You Don't Know Me

I had basically run out of ideas so on the third day I broke into her yard. She had been wanting me to have a key anyway but I had been all weird about it because then she would want a key to my place and well, at the end of the day I am a guy innit? Anyway I went round there at night, quite late, and basically just pushed the door in. All it had was a Yale lock and the door was just plywood really so it didn’t fight back all that much. The door splintered at the lock and swung open. I went in. It was dark and smelled kind of musty but not really anything unexpected. I turned on the light and the place jumped into view. It was just the same as the last time I had been there. The books had grown in number but now they were mainly on the shelves that I had put up for her in every room. Part of me still had a hope she would be there. Maybe lying in bed or something. Even lying in bed with another guy would have been better than what I saw, which was basically no Kira. Just a space without her in it.

I spent the night at the flat rooting around seeing if there was something somewhere that might explain where she was. Her clothes were all still in her wardrobe. All her stuff was untouched. There was a half-drunk cup of tea in the sink. A couple of unopened letters on the doormat. Nothing at all though to tell what might have happened. I stayed till the morning because I didn’t want to leave the place with a broken lock and then as soon as it was light I called Bless round to babysit the place while I got some tools and fixed the door. She stayed while I mended the door and then we left together. As we were walking down the concrete steps, Bless turned to me squinting one eye against the daylight. Something about her expression at that moment or the way the light touched her skin, suddenly reminded me of the Bless I knew from years ago. From the days when I could look at her without sinking. She looked at me hard and took a breath as if she was going to speak. And right then she did. For the first time in nearly seven years. ‘Y-you have to find her. You h-have to.’

‘I know Bless,’ I said, ‘but how?’

Luncheon adjournment: 12:55

9

14:00

The streets are a strange place. Always someone somewhere got a rumour to tell or sell. When Jamil was shot, the police said that they came looking for me because of a rumour. Well that ain’t a surprising thing in itself. It’s a lie, but that’s another story. But rumours are definitely everywhere, that is true. Eventually one of these rumours came my way. It was telling me that someone had spotted Kira in North London. ‘My Kira?’ I said. ‘North London? Don’t be fucking stupid.’ But Kira, as I said earlier, wasn’t a girl that you could easily mistake.

To you maybe north and south ain’t nothing but a line on a map. But to me and the people I grew up with it’s like a different country. You can go up to Camden Town with your girl or what have you for a day out but you better not be going up there with your boys unless you are fully prepared to get into something. You don’t even have to be ganged up to cause a beef. You could just be a normal guy out with your mates and people will assume you are in a gang. It’s just an age thing. I heard loads of stories of young guys being knifed up just for straying into the wrong ends. Even when they were on their own. People look out for you. And if they don’t know you and you’re on their patch, they will come after you. For no reason other than you walking on their ground, you get me. So for her to be up in North was definitely a worry, even though she was a girl. Why she was up in North was a whole different question.

It wasn’t long before everyone round my ends knew that I was looking hard for Kira and it wasn’t long before mans were coming to me with bits and pieces of information. Most of it was shit. I even went up there, Camden, Chalk Farm and them kind of places a couple of times to see what I could see, but what I saw was nothing.

Then this one guy I knew who had just come out of Belmarsh Prison told me something that sounded legit. He weren’t like a mate of mine, more just someone I knew from the area. He was like a face. People knew him. Anyway I saw him one day on the street and he stopped me to ask me if I could get him some wheels. And I was like, ‘Course fam.’ And then he starts telling me he’s heard about my Ki and I might be interested to hear what he’s heard. And I was like, ‘Shit bruv. Tell me what you know.’ Turns out this guy had shared a landing with Kira’s brother who was on the same wing doing a ten for some fucked up shit he had gotten involved in. I knew a bit about Spooks from his sister but I didn’t know the details till then.