Читать книгу Sour: My Story: A troubled girl from a broken home. The Brixton gang she nearly died for. The baby she fought to live for. - Tracey Miller - Страница 13

I had my associates at school. But back home, at Roupell Park, my crew was made up of whoever was around. Who’s coming today? Who’s up for it?

There was no recruitment, no initiation. It ain’t no rotary club.

The ones from good homes kept riding with you till their mums or dads shut them down. The rest of us were just along for the ride.

Most days, we were just a loose collective of bored kids from the estate. Jamal, a big-built Ethiopian guy who was only our age, but looked bloody 18; Eddie, another black boy in the same block; and Sizz, the cousin of a friend. Other two-tails would come and go, but these were the main bloods.

They were up for anything. I was the only girl, and as such I occupied a role all to myself.

The trouble with being a brand-name, as I soon learned, was that once you start you can’t back down. It’s like grasping for the rope of a runaway balloon, innit. Your feet leave the ground, and suddenly you’re stoked by the thrill of soaring high above the rest.

By the time you look down, it’s too late to let go. Part-time wasn’t an option.

No, if I was going to be Sour, sour I had to stay.

I wanted to see who could prove themselves. If I was going to have their back, I needed to know who was just talking the talk and who would take a risk. I told them what they could achieve, and I wanted to see who could achieve it.

I was a very callous young woman. Really, it was just that simple.

Besides, shoplifting was getting boring. That was for rugrats. I was 15. I needed to step up. Tiefing threads and popping tags just weren’t my ting. Too quiet, too sneaky. That was low-level stealing. Kids’ stuff. Robbing, though – robbing was different.

I had some rules. Likking a tek, y’know a punter, on the street, or drumming the yard of private houses was not on. My focus was businesses. They had insurance. That was victimless crime, innit.

We called it steaming – rushing a shop en masse, storming the aisles and clearing out the till, likking the shelves for anything we could get our hands on. The key to success was strength in numbers. One form makes many.

My crew knew I would have their back.

Targets were never mapped out. It wasn’t planned like that. Steaming is about being a chancer: you’re either going to get away with it or you’re not. On some level, yeah, I knew that prison could beckon, but how could I be fearful of that? I hadn’t been there yet.

You do the crime, you do the time. The secret was not getting caught. That was what was at stake.

We jumped off the bus a few stops early. Me, Jamal, Eddie and Sizz. Sizz had brought a friend, a short, stocky guy with a shaved eyebrow. When he pushed back his hoodie, I could see a scar running down his temple. He knocked knuckles with the boys. When it came to me, he looked me up and down and grunted hello.

Maybe not a charmer, but I was glad Sizz had brought him along. He looked broader and stronger than the rest. We needed him.

We sauntered along the pavement, not saying much. Sizz and Eddie kicked a chicken bone between them, dribbling it along the pavement, before shooting it across the road, narrowly avoiding a granny on her shopping scooter. The front wheel underneath the basket crunched over the bone as she trundled on, oblivious.

We loitered for a moment by the sandwich board outside, advertising low-cost money transfers to Nigeria. It squeaked with rust.

The automatic doors opened and a tired-looking mum dragged a moaning child behind her.

“You’re getting no more till we get home,” she barked at the little girl, who eventually admitted defeat and sulked along behind her.

I felt my stomach tighten with nerves.

I reminded the boys of the task at hand.

“The focus is to get the money out of the till.” They nodded. “That’s the job, get it done.”

My right arm hung straight and heavy by my side. I liked that feeling. It gave me confidence.

Holding the collar between my teeth, I managed to zip my hoodie up to my neck, one-handed.

I took a deep breath and walked in first, face-straight.

There were no customers. I glanced up, looking for the CCTV cameras, but could see none. It was clean.

I turned to the door, and gave them the sign. We were on. The boys steamed in behind me.

“Get down!”

