Red Leaves

by Sita Brahmachari

  These things were part of her, and without Muna and the others it was true that she would have had no guides to show her the way. When she was with Muna’s family she felt closer to her father, or ‘Abo’ as she still thought of him. But now she felt that she had also kept something back from her friends; she had failed to convey how important Liliana was to her. She’d often complained to them that Liliana didn’t understand why she wanted to fast, or why she had decided to wear the hijab. These things she had confided in them, but what she hadn’t chosen to express were all the things that Liliana did mean to her.

  ‘You wouldn’t need to have your head in that Quran Explorer App all the time if you were in a Somali family! It would be like everything you learn when you come to my house would just come natural. You wouldn’t have to explain yourself and you could speak the language all the time, not just with us. But the sister thing’s way the best. You’re always going on about how lucky I am to have sisters and brothers. Better watch out though! They’re bound to be stricter than Liliana.’

  Everything that Muna says is kind of true, so why do I feel as if someone has reached inside me and pulled away my anchor? Aisha only half listened to Muna now.

  ‘Yeah, didn’t you say she even tried to persuade you not to wear the hijab? She shouldn’t try to influence you. That’s just wrong!’

  How can Muna, surrounded by all her family understand? Liliana has made me feel safe. She’s given me a home and love and kindness, and I’ve put all my trust in her. It isn’t about meeting the other family. How could Liliana even think of letting me go?

  ‘I always thought that I was more than just another foster child to her,’ Aisha confided in Muna.

  ‘I know I joke about how lucky you are, not having all the rules, but when it comes down to it, no matter how nice she is, no outsider’s ever gonna understand our culture and religion, innit?’ Muna was saying as Miss Sealy peered at them over her glasses.

  ‘What have you two been whispering about?’ The librarian smiled warmly as they passed her desk on their way out.

  ‘Nothing, miss!’ Muna laughed breezily. ‘Just talking about culture ’n’ stuff!’

  Zak read down the long list of names on the war memorial outside his school and sighed with relief that the name Edwin Bainbridge was not carved into the stone.

  He bumped into Mr Slater in the corridor coming out of registration. There would be no point in trying to explain to his tutor why he was late again. The teacher looked as if his patience was about to snap until Zak showed him the piece of plasterwork, and the photo he’d found of Edwin and Albert. By the time Zak finished telling him how he had come across the name, Mr Slater seemed to have lost track of time himself and launched into a passionate eulogy about his favourite subject.

  ‘Now you’re on to something! No use fighting the historian in you. You never know how it all connects up – that’s what I meant when I told you that making sense of history’s like following a trail through the woods. Glad to see you seem in better spirits today.’ Mr Slater smiled and patted Zak on the shoulder. ‘Find a path that grabs your interest, and then you’re away! I just wish I could get all my students to understand. He was pointing at Zak now. ‘That boy who helped to build your house could have been part of everything we’ve been learning about, and as you’re living within those walls you’re connected to that time too. See! That’s the thing about history – once you realize that no one lives outside of it, you’re hooked!’

  In break, Zak texted his dad.

  All OK in NYC? All OK in London. Mum coming home. Love you Dad, Zak X

  After break, in ‘project time’, Mr Slater let Zak go to the library. In the Local History section Zak scrolled through pages and pages of things that probably had nothing to do with Edwin and Albert, but he found himself drawn to them anyway because this was the time that they had lived in and the more he found out about it, the more it shed light on who these two men were. He followed the pathways of his own mind, allowing himself to explore anything that interested him. He picked out a book with a map of the old water courses and was surprised to find streams and rivers running all over the area, even through the woods where he’d walked that morning. He Googled ‘First World War’ plus his postcode, and a whole list of memorials came up. Apparently there was one in Home Wood. Now he was googling anything to do with the local area and the First and Second World Wars because, as his dad had suggested, this Edwin could have fought in both. There was a website that showed where each bomb had hit. He couldn’t believe that they had landed in so many nearby streets. Zak picked up the photo of Albert and Edwin again and admired the look of solidarity, as if nothing and no one could shake them apart. The more he read, the greater the connection he felt to these two strangers who had lived a century ago.

