When We Speak of Nothing Read online

  Karl was on what was his bed in Abu’s box room: a fold-up mattress next to Abu’s single bed. His eyes were now in the complete opposite mode to earlier when he had been with Abu’s mum. His lashes open as if legging it over some big puddle and then frozen in time.

  Sleep? No chance. The who to call and what to say. And more than anything, the how to act. Godfrey, his social worker, would be all understanding but doing his authoritative thing. You need to check in, man. It doesn’t work like this. I know where you’re staying but it’s your responsibility to let me know. That’s the deal.

  The estate on the other side of the street seemed to get into gear. Lights flickering on. One right across switched on, then off, came on again, stayed bright while shadows crept up along the yellow-lit window, turned off for good. Maybe the person was looking for something.

  Like Karl. Like everyone.

  Abu did his sweetest I’m rushing you now thing while stomping from bathroom to kitchen. That banging, he had it down for real. Wasn’t the first time. Karl just couldn’t make it out of bed.

  ‘Karl. Bruv! It’s time. Mr. Brendan, first thing. Not gonna be late man, you know how he gets.’

  Karl was busy. World War II bombers and heavy fighter planes were hitting London; he was running to get somewhere safe. All courtesy of Mr. Brendan’s history class. A voice cut through the hissing. Move, you have to move, otherwise … And Abu’s mum at the door, her soft voice mingling in.

  ‘… before you leave. Come, Karl.’

  Karl’s eyes all gluey. His body hugging the blanket tight. The dream crashing into him, like the day ahead. Like college. Past the wannabes, keep a good face to everything.

  Abu had made his bed already. Karl let him in on a thing or two about tidiness, mainly to show off to Mama Abu, earning his keep you could say, but it helped keeping the tiny room liveable for the two of them.

  He rolled off the mattress. Standing. Facing the Monday. After the weekend with shit weather.

  Sixth form was just up the road. Not even fifteen minutes. The larger estates were already behind them, as they walked by the small houses lining one side of Regent Square. Town houses. Pretty. It wasn’t particularly busy on the small road that led to much busier streets. Most people were already on their way to work. The odd black cab sped by. Some mums on their way to nurseries with prams. Those that were on the street had a reason. A morning reason. This was not random strolling time. The majority of youngsters catching up after the snowy weekend as they started bumping into each other close to college – I mean end of April, for real? – came from the blocks that towered between the beautiful of Bloomsbury. Unassuming, blending in. Beautiful outside as well. Sometimes. Not so small, not so private all of the time.

  ‘I thought they’d give us today off.’

  ‘Yeah, remember last year? Lots of snowdays. Bare fun.’

  ‘Dunno. All we do is sit in some room that has no space for anyone, or freeze outside. Also, how they give us a snow day when it’s supposed to be warm already? Can’t wait for spring.’

  ‘You a baby or something?’

  ‘It’s cold. That’s all.’

  A sulky face stomped off. There was a general pushing and shoving, friendly bantz popping like champagne, then landing all over the place to be taken up by the next hopeful contestant. There were those who always talked and usually also won, others who gave their 5p.

  Karl’s skinny body in dark jeans now. His face blushing; it was freezing. Was easy with his light-skinned self. Abu was always amazed how much embarrassment could be shown on a single face. Never ever drag me into something you have to lie your way out of, he said to Karl on more than one occasion. Nobody is going to believe you when you blush like some fire alarm.

  ‘Hey, you two.’

  A pretty girl caught up with them, her breath steaming the air around her lips a little.

  ‘Good weekend? OMG the weather, it’s like, so pretty but really cold, right?’

  Both Abu and Karl flashed their white teeth. Coordinated, on cue: approach, recognition, reaction. Nalini’s make-up brought life into this grey-white morning. Her friendliness jumped their way like a net swung out for fishes. Both of them bagged.

