The Boy with Two Heads

  ‘Keep going!’ said Tom. ‘You’re doing fine. Don’t touch the mike.’

  ‘I can’t see my words,’ said the boy.

  ‘Oh God, I thought you’d memorized this,’ whispered the headmaster. ‘You were practising all last week – it’s not that difficult.’

  ‘I can’t see, Mr Prowse. I need my specs.’

  ‘Can we give them back?’

  ‘There’s too much reflection. What’s the question?’

  ‘I can’t see!’

  ‘Well, do it from memory!’

  ‘I can’t, sir.’

  ‘OK,’ said Tom. ‘Let the girl at the end have a go.’

  ‘We can edit this, can’t we?’ said the headmaster. ‘Tell me we can edit this.’

  ‘No problem – it’s always tricky. What’s your name, love? . . . What?’

  Aparna whispered her name.

  ‘Aparna, speak into your mike,’ said the headmaster. ‘Don’t go silent on us.’

  ‘What’s your speech about, dear? Can you go from the middle?’

  Aparna lowered her eyes. ‘It’s about how, er . . . food aid in Africa can do more harm than good.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Because it can undermine the, er . . . local farming economy and skew the market.’

  ‘More bananas!’ shouted a voice. The headmaster glared out into the audience, but the lights were so strong he could see nothing.

  ‘That’s a bit heavy for TV,’ said Anton, laughing. ‘That’s not going to work with the song, either.’

  ‘Could you just read out some snippets?’ said Tom. ‘Or just do the beginning, with your name? What’s the boy next to you got? The blond boy? Jeff.’

  ‘Mine’s about racing cars,’ said Jeff.

  ‘Let’s go with that,’ said Anton. ‘That sounds cool.’

  Again, there was a long, shrill whistle. Some of the audience were talking, and there was a lot of fidgeting. Mel walked up the aisle, and a whistle came again, from somewhere else. Mr Barlow had his head in his hands and was refusing to look up.

  ‘Can we stop this noise, please,’ said the headmaster. ‘You can all just be patient for a moment. We’re sorting out the order, and then we’ll get going again.’

  ‘Get the bananas!’ called a voice, and this time some of the children laughed. ‘It’s banana time!’

  ‘Look, who is saying that?’ cried the headmaster. He tried to find the producer, but the cameras had moved again and all he could see were dark shapes. ‘Do you want to give Hermione a go? Honestly, I thought they’d be better than this . . .’

  ‘Sir, I want to hear what Aparna’s got to say,’ shouted a voice. ‘Can we mike her up properly? She’s so interesting.’

  ‘Look, whoever you are, you’re going to be in my office in a minute! Can we do something about the lights? – I can’t see anything.’

  It was Rikki, of course, and he was standing up. ‘I’m just saying we want to listen to Aparna, sir. And Jeff. If he’s taken over from me, it’s bound to be good. I just can’t wait to hear him.’

  ‘We could do some questions if you want,’ said Tom, reappearing at the edge of the stage. ‘Questions should be easy.’

  ‘Let’s hear Jeffrey first. Mr Barlow, can you keep order up there, please? This can all be cut, can’t it?’

  Jeff was now visibly trembling. He started to stand up, and frantic gestures got him sitting down again. His right hand went to his tie, and there was a crunch as he twisted the microphone. Aparna was sitting absolutely still with her eyes closed.

  ‘The Grand Prix,’ said Jeff breathlessly, ‘is the exciting most sporting event in history . . . and it is my, er, dream to go there – is this OK? Every year the nations of the world gather from all around the nations of the world . . . sorry. Gather – to pit their wits and technical know-how, and skill – but . . . What very few people know is that sponsorship. Sponsorship . . .’

  ‘Keep going. Slow down a bit.’

  ‘Deals. Are being made in many millions of pounds, which is the fastest car, is the Ferrari.’

  ‘Not true!’ shouted Rikki. ‘It’s a Skoda—’

  ‘Developed by Federico Ferrari. Here are some of the statistics about its engine, and—’

  ‘I’ve got a question,’ cried Rikki. ‘I want to ask something!’

  Jeff dried completely, and stared hopelessly into the lights. The headmaster shaded his eyes with both hands, and saw with horror that the microphone-boom was being hurriedly swung over the heads of the audience. In a moment, Rikki’s voice was loud and clear.

