The Story of Us

by Barbara Elsborg

  “We’re going home.”

  Zed pushed to his feet, yawned and stretched. He hoped he wasn’t overdoing it. He looked around. “Where is everyone?”

  “Cooking. We can leave now.”

  Zed followed him to the car. “Is Parwez okay?”

  “He’s calm.”

  Calm enough to wear a suicide vest on Sunday? Zed had listened to Fahid repeatedly tell Parwez that it wasn’t suicide he’d be committing—which guaranteed an eternity in hell, but martyrdom—which would send him straight to heaven and his multitude of virgins. Wasim had even gone into detail about how to fuck them. How lovely for the virgins.

  “Would you like me to ask Tamaz to come for the weekend?” Fahid asked.

  Oh shit. Zed turned to him and smiled. “That would be great. Thank you.”

  “I’ll call him now.”

  Was this a test? Maybe for both him and Tamaz?

  Tamaz’s phone went to voicemail.

  “I’ll call him tomorrow. Or you can. Is there food in the fridge?”

  “Enough for me to make us something.” Which I’m not going to be able to eat.

  But he did his best. Fahid was happy with a cheese omelette, new potatoes and salad which was about as much as Zed could stomach even though he hadn’t eaten since that morning. The man whose table he sat at, the man whose hospitality he had accepted, was evil. Not just misguided but pure evil. If he believed in what he preached, in the destruction of all those who weren’t Muslim, why didn’t he blow himself up in his cause instead of persuading others to do it?

  Fahid’s world was narrow, hateful and bigoted. There was no belief in the old traditions of tolerance and inclusion. The new way was the only way and as a result Islam was being destroyed from the inside out and the idiots couldn’t see that. Zed might not believe, but he was sad about the way Islam was burning, because he understood how many needed the support of their faith and that for most it was a good thing. The actions of a few were hurting so many.

  Zed found it hard to sit next to Fahid and pretend friendship, but the knowledge that a boy would bring down this man kept him focused, kept him calm. Dawud and Jalut. David and Goliath. I can stop this happening. I just have to keep calm.

  Even so, Zed was relieved when Fahid told him he was going out.

  “I think I’ll go to the mosque to pray for Parwez,” Zed said. “Is that okay?”

  Fahid squeezed his shoulder. “A fine thing to do. I’ll walk there with you.”

  Shit.

  The good news was that Fahid left him outside the mosque. The bad news was that Zed couldn’t tell whether Fahid trusted him or not. No way was he not going inside. He completed the ritual washing and slid into the prayer room. How long should he stay? Would Fahid be outside watching? Or had he asked someone else to watch him?

  He stayed fifteen minutes before he risked emerging. The imam had seen him just after he’d arrived, but no one was around when he left. Zed hurried to the Tube station and called Jackson.

  “Hello?”

  “It’s me. Zed. Tomorrow. Three at the piano.”

  “I’ll be there.”

  Zed went a roundabout way back to the mosque and prayed again. He had too much information to keep until Wednesday. When Fahid joined him, he nearly jumped out of his skin. Zed went through another rakat—prayer cycle and then rose to his feet. Fahid followed him.

  Does he know? If he did, he wouldn’t do anything now or on the street. He’d wait until they got back. Maybe not even then. He’d drive him somewhere, then kill him. Zed’s heart pounded so hard, he could hear it in his head. But Fahid emerged smiling and they walked back together.

  “How many rakats did you do?” Fahid asked.

  “I didn’t count. I just wanted to pray.”

  “You’re worried for Parwez.”

  “I worry that whatever he’s going to do, is the right thing to do for Allah, peace be upon Him.”

  “If it isn’t meant to be, then it’s not the right thing and won’t happen. Inshalla.”

  You won’t let it not happen. You’re not Allah.

  The following morning, when Fahid asked him if he wanted to go to work with him again, Zed didn’t hold back his groan. Luckily, Fahid laughed.

  “So what are your plans?”

  “I need new trainers. These have a hole.” He lifted his foot to show him. Though the hole had been helped into life by a kitchen knife.

  “Will you cook another Iranian meal tonight?”

