928 Miles from Home

by Kim Slater

  Linford glances back at me and I give an eager nod to back him up. He twists and pulls at his fingers, as if he’s trying to remove a pair of invisible gloves.

  ‘If I get that frigging school on my back again you’re dead, d’ya hear me? Last time that Head Teacher of yours reckoned I could get fined and if I do, I’m going to—’

  ‘I’m not in any trouble, Dad.’ Linford shoots me a warning look.

  I know he’s embarrassed and wants me to go, but I can’t move.

  ‘Who said you can speak, eh?’ His dad presses his florid face closer, just like I’ve seen Linford do with others at school.

  Linford doesn’t cheek back, he doesn’t puff his chest out and pull himself up to his full height. Instead, he winces and half closes his eyes. His lips press into a thin, tight line like he is steeling himself for something.

  My mouth hangs open. Linford’s swagger has melted into thin air.

  ‘I—’ Before he can finish his sentence, Linford’s stepdad grabs him by the scruff of his neck and stares down into his eyes.

  I wait for Linford to push back and pull free. I wait for his fists to clench so tight his knuckles turn white like when he’s mad at school. But that doesn’t happen.

  The Linford I know has disappeared and left a shrunken, pale boy in his place.

  ‘Get in the house,’ his stepdad growls. ‘Now.’

  I want to say something to get Linford out of trouble. I want to run away, back to our flat. Even if Sergei and his mum are there, I don’t care. At least I feel safe at home.

  Instead, I stand rooted to the spot, watching as Linford follows his stepdad meekly back indoors like a lost lamb.

  He turns at the last moment and looks at me and I get a glimpse of the boy I’ve been friends with since primary school.

  ★

  EXT. ST ANN’S PRIMARY SCHOOL PLAYGROUND – DAY

  Two BOYS kicking a football to each other across the yard.

  BOY ONE

  I’m gonna play for Manchester United when I’m older.

  BOY TWO

  (runs after ball half-heartedly)

  That’s just a stupid dream.

  BOY ONE

  You always used to say you were gonna play for them, too.

  BOY TWO places foot on ball to stop it rolling. He leans back against brick wall and closes his eyes.

  BOY ONE

  What’s up, mate?

  BOY TWO

  Mum’s getting married to Martin. She told me last night.

  BOY ONE

  You like Martin, don’t you?

  BOY TWO

  (hesitantly)

  Yeah, but Mum says I’ve got to call him ‘Dad’.

  BOY ONE

  But he’s not your dad.

  BOY TWO

  (sighs)

  I know. But Mum says my real dad is as good as dead and that Martin is my new dad now.

  He ignores the ball and leans back on the wall, looking downcast.

  BOY ONE

  Who is your real dad?

  BOY TWO

  (quietly, eyes glistening)

  I don’t know. I never met him.

  END SCENE.

  When I get back, the flat is empty.

  In the fridge, I find a big plate of triangular-cut sandwiches covered over with cling film. I stuff one into my mouth and put another couple on a plate. In the cupboard, there’s a multi-bag of assorted crisps, and I choose a pack of cheese and onion. I feel like a kid at Christmas. I pour a glass of juice and take the food straight to my bedroom. After wolfing it down, I lie on my bed in the gloom for a bit. I don’t want sunshine and summer; it feels out of place after what just happened outside Linford’s place.

  I remember a couple of years ago, Linford’s stepdad got a bonus at work and took all four of us to the go-kart track in Colwick. He paid for everything and we all went for burgers afterwards, too.

  We all had so much fun that day, we never stopped laughing.

  It was only a few months later Linford mentioned in passing that his stepdad had lost his job. That’s the last I’d heard of him until today, but judging by what I’ve seen today, Linford has been going home to him each night and dealing with his moods.

  I close my eyes and inhale, letting the breath out slowly. Usually when I get home I put the telly straight on, but for once I don’t mind the quiet. I’ve never bothered spending that much time in my bedroom, with Dad being away a lot. I thought of it just as somewhere to sleep.

