

“I wasn't worried because, I know it sounds daft, but I thought I was a deer. I sensed something when I walked in the woods, but I knew I was invisible, an invisible deer so it was ok. But then, I can remember clearly, even now.”

Suddenly Martin didn't want to hear it.

“I saw a light at the end of a cigarette. I started running but he ran after me and he-”

Martin turned away to watch the laundry spinning heavily, clumping from one side of the machine to the other.

“He…touched me…assaulted me. I thought I was going to die and I screamed and screamed but he put his hand on my mouth and it was a terrible smell, but thank…God…a postman heard and came over and the man ran away.”

“Were you alright?”

“The next bit was the hardest. They got me home and I couldn't understand why mum kept asking me that question:

'Did he touch you.

Did he touch you.

Did he touch you?'

“I thought what a stupid question it was, of course he touched me. Then we had to make a statement at the police station.”

She smiled at Martin, “I remember it so well, the seats were cold and all the men had clean shiny nails and blue uniforms. They had looks in their eyes which made me feel nervous. When they were asking me more stupid questions I suddenly remembered. My ribbons, my new blue ponytail ribbons. They were gone, he'd ripped them off. They were still there. In the woods. That was all I could think of, it didn't matter what they said. They didn't say it but I think they thought I was stupid because I wouldn't answer their questions properly. All I could think about were my ribbons. The next thing was that twelve men were lined up.”

“An I.D parade?”

“Yes. He was there, the man with the smelly hand. But there was another man too who I thought looked more horrible. I hated his eyes. So, I…”

“What?”

“God, I chose him, even though-”

“Mum.”

“What did I, but they said I could choose who I wanted didn't they?”

They both sat in silence, Martin lost in his world of thinking about Julie as a girl about his age. He barely heard her.

“I've never forgiven myself, I thought God hated me then Martin. I know what you've, I mean, he had to hate me to do that, I must've been so bad.”

“You're not, no way mum, you were only a girl.”

“But we're all sinners.”

“No we're not.”
“No, we're not.” They both laughed, nervously defiant.

“I…”

“Hang on.”

Martin took the tangled clothes from the machine, piled them into a red plastic basket, carried them to a drier, tipped them in and slotted the money. They were still alone in the laundry. He stood with his hands in his pockets. Julie glanced from side to side before lighting a cigarette.

“What were you…?”

“I decided that I needed help and I had this small Our Lady figure so I decided to believe in her and she could pass on my, um-”

“Messages”

“To God, yeah.” Julie smiled.

“And enquiries.”

They both giggled, felt as if they were getting away with something they'd never done before.

“I didn't, I still don't properly know, how to make up for it.”

“You know what I did once?”

“What?”

“I sort of by accident stole some sweets from a shop coming home, but I felt so bad I threw them away and then I dropped the money they were worth on the train track.”

“Why?”

“To make up.”

“Who to?”

“God.”

“Mmm.”

“Silly.”

“Mmm. When we got back to London, Our Lady was the only person I could talk to because I wasn't allowed to talk about what happened. But it got worse because the bombing was really serious and everything happened.”

“What?”

Julie smiled, blushed, “You know, girl things, my period and…hair…everywhere. Honestly they didn't tell me anything so, honestly, I thought, it sounds so silly, but I thought,” now Martin blushed, but liked the way Julie was being with him now, “I thought God was punishing me, turning me into a monkey.”

“Mum.”

“Honestly! Then one day the bombs were so close so we had to run for the shelter but I forgot my scissors. Our home was hit but I prayed to Our Lady, if she let me find the scissors I'd be better. I ran back and got them, but the planes were coming in low and actually machine gunning people in the streets, but Martin-”, Julie covered her mouth, wiped her left eye,

“I put my brolly up, I knew it would be-”

“What, like it was raining or something?”

“Yep, I made it through though”.

“Mum, you're mad.”

“Look, remember this?”

Julie took a biscuit sized, flat, Virgin Mary from her handbag.

“I remember, you still got it.”

“You remember?”

Martin held it. Remembered his head on his mother's thighs as she'd read to him.
He'd been holding the Mary and she was telling him about the people after Jesus, what they did, where they died, how they died. He remembered understanding that day that there was probably a dog and cat heaven, that it didn't matter if you were no good at anything, that, something about the saints. But then there was nothing, no resting and talking like that with his mum again. She fell.

“Martin?”

Martin looked at his watch,
“Mum, we're still in time to get to the second half of Mass.”

“Do you want to go?”

“Do you?”

“Why not.”
*
By now, of course, it was just Martin and Julie, God's weekly violent hypnosis having destroyed Helen's belief…the scars and bruises on her shoulders, hips, the back of her head, the two chipped teeth when she'd gone forward instead of sideways one particularly bad Sunday. Eventually she'd had enough.

They entered the church, facing a gallery of devout backs in raincoats, jackets, suits, jumpers and best shirts. The priest had just finished with the Gospels. At that moment of medi-tative silence, even through the glass partition, their rusted trolley wheels squeaked too loudly. A few turned. Martin gestured his apology, to Julie's amazement, by acting out a cartoon style tip toeing with the basket heaved onto his back.

Bewildered, distracted, the worshippers turned to the front once again. As was her habit, Julie headed for the side atrium. Before she'd passed two pews, Martin whispered, “Mum?”

She turned. He gestured to the spaces on the bench closest to the back of the church. This was a test. He saw Julie hiding a shudder as the devout ones glanced sideways at her. She nodded. Martin smiled. For the first time, ever, they sat at the back.

As they settled in, the priest began his sermon. Martin let his attention wander, taking in the different ears, hairstyles, fidgets, daydreamers. Julie stared at the bench ahead, her hands resting on her lap, palms up. As Martin turned to the priest again, he felt a sense of joy, there'd been no sign of Julie's usual Mass finger ritual, the constant counting and checking of each digit, having to press the thumb over and over.

Martin guessed the priest would probably explain this change in Julie as some kind of sign or a gift from God. He pictured the tablets in the kitchen cupboard. Julie turned to him, caught his smile, smiled in return. They were both far away from the priest's monologue. In his mother's eyes Martin caught a warmth, an extra step they'd just taken. Somehow he'd allowed her to forgive herself, at least pouring some of it away. When he was brave enough he'd tell her more about the things he'd felt and seen, the sex stuff he needed to talk to her about.

“AND LAZARUS…,” an accidental boom in the microphone. They turned back, the story of the bandaged dead man once again.

“Mum,”

Julie leant over.

“Look”

“What?”

He reached for the laundry basket that sat between them, pulled back the blue plastic weather top, pointed to the loosely folded, warm, fresh smelling laundry.
“Lazarus!” Julie spurted, spat loudly in laughter, and covered her face with her hands. The worshippers ahead turned.
*
The priest raised his arms, “Go in peace, the mass is ended.”

And they were the first out of there. A crowd built at the church entrance as a storm suddenly broke. Hard rain, the type that splinters, blinds small dogs. Everyone waited, a few adjusting their umbrellas. Martin and Julie led them all out, Martin pulling the trolley, Julie on his arm.

“Mum…bullets”

“Don't!”

They sheltered for a few moments beneath a railway arch, deafened by the smooth slow weight of a train entering the station above them. Martin saw the small girl, Julie, skipping towards a forest. It took his breath.

---

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