Why I betrayed my friend over a bottle of rum

Aug 05, 2023

Freddy Gray

There are moments in a boy's adolescence when he catches a glimpse of the man he will become. Faced with adversity, is he the brave sort – or the sort who runs away and lets others suffer? Aged 13, on a school trip to Portsmouth, I discovered I was the latter.

Tom insisted he’d found the bottles on a street, which made him sound considerably weirder than he was

It was my first year at Bradfield College, a boarding school in Berkshire. About a hundred of us new boys packed on a coach. I vaguely recall the hooligan energy of too many young males in a small space: over-excited heads popping up to shout swear words in the direction of the staff at the front, then ducking down to avoid censure. Boys laughing, fiddling with plastic ashtrays on seats, showing off their Walkmans and Discmans, sharing headphones playing their edgiest music. It was 1993, long before smartphones. Metal and grunge were cool back then – Rage Against the Machine, Nirvana, Therapy, Sepultura. Spoilt children adore angst.

We saw the Mary Rose, I think, and I recall being told about shipmates drinking rum and eating biscuits with lice. A guide, or possibly a teacher, said something about insects being a good source of protein. Ho, ho, cringe. The man trying to make us eat bugs, again.

At some point, we had a break, perhaps to eat a packed lunch. That's when the trouble started.

Three of us – Tom Furber, Chris Roberts, who happened to be the comedian Russ Abbot's son, and I – decided to seize the opportunity to rebel. We snuck off to a corner shop on an illegal mission. Tom and I looked about nine and seven years old, respectively, so we tasked Chris, who was already almost 6ft tall, with buying the booze. We liked the exotic name of Malibu since we knew that, as the advertisements said ‘The sun alway’ shine when it pour’. That's what we wanted.

Chris disappeared into the shop. We waited nervously outside until he reappeared, triumphant, with the contraband – a series of miniature white bottles. I have a faint recollection that he also bought a small box of cigarillos, but that might be my memory tricking me. At that time Russ Abbot was the daft face of Castella Classic cigars (‘For the man who thinks that little bit bigger’).

We made our way back to the group. Tom and I peeled off and went into the lavatories and began guzzling the bottles next to a sink. We must have looked so stupidly obvious. As I held up one of the miniatures, I spotted Mr Kilburn, a teacher with a weather-system beard and the eyes of a madman, out of the corner of my eye. Uh oh. Without thought, in an act of instant cowardice, I handed the bottle back to Tom before Kilburn realised what was going on and bolted back out to the museum. I felt concern for Tom and a flush of shame. But that was nothing compared to the relief of not getting caught.

The rest of the afternoon went by in a blur. We must have been a bit plastered. Tom had been busted and should have been angry with me. Defiantly, however, he put it out of his mind. ‘The sun alway’ shine when it pour,’ we reminded ourselves, mock Caribbean.

On the return journey, we listened to Troublegum by Therapy – ‘I’m gonna get drunk! Come round and fuck you up!’ – and basked in our delinquent glory. The other boys were impressed at our naughtiness. We didn't mind them knowing. We were kings of the coach.

Back at school, punishment awaited Tom, though not me or Chris Roberts. Mr and Mrs Furber were informed. Tom was ‘gated’ – not allowed to leave school grounds – for three weeks and made to sweep leaves. I remember him coming up the hill to my boarding house quite upset. I offered, insincerely, to dob myself in in order to share the blame and was relieved when Tom said no.

The teachers weren't fools. They knew others must have been involved. But Tom took the rap like a mensh. He insisted he’d found the bottles on a street, and kept them to himself, which made him sound considerably weirder than he was.

Chris Roberts went on to become a house music DJ and after that, inevitably, a teetotaller. I don't see him any more. Tom is still one of my best friends, godfather to one of my sons, and we’re both off the sauce for Lent. Perhaps that Portsmouth field trip bonded us for life – or at least me to him. I just texted him to ask if he's ever forgiven me for my Malibu treachery. ‘Hmmm,’ he replied.

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Freddy Gray

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