He grasped Satish’s shoulders, dug his fingers right in, and started to shake him. Satish’s head was tossed backwards, making the metal door shiver. Then after one of the rebounds it shot forward, and Cai could see Satish’s face coming towards him, and there was an impact, and pain, and Cai was kneeling in the centre of the driveway, his face in his hands.
‘You fucking nutted me! I’m going to have you!’
‘I’m going to have you, you – you bastard!’
Then Satish was on him, and they were pushing and pulling and trying to hit and trying not to get hit and trying to get a leg free to kick. Where was the punching, the clean strokes they saw on telly? Cai couldn’t do it, so he went for any bits of Satish he could get to. His fist found Satish’s side. He felt bone against his knuckles and heard a cry. Good. Then there was a hand slapping against Cai’s face, twisting his head round. Cai heaved back and rolled on top of Satish and heard him shout out again.
As they struggled Cai could hear him muttering something, moving in and out of clarity as his mouth was muffled by the movements of their bodies. Cai pushed against him hard and scrambled to his feet.
‘What?’ Satish was panting. They both were. Cai stepped back, out of reach of hands and feet. ‘What are you saying?’
‘I said, I kissed her. So what? Why are you doing this? Why do you care?’
Cai’s mouth was filled with the things he couldn’t say. He opened it and found it blocked, so he launched himself at Satish again, kicking and pulling and shaking and shouting.
‘Stop being such a fucking girl! I don’t care!’ he yelled into his enemy’s ear. ‘But she’s not yours! She’s not yours, Paki! You’re a Paki!’ He was sitting on Satish’s hips, pinning his arms behind his head. The simplicity of it came as such a relief, he felt like crying. He got close to Satish’s face – not too close – and told him, ‘That’s just it! You’re a Paki, so you can’t kiss Mandy. You’re Splatish.’
Satish didn’t say anything. He turned his face to the side and didn’t look at Cai. Then he bucked and kicked, trying to throw Cai off him. There was no point to this any more. Cai waited until Satish stopped, then quickly hopped up and away.
‘I’ve had enough of you,’ Cai told him. ‘I can’t be bothered. Stay away from me, or I’ll beat you up some more.’
Cai crossed the road and went through his own back gate. The kitchen door was unlocked, the kitchen empty. He sat on the floor next to the oven and pulled his knees up to his chest. He waited there a long while, until he felt clearer and could decide what to do next.
Chapter 28
Satish had been beaten up by Cai. No: he and Cai had fought. He’d given as good as he’d got. After Cai left, he didn’t know which direction to go in: back to his house, where his parents would see him? Unthinkable. He didn’t want them to be involved; he couldn’t have said if it was more for their protection or his. At the end of Mandy’s drive the street was deserted. He didn’t want to walk into it. He couldn’t go into Mandy’s garden, but he could stay here, tucked into the angle between Mandy’s house and her dad’s garage, and hope no one would see him.
He prodded himself to assess the damage. His ribs were painful on the left side and the back of his neck hurt, probably from Cai banging his head against the garage door. There was a graze on his right elbow, little wellsprings of blood rising through it. Come on, you didn’t do badly, he told himself, and then it came back in a frightening rush: Cai calling him a Paki, calling him Splatish. They weren’t friends any more. He tried to comfort himself – Cai was leaving anyway – but it didn’t work. Cai! If he was a Paki to Cai, he was a Paki to all of them. All of them, even the ones he hadn’t met yet: in his new school, wherever he went.
Satish made himself breathe a few times, taking deeper and deeper breaths that deliberately hurt his ribs, so he could practise. He couldn’t go home yet. He thought of Cherry Gardens, its glaring windows. School would be safe, though; just round the corner, the buildings shut for the day, and Satish knowing all the best places to hide.
He set off, staring straight ahead as if he had somewhere to go. He’d nearly made it to the end of the road, skirting the trestle tables on his right, when he heard the shout: ‘Oi! Splatish!’ The Chandlers. Not wanting to face their casual taunting, he jogged up to the end of the road and turned left. He could see the tree, the gap you went through to get to the school. He could see the school gates.
‘Oi!’ They must have sped up. They were rounding the corner now.
‘Leave me alone!’
