LITMIR.BIZ

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go around in gangs. What Ritchie did – mugging me – was well unusual. But then he was unusual too. Saying all that stuff about how he’d change the world. You wouldn’t think someone like him would think in that way. Have all those dreams.

      You should never judge by appearances.

      Fairfield looked better than I thought it would, but I guess that was because the sun was shining. It was still a bit chilly – I had my charcoal-grey fleece on. It’s sad, in a way, that I don’t even have to describe Fairfield to you. Not because it’s notorious, but because you’ve seen so many places like it. Assemble in your mind’s eye a few lines of maisonettes with women hanging around outside, two or three grey stone high-rises, and pubs with fat blokes sitting outside on wooden tables, supping beer. But funnily enough, there’s a kind of village atmosphere there, because Fairfield is a place a short distance from the centre of town, the nearest we have to a no-go area. So once you’re there, it encloses you. You feel part of it. I felt part of it, anyway. I didn’t even mind the women eyeing me.

      I knew the community centre was a bit further down the road, a one-storey breeze-block building with bars over the windows. As I approached it, I was surprised to see stacks of withered Cellophane-wrapped bouquets of flowers and a couple of damp-looking teddy bears on the pavement outside it. I was trying to read the names on the cards inside the flowers when I heard Ritchie’s voice.

      “Hi.”

      I turned. “Hi. What happened here?”

      “Some kids crashed a car last month. A couple of them snuffed it.”

      “Oh.” I didn’t know what to say.

      Ritchie was dressed in an olive-green hooded fleece and jeans. Standing there by all the dead flowers made me feel very alive, spared from something. Almost invulnerable.

      “Did you know those kids?” I asked Ritchie.

      “No. They weren’t from round here.”

      I put my hand in my jeans pocket then and gave him two ten-pound notes. He took them and muttered some thanks. I tried to make light of it.

      “No sweat. I’m always borrowing money off my mum.”

      “I’ll pay you back,” he said.

      “Whenever.”

      There was a moment of awkwardness. I thought I ought to go back home but I didn’t want to. Ritchie looked different in the sunshine. His shaved head made him look hard, accentuated his jawline and cheekbones. But his eyes – soft, brown eyes – almost seemed to belong to a different person – a shy, uncertain one.

      Just at that moment two lads arrived on mountain bikes. One leapt off his bike and stood in front of Ritchie, as if he was barring his way. Ritchie thrust the two tenners at him and he grabbed them. In a second he was back on his bike – it was all over so quickly that if you’d asked me to pick him out from an identity parade, I couldn’t have done it.

      “I feel shit about taking that money off you,” Ritchie murmured.

      “Why should you? You were going to rob me of it last night.”

      “Yeah – but that wasn’t personal. Now it is.”

      For some reason, I liked the way he said the word “personal”. I smiled, and still put off saying goodbye. I noticed he wasn’t moving either. I wondered if I should suggest we do something. Though God knew what. He didn’t have any money and neither did I.

      And then the guys on the bikes returned. This time, knowing who they were, I felt my stomach somersault. Wasn’t the money enough? Were they going to beat him up after all?

      But I was wrong. These were different boys.

      “Hiya, Ritch!”

      The first one who screeched to a halt and got off his bike didn’t look like my idea of a dealer. He wore a local football shirt and had messy blond hair.

      “Hi yourself,” Ritchie said, looking pleased to see him. The boy with him looked younger – but might just have been shorter. He had a black puffa jacket.

      “We’re going to Woodsy’s place,” the football shirt said. “You coming?”

      Ritchie hesitated for a moment. Then he said to me, “D’you wanna come?”

      You bet.

      We walked to a block of flats which looked about ten storeys high. Grey stone, white window frames: not in bad nick, but not the sort of place you’d want to live in. It was dull, uniform, prison-like. I don’t know if the lifts were working or not, as the lads made straight for the stairs and ran up them. Have you noticed when lads get together they behave differently from when they’re alone? Now that Ritchie was with his mates, he was larking about, competing with them – they were racing up the stairs, calling out good-natured abuse to each other. Luckily I’m quite fit and was able to keep up with them. They – we – ran all the way to the top. I was panting by then. I knew we’d reached the top as in front of us was just a red door and a corridor to our right where the doors to the flats were. But the lads didn’t turn right. Instead, the football shirt – Ritchie called him Loz – was messing around with the red door. I didn’t see what he was doing, but finally he heaved himself against the door and it gave. It opened to a few more steps, leading to a small room with brick walls and some tanks.

      Loz opened another door, and then we walked out on to the middle of the roof.

      I watched the lads as they made their way towards the edge. I stayed close to the door; I noticed the place we’d come from was a bricked-in, covered area you could walk all the way round, a self-contained block on top of the roof. Ritchie and the others were at the edge now. I didn’t want to follow them. There was no railing, just a sheer drop to the bottom. A CCTV camera peered down to the ground and a couple of aerials stood forlornly.

      Then there was the thump of more footsteps and another lad joined us, carrying a stereo. While they were all greeting each other I tried to get over my vertigo. I looked out over Fairfield to the shopping precinct, the covered market and the main road. I turned and could see the park. From up here the whole of Fairfield and its people were insignificant. Being up high gives you a feeling of power. Maybe it was the feeling of power that was making me dizzy. I strained my eyes further to the horizon and saw the hills: tired, worn-out flat hills with the TV mast just a faint line on the horizon. I would have expected it to be windy up on the roof but it wasn’t. I could even feel the sun warming my face, making me feel it was all right to be where I was. Bit by bit I left the wall, no longer feeling afraid, but exhilarated. Even, if you like, on top of the world.

      “Who’s your girlfriend?” one of the lads asked Ritchie.

      “She’s my mate,” he said. “Anna.”

      Yesss! I was his mate. Ritchie introduced me properly to the lads. The little one was called Tanner. Loz I’d already worked out, and the boy with the stereo was Woodsy. I hoped I was going to remember their names. You know how it is when you meet people for the first time – you’re so bothered about what they think of you, you don’t focus on who they are. I was wondering what they made of me, and hoped they’d think I was OK. I just wanted to be accepted by them.

      I was. The boy called Loz handed me a can of Carling from an Asda carrier bag.

      “Cheers,” I said, and tugged at the ring pull. I reckoned I could make as if I was drinking it – the last thing I wanted to do was to say in front of these lads that I don’t drink. They’d think I was such a square.

      We all sat down together, the boys sprawling all over the place, jostling each other sometimes. Loz switched on the ghetto blaster and some R&B played – nothing mainstream, I didn’t recognise it. I decided not to

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