Tall Story (13 page)

And then I winced because something thrust, hard, deep into my heart. I pressed a palm against my chest. But I knew it was nothing serious. Just a pang.

I was homesick.

It was noon in London. The Philippines was eight hours ahead, so it would be 8 p.m. in San Andres. This being Sunday, Auntie would have made lunch of some pork belly deep-fried in chicken oil so that the crackling popped like popcorn. She would have made soup with steamed milkfish belly, tamarind juice and swamp cabbage, seasoned with lime.

My mouth watered at the thought.

Uncle always complained that Auntie made far too much food on Sundays. But somebody was always sure to stop by later in the afternoon: Old Tibo and Flash Gordon, Sister Len-Len with the baby, Sister Lydia, probably with an armful of purple yam jars left over from the stall.

Jabby always turned up about four and headed straight for the fridge and any leftovers. By the end of the day it felt like the entire barrio had dropped by. And Auntie will be slapping Uncle on the shoulder with a smug expression, saying, ‘I told you there’s never too much. There’s only too little.’

And then I felt something cold on my face
and realized that a tear had strayed onto my cheek.

I wiped it away quickly, glancing sideways at Amandolina to see if she’d noticed.

But she wasn’t there.

I
couldn’t believe it when BOTH Mum and Dad announced they had shifts. On a SUNDAY? And then Mum gave me that look. If a picture could paint a thousand words, one of Mum’s glances could paint an encyclopaedia.
You are in charge of Bernardo until we get back from work
, her glance said.

Bernardo just went all meek and mild. I think he said ‘OK’ about twenty times while Mum was giving me precise instructions on how to melt a frozen pizza for lunch. She was talking at Bernardo as she went out the door,
Yakatakabaka
. Brush your hair, wash your feet, cut your toenails. And Bernardo continued to nod like a car ornament. And then we sat in front of the TV and he was TOTALLY captivated by
Star Wars
like it was the greatest movie that ever was.

At lunch time I left Bernardo with his mouth open in front of the TV and baked the pizza, leaving it on the table for him to find. Then I grabbed my gym bag and crept towards the front door. As I passed
the sitting room’s wide-open door, I could see Bernardo sitting on the couch, his legs stretched out in front of him like two abandoned telegraph poles as he watched the scene where Luke Skywalker finally rescues Princess Leia and all she can say is, ‘Aren’t you a little short for a storm trooper?’

The door made a tiny click as I shut it behind me.

Mum and Dad shouldn’t be working today. I mean, it’s Bernardo’s first Sunday!

This was not my fault.

But the thought of Bernardo all alone in the house gave me a twinge of guilt. Poor guy, he had a brain tumour and he’d only just arrived in a strange country, and already he’d been abandoned.

Shut up, Andi. You left a note, remember?

The note said:

Bernardo was not the type to mind. He would probably eat the pizza and put another DVD on.

Wouldn’t he?

I
read Andi’s note again.

It didn’t tell me anything.
Back before Mum and Dad return.
What did she mean? Where had she gone?

I looked carefully around the kitchen. There was nothing to see but the pizza and the dark hole where the ceiling had crumbled after my bath overflowed.

A tiny knot of panic began to grow in my throat. ‘Oh no, Amandolina.’ I hurried upstairs, clinging to the banisters as my big feet slipped and missed steps.

‘Andi?’ I croaked. The knot in my throat made it difficult to speak.

Here I was, musing about how I could be a better big brother, chaperone, guardian, confidant … and then I somehow misplaced my sister.

My bedding lay where I had left it, carefully arranged on my mattress on the floor, with my pyjamas neatly folded on top.

Above my bed, Andi’s was a wilderness of quilt and
pillows, all in a bright orange basketball print. The trousers and T-shirt she was wearing when we were watching
Star Wars
lay on the floor. She must have changed before leaving.

Automatically I picked up the clothes on the floor and started to fold them. But then I stopped. Perhaps Andi had left something, some clue in a trouser pocket. But what would she say about me looking through her things? I felt like a sneak but I decided Andi’s safety was more important than my qualms about invading her privacy. I thrust my hand into every pocket. A stick of chewing gum. A few coins. Nothing useful.

I swallowed my guilt and looked through the pile of books on her bedside table. Nothing. I picked up the basketball duvet and shook it out. A scrap of paper fluttered to the carpet.

On the paper was a scribble in blue ballpoint pen:

Sunday
. That was today. And it should be turning two in a few minutes. Under the writing was a hasty sketch.

It was a map.

I
was feeling a bit sorry for myself when I got to the courts, what with Mum forcing me into playing Evil Sister and abandoning Bernardo to an afternoon of wall-to-wall Darth Vader on his first weekend in London.

But after a few minutes I stopped feeling sorry for myself and began to feel sorry for Rocky.

The Souls were pure and utter rubbish. They could not shoot.

The courts were just round the corner from our new house, on the edge of some playing fields near the hospital. It was just an asphalt space surrounded by high walls of plastic-coated chicken wire.

The team was kitted in metallic blue, with ‘Souls’ across their chests in black, their shorts swishing like skirts over their knees. I wore my plainest of plain Nike gear. I had no desire to attract more attention than necessary.