Satish flapped a hand behind him to bat them away, but they kept on coming, and someone else with them: Sarah, clip-clopping in her high heels, a few paces behind. He reached the tree and looked back again; they had nearly caught up, and there was something in their bearing, in Paul’s head-forward impetus, Stephen’s nearly-smile, that made him afraid. Stephen was holding something behind his back.
The gate was locked, so he had to vault over it. When he went to swing his leg over he was caught by a jab of pain in his side, and as he steadied himself they reached him. He expected them to pull him off but they didn’t. Paul grabbed his foot and levered him over the gate so that he fell on the other side with a cry as his ribs and arm were hurt again. When he dabbed at the graze on his elbow blood came off on his fingers.
‘Leave me alone!’ he told them again, scrabbling to get up as first Paul and then Stephen straddled the gate. Sarah was pacing on the other side, searching for a different way in.
Satish ran towards the building, veering off to the right, past the climbing frame where the Chandlers had made the boy fall all those years ago, and into the adventure playground. He heard the crunch-patter of feet following him, heard panting and laughing. Ducking behind the climbing net, he saw Paul and Stephen face him through the squares of rope. They swayed on their feet like goalies, the bag Stephen carried with him bumping against his leg.
With a sudden, twitching burst of energy, Stephen made a feint towards him.
‘Come on, Splatish,’ he said, beckoning. ‘Let’s be having you.’
‘Cai’s already done it! We … he hit me. Look!’ He pointed his elbow at them.
Stephen laughed. ‘We’re not going to hit you. Are we, Paulie?’
‘Nope.’ Paul shook his head.
Then Satish saw Sarah arrive behind them and the boys moved to the ends of the net so they could rush him from each side, and he ran towards the slide, and climbed its steps because it was the only place to go. He looked down to see Paul at the bottom, arms wide like a father waiting to catch him, and Stephen behind, climbing up the steps, the handles of his Wavy Line bag balled up in his fist.
Satish thought of Mrs Hirsch, the playground supervisor they always tried to avoid because she was so strict. What would she say about this? What would she do to Paul and Stephen if she were here? But there was no one in the playground; the doors of the school were locked, the windows empty. Two against one. It would hurt more than before, but at least Satish could get some of his own blows in. No choice, anyway.
He slid down to Paul, feet out, hands out, and when Paul caught him at the bottom Satish kicked and thrashed, hitting out at any parts he could reach. Then he felt a wallop as Stephen slid down, his feet hammering into Satish’s back. After that, it was easy for them.
They dragged him into the cramped space under the slide. Satish twisted round but Paul held him easily.
‘Now, Splatish. We’ve got a little lesson to teach you.’ Paul raised his eyebrows and a cartoonish grin stretched across his face.
Satish pulled away in a sudden jerking movement. Paul, unfazed, reached out to grab him again. Big and stocky, and so much older, he could subdue him without really trying. His strong hand squeezed Satish’s upper arm.
‘Stay,’ he said softly.
Satish noticed the clean white T-shirt over his jeans, and wondered if he was dressed for the party already; he told himself that no one would dress like that if they really meant to
get into a fight. And he was too young, anyway, or they were too old, fourteen and fifteen and going to secondary school. He saw himself as they might see him, a kid, and thought perhaps that in itself might protect him. Then he remembered the stories about the National Front demo in Ranjeet’s street, and Ranjeet’s neighbour pulling his little daughter to safety as she shouted at the marchers.
‘We need to teach you a lesson,’ Sarah was saying as she came over.
We? He wanted to laugh. She was eleven – eleven! – and dwarfed by the Chandlers, even though she was wobbling on her too-high heels.
‘Go away, Sarah. Go home.’
Beside Satish, Paul snorted.
‘Go avay! Go home! A good bit of advice, Splatish. Do you ever feel like taking it?’
Sarah was undeterred.
‘You kissed Mandy. You kissed an English girl. Pakis shouldn’t do that. We’re going to teach you a lesson,’ she repeated.
Stephen joined her, the four of them crammed under the apex of the slide. He was pulling something out of his bag.
‘Yeah, if you feel like a snog, go back to where you came from.’ He pulled a box out of the bag, and something out of the box; something red. He balanced the object on his palm. ‘If you have to do it, do it with some other brown bastard.’ Then he turned to Sarah.
