Another boring sandwich, I think, but she hears me. I forgot to flip the silent switch.
“Sor-ry,” she shrieks. “I can’t help not being a superstar TV chef!”
Kim’s dad is a chef at a big hotel in Portsmouth. He makes the best steak and chips in the universe. And he makes sticky toffee pudding.
Mum grapples for the remote control and switches channels. As I go back to the kitchen I can hear the raucous laughter of some quiz show pouring through the cottage. I hate those programs.
Trudy’s looking up at me with her gorgeous spaniel eyes, puzzled at the loud voices, and I whisper to her, “I have to do everything around here, it’s so not fair.” I bury my face in her soft coat and wonder how things got so bad. I never used to think about stuff like I do now.
Trudy starts to lick my face and it calms me like always. I give myself a proper doggy shake and then start sorting out the shopping. I’m putting the cans in the cupboard wondering where all this food comes from and I find myself thinking about Samir again. He can’t have been born here, can he? Because his brother doesn’t speak good English.
Then I pick up a packet of coffee and look at the label. I’ve never even thought about this before but did you know that coffee comes from Kenya? And the sugar’s from Malawi. It’s Fair Trade, which I think is meant to be good. There’s a useful fact on the packet: Elephants run at 25 mph.
My top speed is 6 mph and I’ve only seen elephants in the zoo. Must be amazing seeing them out your bedroom window if you live in Africa. Maybe Samir used to ride elephants in his country, although he’s not black, so is he from India?
I wander back into the living room holding the sugar packet and say to Mum, “Do they have elephants in India as well as Africa?”
But you know how with adults if you choose the wrong moment? Her face wrinkles with rage and she huffs, “I missed that answer! Can’t you get on by yourself for one minute?!”
I feel like my blood is about to boil over. It’s been a totally worthless day and now Mum hits the roof because I ask her a question about elephants!
So I yell back, “Didn’t you know slavery was abolished two hundred years ago?!” Grabbing Trudy’s leash I rip my coat off the peg and I’m down the path in a nanosecond, the front door slamming so hard it practically takes the windows out.
“I’m fed up!” I yell. Trudy looks at me but I don’t care who else is listening. Some of the neighbors are out in their gardens in the houses opposite, nattering over the fences, but they don’t hear. They think I’m just a stupid kid anyway.
Better face up to it, Alix, I moan to myself as we tear down the yacht club road to the beach, you’re on your own now. Mum’s gone into free fall, hanging on to me like her parachute just failed; Grandpa’s dead—God, I hate that word—and I’ve got to give up my silly baby fantasies that Dad’s going to turn up bored with the Gremlin, begging us to take him back. He never even rings. Who’s going to look after me? I can’t even relight the boiler when it blows out in an east wind. “It’s coming straight from Siberia,” Grandpa used to say. He was a sailor and knew about winds. He also knew how to look after us.
We head past the Lifeboat Station and down onto the beach. When the tide goes out you can run for miles on the sand and I know everyone is supposed to worship the sun but summer just makes me hot and sweaty. I prefer winter. On gray days like today you can hardly see where the beach stops and the sea begins.
There’s only about fifteen minutes of daylight left but there are still a few boats out on the sea. Their lights coming on like lonely fireflies make me feel even more miserable. I can’t be bothered to run with Trudy anymore, so I just wander down to the old concrete pillbox. Sometimes teenagers hang around here, drinking beer and lighting fires on the beach when it gets dark. I’ve seen Lindy Bellows here with her brother and his gang, smoking joints probably. I keep well away.
But today it just stinks of wee.
Then my phone goes. I wrench it from my jacket pocket. It’s Kim.
“Suicide bomber?” she squeals down the phone and for a second I can’t think what she means.
Then I remember and start to tell her about Samir being bullied by the hoodies and my suspicions about Naazim and I must admit they sound really silly when I say them out loud.
“But did you actually see anything, like sticks of dynamite?” Kim says, beginning to laugh.
“Well no,” I say.
