Me: ‘What happened?’
Dean: ‘It just makes you tired. Your head goes all weird like you’re far away. I only smoked the seeds. You just mix ’em up with some baccy. I think you’re s’posed to use more, I only used a few.’
I was the lookout while Dean collected samples. He got some mud from the side of the river. We both looked at it proper carefully but we didn’t see any blood in it. Then we swapped and Dean was the lookout while I looked for footprints like on
CSI
. I was very careful. It felt lovely searching. It made everything go quiet like you were on an important mission and you were the only one who could fix it.
Dean: ‘See anything?’
Me: ‘Nope!’
Dean: ‘He’s probably covered his tracks. And it’s been raining. All the evidence probably got washed away. We just need to find some more leads, that’s all.’
Me: ‘What will you buy with your half of the reward?’
Dean: ‘A Playstation 3 probably. And a new bike and a shitload of fireworks.’
Me: ‘Me too.’
Dean’s the best partner a detective can have, he knows all the tricks. I don’t even care if he has orange hair. That’s what makes him so brainy (a detective’s best skill).
I swear by God, I thought I was dreaming at first. It didn’t even feel real. I thought under the ground was just mud and bones and the creatures who live there, when I saw the tunnels and all the lights and people, I just had to pinch myself. There was even a man playing a violin. He had long hair in a ponytail even if he was a man. Asweh, the whole thing just felt brutal. Have you ever been on the tube? There’s a million people everywhere all going too fast. They don’t talk to you, they just chook you out of the way with their elbows. The stairs you go down are moving, they’re the same as the ones at the airport. You can pretend like it’s asasabonsam’s teeth trying to eat you. They put blocks all the way down the middle so you can’t slide down. It’s very vexing. Asweh, if I ever see an escalator with no blocks, I’m going to slide all the way down to the bottom! It’s even my new ambition.
I wanted to run through the tunnel but there were too many people in the way. I just made an echo instead. I made the loudest echo I could and made it last for donkey hours:
Me: ‘We are in the
tuuuuuuuuuuuube!
’
It felt brutal. Everybody jumped. You could hear my echo on the other side of the world. I pretended like Papa and Agnes and Grandma Ama heard it. I pretended like they shouted back:
Papa and Agnes and Grandma Ama: ‘We heard you! We hope you like it!’
There’s a funny smell when the train comes. It’s like a wind. It’s hot and it smells crazy. It feels nasty when it blows on your face.
Me: ‘It’s farts.’
Lydia: ‘Advise yourself. No it isn’t.’
Me: ‘It is. It’s the farts of all the people on the train. They just went on your face. Now you have a farty face.’
When the train comes everybody starts pushing. They can’t wait to get on the train. They’re panicking for if there’s no room. Advise yourself! There’s plenty of room for everybody! The train is as long as the whole tunnel! When the train started it made my belly turn over like on the aeroplane, I nearly fell over. Everybody was bumping everybody. Asweh, it was brutal.
I wanted Mamma to stand up with us but she wouldn’t stand up. She likes sitting better. The lady sitting next to her had pink hair. It felt lovely.
Where Auntie Sonia lives looks the same as where I live. It didn’t even feel far away. There are still towers but they’re not as tall as mine, only like the never-normal flats. Auntie Sonia lives in a house. It’s in a big line of them, they all look the same except some of the doors are a different colour and some of the gardens are just pavement.
Some people put their cars on the garden. The car was right next to the window. It felt like the car was waiting to come in but nobody would let it in. I pretended like the car was a dog. He’d been sent out to the garden to ease himself, now he wanted to come back in but nobody was listening. Asweh, it was very funny. I even felt sorry for him.
At first I thought Auntie Sonia’s house was one big house but it’s actually two flats inside. Auntie Sonia’s flat is at the bottom, and there’s another flat up the stairs. Auntie Sonia’s TV is massive. It’s proper skinny and it hangs on the wall like a picture. Everything in her flat looks brand new. Auntie Sonia even has a tree inside a pot. It’s only tiny. A tree inside felt crazy, I didn’t like it. I was worried for when the tree got bigger and hit the roof. Then it would die.
Me: ‘What will happen when it grows up?’
Auntie Sonia: ‘It won’t grow up, it stays like that all the time. It’s a special kind of tree that never grows.’
It’s like a baby who dies when it’s still a baby. It’s very mean to make a tree like that. If I was the tree I’d roar all the time until somebody came and let me outside.
