SNAPSHOTS by Bill Jervis

I'd had enough of walking and sweating in hot sunshine. Leaving my wife, who wanted to go shopping, I headed for Brighton Pier, and a shaded deckchair for a quiet time reading. I'd glanced at the photos in my book and was just about to start reading the text, when I was interrupted by a voice saying, "I see you've got a book there about Morecambe."

Occupying the space next to me was a man in a wheelchair and it was he who had spoken. He was bent forward like a question mark, his knees covered by a blanket despite the heat of the day. It was obviously an effort for him to lift his head to look at me when I answered him, "Yes, I came across it in a bookshop this morning. And as I lived near Morecambe as a lad, I thought I'd buy it. Do you know the place?"

"Oh yes," he replied. "Not recently of course but during the war, I was there for quite a long time."

I'd had my first good look at his face while he was speaking and it gave me a shock. I had to try hard not to look away or show any surprise: it was the face of a very old man and it had been badly burned. His flesh was like raw, streaky bacon, the nose a clown's stuck-on one, his lips the wrong shape and not the right colour. His face was just like a mask but his voice was pleasant.

He pointed to his disfigurements and went on, "I hadn't had these burns long when I ended up in Morecambe. I was a tail-gunner in a Lancaster and lucky to get out alive when she set on fire and we had to bail out.They did what they could for me then they sent me to the Midland Hotel near the Promenade Station to recuperate. There was a lot of us there but it wasn't a hotel in 1942, it was a hospital."

My mind went back to the years of my boyhood and I remembered seeing numerous mutilated airmen, strolling along the prom.They wore light blue uniforms and distinctive red hospital ties; it was hard to associate the realities of war and their suffering, with the eagerness of the crowds trying to get close to and view a glamorous and exciting fighter plane, a Spitfire, which was parked for a while quite close to the hospital, near the Super Swimming Stadium.

All of this was 60 years ago and me only a boy then, just old enough for my mother to let me go off with my friends into Morecambe. I told the old boy about how I'd first learned to swim that very same year, 1942, off the rocks, next to the Stone Jetty, near the Midland Hotel. "When the tide was in," I said.

"Some tide that," he recalled, "coming in as fast as a man could run. On nice days, I'd sit outside watching it. Not much else to do. Just waiting to feel better. And wasn't I lucky, 'cos I did get better, eventually. Some didn't you know, poor lads!" He paused, shaking his head slowly, sadly. "Aye, you came there in an ambulance and if you were unlucky, you left in one too. But I left by train, the boat train from Heysham, all the way to Euston in London. My dad met me there and took me home.

"Funny thing you talking about learning to swim," he added. "It was something I'd never done until that same year, all part of my therapy."

I remembered how I'd only gone in the cold sea that June because my mates dared me to. I hated it in because I used to feel the cold, my flesh would go white and I'd shiver uncontrollably. "I'll bet you were warmer in your pool than I was in the tide. I was always first out even that day when I was proud of my first few dog-paddling strokes.I got dressed quickly on the rocks then went and sat in the sun on the prom., with my legs over the edge, waiting for my mates.There was one of your lot, in his uniform, sitting just behind me. He had a girl with him and he had his arm round her."

The man in the wheelchair was staring straight at me attentively as I went on, "The girl called out to me. We weren't worried about talking to strangers in those days, so I went to see what she wanted. I thought that I might be able to cadge a toffee or maybe a cap badge off him. We didn't have many sweets during the war and cap badges and buttons off uniforms were in great demand, we all collected them then. Anyway, I went over to this couple sitting there. She had a box camera, a Kodak Brownie and she..."

At this point, the old boy interrupted me, "Don't tell me! I know what she did. She asked you to take a photo didn't she?

I nodded.

He continued, "Told you how to use the camera didn't she? How to be careful with it because films were scarce as gold dust."

It was amazing: I realised that this old boy had been the bloke with his arm around the girl! It was some coincidence! Our second meeting after 60 years: two old codgers talking excitedly on Brighton Pier.At last,I found words, "Did the photo come out alright?"

He fumbled in the inside pocket of his linen jacket, found his wallet and extracted a photograph."You bet your life it did!. Here! Look!"

Dumbly, I took it and saw there the young girl with him, a real good-looker she was, in her short, flowery, summer dress, with her pageboy hairstyle, her slim figure, her smile, the kind expression on her face. She had seemed old to me then, incredibly young to me now.

"Aye," he said, "it came out alright! We were married for 53 years. We got spliced in Morecambe in 1943, but always lived down south. Yes, Morecambe was good to me, that's why I was interested when I saw your book. I hope life's been good to you too. I've been a very lucky man."

He went quiet, still looking at his photo, after I handed it back, having a bit of a cry he was.

I reopened my book and read undisturbed, until a pretty young thing, the spitting image of the girl in the photo, arrived."Alright grandad? Had a nice chat?" she asked him. She smiled at me. "Time to get back now."

Skilfully, she manoeuvred the wheelchair past my legs."

"Hang on a minute," he urged her, holding out a hand to me. I grasped it and a strong feeling flowed between us, coming from recollections of briefly shared times past. Then he held out the photo, "Here, take it," he said, "it's a copy; the original's at home."

"Thanks," I muttered. "Thanks a lot, friend!"

She wheeled him away and as they went, he called back, "Don't forget me!"

"I never have," I shouted back.

Just then, my wife arrived. "Who was that?" she asked.

"Oh just someone, I met once, in Morecambe, a long time ago."

This story is © 2002 . Please contact the writer if you wish to use it in publication.