“Or videos of Osama Bin Laden hidden down the back of the sofa?”
She’s really warming up now and, of course, she’s my best friend so she knows me really well.
“Honest, Ali, you’re such a drama queen, Samir’s just some nobody in our year and Naazim is his boring brother.”
Kim always tries to keep my feet on the ground. She’s usually the one who stops me when I go into a real fury.
“Samir’s all right. He’s got nice eyes,” I say without thinking. There’s a pause and I’m wondering if the signal’s gone. Then Kim says, “Well, if you like that sort of thing.”
If you like that sort of thing? What does she mean?
4. Two Percent
It’s freezing next morning and the February wind is slicing through my jacket as I arrive at school. Everyone’s hurrying toward the gates, desperate to get inside. Our school is always boiling hot. In summer the sun fries us through the enormous windows and in winter the heaters blow out stinking hot air.
It’s already late and I’m about to sprint forward when I spot Samir near the gates. A couple of Year 11 boys with rugby shoulders bursting out of their blazers overtake me and I see one of them grab Samir, shove him to one side and snarl, “Out my way, Paki.”
There’s a hard, almost metal smell in the air and the sky is elephant gray.
Why haven’t I noticed this stuff before? But the school buzzer is drilling into my head and if I’m late again Mr. Spicer, our form teacher, will give me detention so I jog forward and call out to Samir as I pass him.
“You coming?”
Samir straightens and stares at me and I can’t help noticing that his nose is very broad with flared nostrils and he has dark stubble showing on his upper lip. It makes him look much older than fourteen.
Then his face breaks into a wonderful smile and for the first time he looks normal, not like some miserable kid everyone’s always picking on.
“All right,” he says.
We fall into step but Samir’s gone all silent again, so I say, “Saturday tomorrow.” He nods but he doesn’t say anything, so I ask casually, “What do you do on the weekends?”
Samir just shrugs. He looks like he’s shrinking back into himself and without really thinking, I say, “Come down to Hayling sometime.”
“Okay,” he says.
He gives me a look as if to say, Do you really mean it?, which makes me wonder if I really do. So then I feel guilty and as we arrive at the classroom door I say, “Come tomorrow morning if you want, we can walk my dog on the beach.”
Kim’s already at our table, Mozart score open, and I can see she’s practicing her fingering on an imaginary clarinet, totally in her own world. Sometimes I think she’s in love with Mozart.
But Lindy Bellows, that’s right, Terrence’s sister, sees me and Samir chatting and calls out, “Must be desperate for a kiss to go with him.”
There’s a general sniggering around the class and I feel myself going all red. Samir slinks off into his usual seat alone at the back.
What’s it got to do with her? I think, and I feel myself flare up again, like with Mum over the shopping. It seems to happen so quickly these days.
Grandpa used to say, “Choose your battles, Alix,” so I just sit down as Mr. Spicer sweeps in. He dresses like a bank manager, black suits, white shirts, and he slicks his yucky brown hair down with gel.
Spicer barks out the class register in his high-pitched voice like an overexcited terrier. Lindy’s name is first. She doesn’t answer but he just ignores her. All the teachers do. She frig
htens them. She’s about as mean as you can get, she’s got frizzy ginger hair and she keeps the nail on her right forefinger sharpened to a spear and she was arrested for shoplifting just before Christmas. Her brothers are always in and out of jail. Everyone knows the Bellows family. Me and Kim keep well clear.
Our first lesson is Citizenship with Mr. Spicer and he announces we’re doing Immigration. I perk up; this could be useful. Maybe I’ll find out where Samir and Naazim come from. I glance over at Kim but she’s got the Mozart score on her lap and she’s tapping her fingers up and down her right leg.
Spicer says he’s going to start with the facts and a groan goes up around the class. He can be dead boring once he starts but this time I try to listen.
“Who can tell me the definition of an immigrant?” He looks around the class. No one says anything. He starts to jig up and down on his heels. He can be so irritating. I think he’s going to keep us waiting until the bell goes.
