Funny Boy (24 page)

After I had been at The Queen Victoria Academy a few weeks, an incident occurred which only increased my curiosity about Soyza.

Our physical training teacher had resigned and gone to work in the Middle East, and a prefect had been appointed to supervise the class until a new teacher was found. Not long after the prefect arrived, Soyza asked his permission to use the toilet. It was granted and he left the room. As he did so, I noticed that the other boys watched him, a few of them smirking at one another. About fifteen minutes passed and Soyza still had not come back. I was surprised that the prefect seemed oblivious to his absence.

Soyza only returned at the end of the interval. There was something different about him and it took me a moment to realize what it was. His clothes, which had been immaculately ironed that morning, now looked rumpled.

A week later, during the interval, I was in the toilet, washing my hands at the sink, when Salgado and some of his friends walked in. The toilet was almost deserted. I noticed that they were looking at a boy who was using the urinal. Now the boy became conscious of them. He hurriedly zipped up his trousers and stood there, not knowing what to do. He turned away from the urinal to face us, and I saw that he was afraid. He began to walk towards the door, but Salgado and his friends were blocking the way.

“I say, Cheliah,” Salgado said. “Don’t you know better than to come to the toilet unaccompanied.”

Cheliah didn’t answer. Now the other boys moved in around him. Salgado gave a signal and the boys grabbed
Cheliah from behind. He cried out, but one of the boys swiftly put his hand over Cheliah’s mouth, silencing his cries. Now Salgado kicked open a cubicle and the boys crowded inside, dragging Cheliah with them. I turned and fled from the toilet.

I walked quickly down the passageway to the stairs that led to my classroom. When I reached them, I saw Soyza coming in the opposite direction. He noticed the expression on my face and signalled for me to wait for him.

“What’s wrong?” he said when he reached me.

I shook my head, unable to speak.

He took my arm and said, “Come with me.”

He led me down another corridor to the playground. There was a garden roller under a tree and he suggested we sit on it. He carefully laid out his handkerchief before he sat down. Then he looked at me, waiting for me to begin my story.

When I was finished, he stared ahead for a while, his elbow on his knee, his hand cupped under his chin. Then he turned to me and said, “Cheliah is the leader of the Grade 9 Tamil class. He and Salgado are sworn enemies.”

“So, it’s a Sinhala-Tamil thing,” I said, more a statement than a question.

He nodded.

“Why doesn’t anybody stop it?” I asked.

He smiled. “Salgado and others like him are in high favour with Lokubandara. They can do whatever they like.”

Now I remembered how Diggy had referred to the new vice principal as a “snake in the grass.”

“What is he like, this Lokubandara?” I asked.

Soyza looked at me, considering whether to answer. “I’m going to tell you something,” he said finally. “But you must never repeat this to anybody.”

Then he began to tell me about the conflict between Black Tie and Lokubandara, which my brother had only mentioned. I never imagined the struggle to be so complex and bitter. Soyza told me that the teachers, clerks, prefects, a few older students who were in the know, and even the canteen aunties were divided into two factions: supporters of Black Tie and supporters of Lokubandara. Mr. Lokubandara wanted to change the name of the school, which he felt was too British. The name he had in mind was that of a Buddhist priest who had done much to preserve traditional, vernacular education. Further, he wanted to make the Victoria Academy a Buddhist school. Here, Soyza paused and glanced at me. “Since all Buddhists are Sinhalese, that means the school would be a Sinhala school, and there would be no place for Tamils in it.”

I nodded slowly, understanding the seriousness of Lokubandara’s plans.

Black Tie, Soyza continued, was a Buddhist, but he was opposed to Lokubandara’s ideas. He wanted the school to be for all races and religions.

I felt a bit overwhelmed by the complexities of Soyza’s story, and wondered how it was that he seemed to know so much about the politics of the school.