  Now Sergei’s here, I’ve got no place where I can just be me – not even in my own room. Every time I want to move around, I have to climb over all his stuff. I keep walking backwards and forwards on purpose so I trip over it all and have a reason to feel so angry. He’s folded his clothes in two neat piles next to a small pyramid of socks and undies. I kick out at one of the piles.

  It makes my guts burn and that feels better than feeling there’s nothing I can do about the situation.

  I squeeze my eyes shut and sniff. There’s a different smell in the air since he came. Not unpleasant or anything, just different – but I don’t like it. Funny, I never realized me and Dad had our own smell until a new one came along. I reckon I could spot Dad at a distance just by the smell of brick dust and cement that invades the house when he gets home from a building-site job.

  After a bit, I get up off the bed and snap on the light. I curse when I trip over something on the floor – it’s the pile of books and magazines that Sergei has dumped off the shelf I let him use.

  I turn round to look and see a model of the Empire State Building sitting proudly on the shelf. In my bedroom. It’s not that big really, but somehow it fills the room. It looks sort of majestic, like it has a presence all on its own.

  I walk over and run my fingers over the lettering at the bottom of the model. The detailing is impressive. The windows seem as if they stand proud of the building but feel smooth under my fingertips. It doesn’t look like a bit of old folded cardboard with black lines scrawled all over it any more.

  I can almost imagine people in there, buzzing around at the ticket turnstiles. Tourists and students, eager to climb to the top to see the view of New York City. Mums and dads and their kids, or maybe couples and folks on their own. People celebrating birthdays and special occasions, all wanting that elusive snap taken right at the top for their Facebook profile, or just to show family and friends back home.

  The photo that will say, I was there. I went to the Empire State Building and saw New York City. I did it.

  I wish I had that photo. I wonder briefly if I’ll ever go there, but I don’t know one person round here who’s been and it just seems like another daft dream.

  ‘Two hundred and thirty-four floors.’ Sergei’s voice floats into the room from the doorway. ‘The Empire State Building was built in 1930.’

  How come he knows so much about everything, coming from a poky little town in Poland? I turn away from the model and pick up my notebook and pen. I’ve started to jot down a few ideas for my screenplay but nothing’s coming together yet.

  ‘It is built to scale, an exact replica of the real thing,’ he says, shuffling around his bed to get to it.

  He places his fingers delicately at the front edges of the building and bends his knees. His eyes scan across its width, checking everything is still level.

  ‘I didn’t move it if that’s what you’re worried about.’ I slouch back on to my bed.

  ‘I’m not worried about it at all,’ he says. ‘Glad you like it, though.’

  I didn’t even say I liked it. I leaf blindly through my notebook, wishing he’d go and sit in the living room or something and take his stupid model with him.

  ‘Do you like it, Calum?’

  ‘’S’all right.’ I shrug. ‘If you’re into that kind of thing.’

  He sits at the end of my bed. I stretch out my legs until my feet push against him.

  ‘If you would like, I can show you how I assembled the building.’

  I d
on’t answer him. He just can’t take a hint.

  ‘We share a room now, Calum. We could try to become friends,’ he says with a sigh. ‘Maybe I’ll even forgive you for being such an idiot at school. What do you say?’

  ‘I say why don’t you sit on your own bed, for starters.’ I snap the notebook closed and glare at him. Who the hell does he think he is? Muscling his way into my life, my home, my bedroom. ‘Why don’t you find something to do?’

  He rolls his eyes and clambers back over to his squeaky camp bed.

  ‘We could just talk for a while if you prefer,’ he drones on. ‘Maybe you would like to tell me why you think only you and your friends are entitled to be happy at school?’

  Happy! He’s even more stupid than he looks.

  ‘If you’re not going to move then I will.’ I slide off my bed and push my way past him. ‘Just stay out of my way.’

  I slam the door on my way out.

  Later, when Sergei and Angie are watching TV, I corner Dad in the kitchen.

  ‘How long are they staying here for?’ I hiss.

  ‘Don’t you like them?’ His face falls. ‘You seem to be getting on really well with Sergei.’

