“What Difference Does It Make?” How very apt that title was,thought Kent. What difference would it make? Up until now the thought ofchanging history had barely occurred to him, but he was certainly thinkingabout it now.
Would it make a difference? He couldn’t imagine that one littlechange of purchase in a small-town Woolworths store was going to set in processa cataclysmic chain of events which would drastically alter the entire futureof the planet. Time travel movies he had seen often portrayed this scenario,but what possible impact could his actions today have?
The loss of one measly sale of the Nena record was not goingto prevent it storming to number one any more than buying The Smiths singlewould make any difference to their fortunes. But in his personal world it wouldmake all the difference.
When that conversation with his teenage pals rolled roundyears later, he’d be able to stand up with pride and honesty to tell them what he’dbought. OK, admittedly The Smiths were not everyone’s cup of tea, but in termsof credibility, Nena couldn’t compare. He could even show them the single as evidenceand challenge them to show theirs. Then they would see who had been telling thetruth and who hadn’t.
After they left Woolworths they went home for lunch. Kentgot to play his new single on the family record player, part of a Pioneer stacksystem that his father had recently bought. His mother didn’t like the single anymore than his sister did or Debs would in the future, but none of that matteredto him.
The rest of the day was uneventful and that was fine by Kent.He just got on and enjoyed the day. It was amazing how easy he had found it toslip back into his childhood self. In the afternoon Annie took him to the parkand Kent braved the rusty old slide that was the main attraction back in thosedays. He had been in his seven-year-old body for quite a few hours now and was beginningto adjust to his new stature. Accordingly, the slide looked huge.
Up at the top he felt quite nervous for a moment before helaunched himself down. He was well aware that the surface below the slide wasn’tthe foamy stuff you got in parks these days that looked like tarmac. It reallywas rock-hard tarmac. It was a wonder no one had ever been killed. Peoplemoaned about Health and Safety ruining things, but Kent had to admit that themodern facilities that had long replaced the junk in this old park were amassive improvement. So, not everything was better in the old days.
He couldn’t have a go on the swings as they were bothbroken. The seat on one had been replaced by an old tyre, but that was hangingoff only one chain. There was also an ancient roundabout but they couldn’t getit to move. It had completely seized up with rust.
Tea was a delicious helping of fish fingers, beans and hismother’s home-made crinkle-cut chips cooked in a traditional chip pan. Afterwardsthey settled down to watch Top of the Pops. It was wonderful seeing thebeaming faces of Simon Bates and Peter Powell again after all these years: to Kentthey felt like old friends. Sadly The Smiths were not on but it didn’t matter.He enjoyed seeing every act, even Nena, now that he’d freed himself from herfirst single curse.
It was halfway through the show when his dad came in fromwork. Kent’s delight at seeing him didn’t go unnoticed. He ran up to give him ahug, just as he had with his mother that morning. His father was quite takenaback, seeming almost embarrassed at the wanton show of emotion. It was rarefor the fathers of his generation to display much affection towards their offspring.
Glancing at the telly, his father made a comment, one Kentcould remember him making almost every week during his youth. The remark wasdirected at The Style Council, performing their new single which had been the highestnew entry on the chart that week.
“Look at this lot, what do they think they look like? I don’tknow what modern music is coming to. They don’t make songs these days like theydid back in the sixties.”
There was nothing particularly odd about Paul Weller’s appearance,thought Kent, not compared to some of the others that came on. But then he thoughtback to how he’d felt when he had been thinking about music the previous day.Maybe it wasn’t just him, but purely a generational thing. His dad had been moreor less the same age in 1984 as Kent was in 2018. He was saying exactly thesame things Kent was thinking now about the current state of popular music.
Perhaps that was the lesson to be learnt from this, that heneeded to accept the passing of time, enjoy the music he had grown up with, andthen accept with good grace when the time came to pass the baton on to the nextgeneration.
He was tired after Top of the Pops finished. A David Attenboroughdocumentary came on and he wanted to stay up longer because he didn’t want theday to end. When his mother suggested that he should go up and get into his pyjamashe resisted at first. Ultimately he couldn’t fight the feeling of tirednesswashing over him.
He crawled under his Superman quilt cover and wondered whatwould happen next. He had loved his day in 1984 and really didn’t want to goback to the future. Given the chance, he would quite happily have stayed where hewas for good.
Feeling happy and relaxed, he drifted off to sleep.
Second-Hand News
November 2018
With a jolt, as if he had woken up suddenly whilst driftingoff to sleep, Kent found himself back on the roof of the car park. He wasfacing west towards where the last of the daylight was still fading from thesky, behind trees clinging onto their last few autumn leaves. All was exactly asit had been when he had left. He may
