Too Much Trouble

by Tom Avery

  ‘This is Mr Ekpo, Emmanuel,’ my dad said, smiling at me. ‘Say hello. He is going to help us.’

  I said hello shyly. Mr Ekpo was a vast man and his face was set grimly, as I had seen it before. He didn’t look angry but his face was far from friendly.

  ‘Is the little man ready, my love?’ my father called past me to my mother, who was encouraging Prince to eat.

  My mother looked up and nodded. I thought I could see tears blossoming in her large eyes; eyes that were normally crinkled in a smile.

  ‘OK,’ my father went on. ‘Emmanuel, I need to speak to you.’ He took me by the hand and led me out of our one-room house. He called over his shoulder as we left, ‘Please, Mr Ekpo, have a seat. My wife will get you a drink.’

  Outside it was as hot as ever, the sun beating down on our heads and reflecting up from the dusty ground. A car was parked in front of our house. The first car I had seen for months. The first car I had seen since my uncle had left. It was a brown, battered jeep, with a small flag emblazoned in chipped paint on the driver’s door.

  ‘This is hard,’ my father said, ‘and I want you to listen carefully until I am finished. You understand, Emmanuel?’

  I nodded and replied, ‘Yes, Dadda.’

  ‘You ask me why you don’t go to school, and Prince always asks when we can go into town. I can tell you, Emmanuel, because you are getting big now, that it is not safe, and your mother and I, we want you to be safe. You understand?’

  I didn’t understand, but I nodded again and said nothing.

  ‘You and Prince are going to see my brother. Victor will look after you.’

  For a moment I was excited at the thought of an adventure coupled with seeing my uncle. Then I realised my father hadn’t included himself or my mother in his explanations. ‘You’re coming?’ I said, my voice cracking slightly.

  ‘Emmanuel.’ My father looked at me, his glistening eyes a mirror of my mother’s. ‘Take this. It is all I have to give you.’ He handed me a worn, brown envelope.

  I turned it over carefully.

  My father took it back and pulled out the contents item by item. A very small wedge of notes. ‘Enough to buy something to eat,’ he said. A slip of paper with a phone number and address, those of my uncle Victor. And two tickets, one for me and one for Prince. Tickets for the plane that would deliver us to the safety my uncle would offer.

  He stuffed them back into the envelope, and pressed it into my hand as Prince came running outside, followed by Mr Ekpo, and finally my mother, carrying my canvas school-bag.

  ‘We are going to town, we are going to town!’ Prince hollered at me, beaming.

  I looked at my father, who gave me a pointed look.

  My mother came over and gave me the bag. It was fuller than I’d ever packed it for school, the broken strap wrapped around it tightly.

  ‘Tell your uncle that he was right,’ my mother whispered into my ear. ‘You tell him that your dadda said he was right.’ She gave me a quick hug and went over to Prince.

  Mr Ekpo had climbed into the jeep and was clearly waiting for us. My father took me by the shoulder and led me over to the passenger door.

  ‘You will be gone when I return?’ Mr Ekpo asked my father.

  ‘Yes, yes!’ my father replied impatiently, and then addressed me. ‘You look after your brother, OK? You look after him, Emmanuel.’

  So I did. I looked after Prince.

  Chapter 7

  It wasn’t hard to get out of the school building. I looked up and down the corridor to check that no one was coming. I hadn’t seen where Mrs Marshall and the teaching assistant had gone. When I was sure there was no one around, we headed for the nearest fire escape.

  The difficult part was getting through the school gates. By this time all the parents would be long gone and the gates would be sealed. If you had a teacher’s pass, the gates would open for you. Otherwise you had to press a button and ask the receptionist, Miss King, to let you through. I didn’t think that Miss King would be too keen to see me and Prince strolling out. Our only chance was if someone was passing through just as we arrived at the gates. Someone trusting enough to let us out without asking questions, or gullible enough to believe any story we told them.

  I walked quickly across the corner of the playground leading from our fire exit to the main gates. I longed for a passer-by as we walked. Prince hurried to keep up, still pressing the blue ice-pack against his swollen and bleeding fist.

