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I looked at him and he looked at me and he held my gaze, his eyes sparkling with mischief. Then he giggled. ‘You know I got what it takes to be a film star, dontcha? Even if alien boy don’t recognise my star quality yet.’
‘Maybe,’ I said.
Pea did a little hop like I’d just told him he’d won an Oscar. ‘You jus’ wait, gran’ma!’
Tokes turned round, caught my eye and then frowned at Little Pea. He looked worried, but he didn’t say anything.
Coronation Road is the main artery running through that part of London and it’s where all the parallel universes collide. There are Ghanaian groceries selling plantains and mealiepap and tiny smelly fish; Caribbean meat stalls with goats’ heads on the wall and ox tongues on giant platters of ice, blood swilling out over the pavement. There are Asian silk shops and tiny Japanese booths selling every type of international calling card. There are pound shops and pawnbrokers; wig shops with windows full of rainbow-coloured hair extensions and skin-lightening creams; nail bars with jewel-encrusted talons – rows and rows of them, glimmering on display. And in among all these are the chain stores, struggling for air, not so high and mighty here. The only thing the shops have in common, my dad said, is that they all have the grumpiest, most unhelpful shop assistants you’ve ever come across in your life. We used to laugh about that all the time. My dad always used to be able to make me laugh – it’s the thing I miss most since he’s gone.
And anything can happen on Coronation Road. People deal drugs in broad daylight, sell knock-off videos, braid hair, cure toothache, piss, pray, break up, make up. I heard one couple got married there once, outside Fry-days Fish and Chip Bar, and that a baby was born on the floor of Beyoncé Hair and Beauty. I even heard that the Queen and her sister visited when they were little girls, and half the road got bombed to rubble in the Blitz. Basically, Coronation Road is like a film set with a million storylines and that’s why I love it more than any other place on earth.
‘So what you gonna call your film, huh?’ Pea squeaked excitedly. ‘I was thinkin’ mebbe Stars of the Starfish ? Whatcha think?’
‘I don’t really know yet,’ I muttered.
‘Me, I born an’ bred on da Starfish Estate, innit,’ Pea went on, nodding towards the square mile of tower blocks behind the library at the other end of Coronation Road. ‘Cut me in half, you find “Starfish” written down da middle of me like a stick of rock. Not like Mr T here,’ he chirped. ‘He got another hood tattooed on his blood, I reckon.’
Tokes didn’t turn round, but I could see the muscles in the back of his neck tensing.
‘Chill out, man,’ said Little Pea who seemed to be enjoying Tokes’s unease. ‘Jus’ makin’ small talk, innit.’ Then he turned to me and winked. ‘No need to tell me where you live, Hollywood, cos everyone know that.’
Tokes turned at that and walked backwards, like he felt he needed to keep an eye on Pea, like he didn’t trust him not to stab him in the back. ‘Why?’ he demanded. ‘How you know where she lives?’
Little Pea smirked and let out a loud laugh that was too big for his tiny body. ‘No way!’ I felt my cheeks hotter than ever as Pea’s face lit up with a delighted grin. ‘You tellin’ me he don’t even know ’bout your mamma?’
I glared at him, but I knew there was no point; he was bursting to tell and there was nothing I could do to stop him.
‘She dittn’t tell you her mamma is bessie mates with da Prime Minister?’ Pea squeaked on, his tongue flicking in and out of his mouth.
Tokes was still looking at me, but I just stared down at my boots, wishing I could disappear into the cherry-red faces.
‘She probably BFFs with Her Majesty da Queen too,’ said Pea. ‘Am I right?’
Tokes was still looking at me. ‘Is he serious?’
‘Sort of,’ I muttered. ‘She’s an MP.’
‘Dat mean Member of Par-lia-ment!’ Pea announced.
‘I know what it means,’ said Tokes, giving him a look. Then he turned back to me and said, ‘That’s pretty cool.’
‘It is so not cool!’ I muttered quickly.
‘She bit touchy ’bout it, I thinkin’,’ said Pea. ‘Mebbe dat why she makin’ a film ’bout how rubbish it is in her mamma’s hood. It a party political broadcast to make her mamma look bad!’
‘That’s not what I’m doing!’ I said, but I could feel my face flushing because he was right, in a way.
‘If you say so, girlfrien’!’ said Pea with a jerky hand gesture. ‘Don’t take a spy to figure out you an’ your mamma don’t exactly got da mother-daughter love t’ing nailed.’