  ‘I just want to know something,’ he said. ‘Remind me, please: what is the point of this?’

  ‘I don’t think we should do questions,’ said the headmaster quietly.

  ‘We’ll just do a few,’ said Tom.

  ‘Not him. Please.’

  ‘We won’t film him, but he’s got a good, strong voice.’

  ‘He’s a menace . . .’

  ‘Can you repeat your question, please, son?’

  Rikki looked up and spoke slowly into the mike. ‘I’ve got a few questions,’ he said. ‘Number one is why me and Richard got kicked off the panel. Number two is why we have to listen to puerile rubbish about racing cars. What are you doing there, Jeff? How could you agree to this?’

  Jeff gaped. ‘Rikki,’ he said. ‘I didn’t—’

  ‘You just can’t keep away from your girlfriend, can you?’

  There was a gust of laughter, and a cry of ‘Shame!’

  ‘Move on, please,’ said the headmaster. ‘Richard! Will you sit down now?’

  ‘You kicked me off the team, sir, but that’s not going to stop me speaking,’ said Rikki. ‘You go on about it all the time, sir – freedom of speech. I don’t see much freedom here, today. I only see people reading stuff you’ve checked and approved. I see a bunch of little kids pretending to be grown-ups, and worst of all it’s your version of grown-ups. Look at them all! Look at us . . . you even make us wear stuff that takes away identity – like these stupid little ties, like we’re all going off to the office. You want us looking the same and thinking the same, and that’s one of the tools of control, Mr Prowse! That was what my speech was about, ladies and gentlemen. It was called “The Tools of Control”, and it was about fear and repression and not being allowed to speak when you need to.’

  ‘This is outrageous,’ whispered the headmaster.

  Rikki had won a smattering of applause, and Mr Prowse was now on his feet. Mel was making her way up the aisle, towards Rikki. Mr Barlow sat still, and his head remained in his hands.

  ‘Let him talk,’ said a parent.

  ‘Shh!’ cried somebody else. ‘Get on with the speeches!’

  ‘He’s hijacking this meeting,’ said the headmaster. ‘Take the microphone away, and let’s get back to the script.’

  Rikki reached up and grabbed the boom. The next moment he was making his way towards the aisle, with the microphone cradled comfortably under his chin.

  ‘Keep rolling,’ said Tom. ‘Camera three, stay on the panel. One and two, pan audience.’

  Rikki laughed. ‘You asked how I dare?’ he said. ‘Well, what have I got to lose? I mean, can you imagine how much trouble I’m going to be in? And what’s my crime? I just want to ask questions – but not about stupid, dumb Ferrari racing cars, or dogs and cats that should be put down and fed to the homeless. Aparna, you were going to talk about Africa. Why? Who cares?’

  The producer made hand-signals. ‘Keep going!’ he whispered.

  ‘What I don’t understand,’ said Rikki, ‘is where any of this is going, or why it’s important. Schools just pump you full of stuff you either don’t need, because it’s irrelevant, or they turn you into a clone. We don’t get taught important stuff.’

  ‘Nonsense!’ cried the headmaster.

  ‘First aid,’ said Richard. ‘Why didn’t we get taught that?’

  ‘Good point!’ said Salome.

  ‘Chinese,’ said Rikki. ‘You’re mucki
ng about with languages nobody needs, when everyone knows the economic future is going to be dominated by China. We should be learning Mandarin for when they invade us, not finger-painting and writing stories. We should be sat in rows learning proper maths, but you waste our time telling stupid stories and doing stuff like this. Why are the cameras here? How has this dumb-arse circus helped us to think? This is a puppet-show, Mr Anton. We are being brainwashed.’

  ‘Be silent!’ shouted the headmaster. He was bright red.

  ‘Why?’

  ‘I do not tolerate rudeness!’

  ‘Who’s being rude?’ said Rikki.

  ‘You’ve been shouting out. You’ve been interrupting—’

  ‘You interrupt us all the time, sir, and you’re the one who’s shouting. You’re trying to shut me up, but what have I done wrong? I’m just being honest! Everyone knows you kick out kids who make your school look bad – you’re trying to get rid of Eric right now, and what’s wrong with Eric? He’s a bit psychotic, but so what? At least he’s a laugh. You didn’t want Salome, and I know you don’t want me. The only thing you’re interested in is looking good yourself – which is why you’ve invited all the TV people here in the first place. And why did I get kicked out of the team?’

