CONWAY WINSTON PERKINS BY PHILIP CONNELL

A strange man moved into the house next door, and life was never the same again. For whatever reason, I can’t explain, I, Mary Wittington, instantly despised my new neighbour – Conway Winston Perkins. There are no words in the English dictionary to describe how I felt about him. Even the mere mention of his name, Conway Winston Perkins, filled me with angry bitterness that was worse than the wrath of Achilles.

When I first laid eyes on Conway Winston Perkins, there was a massive swing in my personality. I could tell instantly that he was a thirty something pain in the arse, someone who was totally in love with himself – a narcissistic prat.

For his part, to say the least, he immediately found me irritating, overbearing and much, much more; it was cat and dog from the off.

It turns out that he came from a prominent family in Nantucket, Massachusetts – and I’m working-class from a little town called Fordwich, in Kent. So, we couldn’t be any more different. That said, we are of a similar age. Me being slightly, marginally, older, perhaps. If I’m honest, I’m in my early forties and he’s probably in his thirties. But then I don’t look my age, so people tell me.

Anyway, I digress: After a rather drawn-out divorce, which ended in a nice settlement for yours truly, I decided to take myself off to a new county, to somewhere where I’d never been before. So, as it seemed convenient, not a million miles away, I went house hunting in Cambridgeshire. I’ve always found Cambridge a romantic prospect. Something about it drew me to it from an early age, the college, I think.

Anyhow, after a long and arduous process, I eventually moved into my new four-bed semi-detached in Jesus Green, a lovely newly built estate overlooking the beautiful River Cam, close to the big outdoor swimming pool.

In late March, I took possession of my new home; and on that same day my divorce was made final. It was by far the best day of my life, a sunny, wonderful, incredible day. Suddenly, I was free from the shackles that bound me to England’s biggest bounder – my useless ex-husband who couldn’t even iron a shirt for himself, not if his life depended on it, a hopeless article altogether.

The one regret about my marriage, if I have one at all, is that it was not long enough. Had it been ten years, instead of five, I would have walked away with enough money to buy the house next door as well. But, mustn’t grumble, I did okay.

The house next door was vacant for six months. It was almost sold no less than five times, each time, for various reasons, the sale falling through. It was an ongoing joke about the area. People said no one wanted to live next door to a scary woman. But I wasn’t complaining. Having no one living next door was a godsend, the peace and quiet was bliss. But, like all good things, my life of bliss came to an abrupt end when Conway Winston Perkins moved in on the first day in August.

A humble bank clerk, born in the Wirral, raised in Kent, I was looking forward to greeting my new neighbour. I even baked a lovely lemon drizzle cake, as a welcome to the area gesture. But it all turned sour when I saw him, Conway Winston Perkins, pulling up outside my house in his fancy Jaguar. Apart from parking outside my house, the cheek, there was something about him that brought the worst out in me. Have you ever looked at someone, someone you’ve not met before, and instantly disliked them? Well, that’s just what happened when I saw Conway Winston Perkins for the first time. There was something in him that triggered something, dare I say, evil in me.

If you can imagine this scene:

He drove up in his flashy Jag, pulled up right in front of my gate, on my grass verge, and entered his new house with a cocky smile on his arrogant face. I could tell immediately that he was a prat, that he had no class. Smarmy, is how I’d describe him, eat himself if he was a bar of chocolate.

I immediately banged on his door, gave him a piece of my mind. I wasn’t having him parking his offensive guzzler on the grass verge in front of my gate, that was for sure.

“Excuse me!” I said to him. “But do you mind not parking in front of my gate?”

He closed the door in my face, and I kinda lost my mind. I acted on impulse, did something I’m not entirely proud of, something that was totally out of character for me – I let the air out of his tyres.

Well, my blood was boiling hotter than the hobs of hell. I saw red. I wanted to hurt that man. I wanted to kill him, if necessary, drag his body through the streets. Well, kill is maybe too strong a word. But I did want to inflict some sort of pain on him.

Anyway, from that point on, the gloves were off.

The first night, he threw a party. The music, if you can call it music, blasted the whole neighbourhood out of it. To give him his due, he did send a rather tall lesbian in her early twenties to my door to ask me if I’d be interested in coming along to his house warmer. Not that I would ever even consider going, but I thought he could have at least asked me to my face, especially when he’d been so rude. It said a lot about him, I thought. I think he sent her to anger me further, as a sort of tease, probably assumed that I’m into women.

