Heartland (4 page)

Come on, less get this sheet done, he said to Chelsey.

Iss shit.

Come on, less get some work done. First question: What religion are you?

What? I dunno. She put her head down on the table.

Chelsey, come on, sort yerself out. This is easy enough, less just get this done. What religion am yer?

I doh know, do I? She looked vacantly at the sheet in front of her. English.

English ay a religion. Iss yer nationality.

I am English.

No, I know yome English, but that ay a religion. A religion's what yer believe in. Yer know, what God yer believe in.

I doh believe in nuthin.

All right, Chelse, get yer head up, come on, darlin. Remember at yer mom's funeral, what was that?

Cremation.

Yeah, I know, but the service, the things we did, that was Christian. Yer know this. The vicar come to yer house. Dyer remember?

Praise the Lord. Hallelujah.

All right. So what shall we put in this box?

Chelsey looked at the sheet in front of her as if for the first time. English?

Chelsey's religion's shaggin in the canal tunnel. Mohammed turned around from his desk and called down the aisle.

Fuck off. Then, under her breath, Paki.

Mohammed turned again. Thass right, ay it, Michael?

Mohammed, give it a rest and turn round, eh? Rob said.

Is there a problem, sir? Miss Pale came walking towards their side of the room. Rob stood up. He was loath to have a conversation with her while sitting on a child's chair with his knees crammed against a school desk. She called him sir in a way that made it quite clear that she knew he wasn't a teacher and wondered exactly what he was doing in her classroom. He wondered that himself.

Chelsey says her religion's English.

No, that's not right, Miss Pale said slowly. They have to say what religion they are. Christian, Muslim, and then find and draw the symbol for that religion. She can say she's Church of England.

I know that, Rob said, even more slowly. Chelsey doesn't, or just won't do it this morning. Any suggestions?

Miss Pale sighed and then spoke in a louder voice.

I'm sick of trying to deal with her and her rudeness. She can sit and do nothing if you can't get her to do anything and I'll write a referral, again, to Miss Dragovic. Then more quietly: Just get her to write something in the boxes and draw the cross.

Rob sat back down. Chelsey stared at Miss Pale's back.

Bitch, she said quietly, then imitated her voice: I'll write a referral again, to Miss Dragon Witch. Frigid bitch.

Less get on with this, Chelse. Come on, doh get wound up.

She actually did settle down then, and while Miss Pale talked to the rest of the class about different religious festivals Chelsey and Rob did some colouring in.

What yer doin for yer dad's dinner today?

Gooin dahn the chip shop.

I thought yer had no money.

Me uncle gid me some.

Which uncle?

Me Uncle Ted. He come to visit.

Rob frowned. She hadn't got an Uncle Ted. He sighed.

That'll be nice, any road. Yer dad'll enjoy some chips.

If he's up aht o bed. He day get up yesterday till after three.

Maybe he was tired.

Maybe he was pissed.

Rob wanted to say something else to her, but couldn't think what. He'd had a pint with her dad in the Lion a
couple of times. He seemed a nice enough bloke. They carried on colouring in together in silence.

Yow like that Paki teacher, doh yer? Rob?

What?

Yow like that Paki teacher, the one in the library.

Doh say Paki, Chelse, come on, yer know that.

OK. Yow like that – I doh know how else to say it – teacher in the library, doh yer?

I doh know what yome on abaht.

Yes yer do. I've sin yer lookin at her in the library.

If you mean Miss Quereishi, I do know her, Chelse. We went to William Perry school together for a bit when we was little. Same primary school you went to, ay it?

I think yer fancy her.

Oh, right.

Yome blushin, look yer.

The bell went. Rob leaned back in his little chair and looked at the kids around him, motioning them to be quiet and settle themselves down to be dismissed.

Enjoy yer chips, Chelse. Hope yer dad's all right.

Yeah, right. Yow havin dinner with yer girlfriend?

Watch yer cheek.

