Jubilee (28 page)

He slid down to Paul, feet out, hands out, and when Paul caught him at the bottom Satish kicked and thrashed, hitting out at any parts he could reach. Then he felt a wallop as Stephen slid down, his feet hammering into Satish’s back. After that, it was easy for them.

They dragged him into the cramped space under the slide. Satish twisted round but Paul held him easily.

‘Now, Splatish. We’ve got a little lesson to teach you.’ Paul raised his eyebrows and a cartoonish grin stretched across his face.

Satish pulled away in a sudden jerking movement. Paul, unfazed, reached out to grab him again. Big and stocky, and so much older, he could subdue him without really trying. His strong hand squeezed Satish’s upper arm.

‘Stay,’ he said softly.

Satish noticed the clean white T-shirt over his jeans, and wondered if he was dressed for the party already; he told himself that no one would dress like that if they really meant to get into a fight. And he was too young, anyway, or they were too old, fourteen and fifteen and going to secondary school. He saw himself as they might see him, a kid, and thought perhaps that in itself might protect him. Then he remembered the stories about the National Front demo in Ranjeet’s street, and Ranjeet’s neighbour pulling his little daughter to safety as she shouted at the marchers.

‘We need to teach you a lesson,’ Sarah was saying as she came over.

We?
He wanted to laugh. She was eleven – eleven! – and dwarfed by the Chandlers, even though she was wobbling on her too-high heels.

‘Go away, Sarah. Go home.’

Beside Satish, Paul snorted.

‘Go avay! Go home! A good bit of advice, Splatish. Do you ever feel like taking it?’

Sarah was undeterred.

‘You kissed Mandy. You kissed an English girl. Pakis shouldn’t do that. We’re going to teach you a lesson,’ she repeated.

Stephen joined her, the four of them crammed under the apex of the slide. He was pulling something out of his bag.

‘Yeah, if you feel like a snog, go back to where you came from.’ He pulled a box out of the bag, and something out of the box; something red. He balanced the object on his palm. ‘If you have to do it, do it with some other brown bastard.’ Then he turned to Sarah.

‘So, tell me again about the beef?’

Sarah passed her tongue over her upper lip.

‘Satish can’t eat beef. He thinks cows are
sacred
. I heard him tell Cai.’

‘Yeah, I’ve heard something like that,’ said Stephen. ‘But I would think, and tell me if I’m wrong here, I would think that’s something he got from his own country? Isn’t it, Satish? That’s not an English thing, is it?’

The thing on his hand was a beefburger: raw, broken in half, the spots of fat showing white against the meat.

‘We do eat beef here in England,’ Stephen went on. ‘Boiled beef and carrots! Roast beef. We love the stuff! Today we’re having beef burgers to celebrate the Jubilee and I would suggest …’ He shifted the burger in his hand, grimacing. ‘… that there’s no better time for you to try it, Splatish. You want to live here, you like English girls, you’ll love English food. Open up.’

This couldn’t happen. It could not happen. Satish clamped his mouth shut and turned his head away. It banged against the bottom of the slide. He kicked out towards Stephen, who sidestepped casually and berated his brother, ‘Legs, Paulie!’

Paul snaked his own leg round and brought his heel down onto Satish’s left foot. The movement swung the two boys together and as they crushed up close Paul confided, ‘I will do that again,’ as if Satish needed the warning. His foot burned, the tender toes delineated by precise lines of pain.

Stephen was close now, the dreadful lump of meat closer still, right in front of Satish’s face. He brought down his lines of defence – the teeth, the lips – and tried to make them solid and unbreachable as Stephen pushed the burger up against his mouth. He heard Sarah shouting encouragement: ‘Go on, Stephen!’

The meat was cold and soft. It moulded itself round Satish’s lips as he resisted. He clamped down on them, rolling them inwards so they touched as little of the meat as possible, then shuddered as he felt some of it rolling inwards. He closed his eyes, as if that might make a difference, then all of a sudden his nose was pinched by a strong hand. He tossed his head back and forth, but the grip remained constant, and he knew that in moments he would have to open his mouth.

I’m British! I’m British! he wanted to say – a stupid thing in any case, because he couldn’t say anything, couldn’t open his mouth. It came out as a lowing, a moan. He
was
British; he did a thousand British things. There was really only one thing left, and it was this: he did not eat beef. There was a pressure in his chest, a pain in his forehead and then his body betrayed him, betrayed him utterly, and his mouth snapped open to take a breath.