Tokes was still walking backwards and he was staring at me in a confused sort of way. Pea had a massive grin on his face.
‘I hate my mum,’ I said quietly.
‘Told you!’ said Pea. ‘An’ what I hear, your dad not around no more neither. I right?’
‘My dad’s cool,’ I muttered. ‘My mum drove him away.’
‘See! Da Pea know everyt’ing!’ said Pea excitedly.
Tokes looked like he was about to ask me something, but then Pea stopped suddenly. We were outside Choudhary’s Electrical Store. The sign said: TVs, stereos, PCs and electrical. Sales and upgrades.
The Choudharys who own the store lived down the road from us and were probably the only friendly shopkeepers in the whole of Coronation Road. They were also the only people I’d really got to know – until I met Tokes that is. There was a power cut on the street once and my mum wasn’t around so I knocked on loads of the neighbours’ doors to see if they had any candles and the Choudharys were the only ones who were home. When they found out I was on my own, they invited me in and Mrs Choudhary gave me sweet honey cake while Mr Choudhary talked to me about Islam and high-definition cameras. He showed me how to use his old Super 8 camera and admitted that he used to be a bit of an amateur film-maker himself.
‘In my younger days I fancied myself the next Hitchcock!’ he said, laughing through his big furry moustache and offering me more sticky cake.
I remember that their front room smelt of incense and paprika and happiness. There was an old grandma who sat in an armchair by the window and didn’t say much, just nodded and smiled, and an assortment of daughters and sisters and aunts who came and went while I was there – all smiling, all dressed in beautiful, glimmering silks.
And then, right at the end, their son – the one I can see behind the counter now – came in. His name was Ishmael and he looked a bit like a Bollywood heart-throb, even though his hair was going a bit thin on top. He wasn’t very old, early twenties maybe, and I remember he was wearing cricket whites with big grass stains on the knees. When he offered me his hand to shake, I blushed and all the words in my head disappeared. Then the lights came back on and I realised I was still holding his hand and staring up into his dark black Bollywood eyes. Later he walked me back to our house and my heart was beating so fast as I said thank you that the words came out all in the wrong order.
Mr Choudhary and I have sort of become friends since then. I pop into the shop most days when I’m at home and we discuss the latest cameras he’s got in stock. Once Mr Choudhary showed me a film of Ishmael playing cricket. I can still see him, arm raised, red ball in hand, running towards the camera, looking right at me. ‘Like a young Shoaib Akhtar,’ his father said. ‘Only with less hair.’
Ishmael always says hello to me very politely and occasionally he tries to chat to me, but I always go red and can’t look at him properly. Something about his eyes makes my knees go weak and my stomach all wobbly.
Anyway, Pea had stopped outside the shop and his face was pressed up against the grille. My stomach did a little flip when I saw Ishmael behind the counter and I could feel my ears going red and hoped the others hadn’t noticed. But Pea wasn’t even looking at me. He and Tokes were staring at the TV screens in the window. They were all showing images of hooded figures being herded into police vans. The headline beneath said, Rival gangs fight on Starfish Estate. Gang member rushed to hospital in a critical condition.
Pea’s eyes were glued to the screens and a slow grin had spread across his face. ‘See – Shiv’s cousin Pats made da news! He like totes famous now, innit!’
Then another headline ran across the bottom of the screen: Family of injured youth claims he was beaten up by police.
‘Seriously?’ said Tokes, turning to Pea, whose eyes were bright with excitement.
‘What did I tell you?’ Pea hissed under his breath. ‘World War Three!’
‘Did you know about this?’ said Tokes. ‘Is this what you told Shiv? That the police hurt Pats?’
Pea looked up and grinned, but I never got to hear his answer because just then a blast of music sounded from his pocket and he pulled out a vivid pink, jewel-encrusted phone from his grubby jeans and flicked it open.
‘Yeah?’ he said into the handset. ‘Yeah, I seen it . . . Good, innit? You what? Now? OK. OK – I said OK, all right, innit.’
Then he flicked the phone shut and I caught the look in his eyes – they reminded me of old Mrs Choudhary’s, clouded and almost unseeing. But he grinned at me and Tokes and said, ‘’S been a blast, but I gotta shoot. Guess I see ya around – if you still alive that is.’
Then he turned and legged it back up Coronation Road towards the station, nearly slipping on a bucket of icy water spilling out of the butcher’s, before crashing into an old lady with a shopping trolley.
‘Keep filmin’, Hollywood,’ he called as me and Tokes stood watching him skedaddle. ‘Things gonna kick off big time in this hood, I tellin’ you!’
