Featured Book – Danny’s Story – An Extract

Sex Drugs Rock ‘n’ Roll – Love, Friendship and Idealism. It was the death of the sixties. Acid, Dope, Smack and violence and a magic old man in a magic garden.

Chapter 7 – The magic garden and Pete

For Danny venturing into the garden was like a trip without the acid. In future times he would become used to encountering numerous strange characters, in pairs or singly, who obviously felt the same, though it seemed they chose to augment their visit with the aid of additional chemistry.

Mr Rose might have been in his eighties but he had created a psychedelic jungle of the first order. Somehow he had combined the most peculiar set of incongruous objects and with the use of hanging vines and garish paint to create a mind-expanding fairyland. There were fairground swing boats, plastic ornaments, seats, fountains, concrete sculptures, plastic flowers and overhanging shelters, all lit by enough light bulbs to keep Blackpool going for a season or two. At night the effect was simply amazing.

The effect when anyone first saw it was mesmerising. People stood open-mouthed and stared.

Danny sat and looked at the multi-coloured universe of a garden with eyes as big as jelly-bean jars. It knocked him out of the ground and through a wormhole onto another planet.

‘Not bad is it?’ A voice said from within the dazzling lights.

‘It’s fucking incredible,’ Danny replied quietly in a voice steeped in awe, without taking his eyes off the fairyland he was surrounded with.

‘I’m Pete,’ the silhouetted figure said, stepping out of the brightness and taking a seat next to him. Danny noted that the figure was a young man with long, shaggy black hair with long fringe hanging over his eyes, a big droopy moustache, a week’s dark stubble and an incongruous ankle-length grey RAF greatcoat. Pete grinned and pulled a ready-rolled spliff out of his shirt pocket and lit it. ‘I live in the bottom flat.’

‘I’m Danny,’ he said. ‘I’ve moved into the top flat.’ He flicked his eyes up towards the top of the house.

Pete nodded and lit up the jay.

Together they sat in the brightness of the magic garden in silence, passed the jay between them like some holy sacrament, and stared at colours around them.

It was a momentous first meeting.

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