  Her friend Afsana tore loose from a couple of other girls who were on their way somewhere else. Other school, or other plans; who could tell? She joined the little group. She had the same purple lips as Nalini, lips that leapt off her flustered brown skin. Their lashes, both dunked in blue mascara, blinked into space, sending messages. A couple of construction workers in hi-vis vests passed them, takeaway cups in hand. They were already on their way back from a break. The building in the area was just not easing up. The cranes had shifted back from the main junction but you could still see them. Otherwise it was still the same: scaffolding and blocked-off paths. The area taken over by dusty men with yellow security vests. You couldn’t escape them, even here where it was quieter, away from King’s Cross construction mayhem, although you could still hear drilling sometimes when they were on a real mission. Abu thought the ground would give then, some days it was so much. A crack might open and make the whole area disappear, swallow it whole. No more major traffic knot. No more endless congestion just to make it around the corner or down the street at King’s Cross station. It would be amazing. A hole of nothing and underneath major chaos piled up on each other, invisible from the world above. He felt like that sometimes. Nothing. Invisible. All the chaos of him hidden underneath.

  ‘How was the weekend?’ Karl asked, giving Abu a look. Where was the chattiness? Acting all shy just because it was girls. Why these double standards in his can’t stop chatting even if I tried to? Any time they appeared Abu stayed for two minutes max then made a disappearing act. When was he getting over that? It was getting tired. And embarrassing.

  ‘Oh really nice. My cousin was over, we, like, all had a really good time. Taking the young ones out, you get me.’

  Abu and Karl got that, for sure, had done almost the same themselves with the twins, but then things had sort of just become the two of them. Like, less hassle.

  ‘And you?’ Nalini stopped for a moment, waved at someone.

  ‘Same old, same old. Not much really.’

  ‘A lot of snow though.’ She laughed.

  Abu looked at Karl to see whether any of yesterday’s attack was creeping into his doe eyes. But Karl seemed not at all concerned with the previous day’s encounter. He had some speedy processing mechanism after first stalling when things happened.

  ‘But so beautiful, isn’t it? It makes everything so quiet. Like a blanket, absorbing all the noise. Maybe to give us all a rest. Almost feels like we’re somewhere else, you know, protected from all the harshness that comes from city life. ’Specially here in King’s Cross, innit.’

  He was on a roll. Karl.

  Nalini and Afsana did some nodding, still blinking bright blue streaks into the atmosphere. Yes, the harshness, the city, they were all very in agreement. So intense, everything. Snow helped, sometimes, it did.

  They had arrived at the gate to the college. It was hectic here. Traffic piling up, pushing impatiently against the thumping city, inevitably getting stuck courtesy of too big, too busy, too small a junction. And no swallowing hole in sight. Their little group was growing.

  ‘You coming Camden later?’

  ‘Can’t be making that journey blud. Oyster card anaemic.’

  ‘Where’s your Zip one? Going by that shop with the discount trainers. They have some new stuff.’

  ‘What’s the point? Shopkeeper is just going to follow us around anyway. Can’t take the hassle of being called a thief just ’cause I want to look at some clothes. Not today. Too cold. Anyways, lost my Oyster, so using my mum’s. And it ain’t got no credit anyways.’

  A lot of haha wazz going on buzzed like swarms of bees meeting for a family reunion. Karl was talking about something or other. This was his department. The way things were out of control. Always being followed around, given lip abou
t this or the other. Being wrong. Etc., etc.

  Abu was tired of it all. To him, it was simple: coppers and sorts didn’t like brown or black people. Avoid or find a way around. No need for all that deep shit and how it all sat in the whole history of mankind. Not on Monday when he was still sore from the fucking jump the day before.

  And either way, it was only because Karl had some proper issues: mixed kid with white mum and all. No dad. Ever.

  Although Rebecca, which she made him call her, was like really on point and better than any other mother Abu knew (minus his own, obviously). She wanted you to be her equal, talk to her with opinions and everything. But she was not around much. Meaning available. Mentally. Always worn out, always in pain. Often down, but proper. So Karl was missing some of that processing talk you were supposed to do with your parents. Abu wasn’t sure if it was really that, but he had heard someone say it once. Not enough family cohesion. Whatever that meant. Rebecca would know how to do that, the cohesion stuff, so the whole point was a bit rubbish anyway.

  Nalini’s fuchsia-framed smile spilled across her whole face, then she started laughing, her little shoulders and upper body trembling. Happy and shit. Afsana held on to her fake leather bag. They all fell into a rhythm, had obviously hung out outside school together before. Karl and the girls, or as he lately said, women.

