Those People Next Door, page 12
He batted at his tears. ‘I took her for a walk and then she came upstairs. I was due to stream on Twitch and she was getting under the rollers of my chair so I sent her downstairs.’
‘And then?’
‘And then I came down and couldn’t find her.’
‘What time?’
‘I don’t know, about an hour ago.’
Salma strode into the house. ‘Molly?’ she called. ‘Molly!’
‘Mum, don’t you think I’ve tried that?’ His voice trembled and it broke her heart to hear it.
‘Have you checked all the corners? The laundry bin? Under the sink? The washing machine?’
‘I’ve looked everywhere.’
Salma proceeded to search the house, Zain closely in tow. ‘Have you called your dad? Maybe he has her?’
‘No, why would he randomly come home and just take her?’
Salma tested the garden door and found that it was open. ‘Was this ajar?’
Zain waved a hand helplessly. ‘I don’t know. I think I opened it when I was looking for her.’
‘Are you sure?’
‘No, Mum, I’m not sure!’
Salma walked out to the garden and peeked under trees and bushes. ‘Molly!’ she called, hearing her own voice tremble. ‘Do you think she was stolen?’
He gripped a tuft of his hair. ‘She’s an old mutt. She wouldn’t be worth anything.’
‘Was the front door open? Could she have wandered off?’ Salma walked back through the house to check the front garden.
‘No,’ cried Zain. ‘I shouldn’t have sent her downstairs.’
‘She must be somewhere.’
‘But where? How could she just disappear?’ Panic changed his features; pinched them sharp and mean.
‘Everything okay?’ a voice asked behind them. Linda stood on the kerb and Zain turned away from her, embarrassed by his tears.
‘Our dog, Molly, is missing,’ Salma told her.
Linda clucked with sympathy. ‘Oh dear. I’m so sorry to hear that. When did it happen?’
‘In the last hour. Did you happen to see anything?’
‘I’m afraid not.’ Linda took out her phone. ‘But I can ask the neighbourhood WhatsApp group.’
Salma blinked. She didn’t know there was a neighbourhood group. ‘Please could you?’ She sent her a picture of Molly and watched her send it on. From the corner of her eye, she thought she saw movement at Tom’s window. A thought struck her. ‘Could she have got into next door’s garden?’
‘I can’t see how that would happen,’ said Linda.
Salma began to fret. ‘There’s a loose board in the fence. We’ve been meaning to fix it. I didn’t think Molly could fit through.’ She looked at Linda imploringly. ‘Do you think you could ask him?’
‘He’s in the WhatsApp group,’ said Linda.
‘No, I mean knock on his door and ask him for me. Things are still tense between us.’
A crease of irritation lined Linda’s forehead. ‘Well, that’s just childish, Salma. If you have a question to ask him, you need to ask him yourself. Tom is a perfectly nice man. You just got off on the wrong foot.’ She nodded at his house. ‘Honestly, just go and talk to him.’
Salma drew back. She hadn’t seen Tom since he’d lost his job and though she now knew that he wasn’t responsible for the damage to the restaurant, she still feared his mood. ‘If he’s seen her, he will say so in the WhatsApp, won’t he?’
Linda sighed. She had clearly decided that Salma was being dramatic. ‘Of course he will.’ She tutted. ‘Look, if I see him, I’ll ask him directly. How about that?’
Salma flushed with gratitude. ‘Thank you, Linda. I’d appreciate that so much.’ Back in the house, she found Zain pacing the living room. He was scrolling through social media, searching different hashtags for recovering lost pets and puppies.
‘I’m sorry,’ he said, still pacing. ‘I should have taken care of her.’
‘It’s okay. We’ll find her.’
‘What if she’s dead?’
‘Don’t say that.’
‘What if she got run over? What if she’s lying injured somewhere?’ His voice was frayed with anxiety.
Salma put an arm around him. ‘We’ll find her,’ she promised, stamping down her own panic.
Zain’s muscles ached as he eased into his chair. He had spent the whole evening searching for Molly, combing lanes and byways. Technically, Molly was his mother’s dog but it was Zain whom she truly loved. She sidled up to him at every opportunity and nestled by his desk for hours. Zain was an only child and Molly was a stand-in sibling, the two of them navigating highs and lows. In a way, they were of a similar temperament: social and outgoing but frequently needing space. At family gatherings, they would escape to a cool corner of the house to sit and take a minute. It killed him to know that he had sent her away and snapped when she hadn’t listened. Where could she have gone?