Jamal was shouting at the shopkeeper. He was big, much bigger than Jamal.

The barrel-chested man behind the counter didn’t look scared. He looked angry. Eddie and the stocky friend jumped over the counter, toppling over the plastic lollipop stand and the lottery ticket board. Nimble hands and trainers vaulted over the confectionary shelves, kicking Tic Tacs and Twixes all over the floor.

They were going for the till.

The shopkeeper ducked down, yelling to a young boy, a son, perhaps, who emerged from the back room.

“Call the police!” he yelped.

The gangly lad stood open-mouthed for a moment before disappearing and locking the door.

Glancing over my shoulder, I did what I was meant to do, and maintained a look-out. No one was coming in. That was good.

Eddie and the cousin had turned their backs on the cowering shopkeeper and opened the till, stuffing their pockets with notes. We would be out of here in a second. The excitement pulsed through every vein in my body.

Jamal and Sizz ransacked the rest of the shop, clearing DVDs from the shelves.

What none of us had anticipated was that, of all the shops we could have picked, we had to pick the one run by a have-a-go hero. Most of the shop-owner Asian guys did the smart thing when they saw youngsters steaming their shops. Most times they let them have the run of it. But this guy, this guy was different.

The till was empty.

“Come on, let’s go.”

Jamal and Sizz were still steaming the back of the shop.

With their pockets full, and hot breath searing their faces beneath their scarves, Eddie and the cousin spun round, ready to make a run for it.

I felt the cold sweat of distant sirens. Were they coming? Was I imagining it? My legs were shaking. “Come on,” I muttered, willing them to leap over the counter as nimbly as they entered. “Come on …”

But the shopkeeper has risen up, shouting something in a language I didn’t understand.

He was brandishing a stepladder he’d been using to stock up. Eddie and his cousin tried to jump back over the counter, but it was much deeper on the other side, with much less room. The shopkeeper had blocked them in. My crew were in trouble.

I knew I needed to do something. He was attacking them.

“Shut your mouf, old man!”

I was the only one left. I had to protect them.

No one had ever tried to fight back before. I felt disrespected. He had disrespected all of us. But more than that, I felt responsible. I had these guys here to do something, and because of this have-a-go hero it’s all gone crazy.

I kept on shouting, until Jamal and Sizz had legged it out the double doors, and Eddie and the cousin had clambered back over the disarray of Snickers and cigarettes and out of the shop.

I kept on throwing cans till all the rest were sprinting down the road, and the street fizzed blue and red with sirens. A bitter, metallic taste flooded my mouth. My lip had been burst in the fight-back. I tripped and fell on to the crumpled man, who was groaning as he pushed himself up off the floor.

The shop fell silent, save for the heaving man on his hands and knees. I dropped the last can and fled.

The boys had bolted. I wanted so desperately to do the same but remembered: I had one advantage they didn’t. Crouching behind some bins, I discarded the baseball cap that had concealed my braids, and rearranged the scarf obscuring my face into a fashionable knot at my neck.

I freed my hands from my gloves, and the bracelets from my sleeves, before unzipping my hoodie and pushing up my bra beneath my vest top.

Then, ignoring every instinct telling me to follow the rest of the crew, I took one step after another and forced myself to walk calmly round the corner and slowly, brazenly down the street.

When the boydem arrived moments later, all they saw was a cute black girl, like any other. Checking my make-up in a hand-mirror, I caught the reflection of the angry shopkeeper waving his hands around for the benefit of two police officers, who nodded into their notepads. Nobody seemed to notice me.

Yeah, in those days I worried my own self. I thought I was invincible. Sometimes, I worried I was actually possessed by the devil.

The boydem caught up with most of the crew eventually. Only Eddie made it back to Dick Shits to tell everyone what happened.

After the glory of that afternoon, my brand-name was bigger than ever. I didn’t have to go recruiting no more. Man Dem came to me. Who was I to argue with that?