Red Jenny

I put a song in the Music Group by UB40 called “Homely Girl” and it reminded me of a friend I knew in school.

She joined my school shortly before we moved to secondary school. At 11 years old she was a short, dumpy, chubby faced little thing, but with the most amazing light blue eyes and a head of flame red hair. She was introduced as Jennifer, but, as we already had one Jenny I christened her Red Jenny.

Jenny and I were paired up by the teacher to work on our last primary school project which meant working with her for two afternoons a week for about two months. During that time I got to know that while shy on the outside, Jenny was a beautiful person, with a kind heart, a wicked sense of humour and we became good friends.

In secondary school I maintained our friendship, but Jenny was a lot cleverer than me so we rarely came across each other in the various classes. I did, however notice that Jenny seemed to be having a bit of a hard time, being taunted because of her looks, especially the red hair.

Then, between 13 and 15 everything changed. For a start she grew from just under 5 feet to 5 foot 8 inches, she developed a figure that could be described as “hour glass” or perhaps “stunning”. The puppy fat fell away from her face to reveal cheek bones a super model would kill for. In short my little Red Jenny went from ugly duckling to beautiful swan.

That’s the looks department dealt with. What really mattered though, didn’t change. She was still the kind hearted girl I’d always known and although now she was fighting boys off with a stick, she managed to do it in a kind and humorous way that seemed to leave the rejects feeling like they’d been honoured.

Jenny went on after school to university and I took another road and I never saw or heard from her again, but when we were leaving this young lady paid me one of the biggest compliments I have ever been given.

She said that I had been her first friend in a new town. That I’d stuck with her through her difficult times and never tried to take advantage of our friendship when her body had changed. That she was proud to have been “my wee Red Jenny” all through school.

She also shocked me to the core by telling me that if I’d asked she would have gone out with me and probably have given me anything else I wanted. She then planted a far more than friendly kiss on my lips, smiled at me, winked and walked out of my life.