  The headmaster peered into the lights, helpless and desperate. ‘Can we stop this, Mr Barlow? Where’s Mr Barlow?’

  ‘You want a Fascist crackdown,’ said Rikki. ‘Plain and simple. You don’t care about people’s feelings any more than I do. Nobody does!’

  ‘Can we cut, please?’

  But Anton was grinning. The cameras continued to roll as Rikki and Richard made their way down the steps towards the stage. Mel moved towards him, and tried to take the microphone. Rikki protected it and stood still, his eyes closed.

  There was a deathly silence.

  ‘Here are some proposals, OK? Real ones that I think about, because Kidspeak is about thinking, yes? Teach us about real life, please, sir. Teach us something useful, like about sex, so we know stuff and don’t get scared, or pregnant, or sick, and so we don’t get it wrong. Cut the stupid hymns in those . . . mind-numbing assemblies, and admit that God, if he ever existed, is now dead – or fled. He’s not here now, that’s for sure.’

  ‘Hey!’ shouted a parent. ‘We didn’t come here for this . . .’

  Mel tried again to seize the microphone. Rikki held onto it and raised his head. ‘Listen to me,’ he said quietly. ‘What are you scared of? I don’t care about kids’ stuff any more, or global warming, or . . . polar bears, or all the other rubbish we’re supposed to worry about. Can’t we just cut the environmental nonsense, because who gives a toss, really? It’s all too late. If pandas are too dopey to survive, stuff a few and put the rest in a zoo. Castrate poor people so they don’t have kids – stupid people too – and save money. Bring back the death penalty, and improve chemical weapons. Make it easier to buy guns, and that way we might start getting the population down and save the planet, if we really want to save it.

  ‘What about fat people? I say, put them in cages and don’t let them eat, and give the skinny ones their food. Take us to old people’s homes, and line us up in front of people that are dying – we need to know how scary that is, so we’re ready for it. Cut the charity-days, because all those poor kids – how’s charity going to help them? They’re going to die anyway, from Aids. Or famine, or floods, or just from battering the hell out of each other with the bombs we all keep selling them. Let me finish! I heard Aparna’s speech last week, and she’s right – the only reason we send food to the Third World is to make a profit out of them, and get them addicted to the rubbish we can’t sell to all the obese, retarded kids in our own country who can hardly walk ten paces down the street without needing an ambulance, which won’t even come because there aren’t enough of them any more.

  ‘Tell us how to build nuclear shelters, Mr Prowse! So when some mad country nukes us, we might survive – if we want to survive. If we don’t want to survive, give us a worksheet on how to kill ourselves painlessly, which you could do now if you wanted, because I’m not sure me and Richard want to go on much longer. How do we die, sir?’

  There was another long silence.

  ‘Why do our bodies fail, and where do we go? What’s it like – dying? Why don’t you ever teach us anything that’s useful? Show me someone dead again. Tell me what happened. Tell me why the heart stops. There’s no heaven, is there? There is no God, no afterlife, no point, no . . . sweet choir of angels, and we don’t ever see the ones we love again, do we? Hell, I believe in, because I’m standing in it right now. But no heaven. Just tell us the truth. Please.’

  Again, nobody spoke. The cameras rolled, and the audience gazed at Rikki, dumbfounded. A child started to cry, and Anton Dekker wasn’t smiling any more.

  ‘Ideas,’ whispered Rikki. ‘That’s all they are, sir. You told us to put on our thinking caps. I spent a week working on that, but I can’t go on much longer. Not like this.’

  ‘Have we finished?’ said Richard quietly.

  ‘Yes.’

  Someone in the audience started clapping, but nobody joined in. It died out, and the producer said: ‘Cut, thank you. Cut everything.’

  Nobody moved.

  ‘That’s a wrap, I think. Close it down.’

  CHAPTER NINE

  Jeff was waiting for Richard and Rikki when they got close to home.