Then he dodged into an alleyway and was gone.
‘He’s mental that kid,’ said Tokes. ‘And he’s gonna get himself killed one day if he keeps hanging out with the Starfish Gang,’ he added, a worried look in his eyes.
‘Maybe he’ll get us killed too,’ I said, self-conscious again suddenly now it was just the two of us.
‘He’s gonna try his best, that’s for sure,’ said Tokes. His face broke into another sunny grin. ‘In the meantime, do you want to, you know, hang out with me for a bit?’ he asked. ‘Maybe we could, um, do some stuff for your film. If you want to.’
It was funny how he said that. Funny in the way things are when you look back on them after other stuff has happened. If I’d known how things were going to turn out, would I have walked away? Anyway, I didn’t. I just shrugged and said, ‘OK. If you want.’
‘Cool,’ he said. ‘Where do you want to go?’
SCENE 6: BEHIND THE FISH FACTORY
Next to Coronation Road Station, between the fish factory and a derelict house that looks like a squat, is an abandoned patch of yard. I found it the summer before last when my mum and dad were arguing all the time and I needed somewhere to escape to. But I’d never taken anyone else there before.
We clambered through the hole in the corrugated-iron fence and into the overgrown backyard. It was right behind the station platform and we could hear the announcer going on about some delayed train in a tinny, bored voice. There were so many pigeons roosting up in the netting under the arches that the brickwork was almost completely painted in white pigeon poo, and the stench of fish from the factory was mixed with the smell of old wee and diesel and oil.
But there was an old sofa there, and I’d dragged some other stuff in too: a couple of pots which I’d planted pansies and daisies in, a camping table with only three legs and some faded bunting left over from the Olympics. Tokes looked around him and grinned like I’d just brought him into some kind of palace or something. ‘Cool!’ he said.
‘You like it?’ I asked shyly.
He looked at me and smiled his big smile – all white teeth and twinkly eyes. A proper hero’s smile. ‘I love it!’
‘You’ll be able to stay out of trouble here,’ I said. ‘And they’ll never find us.’
He looked up, alarmed, and his voice was sharp, like I’d pressed on a place that hurt. ‘Who won’t find us?’
‘Um . . . Shiv and his gang – the Starfish,’ I stammered. ‘That’s all I meant. I . . .’
‘Oh.’ Tokes seemed to relax. ‘Them.’ And the way he said it, I wondered who he thought I was talking about. ‘I reckon they always track you down in the end,’ he said, flopping down on the sofa and looking upwards towards the platform. ‘How’d you find this place anyway?’
‘I have a lot of spare time,’ I said with a shrug. ‘And I need somewhere no one else knows about.’
‘Because of your mum and dad?’
I could feel the weird clicky feeling in my throat that I get when I have to think about what happened, but luckily there was no time to answer because I could hear the sound of a train overhead. ‘Duck!’ I yelled, grabbing an old umbrella from behind the sofa. ‘It sounds like a through train.’
‘What?’ said Tokes as I slid on the sofa next to him and pulled the umbrella over both our heads.
‘You’ll see!’
I was pressed up so tight against Tokes I could smell a faint tang of sweat and toothpaste. As the train went thundering through the station above us, suddenly all the pigeons up in the arches started flying about and making a load of noise, and splats of poo fell all around us.
‘The trains make the pigeons poop,’ I yelled.
‘Like poo rain!’ he shouted over the clamour of the train and we both laughed.
‘Does that happen often?’ asked Tokes, grinning from ear to ear once the train had passed.
‘About every ten minutes,’ I said.
He laughed. ‘This is one weird place to hang out, film girl!’
I shoved the umbrella down the back of the sofa.
‘So you want to tell me about your mum?’ he asked.
I wasn’t expecting that.
‘I mean, it must be kind of weird having a mum who’s in the government or whatever,’ he said. ‘It’s sort of cool though.’
‘It’s not cool at all.’
‘Why? I mean, she gets to make the law. She can change stuff – make things better. That’s good, right?’
I bit my lip and tried to explain. ‘I think she cares more about “society” than her own family.’
Tokes didn’t say anything, but I could feel his eyes watching me.
‘And she only pretends to care about that stuff anyway. All that really matters to her is her career.’ I wasn’t sure why I was telling him this, and my voice came out a bit funny as I spoke. ‘That’s why they split up. My mum and dad.’
‘Because of her job?’