  “Okay.”

  Fahid handed him twenty pounds. “Keep what’s left over.”

  “Grass salad and bread then.”

  Fahid laughed all the way out of the house.

  Zed went back to the mosque that morning just to check if anyone was watching him. He was ultra-suspicious of everyone, familiar faces and new. He called in at the supermarket, bought the ingredients to make khoresh fesenjan, chicken stew with walnuts and pomegranate sauce and prepared it before he ventured out.

  When he thought he saw a face he recognised from the mosque, he pretended he hadn’t noticed the guy. Just because they were both using the Tube didn’t mean he was being followed. Even when he pursued Zed onto the Victoria line, he wasn’t too perturbed. Only when the dark-haired guy got off at St Pancras and stayed on his heels did Zed worry. He changed his plans and boarded a train to Oxford Circus.

  He got on and off three trains before he was convinced he’d lost him. He had to move without leaving a shadow. He bought a pair of trainers from the first shop he found, dumped the others and headed back to St Pancras. He was early and there was no one playing the piano so he sat down and launched into Mozart’s Rondo alla Turca. He’d almost finished before he realised Jackson was watching. Zed completed the piece, pushed to his feet and followed Jackson across the busy concourse.

  They sat inside a café but although Zed would have loved something to eat and drink, he refused the offer.

  “I thought you weren’t a Muslim.” Jackson stirred his coffee.

  “I’m not but if I’m seen with you, I can lie about you who are. If I’m seen eating or drinking, I can’t excuse that.”

  “And you can the piano?”

  Zed sighed. “No, but it’s an indiscretion more likely to be forgiven than breaking the fasting rules of Ramadan.”

  “Why have you brought the meeting forward?”

  Zed told him everything that had happened. All about the tickets, about Parwez and everything else he’d heard.

  “You’ve done well. You have a good memory, Hvarechaeshman.”

  Zed groaned. “I shouldn’t be surprised. You’re just doing your job. Can I borrow your phone to call my brother? Is there a way to stop your number coming up on his phone?”

  “There is but why do you want to call him?”

  “Fahid wants to invite him for the weekend. I don’t want him to come. By then I won’t even be at Fahid’s house, will I?”

  “You can’t call him.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because you stopping him coming will make him suspicious. He might say something to Fahid and Fahid might change his plans.”

  “But Tamaz has nothing to do with this.”

  “Are you sure? If your brother is involved, you can’t save him.”

  Zed shuddered. “He’s not. He wouldn’t.”

  “How can you know for certain?”

  “Because he wouldn’t put me in danger.” Zed put his head in his hands. Was that true? He looked up. “I can’t run the risk of meeting you again. There’s no way for me to get more information. You have enough to act. You know where the bomb making equipment is. You know who’s involved.”

  “You seem more scared than you were before.”

  Zed let out a shaky breath. “Yeah, I’m more scared. If Parwez has fallen to pieces once, who says it won’t happen again. Javid too. He panicked. Who will they use instead? What if they hold Tamaz and threaten to hurt him if I don’t do what they say? That’s why I’m scared. I’m
afraid of what I might get asked to do. Save my brother or kill dozens of innocent people. Maybe a lot more than that.”

  “Calm down.”

  “Easy for you to say.”

  “I know.”

  “I wouldn’t ever be a suicide bomber. I don’t understand how anyone could do it. But they do.”

  Jackson patted his arm. “Yeah, they do but maybe not as many as you might think. The person doing the detonation isn’t always present.”

  Zed straightened. “You mean there’s someone ready to detonate the bomb if the person carrying it gets cold feet?”

  “Yes.”

  “Oh fuck.”

  “If you think you’re in any danger of being involved, you make an excuse to get out of the house and you run and call me. Otherwise, sit tight. Do exactly what you’ve been doing. There will be a raid. I won’t tell you when and your reaction will be genuine. You’ll be arrested. No one taking part in the raid will know you’ve talked to me. It keeps you safer. Don’t resist. Do exactly as they tell you. I’ll come to the police station afterwards. Okay? Go back now.”

  Zed pushed to his feet.

  “Oh, and the piano playing? You’re very good.”

