Collected Stories by Hanif Kureishi Read Free Book Online Page B

They would follow her and Azhar. With a sigh she sank back down. The conductor came, holding the arm of his ticket machine. He knew the Billys, and had a laugh with them. He let them ride for nothing.
    Mother’s grey perfumed glove took some pennies from her purse. She handed them to Azhar who held them up as she had shown him.
    ‘One and a half to the Three Kings,’ he said.
    ‘Please,’ whispered Mother, making a sign of exasperation.
    ‘Please,’ he repeated.
    The conductor passed over the tickets and went away.
    ‘Hold onto them tightly,’ said Mother. ‘In case the inspector gets on.’
    Big Billy said, ‘Look, he’s a big boy.’

    ‘Big boy,’ echoed Little Billy.
    ‘So grown up he has to run to teacher,’ said Big Billy.
    ‘Cry baby!’ trumpeted Little Billy.
    Mother was looking straight ahead, through the window. Her voice was almost normal, but subdued. ‘Pity we didn’t have time to get to the library. Still, there’s tomorrow. Are you still the best reader in the class?’ She nudged him. ‘Are you?’
    ‘S’pose so,’ he mumbled.
    Every evening after school Mother took him to the tiny library nearby where he exchanged the previous day’s books. Tonight, though, there hadn’t been time. She didn’t want Father asking why they were late. She wouldn’t want him to know they had been in to complain.
    Big Billy had been called to the headmistress’s stuffy room and been sharply informed – so she told Mother – that she took a ‘dim view’. Mother was glad. She had objected to Little Billy bullying her boy. Azhar had had Little Billy sitting behind him in class. For weeks Little Billy had called him names and clipped him round the head with his ruler. Now some of the other boys, mates of Little Billy, had also started to pick on Azhar.
    ‘I eat nuts!’
    Big Billy was hooting like an orang-utan, jumping up and down and scratching himself under the arms – one of the things Little Billy had been castigated for. But it didn’t restrain his father. His face looked horrible.
    Big Billy lived a few doors away from them. Mother had known him and his family since she was a child. They had shared the same air-raid shelter during the war. Big Billy had been a Ted and still wore a drape coat and his hair in a sculpted quiff. He had black bitten-down fingernails and a smear of grease across his forehead. He was known as Motorbike Bill because he repeatedly built and rebuilt his Triumph. ‘Triumph of the Bill,’ Father liked to murmur as they passed. Sometimes numerous lumps of metal stood on rags around the skeleton of the bike, and in the late evening Big Bill revved up the machine while his record player balanced on the windowsill repeatedly blared out a 45 called ‘Rave On’. Then everyone knew Big Billy was preparing for the annual bank holiday run to the coast. Mother and the other neighbours were forced to shut their windows to exclude the noise and fumes.
    Mother had begun to notice not only Azhar’s dejection but also his exhausted and dishevelled appearance on his return from school. He looked as if he’d been flung into a hedge and rolled in a puddle – which he had. Unburdening with difficulty, he confessed the abuse the boys gave him, Little Billy in particular.
    At first Mother appeared amused by such pranks. She was surprised that Azhar took it so hard. He should ignore the childish remarks: a lot of children were cruel. Yet he couldn’t make out what it was with him that made people say such things, or why, after so many contented hours at home with his mother, such violence had entered his world.
    Mother had taken Azhar’s hand and instructed him to reply, ‘Little Billy, you’re common – common as muck!’
    Azhar held onto the words and repeated them continuously to himself. Next day, in a corner with his enemy’s taunts going at him, he closed his eyes and hollered them out. ‘Muck, muck, muck – common as muck you!’
    Little Billy was as perplexed as Azhar