This is my earliest memory of sex and one of only three dreams from my childhood that I can now recall with any accuracy.

∗

Joan lived a few doors down the road from us. It was when our respective mothers had been pregnant that they first became friendly with one another, so we could truly claim to have grown up together. We went to the same school, and even at this age had the reputation of being slightly on the intellectual side, which was another factor in determining the closeness of our relationship. By now not only had I made up my mind, somehow or other, that I was destined to be a writer, but my first book had already appeared, in a limited edition of one – designed, illustrated and handwritten by myself. In a narrative peppered with cheerful anachronisms, it told of several episodes from the casebook of a Victorian detective; my hero being modelled, without much regard for the restrictions laid down by copyright law, on a character from one of the many comics which formed the backbone of my reading matter during this period. Joan had literary aspirations as well: she wrote historical romances, usually concerning one or other of the wives of Henry VIII. But in my opinion – not that I would ever have been so blunt as to tell her this – her work was immature. The characterizations were thin, compared with my own, and her spelling wasn’t up to much. None the less, we enjoyed showing each other our stories.

Joan and I would often ride out to Mr Nuttall’s farm together. It was a short ride, not much more than ten minutes, and contained a fabulous stretch of road – downhill but not too steep, just enough to get a bit of speed up, take your feet off the pedals and coast forward with the wind skimming your face and rushing through your ears, sweet tears of excitement welling at the corner of each eye. Of course, riding back was a different matter. We usually had to get off and push. Being conscientious children – unnaturally so, I would think now – we knew that our parents would begin to worry about us if we were gone for more than a couple of hours, which meant that our visits at first tended to be breathless, episodic affairs. We’d take books and pens and paper and things to eat, but usually, through lack of industry, would end up spending most of our time with Harry and the animals. That’s my recollection, anyway, of how things were in the spring and early summer of 1960: before Joan and I took the momentous step of setting up house together.

A word of explanation, at this point. For some weeks now I had been keeping my eye on a cowshed which stood empty in one of the outbuildings and which was, as far as I could see, going begging. I nagged my mother about this with some persistence, until finally she caved in and made a polite inquiry as to whether it would be possible for me to use it. ‘He’s writing a book,’ she explained with reluctant pride, ‘and needs somewhere where he can get peace and quiet.’ Clearly Mrs Nuttall was quick to pass this information on to her husband, who was so impressed that he took personal responsibility for the matter: and when I next rode down to the farm and opened the heavy, rust-hinged door on to the cowshed’s dark interior, I found that my new retreat had been supplied with a desk (actually, I think, an obsolete workbench) and a little wooden chair, and that the naked bulb which hung by a wire from the roofbeams was now tastefully veiled with a faded green lampshade. And that was just the start. As the summer went on I moved all my favourite books and ornaments out of my bedroom and into this gloomy haven; Mrs Nuttall provided me with two vases and a regular supply of irises and chrysanthemums; and Harry even managed to fix up a makeshift hammock, attached to the wall in a corner of the shed by two sturdy nails which were presumed (rather cavalierly, if you ask me) to be capable of bearing the weight of my recumbent body. I had, in short, acquired a new home, and it seemed to me that no happiness could be more complete.

But I was soon to find out that it could. One morning, early in the school holidays, I arrived at the shed to discover that a white envelope had been pushed underneath the door. It was addressed to me, in my father’s handwriting. It was my first letter.

∗

The Nuttall Farm Residents’ Association,

Poultry Place,

Much Clucking in the Yard,

Cropshire.

19 July 1960

Dear Mr Owen,

May I just say, on behalf of all my fellow-residents, how delighted we are that you have decided to take up the tenancy of Mr Nuttall’s vacant cowshed.

This news has caused general rejoicing all over the farm. Some of the animals have even come out in goose-pimples, and can’t wait to come and have a gander at your new house, while the cows are simply over the moon. As for the horses, they, of course, are especially pleased to have acquired a new neigh-bour.

You may find at first that some of the smaller birds have a tendency to grouse, or even snipe. But you must bear in mind that many of these animals, far from being as educated as yourself, can only be described as pig-ignorant. In short, I hope that you won’t be cowed by any of the remarks you may have herd.

Don’t hesitate to drop round for a chat whenever you like, as my wives and I are always happy to receive visitors. We get sick and tired of being cooped up in here, as the atmosphere is positively fowl.

Yours sincerely,

Bertie Rooster

(Cock of the Walk).

∗

The next dream that I remember is the briefest of the three, but was so vivid and frightening that it had me screaming at the top of my voice until my father came running from his bedroom to quieten me. When he asked me what was wrong, all I could say was that I’d had a nightmare, in which a man had been bending over my bed, staring into my face so intently that I was sure he was going to kill me. My father sat down beside me and stroked my hair. After a while I must have fallen asleep again.

There was one other thing I might have told him – except that I didn’t really grasp it myself at the time – to explain why the dream had been so terrifying. The truth is that I had recognized the man bending over the bed. I had recognized him because it was me. It was me, as an older man, staring back at my own young self, and my face was now ravaged with age and grooved like an ancient carving with the traces of pain.

∗

Photography was one of my father’s hobbies. He had a little, leather-cased box camera and a home-made flash unit, and in lieu of a darkroom he would cover up the bathroom windows with black paper and fill the bath with developing fluid until one day he miscalculated and burned off all the enamel and my mother forbade him to use it ever again. Before that happened, though, he came down to Mr Nuttall’s farm to make a photographic record of Joan and me at the height of our domestic bliss.

Yes, we were now living together. Or at least, writing together – for I had warily agreed to embark upon a collaboration, in which my Victorian detective was to be transported back to the Tudor period in order to solve a murder mystery at the behest of Henry VIII himself. (This whole scenario, I seem to recall, was largely inspired by The Time Machine, which my father had been reading aloud to me at bedtime.) For this purpose another chair had been obtained from Mrs Nuttall, and we now sat opposite each other, writing alternate chapters and passing them back and forth along the workbench, in between breaks for refreshment and inspirational walks around the miniature garden. Needless to say, the venture was not a success: we never finished our story, and when we found ourselves reminiscing about it more than twenty years later, neither of us could remember what had become of the manuscript.