by Rashad Salim
“Just a few potentially disgruntled students I might have had.”
Atif smiled. “Someone you didn’t give an ‘A’?”
Tom couldn’t help but smile at that. He had always liked Atif. He was one of his favourite students. He didn’t know if that made it easier or harder for them to be in this situation together.
“Tell me about Zafar Khan,” Tom said, and found himself sounding like DS Barker.
The comment wiped the smile off Atif’s face, which made Tom feel bad about his line of questioning. He decided to soften the query. “Barker mentioned him to me too. I had him expelled, Atif. That means we got Zafar in common.”
Atif looked down at the table. “What do you wanna know?”
“Why would Zafar want to harm you? I’m the one who had him expelled.”
Atif looked at him. “Don’t you remember?”
Tom felt that he should but he didn’t. Up until this day he hadn’t realised how many troublesome students he had expelled from Binford. There had to be one or two other expelled students he hadn’t mentioned to DS Barker and that was only because he hadn’t considered them as viable threats.
Not like Mobeen and Marcus.
“I remember he started a fight with you and it was the last straw as far as I was concerned,” Tom said.
Atif nodded.
“And that he had been pushing his luck with you for a while before that.”
“There you go,” Atif said.
“But I don’t remember what it was all about. Was it enough for him to want to kill you?”
Atif sighed. “Fuck knows. He was a mad bastard. You could see that too.”
“So what was worth killing you for?”
Atif looked at him and hesitated.
Tom knew the boy knew more than he had let on. And now was the time for all of it to come out.
“Look, I don’t even know if it was him. Barker just asked me to think about who hated me the most and if I had any enemies. Zafar was the only one I could tell him.”
“Atif, just fucking tell me!” That stunned the boy. “I nearly got murdered ‘cause of this!”
“Okay! Okay! Calm down.” Atif raised his hand to silence Tom.
Tom felt his heart racing and felt guilty for losing his calm.
“It’s a bit of a long story but the bottom line is we fought over Heena.” Atif looked away to hide his embarrassment.
Tom sighed from relief now that he got his answer. “Over a girl?”
“Yeah.”
Tom thought it over, trying to recall that period with all the trouble between Atif and Zafar. He tried to remember anything about Heena somewhere in all of it and came up with nothing.
“He fancied her too?” Tom asked.
Atif nodded.
“Did she fancy him back?”
Atif screwed up his face at the thought. “Fuck no. She hated him.”
“You’re sure they never had a history, Zafar and her?”
“Trust me. I’d know if they did. Nothing’s a secret at this school.”
“So what was it? He couldn’t handle the fact that she liked you over him?”
“He was always competitive with me. Since we first met in Year 7. We had run-ins every now and then over the years but nothing serious. Not until Year 11 when me and Heena got together. That just pushed him over the edge. Suddenly, he found a reason in everything to start shit with me and I wasn’t gonna take it...you know what’s funny?”
“What?”
“When we finished Year 11 and had our exams – exams I passed and he failed – I thought that was the end of it. And when I realised he was enrolling here too I didn’t think much of it. Thought that he’d moved on but he hadn’t. First week in and it kicked off all over again. Then about a few weeks later you stepped in and he got kicked out. End of story.”
“You never saw or heard from again after that?”
Atif thought it over. “How long’s it been? That was September, it’s January now. That’s about four months since he was kicked out. I’d heard shit here and there from some of the other guys but never really paid attention to it.”
They sat in silence for a moment. Tom had taken in everything Atif had told him. Then something Atif had said a few minutes earlier struck him.
“You said Zafar was the only one you could tell Barker.”
“So?”
“The only one? Was there someone else?”
Atif swallowed hard.
“Atif?”
“What?”
“Is there someone else out there who might wanna harm you? Someone you didn’t tell Barker about?”
Atif looked at him hard and long. “Look, I can’t be sure about this so don’t go telling anyone, okay?”
“Okay,” Tom said but was eager to find out what it was before he agreed for real.
“Heena’s older brother Shazad.”
9
“Why would Heena’s brother wanna harm you?”
Atif shook his head and looked at Tom. “Take a guess, sir.” When Tom didn’t respond to that, he added “I’m in a relationship with his sister.”
Tom thought it through but was having difficulty understanding. “He disapproves of you?”
“He doesn’t even know about us! I don’t even wanna think about what he would do if he did.”
They sat in silence for a while.
Atif breathed out like he had been holding his breath all the time he and Tom had been talking.
“...You know when I saw those attackers rushing towards us...man, I thought they were Shazad’s mates and he was the getaway driver.”
Tom thought it through. “How old is her brother?”
“About twenty-one, twenty-two.”
“You think he knows about you two?”
“Yeah, I do now,” Atif said.
“You talk to Heena about this?”
“No, but I’ve been meaning to. It’s just a tricky subject, ya know? Some things ain’t easy to talk about with girls.”
Tom thought about Kate right then. “What do you know about him?” he asked.