  Abu lost interest. How Karl always went from having to be dragged out of the house to then getting all deep at the college gate. All within half an hour? And of course his pale self was spotless, a just throwing something on outfit. Whatever. Looked more like fashion scientists had assembled a careful combination after some intense research.

  The previous day’s wannabes were coming up on the far end of the street. It was their inner circle: Leicester, Connor and Sammy. They were walking amongst the other immaculate soon-men, towards the gate. Connor was wearing a trendy sweater he would have had to borrow from his mates. Everybody knew it. Still, he pretended to be all on top of fashion. As if there was money for anything like that at his home. The other two almost drowned in their classy, as in totally now season, down jackets they must have quickly bought in the middle of the fancy ice-cold. It wouldn’t last, but when else would you get to show off proper winter gear?

  These three? The gang. Abu. What to do?

  The laughing had put some tears in Karl’s eyes, and his dimples were indented to the max, achieved max effect, with no effort whatsoever. Abu watched the trying-hard-to-be-gangsters stroll closer. They wouldn’t do anything to them. They wouldn’t even say a word. Not now, not here. No acknowledgment, nothing. It would all be very casual, very yu’aright? and straight to the gate.

  What is worse? Getting jumped or not existing at all?

  And what to do with both when, at any time, anything could change like the weather mid-season, unexpected, unannounced and with no sense of logic?

  Abu turned back and looked over his shoulder.

  ‘See you inside.’

  Karl didn’t see the wannabes. He was now carr ying someone’s bag while the owner was showing him something that required stepping forward and hopping. Was lost to Abu, who’d missed that train half a block earlier. Whatever.

  ‘We’re coming now anyway.’

  No one moved but Abu. Nothing unusual here. Your typical Monday. Except for Abu’s throbbing shoulders and aching neck. And even that wasn’t new.

  In the afternoon the snow started melting and the greyish day turned completely rubbish. Abu’s mum opened the door for them with tired eyes in her heart-shaped face. Her lids looked like someone was pulling with both hands. Aazad had been sent home when he fell on the icy school ground. Nothing much to worry about, just a twisted ankle and crankiness in front of the TV. But you know that can be a whole lot, especially when you didn’t expect it. She had just returned home, after the long wait at A&E, twins on the couch: one in pain, one sulking.

  And there was the call Karl had to make, hanging in the air, waiting for credit. But when Karl came into the kitchen, Godfrey was already sitting there.

  ‘Hello, stranger.’

  3

  * * *

  Junctions.

  There is always too much choice.

  Karl nodded, his whole face shutting down.

  ‘It’s nothing new,’ Godfrey said. ‘Come on. We agreed. I don’t even get what the big deal is.’

  He waited. No answer. Nothing that could be swung like blah blah because of this, you get me, blah. No reason whatsoever other than Karl liked to run. At night. Away. Not to disappear, just to run. And to not call any-bloody-fucking-one. Not Godfrey, not Rebecca. No one but Abu.

  Usually in the middle of the night, underneath Abu’s grand mansion of an estate around the corner from the big old new St Pancras. Posh and all. Prostitutes and druggies moved somewhere else. All cleaned up and shiny. You could use it as a mirror if you were so inclined. Watch yourself disappear. Soon to be pricing them all out, council flat or not.

  Abu would walk to the front door, asleep, and buzz Karl in, often his mother awake also, by the time Karl slowly climbed up the stairs. She would be standing in the hallway in her nightie and the gown that was really a bit too big for her. And sometimes when Abu’s dad had come home from the night shift, he would come to the hallway from the living room. Nodding at Karl. Karl would go to shake his hand. That sort of respect thing between them. Abu’s dad treated him like an esteemed extension of the family. Even if Abu’s dad seldom had a lot of words. It was different to Mama Abu’s silent reasoning. He had them for no one. Night shift can do that to you.

  ‘Will you come to the hospital, at least?’

  Karl’s hands in the pockets of his jeans.

  ‘She doesn’t have an infection this time. It’s a relapse. She’ll be home day after tomorrow.’

  ‘How does she look? Pale again?’

