On this particular day, Tani couldn’t argue against a single point his father was making. He was lucky to have regular work made available to him by virtue of being the son of Abeo Bankole, proprietor of Into Africa Groceries Etc. as well as a butcher’s shop and a fishmonger’s stall. He was privileged that his father allowed him to keep one-eighth of his wages for his personal use instead of depositing all of them into the family pot. He did enjoy three meals each day provided for him by his mother. His laundry was delivered to his bedroom spotlessly clean and perfectly ironed. Et cetera, et cetera, and blah blah blah. Instead of taking any kind of notice of the waves of heat rising from the pavement, of the trees—where there were any in this part of town—losing their leaves far too early into the year, of the remaining ice in the fish stalls in Ridley Road Market melting so quickly that the air was thick with the smell of hake and snapper and mackerel, of the meat in the butchers’ stalls sending forth a stench of blood from the simmering organs of sheep and cows, of the fruit and veg having to be sold at discount before they rotted, Abeo merely strode onward in the direction of Mayville Estate, oblivious of everything save Tani’s failure to arrive at work on time.
Tani was completely at fault. His father said nothing that wasn’t true. Tani couldn’t keep his mind on what he was supposed to be doing. Tani did not put his family first. Tani did continually forget who he was. So he didn’t say anything in his own defence. Instead, he thought of Sophie Franklin.
There was much to think of: Sophie’s gorgeous skin; her soft, cropped hair; her smooth-as-silk legs and glorious ankles; her luscious breasts; her lips and her tongue and all the rest of her . . . Of course he was completely irresponsible. When he was with Sophie, how could he be anything else?
His father might have understood this. Although he was sixty-two, he’d been young once. But there was absolutely no way that Tani was about to tell him about Sophie. The fact that she was not Nigerian was only one of the reasons Abeo Bankole would have a stroke there on the pavement if he knew of Tani’s relationship with her. The other was sex with Sophie, the very fact of which was more than Abeo would ever be able to take in calmly.
So Tani had been late to work at Into Africa Groceries Etc. He’d been so late, in fact, that the daily restocking of shelves was in progress when he’d finally arrived. This restocking—along with reordering and general cleanup—was Tani’s job once his college duties had been fulfilled each day, and the only other employee of Into Africa, Zaid, was not intended to do anything but direct customers to whatever they were looking for and otherwise to work the till. Zaid wasn’t happy to be doing everything on this particular day. He’d expressed this unhappiness via mobile to Abeo just along the way in the butcher’s shop.
Tani had rushed dutifully to take over the restocking of the shelves when he finally arrived. But Zaid had done the general cleanup, and he cast a number of baleful looks in Tani’s direction before Abeo walked in and told Tani he was to come with him.
Tani had understood he was in for it. But he recognised that this might be a very good opportunity for him to put his father in the picture as to Tani’s future. He hated having to work in either one of his father’s two shops, or the fishmonger’s stall, and he hated even more that he was intended to take over the running of Into Africa Groceries Etc. as soon as he finished his catering course at sixth form college. This was not for him. Truth about it? This was bollocks. What he meant to do was to head to uni for a degree in business and in no one’s dream world was he going to waste that degree by taking employment in a shop. Abeo could call upon one or more of the Bankole cousins for a shop manager. Of course, that would mean allowing a family member from Peckham into the constricted life Abeo had designed for his wife and his offspring in north-east London, and Abeo wouldn’t like that. But Tani wasn’t going to give him a choice. He meant to have the life he wanted.
The walk to Mayville Estate after work hours followed a zigzag pattern north through the streets. Late afternoon and there were pedestrians and cars and buses and bicycles everywhere as inhabitants of the area headed home. Among a very few Nigerians in this part of town, in a mixed-race community that was transitioning from African to West Indian, the Bankoles lived on the grounds of Mayville Estate in Bronte House, a building that comprised five floors of the undecorated London brick that was ubiquitous on the housing estate. The structure had the distinction of being directly across the lane from an asphalt play area, shaded from the scorching sun by enormous London plane trees. There were basketball hoops and goalposts at either end of it, and it was fenced to keep children chasing balls from going into the street.