‘Because she puts her career ahead of everything else,’ I said. I remember hearing Dad say that, saying he’d had enough of coming in second place to Downing Street. That was the day he walked out. My funny, brilliant, kind dad who left because of her.
‘So it was your dad who left?’ Tokes said.
‘Last year.’
‘And you figure that’s your mum’s fault?’
I nodded.
Tokes glanced up. He had the questioning look in his eyes again. ‘You ever talk to her about it?’ he asked.
I shrugged. ‘No point.’
Tokes nodded, then after a second he said, ‘You should put it in your film then – maybe.’
‘Maybe,’ I said, although I couldn’t imagine what my mum would do if I said stuff about her in my film and then it won the competition and got shown on TV – which was part of the prize.
‘You miss your dad?’ Tokes asked.
‘Lots.’ I looked up. ‘He’s funny. And he doesn’t nag. He gets me. She doesn’t.’
‘You see him much?’
‘No. He’s in New York now. He sends me stuff all the time and we Skype sometimes.’ I pushed to the back of my mind the thought that we hadn’t spoken for over two weeks. ‘I’m going to go over there soon, he says. We don’t have a date yet, but . . .’
‘But it’s not the same?’
I nodded. Nothing was the same since my dad left.
Tokes’s forehead wrinkled. ‘That’s something we got in common then.’
‘What? Your dad is abroad too?’
‘Sort of.’ He didn’t look up when he said that, just changed the subject. ‘So we gonna make this film or what?’
I tugged my camera out of my pocket, nervous suddenly. ‘I should probably interview you,’ I muttered.
‘Me?’
‘It’s just you’re sort of the main character now,’ I murmured shyly. ‘You know, like the hero. Because of what happened in the park.’
‘Don’t be dumb,’ he laughed, then his face was serious suddenly. ‘I’m the opposite of a hero – trust me.’
‘The way I see it, you’re the hero, Shiv is the villain and Little Pea is the funny man,’ I said. ‘It all kind of fits.’
‘And what does that make you?’ he asked, squinting at me in the sunlight.
I shrugged. ‘The geeky weirdo, I suppose.’
‘She usually turns out to be the star in the end,’ he said with a smile. ‘Doesn’t she?’
‘Not in my case.’
Tokes gave me another of his funny looks then he shook his head and scuffed his feet against the rubbly ground, sending up clouds of dust. ‘And you’re really gonna let Pea be in the film?’
‘He’s good to watch,’ I said.
‘Yeah, but why does he want to be in it?’ said Tokes. ‘A kid like that doesn’t do anything unless there’s something in it for him.’
‘Maybe he just likes performing.’
‘Maybe,’ said Tokes, unconvinced. He glanced up at the pigeons in the netting. ‘Anyway, we’ve got no choice now, because if we don’t let him be in it he’ll try to mess it up for us.’
‘Really?’
He nodded. ‘Yeah. And if he is in it he’ll probably try to sabotage it anyway! So either way he’s bad news.’
I glanced at Tokes again when he said ‘sabotage’. I liked the way he used words.
‘I know kids like him,’ he said. ‘Magnets for trouble. Can’t help it. They ruin all the good stuff that happens to them.’
‘Maybe he wants a fresh start,’ I said.
‘Maybe,’ said Tokes, but his eyes were clouded with doubt.
‘Well, maybe he just wants to be friends. It doesn’t seem like he has any. Except Shiv and the Starfish Gang.’
‘And they’re not the kind of friends a kid like that needs,’ said Tokes. ‘Believe me, I know.’
I wanted to ask him how he knew, but he had the faraway look in his eyes again.
‘So can I interview you?’ I said instead.
His eyes came back to me and he gave me a look, then said, ‘OK. Fine. I’ll try to be heroic!’
So I pressed a button and the camera beeped into record mode. It looked good: the skinny kid with the sunshine face, sitting on the ripped-up old sofa, with the graffiti and the corrugated iron and the pansies in pots behind him. There was a shaft of dusty sunlight spilling down from the platform above, drawing lines of light through his fuzzy Afro hair.
I waited for him to say something, but he didn’t.
‘So, um, tell me about yourself,’ I said, putting on a voice like one of those chat-show hosts. ‘Er, what are your hobbies?’
‘I like football,’ he said, uncomfortable suddenly now that the gaze of the lens was turned on him. So I turned the camera down to focus on his feet. His wrecked Vans fitted in with the broken rubble and rubbish scattered all around the den. In the scorching heat the bits of broken glass glowed and looked like they were ready to combust. I moved round in an arc then brought the camera back to focus on his face again.
