Fighting Back Read Online Free PDF Page B

are nice people,’ the policeman had said.
    They just weren’t nice to us.
    ‘I think Ali likes you,’ Ming said one day as we left the shop.
    ‘He’s just making sure we won’t change our minds.’
    ‘And your mother won’t, will she?’
    I shook my head. ‘No chance.’
    Suddenly, Ming stiffened beside me. ‘What’s wrong?’ I asked him. ‘You look as if you’ve just seen a ghost.’
    ‘Worse than that,’ he said softly. And he nodded in the direction of the children’s playground.
    Children’s playground! That was a laugh. Mothers wouldn’t let their children near it. It was always full of drunks and junkies, and goodness knows who else.
    Now, there were only two men there. One was sitting on a swing, bouncing a ball on the ground. The other was swinging a bat high, waiting for him to throw.
    ‘The Laffertys,’ Ming said, though I hardly needed to be told. He tried to pull me away in the opposite direction. Too late. One of the Laffertys looked up, the one on the swing. I would say he looked like a pit bull terrier, but I think I’d be insulting pit bull terriers.
    ‘Hey, it’s wee Ming.’ Was he smiling? I couldn’t be sure. It was a nasty-looking expression anyway. ‘Come on over. Bring your girlfriend.’
    Girlfriend! What a cheek! That alone almost mademe march away. Almost, but not quite. Ming and I edged towards them. He was as scared as I was.
    Suddenly, it seemed to me there wasn’t a noise on the estate. Everything had gone quiet.
    All I could hear as we moved forward was my breathing and Ming’s.
    I couldn’t take my eyes off those two men. Suddenly, the one on the swing hurled the ball in my direction. I screamed and threw myself to the ground. It whizzed past my ear and landed somewhere behind me. Not close enough to hit me, but close enough to scare me to death.
    The one with the baseball bat came hurrying towards us.
    ‘Oh sorry, hen. That was close.’ He was actually helping me up! He looked back at the pit bull terrier. ‘That was your fault, Chopper. I told you to be careful.’
    Chopper! His brother was called Chopper! I almost laughed, but I was too scared.
    He turned back to me. ‘See that Chopper, he’s awful careless.’ At that, he swung his baseball bat high in the air and I jumped. I was glad Ming was there, grateful, and surprised that he had stood his ground beside me. ‘Lucky that didn’t hit you.’
    ‘Tell her I’m sorry, Chas,’ Chopper called over. ‘Don’t want to give her any trouble. ’Cause that’s Kerry Graham, and we’ve been warned to keep back from her and her mother.’
    Chas tried to look surprised. And failed. So they had been waiting for us … for me. They couldn’t hide that.
    ‘Oh, sorry, are you wee Kerry?’ He moved aside quickly. ‘We don’t want any trouble.’
    It was Ming who pulled me on. Otherwise I don’t think I could have moved.
    ‘Just you be careful, Kerry,’ Chas called after us as we ran. ‘This estate can be a dangerous place.’
    We gave Chopper a wide berth on the swing.
    ‘Aye, there’s a lot of bad people up here. Look what happened to Ali. You have any trouble, Kerry … ’
    We were moving off, running faster, getting away as quickly as we could. But still I heard his words.
    ‘ … just don’t come to us for any help.’
    And their horrible cackling laughter followed us all the way into the flats.

Chapter Eleven
    I arrived home to find a strange man in the flat.
    ‘Kerry, say hello to Mr Telfer,’ Mum said.
    Mr Telfer looked up at Mum. It was hard not to notice he had only one tooth, a discoloured one at that. ‘I told you, Jane, call me Tommy.’
    I fell back on the couch. He was on first name terms with my mum already?
    Mum handed him a mug of coffee. ‘Tommy,’ she said with a smile. Then to me she explained that Tommy was about to fix our television.
    I looked at Tommy. He was having trouble trying to figure out how to plug it in. He had a bag of tools with him and from it he extracted