Sunjeev Sahota - The Year of the Runaways

‘It’s David,’ she said, quietly, moving round the kitchen table, as if to place a safety barrier between them.

‘Ah, Mr Sanghera, good to meet you again.’

He extended his hand, which Randeep took.

‘As I was saying to your wife, I realized I don’t have your phone numbers on file. And that’s no good at all.’

‘You should have written to us only,’ Randeep said.

David smiled. ‘I was in the area.’

His charcoal trench coat hung open, revealing a smart suit of a paler shade. The hair, grey, was swept back. He moved to Avtar.

‘I don’t think we’ve met. David Mangold.’ Again he held out his hand.

‘Hello, sir.’

‘Your name?’

‘Hmm?’

‘Name?’

‘Gurpreet.’

‘Off out?’ He nodded at the rucksack, or maybe the window.

‘No,’ Avtar said, reflexively, defensively, then wished he’d said yes and stolen the opportunity to get out of there.

‘Are you staying with Mr and Mrs Sanghera? Sorry — ’ a smile over his shoulder at the couple — ‘Mr Sanghera and Ms Kaur.’

‘No. Visiting only.’

‘Oh. I thought that would’ve explained all this,’ he said, looking at the pillows and blankets.

‘Visiting for a few days.’

‘Two blankets?’

‘It gets cold.’

‘Ah. Of course.’

He smiled that fake, flat smile again, and his gaze moved slowly around the room.

‘I see you’ve removed all your photos.’ He turned to Randeep. ‘I hope all is well in the matrimonial abode?’

‘We’re fine. Thank you. We’re redecorating.’

‘And this suitcase? My, what expensive-looking leather. I’m assuming that’s not yours, Mr Sanghera? Why would you keep a suitcase full of your things in your own living room?’

‘No.’

‘So it’s. .?’

‘My friend’s,’ Randeep said, nodding at Avtar. ‘Sir, did you come to interrogate us or for our contact numbers?’

‘Very true. I’ve taken up quite enough of your time,’ and he scribbled down Randeep’s and Narinder’s mobile numbers and wished them all a pleasant rest-of-the-morning.

They heard the downstairs door shut and Narinder sank onto a kitchen chair. ‘They know.’

‘It’ll be all right,’ Randeep said.

‘He can’t prove anything,’ Avtar said. ‘Don’t panic.’ He unzipped his rucksack and crushed into it a T-shirt he’d left drying on the radiator.

‘What are you doing?’ Randeep asked.

‘He might come back.’

‘We’re going?’

‘I am.’

‘I’m coming with you.’

Avtar swung the rucksack on. ‘And if he comes back?’

‘I’ll say he’s working. I’ll call you,’ Narinder said, turning to Randeep. ‘And I’ll probably handle it better on my own. But you can’t stay here.’

They returned to the surgery before heading to the bus stop — Randeep had insisted. He wanted to make sure Gurpreet was all right. He wasn’t there. They must have taken him to the hospital.

‘You sure?’ Randeep said.

‘If anything had happened to him there would have been police everywhere.’

Randeep nodded and let his head fall back against the bus stop. He turned his face away from Avtar and the tears that fell were ones of relief.

*

Gobind’s was an Indian supermarket that seemed to sell things in bulk: six-packs of lychee juice, giant mesh sacks of purple onions, sticky gold tins of rapeseed oil — Food For Functions, the sign outside the shop read. Hari’s room-mate had told them about it. They had been sleeping in the station, their second night away from Narinder’s, when Avtar got the call saying that there was definitely work going in Derby, in a place called Normanton. A gurdwara uncle on his way back from the cash-and-carry had given them a lift as far as Chesterfield and from there they’d hidden on a train.

Walking into the supermarket, Avtar was ambushed by the spices: cloves, coriander, ginger. There was another smell that reminded him more of home but which he couldn’t place until he turned and saw the brown powder spilled across the floor; piled up beside it, the split boxes of malati. He marched on, climbing out of whatever mood he was in danger of sinking into. The woman behind the counter looked old enough to be their grandmother, though the gold eye make-up seemed to warn against addressing her as a biji. She had very long, very straight hair in a fat clip at the nape of her neck and her green cardigan was buttoned singly at the throat, over her darker-green kameez.

‘Sat sri akal,’ Avtar said.

She exhaled in apparent dismay — ‘Mera ghar e tuhanu labda a?’ — and moved onto her tiptoes, looking over Avtar’s shoulder. ‘Arré, ji? Another one!’

The job wasn’t with them.

‘Too much checking in this area now,’ she said, shaking her head as if at an increase in crime. ‘We only dare keep one. Not that he’s much good,’ she added and rolled her eyes at the young man come to sweep up the liquorice powder.

‘So where is the work?’ Avtar asked.

‘No need to sound so desperate,’ the woman said. ‘The van’s coming tomorrow. In the car park.’

‘Whose van?’

‘He has a few businesses in the area. A local man. Don’t worry, he’s apna. Just make sure you’re there tomorrow. Early.’

The car park was too cold to sleep in so they returned to the shop and were given directions to the nearest gurdwara, where they ate and shat and climbed the stairs to spend the night in the darbar sahib.

‘We’ll find a room somewhere tomorrow. And work,’ Avtar said, coming back with some prasad. He gave half to Randeep, who ate it in one and then seemed disappointed not to have made it last.

‘I never thought it would be like this,’ Randeep said.

‘Have faith.’

Avtar’s phone buzzed — a message from Bal, demanding the next payment, and a warning: wanna c ur ma beggin on da street?

‘Work?’ Randeep asked.

Avtar plugged his phone in to charge. ‘No,’ and he left it at that. If he told him it might get to Lakhpreet, and maybe even to his parents. He’d got his family into this mess and he had to get them out. He had to earn, and more than he was earning now.

Randeep turned to face the wall. Avtar lay down and asked God to keep His hand on their heads, before turning round and trying to sleep himself.

They were at the small, ragged car park behind Gobind’s by six. Already five others were there, lined against the wall with their different rucksacks.

‘Join the queue,’ they said, though everyone knew that once the van turned up any queue would explode.

‘Whoever gets in helps the other,’ Randeep said.

More kept on arriving and by mid morning there must have been at least thirty waiting in the car park. They were from all over Panjab: Phagwara, Patiala, Hoshiarpur. The first thing anyone asked was what pind you were from. Which is your village? Who are your people? Some had been here more than ten years. One or two less than a week.

Someone ran in from the road and shouted that there was work in a biscuit factory on the other side of the city. The ones new to England slung on their bags and chased after the man, who said he’d show them which bus to catch.

‘That was my cousin,’ the man beside Avtar said, grinning. ‘Bhanchods, why didn’t more of you fall for that?’

The van — an old red Bedford — arrived late in the afternoon and a brusque round-bellied man in a quick-wrap saffron turban stepped out. His beard was neat and evenly black, the work of some dye, though his eyebrows were as white as butter. The boys assembled around the back of the van, Avtar elbowing his way to the front. The van man spoke.

‘I’ll only take men with National Insurance. If you don’t even have a fake one, don’t bother getting in the van.’