by Rashad Salim
“Ali, I know this has been very difficult for you but we need you to get on with your life. It’s the best thing for you and I think you know that too.”
I wondered who the police had down as the main suspects. “Is it common for supermarkets to be petrol bombed?”
DI Martin shrugged. “These things happen all the time,” he said. “This could’ve been a gang initiation of some kind. Then again it could’ve just been a bunch of bored teenagers simply trying to kill the boredom.”
The thought made me sick.
“Go home, Ali. Like DC Barker said, get on with your life and leave this alone, okay? We know what we’re doing.”
I nodded.
“Goodbye.”
We shook hands and he walked towards his car. The two cops got in and drove away.
When they were gone I turned my attention back at the crowds gathered outside the Bestco branch. Fuck them, I thought and headed towards the rail station.
I had wanted to visit my mum but decided to leave that for another time. I had had enough of Binford for one day.
7
That night I got a call from Sajid while I was in bed.
It was around midnight and he was the last person I was expecting to hear from. Mustafa had given him my number.
“You ever think about the old days?” He asked, a few minutes into the conversation, which up until then had been not much more than updating each other on our respective current lifestyles. “You know - before you fucked off to that goodie goodie college out of town - our school days and all the shit we got up to together?”
I had many fond memories of my school days with Sajid. I had some really wild experiences with him. Even though I had a bit of fun with a sensible crowd at college and despite everything that had occurred during my university years in West London, nothing ever came close to what I got up to as a teenager in Binford. But I had my regrets too and I wasn’t about to let Sajid forget that either. After all, they were the reasons I had to go to a college out of town.
“You miss em’, eh?” He laughed. “Yeah, you know you do.”
“Nah,” I lied. “I don’t really think about the past much to be honest with you.”
“Bullshit! You gonna tell me you don’t miss all those times we bunked off school and went on our adventures? All those times we broke into places and ran around wild and free?”
I smiled. “Alright, I admit we had a lot of fun. But I ain’t a kid anymore.”
“What about Seema?” There was a cunning smile at the other end for sure .
Seema.
I hadn’t thought of her in a long time.
“Seema?”
“Don’t act like you don’t know who I’m talking about, you fucker!”
“Yeah, I remember,” I said. “I just never thought she was all that.”
“Yeah, right,” he said. “She was a babe. The sexy bitch was the hottest girl in our year and you know it.”
“I wouldn’t go that far.” The truth was Seema was as stunning as Sajid made her out to have been but I had always denied it. It was my way of coming across innocent – innocent of whether or not there had ever been anything between me and her – when it was an open secret that there had indeed been something between us.
“You fucked her, didn’t you?” he asked.
In an instant he made me more uncomfortable than I had expected I’d be talking with him after all these years.
“...You did! Didn’t you? I’m so proud of you!” He laughed wildly. “I knew it! I always fucking knew it! You little bastard, you always claimed you didn’t but I was too stupid not to have realised it back then.”
“...Don’t jump to conclusions now. I never said I shagged her, okay?”
“Bull! You shagged her good and proper,” he said like he was telling me a common fact. “...You know she got married to Anil, right?”
I didn’t.
Anil was a boy from our school who had been in love with Seema for as far back as I could remember and as far back as I could remember he had always hated me.
“...Nah, I didn’t know that.”
“Like I said, makes me prouder to know you were fucking her first,” he said and gave in to more laughter. “Actually, allow me to correct myself: fucking her while she was with him!” he said, still laughing. “Just think of that if you miss her, okay?”
“I don’t care about Seema,” I said. “I never did. And I don’t care about her and Anil either. Hope they live happily ever after and all that shit but it don’t bother me.”
“Oh yeah, that’s right,” he said. “She ain’t the one you miss, right?”
I knew what he was going to say next and felt my body tighten.
“I still see Chantelle, ya know,” he said. “She comes in to the shop all the time.”
“Really?”
“Sure. She came in just the other day. I could get her number or give her yours-”
“Yeah, I wouldn’t mind,” I said a little too eager.
“You’d call her?”
“I dunno. Maybe,” I said. “After all that had happened it might be a bad idea.”
“I see,” he said. “You come back to the hood but you don’t wanna hear from any of us again, eh?”
“It ain’t like that, bruv,” I said softly. “Honestly, when I think about it, I do miss the place and the people.”
“But you ran away from us...”
He was right but there was no easy way for me to say it.
“I had to leave. I had to. Leave all the mess behind.”
“I understand, bruv.”
I wondered if he still had any hard feelings about me leaving him behind like I did everyone else.
“...I hope you had fun, son,” he said. “I can only dream of the parties you students had at uni.”
I wondered if he was bitter that he never had the same chance to go to university.
“Now that your branch got toasted are you going back to the one you were at in West London?”
