A Walk Along the Promenade - 1. Scene One, A Seaside Promenade in Summer, Part 1

Shaun sat down on the wooden bench with a sigh of relief and stretched out his left leg against the pain, it was still another hour before he could have his next pain killer. It was the same dull, throbbing pain that he always got in his leg, but this evening it seemed to have arrived extra early. It was barely seven o’clock and already his leg was throbbing so much that he had to sit and rest. His planned walk along the promenade was now out of the question.

He’d taken the cliff railway down here from his hotel a little over an hour and a half ago. He’d found himself attracted to the cliff railway out of more than just a practical need. Yes, it did provide him with an easy and quick way down to the promenade and the beach beyond it from his hotel, perched up there at the very top of the cliffs, but it also brought out a childhood excitement within him, and that did not happen often.

The cliff railway was a Victorian thing of wonder. The two railway tacks ran down the cliff face at forty-five degrees, while the two railway cars perched on either track. The cars themselves were designed to run at this angle, car’s front wheels were much longer than the rear wheels, so enabling the car’s green body to remain level as it slid down the cliff. The two cars were linked by a cable, pulled by an electric motor under the top station building, Shaun could hear its labouring noises as he started his decent, so as one car moved slowly down the cliff the other car rose up the cliff on the adjacent track. It was a simple and basic thing and yet it had brought out a moment of childhood wonder in Shaun, every time he used it. It also saved him a difficult walk down to the promenade and an impossible walk back up again.

He’d sat on this bench because it was the first one he’d found when the pain in his leg became too much to bear and he had to stop walking. It was the same as all the other benches spaced out along the promenade, it was made from wooden planks forming the seat and back, while cast iron ends held it in shape, the cast iron ends actually forming the shape of a seat. The benches were placed along the edge of the pavement but all faced out towards the sea, with their backs to busy road of traffic that ran alongside the promenade. Shaun sat there now and looked out at the view of the sea filling up the natural bay the town of Scarborough was built around, though most of the town was perched on the cliff side that rose sharply up from the bay, as a natural protection to the bay.

The tide was now pushing the sea up the beach, wave after wave, covering up the white sand that had offered an open playground for children only a few hours before. At first Shaun had watched the tide creeping up the beach, the next wave stretching further up the beach than the last one, he’d always been told that staring at the sea could hypnotise you, and he so wanted a distraction from the pain in his leg. But that wasn’t true, he hadn’t been hypnotised, just the sight of the sea water making him think about how awkward his walk to the cliff railway was going to be.

He’d come down to the promenade for his evening meal, his hotel only supplied breakfast, any other meal was extra, so he’d had to find a restaurant each night for his evening meal. Tonight, he had fancied a fish and chip supper, he was at the seaside, and yesterday he’d seen a fish and chip restaurant along the promenade, so he returned there tonight. The food had been good, crisp chips and an even crisper batter on his fish, and all of it piping hot. His waitress had been Polish, though her English had been perfect under her thick accent. Most of the staff at his hotel seemed East European, and wherever he ate the waiting staff were East European too, the only people who seemed to speak with the local Yorkshire accents were the other tourists there. He’d wanted to ask his waitress if she was home-sick, did she miss Poland and hearing Polish being spoken, but those questions had seemed too personal for him, so he’d left her a large tip instead.

His plan for after eating had been to have a walk along the promenade, that line along the top of beach, separating it from the town, a stone and iron line drawn to show were the beach ended and the town began. It was such a Victorian thing, a promenade, something to just walk along, to be seen on and to be there to see who you could see. Now it just seemed a thing people walked along to get from one place to another. The opposite side of the promenade to the beach was lined with cheap and gaudy shops, amusement arcades, fast food take-aways, gift shops full of cheap and tacky plastic beach items. It seemed so coarse and commercial, but hadn’t the Victorians been coarse and commercial, under their veneer of respectability. His grandfather had prided himself on having “Victorian Values” and every time in reply his mother had called the old man a hypocrite. But his grandfather had been dead for over twenty years. He’d died when Shaun was eleven and he barely remembered the old man now.

His walk had been cut short by the sudden increase in the pain in his leg. It had quickly risen to such a degree that he couldn’t walk, he had to sit and wait for it to ease. Most times the pain was there but it was a dull ache in the background and he could almost ignore it, certainly with the aid of pain killers that he still needed to take. But from time to time the pain would flare up to such a high degree that all he could do was sit and wait for it to pass, or for the time to creep around until he could have his next dose of pain killers. That was what had happened tonight, suddenly the pain was too much and he’d had to stop. The pain had been dulled for most of that day and he’d been able to have a decent walk in the upper town, exploring the shops and buildings there, so tonight he’d hoped to take advantage of that and go for a walk along the curving promenade, but he had been proved wrong. His leg was now too painful and all he could do was sit there and wait for the pain to pass.