‘So, tell me again about the beef?’
Sarah passed her tongue over her upper lip.
‘Satish can’t eat beef. He thinks cows are sacred. I heard him tell Cai.’
‘Yeah, I’ve heard something like that,’ said Stephen. ‘But I would think, and tell me if I’m wrong here, I would think that’s something he got from his own country? Isn’t it, Satish? That’s not an English thing, is it?’
The thing on his hand was a beefburger: raw, broken in half, the spots of fat showing white against the meat.
‘We do eat beef here in England,’ Stephen went on. ‘Boiled beef and carrots! Roast beef. We love the stuff! Today we’re having beef burgers to celebrate the Jubilee and I would suggest …’ He shifted the burger in his hand, grimacing. ‘… that there’s no better time for you to try it, Splatish. You want to live here, you like English girls, you’ll love English food. Open up.’
This couldn’t happen. It could not happen. Satish clamped his mouth shut and turned his head away. It banged against the bottom of the slide. He kicked out towards Stephen, who sidestepped casually and berated his brother, ‘Legs, Paulie!’
Paul snaked his own leg round and brought his heel down onto Satish’s left foot. The movement swung the two boys together and as they crushed up close Paul confided, ‘I will do that again,’ as if Satish needed the warning. His foot burned, the tender toes delineated by precise lines of pain.
Stephen was close now, the dreadful lump of meat closer still, right in front of Satish’s face. He brought down his lines of defence – the teeth, the lips – and tried to make them solid and unbreachable as Stephen pushed the burger up against his mouth. He heard Sarah shouting encouragement: ‘Go on, Stephen!’
The meat was cold and soft. It moulded itself round Satish’s lips as he resisted. He clamped down on them, rolling them inwards so they touched as little of the meat as possible, then shuddered as he felt some of it rolling inwards. He closed his eyes, as if that might make a difference, then all of a sudden his nose was pinched by a strong hand. He tossed his head back and forth, but the grip remained constant, and he knew that in moments he would have to open his mouth.
I’m British! I’m British! he wanted to say – a stupid thing in any case, because he couldn’t say anything, couldn’t open his mouth. It came out as a lowing, a moan. He was British; he did a thousand British things. There was really only one thing left, and it was this: he did not eat beef. There was a pressure in his chest, a pain in his forehead and then his body betrayed him, betrayed him utterly, and his mouth snapped open to take a breath.
The beef came in with it, piling over the barricade of his teeth and flopping onto his tongue. Terrible, terrible, get it out! He shook and waggled and pushed out his tongue to get rid of it, but it fragmented into little bits. It was fatty and metallic, and he gagged. He felt Paul dropping away from him smartly, but he wasn’t sick.
He spat two, three times, using his fingers to scrape it all out, then pulled up his T-shirt and scrubbed at his tongue with it. When he’d finished, the inside of his mouth was coated in a greasy film. He was filled up with the taste of the meat. He’d eaten beef. When he saw the bits on the ground he gagged again. He became aware of himself doing this and what he must look like. The other three had retreated. They’d done it now, anyway. They’d done the worst thing. There was nothing left. He rushed at Stephen, arms flailing, then brought his foot up sharply into his balls.
Stephen went down and Satish took his chance and ran, not bothering to look behind him, not bothering to listen for them coming, just pelting for the gate and over it, running for Cherry Gardens, and adults, and safety.
Chapter 29
Before Satish turned into Cherry Gardens, he heard the impact: a clattering noise, a crash, a man’s voice rising, ‘Woah! Verity. Verity!’
A front door slammed. He bolted into the street, thinking only of finding an adult, someone he could tell, someone who could take charge. A paper plate somersaulted towards him, spinning like a flipped coin. He saw more on the ground, and cups, and a glass jug smashed next to an overturned trestle. Skewed across the street was Miss Bissett’s little blue car. She was getting out of it. Mr Brecon was rushing to help her.
‘Verity. Are you all right? What were you doing?’
Miss Bissett tugged her cardigan down over the top of her skirt and sidestepped his open hand. ‘I’m fine, thank you very much, Peter. A slight misjudgement. I think something must have blocked my view.’