  “Thank you.”

  “You’re also good at spotting when you’re being followed and slipping the net. Well done.”

  The praise put more of a spring in his step than his new trainers.

  Fahid was in when Zed got back. He put the change from the food shopping on the table. “I didn’t need it, thanks.”

  Fahid looked down at Zed’s grey and red trainers. “Will they make you run faster?”

  “The guy in the shop said they would.”

  Fahid chuckled. “They look nice.”

  “They’re really comfortable and now I don’t have to worry about outrunning velociraptors.”

  Maybe Zed was wrong, but it seemed to him that being able to joke made Fahid more relaxed with him. Four days until the bombings were due to take place. How long before the police raided? The thought smothered him. Heaviness filled his gut and his heart.

  He and Fahid went to the mosque, ate together and Zed went to bed leaving Fahid in front of the TV watching the Olympics. Zed didn’t believe in God but he muttered a silent prayer that night for everything to go smoothly, for no one to get hurt.

  Zed sat bolt upright in bed. What the hell was that? Another crash downstairs and he gulped. Four twenty in the morning. Was this the raid? His heart pounded as he listened to guys downstairs shouting, “Clear… Clear… Clear…” Then his door flew open and two men slammed into the room and moved apart. They were dressed in dark clothing, had helmets on their head and guns in their hands. Red laser sights flickered over him and Zed shook.

  “Hands in the air. Get out of bed. Get on the floor,” one of them screamed.

  Zed put up his hands and slithered onto the floor, his throat dry with fear.

  “Hands behind your head.”

  Even as he complied, he heard others yelling “Clear… Clear…” and fear galloped in his chest. Zed told himself everything was going to be okay, but he was terrified. He’d set all this in motion and had no idea where it would stop.

  He lay still while he was handcuffed, and it gradually began to dawn on him that he hadn’t heard Fahid’s voice.

  “Who else lives here?” a guy yelled at Zed.

  “Just Fahid.”

  “Where is he?”

  Oh shit. “I don’t know.”

  Had he managed to get away while they were breaking in? Or before? Maybe he’d left after Zed had gone to bed. It was possible he’d never intended to stay around until Sunday. But did I fuck up?

  Zed was allowed to get dressed once his clothing had been checked. He was escorted from the house and shoved into a police van. Three anti-terrorism officers piled in after him, still wearing their helmets, the bottom half of their faces covered. Two of them pulled him onto a seat, fastened him in and sat either side of him. Zed kept his mouth shut and his head down. They hadn’t been rough, not really, but he could feel their anger, their disgust, almost taste the adrenaline. No one spoke. All he had to do was keep quiet and wait for Jackson.

  Except—where was he supposed to go after that? The few possessions he had were still in Fahid’s house. And his money. How was he going to get it back? When would Tamaz find out what had happened? Would he tell their father? Even if Zed’s name was kept out of it, Tamaz knew he was in Fahid’s house. It was bound to be on the news. Shit. But maybe Tamaz’s place had been subject to a dawn raid too. Zed trembled.

  Even though he currently sat in a police van and the guys with him thought he was a part of terrorist cell, Zed wished Caspian was with him. Maybe he could ask Jackson to find out about him, check he was okay, discover why he hadn’t come to the station. Wherever he is, Caspian can’t be worse off than me. The thought made Zed feel better.

  He was bustled from the van into a police station, taken to a room with a table and two chairs, told to sit down and left on his own. There was a camera in the top right-hand corner and Zed guessed he was being watched. He put his arms on the table, rested his head on them and closed his eyes. He was exhausted and yet his mind still raced. Did they have Fahid or not? What about the others? Please not Tamaz. Where am I going to go? What am I going to do? How will this end?

  It seemed hours before the door opened but when it did, it was Jackson who came in carrying a bottle of water and a sandwich.

  “Here you go.”

  “Thank you.” Zed opened the water and took a long drink.

  “Are you okay? Were you treated properly?”

  Zed nodded. “I’m okay. I was scared. I forgot I hadn’t done anything. What happened with the raids? Did you get everyone?”

