Yorkshire Vignettes
by austenfan1990
A/N: My first Last Tango fanfic, so I do apologise in advance if it's wildly out of character. Alan and Celia are definitely not mine and belong to the combined geniuses of Sally Wainwright, Sir Derek Jacobi and Anne Reid.
1963 – Alan
Alan Buttershaw seemed to have made his way in the world. Not anything grand, of course, but in his own modest way. Twelve years after starting at Jessops, he had become manager at the local store in Elland. An achievement for the likes of him who left school at sixteen and hadn't been up to university as was the fashion these days. His mum and dad were proud of him, especially when he wasn't as outgoing and boisterous as his younger brother Ted who was still proving a handful. There was talk of him even immigrating to Australia of all places; 'I'll believe it when I see it!' said Alan when Ted had come in from work one day and announced his plans. He was an assistant to one of the sheep farmers up north and being the more robust of the two brothers, it was like him to be more than willing to accede to a little adventure.
'Why go all the way to Australia when you can make yourself a living here in Yorkshire?' asked Alan one night when they were down at the local pub and when he realised that this wasn't merely another of Ted's whimsical fancies.
'Because there's a future there, you dozy bugger,' replied Ted, matter-of-factly.
'Well, isn't there a future here in England? I mean, Australia isn't just down road, you know. It's halfway 'cross the world.'
'I don't mean to say I'm going off this minute. Oh aye, sheep farming's all right in Yorkshire at the moment but that don't mean to say that it'll last forever. Look at the coal mines, Alan. One day, I'm telling you, those miners will be out of work.'
'But this is Yorkshire, not Durham or South Wales, lad. And when have you ever been interested in mining?'
'Not to beat about the bush but I have done a bit of coal mining meself, just so you know. Just don't tell mum and dad about that.'
'Well, I never,' murmured Alan, taking a sip of his pint. 'You definitely haven't lost the knack to surprise, Ted.'
'And I bloody hope I never do.'
Alan looked into his brother's face and noted, not for the first time, that it seemed to be carved of tougher stuff than his. Whereas he looked kindly and gentle with an air of vulnerability which seemed to draw all sorts of womanly attention to him – whether it was motherly or otherwise – Ted Buttershaw looked like the sort of fellow who won the Battle of Britain with his dark eyes, strong jaw and his overall impression of confidence and determination. He was half-surprised that Ted never enlisted in the armed forces, even after their two-year stints in National Service. 'Churchill would have loved him,' murmured their mum as she saw him off on his first day and wearing his khaki uniform. Alan had to admit that Ted looked a great deal better than he did in army togs. And if memory served him correctly, he also came across Ted's photo in the enlistment brochures on his way to work one summer. Aye, there was no need to fret over his younger brother since he was certainly going places in the world.
In a way, he envied Ted. He could never imagine himself uprooting himself on a whim and dashing off to the other side of the world. No, life was too comfortable at the moment for that. At the age of twenty-eight, he was settled, had a happy married life and not two months ago, had welcomed a newborn daughter, Gillian. Even venturing outside of Yorkshire for the odd business trip to London seemed daring and adventurous.
But he hadn't always been so wary and it was at times like these when he listened to his brother's talk about sheep farming on a farm in Australia, he remembered a more carefree lad who had often been out in the evening jiving down at the town hall. Eileen had always been there, nearly always claiming the first dance but no one but Celia Armitage had set his heart racing when it came to dancing with the girls. They had never gone out together though they had been on trips and things with the rest of their friends and she had often encouraged him to be more daring, more confident. Perhaps it was an aura she had around her for he saw other shy lads like himself not lacking in confidence when she was around. And sometimes, even twelve years after being stood up, he wondered whether she had felt the same way as he did about her.
'"Now heaven walks on earth."'
'Eh, what's that you say?' Ted was looking at him in bemusement.
'Oh, nothing,' said Alan quickly, hiding his embarrassment by taking other sip of beer. 'Nothing.'
Notes: Dates given are, of course, estimates and based on the information given in Sally Wainwright's screenplay for the first episode of the first series which you can find on the BBC's 'Writersroom' Script Library. In that, she gives both Alan and Celia's age as seventy-four and mentions that Alan was sixteen in 1951 when they last met. Thus they were both born in around 1935.
