Sunjeev Sahota - The Year of the Runaways

‘Sorry,’ Avtar said, and as he climbed the stairs he realized the vents in his jacket had been inside-outed. Fortunately, he kept no money in them.

He used a tablecloth to lift the pan and pour the boiled water into their iron bucket, adding a small amount of cold from the tap. He took the bucket and the letter up to his room. He’d been expecting the letter: Cheemaji had already rung to say he’d forwarded it on. He sat in a straight chair, rolled his jeans up past his knees and slowly, wincing, let his blistered feet sink into the steaming water. The bucket was a narrow one, forcing his knees tight together, and as the water rose up past his calves it spilled over.

One corner of the envelope bore the shield of the college, and the London address on the sticky label had been crossed out with two decisive red lines and replaced with this Sheffield one. Avtar turned the envelope over, then back again. He ran his fingernail along the seam and jiggled out the folded white sheet of paper. A column of Fs. Below it, a short paragraph confirmed he’d failed his first year. If he wanted to continue at the college, the letter went on, then his only option was to retake all the modules. If he wanted to exercise this option a form was enclosed. Please could he fill it in, along with an indication of how he intended to pay the fees: in a single lump sum before term began, or in regular monthly instalments.

He rang his father, waking him up, and told him his visa had been renewed for another year.

‘So you passed?’

Avtar hesitated. ‘Yes.’

His father roused Avtar’s mother, and she said she’d go to the temple tomorrow and distribute some mithai.

He had a few pounds left on his phonecard and knew he ought to call Lakhpreet and tell her the good news too. The dialling tone seemed to stretch time: a beep, a long pause, another beep. She answered: ‘Hello?’

They couldn’t speak for long, and afterwards he sat looking at the yellow screen of his phone. She was out at the cinema with her friends. Enjoying herself.

‘Can I call you tomorrow?’ she whispered.

‘Fine.’

‘Jaan? I’ll definitely call you tomorrow, OK?’

‘I’m doing this for you, you know. You and my family and all our futures. Do you even think of me while you’re out enjoying yourself? Think of me living here — ’ he drew his finger along the side of the chair and brought up thick dirt — ‘living here in this squalor?’

He wished he’d not been so angry. He mustn’t start hating her. He mustn’t let this life change him. He groaned and, with what energy he had left, dredged his feet out of the bucket of cooling water.

*

She was quick to open the door, which Randeep took as a positive sign. Ever since the inspectors’ visit she’d not once invited him in. Maybe this month would be different.

He was still panting a little from the climb. ‘For you.’

She took the envelope, thanked him. ‘I was starting to worry. He comes tomorrow to collect it.’

‘I’m only three days late.’

‘I know. I didn’t mean anything by it.’

‘And I did send you a message.’

‘I know. Thank you.’

He smiled, hopeful, not sure what to say next. He’d planned on telling her about their job troubles, but there seemed no point. She didn’t even care enough to ask him up. He worried he was making a fool of himself.

‘Well, see you next month,’ he said.

‘Aren’t you going to see if your friend’s in?’

So he was here. Randeep had already tried looking in through the window — it had been too dark. ‘He’s not my friend.’

‘Oh.’

‘He’s not a good person. He stole Avtar bhaji’s job. It’s his fault we’re struggling.’

‘How can you steal someone else’s job? Isn’t that up to the boss?’

‘He did.’

He could tell she thought he was making it up, or making it sound worse than it was.

‘He’s a chamaar.’ It sounded like he’d said it to clinch the argument, though he wasn’t sure he’d meant it like that. He wasn’t sure why he’d said it at all. Did he think she’d like him the more for it? And now she was withdrawing, saying goodbye, that she’d see him again next month.

He didn’t know why she was being so cruel, always shutting him out. Had he offended her in some way? She couldn’t still be annoyed about the inspectors. He slipped his shirt onto its hanger and hung it in the wardrobe. Then he moved to the swivel-mirror and inspected his armpit hair — it seemed thicker nowadays — and flexed his biceps. There was definitely some thickening there as well, he told himself, if he looked at it in the right way. The door opened and Gurpreet came in.

‘You’re meant to knock,’ Randeep said.

‘You on your own? Where’s your friend?’

‘Out.’

Gurpreet glanced around the room, at Tochi’s mattress, sheetless and laid on its edge, as if awaiting removal. ‘I thought you two were going to buddy up in here?’

‘No,’ Randeep said, though he had asked Avtar. He’d said something about Randeep needing to be more independent, which had hurt.

‘Right. Anyway, I’ve just been tipped off about a job. You want to come?’

‘You’ve got a job?’ He sounded incredulous.

‘You coming or what? Or do you have to ask your friend?’

After walking for some twenty minutes, Randeep found himself in a loveless part of town he wasn’t sure he recognized.

‘There isn’t a job, is there?’

Since leaving the house, Gurpreet hadn’t answered any of Randeep’s questions. A woman, prostitute, is that who he was going to meet?

‘I want to go back,’ Randeep said, halting, just as a pub appeared, a mouldy green thing squatting on the corner.

‘There it is. How much you got on you?’

It was a rundown place, all chipped mahogany, powder-pink booths and John Smith’s beermats. On the walls were hemispheres of frosted glass, and inside each glowed a dense yellow orb. They took their drinks — a whisky, neat; a lemonade — and made for the corner seat furthest from the bar.

‘We shouldn’t stay long,’ Randeep said.

‘Give it a rest,’ Gurpreet mumbled, and brought the glass to his lips, eyes widening.

They drank in silence. Then Gurpreet pulled a knife out of his pocket and laid it across his lap.

‘Why do you carry that everywhere?’ Randeep asked, looking around. The half a dozen or so customers seemed busy drinking, smoking.

‘Hm?’

‘Have you ever used it?’

He seemed to consider this. ‘Once or twice.’

‘When?’

Gurpreet laughed, almost into his shoulder. ‘When people don’t do as I say. When I’m with a woman.’ He looked across. ‘You’re shocked.’

Randeep moved his head, carefully, side to side.

‘We all need love, little prince. And we all love differently. Some women like it.’ He picked up the knife and turned the blade over. ‘Some women like it when I hold it against their throat, ever, ever so lightly. You know?’

Randeep nodded, like someone trying to follow a complicated argument.

Gurpreet took a long sip of his whisky, savouring it. ‘But, yeah, I’ve killed. Sometimes you have to.’

He didn’t think he believed him. ‘How many?’

‘In England?’

Suddenly, Randeep felt conscious of how he was sitting, of his half-sleeved goose-pimpled arms just hanging there at his sides. He gathered them up in a fold across his chest.

‘It gets easier,’ Gurpeet said. He seemed to be enjoying himself and extended his arm across the back of the seat. ‘Especially when things get desperate and people won’t tell you where they hide their money.’ He met Randeep’s gaze. ‘Where do you keep your money, little prince?’

‘I want to go.’