A clink on the glass distracted him. He looked up to find Jamie waiting and hurried over to let him in. The younger boy puffed out his chest triumphantly, hands on his hips like Superman.
‘Guess what?’ he said, excited.
‘You found her?’ said Zain, breathless with hope.
‘Found who?’
‘Molly!’ Zain saw his confusion and felt his hopes deflate. ‘She’s gone missing,’ he explained. He recounted the events of the evening and was touched to see that Jamie was teary. In the mere weeks they had known each other, he too had built a bond with Molly.
‘We’ll find her, mate. Don’t worry.’ Jamie looked conflicted. ‘I do have some news to tell you.’ He shifted unsurely. ‘We won the funding.’
Zain stared at him. ‘We what?’
Jamie couldn’t hold back and broke into a grin. ‘We won.’
‘We won?’ Zain shot to his feet. ‘We fucking won?’
‘We won!’
‘Oh my god.’ Zain covered his mouth. ‘You’re not fucking with me?’
‘No.’
‘Oh my god!’ They embraced instinctively, overwhelmed with shock. They had just won £30,000 of funding.
Jamie gave him a shy smile. ‘Thanks, man. I couldn’t have done it without you.’ He exhaled sharply. ‘The first half hits my account tomorrow. We’ll get the second half once we upload a working demo. The deadline’s in three weeks.’
‘I can finally buy a new laptop,’ yelled Zain. An idea occurred to him. ‘Hey, maybe we could offer a reward for Molly? Like a thousand quid or something? If someone has her or has seen her, that would encourage them.’
Jamie’s face fell. ‘Um, we can’t do that, can we?’
‘Why not?’
‘Well…’ Jamie hesitated. ‘Because we submitted a budget. It all has to be accounted for.’
Zain drew back. ‘Yeah, but it’s our money now. We can spend it where we need to.’
‘But not on personal things.’
‘Who’s gonna know?’
‘Come on, man,’ Jamie said with a little laugh.
The air left the room. ‘Come on what?’
‘We can’t do that.’
‘Can’t or won’t?’ said Zain.
‘Can’t.’
Zain stared at him. ‘Okay, maybe just five hundred then.’
‘It’s not the amount.’ Jamie fiddled with the button on his cuff. ‘You’ve read the terms and conditions. We have to account for how the money is spent.’
‘Yeah, but they give us some leeway.’
‘Not for spending on a dog!’
‘She’s not just a dog. She’s…’ Zain stopped, embarrassed by the sudden high pitch of his voice. ‘It’s just five hundred quid, man.’
‘Maybe it could be a loan and you could pay it back?’
‘A loan? That’s my money too.’
‘It’s Grapevine’s money.’
Zain realised that they hadn’t made things official. All their agreements were verbal and Jamie had all the money. They had named him as the principal founder because he was the deaf one. ‘It’s a bit weird that all of it’s in your account,’ said Zain. ‘Shouldn’t we split it?’
Jamie was uncomfortable now. ‘I mean, we can leave it in my account and then we agree on all the expenses and stuff.’
‘Why are you being like this?’
‘Like what?’
‘This whole application was my idea and now you’re acting like you’re in charge.’
‘I’m not. I just want us to be careful with it. We can’t just spend it on dogs and shit.’
Dogs and shit? Zain felt his blood heat. ‘Why are you being a cunt about this?’ He bared his teeth meanly. ‘Just fuck off, Jamie.’
The boy stood there, not saying anything.
Zain was unable to deal with his anger and shoved Jamie’s shoulder. ‘I said: fuck off.’ When Jamie still didn’t speak, Zain snarled at him: ‘What? Are you dumb as well as deaf?’
Jamie’s face cracked with hurt. For a beat, neither of them moved or spoke. Then, Jamie nodded and mutely turned and left. Zain clung to his temper, knowing if he let it waver, it would cave right into shame.