Then he says, “Immigrants are people who go and live permanently in another country. It’s important to understand that people leave their countries for different reasons.”
Okay, I think, so maybe I’ll find out the reason Samir is here. I lean over to whisper to Kim but she’s still finger tapping on her knee.
“One group of immigrants are called economic migrants,” says Spicer. “These are people who have the right to live and work here, people who have moved for economic reasons.”
“Like all those Polish plumbers?” says one of the Science Club geeks.
“Exactly,” says Spicer, looking pleased.
Someone yawns rudely and Spicer glares around the class. Everyone goes very quiet. Spicer hands out detentions with lightning speed. He starts droning on again about the EU and I drift off thinking about the weekend.
Then he says, “Another group of immigrants are refugees,” and I tune in again. This could be useful.
“There are a lot of myths and stories on TV and in the papers about refugees,” says Spicer. “It’s important you know the facts, right?”
No one says anything. Are they even listening? I decide to nod in the teacher’s direction but he doesn’t even notice me. So nothing new there.
“Now,” says Spicer, and he picks up a leaflet. I can hear a few subdued sighs behind me. “According to the UN,” he goes on, waving the leaflet in the air, “refugees are people who have a ‘well-founded fear of persecution or death in their own countries.’ When they arrive in the UK they have to say they are ‘seeking asylum,’ which means protection from our government.”
“Like all them Romanians,” someone calls out in a nasty tone.
I jerk my head around but I can’t see who it is. I look back at Mr. Spicer, he doesn’t seem too worried.
“No, Romanians have the right to come and work here, they’re not refugees,” he says.
“What’s the difference?” asks one of the science geeks. Lindy gives a loud yawn but Spicer ignores her. “Romania is in the EU, like Britain, and so we can live and work in each other’s countries. Refugees are people who are fleeing their countries because they are threatened with unfair imprisonment, torture or death.”
“Yeah, well my dad says all them asylum seekers are bogus. It’s in the papers. We should chuck ’em out,” calls out Charlie Parks.
Some people mutter in agreement and I turn around to glare at him.
Charlie bares his teeth at me. He’s such a bully. He’s a starter on the football team and built like a tank. So I just toss my head and turn back but my insides do a flip.
“My dad says they’re all thieves anyway. They take our jobs and our houses.”
That’s Jess Jayne, from the Jayne family. There’s three of them. They’re not really sisters but the meanest girl gang in the school. They speak posh and they’re from minted families so the teachers like them. They all added Jayne to their first names because one of them is called Sarah Jane. Only they spell it with a y. Very clever, I don’t think.
Jess and Charlie have really set things off. People start shouting horrible comments just like the sort of thing I heard on the street against Samir. I twist around to try and catch his eye but he’s hunched over his desk, his face buried in his arms. Somebody says, “That’s racist,” and then the noise in the classroom starts to rise as people start arguing.
I give Kim another nudge.
“What?” she says, and I can see she hasn’t been listening. Her head is full of Mozart. Doesn’t she care about this stuff? “All right you lot, settle down,” yells Mr. Spicer, and the room goes gradually quiet. “Let’s get one thing straight. There’s no such thing as a ‘bogus asylum seeker.’ All refugees have the right to ask for asylum under international law.”
“Even if they’re all terrorists,” says Charlie with a smirk.
Jess lets out a silly scream and the Jayne family laugh, but Mr. Spicer silences them with another glare.
“Show some respect, Year 10,” snaps Mr. Spicer, and he glares around the class. The room goes silent. “In Britain, not everyone is granted asylum,” he goes on. “They have to prove their case to the Home Office and believe me, it’s very, very difficult. They need a top-notch lawyer. Sometimes they wait for years for their case to be decided and all that time they live in fear of being deported, sent back to their own country where they could be tortured or even put to death.”
He stops and looks around the room but no one says anything. “All they might have done is say their prime minister is stupid.”
“They say that on the news every day here,” someone calls out.
