Nobody Saw No One (11 page)

But suddenly he seemed to blank out. Just stood there, squitzing at the screen.

“What?” says I, but he don’t say nothing back, just keeps on squitzing like he’s seen Jesus or Michael Jackson or whatnot. I follow his eyes and I see a box that says:
Name of Mother
. And in it is typed:
KATARIINA UNKNOWN
.

“Katariina,” he purrs, taking his time over the two
i’
s, enjoying the sound good and proper. “Katariina,” he repeats. “Katariina.”

From Alfi’s rants, I always assumed they’d told him his mother’s name wasn’t known.

“Katariina,” he purred again, like a hypnotic kitty.

“I guess
Alfi
’s a letter down, but your mum’s got one extra, so that balances out.”

He didn’t answer, and then I saw he had a tear trickling down his cheek. I suppose it probably must have been a bit moving, suddenly finding out what your mum was called, after all that time. Then I saw he had tears trickling down both cheeks. The Digit’s a bit emotionally embarrassed. I looked back down the corridor, hoping Barry might be on his way back, but he was still rolling round with the Psycho Girls.

“Come on.” I start to hint we maybe should get out of there, and I see Squealer’s chin all trembling, and the tears are getting worse. I’m reaching into my pockets, seeing if I ain’t got a tissue for him, and he only starts moaning, doesn’t he?

Then he starts wailing, good and proper. Next thing I know, he’s got snot coming out of his nostrils, and his shoulders are shaking too.

The Good Citizen’s never seen anyone sob as much as this before. It’s a veritable tsunami of tears. I lay my hand on his back, dead gentle, try and help him through it.

Through the tears and sobbing, he says again, “Katariina,” only it’s all in a gurgle and he sounds like he’s drowning. In his own tears.

“Come on,” I say, even more gentle and kindly than the first time. But he can’t stop crying, can he? He’s all choked up.

What he needs is a surname, added on to Katariina. A proper one instead of a supermarket chain. I wish I could do the opposite of delete – add his real, lost name to his file. But I can’t. So I stand there, don’t I, like a dingbat, and make
there there
noises of reassurance, and keep patting his back, gentle as I can.

*

I know who I am. I am the son of Katariina. I know me mother’s name. I am Alfi Spar, son of Katariina.

If she has a first name, I can find her second name. She’s no longer Unknown Unknown. She’s Katariina. And when I get out of here, when I can live me life for meself, I can find who she was.

Katariina Somebody. My mother is Somebody.

When I find her name, I’ll know mine. Nobody’ll make jokes any more about us having a shop sign for a name.

I’m only Alfi Spar for now. Tomorrow – sometime – I’ll be Somebody.

Alfi Spar was doomed.

The Digit has seen many a WhyPee in a dreadful state. I’ve seen acts of violence and destruction, the head-buttering of Carers, the smashing of fists, the slashing of wrists, rainbows of bruises and overdoses of booze. Life is hard. I walked away from Alfi that afternoon knowing that the boy didn’t have the strength in him to survive what was hanging round his next corner.

The Digit kept his nose to the ground. Sniffed what was afoot and heard the furtives. That night was going to be another party night.

The Jimmys. Alfi Spar was perfect fodder for them – without family, friends or respectabilities. Their big party was going to freak him out, sure enough, and then they’d put him down. Right down.

The Digit was outta there anyway, but Alfi had to get himself out of Tenderness House too, or he was going to end up such a damage case that he’d never be allowed back on the outside.

The Digit knew, because Byron himself hadn’t been in much of a better state. Only the Incredible Citizen Digit knew how to survive.

So, even though he didn’t deserve it, on account of being a misery-guts goody-two-boots cry-baby snob, I decided – at great risk to my good self – to give Alfi a bit of a hand.

There was only one option. I had to invite him to join Citizen Digit in his Greatest of Escapes.

“You’re nuts,” I said. “How’re you gonna escape anyway? Do you reckon it’s really any better – out there?”

Byron had snuck up to us in the yard during afternoon break. He cudn’t leave us alone, could he?

“Listen up,” he said. “You remember in the newspapers, all that stuff about that freak Jimmy Savile?”

I had nowt to say to that. All of us had heard that horrible stuff. Byron knew that well enough. So he went on. “In all of them children’s homes, yeah?”