  ‘Where you off to then, boys?’ The heavily accented voice stopped us dead in our tracks. My heart froze in my chest. I turned to see Dave Williams, the school’s caretaker, walking towards us carrying a long length of wood over one shoulder.

  ‘Er, doctor’s, sir,’ I said hesitantly.

  ‘Er, doctor’s? What you got, an ‘er’ cold?’ Dave cracked a broad smile at us both, then started at our grave expressions. ‘Oh, you must be very ill. I never see you without a smile, Prince.’ At this, he walked on past us. ‘Come on then, boys.’

  My heart stuttered back to life and breath returned to my lungs.

  ‘Thanks, Mr Williams,’ I voiced, and Prince smiled weakly as the caretaker pressed his pass against the sensor. He pulled the gate open as a voice crackled over his walkie-talkie.

  ‘Hello, Dave?’ Miss King’s voice was clearly strained and I could feel our luck ebbing away.

  ‘What’s up, Judy? I’m just down by the gates.’

  I grabbed Prince’s arm and hurried through the open gate, putting ourselves the other side of the black metal bars that surrounded the school.

  ‘Come on, Prince,’ I hissed and broke into a trot.

  I could hear the conversation continuing over Mr Williams’ radio as our trot became a run and in a few steps, an all-out sprint. As we reached the end of the short stretch of road that the gates stood on, we heard the caretaker’s voice pursuing us.

  ‘Hey, you two, what are you playing at? Get back here!’ Dave was a big guy, not huge, but big enough and slow enough that we weren’t scared he was going to catch us. I’m not sure what we were actually scared of, but I know that every step I took in that frantic dash was fuelled by fear.

  For the second time that day I ran until my legs or my lungs gave out. This time it was my lungs. We found ourselves sandwiched between a tall, garden fence, a gate set in it every four or five metres, and the backs of what I guessed were garages. I crouched on the pebble-strewn path, my body screaming for rest. I had thrown our bags down and the contents of one had spilt out. Prince leant against a fence, his hands on his knees, the ice-pack long since discarded, and his head down.

  ‘What. . . are. . . we. . . doing?’ Gasped breaths punctuated Prince’s question as he tried to re-fill his lungs.

  I didn’t answer for ages. I collapsed further on to the path, my head resting on one of Prince’s school books. I looked up at Prince before I answered.

  ‘I don’t know what we’re doing, but I do know that they weren’t about to drop that one. Mrs Marshall was gonna keep going until Uncle Victor turned up. Did you want to hang around for that?’

  Prince looked down at me, then up at the top of the fence. He didn’t answer my question but asked, ‘Do you know where we are?’

  I had no idea. We walked back to the end of the alley and looked for a road name. Gillott Road. We still had no idea where we were. We could have been on any one of a hundred roads around our area. We turned round again and followed the alley to the other end. It came out on to another road that we didn’t know, Lords Lane.

  We had no intention of retracing our steps, we didn’t know who might be searching for us, so we took some aimless turns, hoping to find something familiar.

  After about fifteen minutes of wandering we found one of the entrances to the park. As we went through the gate I pulled out the loose change, all the money we had in the world, from my jacket pocket. Prince ran ahead as I counted it slowly, down to the last penny. There was not enough.

  Not enough for anything
much.

  I loved our park. In the middle was a huge, open space. A field of green, defined by white lines and football goals. It was pretty much on top of a hill, so it seemed like the sky went on forever. A concrete path ran all the way round the grassed area and paths led off this into the woods around it. One path led to a play-park, another to a BMX track, where me and Prince had often had foot races, jumping over the obstacles and charging up and down the ramps. We took another path to a smaller and more secluded field where the park-keeper rarely went.

  This field was sloping and finished with a steep incline down to a row of trees that were perfect for climbing. Me and Prince picked the biggest tree. We climbed until we thought no one would be able to see us from the ground.