They kept yelling encouraging stuff at each other
like, ‘Oh, bad luck!’ ‘Good shot, otherwise.’
Good shot, otherwise?
They sounded like characters from one of those really bad black and white dramas on TV.

Anybody could see that it had nothing to do with bad luck and everything to do with slinging the ball around like they were in a pie-throwing festival.

Did I really want to become one of these clowns? If I believed in magic, I would have felt like I’d wasted a perfectly good wishing opportunity.

Rocky wasn’t even there. Mister Bouncy Dreadlocks was late. I had to sit on a bench just outside the chicken wire for half an hour. I couldn’t just join in until he came.

One thing was for sure: Rocky wasn’t worried about height. One of the boys was my size – maybe shorter. He had a tiny moustache. Maybe he wanted to make sure nobody mistook him for a kid from the primary school. He took the ball down the court, doing all sorts of fancy dribbling, his legs flashing in and out like a pair of scissors.

But he couldn’t shoot either.

Where did Rocky get these guys?

‘Hey.’

‘Rocky!’ I jumped to my feet.

Rocky loped up to the bench where I sat. He wasn’t wearing his Chicago Bulls kit today either. Instead, he wore a grey tracksuit that had gone slightly pink. It must have got into a hot wash with some red socks.

The tempo on the court slowed down as the boys began to eye us with interest.

‘So.’ He gestured at the team. ‘What do you think?’

I sucked some oxygen in between my teeth. ‘Well …’

‘They may not shoot but they sure can handle the ball,’ Rocky said. ‘We’re bottom of the tournament but you know what they say, it’s not the winning that counts.’

If it’s not the winning that counts, then what’s the point of playing at all? But I didn’t say that aloud. I just nodded and followed Rocky into the court.

‘We’re playing our last game of the league next week,’ Rocky said. ‘And we’re gonna go out with a bang.’

The Souls nodded politely and mumbled, ‘Hey,’ as Rocky introduced me.

‘Louie here is our point guard,’ Rocky said, indicating the short boy with the tiny moustache.

Louie held out his hand and I reluctantly shook it.
He didn’t let go when we’d finished. He winked at Rocky. I glared, but Louie just grinned. The other Souls giggled.

They thought Rocky was only letting me play because he liked me.

The realization curdled any pleasure of getting a game. My cheeks heated up.

We played a practice match. Rocky called himself for the Reds and called me for the Blues. As we slipped numbered bibs over our heads, Louie, who was going to point guard for my side, gave me a smarmy smile. Idiot.

The Reds won the toss. Instead of taking the ball down to their basket as quickly as possible, they
strolled
across the court. The Blues stood around sniggering. OK. They were having fun with the girlfriend. Rocky glanced at me with an embarrassed smile.

‘Quit mucking about, guys,’ he yelled. But Louie just blew him a kiss. The Blues fell over themselves laughing.

Instead of getting serious with them, Rocky giggled.

That did it.

I stole the ball off the Reds’ point man and raced to
the opposite end of the court. I stopped at the three-point line and jumped.
Swish
.

You would have needed a poop scoop to scrape their jaws off the asphalt. Louie rubbed his eyes with his fists like he couldn’t believe it.

Rocky collected the ball and passed it down the court. This time the Reds put some muscle into their passes as they ran to their goal.

But snatching the ball off them was not hard. I raced to my three-point line.
Swish
.

I turned. All eyes were on me now.

The ball rolled swiftly across the court.

‘Red ball!’ Rocky yelled.

One of the Reds picked the ball up. But he just stood there as if he didn’t know what to do.

Louie gently took the ball from him and began to run towards our side of the court, his eyes seeking mine.

I hung back to see if he could sink it.

But as he passed me on the three-point line, he palmed the ball into my hands, jogging backwards to see what I would do.

I raised it in the air, aimed, and released.
Swish
.

Louie grinned and swung towards me, his hand raised high.

We high-fived.

Suddenly we were running and passing and stealing. Whenever the Blues stole the ball, they passed it down to Louie, who delivered it to me at the three-point line. Then I scored.

Swish. Swish. Swish
.

No more ‘Oh, bad luck!’ and ‘Good shot, otherwise’.

Louie was grinning so hard his moustache looked like it was about to fall off.

After a few minutes, the score was telling.

Reds: 0, Blues: 30.

Note: all thirty points were mine.

We were playing basketball.

Then Rocky, bless his dreads, tried to sink a long one from the far end. It was typical Souls, all muscle and no eye. The ball bobbled high, high in the air, and it was obvious from the moment he released it that it was not going anywhere near the goal.

And then, from nowhere, a hand reached up and plucked it from the sky and popped it into the basket, like a coin through a slot. And the Reds went wild, as if they had won the NBA Finals. And all I could do was stare with my mouth hanging open.

Because the helping hand in the sky? It belonged to Bernardo, beamed out of nowhere to the perfect spot by the goal.

I
t was habit, I guess.

How many times did I go through the set-up with Jabby? Jabby simply threw a high ball – he didn’t even need to aim – and I stepped towards the goal at the last moment to tip it into the basket.

So when the boy with hair like a toilet brush threw that high ball, it seemed the most natural thing in the world to step into the court and tip it in.

Andi came marching over, her face a knot of fury. The number on her bib was blue, not red like the toilet-brush boy’s, and I realized that I had helped her opponent score.

I wished that I had kept my hands in my pockets.