When he told his mother he was coming to Scarborough for a holiday, and in early June, she had scoffed at him, saying:

“Only coach parties and adulterers go there for a holiday. What the bloody hell do you want to go to that hole for?”

“Because I’ve never been,” he’d replied. Though the truth was he had chosen the place because there was no chance of him running into anyone he knew there, he would be a stranger there and no one would bother him.

He was staying in The Grand Hotel Scarborough, and the building matched its grand name. It was a huge Victorian hotel that didn’t just cling to the cliff top but actually rose above it, dominating the Scarborough skyline. Its exterior was impressive, row upon row of wide windows staring down at the town and beach, majestic lines and curves dominating the building, it was even crowned off with four Middle Eastern looking domes, it was so out of character with the rest of the town, which consisted of low two- and three-story buildings that clung to the cliffsides. Inside though all the opulence had long since been stripped away, even the entrance hall had been reduced and sectioned off into different rooms and functions, being replaced with a simple reception area. The hotel’s corridors were now narrow and functional and the big rooms had been cut up into a handful of smaller rooms. Shaun’s own room had been obviously been created by cutting the corner off a much larger room. The room’s single window was only half of a much larger window, tucked away in the corner of the external wall. Shaun did not mind any of this. His room was comfortable and functional, and no one in the hotel bothered him. No one asked him why he was there and what his plans were. He was left alone.

He looked up from the sea and saw a large, white seagull, perched on the iron railings that edged the beach side of the promenade. Almost the moment he’d arrived, he’d been struck by the large number of seagulls there was in Scarborough. They were everywhere and they always seemed permanently hungry, ready to swoop down on any unwary person who chose to eat in public. They seemed completely unafraid of people and would literally snatch food straight out of people’s hands. The day before, Shaun had seen a woman, stood under an open purple umbrella, as if hiding from the afternoon sun. She had been eating a bagel, slowly and meekly biting around the edge of it. In the next moment, a seagull had swept down, snatched the bagel out of the woman’s hand, and had flown off, all in the matter of a few seconds and the seagull hadn’t even knocked the umbrella out of her hand. The woman had screamed in anger but it had been too late.

This seagull was just staring at him, its black, beady eye staring straight at him, as if it was watching him, waiting on him. It was as if the seagull knew what he was planning to do. Shaun felt an uncomfortable shudder run through him. That stupid, white bird couldn’t read his mind, it was just a stupid bird and it was probably just looking for food, but it was staring at him so intensely. Then, with a load and angry squawk, the seagull spread its large wings wide, jumped into the air and flew off.

At thirty-two he had finally decided he should come out, before then he had cruised along in his life with no fixed objectives or ideals, he’d just done what was expected of him. After he’d left sixth form college, with poor A Level results, he’d gone to work for his mother’s company, who provided home carers around the region, and stayed living at home with his mother. His mother carried on being one of the main people in his life. He hadn’t questioned it then, he worked for his mother and he lived with his mother, it was just the way things were. Even though he was physically close to his mother, she was the person he spent most time with each day, both living and working with her, but he knew he wasn’t the top of her affections. That place belonged to his brother Nathan.

Nathan was six years older than him and Nathan had done everything right in his life. Nathan had left six form college and gone straight onto university, were he’d studied electronical engineering. From university Nathan had got a job with a big aeroplane manufacturer, causing him to move to Sheffield, miles away from their home. Shortly after this he’d married Jessica, his girlfriend from university. Over the following years they had two children, Eric and Poppy, who quickly became the apple of their mother’s eye. His mother doted over her grandchildren, and she would take weekend visits to Nathan’s home, in a large, private housing estate on the outskirts of Sheffield.

He’d never been close to Nathan, the six years age difference had seemed like an impassable gap, but growing up he’d quickly learnt that he was second-rate compared to Nathan. If he did something wrong, if he failed at something, if he didn’t achieve what was expected of him, his mother would complain, “Nathan would never have done that!” Soon he learnt that no matter how hard he tried he would never be as good as Nathan was. Soon he grew to hate Nathan and what Nathan stood for, the perfect son that Shaun felt he could never be.