I snapped out of my reverie. “Listen,” I said. “There’s something I didn’t tell you about the arson.”
“What? That you were rocking out at some show when you were meant to be at the store? You told me, you lucky punk,” he said before adding “Some of us have never been to a rock show.”
“Nah, not that.”
“What then?”
“The guy that was covering my shift-”
“The one you went to uni with?”
“Yeah,” I said. “They took him to hospital for carbon monoxide poisoning. You know from inhaling all the smoke?”
He murmured.
I could feel myself stalling from telling him but there was no more stalling left. “He died in the early hours of this morning.”
“Fuck, man,” he said. “Sorry to hear that. That’s fucked up.”
“I know,” I said and swallowed hard. “I was meant to be there in the store when it was attacked. Not him. It would’ve been me if I hadn’t switched shifts to go to that gig.”
Sajid said nothing.
“I’m not saying I blame myself for his death and I’m not saying I feel guilty for having survived...,”
“Then...?”
“I’m saying I blame the cunts who did it and I want the cops to find them and I’m not gonna let it go ‘til they do.”
“How you gonna do that?”
“I don’t know but I’m not gonna give up and run away from this town this time around. Not ‘til Mark gets justice.”
“You better be careful then,” he said. “This town could carve you right up if you knock on the wrong door – and by wrong, I mean right. You feel me, son?”
I didn’t like where the conversation had ended up. “Yeah, listen it’s late and I’m knackered. I’ll talk to you some other time-”
“Why don’t you come around and we can do this in person?”
“I’ll see...”
“...Right.” The disappointment in his voice was clear. I shou
ld’ve come up with a better excuse for a reply. “You know that I don’t blame you for what happened with me, right?”
I felt my body tighten again and tried to calm my breathing. “You know I felt bad about that.”
“That’s right, I do. And it wasn’t your fault. I don’t blame you for anything. So no point in us dancing around it no more...”
“Alright, then. Let’s meet up.” And finally get it over with.
8
I had been holding off visiting my mum and by the time I reached Binford, it was just after three in the afternoon.
Binford was so disconnected from the rest of London that it didn’t even feel like part of the city. It was located in the far end of East London and wasn’t on any of the Underground train routes. Binford Station consisted of just a few rail platforms and a ticket desk that wasn’t even open half the time.
When I got out of the station I walked down the backstreets of Binford and wondered how best to explain what I knew to my mum. I hadn’t seen her in over a month. She hadn’t called me in over a week and I thought it was strange that she hadn’t called yet.
No doubt she knew about the Bestco arson and she was well aware that I was to be based at that store because I had told her myself.
I caught a glimpse of myself in the reflection in a shop window that passed me by. I had been meaning to get a haircut before I went to see my mum so I decided to get it done there and then. I thought of Asghar’s barbers.
Asghar’s barber shop was the place I used to get my hair cut before I left Binford. I had been getting my hair cut there for as far back as I could remember. My dad used to take me there when I was a child and I remember hating it. Eventually, I got used to it and even when loads of other barber shops opened up nearby I still stuck to Asghar’s even if the competition was cheaper.
I made my way down the backstreets towards the barber shop and the further away I got from the main roads like Binford Lane the more peaceful it became and I was feeling a lot better about everything.
The closer I got to Asghar’s the more I noticed slight changes in the kind of shops now open. I had noticed there were pound stores and fried chicken shops all over Binford Lane but down where Asghar’s barber shop was located there were hardly any other kinds of shops in business. It made me wonder how badly local businesses had been affected by the recent recession.
I was seconds away from reaching the barber shop when a young woman came out of the beauty parlour next door and blocked my path.
It was Seema.
Before I could think of turning around to avoid being seen, she looked up and saw me.
I froze. For a moment that felt like ages we stared at each other and neither of us spoke. Not knowing what to say I barely managed half a smile.
She returned the smile and blushed. She wore tight figure hugging jeans and a little jacket. Her long hair had been straightened. She was more stunning than I had remembered and in those few seconds spent checking her out, all the memories of her came rushing back. I recalled Sajid telling me she was now married to Anil and shook myself out of my reverie.
“Well, stranger,” she said, her hands on her hips. “Where have you been hiding all this time?”
She was smiling but it was a devilish smile that conjured up certain memories of times I had never told anyone. And with her standing before me then it was almost as if the last four years since we had last met had been a dream and we had never been apart.
“Hey, Seema,” I said. “How ya been?”
“Busy.”
“That’s good,” I said, not knowing what else to say. There had been a lot of drama between us and in the years since I had left Binford, I had been glad it was all in the past. “...I heard about you and Anil. Congratulations.” She didn’t say anything so I asked her if they had any kids.
“No,” she said with a laugh. “Not yet. It’s gonna be our first anniversary next month.”
“Well, it’s good to hear,” I said. “So what do you do these days?”