Auntie Sonia made kenkey and fish. I got so fed up I thought my belly would pop. I even had a cup of tea with two sugar. Auntie Sonia dropped the spoon on the floor. It made a mighty crash. Her face went hard.
Me: ‘Is it because of your fingers?’
Mamma: ‘Harrison.’
Auntie Sonia: ‘It’s OK. They’re not babies, they should know.’
Lydia: ‘I want to know. You’re always keeping secrets from us.’
Mamma: ‘Lydia.’
It’s true though, Mamma does keep secrets. I found her lottery tickets when I was looking in the secret drawer for chocolate. Mamma always says the lottery’s for foolish people and you might as well throw the pound down a well.
Auntie Sonia: ‘Where’s the harm? I don’t want to lie to them.’
Mamma let out a big breath. That means she’s given up trying. She just carried on washing up the plates proper fast like it was a race against the clock. I love it when Auntie Sonia wins. She tells the best stories. They’re even true.
Auntie Sonia burned her fingers on the stove. It’s the easiest way.
Auntie Sonia: ‘There’s nothing to it really. You just keep your fingers on the stove until all the skin has burned away.’
Me and Lydia: ‘Did it hurt?’
Auntie Sonia: ‘It’s quite scary the first time. You can smell your skin cooking. You have to pull your fingers off before they get stuck for good. It’s the only time I cried.’
I felt sick when I thought about it. I loved the story so much already.
Auntie Sonia: ‘You hardly feel it really. It’s easier when you’re boozed. Like most things.’
Mamma: ‘Don’t tell them that.’
Lydia: ‘Do they feel funny?’
They look funny. Auntie Sonia’s fingers are all black at the end and shiny. It looks like it hurts. It looks like a zombie’s fingers.
Auntie Sonia: ‘Sometimes. I can’t feel the close-up of things anymore.’
Lydia: ‘Like what things?’
We tested Auntie Sonia’s fingers. We gave her a hell of different things to feel and she had to say if she could feel them or not. We tried the remote control from her TV. She couldn’t even change the volume at first.
Auntie Sonia: ‘The buttons are too small.’
She wasn’t even lying. Lydia made her feel the pattern on her top. It’s only little stars on the sleeve. Auntie Sonia made a concentrating face. It wasn’t working, you could tell.
Mamma: ‘That’s enough now. Leave her alone, she’s not an animal at the zoo.’
Lydia: ‘Adjei, I don’t know how you could do it. I could never do it.’
Auntie Sonia: ‘You do what you have to.’
Mamma: ‘You didn’t have to do that.’
Auntie Sonia: ‘I thought I did at the time. This is where your Mamma and me will never agree.’
Mamma: ‘It’s not the only thing.’
Auntie Sonia: ‘But you still love me, don’t you?’
Auntie Sonia burned her fingers to get the fingerprints off. Now she has no fingerprints at all. It’s so if the police catch her they can’t send her away. Your fingerprints tell them who you are. If you have no fingerprints, you can’t be anybody. Then they don’t know where you belong so they can’t send you back. Then they have to let you stay.
Auntie Sonia: ‘I did it the easy way. Some people do it with a lighter or a razor. It takes donkey hours that way. Just get it over and done with, that’s what I did.’
Every time her fingerprints grow back she has to burn them off again. It feels very hutious. Auntie Sonia says she’ll stop burning them when she finds the perfect place. When she can stay in that place forever and there’s nobody to ruin it or send her away, then she’ll let her fingerprints grow back for good.
Me: ‘It could be here.’
Auntie Sonia: ‘It could be. We’ll see.’
Me: ‘I hope it is, then we can come round to your house for Christmas. If I get a Playstation we can play it on the big TV, I bet it will look dope-fine.’
Auntie Sonia hasn’t even done anything bad. She’s never killed anybody or stolen anything. She just likes to go to different places. She likes to see the different things there. Some of the countries won’t let you in if you’re black. You have to sneak in. When you’re in you just act like everybody else. Auntie Sonia only does the same things as them. She goes to work and shopping. She eats her dinner and goes to the park. In New York it’s called Central Park. It’s big enough to fit a hundred children’s parks inside and it even has ice skating.
Me: ‘If you fall over on the ice you have to fold your fingers in so they don’t get sliced off. My friend Poppy told me.’
Auntie Sonia: ‘Does Harrison have a girlfriend?’