  The television people had packed up and gone, and the last lesson had taken place in a horrified, frightened silence. The headmaster did not appear – he had been seen in heated conversation with the producer, and had driven after him in his car. The rumour went round that he was offering money to get the whole item dropped from the schedule. Rikki and Richard got all the way to their own road, walking alone and not talking, when they looked up and saw Jeff blocking their way.

  ‘Hi, Jeff,’ said Richard.

  ‘Why did you say that about bananas to Aparna? What if that goes on TV?’

  Rikki looked tired. ‘It was a joke,’ he said.

  ‘Why do you keep going on about bananas? How is it funny?’

  ‘Are you going to thump me? You said I need battering. If you want to hit me, Jeff, just—’

  ‘It’s because you’re racist,’ said Jeff. His voice was trembling. ‘I know what you mean by it. She knows too. Bananas are for monkeys. Aparna’s Indian origin – so you’re just a racist, saying all she eats is bananas.’

  ‘I’d never thought of it like that,’ said Rikki. ‘But I see what you mean.’

  Jeff stared at him, so full of emotion that Richard thought he was going to cry. His mouth was working. ‘It’s filthy too.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘You know why!’

  ‘Are you going to spit at me?’

  Jeff said, ‘No.’ Then he looked at Richard. ‘It wasn’t my fault you got kicked off the team.’

  ‘I know,’ said Richard.

  ‘So why did you make me look so . . . stupid?’

  ‘Because you are,’ said Rikki, butting in.

  ‘Am I? OK, I can’t use lots of long words like you can. But at least I don’t go around upsetting everyone. And you – Richard.’ He shook his head, and tried to get control of his voice. ‘You were my best friend, once. I don’t know who you are now, or . . . what you are. You just make everyone feel bad all the time. Why don’t you leave? Why don’t you go to some institution where they can . . . sort you out? Aparna’s a nice girl and she’s worth fifty of you. You’re a racist . . . slug. You’re not even worth hitting, and if I could step on you, I would.’

  He walked away, fast, and Richard heard his footsteps break into a run. He and Rikki plodded on towards their house. They walked up the path and then round to the back garden, past the shed, and they glanced up at the tree house. They moved past the vegetable patch, where nothing grew, and when they opened the back door, their mother was waiting.

  ‘Mr Barlow phoned,’ she said. ‘I know what’s happened. He says they probably
won’t show it – they’ve agreed to cut it.’

  They watched the television together, and at four thirty-five Green Cross School appeared. Anton’s routines dominated, but there was cleverly edited footage of happy, smiling children. Ten seconds was given over to fragments of the various speeches, and somehow the producers made it all seem sensible.

  Moments later they cut to Anton’s co-presenter, who was reporting from a seal sanctuary in Cornwall. The seal pups were doing well, but more aluminium ring-pulls were needed for the fight against flipper rot. Three minutes were devoted to a school that had collected a whole lorry-load. By the time the programme had finished, Richard and Rikki were lying back in the chair with their arms over their heads. Mrs Westlake served tea and there was no conversation.

  When they went up to their room, Richard felt more tired than he had ever felt in his entire life. He tried to get on with his evening revision, but his eyes kept closing.

  ‘Let’s stop,’ he said to Rikki. His head lolled and the papers on the desk were blurred.

  ‘Why do you want to stop?’ said Rikki. ‘This is life. It’s what we do.’

  ‘I don’t want to do it.’

  ‘No choice, Richard. We learn stuff and we do stuff.’

  ‘I can’t think. I can’t see the words. I can’t remember what I’m supposed to remember. I just want to sleep, Rikki. Today was horrible.’

  They were staring at a labelled diagram of a chrysalis. Rikki was colouring in the butterfly, bound up tight like a tiny parcel – like an Egyptian mummy. He made the body purple, and he gave the folded-up wings yellow stripes. He put spikes around the head, and drew lightning bolts.

  ‘I’m going to finish,’ he said. ‘There’s nothing else worth doing.’

  Richard, however, was already dreaming.

  He found himself up in the clouds, hurtling through mist. When his head was jogged, he suddenly burst through into a bright blue sky and found that he was sitting on a wing. Why he wasn’t blown off he couldn’t say, but it was as comfortable as a chair, and his hair was streaming out behind him. His hands held the hard, cold metal beneath him, and it was some moments before he thought of looking round at the pilot.