That day, Lokubandara visited our class. When Salgado and some of his friends saw him in the doorway, they cried out to him in Sinhalese, “Sir, sir. Come in, sir.” When he walked in, Soyza glanced at me significantly to indicate that this was
Mr. Lokubandara. A thin, short man, he wore thick glasses with black frames.

He smiled and walked to the front of the class. “What?” he said, also in Sinhalese. “No teacher?”

“Don’t know, sir,” Salgado replied, eager to be helpful. “Maybe she’ll come soon.”

Mr. Lokubandara glanced around the class and smiled benignly. “Good, good,” he said as if blessing us. “Continue with your studies.” Then he turned and left.

He was not what I had expected at all. It was impossible to imagine that this man had anything to do with the fight I had witnessed that morning in the toilet.

I had been at the Victoria Academy for almost two months before I actually saw Black Tie close up. A rubber band and paper pellet fight was raging in our classroom that day when suddenly someone cried out, “Black Tie, Black Tie!”

There was a mad scramble as the boys ran for their seats. They took out their books and I, too, reached into my bag and brought out a book. Then I heard an exclamation from Soyza and turned to see him searching frantically in his desk. “My hair clips,” he said. “I can only find one.”

By now a silence had descended over all the classrooms, and the only sound that could be heard was the brisk tapping of Black Tie’s footsteps as he drew near. “Never mind,” I hissed at Soyza. “Just use one clip, then.”

He nodded and quickly put his hair up. I was relieved to see
that it stayed in place. I checked my shirt buttons and sleeves and smoothed down my hair. My hands were damp and I rubbed them against the sides of my pants. As Black Tie drew nearer, I prayed that he would walk right past us. My prayers were not to be answered, however, for the footsteps came to a halt outside our door.

Black Tie pushed the door open and walked into the classroom. We rose quickly to our feet. “Good morning, sir,” we chorused. He didn’t respond as he stood by the teacher’s desk, scrutinizing the class. This was the first time I had seen him this close. His face, under the sola topee, was round and might have been jolly but for his aquiline nose and the severe, downward turn of his mouth.

Now Black Tie stepped forward, his eyes widening as if he had seen something astonishing.

“You,” he suddenly said, and I thought he was pointing at me. “Come here.”

I started to go towards him, but he waved me back and said, “Not you, hooligan.” He pointed a little to my right. “You,” he said.

I turned quickly and I saw the cause of Black Tie’s amazement. A lock of Soyza’s hair had come undone and was hanging down the side of his neck. His face had become rigid.

“Come here, come here,” Black Tie said, and Soyza went to him.

Black Tie reached out and pulled the clip from his hair. Soyza winced slightly as his hair fell around his shoulders. Black Tie stared at him as if he could hardly comprehend what
he saw. “What’s this?” he finally said. Soyza didn’t answer. “How did you get away with this?”

Still Soyza didn’t answer. Black Tie grabbed him by the ear and pulled his head to one side. Soyza’s features became contorted with pain. “Answer me, hooligan.”

“Sir,” Soyza finally gasped, “I used hair clips, sir.”

“And the teachers and prefects have permitted this?” Black Tie looked hurt, as if he had been betrayed by them. “This is precisely what’s wrong with this school,” he said, pulling Soyza’s ear harder. “This is what the school is coming to.” Now Black Tie let go of Soyza’s ear and grabbed his hair. He pulled his head back so that his face was turned up towards him. Soyza’s eyes were open wide with fright. Then Black Tie raised his hand and slapped him. From the force of the blow, Soyza stumbled back against the teacher’s desk. Black Tie pulled him forward again. “Scallywag,” he said, “don’t ever think you can get away with this in my school. As long as I am principal, we will have discipline in this school.” He slapped Soyza a second time, his blow ringing out in the silence. He grabbed him roughly by the arm and pushed him out of the classroom. Before he shut the door, he turned to look at us warningly. Then we heard their footsteps getting fainter as they moved down the corridor.