Me: ‘No! And it’s the same with firemen, when they can’t see because of the smoke they have to feel around instead. They always feel with the outside of their hands, if you feel with the insides and you find a wire your fingers automatically grab on it and that’s how you get electrocuted.’
Auntie Sonia: ‘Is that right?’
Me: ‘Absolutely!’
Asweh, I’d love to go ice skating. I’d even burn off my fingerprints to get there. I’d do it on the stove, it’s quicker. It’s not really cheating, I’d still pay for my skates like everybody else. Auntie Sonia bought me a proper football made from skin. Lydia got a Tinchy Stryder CD. Auntie Sonia always knows what you want the most, she can read your mind.
We had to go when Julius came back. He had his baseball bat but no ball so we couldn’t play a game. Julius calls his bat the Persuader. He always brings it home from work with him. He pats it and talks to it proper gentle like it’s a good dog. You can pretend like all the scratches in it are from where it got in a fight with another dog.
Julius: ‘He earned his keep today. Give him his bath, eh?’
Auntie Sonia took the bat to the kitchen to wash it. She had to pretend like it was a dog as well. You only can’t ask why because too many questions give Julius a headache. You just have to let him drink his kill-me-quick in peace.
Julius: ‘Harri, want some?’
Me: ‘No thanks!’
Julius: ‘The only friends a man needs, his bat and a drink. One to get you what you want, the other to forget how you got it. You’ll see what I mean one day. Just stay good for as long as you can, eh? Just stay the way you are.’
Me: ‘I will!’
On the tube coming home I saw a lady with a moustache. At first I thought it was just dirt but when I looked again it was definitely hair. It wasn’t thick like Mr Carroll’s but you still knew it was there. I wanted to laugh but I held it in.
We couldn’t see a barber on a bike, I don’t think they have them here. Kwadwo was my favourite barber where I used to live, his bike had a radio as well and he always warned you before he used the razor on your neck so you had time to get ready. We had to go to a shop instead. The barber was called Mario. He’s quite grumpy. When he moved my head it was too rough. He did it too fast. And his fingers were too hairy. Mario didn’t even talk to me. He even hates cutting people’s hair.
Dean: ‘He’s only a barber so he can sell all the old hair to China. They make it into clothes, innit.’
At first I asked Mamma if I could have cornrolls.
Mamma: ‘Why, so you can look like a bogah?’
Me: ‘No. I just like it. It’s bo-styles.’
Lydia: ‘He only wants cornrolls because Marcus Johnson has them.’
Me: ‘Gowayou. No I don’t.’
Mamma: ‘Who is Marcus Johnson?’
Lydia: ‘He’s in Year 11. He thinks he’s the ironboy. They get the younger ones to do tricks for them. They have them all running around. It’s very sad. He calls himself X-Fire.’
Me: ‘It’s not X-Fire, fool. It’s Crossfire. It only looks like X-Fire when he paints it on the wall.’
Lydia: ‘Whatever. It’s still sad.’
Me: ‘Is not. At least nobody tells him what to do all the time, not like you keep making me kill the bedbugs. Smash your own bedbugs, they don’t even go on me.’
Lydia: ‘It was only one time, what are you saying? Are you saying I’m dirty?’
Me: ‘One went up your nose when you were asleep. I saw it with my own two eyes. He’s probably built a house in your brain by now. He’s probably planted a garden and bought a satellite dish, he go live there forever.’
Lydia: ‘Gowayou!’
Mamma: ‘Stop vexing your sister! Your hair’s not long enough for cornrolls anyway. You can have low hair. And don’t make squeeze-eyes at me.’
I just got low hair. Mario didn’t even know what it was.
Mario: ‘You mean a number one or a number two?’
He called it a number two! I swear by God! It was the funniest thing I’ve ever heard! Mario is dey touch. From today onward going I’m saving up all my hair until it’s long enough for cornrolls, I don’t care what Mamma says. Then I’ll have the blood to pass any mission and they’ll have to let me join the gang.
Number two is another name for a shit. I know, I didn’t believe it either!
If you start from my tower, you go under the tunnel and past the little kids’ school and some other houses, and then you’ll get to the green. It’s quite big. There’s two football goals with no nets and a playground with swings and a roundabout and some other stuff. There’s a little pirate ship and loads of springy things: a jeep on a spring and a motorbike on a spring and two ladybirds. You just sit on them and they bounce around. I don’t go on them anymore because they’re gay. Everybody agrees. They’re just for babies. The swings are always broken from the dogbites.