  Here we spent the rest of the school day. Neither of us mentioned the morning’s events. Another thing we didn’t mention was the fear that clung to us like the cling-film that covered Asad and Ikram’s sandwiches every day - suffocating. The fear of what would happen if Prince’s school did manage to contact my uncle. Of what would be awaiting us when we returned to the house.

  We played boxes and hangman in the notes section of my school planner. We practised hanging from the branches by our ankles. We tried to climb to the highest branch. When we got hungry, Prince pulled out his Chomp and I had the rest of my Space Raiders.

  We were still hungry, but we had both been hungrier before.

  Chapter 8

  My uncle gave us an allowance every month. It had been the same for the last two years. Sometimes he would bring us the money, sometimes it would be thrust at us by one of his friends. For the first few months, the money ran out before my uncle appeared again. I didn’t know how to ration then.

  For those weeks we lived on anything we could scavenge. That was hungry. I learnt about rationing pretty quickly after that.

  It wasn’t too bad during the week. We would sneak into the free dinners’ queue at school. The weekends left us with fewer options.

  I remember one Saturday. We were starving. We had not been in England long, and had not smelt the scent of a barbecue before, as it wafted through the air from a neighbouring garden. We didn’t recognise the smell, but it still made our mouths water and our stomachs ache.

  We sniffed the air around us, and licked our lips.

  ‘Can I have some of that?’ Prince asked. Prince’s adjustment to our new life had been quick, but he still expected to get what he wanted.

  We went through the loose panel at the back of the garden, and made our way down the path, following the enticing smell. I gave Prince a bunk-up to look over each fence as we went.

  ‘Yes, yes, yes!’ he said, when we found the right garden. He dropped down and I scrambled up, gripping on to the top of the fence and placing my feet flat against the panel. At the far end of the garden there was a large man. He wore a cap and a checked, short-sleeved shirt. The lower half of his body was obscured by a smoking barbecue.

  ‘Darling!’ he shouted. ‘Darling, can you get me a tray? This chicken’s done.’ He stood listening, facing the house. No reply came and he barked, ‘Darling?’

  He walked into the house, and without a word to Prince I hauled myself over the fence.

  I ran as fast as I could, and reached the barbecue, panting. Quickly I picked up as many chicken legs as I could carry. I tried not to scream as my knuckles were seared on the blackened metal bars. As I ran back down the garden, I thrust the sticky meat into my pockets. I slammed into the fence and again hurled myself over. I crashed into Prince as I fell down the other side.

  That was the first thing I ever stole. It was terrifying.

  ***

  It must have been nearly time for school to finish when we decided to head back to the house. We could hear the jingle of an ice-cream van at the nearest entrance to the park. It was a ten minute walk back to the house.

  We decided to take a detour to the mini-supermarket on the green. We stretched our money carefully. A pack of six finger rolls, a big bag of nachos, some cheese slices, and a big bottle of cola pop. I had just silver coins left in my pocket. Prince wanted another Chomp or a Freddo, but I knew that a little money in my pocket was better than slightly fuller stomachs.

  As we walked the few minutes from the shop to our own alley and garden fence, you could almost hear us not mentioning what might await us. When we arrived, we both looked over the fence cautiously. There was no sign of my uncle or any of his friends, no lights on, no windows open. We both let out long breaths. You might have thought we’d been holding them for the last hour.

  Prince climbed first. I passed over our bags and shopping. I hauled myself over and followed Prince through the jungle to the back door.

  We went through into the kitchen. Prince threw his bag down in the corner and I walked over to the cupboard which held our three chipped plates. We were hungry and tired. We would eat and then go to sleep. I was so tired that thoughts of what tomorrow would bring were muted and distant.

  As I swung the cupboard door open I heard Prince begin to scream, and I knew that trouble had found us.

  In a moment I felt something strike the back of my head. I collapsed into the cupboard door and then down on to the floor. The cupboard door came crashing on to my chest, having been pulled away from the unit. Prince’s scream redoubled in my ears and then cut off abruptly as I tried to focus my swimming eyes.

  Something struck me in the side and I heard my uncle growl, ‘Get up, you!’