“Yeah,” I said. So what was he getting at?

“Well, it’s like that here.”

And he told us, all about it. How he reckoned that Call-Me Norman were grooming us, setting us up. He told us what Sniper and some o’ them other WhyPees had been having to do to get all their so-called rewards. How Call-Me would have “parties” in his lounge at night, with all his posh friends coming round. How the WhyPees and WhyPettes would provide the entertainment.

I’d never heard such a load o’ rubbish. I stood there, shaking me head at him. “It’s against the law, in’t it. They can’t make you do owt if you don’t want to. Anyway, even if you did want to, for rewards or whatever, it’s still against the law. We’re only kids.”

“Doesn’t make any difference,” he said. “They make you do it.”

Like he knew all about it. Byron reckoned if he went round calling himself Citizen Digit he could come out with any nonsense and it made it true. But he din’t know. How could he? He were just trying to freak us out.

“No,” I said. “I wun’t let ’em. Not for an iPod. Not for owt.”

He laughed at us, din’t he? Like I were a stupid littl’un.

“Anyway –” I weren’t having it “– if they tried any o’ that stuff, they’d get in massive trouble wi’ the police, wun’t they?”

He laughed louder. Right in me face.

“I don’t believe you,” I said. “You’re just saying it ’cos you’re jealous, ’cos I got given an iPod.”

The trouble were, he had a funny look in his eye, dead serious, like. And he grabbed me arm. “I’ll prove it, if you like,” he said. “I’ll show you. Tonight. You can see with your own eyeballs.”

Din’t I have enough to worry about? Why wun’t folk just leave us alone?

“No. Forget it,” I said. “This conversation is over. Right?”

He gave us a dirty look. Like he thought I were dead pathetic. Not worth the effort. And he let it drop.

*

You know what? I was outta there anyway. Tenderness House was horrible enough even without taking the Jimmys into consideration. But the mood around the place the day after one of their parties was too miserable to bear. The place stank.

I had it all planned out. Citizen Digit could finally begin to make a proper life for himself. In London. I had Grace’s details. All I had to do was track her down on Seven Sisters Road, see if she could help me out for a day or two until I settled into my brand-new life.

But.

Alfi Spar. He had no one watching out for him, did he? If he wouldn’t see how much danger he was in, I’d have to open his eyes for him, so he could get to grips with the situation and sort himself out. I’d do just this one thing for him, and then I’d be off, out of Tenderness House for good and for ever.

So Citizen Digit, for better or worse, adapted his perfectly laid plan.

I waited for nightfall. Then, the first thing I did was pick the lock of Alfi’s room, while he slept, and steal his iPod.

iPods have a video function, see? Not sure Call-Me Norman totally twigged that when he gifted it to Alfi. He pictured young Spar-Boy foot-tapping away to endless hours of dub-step. As if.

Boy was sleeping like an angel, not that that mattered because the Master Crim Didge was as light on his feet as a ghost. So the ghost took the angel’s iPod and then floated away through the corridors of Tenderness. Sure enoughski, the corridors had more security cams than corners, but I’d studiously studied the blind spots. No nightshift Carers were going to spot the Citizen making his way out of the accommodation block and into the driveway. I was Mr Invisible himself, the Floating Shadow, Sir Citizen Digit esq. I was Night-time Plus. If the Digit wants to stay unspotified, it is a hundred and fifty per cent guaranteed that he will stay unspotified.

And so it was. I planted myself like a shrub in the driveway outside Call-Me Norman’s office-come-dirty-den, between a rose bush and a hedge, and as the visitors came, I watched, and filmed.

First up, a Jaguar. Poshness itself. I filmed the number plate and the boat race of a man who oozed out the passenger door. He must have been full of influentia to have his own driver, and by the look of his threads he’d come straight from work. What kind of man wears a suit and works these kind of hours?

The chauffeur drove off and a few minutes later another car pulled up and, I kid you not, a
Sherlock
got out, in full uniform too. I almost jumped up in excitement, thinking for a moment the law’s long arms had stretched all the way over to Tenderness to nick Call-Me Norman and his cronies. But the Digit knew better, and I kept filming.

