On a holiday to Marbella in May 2016, John kept getting stopped by other men on the beach – they wanted to know his training regimen. John would be in the gym most mornings at 6am. “He really pushed his body to the limit,” says Jonathan. John’s dedication to fitness was something to behold.
“Suddenly, we were going out every weekend together.” “He’d spot me in the gym with a set of weights and it was a natural progression from there,” says Jonathan. He was a fixture at his local gym, which is where he met his best friend, Jonathan Cohen, 37, a chartered surveyor. He got into triathlons for a while, then bodybuilding competitions, then mountain climbing. In his teens, he was a champion pole-vaulter and hockey player. “He would do something and get obsessed with it,” Jenny says. He worked to keep the lights on, but sport was his big thing. His stripping days over, he returned to Southport and began working as a product specialist in the flooring industry. The relationship with her mother didn’t work out, but John was a committed and loving father. Photograph: David Levene/The GuardianĪround this time, he had a child, Macey, who is now 19. ‘When we were very young, we were shadows of each other’. “He had piercings in places you don’t want to know about your brother having piercings in,” Jenny shudders. He worked in their parents’ carpet business for a while, but didn’t enjoy it, then joined the erotic dance troupe the Chippendales, performing all over Europe. Jenny left home at 18 to go to university, leaving her brother behind. (He had been knocked off his bike by a lorry.) “He didn’t want Mum to worry,” she says. Into adulthood, she always knew when her brother was lying – like the time he told their mother he hurt his shoulder tripping over a witch on Halloween. “When we were very young, we were shadows of each other,” says Jenny. Jenny was a bookish goody two-shoes John was mischievous, good at sport and uninterested in school.ĭespite their differences, they shared a formidable bond. As children, they were diametrically opposed. John and Jenny were born in Southport in 1978. Neither had any idea it would be their last time together. Twins enjoying each other’s company after the enforced separation of the pandemic. They went swimming and played tennis and forgot about it.Ī perfect weekend, then. “‘He said: ‘You aren’t my mother – don’t tell me what to do.’” John eventually acquiesced, then made another easy joke. “I said: ‘John, put your face mask on,’” Jenny remembers. There was only one other difficult moment, when the family went to a local health club. John scored a bullseye with his eyes closed and bragged about it all weekend. They went for dinner at a Turkish restaurant and played darts in the garden. “John was on really good, funny form,” says Jenny. “He would make a joke about everything,” says Jenny, who is 43 and works as an operations manager.Īrgument aside, it was a great get-together. Photograph: Courtesy of Jenny McCannĮventually, he made a joke and changed the subject – that was his way of defusing tension. The last family photo taken with John, in June: (left to right) Jenny’s husband, Amit Jenny the twins’ father, Derek John their mother, Lyn and Jenny and Amit’s children, Maya and Seb. “He kept saying: ‘I won’t be a guinea pig.’”
T launcher no virus for free#
“About how people were only getting the vaccine for free McDonald’s, and there was formaldehyde in it.” The rest of the family remonstrated with him, pulling out their phones to factcheck what he was saying. “John started saying really crazy things that didn’t make sense,” she says. She can’t remember how the argument about the Covid vaccine started.
The adults were buzzed on wine, the kids on birthday cake. John and their parents had come down from Southport in Merseyside for the weekend to celebrate. Jenny McCann sat in the garden of her home in north London with her twin brother, John Eyers, their parents, Lyn and Derek, and Jenny’s husband and children. Warm enough to sit outside in a T-shirt, listening to birdsong warm enough to stay out late, savouring a meal warm enough not to notice night settling in, the visitor that slipped into the party unannounced. I t was one of those rare, almost magical, summer evenings.
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