‘OK. I’ve got some paperwork to do anyway. Hope it works out all right – for Louis, mainly.’
‘He’ll be grand. And I really don’t get that Aldi thing, do you? Lovely cheese in there!’
She gives me the thumbs up sign, takes a deep breath, and reinstates her respectful-listening face as she goes back into the lionesses’ den.
I amble down towards my office, flushed from the conflict. I have been brave – I have attempted to right a small wrong.
Now, I need to be even more brave – and right the much bigger wrong that was done to Joe, to me, all those years ago.
It is time to stop trying to dodge the tsunami. It’s time to leap right in, and surf the wave, and see where the water takes me.
I retrieve my phone, and hit Michael’s number. He answers with the words: ‘He-Man and She-Ra’s House of Pain, how can I help you?’
‘Cousin dearest,’ I say, ignoring that. ‘How do you fancy joining me on a road trip?’
Chapter 13
‘When you said road trip,’ Michael complains as he parks his car, ‘I had in mind something exotic. A soft-top drive down the California coast, or a journey through Tuscany? The wind in my hair as we cruise through the sloping paths of Montenegro? I didn’t really have in mind Moss Side. I’m not sure I’m dressed right.’
‘Stop whining,’ I say firmly, glancing across at him and smiling. ‘And you’re not dressed right for anywhere.’
He rolls his eyes in disgust, and smooths down the eye-searing linen print shirt decorated with multicoloured neon palm trees. He’s combined it with linen shorts and hot pink espadrilles. I think it’s a safe bet that his parents have not been treated to this outfit.
‘When does your lease run out?’ I ask, as he unfolds his long legs from the car. He has just finished his final year studying law, and is supposed to be moving back to his parents’ home from his student accommodation.
‘My lease ran out ten days ago,’ he says, locking the door. ‘I’ve been sofa surfing since then. I just can’t face going back. I mean, I wouldn’t be able to wear gems like this, would I?’
‘You can stay with me if you like,’ I say, shrugging my shoulders. ‘But I’m warning you now, if you wear a gem like that in front of my face before nine a.m., I’m likely to attack you with my mother’s grabber.’
He pulls a horror-struck face, and follows me as I check my phone.
‘I always lived in fear of that grabber … it looked like some sort of torture device for sadists with arthritis … but thanks. I may well take you up on that. If you could possibly feign illness, or pretend to be overly distraught about your mum’s death, that would be fabulous – then I can say I’m moving in out of generosity of spirit.’
‘Rather than because your parents are robot clones with no sense of humour?’
‘That. Yes. Are we here? Is this it?’
We are standing together in front of a terrace of large, recently renovated Victorian buildings. The brickwork is clean and neatly pointed; the windows are new and the front doors are painted in vivid shades of primary colour gloss.
It all looks rather splendid, and I am taken aback by how much it’s changed in this part of Manchester. I was never a regular visitor – this is the place Joe’s foster parents lived, and we were both happy to avoid seeing them – but I still notice the changes.
The whole area used to be in the shadow of the old Manchester City football ground, surrounded by hundreds of terraced houses, a weird mix of vibrant local cultures and people who looked like they’d shoot you in the face if you looked at their trainers funny. The gang and gun and drug reputation was never a complete representation of the neighbourhood, but it did exist, even when I first came here in the late nineties.
The football club has gone now, Google told me earlier, and it seems to have been replaced with new housing and a school.
The terraces and kebab shops and bookies are still around, but I don’t feel quite as much like anyone is going to shoot me in the face. There’s still time yet, of course.
The row of done-up buildings in front of us is a hub of various community associations, clubs and businesses. There’s a Polish café, and something to do with gardens and organic food, and a Somali centre, and another building with posters for a Caribbean Carnival in the window.
In the middle of the row, with a bright red door, I see the place I’ve come to visit – BLM Associates. I don’t know why I decided to start here – perhaps because it was easy to find. Perhaps because I need to talk to someone who knew him; who loved him. Who might even know where he is now.
I’m not sure what kind of welcome I’m going to get – when I called to make an appointment, the receptionist took my name, and didn’t ask for any more details when I described the purpose of my visit as ‘personal’. In fact she booked in the meeting and hung up.
Like a lot of things that make sense at the time, it now seems like a poor decision. As I stand here, in this neighbourhood I barely recognise or remember, I feel a sudden whoosh of nerves, my knees wobbling as though I am a puppet and someone has cut my strings. I am taking a journey through time and space into a forgotten land; a place fraught with danger. This might go well – or I might get ambushed.
This is where I could back out. This is where I could ask Michael to drive me home, and start a celebratory bonfire in the garden where I burn all of those pesky letters and cards and other paper-based soul-torturing devices. I could send it all up in smoke, and concentrate on nothing more challenging than a book of crosswords for the rest of my life.
Part of me is tempted to do just that, and there is a burn of acid in my throat – from trepidation, and from self-loathing. From the need to be brave. I wish I could channel some of the fire and fury I felt at the meeting in school yesterday, but I feel weak and stupid. Like a child pretending to be an adult. The past is the past, and maybe it would be better for everyone concerned if I left it exactly there.
Just as I’m about to give up, to admit defeat and ask Michael to get me the hell out of here, the door to BLM Associates is pulled open. A tall, strongly built woman in skinny jeans and a tie-dyed purple T-shirt stands there on the step, arms crossed over her chest.
‘What’s up?’ she says, a slight grin tugging at the side of her mouth. ‘Never seen a black chick before, Baby Spice?’
Chapter 14
The inside of the office is clean but cluttered, noticeboards coated in posters and flyers for everything from political rallies to salsa lessons and meditation groups.
We follow Belinda into a room that is clearly an active working space – a desk, a small table for visitors, a mish-mash of coiled wires connected to computers and phones and, bizarrely, an Xbox.
There’s a coffee machine that looks more expensive than all the furnishings put together, and a huge cheese plant with shiny green leaves. I stare at it for a while, my brain telling me there’s something odd about it but not quite recognising what.
Then I realise that several of the curling fronds are decorated with black-and-white googly eyes – the kind we use for crafts in school.
‘Googly eyes make everything look better,’ I say, reaching out to touch one of the leaves.