Zain had heard it said that the bullied became bullies, but this wasn’t always true. You could have a perfectly lovely childhood and still behave disgracefully. He had learnt this from experience, at the end of primary school when he was ten years old. Zain’s friend, Raj, had invited him to his home: a flat with his mum, dad and three siblings crammed into a tiny space. The living area had been fashioned into a makeshift bedroom and Zain remembered that Raj’s mother placed them in the ‘machine room’, a store cupboard with a giant Brother sewing machine. He and Raj squeezed onto folding chairs and ate their rice off the sewing machine, using it as a table. At school, for a reason he couldn’t remember, Zain had taunted his friend. Oh yeah, and when I went to his house, his mum made us eat off their sewing machine! The kids in the class were scandalised and equal parts amused. They built upon the taunt, guffawing at Raj’s trousers for being an inch too short. When Zain saw the look in his eye – humiliation and betrayal – shame turned over in his gut, but he knew it was too far gone; a genie out of its bottle. For the rest of the year, Raj was teased mercilessly: in PE for his threadbare socks, the heels near translucent; at the track on sports day for running in his school shoes.
It was a relief when, at secondary, they went to separate schools. It was a chance for both of them to reinvent themselves. Years later, Zain ran into Raj at Westfield. They locked eyes on the top-floor concourse and Zain wasn’t sure if he should say anything but Raj approached him first. His old friend had got into a grammar school and Zain was relieved, but also surprised, to see his newfound confidence. They spoke for a while, swapping stories about their studies, and throughout it all, Zain groped for the courage to say the words Hey man, I’m sorry about what happened back in the day. Or I’m sorry about what I did. Or I don’t know if you remember Year 5? I know I was a little shit. But the words got stuck in his throat.
Raj lingered for a moment, knowing he was owed an apology, but Zain simply held out his hand, smacked it into Raj’s and shook it firmly. It was good to see you, man. Raj nodded stiffly and said, Yeah, you too. They parted ways and Zain’s burning shame never again let him stand by and watch a peer be bullied. The impulse drew him into scrapes and fistfights and through this specific violence, Zain paid his repentance. He had thought himself reformed, but the fact that this old instinct – to harm someone weaker than him – had come back so naturally made him pulse with shame. Are you dumb as well as deaf? What rotten thing inside had made him ask such a thing?
Salma stood on her lawn and watched the pot-bellied man on the ladder. Fred had a moustache like a Texan cowboy and wore suspiciously clean overalls. He dabbed his brow with a handkerchief and carefully climbed back down. He drained his glass of lemonade and propped it on the window ledge.
‘Thank you. That was lovely,’ he said, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand. ‘Make sure you keep that booklet over there. Any problems, just call the number on the back.’
‘Thank you.’ She gestured towards the house. ‘If you need the bathroom before you go, it’s on the second floor.’
‘I’m all right, but thank you,’ said Fred as he finished loading the van.
Bil often teased Salma for offering their bathroom to tradespeople ‘with all the zeal of a pervert’, but she did it regardless. A plumber cousin had told her once how hard it was to find commode, so she always made a point to ask. Whenever they said yes, she would glance at Bil and smugly raise a brow.
She waved her thanks to Fred, then picked up his glass and walked inside. Next to the sink was a pile of dishes that Zain had used at breakfast. Normally, she would call him down, but he was in a state about Molly.
She was just about to run the water when she heard a rap on the door. She spotted the orange cap through the window and felt her stomach drop. Tom was waiting outside. She braced herself and opened the door.
‘What the hell do you think you’re doing?’ he said, pointing at the security camera that Fred had just installed. ‘You can’t do that.’
‘Of course I can,’ she said, laughing a little to show he was being ridiculous.
‘Will you be filming beyond the bounds of your property?’
It occurred to Salma that she hadn’t checked this.
Tom caught her hesitance. ‘You can’t do that, so point that fucking thing elsewhere.’
‘Can you not swear at me, Tom?’
‘What the fuck are you trying to do? Film my every move so you can put it up on Twitter? Don’t you dare point that thing at my house.’
‘I’m not pointing it at your house. I’m pointing it at my lawn.’
‘And recording parts of my house.’
Salma spoke calmly. ‘My family have been targeted. I have every right to protect my home.’
‘Targeted?’ He sniggered. ‘It was one measly banner, you bint, and you shell out a thousand pounds as if you’re under siege?’