“Not much and what I do know ain’t nice.”
“As in?”
“As in he’s a bit of a black sheep of the family. A bit of a rude boy, hangs around with a rough crowd. Know what I mean?”
Tom nodded. “Heena ever talk about him? Confide in you about him?”
Atif shook his head. “She doesn’t like talking about him. I don’t think they get on. Besides, I don’t even like thinking about the idea about her having an older brother so it suits me fine her never bringing him up.”
“You think he would really try to kill you just for dating his sister?”
Atif looked at him in disbelief and let out a laugh.
“What?” Tom asked.
Atif shook his head. “Seriously, sir. You still don’t know much about Asian culture, do you?”
Tom raised his hands conceding to the implication.
“I remember when you first came in to our class, you remember that day?” Atif asked.
Tom shrugged. “Vaguely. Why?”
Atif stared out the window on the other side of the classroom. “We came out that class and we couldn’t believe how little you knew about other cultures. Ya know, multicultural societies? Like London. Like Binford.”
This piqued Tom’s curiosity. He wanted to hear all this. Even though it made him feel self conscious.
“You might not remember this but when you read out our names in the register and Heena answered for me and I answered for her and everyone was laughing ‘cause you hadn’t realised what was going on.”
Tom thought about that. “Yeah, rings a bell. I thought it was just the usual ‘tease the new teacher’ malarkey.”
“It was,” Atif said. “But what made us think was how you hadn’t noticed anything was off. We tried that stunt on other teachers before you and they shut us up, there was no pulling the wool over their eyes.”
Tom though
t about how he had been ridiculed and felt himself getting hot. “So what’s your point?” he asked.
“My point, sir, is that the other teachers were lifelong Londoners. They knew Imran’s and Hitesh’s didn’t use the ladies toilets. You didn’t. From that day on, we all knew people at this school were gonna take you for a ride and you’d never even know. And if you did by then it would be too late.”
“That’s a great observation, Atif. What’s it got to do with you and Heena’s older brother?”
“Don’t you get it, sir? If you were familiar with Asian culture you wouldn’t have to ask me why Shazad would wanna harm me if he found out I was dating his sister. You’d know that most Muslim guys – hot blooded, badly behaved types especially here in Binford – that were in his shoes wouldn’t think twice about kicking the shit out of loverboys like me.”
Tom took it all in. “Seems a bit of a stereotype. Coming at you with knives – that’s a bit overkill, no?”
Atif shook his head and stared at Tom in disappointment.
“Wake up, sir. This is Binford, you’re talking about. No such thing as overkill here.”
10
Tom asked Atif if not mentioning Shazad to DS Barker was the right thing to do.
Atif told him he’d rather die than draw attention to his and Heena’s relationship into the murder investigation. He wasn’t willing for the illicit relationship to be discovered by either his or her parents.
Tom thought it was wrong. There was no way he could allow a potential suspect get away from the police’s attention. He couldn’t let Chris’ killer remain undiscovered just because of two star-crossed young lovers were afraid it would affect their relationship. But the more he thought about it, the more he realised he had to take Heena’s welfare into consideration.
He couldn’t ruin the girl’s life by putting her brother under police scrutiny just like that. In the past he had read news articles about honour killings of girls from her background but didn’t see the link until now. He didn’t want to speculate how badly her parents would punish her for the forbidden relationship.
He had to handle this carefully. And if the police couldn’t be involved right away, he had to make sure Shazad was a legitimate suspect and not one focused on purely out of Atif’s paranoia.
Tom and Atif walked out of the empty classroom as the bell rang signalling end of break time. Tom thanked Atif again for taking the time to talk to him before the boy went on his way to his next class.
Tom entered the common room and was relieved to see Heena was still there. She was with a few of her girlfriends at the table Atif had been sitting at earlier. Tom approached the table and greeted her.
“How’s it going, sir?” she asked him with genuine concern. “I’m so sorry about Mr Jones. I can’t believe he’s gone.”
“Yeah.” Tom didn’t know what else to say. He had to get her alone. “Listen, I need to discuss your History coursework with you. I’ll be away from school for a while.”
“Oh?” she looked shocked and stood up. She gathered her things and moved around the table to join him.
He led her out into the corridor. He wanted to talk to her alone in the same room where he had taken Atif but it was occupied now. He looked around the corridor and decided to question her right there. It was his only chance.
“Are the police gonna catch his killers?” she asked.
“Hopefully,” he said. “Listen, I need to talk to you about Atif.”
Heena frowned. “What about him?”
“Well, I’m just a bit worried about him, that’s all.”
“Has he talked to you about what happened yesterday?”
“A bit. He’s still a bit shaken. He was saying how his parents didn’t want him to come back to sixth form so soon. They wanted him to stay home ‘til all this blows over. If it ever does.”
Tom nodded. “I see. Well, he’ll be needing someone to talk to and I’m guessing that’s gonna be you.”
“Don’t worry, sir. I’m here for him.”