  ‘You should have told me they were coming.’ I bite my lip. ‘It’s a shock them just turning up like this.’

  ‘I’m sorry, lad.’ Dad puts down the tea caddy and lays his hand on my shoulder. ‘I’ve not handled it very well, have I? But I never expected to meet anyone or thought things would move this quickly. But you know, sometimes life throws you an opportunity that you just can’t pass on.’

  ‘But you hardly know Angie, Dad.’ I don’t want to make him feel bad but this is stuff that needs saying. ‘I mean, you haven’t had time to properly get to know her, have you?’

  ‘I know what you’re saying, son. And I know this is going to sound crazy. But when you get to my age, you get to be a pretty good judge of character, and we’ve spent a lot of time talking and getting to know each other since we first met that day at the university.’

  He’s right, it does sound crazy.

  ‘It suited all our circumstances to ask them if they wanted to move in here rather than be stuck in some crabby B-and-B. Sharing the bills is a big relief for both me and Angie. And I thought you’d like having a lad your own age around.’

  ‘You thought I’d like giving up half my bedroom to a complete stranger? Sergei’s got a bad attitude, you just don’t see it.’

  I don’t want to hurt Dad but my head feels full of building pressure.

  Dad runs a hand through his hair.

  ‘I thought it’d be a bit of company for you,’ he mumbles. ‘When I’m away, I mean. And it turns out you knew each other from school, so Sergei’s hardly a complete stranger, is he?’

  Now my head feels like it’s going to explode.

  ‘You can’t just bring other people in to take your place,’ I snap. ‘You’re the one who should be here, at home. Not them.’

  Dad’s eyes widen at my outburst just as the door opens and Angie walks in.

  ‘So, what are you two boys up to in here?’ She grins, catching Dad round his waist and nuzzling her face into his chest. Ugh.

  ‘We were just saying how nice it is having you two around,’ Dad simpers. ‘Right, Calum?’

  I can’t say anything without the truth spilling out so I reach up to the cupboard and take out the biscuit barrel.

  ‘I know adjusting can be difficult, Calum.’ She walks over and touches my arm lightly. ‘Change is never easy. Sergei and I, we have had very big changes in our lives also.’

  I should just walk away but instead I freeze, with my fingers stuck down among the custard creams.

  ‘We miss home,’ she says faintly, and her eyes fade far away.

  ‘Why don’t you go back there, then?’ The words slip out before I can bite them back.

  ‘Calum!’ Dad throws me a warning look.

  ‘I’m not being rude,’ I say, but I am really. I don’t care.

  Like Linford says, they’re the ones who’ve come over to this country. Nobody forced them, right? Angie might have even planned all along on meeting someone gullible like Dad.

  I look away from Dad’s frown and feel the dry biscuit crumbs rubbing and chafing as I wriggle my fingers.

  ‘I only meant that if you miss home that much, you could always go back,’ I say.

  Angie smiles and shakes her head at Dad to silence him.

  ‘It’s a fair question, Pete.’ She looks back at me. ‘Things were very difficult for Sergei and me back in Poland, Calum. In fact, the situation got very dangerous. When Nottingham Trent University offered me the teaching placement, it was the perfect chance for us to make a fresh start.’

  Teaching placement? I’d assumed she’d latched on to Dad because she had a low-paid cleaning job. I pull my hand out of the biscuit tin and dust off the crumbs.

  ‘Moving in here so quickly has been a shock for all of us, I think.’

  Dad never said they were moving in. Only yesterday, he said they’d just be staying a few nights. ‘I thought you said the university was sorting you out with accommodation?’ I remarked. If she really was a teacher, surely they’d be happy to sort a place out for her, coming over from a foreign country?

  ‘Yes, they did say that in my Skype interview,’ Angie tells me. ‘But the staff quarters have fallen behind in the refurbishment schedule and so we must wait longer than expected.’

  Very convenient.

  ‘Don’t you have any other family here?’ I ask, and her eyes dart over to Sergei’s. He looks at his feet.

  ‘No. No, we don’t,’ Angie says quickly.