The beef came in with it, piling over the barricade of his teeth and flopping onto his tongue. Terrible, terrible, get it out! He shook and waggled and pushed out his tongue to get rid of it, but it fragmented into little bits. It was fatty and metallic, and he gagged. He felt Paul dropping away from him smartly, but he wasn’t sick.

He spat two, three times, using his fingers to scrape it all out, then pulled up his T-shirt and scrubbed at his tongue with it. When he’d finished, the inside of his mouth was coated in a greasy film. He was filled up with the taste of the meat. He’d eaten beef. When he saw the bits on the ground he gagged again. He became aware of himself doing this and what he must look like. The other three had retreated. They’d done it now, anyway. They’d done the worst thing. There was nothing left. He rushed at Stephen, arms flailing, then brought his foot up sharply into his balls.

Stephen went down and Satish took his chance and ran, not bothering to look behind him, not bothering to listen for them coming, just pelting for the gate and over it, running for Cherry Gardens, and adults, and safety.

Before Satish turned into Cherry Gardens, he heard the impact: a clattering noise, a crash, a man’s voice rising, ‘Woah! Verity.
Verity!
’

A front door slammed. He bolted into the street, thinking only of finding an adult, someone he could tell, someone who could take charge. A paper plate somersaulted towards him, spinning like a flipped coin. He saw more on the ground, and cups, and a glass jug smashed next to an overturned trestle. Skewed across the street was Miss Bissett’s little blue car. She was getting out of it. Mr Brecon was rushing to help her.

‘Verity. Are you all right? What were you doing?’

Miss Bissett tugged her cardigan down over the top of her skirt and sidestepped his open hand. ‘I’m fine, thank you very much, Peter. A slight misjudgement. I think something must have blocked my view.’

‘Please!’ Satish was with them now. He pulled on Miss Bissett’s sleeve. ‘Help me!’ In his peripheral vision, he saw three figures scurrying across the entrance to the street: Sarah and the Chandlers. They kept going. They would loop round Cherry Gardens and come in at the other end.

‘Help me!’ he said again. ‘They … they’ve …’ The relief of it broke him and Satish felt his face crumple. He put a hand over his eyes and let himself cry. ‘It was just terrible …’

Mr Brecon shook his head. ‘OK. This can wait, Satish. Can’t you see what’s just happened here? Have a bit of sense.’

‘No! They made me—’

‘Bloody Nora!’ said Mr Brecon.

‘I just wanted to nip into Graham’s driveway,’ Miss Bissett went on. ‘I don’t like to think of the car sitting on the main road all day. I was going to park it in there.’

Other people had come out of their houses now. Looking up, Satish could see Mr and Mrs Hobbes hurrying from the other end of the street. The Millers’ door had opened, and Mrs Miller was bustling towards them. Mr Chandler arrived from his side of the road. Satish wiped his mouth again. He opened it and took a few breaths to let the beef taste out, but it just made it stronger.

‘What a carry-on!’ It was Mrs Miller. ‘You all right, Verity?’

Miss Bissett started to reply: ‘Yes I am, thank you. I’m not sure it’s worth—’ But Mrs Miller cut across her.

‘Right! Let’s get this sorted, shall we?’ She rolled her eyes at Mr Brecon, who grinned back. ‘Peter, can you move Verity’s car for her? Pop him the keys, will you, Verity? Pam and I can tidy up. Don and Ed, could you sort out the table? Lovely.’

‘
Wait!
’

Satish could see them ranged in front of him: the cavalry. Mums and dads, the adults he’d grown up with. They were already starting to disperse, Mr Brecon reaching out for the keys, the other two men bending to the fallen table.

‘Help me! Please. Stephen and Paul, they did something awful …’ He looked at Mr Chandler. ‘Sarah was with them. It was
terrible
.’

Saying the names seemed to stop everyone, and they all turned towards him. Mrs Hobbes pushed past Mrs Miller and went straight to Satish. She put an arm around his shoulders. ‘What’s wrong?’ she said. ‘What happened?’

Mrs Miller’s eyes narrowed. ‘What did Sarah do?’

‘Little fuckers,’ said Mr Chandler. ‘Excuse my French. What did they do now?’

Satish leaned into Mrs Hobbes and she pulled him close. ‘They chased me into the school. We were in the playground.’ He was still crying, he was snotty, all vowels.

Mrs Hobbes held him away from her and searched his face. When she spoke, her voice was hard. ‘Where did they hit you?’

‘They didn’t. It wasn’t that.’

‘Oh.’ She smiled, and he could feel movement around him.

The adults relaxed. Someone laughed. He heard Mr Chandler say: ‘Small mercies.’

‘If you’re sure you’re happy to park it,’ said Miss Bissett.

