You Don't Know Me

Well that was really the turning point right there. The day she came back from the mosque. From that minute everything changed. I should have been on it. If I had a brain like hers I would have seen it but as I told you before I ain’t got one of them kind of minds. Black and white my brain is. Hers … hers is all kind of colours.

Break: 15:00

30

15:15

So then every day for the next four or five days Ki is at the mosque for hours at a time. She puts on her burkha thing and leaves taking nothing but her phone with her. I try asking her why, why does she have to go there, to the mosque, but she just passes it off as one of them things.

‘What, you want me to go to the park or the library or something dressed like this?’ she says as if it is the stupidest thing she has ever heard.

‘But why you have to go out at all?’ I say after the third day. ‘Can’t you do your thing here, in the flat?’

‘No I can’t. I need to think. I need room. I need some peace. How can I think with you breathing down my neck all the time?’

‘I know that,’ I say. ‘But can you not see that it is dangerous for you to be out there? Dangerous for you, for Mum, for Bless, for Curt. Everyone, Ki. Is it worth it for your breathing room or whatever you want to call it?’

‘It’s okay babe. I’m wearing this,’ she says tugging on the side of her burkha. ‘I’m invisible.’

I even tried to walk her down there myself but she wasn’t having it at all. It was too dangerous she told me. Turning my own lines back at myself.

Then she would come back and each time she would have this bright-eyed look about her like she just been washed in light. Like she was alive again. But that weren’t the only thing. She began to look sketchy you get me? Jumpy and nervous. And whenever I asked her whether she was any further with her plan she would just say, ‘Soon. Just give me a little more time. It’s coming together.’

On the fourth or fifth day I started to get worried about Ki. Proper worried. I half questioned whether the pressure that Ki had put on herself to come up with a plan was what was bothering her. God only knew how we were supposed to get ourselves out of this shit. And why did I think Ki would have the answer anyway? What was she supposed to do? Think up a plan that would take Face out of the picture somehow – just like that? It was one thing maybe to bring down some next crew, but Face was premier league. There was no way we could face off Face. Mouse can’t fight a snake, I said to myself. Mouse can’t fight a snake.

But the more I thought about how impossible it was, the more it became obvious what had to be done. How it was going to be done was another thing, but at least I knew what it was that needed to be done.

I stared out of the window and noticed that the skies had gone dark like they were brewing up for a storm. I hoped Ki wasn’t going to get caught in the thunderstorm. I was pretty sure she hadn’t taken an umbrella. I found myself wondering whether burkhas were waterproof. Then thinking about Ki, getting caught up in the rain, just a simple thing like that got me wondering about her moods when she came back.

She had this look painted across her face like she had found enlightenment. She didn’t seem worried no more. And each day she seemed less and less scared and more and more focused. Those grey eyes would slip all lazy under her lids and I could almost see her brain mashing up the problems and sifting out the solutions. Was it the pressure of being cooped up inside the flat that was making her strange or was maybe some shit going on at that mosque she was going to? It made me wonder. After all, those places know how to churn out the nutters don’t they?

I didn’t really think of myself as following her exactly. I was more just making sure that she was okay in my mind at least. Who knew what went on in those places after they finished the prayers? Did they all meet up in some room with a wall chart and start planning their next terrorist attack or was it was just tea and cakes? Who the fuck could tell? Not me at any rate. I just wanted to be sure they weren’t mind-fucking her you know what I mean. She had enough shit going on without having to help some shoe-bombing sisters of Islam put their shit together.

The nearest mosque to our place was just a short bus ride away in a straight line. It wasn’t one of them domes and minuets places that I had in my mind. It was more like some grim little community centre that they had converted. Although I didn’t know for sure that was where she went, that was my best guess. I don’t know why I didn’t ever ask her. Maybe I was worried she might have thought I was crowding her if I started to get all up in her face about exactly where she went.

Anyway half an hour after she had gone on this fifth day, Friday I think it was, I decided to go after her. Like I say, not to follow her or check on her, but just to make sure she was okay.