  There was no doubt about it. It was kind of addictive, this tracing of people in history. He’d watched a programme on TV where families went hunting through their ancestry. He’d seen the look of satisfaction and sometimes overwhelming emotion on their faces when they found the names of people in their family from generations before stamped and written on documents, certificates and gravestones . . . Now, leafing through a book in the reference section, he found another mention of a memorial somewhere in Home Wood. It looked as if it was in the opposite, wilder side, which seemed all closed off. According to the information, it was this part of the wood that had once been a burial ground for plague victims. Yes, I read, that on the sign. Maybe this was the reason why people didn’t walk there so often? He looked closer at the map and spotted something else too – an air-raid shelter. That makes sense if the roads around the wood were being bombed. He wasn’t allowed to take this heavy tome of a book out of the library, but for the first time in ages he felt a bubbling up of interest in something. Maybe Mr Slater was right – he was following trails that seemed to be leading him back into the woods. Zak cast around to check that no one was watching and carefully tore out the map and stowed it away.

  As he walked out the librarian nodded and smiled at him. ‘Got what you came for?’

  Zak felt the map burning a hole in his blazer pocket as he ran along the road and back into school.

  ‘Find anything interesting?’ Mr Slater asked in form time.

  ‘Not really,’ Zak mumbled.

  ‘Never mind. Research can be a lengthy process. It’s part of the joy of it . . . the hunt . . . the unexpected discovery . . .’ Mr Slater’s voice faded in to the background. At the weekend Zak had already decided that he would head off into the woods and see what he could discover. If nothing else it’ll help to kill time until mum comes home.

  A text jumped into Zak’s inbox.

  All OK in NYC. Happy all OK in London too and Mum on way back. Love you son. It will get easier. Promise. Speak later, Dad x

  Zak smiled. It felt good not to be at war with his dad anymore.

  Walking home along the woodland path Zak glanced up at a wanted poster with a hand-drawn sketch of a dog. It looked like the copper coloured one he’d seen with the homeless girl the day before, the one she’d drawn on the pavement outside the shop. Underneath the poster she had written a note:

  Red is missing. If you find her, bring her back to Kalsis Woodland Store. Reward offered.

  As soon as he emerged from the wood he saw the girl slumped on a chair strumming a few idle chords on her beaten-up guitar. Zak noticed that her eyes were red and sore.

  ‘You haven’t seen my dog, have you?’

  Zak shook his head.

  ‘Her name’s—’

  ‘Red. I know,’ Zak interrupted.

  ‘Sometimes I wish I was that dog! Everyone seems to know her. Well, you’ll look out for her, won’t you?’

  ‘You’re Iona?’

  ‘How do you know my name?’ she asked.

  ‘I saw your signature on the drawing there.’ Zak nodded at the faint smudge where her name had been. ‘It’s really good.’

  ‘Thanks!’ Iona whispered, looking
down. ‘It’s faded now though.’

  Zak heard her voice break and tears rolled down the girl’s cheeks. He was shocked to see how young she looked when her face relaxed. Her grey eyes were wide and full of sadness, making her look like a very small lost child.

  He found himself rummaging in his blazer pocket and passing her a tissue.

  ‘Thanks!’ Iona gave a great trumpet-blow of her nose. ‘That’s what she does, my Red, just ups and leaves me all on my own. Once a stray, always a stray, they say. But it’s only usually for a couple of hours. She’s never wandered off for this long before.’

  The tough edge had gone from Iona’s voice, replaced by a desperation that was much harder to ignore.

  ‘Without her I hardly make a penny in sales.’ Iona indicated the pile of unsold magazines on the table next to her. ‘I swear people care more about her than me!’

