Trash - Andy Mulligan [15]
I sometimes sit on the stairs, under the plaque we had made, and I think about this brave man. It is by such small things – small as a silent staircase – that the dead live on and help us. In this country, the dead are very important.
You want to know how I was part of Raphael’s tale, of course, and what I did. I was on the edge, only. Sister Olivia, our temporary house-mother, was more crucial, and perhaps more foolish – but I got involved because of the school computer, which was donated by the RCBC bank. We score these little successes! We get our foot in the door. You won’t think me uncharitable, I hope, when I confess that the computer was old and out of date, and if they hadn’t given it to us, it would have ended on one of the trash heaps. Who cares? They gave with a good heart, I think, and we have had much use out of it. It connects to the Internet, and the children play games on it when I let them.
It was a Thursday afternoon when Jun came by, with the two boys I hardly knew.
‘Sir po,’ he said. ‘Sir po?’
He’s got a high-pitched, musical little voice, and I recognized it instantly.
I turned and smiled, and he was leaning on my office door. He’s thin as a match, and the colour of ash. He has a smile that makes me smile too, and I’m always pleased to see him. ‘We are looking for something, po.’ ‘Po’, by the way, is the word of respect people use here for their elders. ‘Can we use the computer, sir po?’
I told him it was late. Then I looked beyond him, and saw he had two friends with him – slight, skinny boys. One looked shy and the other looked watchful – you could see at once who the leader was. His head was shaved and his eyes didn’t blink. He had long arms and, even with the poor diet he had, the poise – the grace – of an athlete. The other one had long hair over his face, and another enchanting smile.
‘Po, sir po. This is Gardo.’ He pointed at the boy with the shaved head. ‘This is Raphael – d’you know them?’
I told him I didn’t but was pleased to – and we all shook hands.
‘They’re taking part in a quiz,’ said Jun. ‘It’s a newspaper thing, sir. They have to research, sir. They said they don’t come to school here so why would you help them, so I said I’d come. They can give money for the computer time, OK? I said maybe you would, po.’
I told them to come in, and they came over to my desk. Shorts and T-shirts, bare feet black right up to their knees – their smell filled the room. The one called Raphael looked at me, pushing his hair back, too shy to make eye contact. He held a twenty-peso note in both his hands, for computer time. Gardo stayed behind him, and I could feel him staring right at me, as if he might have to fight.
‘I’m afraid the connection’s slow today,’ I said.
I put a second chair by the computer, and waved away the boy’s money. They slid onto the chairs, and Raphael got straight down to work. Children always know how to use computers – it never fails to amaze me. Children who’d never stepped inside a classroom could work a keyboard faster than me. It was the games shops where they learned, of course. For ten pesos you could get fifteen minutes of shooting and chasing.
I saw him go straight to a search engine, and the bald boy opened a piece of paper. Raphael tapped in a name, and we all watched as the computer thought long and hard.
I said: ‘What have you eaten today, Jun?’
He smiled up at me and held my arm. ‘Nothing!’ he said proudly.
I went down to the kitchen and made some sandwiches. I got three glasses too, and filled them with lemonade. By the time I got back, the boys were chattering in low, excited voices, scrolling down the screen