  I felt myself being lifted off the ground, my enormous uncle picking me up in one hand as he held Prince by the neck in the other. ‘What have you done, you stupid boys?’ Before I could begin to answer, my uncle released me and then quickly struck another blow across my face.

  This time I didn’t stay on the ground for long. Prince was beginning to turn purple and I could hear soft, choking noises. I leapt up and grappled with my uncle’s arm, plunging my teeth and nails into his muscled limb. That made him let go. I heard Prince gasp a breath as another blow swept across my face.

  ‘Get out, Prince!’ I coughed, struggling to rise. The back door clattered as Prince rushed through it, then my uncle’s box-fresh, white trainers connected with my stomach. I stopped trying to get up and just fought for breath.

  ‘Why am I getting phone calls to my house?’ my uncle roared, then kicked me again. ‘Your sons have run away from the school, they say!’ He imitated a lady’s voice as he kicked me again. The kick turned me over to face him. ‘You need to come and see us or we will come and see you, they say!’ My uncle picked me up again and threw me on to a wooden chair, then took a step back as if to admire his handywork.

  I looked over to the door and saw Prince peering in through the glass. I willed him not to come back in.

  My uncle had turned away from me, letting out a long sigh. I tried to control my ragged breathing and my uncle turned back towards me.

  ‘You are my brother’s son, but I cannot look after you any more. Here...’ he said, thrusting a wedge of notes at me. ‘Now, get out. You will be gone before my friends come. You will not like what they will do when they find that you have brought trouble. Get out, Emmanuel, take your brother and go.’

  With these words, my uncle headed for the door that led into the rest of the house, pulling a packet of cigarettes and a lighter from his pocket.

  Prince opened the back door and looked at me, open-mouthed, the shock clear on his face. He mumbled, ‘I’ll get the stuff.’

  That was the last time we ever saw that house. I’ve never missed it.

  Chapter 9

  There had been four occasions, when my uncle brought us our allowance, that he had stayed to play with us. Just four in three years. Once he had brought us an old Playstation One. A scratched and chipped grey box with a circular lid. You pressed a button and the lid slowly raised so that you could insert games.

  I knew it was nothing to boast about, compared to my friends’ elaborate computer systems, but me and Prince had never owned anything li
ke it. There was a game called Bust-a-Move. It was brilliant.

  You had to shoot these different-coloured bubbles at other coloured bubbles and if you got them in a group of all the same colour then the bubbles exploded. OK, that doesn’t sound too fantastic, but it was two-player.

  My uncle held a cigarette between his lips as he challenged me and Prince to play against him. You had to destroy more bubbles than your opponent. We didn’t beat him once.

  Every time he beat us my uncle laughed and called us funny names. Me and Prince came up with tactics for how we could win, and he laughed even harder. It was a very good day.

  The computer console didn’t last long. Me and Prince played on it semi-constantly the week after my uncle had left us. We were trying to get good enough to beat him. We hoped that maybe he would stay the next time he came.

  But one evening, when we weren’t busy with the bubble game, one of my uncle’s friends found us somewhere we shouldn’t have been. We had been playing hide-and-seek. I was ‘it’ and Prince had decided to hide in one of the rooms with all the plants. I had gone in to find him when I heard the front door opening.

  I froze in the doorway and Prince collided with me on his way out. We lay in a heap as footsteps approached. My uncle’s friend grabbed us roughly and threw us back into our part of the house. He phoned my uncle. I could hear their conversation, my uncle’s replies muted and indistinct.

  When he hung up, the man who had found us picked up the playstation, placed it in the middle of the room and stamped on it several times. It didn’t work after that and we were much more careful about where we were found.

  ***

  When I had the opportunity to look in a mirror I saw why Prince had looked at me with such horror.

  After my uncle kicked us out, Prince quickly gathered our few belongings, then led me stumbling out of the back door. We didn’t climb the fence. Prince kicked out the loose panel. We wouldn’t need to worry about dogs in the garden any more. At the end of the alley we turned left, towards town. After a few steps I stopped by a car and glanced at my reflection. The failing, evening light bounced off the tinted windows and my face was clearly reflected.