  Zak felt in his pocket, found a pound coin and attempted to hand it to Iona.

  She clenched her fist tight so that he couldn’t place the money in her palm. ‘I’m no beggar,’ she said, pushing his hand away. ‘But you’ll tell me if you come across her, won’t you?’

  Zak nodded.

  ‘You see, that dog’s all I’ve got.’

  Dear Liliana,

  I thought you knew how alone I used to feel. I can’t understand how you could even think I can move away now. My friends don’t get it either, they think the adoption is a good idea. Maybe if it had happened at the beginning, it would have been better for me. Now I know that the only person in the world who can help me is my abo. I thought you would keep me safe until he comes. I can’t start all over again.

  I love you and I thought you loved me,

  Aisha

  She swallowed back the tears, folded the paper in half and wrote Liliana’s name on the front. There was not much to take with her. She remembered now how little she had carried on to the plane to London, just one small cloth bag. Will I ever have anything much to carry with me through my life? she wondered as she packed the small prayer mat that Muna had given her as a gift along with her poetry book from Liliana. She wished she could have taken her beautiful Quran too, but there was no way that she would be able to keep it clean and dry. Instead she placed it carefully on top of her wardrobe.

  Aisha felt around her neck and ran her fingers over her smooth jet. At least I have my prayer beads. ‘For all that I have, and all I have lost . . .’ her abo’s words echoed through Aisha’s mind as she placed her final belongings in her rucksack. She’d packed all her clothes and her big winter puffa coat, a sleeping bag, some food she’d collected over the last few days from the kitchen, camping equipment, some matches and a powerful torch. She’d squirrelled it all away in her room little by little so that Liliana would not become suspicious. She knew it was time when Liliana had knocked on her bedroom door to say that they needed to pop up the road for an hour to look after her grandchildren. The scene of her lie kept replaying in her mind.

  ‘I’ll stay here.’ Aisha smiled and Liliana took the little encouragement offered as a sign that she was beginning to forgive her. She walked over to Aisha and wrapped her arms around her.

  ‘I know you want to be more independent, but I can’t leave you here on your own . . .’ As the words came out of Liliana’s mouth she noticed a look of scorn cross Aisha’s face.

  ‘You don’t want to leave me for an hour to go up the road, but you’re happy to let me go to a family you’ve never even met.’

  Liliana sighed. ‘You know that’s not the same thing.’

  ‘You go, I’m OK,’ Aisha lied. ‘I think I can survive for one hour on my own.’

  ‘Well, if you’re sure love. If you need me I’m on my mobile.’

  Aisha took a final look around her bedroom, zipped up the rucksack and tested its weight. It was much heavier than she’d expected with all the tins of food she’d taken. Why did the image of herself arriving at Heathrow Airport with her flimsy cloth bag keep returning to her? She had tried so hard to block out that time of terror, and yet here she was choosing to step out of Liliana’s safe haven . . . and she hadn’t even thought about where she would go. It had been enough to decide to leave.

  Aisha walked into the kitchen, opened her life story book and lay her note to Liliana on the first blank page. She had to stop herself from looking at the pictures of the picnic. That sunny day was a world away now. Everything had seemed perfect then, but now Liliana had spoiled it all. Aisha went out into the hallway, hoisted her rucksack higher on her back and headed quickly out of the door.

  Linden Road was a well-lit street and so it was not until she reached the end of it that she realized quite how dark it was by the side of the woods. Here she was again for the first time in years walking without a purpose, without a destination. Her stomach lurched and rumbled with hunger. What was the matter with her? She’d eaten only a couple of hours before, but it was as if her body anticipated that she might need to ration out her food supply and was protesting. Perhaps her belly remembered the feeling of hunger that her mind had allowed her to forget. With every step she took she felt her rucksack growing heavier along with the memory of another weight that had once lodged permanently in her stomach; the cold stone of grief and loneliness. She turned left at the end of the road and followed the railings that bordered the woodland. She had never before felt afraid here at this time of night, but as a scrufly-looking girl with matted hair walked past, Aisha veered to the side. The girl looked insulted.