Rob was smiling, though. At this point he caught Miss Pale's eye. She looked at him and then at Chelsey with the same expression. She announced that the class could go. Before Rob could get up Chelsey had pulled herself on to the table top and swung her legs round to bolt for the door, her skirt sliding up over her arse, pulling a packet of Joey Khan's Arabic-squiggled Silk Cut from a little handbag that wasn't big enough to accommodate school books.

She's done a bit of colouring, Rob said and handed Miss Pale Chelsey's paper.

Thanks. About all she's good for. That and lying on her back with her legs open.

Miss Pale was already moving fast between the tables, muttering, laying out papers for the afternoon lessons. He thought of grabbing her blond ponytail and smashing her head off one of the tables, the pearls on that necklace bouncing around the room, her body flopping like a caught fish as he pulled her towards the windows. He gritted his teeth.

Look. Her's gooin home now to sort out her dad's dinner. Iss her in charge o the house. Her mom died. I know her's difficult but –

Miss Pale had stopped.

I know, I know, but where does it end? I'm here to teach her and she can't even read.

We could try and teach her, Rob mumbled.

The door flew open and some boys ran in wanting to store their coats and bags. They wrestled with each other in the corner. Miss Pale recovered her composure.

Guys, if you're not sensible you won't be able to leave your stuff.

Rob took some of the papers from her and began putting them out on the empty tables.

Look, thanks for trying with her at least, she said. It's a miracle she stayed in here for the hour.

Thass all right, Rob said at the door.

I won't write the referral on her, she said, back at her desk, looking at her computer screen.

Fantastic. I'm sure that was worrying her.

Zanetti had a shot; well, a cross that drifted goalwards.
Seaman caught it easily enough but Rob shifted in his seat, put his half-eaten burger back on the table, his mouth drying.

All day, his uncle boomed. They'll have to offer more than that to get anything in this game, eh?

He spoke too loudly and confidently, probably knew it himself, whistling against the dark.

Rob imagined that somewhere, in some run-down football club next to a rusting corned-beef factory in the back end of Argentina, there was a minor local politician proclaiming loudly the inevitability of an Argentinian goal. Sitting next to him, there'd be his nephew, a failed footballer, fidgeting in his seat, barely able to watch, sitting with his old man on the other side, a disabled Malvinas veteran or prisoner of the generals or an old team-mate of Maradona's or something, biting his nails, wondering just quite why and how some men that you didn't even know running around on a field on a different continent, some foot or hand of God, might somehow re-order the world, or at least re-order the world in you.

Dyer want the rest o that, Rob? Jim motioned at the half-eaten burger and reached for it as Rob shook his head.

The truth was that he wasn't a good councillor.

This thought was beginning to haunt Jim. He couldn't think of one thing he'd done well in twenty-three years. Not really well. Even things that had been successful, like the vegetable van that came round the estate now or pulling down the Perry Court flats, he'd opposed at first and had to cover his tracks. The things that he could say he'd done well, like getting that Lottery funding for the drainage ditch at the club and organizing all the junior teams, or being on the governors when the school came out of Special Measures, finding this new Head, weren't anything to do with being a councillor, not really. Even little things like helping Stacey with her tax credit forms the other night for instance, that made him feel good, were good things to do, but really, really, what difference did they make in the end? The councillors didn't even run the council anyway, the bloody officers did and they were all Tories.

What was more, for once in his life, he could have done without this game of football on Sunday. It was like some
sort of bad joke. The Sunday team used to just be a way of raising the club extra subs towards the pitch and a few quid behind the bar after the game. Nobody took it that seriously. Sometimes a few of the first team squad would turn out, but usually it was a case of sending eleven out from the pub. Sunday football had been a bit of a joke, but something had changed. It became easier to get players out on a Sunday than on Saturday afternoons, even with the promise of a bit of cash and a write-up in the
Sports Argus
. Something had changed. And while Cinderheath FC scraped along on Saturday afternoons at the bottom of the West Midlands League, not knowing if they'd have hot showers or be able to paint the lines that week, these bastards – to add insult to injury – swanned around on Sunday mornings in their new England kits at the top of the league. It wasn't a bad standard these days, as well.

