"Collaboration" Background Summary
Inspired by a Portuguese initiative featuring 45 authors and numerous editors
(https://escapegoat.world/ ) Slough Libraries & Culture have formed a group of Slough writers to create a collaborative novel that explores the very pertinent themes of oppression, prejudice, kinship and love similarly addressed in Noughts and Crosses (one of the BBC’s ‘Novels that shaped our world’). Writers and editors aged 18 and over of all levels of experience are welcome to get involved, for further details email Volunteer & Development Officer Joseph Sammon at joseph.sammon@slough.gov.uk
Each chapter will be written by a different writer and edited by members of the group and will be released on Tuesdays and Fridays each week on this website. Chapters will be accompanied by a short biography on each writer.
Chapter 2
Kwame
By Josi Buerger
(edited by Gabrielle Koenig)
5 years earlier
Kwame steps out of the cool stairwell and onto the street. He grimaces. The sun is too bright and too cheerful. The afternoon is warm but Kwame is wearing a big grey hoodie.
He doesn’t really want to leave his shared flat. All he wants is to lie in bed and do nothing. But sometimes, going outside helps with his grey days. The hoodie helps too.
“Morning!” chirps his old neighbor Tom. Tom had not changed out of his hideous dressing gown to collect the mail. Kwame barely registers him, but the image of Tom’s varicose pale legs, almost grey in pallor, festers in his mind as he makes his way into town. Without paying much attention, his feet steer him to Memor Park.
Memor Park is tucked behind the high street and is a popular hangout for families in the daytime and teenagers in the evening. At night, less savoury populations come to roam its paths. There are cigarette butts on the ground and the bins are overflowing, but the place is nevertheless well-maintained. Kwame has a tender spot for the park. He was here with his ma as a kid. Later he came with his friends, smoking and drinking and feeling like kings.
---
A little boy runs up to his mother and tugs at her arm. She is chatting at the side of the playground.
“Ma! Let’s go home now. MA! I wanna see Daddy.”
The circle of women turn around. Kwame is too young to notice the looks of surprise at the little black boy bobbing at his white mother’s side. His ma suppresses her annoyance and picks him up.
“Darling, you know Daddy has to work today. Another hour, ok? I’ll buy you some sweets on the way home, how is that? Sweets for my sweets…” she smiles at him.
“Sweeties!” Kwame shouts and wiggles to be let back down. “Sweeties!”
Kwame’s mother releases the squirming kid, who sprints back to dangle off the monkey bars.
“Is he adopted?”
Kwame’s mother nods curtly and changes the topic of conversation.
----
Kwame gives the playground a wide berth. He regrets his hoodie now. The sun and the walk warm him and his mood has indeed lifted, just a little. Just a little was worth a lot, for him. At least recently. Ever since --- No. Kwame shuts down the thought.
Further on, a few kids were kicking a ball. Shouts and laughter trickle over the grass. Several bright picnic blankets are spread in the shade of several juniper bushes. One of the women removes the plastic wrap from an intricately arranged fruit display and places it among the many dishes. Occasionally, she glances up to check on the fierce match.
A family picnic. A beautiful family that looks like Kwame, from the chubby baby to the grandma dozing in a camping chair. Nothing at all like the dysfunctional triad of his own childhood: doting mother, father who worked in the city, and Kwame. This group emanates happy, even the couple squabbling on a far blanket. Kwame recognises a face or two from around town.
Suddenly a ball rolls towards him. It rests next to his foot. It’s an old thing, the black worn down and the white dirtied Kwame rests his foot lightly on the ball, out of habit. He looks up. The kids have stoped running, and are looking back. Kwame is much closer to the picnic than he had thought..
“Play ball!” one of the very young girls shouts at him. “Kick it!” she yells and claps in excitement.
Kwame doesn’t hesitate. He dribbles, feigns, dodges around the older boy closest to him, and passes the ball to the little girl.
One of the mothers looks up. She halts, just for a moment, when she sees the tall man running amongst the children. The little girl giggles in delight at the ball and nearly trips as she kicks it back. The mother smiles, and resumes her conversation.
The match is fiercely fought despite scraped knees and some bickering. Twenty minutes later, half of the field is lying in the grass, tired but happy. Kwame too is happy. Kwame is happy.
The team is beckoned over, to help with eating the endless food.. Kwame gives the kids a wave and turns to head home. He doesn’t want to intrude.
“Wait!”
A young woman has gotten up. One of the little kids is clinging to her arm. Kwame turns back and the sight makes him stop. The little boy looks so much like Kwame when he was young.
“Why don’t you join us?” she says. “There’s more than enough food. I’m Keisha! This is my little brother, Samuel.”
She sticks out her hand in greeting, dragging the little boy along.
Keisha. Kwame tries the name out in his head. He likes it. The tangy scent of warm juniper envelops him. Kwame smiles widely and shakes her hand. Hello.
Writers brief biography
Josi Buerger
"Josi is a scientist who swims in the ocean of words, books, and writing in her spare time. She lives in Slough with her husband and a very spoiled cat."
Chapter Three to be published 21st July 2020
Disclaimer: This chapter is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, organisations, and places are used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead is purely coincidental.