  Rebecca had looked as if she had got mouldy last time. Pale wasn’t even the bloody word.

  ‘She looks good, Karl. Her cheeks are almost as rosy as yours.’

  The corners of Godfrey’s lips twitched. Supposed to be a smile. If the youngster would finally let him. What the eff was it all the time? This can’t make a phone call am too sensitive yet wanna act all grown up thing? But he knew better than to let any of that seep from his lips. He got up from the kitchen chair and put his hands on Karl’s shoulders.

  ‘I think it will be good for you.’

  Oh, the social workers of this world. Knowing everything that was well good. Godfrey was all cute like that.

  When they got to the hospital Rebecca was sleeping. Her face was rosy. Healthy. The doctor said she didn’t really need to stay; they’d release her the following day. She was smiling in her sleep. Karl said he would go by later so they went to Rebecca and Karl’s flat, where he lived when he wasn’t running away. And although everyone knew where he was, running was running and the point was still the same: to be away. Because his mum, Rebecca, wasn’t there, couldn’t be there. Couldn’t really be there for him like proper because she was in hospital. This time. If not that, then seriously unwell. Again. Godfrey was taking care of him, Abu was, Abu’s mum was and the dad, all of them were having Karl’s back, in some real, big-time way. And the girls on their way to school and their other friends. The ones they really had. Not the wannabes, not them, of course not them. But it wasn’t enough.

  Karl had helped his mum pack the bag he had got her for Christmas. The one that was super busy with the intense flower pattern. Cute though, if that was your thing. He hadn’t been sure if it was a good present. It was something she would use those rare times it really was too bad and she needed the hospital ASAP. Just in case. Just to get back to the right level. Where one could manage this MS. Multiple Sclerosis. It was major. But also it reminded them that she wasn’t all that well a lot of the time.

  Last time Karl had scrambled out of the house when he heard the ambulance pulling up the road. Put the pre-packed bag by the door, left her on the chair, ran down the stairs,
opened the door to the building for them, and said: ‘Second floor, first door on the right. Her keys are in her coat, the bag is by the door, she’s ready to go. Please close the door. Make sure it’s shut.’

  And dashed. Split. Nothing could hold him and he ran and ran until the cold air almost cut into his face. Fingers throbbing, temples wanting to burst. His breath was broken and fast and spitting air with all that other stuff that was tight inside his stomach. Inside. Outside. If there were better ways to handle the difference, he would. We all bloody would.

  The flat had been left mid-action. It was almost tidy if you discounted the mess around the gas cooker, the unwashed dishes, the crusty plates – two for the both of them – and the cups he had started soaping when his mother thought it would be better to call the ambulance. Better because for two days her balance had been way out and her legs were cramping and shaking. My friend, you couldn’t look at it. It was heartbreak proper. Karl had helped her move from kitchen to living room, to bedroom and back. Her face scrunched up like McD wrappers thrown in the wet dirt just outside the estate. Grim. So slow that Karl thought they wouldn’t make it. She didn’t want to call the doctor but then she said, ‘just in case’. Last time she’d gone in, she’d caught an infection that had knocked her sideways.

  Godfrey had the mail in his hand and went straight to the sink to run water over the plates.

  ‘Seems like there are a couple of bills. Have a look while I do this, will you?’

  He didn’t really need to ask. Karl was a runner but otherwise he had bare manners. Just the staying and looking at fate, at the inevitable, the feeling the pain, waiting for it to hit you straight on was hard, not washing dishes or paying bills. Could knock you off if you weren’t careful. Right?

  He opened a window in the stuffy living room and sat by the small corner desk with the new laptop on it. It had come through some government scheme for single, disadvantaged mums. Although he was almost an adult it had still counted. They’d been eligible and after endless paperwork they’d been hooked up with the essential twenty-first-century gadget courtesy of the taking-care-of-those-less-fortunate charity-type scheme. The cheap desk, which they had to get themselves, was made of white, plastic-coated MDF. IKEA madness but second-hand, so they’d been spared the extended puzzling hours of putting it together. He opened the drawer, looking for scissors. A pencil with a broken tip, a sharpener, loose paper. Karl placed the wad of envelopes on the desk. Godfrey shouted from the kitchen.