  ‘Who you staring at? Where you off to anyway, veil-head? Going back to Africa? That’s a fair way to walk.’

  Aisha quickened her pace. She’d suffered this sort of abuse before and had learned to never look it in the eye.

  The girl called after her again, but Aisha couldn’t tell what she was saying. Probably some racist jibe. When she was at a safe distance, Aisha turned back. The girl had slumped on the pavement outside Kalsis Woodland Store. Aisha watched as Mrs Kalsi waddled out and started chatting to the girl. She took her arm and seemed to be trying to pull her up and invite her into the shop, but the girl resisted and Mrs Kalsi seemed to give up and went back inside. I wonder if Mrs Kalsi would be so nice to her if she’d heard what she just called me.

  The words stung but Aisha had experienced worse since she’d started wearing her hijab. It was why Liliana kept asking if it was worth it. Maybe it did make her a target, but she would not be bullied by ignorant people into removing it. She would never think of calling that girl names because of the piercings all over her ears and mouth. But she had to admit to herself that what had been going through her mind as she looked at the girl was this: Is that what I’ll become, a homeless beggar girl, filthy and smelling and reduced to sleeping on the streets like a dog? Perhaps she had felt Aisha’s disgust.

  A police car crawled up the street and came to a halt. Aisha strode a little further along the road and sheltered under the shadows of the oak trees. She huddled down and watched. She had not hidden away in fear like this since . . . She closed her eyes and made her mind go blank. She would not think about that day. It was always easier to focus on something else, someone else. As Aisha opened her eyes a woman officer got out of her car and stood on the pavement talking to the homeless girl. Why would someone want to live on the street? she asked herself, then remembered that she had left the only place in this country she had ever called ‘home’. Soon Liliana would be back. She would go to the table and find Aisha’s note and then she’d be calling around Muna, Mariam, Somaya and anyone else she could think of, checking to see if Aisha was with them. She would find her abandoned mobile phone on the bed, and her wardrobe emptied. It would only be a matter of time before she’d call the social worker and the police. But Aisha couldn’t bear to think about Liliana’s panic. She shrank further into the shadows as the policewoman climbed into her patrol car and slammed the door behind her.

  Aisha clasped her prayer beads.

  ‘You know this jet was alive once too, as trees from the a
ncient forests . . .’ Her abo’s words echoed through her head. Perhaps her hoyo and abo were leading her to safety here. Should I hide in the wood instead of heading into town? On the opposite side of the road was the part of Home Wood where she and Liliana had picnicked so often, but the wood that ran alongside this pavement was unknown to her. Aisha peered between the metal railings of the entrance into the dense, dark woodland. ‘Keep out, this is our territory,’ the trees seemed to whisper. Through the gloom the branches of a fallen tree extended towards her like the beckoning arms of a skeleton. Aisha shivered and waited for the police car to pass. She had already changed her mind about staying in the wood and was about to step away from the entrance when two men wearing high visibility jackets appeared and walked up a narrow mud path towards the metal railings. Aisha ducked behind a tree, just inside the wood’s boundary.

  ‘Sure you’ve checked the place over? No vagrants hanging about in there?’ One man lifted and pulled a heavy gate to as his colleague took the other side and together they heaved closed the rusting metal that had been folded against the railings.

  ‘Better off shutting up the place for good, I say. Who walks in here anyway? You’d have to be out of your mind to stick around here at night.’ The taller man shivered.

  ‘True! But if they don’t fix these gates soon, we’ll have no choice but to keep it closed; they could do someone an injury. Anyway, looks like the conservation people have got their way. It’s got to be locked up for Halloween and Fireworks Night after all that bother last year . . . kids building fires. Lucky the whole thing didn’t go up!’

  Aisha held her breath as she heard the padlock being rattled.