Heaven's Promise (20 page)

‘How you doing, boss? I thought you were going to call.'

‘Shit, I'm sorry, P. How are things?'

‘All quiet on the western front, I'm glad to report.'

‘I could come over if you need reinforcements.'

‘Not necessary. The natives are quiet tonight.'

‘How's Amanda?'

‘Bearing up. We went up to see that Indian lady tonight. We're holding a march on Saturday. Can you make it?'

I had no hesitation in accepting my call-up papers, although it was immediately obvious that there was a very good chance indeed that our walkabout could end in bloodshed.

‘We're having some leaflets made up. When you next playing at the Unity?'

‘Saturday.'

‘Too late. I'll go down there tomorrow. Also, I'd be careful about bringing Indigo, if you know what I'm saying.'

‘Right.'

My curt reply instantly gave the game away.

‘What's up?' Brother P. asked and that's the trouble with people who know you well: you can run, but you can't hide. They catch you each and every time.

‘I'll tell all when I see you.'

‘I'm in Westward Ho tomorrow. Meet me at Papa's about five?'

‘No, don't worry about it. I'll see you Saturday.'

‘Not that. I want your help over this march, okay? So I'll check you then. Go well.'

The next day, having seen off the night with only a couple of hours' sleep and feeling heavy from all the cigarettes I had been burning up, I made it over to Papa's where, much to my surprise, the Brother P. was already waiting, shooting the breeze with Marissa who was on her coffee break.

‘Greetings all,' I cheerily announced before ordering a capo and settling down, not failing to note the uneasy silence at the table.

‘So how's the march preparations coming along?' I asked.

‘Good. I'm picking the leaflets up in an hour.'

‘What match is this?' Marissa asked.

‘It's a march to put right some wrongs,' Brother P. replied, not caring to correct the gracious lady.

‘You look pale,' Marissa said, looking my face over with a kind concern. ‘You coming down with something?'

‘No, I'm fine, really.'

‘He has a broken heart,' cut in the Brother P.

‘Yeah,' I angrily responded, ‘how do you figure that one?'

‘It's in the eyes,' interjected Marissa, ‘it's always in the person's eyes. When you're happy they sparkle, when you're sad it creeps all over your face. Paolo is the same and Papa.'

‘Help to talk?' Brother P. softly enquired and then I knew it was time to lay down my burden and fill both parties in with the sad and tragic details of recent events, and even though I understood that there was no easy solution, just the act of parlaring and laying it all out on the table did, in fact, help a little. I finished my unhappy fable and waited.

Marissa was the first to speak.

‘Silly boy, eh? Silly boy. And the child? Do you see the child?'

‘No, but I send money when I can.'

Marissa gave me a little smack on the hand.

‘Not good enough. Every child needs their parents. That's far more important than money. You have a child who needs you and you have to go to her. Never mind the mother, it's the child that's the only thing that is important here. Of course it's difficult, but that's the price for your fooling around.

‘As for the girl who left you, why should she return when you hid all this from her? You're like a naughty child running away all the time. If you want my advice, then act like a man. Go see your child and be a father. If I was her that would be about the only thing that would impress me.'

I sighed deeply. Marissa had told me what I somehow already knew, but had refused to act upon, and sometimes, when the truth is delivered and it hits you square in the eyes, once the sting has gone, you see your runnings in a light that was never there in the first place, and you wonder how you could be so blind.

It took me a day but that following night I belled Sandra. ‘It's me.'

‘Yeah?'

She sounded sullen and tired and I began to see a fraction of the hurt that I had put upon her for it never once crossed my mind how it must be to raise a kiddiwink singlehandedly whilst having to keep your own life in the balance. All I had been worried about was my own runnings.

‘How's it going?'

‘What do you want?'

‘Can I come over on Sunday?'

‘And let us down again? I don't think so.'

‘I'll be there. I promise.'

Sandra was silent and I could literally hear the suspicion taking over her mind.

‘Look,' I said slowly, ‘I know now that I haven't been up to much where you and Kimberley have been concerned. I'd just like to come over and spend some time with you both. I'll understand if you say no.'