“Exactly,” says Mr. Spicer.
“So what happens if no one believes them?” asks the science geek.
“If they fail to convince the authorities that they’ve run away from danger then they can be sent home. But once their story is accepted they stop being asylum seekers and they get refugee status, accepted as refugees. They can work and they won’t be deported, which would come as a huge relief as I’m sure you can imagine.”
Some people nod and there’s more muttering. Then the science geek says, “What about illegal immigrants, you hear about them all the time.”
“Good question,” says Spicer, and Charlie gives a sarcastic snort. “Some people try to come in illegally, hiding out in trucks and on boats. If they’re discovered and not in fear of persecution, they’re deported straightaway. But sometimes they’re genuine refugees in desperate need of asylum and their stories have simply not been believed. It’s a very complicated picture. Put yourselves in their shoes for a minute.”
While we all think about this he thumps keys for the interactive white board. A number comes up—9.2 million.
“That’s approximately how many refugees there are in the world today,” he says, straightening his tie with such a smug smile I almost wish he was wrong. Then he taps out another number—2.7 percent.
“That’s the percentage of the world’s refugees who make it to the UK. The other 97.3 percent go somewhere else.”
“Two percent too many,” sneers Lindy. Mr. Spicer ignores her.
“And they’re not all terrorists, Charlie Parks.”
People mutter but Lindy’s voice grates over them, “Yeah? Prove it.”
She’s got her mouth slightly open and her tongue stuck in her cheek as if to say, You can’t, can you? She’s twirling a broken pencil between her fingers.
Spicer doesn’t say anything. Why doesn’t he stand up to her? Kim isn’t even listening. It feels like I always have to do everything on my own these days. I don’t have any facts and figures at my fingertips, except the speed at which elephants run.
And I can’t quote my dad because he never had opinions about anything except why he kept losing his jobs, which was always the boss’s fault of course or the useless computer networks. He did have one opinion—about punks. “Neanderthal throwbacks,” he’d mutter whenever Mum spiked her hair or laced up her Doc Martens.
That was one of the problems between Mum and Da
d. He didn’t appreciate her being a punk, Mum always said. Even though she shaved off her Mohawk when they got married. “Love’s not enough,” she’d say. Dad was always trying to change her right from the beginning.
But I miss my dad.
Spicer’s droning on about how immigrants have contributed a lot to this country and then Lindy says in a sarcastic voice, “Like what?”
“Like fish and chips,” he snaps back, and a laugh goes around the class.
That’s told her, I think, and I try to catch Kim’s eye. But she’s staring at her music score under the desk.
“Around eighteen Nobel prizes have been won by refugees,” Spicer goes on. He’s really warming up now, listing painters, writers and musicians. I’m impressed and I can see some of the others are too.
But then he starts on statistics again, arms folded, eyes fixed on the back wall and I find it harder to concentrate.
Someone says something behind me again, but I’m not really listening until Spicer replies in a dramatic voice, “Never forget, many of these people we’re talking about are fleeing war, torture, illegal imprisonment, death.”
Someone snorts and scrapes back his chair. Spicer stops and puts his hands on his hips with a warning look. No one speaks.
I crick my neck around to catch Samir’s eye but he’s still slumped down on his desk. Did he come to England to escape torture or death? A chill scutters down my spine.
“So not all refugees are here illegally,” Spicer goes on in a stern voice. “Many of them have come here because otherwise they’d be dead or frankly worse.” Worse? So what could be worse than death? I think.
I’m just about to call out when the door flings open and the student teacher from next door rushes in, sobbing.
You can see that Mr. Spicer enjoys being Buzz Lightyear, saving the day.
He mutters something to the student teacher, then says to us with a glare, “Read pages 91 through 95 and answer the questions. I’m just going next door with Miss Redding. I expect total silence,” and he’s gone.
The class is quiet for a second and then Lindy swivels around in her chair, points her spear nail directly at Samir and snarls, “Two percent too many.”
Hidden Page 2