‘Please!’ Satish was with them now. He pulled on Miss Bissett’s sleeve. ‘Help me!’ In his peripheral vision, he saw three figures scurrying across the entrance to the street: Sarah and the Chandlers. They kept going. They would loop round Cherry Gardens and come in at the other end.
‘Help me!’ he said again. ‘They … they’ve …’ The relief of it broke him and Satish felt his face crumple. He put a hand over his eyes and let himself cry. ‘It was just terrible …’
Mr Brecon shook his head. ‘OK. This can wait, Satish. Can’t you see what’s just happened here? Have a bit of sense.’
‘No! They made me—’
‘Bloody Nora!’ said Mr Brecon.
‘I just wanted to nip into Graham’s driveway,’ Miss Bissett went on. ‘I don’t like to think of the car sitting on the main road all day. I was going to park it in there.’
Other people had come out of their houses now. Looking up, Satish could see Mr and Mrs Hobbes hurrying from the other end of the street. The Millers’ door had opened, and Mrs Miller was bustling towards them. Mr Chandler arrived from his side of the road. Satish wiped his mouth again. He opened it and took a few breaths to let the beef taste out, but it just made it stronger.
‘What a carry-on!’ It was Mrs Miller. ‘You all right, Verity?’
Miss Bissett started to reply: ‘Yes I am, thank you. I’m not sure it’s worth—’ But Mrs Miller cut across her.
‘Right! Let’s get this sorted, shall we?’ She rolled her eyes at Mr Brecon, who grinned back. ‘Peter, can you move Verity’s car for her? Pop him the keys, will you, Verity? Pam and I can tidy up. Don and Ed, could you sort out the table? Lovely.’
‘Wait!’
Satish could see them ranged in front of him: the cavalry. Mums and dads, the adults he’d grown up with. They were already starting to disperse, Mr Brecon reaching out for the keys, the other two men bending to the fallen table.
‘Help me! Please. Stephen and Paul, they did something awful …’ He looked at Mr Chandler. ‘Sarah was with them. It was terrible.’
Saying the names seemed to stop everyone, and they all turned towards him. Mrs Hobbes pushed past Mrs Miller and went straight
to Satish. She put an arm around his shoulders. ‘What’s wrong?’ she said. ‘What happened?’
Mrs Miller’s eyes narrowed. ‘What did Sarah do?’
‘Little fuckers,’ said Mr Chandler. ‘Excuse my French. What did they do now?’
Satish leaned into Mrs Hobbes and she pulled him close. ‘They chased me into the school. We were in the playground.’ He was still crying, he was snotty, all vowels.
Mrs Hobbes held him away from her and searched his face. When she spoke, her voice was hard. ‘Where did they hit you?’
‘They didn’t. It wasn’t that.’
‘Oh.’ She smiled, and he could feel movement around him.
The adults relaxed. Someone laughed. He heard Mr Chandler say: ‘Small mercies.’
‘If you’re sure you’re happy to park it,’ said Miss Bissett.
‘It was worse! Much worse!’
‘Maybe this is something for you and I to chat about,’ suggested Mrs Hobbes at his side.
‘No,’ he told her, and then: ‘No!’, shouted, so that they all stopped again. ‘You need to hear this! You all need to know about this!’ It was Satish’s last chance. His face was still chilly with tears, but he wasn’t crying any more. ‘They didn’t hit me. It was much worse. What they did! They made me eat beef …’
He looked up and he saw Sarah, Stephen and Paul coming into Cherry Gardens. Colette caught sight of them from her front garden and tagged along, trotting behind. They came towards the car and the small crowd of adults, but stopped a few yards short; they’d seen Satish.
‘They forced me. Stephen and Paul did, and Sarah was there …’ He saw Sarah look, horrified, at Stephen.
Mrs Miller glanced at Mrs Hobbes and grimaced. Mr Brecon let the keys slip in his hand and they clinked against his palm. He sighed. ‘I’m sorry. I don’t—’
‘I can’t eat beef! It’s not allowed! It’s a thing, a taboo thing. Hindus can’t eat beef.’ Satish looked at each adult in turn, waiting for them to realise what had happened.
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