‘I don't know,' she warily replied. ‘I'll have to think about it.'

‘Well, call me as soon as you decide. If I'm not here, leave a message. Okay?'

‘Alright, come over. But you let me down on this and I swear you'll never get another chance. You know I don't joke when it comes to my baby.'

I swallowed the words ‘our baby', and instead said ‘I'll be there. I promise. Check you then, alright?'

‘I suppose so. I got to go now. Kimberley needs washing and feeding. No doubt she'll get me up at four tomorrow screaming her head off so don't expect peace and chocolate when you get here, if you get here, alright?'

‘Alright.'

That night, I have to report, I slept better than I had done in days, the idea that I had finally started to get on top of events, no matter how small the progress, acting as a welcome sedative and seducing me into the darkness. It was then that I found my solar system unexpectedly whisking me back to teenage memories, the most specific being the day that my father made clear his intent to join a picket outside a local factory. He had decided on this action, God bless him, as it was heavily rumoured that a group of strike breakers, paid off by their bosses and protected by the boys in blue, were planning to drive their lorries through the line on this day. My mother had other ideas.

‘You can't down go down there in your condition,' she firmly stated. ‘You know what will happen. There will be bloodshed and violence and you'll end up in hospital.'

‘You're never too old to fight those bastards,' he roared back but my mum knew better.

‘If you go down to the picket line today then I'm off. I'm not going to wait around for you to come home in a coffin. Simple as that.' They had no idea that I was standing in the kitchen catching their every word.

‘You have to face facts. You're too old for this kind of thing.'

‘I'll be alright.'

‘You won't and you know it.'

My father sat brooding in his chair all day, defeated by the passing of his years and his subsequent failing strength and, in my dream, I went to him and sat by his side in silence, holding onto his arm as if I could freeze him in time. I had been with him for what seemed like a minute when the alarm bell by my bed sprung into life and, in an instant, whisked me back to reality. I tried to close my eyes and re enter the dream but it was gone forever, and now it was 10. 30 a.m and time to rise up and head down to Riversdown.

As I dressed and prepared myself for the march, I tried to keep the thought of the day's threatened violence firmly at the back of my mind, for if I really considered the odds, then it was pretty certain that the cavemen would be out in force, blocking our every move.

To fire me up I put on ‘Fight The Power' four times as I got my shit together and, taking one last look around my yard, I headed out and onto the Stroud Green Road. The sun was. well up by now and was strong enough to have allowed Digger, who sat on a pub doorstep, to strip down to just his grimy, cotton shirt, his overcoat laying across his lap, drops of beer dripping off the arm sleeve, as he pulled on a can of lager. As I passed, he raised his can in the air and gave me a salute and, I have to say, such a gesture considerably lightened my mood and, in an up frame of mind, I took the train to Riversdown.

As I had previously arranged, I met up with Brother P. outside the station and we made the short journey down to the estate.

‘I think we'll get a good turn out today,' Brother P. surmised, ‘we've had a good response. Now let's see if the words will be turned into action.'

‘Did you leaflet The Unity?'

‘Yeah, I did an hour there and then I went to some other clubs, Legends, Astoria, and ha nded them out there. Most people thought I was handing out flyers for a dub.'

‘Your reputation precedes you. Do you think there'll be trouble today?'

‘Could be. I know the boys in blue will be turning out in full force. I brought you this.'

He fished in his pocket and pulled out a small length of iron and then quickly passed it over before anyone could see.

‘Is this necessary?'

‘Better safe than sorry. And, anyway, the harder they come...' Uneasily, I slipped the weapon into my inside jacket pocket and we made our way into the sprawling estate where the march was due to wind through, ending up outside the BNP bookshop in a mass protest. At the meeting point, a full crowd of about 700 had already gathered, containing a lot of familiar faces and numbers, such as the MP Bernie Grant who I always have a soft spot for, primarily due to his insistence on turning up at the opening day of Parliament, decked out in full African gears, the sight of which pisses off a lot of people, including most of his work mates.