‘It’s not just a banner though, is it, Tom? It’s the paint on my window, my scratched-up car, my stolen dog.’
He looked at her with venom. ‘So, wait, I’ve stolen your dog now? Is that the story you’re peddling?’
‘Look, I understand you’re frustrated and I’m sorry that you lost your job, but—’
‘Sorry!’ He cut in, loud and bitter. ‘Is that right?’
‘I didn’t plan to upload that video. It was a misunderstanding.’
‘You knew exactly what you were doing,’ he said. ‘You knew the wokerati would come for me.’
‘That’s not true.’
‘I’ve worked at Sartre for fifteen years and I say one thing wrong and I’m’ – he clicked his fingers – ‘gone.’ Anger leaked from his breath. ‘I shouldn’t have removed your banner – I admit that – but everything that came after? That’s on you.’ He pointed at her face. ‘You don’t know me. You don’t know who I am. You just made presumptions based on what you see.’
Salma was about to speak but another voice cut in.
‘Everything all right here?’
For once, she was relieved to see Linda.
‘Linda, I’m glad you’re here,’ said Tom, sweeping up to her side and drawing her closer by the arm. ‘Salma here and I are having a bit of a debate.’ He nodded at the security camera, which, now that Salma looked at it, did look somewhat obtrusive. ‘She’s installed a camera that films part of our lawn and I’m asking her to repoint it so it’s off my property. That’s reasonable, isn’t it?’
Linda frowned at the camera, then looked over to Salma. ‘Do you really think it’s necessary? This is a nice street.’
‘A nice street?’ echoed Salma. ‘You saw what happened to my car this week.’
Linda tilted her head. ‘Yes, that’s true, but this seems excessive. It signals something about the street, doesn’t it? I wouldn’t want it to say the wrong thing. It’s a bit like having bars on your windows. It degrades the neighbourhood.’ She smiled at Salma kindly. ‘You really don’t have to feel unsafe here.’
Salma looked from one to the other, as if stuck in a farcical comedy: the straight man to two absurdists. ‘I would just feel safer with it here.’
Linda held out her palms. ‘Well, who am I to argue? Was there a white one by any chance? This one seems so…’ she wrinkled her nose, ‘noticeable.’
Salma was at a genuine loss. ‘I… They were out of stock.’
Linda gave a rueful flourish. ‘I do wish you had waited. It’s a shame to do that to a pretty street but if it makes you feel safer, then who am I to argue?’ She gave Tom a meaningful look.
He saw that Salma caught it and smiled at her smugly. She looked from one to the other, not knowing what to say. The silence became uncomfortable until, finally, she compromised. ‘I’ll speak to the supplier and ask them to narrow the field of vision.’
Linda’s face grew pinched, clearly displeased that Salma hadn’t yielded fully. ‘Well, I can see I’m not making a difference,’ she said. ‘I might as well get on with my day.’ She nodded at Tom and headed off.
Salma locked eyes with him, maddened by his arrogance. She was tired of being bullied and wanted to strike back at him. ‘Maybe Linda’s right,’ she said. ‘Maybe I don’t need the camera. You and Willa will keep an eye on the street, won’t you, now that you’re unemployed?’ Before he could respond, Salma coolly closed the door, quite unable to believe how delicious it felt to be cruel.
Chapter 7
Willa had dithered over what to wear ahead of her lunch with friends. She had settled on a pair of jeans and a loose white shirt from Eudon Choi that she had preserved immaculately. Her baby bump wasn’t yet showing, but something light and floaty suited the occasion. Her friends had two kids each and Willa was aggrieved that she was the one who was out of sync. She had had Jamie far too early and this one far too late. One bonus, she supposed, was that her children would not compete with her friends’, which wasn’t true for the others.
Sophia was the first to arrive and Willa tipped up her cheek to greet her. Sato and Amelia followed soon after. Willa was pleased to see that they looked well, but not too well. This way, she could pretend that she was keeping pace with them. In some ways, not being able to afford Botox and fillers worked to Willa’s advantage. Her friends had started to look a little ‘stretched’ and she wasn’t sure if she should tell them. She insisted that she preferred to age naturally, but if she had the funds, she knew she wouldn’t resist.