“Has he been stressed lately?”
“How do you mean?”
“Anything in particular stressing him?”
She frowned. “No. Why? Has he said anything?”
“I can’t be certain. I know he’s still in shock from yesterday but I was wondering if there was something else bothering him too. You two aren’t having problems, are you?”
She smiled. “No, sir. We aren’t. We’ve never been better.”
Tom smiled back at her. “How long have you two been together?”
“Longer than you and Ms Banks.” She gave him a knowing look.
Tom blushed and tried to move on with his questioning. “Well, that’s good.” The next part was crucial that he get right. This was what it was all about. Getting to the point even if in a roundabout way. “I’m curious, your parents and his don’t know about you two, do they?”
Her eyes widened. “No, and thank god for that. They’d probably have heart attacks before they could disown me,” she said, punctuating her point with a laugh.
Tom giggled along. “What about your brother? Do you think he’d get along with Atif?”
She stopped smiling. “I don’t know about that. He’s a bit of a mess, if you get my meaning.”
The common room door opened and Heena’s friends walked out.
“Hey,” one of her girlfriends said. “We’re going to the library now.”
Heena turned her attention to her friends. “Okay.” She looked at Tom and he sensed he was losing her before he found out what he had approached her for. She half turned away from him and was about to wave bye.
“So what does he do, your brother? Where is he now?” Tom tried not to sound desperate in his panicked state.
“Oh, it’s funny you should ask.”
“Why’s that?”
“He’s just arrived in Pakistan. He flew out last night.”
Tom frowned despite himself. It wasn’t the answer he was expecting and it rattled him so much he was tongue tied.
“See ya later, sir.” She waved and turned her back on him.
He stood there watching her catch up with her friends and thought about what she had said.
He recalled reading several news articles about criminals trying to flee the country after committing a crime and being captured at the airport. He couldn’t stop himself from making a connection between Chris’ murder and the flight date.
Was it just a coincidence that Shazad had left the country right after the botched attempt on Atif’s life?
11
After going through some formalities concerning his immediate leave from work, Tom spent some time surfing the Internet in the school library. He scoured the web searching for articles about Binford’s crime rates and it reminded him how he had done this before making the decision to leave Nottingham and move down to the troubled town in East London. Most of what he had found was the same information as he had while he was in Nottingham. But it was different now.
Now he was reading all the findings as a victim of crime and that changed everything.
He recalled how he had been so positive about the move down south and how he wouldn’t be deterred due to the grimy nature of Binford and its schools. At the time he had seen himself as headstrong. Now he felt he had been naive.
He sat there in the library and ruminated on everything – his life, Chris, Kate, Nottingham and Binford. He knew he had to make a few phone calls back home and wondered if he should start enquiring about employment opportunities there. He quickly realised it was a pointless speculation.
The whole reason he had moved to Binford was for more money.
He wasn’t making enough in his previous teaching job in Nottingham. To go back now would be a form of quitting, he thought. And he had come too far to turn back now, hadn’t he? If he abandoned his current post and the promotion he was already offered, he’d be going home with nothing. He knew his barely five months of work experience in Binford wou
ld be laughed at. And how would he explain it? By telling future employers about the murder attempt he survived? He would never allow it.
He couldn’t live the rest of his life knowing London had beaten him.
That Binford had tried to destroy him and how he had barely gotten out alive.
Tom left the school after lunchtime ended. He had been psyching himself up to do what Kate had been on his back about – call his mother and tell her what had happened.
He would only do it under two conditions.
Firstly, he didn’t want to make the call from home because he didn’t want to spend the rest of the night shifting around his flat and dwelling on the conversation, which he was certain would be upsetting for both his mother and himself.
And secondly, he knew he was going to need a few drinks right after he made the phone call to help him get over it and he wasn’t going to drink alone by himself in his flat. And when he gave it some more thought, maybe he needed a drink before he made the call too.
Therefore, it only made sense to make the call from a pub. And that was where he was now on his way towards.
He knew he could speak to his mum at Kate’s place. It’s what Kate would’ve wanted.
It would mean he wasn’t alone during the aftermath of Chris’ murder and Kate could also spend some quality time with him and talk to his mum, letting her know she was taking care of him.
He knew all this. But he couldn’t do it like that either.
It was hard enough having to break the news to his mum. Letting Kate see him at his weakest would only make him feel worse than already did.
He didn’t know who else knew the reason he survived the attack was because Chris sacrificed himself and Atif defended him by disorienting Chris’ killer by hitting the knifeman with his bag. Both of those acts made Tom ashamed.
He believed he should’ve been the one to defend the student and it had been wrong to let someone take a killing blow meant for him.
12
Tom leaned against an alley wall beside a shitty local pub in Binford. He’d had a few drinks already. More than he had planned to take in before he made the call. But there was nothing he could do about that. He could’ve waited. Made the call later when he felt better but there was no putting it off any longer. He just wanted to get it over and done with.