A sigh of relief ran through the class and everyone took their seats. I had never seen anyone slapped like that before and my cheeks felt hot, as if I had been the one who had received those blows. Some of the boys began to titter now and comment on the look of shock on Soyza’s face. They said that he would now
become one of the “ills and burdens.” In front of Black Tie’s office, one of the boys explained to me, there was a row of benches and tables where he kept what he called “the future ills and burdens of Sri Lanka.” Once you became an “ills and burdens,” you remained one for a long time. Every morning you had to report to the principal’s office and stay there, usually for the whole day.

“Hooligan!” Salgado cried in a perfect imitation of Black Tie’s slightly nasal voice. He strode to the front of the class and gazed at us with his brows furrowed. Now all the boys began to giggle. Salgado dragged a boy out of the front row. “What’s this?” he said, pointing to his hair. Then he pretended to slap him, and the boy reeled across the room. Now the boys began to laugh loudly. I stared at them in disbelief, wondering how they could make fun of what had happened to Soyza.

Soyza wasn’t released until school was over for the day. I stayed behind in the classroom, waiting for him. When he came in I was shocked by his appearance. His hair had been cut short and it hung in jagged layers close to his head. He smiled and imitated the look of horror on my face. “Don’t you like it?” he asked, touching the edges of his hair. “It’s the latest thing in town. The Black Tie bob cut.”

“How could he do that?” I said. “He had no right to.”

“Of course he had the right to,” he said. “He’s Black Tie.”

“It’s not fair. He can’t get away with this.”

Soyza studied me with mock pity. “You poor thing,” he said, “you really are fresh meat, aren’t you.”

“Stop joking,” I cried at him, “it’s not funny.”

“Why not? I think it’s extremely funny.

“You should do something, Soyza.”

“Ohhh,” he said. “And what should I do?”

“You should tell your parents,” I said, not caring what Diggy had told me about the price of complaining to one’s family.

He didn’t reply. He turned away and began to pack up his schoolbag.

“If I were you I would –”

“Well you’re not me,” he snapped back. “You don’t know anything about it …”

Angrily he pushed at his books, forcing them deeper inside the bag. I wondered if I had accidentally struck something, some unhealed wound of his.

Now Soyza seemed exhausted. I stood watching him, and then, without quite realizing what I was doing, I reached out and touched his head. He moved away, as if my hand had stung him, and I quickly lowered it, embarrassed by my involuntary gesture. Soyza was frowning now in the same way he had done when I had passed him that note in class. Without a word, he picked up his bag and went out of the room. I followed him.

He, too, had cycled to school, and we went together to the now deserted bicycle shed.

I was unlocking my bicycle when Soyza suddenly said, “What do you know about me?”

“What?” I said, taken aback by the question.

“Never mind,” he replied, and bent down to fiddle with the lock on his bicycle.

Yet I had heard the question clearly and was left wondering what he had meant by it.

Our first period the next day was physical training, so once again a prefect came to supervise us. A short while later, a teacher came into the room. He was a frail-looking man with stooped shoulders. We rose to our feet and he gestured to us vaguely to take our seats. The prefect must have been expecting him, for he didn’t seem surprised by his arrival. He got up from the teacher’s chair and sat at one of the desks in the front row. Still without addressing a word to us, the teacher began to write on the board. When he had finished he stepped back and looked at his writing. Now we, too, got a clear view of what he had written.

I stared at the lines, wondering what they meant and why he had written them on the board. Now the teacher turned to us.

He indicated to a boy in the first row to stand. Then he pointed to the board to show that the boy was to recite the lines. As the boy read them aloud, the teacher leaned his head to one side, listening intently. After the boy had finished, the teacher gestured to him to sit down and motioned for the next boy to read aloud from the board. When it was my turn, the teacher listened to me with a slight frown. This made me think I had not read as well as the other boys. I was surprised therefore when, after everybody in the class had read aloud, he asked me to stand up and read the lines again. This time, as I recited, he nodded slowly to himself, and I could tell that he was actually pleased. When I was finished, he peered at me as if he were shortsighted and said, “What is your name?”