Well now we're really in trouble, Royce left school and went to college, not for long, he was bored! He started wheeling and dealing, a right Arthur Daley. He had so many friends male and female. He was always on the move, he would come in like a whirlwind and go out just as quick. He passed his driving test and was off in his first car, a Fiesta, until he wrote it off then he would borrow mine!!! He didn't smoke or drink (not too much anyway and I know he liked champagne, mine always went missing!) and to my knowledge didn't take drugs. He knew how to enjoy himself.
I hated him going out on his bike, it frightened me and I was always glad when I heard it revving down the cul-de-sac it meant he was home and I could turn over and get to sleep.
My favorite pic of Royce
Flying out or in?
He loved going to Ayia Napa and one year went twice in one month only coming home for me to wash his clothes and immediately pack them again.
OK I'm not going to beat around the bush here, Royce went down the wrong road and got into trouble, he ended up in prison, but believe me he'd learnt his lesson. I read a diary that he'd written when he was doing a course inside it tells how he new he was wasting his time in there and how he couldn't wait to get out to do something positive with his life. I know he had plan (a legal one!) and I know he would have followed it and in a few years time would have been a very succeful young man.
He followed all his courses in prison and made top marks in everything. Again he became very popular in there, joining in the football team when there was one and by the sound of it being a shoulder to lean on with many of the lads. He became very friendly with the Rev Marvin Hector who helped and guided him through the bad times and for whom I will be eternally grateful.
Royce was sent to an open prison at the beginning of 2005 and started to come home every weekend, he didn't go very far spending most of his time at home planning his future.
He had grown up and was now an ambitious young man who loved his mum and showed it. He thanked me time and time again for being there for him. He'd learn't his lesson inside, one that he wasn't about to forget, He'd talk about the drug addicts and the non hopefuls he'd come into contact with and he would show a genuine concern for some of them.
Regardless of what you may think when you read this he was a good lad who, like many had taken the wrong turning in life thinking it would be easy and found out the hard way that it wasn't. Go to Gallery 4
THIS WEBSITE HAS BEEN VERY HARD FOR ME TO DO: MANY TIMES THROUGH FLOODS OF TEARS. THE NEXT PAGE IS EVEN HARDER. IT TELLS YOU ABOUT HIS ILLNESS WHICH I THINK MANY OF YOU NEED TO KNOW ABOUT: