Black Sheep (17 page)

‘You may be past that, blud, but as for me, I’ve got to make my Ps, same way.’

‘So you ain’t gonna listen to nobody: not your mum, not Ms Walker, not Brother Malcom, not even your Lord? Let alone what Misha would think if she knew.’

‘That’s what I hate about you, man. You’re so idealistic. You don’t think practically. Yeah, I want to go straight, I want to sort my stuff out. But in the meantime,
man has to eat. And if those crackheads don’t get it from me, you know they’re gonna get it from someone else, innit? I didn’t create the market, blud, I just supply
it.’

Silence.

‘So what, now you ain’t got nothing to say?’

‘You make me sick, man.’

‘Stay like that.’

But by the time I had spent a few minutes standing around those stinking bins, I was regretting it. There were some other man there too, eyeing each other up. Someone said that
they heard that the 5-0 would be patrolling so everyone was on high alert. I had just wanted to chill, score some easy money, and go home and eat pizza. But it didn’t look like it was going
to be that kind of night.

I was tense, listening out for any police sirens coming into the estate. It was Brixton so, true say, there were always sirens going off. What mattered was how far away they were. Did you have
enough time to stash whatever you were holding and make a run for it before they came with their sniffer dogs and batons?

One by one, the crackheads starting appearing from the dark corners of the estate. I tried my best to be polite to them for the sake of business but, to tell the truth, most of them made me want
to heave. How could they let themselves go like that? Matted, dreadlocked hair, funky clothes, teeth that hadn’t seen toothpaste since before I was born. I tried to avoid touching them; I was
sure they had lice and stuff like that.

But hey, these were the customers and you know what they say: the customer is always right. So I smiled and joked with them same way, happy that my bag was almost empty and that I would be going
home soon.

When I had one bag left, I decided to call it a night. I was mash-up and proper hungry. I’d be ordering an extra large pizza when I got home.

“Yo, I’m out,” I called to the others who were still standing around, hoping for more customers.

“Catch ya later, yeah?”

“Stay safe...”

As I squeezed through the narrow gap between the two bins that hid our spot from the rest of the estate, I bumped into a little kid, his hood over his head.

“You got some punk, bro?” he asked, trying to make his voice sound all manly. I frowned and pulled his hood back off his head. I knew that voice.

“Spaz!” I almost shouted. “What you doin’ here, man?” It was Jay’s best friend from school.

He seemed embarrassed to see me. “I just came to get some weed, innit. My brother’s vex’ with me coz I broke his iPod, now he won’t get me any weed. Told me I have to get
it myself until I pay him back for the iPod.”

“What you gonna do with weed, man? Ain’t you still in nursery school or something?”

He stood up taller and said, “I sell it at school, innit. ‘Nuff boys can’t get it for themselves but, through my brother, I can get it for them. Make a little dough,
y’get me...”

And I looked down at the bright white trainers he was wearing – the latest style. I didn’t have to ask him how he was spending his money. I thought about the trainers I bought for
Jay every couple of months. I never wanted him to go through what I went through: being teased because your mum bought your clothes from Primark, never having money to get the latest trainers. I
made sure that my little brother had everything he needed – mainly so that he wouldn’t have to be hanging around bins under St Paul’s with a bunch of junkies and drug dealers.

I looked down at Spaz. He was just a little kid, man. He should have been home in bed, not out here on his own. I flipped his hood back over his head and pushed him away from the gap between the
bins.

“Go home, man,” I growled. “It ain’t safe for you out here, y’get me.”

But he wasn’t having it. “What’re you talking about, man? I can handle myself! I just need to get some food, that’s it. Why don’t you just sell me some, innit?
I’ve got the money...” And he put his hand in his back pocket and pulled out a bunch of ten pound notes. He looked up at me and, in that moment, I saw Jay’s face instead of
his.

It was too much for me.

“Nah, I said go home, man! I ain’t selling you nuffin’. Now go home before I mash you up, yeah?” And I gave him a shove to show him I wasn’t joking.

He swore at me, then spat on the floor next to my shoe. But he still turned and walked away towards his flat on the other side of the estate.

“And don’t let me catch you here again, y’undertand?” I shouted after him.

He gave me the finger.

Feisty.

By the time I got home, I didn’t even feel like pizza any more. I felt sick. I just wanted to sleep, to block out everything that had happened that day.

That’s one of the wonderful things about sleep: it’s like a warm, dark tunnel where you can go to escape from everything and everyone. I counted myself lucky that I didn’t
dream and, if I did, I never remembered my dreams when I woke up.

I wondered why I hadn’t heard from Misha, then remembered that I had put my ‘non-work’ phone on silent while I was out on road. I took it out of my pocket and checked it for
messages. Two from Misha and five missed calls from Mum. Five missed calls? It must have been serious because Mum hardly ever rang my phone.

I rang her number.

“Dwayne?” Her voice sounded weak and tired and straight away I got scared. What had happened?

“Dwayne... it’s Jay...”

“Jay? What, Mum? Has something happened to him?”

“Well, sort of... I need you to come, come now...”

“Mum, where are you? Just tell me, I’ll be there.”

“We’re at the police station in Brixton, Dwayne. Your brother’s been arrested.”