Anyway, I didn’t get a wink of sleep for the loud music, and there was a woman who had a most horrendous laugh, more of a cackle, and she could be heard over the rest of his noisy guests. I phoned the police, what a waste of time that was. They came and had words with him, but left, and the party continued. I’m sure he bribed them with food and drinks, and probably money.

The following morning, I discovered the contents of my bin strewn over my car’s bonnet and on my driveway. I needn’t tell you, I erupted with anger. He was sunning himself out in his back garden, in his shorts, with a pair of ray bans on, like the prat I knew he was, and I shouted over the fence that he was going to regret moving into the house next to mine. I informed him that it was war and that two can play at that game!

But he ignored me, completely blanked me, just lay there looking up at the sky, with his sunglasses on, whistling Dixie. I went into my house. I was fuming. I screamed at the walls. It was then, at that moment, I decided that it was either him or me. One of us would have to move out and, as I was first in, it would have to be him – the neighbour from hell.

As it was her routine at eleven every morning, the village gossip, Mrs Armstrong, was in the corner shop chatting to Mrs Treefell, as the shop’s owner, Mrs Buttle, shook her head and nodded at what the pair of gossips had to say. I moved obsequiously about the shop, picked up a morning newspaper and a box of Yorkshire Gold and brought them to the till.

“Good morning, ladies, lovely morning,” I said with a smile. “Now, I don’t know if you’ve heard,” I whispered gravely, “but Mrs Kellaher, from round the corner, told me that Mrs Holmby, from over the road, heard from another lady who lives in the city, that my new neighbour, Conway Winston Perkins… is a convicted rapist!”

Within an hour, maybe less, the whole area was talking about the convicted rapist. I did feel a little guilty about that for about five seconds. But, wanting shut of him, I meant to get him gone by hook or by crook.

By teatime, while doing a spot of gardening, at least ten of my neighbours, worried women of all ages, warned me to tread carefully where my new neighbour was concerned. They were afraid for me, an attractive woman living on her own. As a matter of fact, I’d heard it that many times that I began to believe it to be true, that Conway Winston Perkins was actually a convicted rapist. I never thought it would happen to me, but I was guilty of mendacity. That said, I wouldn’t have put it past him; I believed the slur of it suited him down to the ground.

The police arrived at his door at half past five in the morning. They took him, along with laptops and computers, and put him into a police car. They were shouting at him, but he didn’t seem bothered. It was like he didn’t care. He looked up at my house with glee in his dubious eyes, as if to say:

‘I’ll be back.’

While he was in the police station, I had a brief conversation with a woman, Mrs Carnaby, who came sailing by my house in her lovely barge – her summer home. I told her, as she and her husband sailed by, that I’d heard my new neighbour was arrested on a charge of indecent exposure.

“Apparently,” I added, “he was seen exposing himself to schoolgirls at a bus stop outside their school.”

This rumour spread just as fast as the previous one.

The following morning, payback, when I looked out my window, I saw my car had lots of dints and scrapes with pink paint plastered across the bonnet of it; a write off. It was as if it had been in a demolition derby, and I wondered, as I’m a light sleeper, how I didn’t hear a thing in the night. The police came, but, true to form, they were useless. They said they would need visible proof that my neighbour did it. Just as soon as they left, he, Conway Winston Perkins, arrived at my door. He was furious, like a madman, with bulging eyes, saying things like he was delighted that my car was destroyed, and that it was only the beginning of what was to come.

I closed the door in his face.

With a deep-seated hatred for him, I promised myself that I would make him pay every day he remained living next door to me. The easy way out of it would have been for me to sell up and move on. But, in all honesty, I could not give in to a bully. That’s not how I am. I constantly threw my rubbish over the fence into his back garden, and he often replied in spades. When I’d leave for work, as he was home all day, I’d leave my stereo on full blast. Anything to annoy him. If he had a girlfriend over, I’d call her names as she’d be entering his house. I was like a mad woman on a mission, on a mission to destroy Conway Winston Perkins.

But it was a two-way street. I’ve had my windows smashed in and had rumours of lesbian prostitution about me spread like wildfire. The police came to investigate a complaint, from someone in the neighbourhood, uh, that I was keeping a house of ill repute. I’ve lost friends and family over him and his antics. In return, I’ve spray painted obscenities on his walls, took a hammer to his car, burnt down his timber shed, called him a rapist in public, followed him into restaurants and public places and levelled all sorts of accusations from racism to Naziism at him.

