Summer of '76 Read Online Free

you’d have liked it round here back in the day.’
    ‘How’s that?’ asks Luke.
    ‘Well, we had our own nudist colony up at Woodside, when it was still just the big house. Run by Reverend something-or-other. Bare bottoms everywhere. And not all of ’em that nice to look at, I’ll bet.’
    ‘A vicar? Are you pulling our legs, Nan?’
    She looks affronted. ‘No, I’m bloody not! It only closed down ten or so years ago, before they turned all that land into the holiday camp, as if we needed another one. You ask anyone. They were supposed to stay in the paddock if they were in the altogether, but no end of ’em used to get down on the beach, frolicking about under the tamarisks!’ She giggles to herself. ‘I remember it clearly, because it all started up the year your dad was born, not long after we’d moved on to the island. Lots of the locals were up in arms about it – couldn’t believe a vicar would encourage such shenanigans! Some of the youngsters used to cycle up to the bay and stand on their saddles trying to peek over the hedges. I even heard that the lads from Ryde rowing club used to take a regular trip across the creek just to get a sneaky look on their way down to the Sloop. Well, we didn’t have all the dirty magazines in them days. Probably the first time some of ’em had seen a naked body!’
    She gives Martin a little shove across the table and the boys fall about laughing. ‘Bloody hell, Nan,’ says Luke. ‘I’ve never heard of that before. What about you and Grandad? Didn’t you ever fancy getting yourself a nice all-over tan?’
    ‘You cheeky bugger!’ she hoots, slicing them all a second piece of cake. ‘No, we did not! Mind you, I once had to give him a right bollocking, when I heard him and his daft mate Eric Stubbs had cycled down there for a look one Saturday night. Eric’s wife, well, she heard him bragging at the front gate and dragged him round here to get it out of them.’
    ‘No! What did Grandad say to you?’
    ‘Not much. He said he was so drunk at the time that all he remembered was falling into the hedge and tearing his shirt collar. He said Eric was a bleedin’ idiot for thinking they’d all still be out in the gardens at that time of night. It must’ve been midnight by the time they got up there – all the nudies were tucked up nice and cosy in their beds by then!’
    ‘I bet you were mad at him, weren’t you?’ Luke licks his finger and cleans up the crumbs from his plate.
    ‘Me? Nah. He’s just a man, after all. Anyway, talking of daft men, how’s that dad of yours? Hasn’t been over to see me in weeks – since he bought me that bloody thing over there.’ She flicks her hand towards the small fridge in the corner of the kitchen. ‘Waste of space. What do I need a fridge for?’
    Luke stacks the plates and puts them on the side. ‘You’ll be glad of it if this weather keeps up, Nan. But yeah, Dad’s fine. Looking forward to the end of term, I think. He’s always threatening to jack his job in, but you know he never will. He never stops moaning about teaching, but I think he’s glad of it when the long school holidays come round.’
    ‘He always was a lazy git.’
    ‘
Nan
.’
    ‘Well, he was.’
    Martin hides his face behind his teacup, draining every drop with his last mouthful. The sun shines through the window into his eyes and he blinks like a mole.
    ‘Actually it was him who came up with the idea of me getting a job at the holiday camp. He said he was a Bluecoat at Pontins for a while when he was my age.’
    Nan splutters. ‘A Bluecoat?’ She wipes her lashes with a crumpled lavender hanky. ‘The closest he ever got to it was a singing competition he went in for when he was nine!’
    Luke’s jaw drops. ‘He wasn’t a Bluecoat?’
    She raises her eyes theatrically. ‘
And
he came last, poor little bugger. Tone deaf.’ She eases herself out of her seat and hobbles over to the sink, where she pauses to watch the rise and fall of the