A third car pulled up and a bald, fat man in a suit belly-huffed out.

Next thing, I see Barry Gorilla-Hands leading one of the WhyPettes by the wrist. She was a fairly new girl. I figured by the pale look on her face, and the way Ape-Face was dragging her, that this was her first time. They went in, and Barry came out a minute later, on his own.

Maybe I’d filmed enough already. All I needed was to convince Alfi of the need to get out of this place. But it made me angry, seeing the way Barry had rough-handled the girl.

“No way,” says I. “I’m going to paparazz the lot of them.”

Then Barry came back with one of the boys. Moses. I knew Moses had done this before, ’cos his room was practically overflowing with rewards. He was marching ahead of Barry, full of grimful determination.

Barry was away again, and returned a few minutes later with another girl. She was smoking a cigarette, trying to look cocky, and failing. I’d seen her in the games room the day before, practising a hand-clapping routine with one of her mates.

This time, Barry didn’t come back out.

I should have left it at that, but I couldn’t, could I? I’d caught the Squealer-Boy’s righteousness.

And before I could instruct them otherwise, my very own legs were skedaddling towards Call-Me’s doorway.

Dimwit legs.

I get to the door, ease my way through it and make my way down the corridor towards the back lounge.

Where’s the Citizen’s brains gone? Only gone and fallen out into the mud by the rose bush, ain’t they? ’Cos at the end of the corridor, I slide the door open, just a tad, and keep on filming.

Never-been-seen, never-to-be-seen, that’s me, yeah?

Classical music is flowing out of the speakers and you-don’t-want-to-know-what is playing on the Widescreen. On a sofa, the flabby Groan and the girl with the cigarette, together. I really do not want to look at what’s happening in the room. I turn my head away and just point the iPod.

I close my eyes. Try not to imagine what it is I’m not watching.

But I can hear it, can’t I? Going right through my brain. Those two girls, and Moses, and the Groans.

I clap my hands to my ears. Block it all out.

Stupidity itself. The iPod clatters to the floor.

“Hush!”
Barry hisses to the others.

I grab the iPod, run to Call-Me’s office and leap into a hidey hole.

Barry comes through a moment later. Stands there, assessing the room. I left Call-Me’s door open, and I can see him thinking about that, trying to remember whether he left it open himself or whether some fool WhyPee has just fled through it. Then he turns round, scans the room. He bends down by Call-Me’s desk, to look under it. He pulls open the curtains, checks nobody’s hiding behind them, pulls out some cabinets, checks no one squeezed between their gaps. Then he walks towards Call-Me’s closet.

My heart is pounding like it wants to give me away. My breath whooshing like waves on a stormy beach. I can see him, listening. And I’m so loud!

He tugs open the closet door and straight away starts punching and kicking into the space.

Hush, boy.

Then he sticks his whole body in and starts rummaging, pushing aside coats and jackets and wholesale boxes of Bourbons and piles of confiscated WhyPee smokes. He pulls out a bag of golf clubs, which Call-Me probably uses to play rounds with the fat Sherlock. He pulls one out, measures the weight of it.

“Come out now,” he says, turning to address the room. “It’ll be better for you.”

As if.

He whacks the club down on Call-Me’s desk. All the stationery on it jumps. So do I.

Barry starts viciously jabbing the golf club at every space he can find. With each jab he goes
Hunh!
like he’s stabbing as hard as he possibly can.
Hunh!
he goes,
Hunh!
Each time, I flinch like I’ve been stabbed in the gut. Then he stops. He waits.

He drops the club and he chuckles. He goes back to the closet and comes out carrying a baseball bat. A baseball bat is exactly the thing that would make Barry chuckle.

He strides out of the office, a hungry look in his eyes.

From behind the ajoining door, opened wide against a corner of Call-Me’s office, I step out.

From the inner sanctum, I can hear the men, enjoying themselves.

I wait, for as long as I can stand it, then follow Barry out into the courtyard.

Having filmed the evidence and shown it to Alfi, the Didge was getting the hell out of Dodge, preferably with Squealer-Boy riding side-saddle. I’d hotwire Norman Newton’s car, which he always parked in the same spot in the driveway, pick the lock on the main gate and burn rubber all the way back to civilization. That was
the plan.