In return, he went into my bank when I was on my day off and convinced my manager that I was dipping my hands into the tills. He said I had told him so.

This all went on for over a year, phantom pizza deliveries that would feed an army arriving in the early hours of the morning. Me rummaging in his rubbish bins for anything that would incriminate him in some sort of wrongdoing, something that would see him jailed for a long, long time. It was never-ending, it was exhausting. Destroying him was my obsession, to the point of near self-destruction.

The police eventually wiped their hands of both of us, especially me. I think they blamed me more than my neighbour. I felt they believed that I should have thrown in the towel, that I should have been the one to sell up and leave, leaving Mr Wonderful Conway Winston Perkins to wallow in his victory over me. They even tried to bring us together, tried to get us to talk it over, but I wouldn’t budge. There was no way was I going to sit down at the same table with that animal, that thing, as I called him.

I stuck to my guns, prayed for a heart attack that might kill him off, but there was no such luck, more’s the pity, at the time. God is good, but He's not that good, was my undying chant. It was all consuming, almost soul destroying, but I knew it was an experience that would ultimately run its course, like a drug addiction, or a gambler on the road to destruction.

Then one day a funny thing happened, like a really funny thing happened; I guess you could call it coincidence if it wasn’t so embarrassing. I was invited to a friend’s wedding in Shrewsbury, a big house in the country. It was all very, very charming, the gardens, a fantastic golf course, a full menu and an open bar; no expense spared. My friend, Jill, bagged a multimillionaire. She said she would, and she did, more luck to her. The only thing was my useless ex-husband was there too, with his young wife. I knew they were going to be there, but I thought I could handle it. I thought I’d put all that behind me, especially as I’d done so well out of the divorce. But I felt small, you know. I felt they were laughing at me behind my back, and I believed everyone was staring at me, judging me, saying things like, she can’t even hold onto a useless husband who can’t even iron a shirt.

So, in a weak moment, as you do, I made my way to the free bar. I was feeling sorry for myself, so I decided to drown my sorrows. I ordered a large vodka, and I went on from there. I was hammered in no time, laughing my head off at my ex-husband and his new bride with her massive boobs. He likes big boobs. Anyway, I made a spectacle of myself. But I didn’t care. I was sorry I’d gone now, didn’t miss any of the people there, my old friends from my past were no longer my friends. I had moved on.

Then, like a knight in shining armour, too hammered to care, this really good-looking guy approached me and paid me a compliment and it turned out that we had a lot in common. I was invited by the bride, and he was invited by the rich groom, and his ex-wife was there with a younger man, and he, like me, was plastered too.

“Hi, Mary,” he said to me softly. “My but you look lovely in your dress.”

I remember looking into his eyes, both of us swallowing down another large one, thinking he was a lovely, lovely man, and that was when he took my hand in his hand and kissed it. This brought me to tears and he said, holding my chin up, kissing me softly on the lips:

“Don’t worry, Mary, darling, everything is going to be alright from now on.”

The following morning, with a massive hangover, my head banging like the bells of Notre Dame, I woke in my bed with this hairy chested hunk of a man beside me. I moved my eyes up to his face and could not believe what I was seeing. It was Conway fucking Winston Perkins – my nemesis. I was going to slap him, but I didn’t. I found myself staring at him as he slept, realising that he was beautiful. I thought about life and how stupid the last year or so had been. What a waste of both time and energy it all had been, a dehumanising experience that ultimately had ended with loss.

Conway Winston Perkins opened his eyes and I pretended to be sleeping. He stared at me as I had stared at him. Eventually, like he had done at the bar the previous day, he leaned over and kissed me softly on the lips, saying that he wanted to spend the rest of his life with me. We both lay there, in that bed, reminiscing about all the bad stuff that had gone on between us, laughing our heads off at some of it, as if we were talking about two strangers neither of us knew. Looking back now, it was funny, yet again, it was anything but funny, as it was embarrassing.

Five years later, married with two children, boy and a girl, both of us are two very different people to what we were before. We have both discovered that it is always easier to bend a little in hot situations, that way life is a hell of a lot easier to get through. In fact, since that boozy encounter in that country house, every day my husband tells me that he could not imagine life without me and that’s a really good feeling for someone who used to be obnoxious.