‘It was worse! Much worse!’

‘Maybe this is something for you and I to chat about,’ suggested Mrs Hobbes at his side.

‘No,’ he told her, and then: ‘No!’, shouted, so that they all stopped again. ‘You need to hear this! You all need to know about this!’ It was Satish’s last chance. His face was still chilly with tears, but he wasn’t crying any more. ‘They didn’t hit me. It was much worse. What they did! They made me eat
beef
…’

He looked up and he saw Sarah, Stephen and Paul coming into Cherry Gardens. Colette caught sight of them from her front garden and tagged along, trotting behind. They came towards the car and the small crowd of adults, but stopped a few yards short; they’d seen Satish.

‘They
forced
me. Stephen and Paul did, and Sarah was there …’ He saw Sarah look, horrified, at Stephen.

Mrs Miller glanced at Mrs Hobbes and grimaced. Mr Brecon let the keys slip in his hand and they clinked against his palm. He sighed. ‘I’m sorry. I don’t—’

‘I
can’t
eat beef! It’s not allowed! It’s a thing, a taboo thing. Hindus can’t eat beef.’ Satish looked at each adult in turn, waiting for them to realise what had happened.

‘So what did Sarah do?’ asked Mrs Miller.

‘She was part of it. Do you understand? I’m not allowed. Cows are sacred. She
wanted
them to do it.’

Miss Bissett turned to Mrs Miller. ‘Are you going to let him talk to you like that, Jane?’

‘I’m sure Satish isn’t trying to be rude,’ said Mrs Miller, tilting her head to one side. ‘I think it’s all got a bit much, with the party and everything. You ate beef, Satish. It’s scarcely the crime of the century.’

‘Beef is forbidden! And it was
raw
!’

Miss Bissett winced, but Mr Brecon said: ‘Boys will be boys, Satish.’

‘I think you’ll survive,’ said Mr Chandler. He smiled round at the other adults. ‘And you know what?’ He leaned down to Satish’s level, dropping his voice. ‘There’s a reason boys like you get messed about by boys like them. Show them a bit of backbone. A bit less snivelling. Then they’ll leave you alone.’

Behind him, Stephen mimed vomiting. Colette was staring at Sarah. She was still staring as the three older children turned and made off down the street, away from the adults.

‘Right,’ said Mrs Miller. ‘Peter: car. Don and Ed: table. Verity, why don’t you go home and put your feet up? We’ll sort this out. Pam, I’ll get a bag for us to put that glass in.’ She gave Satish an admonishing nod and headed back to her own house.

‘Come on, out of the way,’ said Mrs Hobbes. She led Satish onto the pavement opposite and Mr Brecon started up the car. Next to them, the men righted the table. Satish could hear Mr Hobbes telling Mr Chandler:

‘You’ll always have problems with an 850. Rustbucket.’

‘You OK, Satish?’ asked Mrs Hobbes

‘No, I’m not OK! It was horrible and wrong and no one cares! I don’t know what to do.’

‘I’ll tell you what we’re going to do. Right now.’

‘Really?’

‘Really.’

In his relief Satish sagged against her, put both arms round her and tucked his head under her chin. He let her stroke his hair and he didn’t care how childish he looked, or what people might think.

‘You and I are going to go back to my house.’

‘OK.’

‘We’re going to sit you down and get you a cup of something hot, maybe find you a flapjack.’

‘OK. Yes.’

‘And you’re going to calm down and get settled so that you’re ready to enjoy this lovely party.’

‘What?’

She tutted and ruffled his hair. ‘You daft h’a’porth.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘You silly boy. I know the Chandlers are
awful
.’ She said it quietly, Mr Chandler just a few feet from them. ‘They’re awful boys, but you’re tougher than that. It’s only a bit of beef.’

‘It is not!’

‘Come on, Satish. It’s time to calm down. You know what they’re like. They’ll have their fun and move on. Now, let’s get a bite to eat?’

Satish knew now that he wouldn’t go to her house or anyone else’s. Only his own. He broke out of her enclosing arms and walked away. He heard her call his name but he kept on going, away from the site of the accident, where Miss Bissett’s little blue car was inching into the driveway.

He walked back down the length of the table towards home, between a line of closed front doors and the endless repetitions of the Union Jack. The flags fluttered above him; the table beside him was a streak of red, white and blue. People would sit here and laugh together. They’d drink Ribena and Coke and eat burgers and jelly and fruitcake. That’s what the adults were preparing for. He glanced back at them: industrious and good-humoured, calling out to each other, making jokes. They had forgotten him already.