We Can Be Heroes (35 page)

‘He was angry,' says Grandad quietly. His voice is muffled as if he is curled up close to her. ‘It was like he blamed every Muslim in the world for what happened to his brother.' He pauses, coughs. ‘For what happened to Andrew.'

There is another pause and I can hear Granny crying softly in low, rhythmic sobs.

‘I think perhaps he wanted revenge,' says Grandad. ‘That's the only reason I can think of for what he did.'

There is laughter from outside and loud cries of joy.

From my grandparents' room there is only the steady rise and fall of Granny's sobbing breaths. Then I hear her say, ‘I'm not sure I can forgive him, Barry.'

‘I know,' says Grandad. ‘I know.'

There is a moment of quiet then I hear a low sound, something between a cough and a gasping exhalation of breath, and I wonder if my grandad is crying. And then the house is silent again.

I glance out of the window. The close is still full of journalists. There's a police car in Priti's driveway, and a couple of policemen are carrying boxes back into Priti's house, under Shakeel's direction. His radio stuff, I suppose.

‘What happens at the end?' asks Jed.

I look down. He's not staring at the ceiling any more. He's looking at me.

‘What?'

‘In your cartoon,' he says. ‘What happens at the end?'

‘Oh,' I say, because I haven't totally figured out myself how it ends yet. ‘Well, I thought maybe Jedeye and Lil' Priti and Ben-D discover that they'd got
it all wrong: that Stee-V was never in danger of being blown up, but had just gone to the funfair with her grandma.'

‘That could work,' says Jed.

‘And then Da Hona Killaz and Da Bikaz turn out to be undercover police units, so they make up and become best of friends,' I add, glancing at him quickly before going on. ‘And the Pub Men turn out to be the real baddies, so they get arrested for perverting the course of justice.'

‘Cool,' says Jed. He once teased me for using the word ‘cool'. He told me it was dead old-fashioned and that I should say ‘Rad!' or ‘Insane!' instead. But I don't remind him of that now. ‘What happens then?'

‘Um, well, Jed-eye, Ben-D and Lil' Priti eat garibaldi biscuits and then set up their own pirate radio station.'

‘And become millionaires?' says Jed, glancing up at the stars again.

I think of Shakeel, unpacking all his radio equipment. I wonder if any of it's been damaged, and
if he'll be able to make his radios work again. Maybe he'll let me and Jed and Priti help him if we ask.

I can feel Jed looking at me again, waiting for an answer.

‘Yeah,' I say. ‘They become millionaires.'

Stevie Sanders' baby sister is born about the same time that they find Stevie. A little girl, Billie Maud Sanders, weighing just 5 lbs 10 oz. (‘What on earth else did she have in that bump?' says Grandad.) She was born at 3.45 p.m. and shortly after her birth, Mr and Mrs Sanders received the news that Stevie had been found safe and well. Both sisters arrive back in the cul-de-sac within half an hour of each other the very same day.

We watch it all happen in duplicate – live outside the window and, just a second later, on TV. Mr and Mrs Sanders give an interview at the door of their house. They are holding their new baby daughter and saying how happy they are to know their elder daughter is safe. They thank the police and everyone who helped with the enquiry. They do not offer an apology to the Asian community.

Half an hour later, a police car draws up and a little girl with her face covered by a towel is carried inside by two female police officers. The door shuts behind them and the curtains are closed, so we don't see the reunion.

TV commentators discuss the ordeal Stevie has been through and the help she will need to recover from it. They talk of the loving family around her and they stress that police have no reason to believe that she was harmed in any way, although they will continue to question her and to search the premises where she was found. The motivation for her abduction is still unclear.

Then they start to talk about the man they have in custody, who is helping the police with their enquiries, and Granny turns off the TV. She doesn't look at Grandad.

She makes us ham sandwiches as we watch another family reunion going on across the road. Mik – who has been released without charge – is dropped off by a police car.

‘I expect all the reporters will be gone in a few
days,' says Granny quietly, coming in with the plate of sandwiches.

Grandad doesn't say anything. The police haven't yet released the name of the man they now have in custody. But as soon as they do, the press will be knocking on our door – even I know that. And then Granny will have lost two sons.

My mum's coming later. She won't take me home with her right away – I said I want to stay here with Jed for a few days, until they know what's happening with him. Jed asked Granny to call his mum – Granny Brenda gave her the number – but I don't know what's going to happen there. Granny says that Jed can stay here as long as he likes, so who knows?

For now, Granny, Grandad, Jed and I sit in the front room and eat our ham sandwiches. Grandad looks at us both and says, ‘My two boys.'