  Something isn’t adding up here. Something isn’t right. But I can’t put my finger on what, apart from the fact they seem to both be acting shiftily.

  I glance at Dad and see he is frowning, so I don’t say anything else.

  I don’t feel like joining them in the living room and playing happy families, so I go to my room and lie on the bed staring at the ceiling.

  The white paint has thinned in places, and patches of the old dirty cream colour are showing through. Like most things in this flat, it needs refreshing, updating.

  I wonder if Linford is in his bedroom too, keeping out of his stepdad’s way. I wouldn’t want any of the lads to see my tip of a room even if Sergei wasn’t here.

  I glance over at the Toy Story 3 lampshade I grew out of about four or five years ago. I can remember Dad taking me to the cinema at the Cornerhouse to see the film and then we had a burger afterwards.

  He didn’t work away as much in those days.

  He’s too busy now to worry about things like replacing lampshades and repainting – apart from his own bedroom of course. He’s always too busy to go to the cinema, although now Angie and Sergei are here, he seems to want to be around an awful lot more.

  I don’t know why I’m thinking about stuff that doesn’t matter. I’ve got ninety-nine problems and my lampshade isn’t one of them. But there is one big problem in particular that needs sorting out pronto.

  I need to work out how I’m going to break the bad news to the lads. How am I going to tell them that Sergei and his mum have just moved into our flat, without looking like I’ve known about it all along?

  It feels as if I’ve kept it from them on purpose but I really hadn’t got a clue who Dad had in mind when he said we had visitors coming round. Perhaps if I could explain everything from the very beginning, Linford would be able to see that I haven’t had a say in it. He should know all about putting up with crap from your parents. I could explain how, after all these years, Dad randomly announced he’d met someone and how I thought she was bringing a dog but the dog actually turned out to be Sergei Zurakowski.

  I suppose even I wouldn’t believe that, even if it is the truth.

  I barely get five minutes’ peace before the bedroom door opens and Sergei’s dour face appears.

  ‘What are you up to in here, Calum?’

  ‘Who wan
ts to know?’

  Sergei’s mouth hovers on the edge of a grin like he’s trying to decide if I’m joking with him.

  ‘I am asking because I am wondering why you choose to be in here, all alone,’ he says.

  ‘Well, last time I looked, this was my bedroom.’ I focus on a cobweb on the ceiling. ‘I don’t need an excuse to spend time in here and I don’t have to explain myself to you.’

  ‘I came to see if you wanted to watch TV with us in the salon?’

  ‘Salon? I don’t need my hair cut, thanks.’

  ‘I mean the living room, as your father calls it. Salon, it is a Polish term for the room in which all the family sits together.’

  ‘Yeah, well you’re not in Poland now, are you?’ I snatch up a magazine. ‘More’s the pity.’

  ‘Why have you such hatred in your heart?’

  ‘I don’t know what you’re talking about.’

  ‘You and your friends, you hate anyone who is different. That is the truth.’

  ‘Why don’t you just go and watch TV?’ I pretend to read the magazine. ‘I don’t want to hear your lecture, thanks.’

  ‘I am trying to understand.’ He frowns. ‘Understand what makes you behave the way you do.’

  ‘Save it,’ I huff. ‘When Brexit gets going, it won’t make any difference cos you’ll be gone anyway.’

  He sits on his bed facing me.

  ‘Stop staring at me.’ I stare back at him.

  ‘It is a free country.’ He smiles. ‘I can look where I like. I do not need your permission.’

  I kick my foot forward and purposely miss him. He doesn’t flinch.

  ‘Not so brave at school, are you?’ I taunt him.

  ‘Neither are you.’ He kicks back and misses me only because I scoot to the left. ‘Not so brave when your friends are not around.’

  I feel like kicking him, and this time making sure I don’t miss. But there’s something in his eyes that stops me. Something dangerous and daring . . . a side I haven’t seen at school.

  ‘I want you out of my room,’ I say.

  ‘I cannot do that because I have more buildings I must assemble,’ he says, as if making up stupid cardboard models is a proper job he gets paid to do.