Chapter 2: Shamayal - April 2010 - Sutton High Street
It began in March. March, April. Late at night, anyhow. Making himself scarce had been fine by Shamayal before it started chucking it down. Sheltering under the awnings of KFC - the only shop without its metal grille lowered - he heard the sound of tyre treads making spray out of standing water. Turning in time to see a driver’s window slide down he clocked the make of car as it drew alongside the kerb, deciding it posed no threat.
“Shamayal!”
At the sound of his name hurled unexpectedly into the dark, the boy’s shoulders froze.
“What are you doing out so late on your own?”
Recognising his history teacher, he breathed out; swaggered over, jeans low on his hips, eyes blinking, beanie dripping. Slapping one hand on the roof of Mr Stevens’s car, he threw back his head. “I’m walkin’, innit? What you doin’?”
“Offering you a lift. Get in before I change my mind.”
Shamayal didn’t appreciate the presumption that teachers’ authority extended beyond the wire-fenced perimeter of the school. “Nu-uh. I ain’t getting in no Corsa, see?”
Mr Stevens’s friendliness turned to exasperation. “Only you can worry how you look in the dead of night!”
“Do I have to, Sir?” But seeing he had reached Situation Unavoidable, Shamayal loped around the bonnet, the slant of driving rain picked out in the headlights, wipers cranking back and forth. The passenger door dropped inexpensively as he opened it. Two Door Cinema Club was playing on the stereo, not his scene but definitely not the Dad-rock he had expected. A bag of chocolate limes lay open on the dash. Shamayal got in. He felt every inch of wet denim where it adhered mercilessly to his skin.
“Help yourself.” His teacher nodded to the overspill of sweets, then just as the boy took the cellophane wrapper in his teeth, he turned. “Do your parents know where you are?”
Look busy: use your shivering as an excuse. “Know somethink, Sir? It was w-warmer outside.”
“You need to get out of those wet clothes.” Mr Stevens twisted the control of the heater to red, the second dial to four. Waiting for the blast of Arctic air to turn tepid Shamayal rubbed his hands together then held them in front of a round vent.
His teacher looked in the rear-view mirror before pulling away from the kerb. “You’d better tell me where you live.”
“You won’t know it.” The rain changed direction, drops forcing themselves in the spaces between each other, aiming for a setting beyond torrential. “Ralegh Grove.”
Shamayal didn’t expect an explosion of laughter as a response. Boiled sweet clashed with teeth as he moved it to his other cheek, chocolate cutting through the sharpness of the lime. “You got somethink against Council?”
“God, no! I know it well.”
“How come, Sir? You get dragged out to see some pupil?”
“I grew up there.”
Now it was the boy’s turn to hoot. “For REAL?”
“I haven’t been back in a long, long time.” Taking one hand from the steering wheel, Mr Stevens scratched the side of his nose. “Not since my mother died.”
“That’s harsh, man.”
The word, “Yup,” was virtually inhaled.
Counting a moment’s silence out of respect, timing himself with the windscreen wipers, Shamayal got to forty- nine. “Then how come you’re always actin’ like you’re some big teacher-guy?”