To the left of him, I was surprised to check Daddy Cecil and his posse dressed up like the Black Panthers, sporting jeans, leather jackets, dark tops, berets and glasses, and there they stood in a rigid formation, impassively eye balling the assembled crowd of all shapes and sizes.

To their right stood members of the SWP, selling their weekly paper, rattling their cashola boxes in search of donations and filling the air with anti Government slogans. There was a palpable sense of excitement all around that you couldn't help get caught up in and as I was savouring the atmosphere, Brother P. called out, ‘Amanda, over here,' and his sister made her way through the numbers.

‘Hi everyone,' she greeted us with and what a difference a few days make, for here she was looking alive and fresh, a sharp contrast to our last meet.

‘Good turn out, eh?' she said to no one in particular, scanning the growing crowd. Unlike her brother, Amanda was tall for her age and thin with it, although sometimes, when she turned her head a certain way you would catch her brother's features.

‘I spoke to mum this morning,' she said, ‘she called just after you left the flat. She says dad is making plans to go back to JA for good.'

‘Really? He hasn't said anything to me.'

‘Would you go?'

Brother P. shook his head. ‘You're joking. This is my home.'

‘Same as that,' Amanda replied.

‘Has anyone seen the animals that attacked you?' I enquired. ‘No, and nor have the police despite a name and three descriptions.'

‘Yeah, funny that,' Brother P. put in. There was a shout from behind and we all turned to see none other than The Sheriff and Jasmine, holding hands, and making a path to us.

‘Alright?' they both breezily enquired. ‘Good to see you both,' said Brother P.

‘So, come on then,' Jasmine half shouted, ‘let's get moving and sort these wankers out. I want to get down The Unity tonight. It's your last night isn't it?'

‘Yeah, until Costello finds another club. They're bringing in a load of special DJ's for the last night and for once in my life I want to enjoy myself there instead of having to work.'

A voice, belonging to one of the women residents, and comically distorted by a loudspeaker, interrupted, informing us all to gather up as the march was about to commence.

By now, the numbers had swelled to about a thousand and banners, carrying slogans such as Black Under Attack and Stop The Fascists, shot up towards the sky as we started our journey, all of us knowing, deep down, that trouble was not far away. You could smell it in the air.

Two minutes into the march and it became reality. With the boys in blue marching alongside us, impassive to the shouts from the crowd that taunted them, we had walked along the estate's main thoroughway, hemmed in by the flats on either side.

It was just as the first marcher turned to go right that it happened; from out of nowhere the sky above went from blue to black and suddenly all manner of debris, picked like flowers, from the surrounding wasteland, was raining down upon us. The attack, I hate and have to admit, was brilliantly executed because not only did it send us into a whirlpool of panic, splitting up the bulk of the crowd, but it totally wrong footed the coppers, who now couldn't work out whether to leave their positions or not.

Some of the helmets made for the stairs to the building on the left, where, on the fifth floor, some twenty cavemen were hurling down their weapons of hate, and as they did, from behind us came a roar, and then there were 50 of them, piling into the crowd, scattering everyone to the side as they cut through the crowd, kicking out in all directions like Olympic sprinters gone crazy.

I quickly reached for my weapon just as a flying body stumbled into my back and sent us both to the floor. Luckily, I was the first to scramble up and without thinking, lashed out at the guy with my foot, just catching the side of his shaven tattooed head.

I moved off quickly while the women and their screaming kiddiwinks made for the relative safety of the flat entrances, to huddle up in inside. Tightening my grip on my weapon, the next thing I knew Daddy Cecil and his posse were rushing past me to attack the oncoming rush of caveman, smashing into them like surfers attacking monstrous waves.

I looked around for my friends but they had disappeared and now a surge of adrenalin was pumping hard into my heart, swarming into my bloodstream and taking away all fear. I moved as if I was on auto pilot, not even concerned for my safety, as I went to help Daddy Cecil and his crew. One of his men had been wrestled to the ground and was covering up his body as the caveman rained in kicks on his body.