And now they were dead level with Cinderheath Muslim Community FC and playing them on the last day of the season to decide the title, unless some kind of miracle happened – if the game was drawn and the Gurdwara scored a hatful up at Castle Villa then the Sikhs could nick the league. Ordinarily, it would have been quite exciting. As it was, it was like some kind of bus crash.

The newspapers, TV and radio had suddenly begun talking about the ‘possibility of new extreme-right West Midland heartlands' emerging in reaction to terrorism, political correctness and multiculturalism –and the Labour government, probably, tame and increasingly disappointing as it was. If they said it often enough it would probably happen. He wished everybody would just shut up.

A phone call earlier that week meant his estrangement from the local Labour Party was almost complete. Trevor Williams urged Jim to give him times when he could send some of the Labour students from the university to come and bang on doors.

We'll do our own door-banging here, Jim had said.

Why won't you just accept some help?

Because it won't be help, just hindrance. Folks doh wanna listen to it, at least, with respect, Trev, from the likes of all that lot.

I'm tryin to help you out.

Yome gonna send em rahnd any road so it doh matter what I suggest.

It might have escaped your attention, but there are other seats, other wards, you know. Why are you so intransigent?

I doh see how folks comin in from outside an tellin people how brilliant it ull be if they vote Labour is gonna work. Crowd of students, outsiders, walkin up and down the streets rahnd here, poking theer noses in is all folks ull think cos they'll soon disappear. All that'll happen is they'll have theer phones nicked an I'll have another mess to deal with.

Even though he'd been working on not blowing his top, he could feel his voice rising and his face reddening. Pauline had come out into the conservatory and mouthed, Calm, calm, calm.

Is that all you think of the people you're meant to represent? Trevor asked.

Doh start with that nonsense.

Why should your cynicism mean we lose a council seat to extremists?

If yer listen to me, I've actually thought it through. I doh wanna stir folks up. Thass what the BNP am dooin. Softly, softly, thass the approach. A bloody twenty per cent turnout ull suit we. Get the Asian vote out and keep it quiet on the estate. Any road, I thought cynicism was what we did these days.

Jim, there's obviously no reasoning with you.

Eh, talking of these students, what happened that time I asked if yow'd get some on em to come dahn an do some
reading in the primary school? Lasted abaht a wik, most on em.

With that he'd put the phone down. He was on his own. These days it was how he preferred it.

Adnan the mujahedin.
Adnan the ghost. He'd been missing now for nearly ten years. One June morning he'd driven off in his taxi and never come back. For a while, as kids, Rob and Adnan had been best mates. They'd been in the same classes at primary school, drifted apart as teenagers. There were a couple of years when they were eight, nine, ten that they'd lived in a kind of state of grace. They'd had the same class teacher, Miss Johnson, for two years running. They'd do projects on space, the sea, knights in shining armour. They'd put on Diwali and Nativity plays. At the end of each day they'd sit on the mat at the front of the classroom – out the window you could see the works' gantry and the castle in the distance behind it – and Miss Johnson would read them stories.
Narnia
, tales from Shakespeare, Roald Dahl. Or they'd read each other's work out. Adnan had written a whole book on his own at the library about journeys to other planets, monsters, ghosts. When school finished they'd play football or cricket on the field, collect frog spawn. A couple of times Rob and Adnan went all the way through the canal tunnel out the other side and over the hill to look for golf balls, showed them off the next day. Rob knew he remembered it how he wanted to remember it, not how it really was, but he didn't care.

This was about the time things had begun to change around there. The works had closed. Their dads lost their jobs. During this time Rob's family had all lived at his grandparents' house on Dudley Road. Then his grandad died, his uncle moved out to live with his Aunty Pauline, Rob and his mum and dad moved into the house they
lived in now, further into the estate. His nan went into the old people's flats. Things changed. Miss Johnson left the school, other teachers too. Loads of kids left as well, like Jasmine Quereishi, who Chelsey had seen him talking to. Jasmine's dad had recently saved Rob's dad's life. He was working on how he'd tell her this. It was true. His old man had a heart attack. Her dad was a consultant at Russell's Hall and did his dad's triple bypass.