DWAYNE

Jay, Jay, what have you done, man? What have you done?

A million questions were buzzing around in my head as I ran all the way to the police station on Brixton Road. I had seen him just that afternoon! Where the hell did he go when he left the
house? Who had he seen? I thought of his little face in the bright neon lights of the police station. He was only ten! He didn’t belong there! Did they rough him up? ‘Cuff him? Who did
they put him in a cell with? A ten-year-old for God’s sake!

I was jittery by the time I got to the station but I took a deep breath before going in. I had to hold it together, for Mum, and I didn’t want the police to go asking any questions about
me either. Although I had managed to keep myself out of trouble with the police so far, I knew that one false move, one stupid mistake, and you would be banged up in a cell with rapists and
junkies, on your way to remand or jail somewhere mad far like Portsmouth, where your family couldn’t even come see you on the regular.

I stuffed my hands into my pockets – and my heart nearly stopped beating.

I still had the bag of weed in my jacket pocket.

I stood there, chewing my lip. What the hell was I going to do? My phone rang again. It was Mum.

“Yeah?”

“Dwayne, where are you?”

“I’m almost there, Mum. Just give me a minute...”

I looked around. If I did anything here, the CCTV was bound to pick it up. But I had to get rid of the bag. There was no way I was walking into the police station with it, not with the sniffer
dogs. And anyway, the 5-0 could easily stop and search me for no reason other than that I was a black boy out on the street. I had to be smart about it.

Nice and easy, I backed away from the entrance and turned to walk up Gresham Road. I figured if I stashed it in one of the bins, I would be able to get it back again later. As I walked past the
row of terrace houses, I looked across the road and saw that the lights were on in the mosque – Tony’s mosque – and there was some sort of party going on. There were loads of
brothers with beards, short thobes, puffa jackets and Timberland boots standing around outside, talking, laughing, sitting on the curb. It looked like they were having a barbecue or something and I
could smell the jerk chicken from where I stood, on the other side of the street. My mouth watered and I heard my stomach growl – man, I
still
hadn’t eaten!

‘Boy, man would love to just step there and grab some jerk chicken, y’know.’

‘Yo, rudeboy! Focus! How’re you going to go to the mosque with a pocketful of weed and eat chicken while your kid brother’s sitting in a police cell? Dash the ting and
let’s go, blud!’

‘Yeah, you’re right, man. You’re right.’

‘KMT. You know I’m right – I’m
always
right. Now just drop the bag in this bin here and let’s get back to Jay and Mum. Forget
your belly for once.’

In a few minutes, I had put the bag in one of the bins further up the road, being careful not to touch it with my bare hands, and sprinted back to the station. Usain Bolt couldn’t have got
there any faster.

When I stepped in, I saw Mum sitting on the bench. I looked around – Jay was nowhere to be seen. Were they planning on keeping him overnight? I began to walk up to Mum but she saw me
coming.

“What took you so long?” Her voice was harsh but her eyes were red and raw and tired-looking. She must have been crying for ages.

“I’m sorry, Mum. I just had to deal with some stuff, y’get me. Where’s Jay?”

“They’ve finished with him now. They’ve taken his fingerprints and everything already...”

“But what happened, Mum? What did Jay do?”

“They say he was caught trying to rob an old lady on the street. Said that he pushed her over and ran off with her bag but someone on the street catch him before he could get away.
That’s what
they
say.”

“Jay?
Robbing
?” I shook my head. It didn’t make no sense, no sense at all. Jay didn’t need to go robbing nobody – I made sure he had everything he needed.
What was he thinking? “Will they be keeping him overnight?” I turned to glare at the officer behind the desk.

She’d been listening to us, of course. “No, he’s too young to be kept in custody,” she said with a shrug.

I wanted to give her one across the face. It sounded like she
wanted
to throw my little brother in jail.

When Jay came out into the waiting room, escorted by a female officer, I jumped to my feet.

“Jay...” I said, wanting more than anything to hug him and strangle him at the same time. What had the little nutter been thinking?

But Jay avoided my eyes and, instead, looked towards Mum, who took him firmly by the hand.

“We’ll see you again tomorrow then, shall we, when the Youth Offending Team will meet with you both?”

Mum nodded, her lips pressed together. “Let’s go,” she said shortly.

Mum didn’t say anything on the way home; she walked two steps in front of me, her pace getting faster and more determined the nearer we got to the house. Jay was practically running to
keep up with her. I was glad to see that her strength was coming back but her silence was making me didgy.

When we got inside, I wanted to have a go at Jay, even give him a beat down. But Mum pushed Jay down the corridor. “Get in your room and don’t come out, y’hear me,
boy?”

“You go and sit down, Mum. Just relax.” I went into the kitchen, thinking she would be needing a cup of tea. But when I turned around, she was standing in the kitchen doorway, still
wearing her coat, looking right at me. Her eyes were dry now, but hard, harder than I had ever seen in my life.

“
You
...” she said in this hoarse, grating voice I didn’t recognise. “You did this.”

Her voice and the way she was looking at me proper freaked me out.

“What are you on about, Mum?”

“This is all happening because of you. Your little brother Jerome has had his fingerprints taken and seen the inside of a police station because of you.”