  “We have Wasim, Parvez, Javid and Saheed in custody. There are other people being questioned as well, including the man who gave Parvez the tickets. The houses are being searched as are the travel agencies. We’ve found the explosives.”

  “My brother?”

  “Has been taken to a police station in Canterbury.”

  Zed groaned. “He had nothing to do with this. What about Fahid?”

  “He’s the only hiccup. He wasn’t in the house. Nor was he at the mosque. We’re still looking for his passport and he’s taken out a large quantity of cash over the last couple of weeks. There was no sign of that either. Did he give you any hint he might be worried that the plan had been compromised?”

  “No. Last night he was normal. We went to the mosque, ate and I left him watching TV when I went to bed.”

  “Not having him in custody gives us a problem.” Jackson circled his index finger on the desk as he looked at him.

  Zed sighed. “You can’t let me go.”

  Jackson gave a brief laugh. “You are amazingly quick for a sixteen-year-old. Two years too young for MI5 or I’d make sure you were offered a job. Yes, you’re right. If we let you go, and Fahid or anyone who knows you sees that we’ve released you, you’ll be seen as the traitor because we’ll have everyone else in custody.”

  “What had you intended to happen to me? I should have asked you before. I have no place to live. Little money. I won’t go home. It isn’t that I want any sort of reward for what I’ve done. I really don’t, but now you’ve even taken my brother away from me.”

  Zed’s throat hurt.

  “You’re old enough to live on your own. We could help you with that, but we think it would be better if we found you a family to live with. You could go to school, university if you wanted. We weren’t just going to desert you.”

  Zed unclenched his fingers.

  “But to keep you safe in the short-term, you need to be seen to have been treated like the others. Charged and remanded in custody, just until we find Fahid. You won’t be charged, we just need to make it look as if you were. Because you’re only sixteen, there’ll be no name, no photo in the paper but the press release will make it clear a sixteen-year-old was taken from a house in Islington an
d has been remanded in custody in relation to terrorism offences.”

  “So where do I go?”

  “A Young Offender Institution. Only for a short while. I won’t forget you’re in there.” Jackson smiled.

  Zed thought about asking him to find out about Caspian but maybe it was better that he didn’t think of him anymore.

  Chapter Fourteen

  Caspian spent two days in Healthcare, during which his cast was removed. The relative quiet, the lack of a roommate, particularly one who might have killed him, and the chance to take a shit and shower in private made Caspian even more resentful of what his brother and father had done.

  Though it was partly his own fault he was in here and he wasn’t resentful enough to want to beg to go home. So no whining! He wasn’t sure he’d be allowed home anyway. Though maybe if he promised to be a good boy and not run away, and his father promised to keep him in line, it would be enough to get him released until the trial. Except while he was at home, his father and brother would be playing on his guilt complex to persuade him to change his plea. Fuck that.

  Naughton, his PO, had been to see him wanting to know what was behind Jason’s attack. What did you do? Naughton had asked. I just fucking lay there and got hit. His PO’s attitude made Caspian quietly seethe. Jason had kept his mouth shut and so did Caspian.

  He passed the time watching the TV. There’d been a plot to set off bombs at the Olympics and a load of people had been arrested. Hopefully all of them. Various countries were threatening to pull out which seemed stupid to Caspian. The plot had been discovered so everyone was safe now, weren’t they?

  He didn’t go back to Mako wing. He was put where he should have been placed at the start, Dolphin wing for those on remand aged between sixteen and eighteen. What idiot thought that sounded a good name? And a dolphin wasn’t a fucking fish! The atmosphere wasn’t much different. A load of slightly younger testosterone-filled boys who were either trying to big themselves up into men or disappear into the woodwork like worms.

  Caspian was given a cell to himself, which—on thinking about it—had been worth getting beaten up for. But there was another bed in there, so he might not be alone for long. There was also a shower in the corner and a TV too, though probably not for long either because Caspian hadn’t yet reached the silver behaviour status to warrant his own TV. Fucking unfair that getting attacked kept him off the privilege ladder. He’d thought everyone had a TV, but Jason was a gold inmate—back to lead status now, Caspian assumed, or whatever came below bronze.