It was the last day of the school holidays. As always, I was spending it with my two best mates. As always, we had planned to head to the local park to play footie. But this was Linlithgow in August, and malevolent grey skies and torrential rain had scuppered our plans.
I opened the front door to Dean, who burst in wearing his navy Adidas cagoule, which was already soaked through and draining excess rainwater onto his saturated jeans. ‘We’ll not be going down the park then?’ he ventured.
‘Hey Deano!’ called Paul from the kitchen.
Paul lived next door, so he had arrived without any evidence of the deluge or indeed a jacket. He was happily ensconced at the kitchen table, waiting to share our Plan B with Dean.
‘We’ll just play Subbuteo instead! It’ll be cool. We can have a tournament with the three of us, and Liam’s mum has left out some juice and snacks.’
Although we were soon to begin our fifth year at high school, these simple pleasures from our younger days still proved irresistible.
My mum had gone to visit my gran, so we had the house to ourselves for a few hours. With the pitch set up on the kitchen table and a hastily scribbled schedule and score sheet, we had all we needed for our Subbuteo tournament.
Dean and I won through to the final. Both avid ‘Hoops’ supporters and unwilling to relinquish our favourite team, it was a Celtic v Celtic final. Paul, as ref, awarded a penalty in the dying minutes of the game. I crouched close to the table to get the best shot. Dean leaned over me, preparing to save my attempt. As I suddenly raised my head to shoot, he simultaneously moved down to save, resulting in a clash of teeth and heads!
Forty-five minutes later, we were waiting in A&E with my mum. Dean was white-faced with worry. I had initially thought the collision had knocked out some of his teeth. However, the blood in my hair, a feeling of wooziness, and Dean’s guilt-filled confession that he could see a ‘big gash’ in my head resulted in our appearance at St. John’s Hospital.
‘How did this happen?’ inquired the young doctor.
‘A football injury,’ I responded, truthfully.
He began to examine the gaping wound.
‘Really? It looks more like...’
‘We were playing Subbuteo,’ I interrupted, before giving the full account of my ‘football injury’ and awaiting the stitches which were sure to come.
Twenty-five years later, the firm friendship between Dean, Paul, and me remains. So does the large scar on the back of my head.