‘Anything else?’
‘Books,’ he said, still self-conscious. ‘I like reading.’
‘What sort of books?’
‘All sorts,’ he said. ‘Whatever I can get my hands on. My English teacher, Miss Kayacan, she –’ He hesitated like he’d said something he shouldn’t, but then he went on. ‘Anyway, she reckoned I should read some of the classics. Said I should go to the library over the holidays. Only . . .’ He stopped again. ‘Only you saw what happened there because you were following me.’ He shrugged and looked right at the camera.
‘What else?’ I asked.
‘I like school. I want to get a good education.’ He was more serious now, looking down at the rubble, not at the camera. ‘For my mum, you know? She reckons education gives you choices in life. That’s why we moved –’ He broke off again. It was like he was monitoring everything he said.
So I took a deep breath before I asked, ‘So, um, are you going to tell me where you were before then?’
He didn’t jump down my throat this time. ‘Are you gonna put this in the film?’
‘I don’t have to,’ I said.
He looked up at the arches then back at the camera. ‘It’s nowhere really. Just some place in North London, like Pea said.’
‘So why did you move to Coronation Road?’
He sighed then stared hard at me, his face screwed up. Then he seemed to make up his mind about something. ‘Can you keep a secret?’ he asked.
I nodded. ‘I don’t have anyone to tell secrets to.’
He grinned but still looked uncertain. ‘OK, well, if I tell you this, you have to swear to keep it between me and you.’ He looked dead serious as he said, ‘Promise?’
I nodded quickly.
‘And you can’t film it either,’ he said.
‘OK.’ I switched off my camera and waited for him to go on.
‘So, my dad,’ he said quietly, looking down at his Vans, his face seemed younger suddenly. ‘The thing is that he was in with the wrong crowd. My mum was worried I’d get dragged in too.’
‘Why?’
‘It’s hard to explain,’ he said, a concentrated expression on his face. ‘But basically stuff happened and one day my mum packed up and we left.’
‘What did your dad say?’
‘He didn’t know,’ said Tokes quickly. ‘We went in the middle of the night so he wouldn’t be able to follow us.’
I didn’t know what to say so I just kept quiet, let him keep talking.
‘My dad’s not a bad man,’ he said, looking up at me now like it was important to him that I believed this. ‘When I was a kid, he taught me how to do keepie-uppies, and how to do wheelies on my bike and all that stuff – he even helped me with my homework when he could, even though he wasn’t too hot on school himself. And he treated my mum good too.’
‘Why did she leave him then?’
I thought of my dad saying, ‘When you’re older, you’ll understand why I’m going, Maggie.’ I wondered if it was the same for Tokes.
He shook his head. ‘I don’t even know why I’m telling you all this,’ he said.
‘You don’t have to if you don’t want to,’ I said.
‘I kind of do,’ he admitted. ‘It’s sort of a relief to tell someone about it, you know?’
I nodded because I knew exactly how it felt to have secrets eating away at your insides. And maybe that’s why he told me, because he could tell I got it – sort of.
‘OK, so it’s hard to explain. My dad was in this gang. A bit like the Starfish, I suppose.’ He hesitated. ‘He wanted to get out, make a new start. But once you’re into all that it’s hard to break free.’
‘Right,’ I said quietly.
‘My mum didn’t want that for me.’ He looked like there was a kind of weight on him as he spoke, pressing on his shoulders. ‘She gave up everything so I could make something of my life. Which is why I can’t let her down.’
I wished I’d still been filming then, so I could have zoomed in on his eyes, focused on the bitter black colour in them as he spoke.
‘Do you miss him?’ I said eventually. ‘Your dad?’
He nodded. ‘Yeah. He was cool. Funny. Kind.’
I thought of my own dad then: how he could always make me laugh; how he got me in a way my mum never did.
‘Every time I hear some black man’s been shot or in hospital I always think it could be him.’ Tokes’s brow was furrowed and he had that ‘Do you understand?’ look in his eyes, so I nodded even though I didn’t understand. Not that bit. Not really.
‘You know what the average life expectancy is for a black man involved in gang culture?’ he said suddenly.
I shook my head.
‘Twenty-eight,’ he said. Then he looked down again. ‘My dad’s thirty-two already. He’s been running with the gang since he was fifteen, so he’s already pushed his luck, right?’
I imagined filming figures. A two and an eight. Maybe cut out of newspaper or on somebody’s front door: 28.