“Oh, you know,” she said, letting her words trail off. “...Just take care of things at home. I don’t have to work ‘cause of Anil.”
“I see.”
“He helps run his dad’s business. You know? On Binford Lane..?”
I remembered Anil’s dad. Mr Kumar. He owned one of the most successful convenient stores on Binford Lane for decades now.
“That’s good,” I said, trying not to give away how much I didn’t care. I just wanted to get my hair cut and get away to my mum’s.
“So what about you?” she asked. “Are you married? Engaged?” She was searching for the answer in my eyes, shifting from one to the other.
I shook my head. “I don’t have time for anything these days.”
She smiled. “That’s a shame.” I could’ve sworn she batted her eyelids at me.
There was an awkward silence between us as I struggled to end the conversation.
“Oh, look!” she said and showed me the backs of her hands. “I just had my nails done.” She held them up for me to see. “Do they look pretty?”
I looked at her nails and then back at her. I didn’t think there might actually have been something more to her query so I didn’t hesitate in telling her they did look pretty.
She gave me a smile and blushed.
“Listen, I’m in a bit of a rush here,” I said and nodded towards the barber shop behind her. “Sorry. I gotta run.” I swapped positions with her so she wasn’t blocking my way.
“Oh.” Her disappointed was clear. “Well, it was nice seeing you.”
Before I could say anything she gave me a hug, which caught me by surprise. I put one arm around her back and felt her squeeze me tight. I could smell her hair against my face. She smelled nice but I knew I wasn’t meant to be that close to her anymore.
She eventually broke free and took a step back. “We should stay in touch.” She giggled.
“I don’t know how Anil would feel about that,” I said. “Know what I mean?”
“Oh, don’t worry, it’s fine.” She waved away my comment. “That was a long time ago. I’m sure he doesn’t even care about that childish stuff.”
I wondered if she knew how much she was downplaying the past.
“Well,” I said. “See you around.” I waved goodbye. She nodded and I turned my back on her and walked towards the entrance to Asghar’s barber shop.
As I opened the door to walk into the shop I noticed Seema’s reflection in the door window.
She was still there staring at me.
9
Asghar’s shop was fairly quiet when I entered. There were no other customers aside from the Pakistani boy getting his hair cut by Asghar.
I walked over to the seats and sat down. Asghar paused to look up at the mirror and saw me in the reflection. His eyes lingered.
I smiled. “Salaam.”
He smiled back and took a few steps towards me. We shook hands.
“Hello, son,” he shook my hand thoroughly and did not let go. “Long time no see. Where you been? Back home?”
I laughed and told him the usual line about how I’d been busy. “Nice to see you’re still here after all these years,” I said and took my seat against the wall.
“By the grace of god, son,” he said, finishing up with the boy in the chair. When the boy left the shop Asghar brushed the armchair clean and gestured for me to sit.
In that moment I took the seat I was taken back to the days of growing up in this town – where on Fridays at the mosque, you’d bump into the guy who made your burgers, the guy who fixed your car, the guy who sold you groceries, and of course, the guy who cut your hair.
It always felt strange for all of you to be in the same place together. Like that was your whole world – and that’s all it was ever going to be – and small enough to fit in one hall.
Asghar began cutting my hair. “That was some drama you did the other day,” he said.
That took me by surprise and I remai
ned silent.
“...On Binford Lane.”
“Someone tell you about it?” I asked.
“I saw myself. On my way here.”
“...Had to be done.”
“Why?”
“I thought they killed my friend.”
For the briefest of moments he paused cutting. “But you don’t think that anymore?”
I could feel doubt growing inside me about my suspicions of Defenders of Islam. It had been growing since I had talked with DI Martin. “I don’t know what to think.”
Defenders of Islam had done plenty of bad shit over the years so they had to be taken into consideration regarding the arson.
“You think it was Defenders of Islam but what about the gangs around here?”
I decided to tell him about the black suspects.
He wasn’t surprised. “Look what they did last year – those riots. These boys have no respect for anyone. It would not surprise me if they started to burn other shops down. Shops like Bestco might be able to take it but what about the rest of us? And other high street superstores like Kumar’s?” Before I could say anything he looked outside the shop window and said, “There’s his son right now.”
I struggled to look in that direction in the mirrors because Asghar was still cutting my hair but I managed to see who he was talking about.
Anil.
He was with two other Indian men and they were all approaching Asghar’s barber shop.
10
Anil was shorter than I remembered – no taller than 5’3 – but much bigger now. He wore jeans and a tight T-shirt that showed off his muscular physique. He had always been skinny and I wondered how he had managed to become this size since I last saw him. The two men he was with were almost a foot taller and made him look even shorter.
One of the men was in his early forties and very dark skinned and had a strong build. The other was also tall but young and slim. As the dark skinned man opened the shop door for Anil I wondered what to do.