1. I end up staying on at Granny's for the rest of the summer. Mum and Gary come to visit lots – Mum is wearing see-through lipgloss, her hair is shiny and she looks happy. She asks if I want to come home right away, but I decide to stay on a bit longer because of Jed.

2. Jed is a mess after his dad is arrested. He cries all the time and no one can cheer him up except Grandad – and sometimes me. For the first time ever, it's kind of useful that I've lost my dad too. 3 Granny calls Auntie Karen, but then Jed changes his mind and says he doesn't want to see her. He doesn't even want to see Granny Brenda. Grandad says we need to give him time.

4. Jed is going to stay with Granny and Grandad ‘for the time being' and go to the school Zara goes to, and where Priti is starting in September, which I say will be really cool although Jed doesn't look so sure suddenly.

5. Priti's latest scheme is to set up a Muslim matchmaking business to ‘put the spark back into arranged marriages'. Zara obviously isn't on her books because she starts dating a boy from school who Priti says ‘is hardly the person she – or her parents – would have chosen for her'.

6. Mik stops wearing jeans and Converse trainers and starts wearing Muslim robes and the little Muslim hat thing all the time. I don't know if he's still mad at us, but we don't see him much any more and Priti says he spends all his time at the mosque.

7. Tyreese gets arrested for stabbing Said, although Shakeel reckons he'll wriggle his way out of being charged.

8. The Sanders won't let Stevie play with me or Jed or Priti. They won't even let her play out on her own in the road any more, so the rest of the summer she's stuck in the hot house with her new baby sister who screams all the time. Sometimes we see her looking out of the window, her face pale now that her tan has faded. We wave, but she doesn't wave back.

9. The Sanders decide to sell their house, which contains ‘too many unhappy memories', they say. They throw a farewell party and invite all the neighbours except Granny and Grandad. To everyone's surprise, the Muhammeds are invited, but they don't go either.

10. At the end of the summer, when I finally do go home, Priti writes me letters on
Twilight
notepaper, with swirly handwriting in pink ink. I send her postcards (which Mum helps me choose) with short messages and cartoons on the back. Priti and Jed are going to come and visit us at half-term.

11. I start a new comic strip about three kids who think they're hotshot teen-spies, but always get things wrong. Gary shows me how to make my own website to post the strips on and pretty soon I'm getting hundreds of hits.

12. And Priti gets her wheelies back at the end of the summer, but loses them again a week later after ‘reckless wheelying on school grounds'. Some things never change!

With grateful thanks to everyone at Tuesday's Children, especially Brielle Saricini, Erik Abrahamson and Bridget Fisher; to Peaceful Tomorrows, Families of September 11th, Voices of September 11th, the Child Bereavement Trust; Mothers Apart from Their Children (MATCH). Thanks to Dr Cynthia Pfeffer of the New York-Presbyterian Hospital/Weill Cornell Medical Center, Dr Claude Chemtob of the Trauma Recovery Program at the Mount Sinai School of Medicine in New York, the late Dr Richard A Gardiner and the BBC Newsround website for their invaluable research. Also to Martin Hart, Patricia Bingley, Marian Fontana, Alissa Torres; and to Elizabeth Turner and William who I hope will like the book.

Many thanks also to all the amazing children I have the pleasure to know and to teach: to my uber-cool nephew, Nye; to Joshua Butler, Skye Lawrence and the wonderful Sawyerr kids; to the Year 6s at Otjikondo; my U4As from Habs (1996/7); to
Paulinas each and every one; to the KES Manga boys of Years 7 and 9 (2009/10), to Max Lury, Hannah Gibs and Adam Dudley Fryer; and my ‘insane' KES Year 11s (2011), particularly Ollie Chadwick who, ‘used to draw cartoons of aeroplanes flying into towers'.

Thanks to the following people for support and inspiration: Naomi Rich, Joanna Nadin, Kit Watson, Claire Baguley, Paula Trybuchowska, my lovely book group, the Freshford playground gang and the English department at King Edward's School, Bath.

Massive thanks to both Caroline Montgomery and Ali Dougal for loving my little book and making it better than I ever could; to Stella Paskins and to everyone at Egmont for general loveliness, Mr Gum and chocolate cake.

Especial thanks to my family – in and outlaws included – for their love and support. To Granny's table; Graham Avenue and Wellington Grove; to my much-missed dad, lovely mum and bonkers brother and sister; and to Jonny, Joe-Joe and Elsie Maudie whom I love up to the moon and back again.