‘You’re brainwashed,’ Mum said, slamming her hand on the armrest of her wheelchair.
‘Brainwashed, damn you, brainwashed.’
I leant over and put my hand on Mum’s arm.
‘Mum, I have to go, if I don’t they’ll lock me up again, and I’ve only been out of jail for three days.’
I’d been locked up for two months in the Army Military Corrective Training Centre in Colchester and it had taken me three days since my release to travel to the Orkney Isles in Scotland.
‘I’ve got no choice Mum, I have to go back and sign the discharge papers.’
I picked up the phone and dialled WO1 Brady’s number again; the administrative officer in charge.
‘Just a few more days please, Sir,’ I begged, ‘I’ve only just arrived.’ But he was adamant, I had to leave straight away or I’d be forcibly made to return and I knew exactly what he meant when he said I’d be forced.
I could tell my Mum was worried about being left alone again, I was worried too. She’d been on her own four days ago when she’d had a heart attack; the same day I was in Winchester standing at my court martial. When that piece of information was revealed in court, you could hear the sudden gasp of the five judges. You could imagine the next day’s head-line, ‘Soldier jailed while mother dies’. Bad PR was the last thing the army wanted. I didn’t know which way the judgement would go. I thought I was looking at a twelve-month sentence. On the way to the court martial, on that sunny morning, a prison officer asked,
‘What do you think you’ll get?’
‘I’ll walk,’ I said.
In my heart of hearts, I knew I wasn’t a criminal. My only crime was aligning my loyalty with my mum above and beyond my Queen. My crime was a crime of the heart, a crime that shouldn’t even be a crime, let alone a crime deserving a year long sentence. I remember well what I said to the five judges sitting before me.
‘I want to take this chance to express to this court martial my deep felt apology and shame for not only abusing the opportunity, trust and responsibility afforded to me by the Royal Military Police Corp, but for also bringing shame on the British Army as a whole. I concede that the offences brought against me today deserve the appropriate punishment. I humbly ask you to consider the mitigating circumstances in a compassionate light. I committed the offences misguidedly, as they were only committed to alleviate the suffering of my mother. I stand before you now with the heartfelt wish that you judge me with the utmost leniency. My one and only mistake was to love my mother beyond the call of duty.’
After a short break for deliberations, the judges returned and took their seats.
‘You are discharged from the British Army with immediate effect, reduced in rank and sentenced to four months imprisonment,’ a judge declared. And with time served, I walked free.
Arriving at the Kirkwall Hospital in Orkney three days later, I found my mum had already been discharged, recuperating on St Margaret’s Island. I had to find my way there by public transport.
I sat down on the cold plastic seat in the bus shelter. The timetable told me that the next bus was due at 16:00 hours. Three hours to wait before I could see my Mum. I was so looking forward to it. Our relationship was special, much like other mother and son relationships no doubt. However, it seemed over the past six months our relationship had gone beyond mother and son; to good and dear friends. I had learnt more about Mum in those six months than I ever did over the thirty years that preceded it. The stroke she’d had, changed her life forever. In her heyday she was the talk of the town; her party piece was fortune telling. Mum was a great talker and the stroke took that away. She knew she was a burden, having to be pushed from A to B in a wheelchair, but she was a burden I was more than willing to bear.
She’d had the stroke during a weekend I was home from the Army. I had been out with friends the night before and didn’t get out of bed until ten in the morning. I walked through the living room to get to the toilet, saw Mum asleep on the couch and I didn’t think anything of it. She was trying to say something to me but I didn’t hear her properly. To my present shame I pretended not to hear her and I went back to bed to sleep off the hangover. The doorbell woke me up again at about two in the afternoon. It was Emma, my sister.
‘How long has Mum been laying there?’
‘All morning, why,’ I replied.
‘Well I think we’d better call for an ambulance. Mum doesn’t look well.’
She’d suffered a stroke and I had simply ignored it and went back to bed. It left her disabled down her left side, confined to a wheelchair and unable to walk and talk coherently. I was heartbroken.
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