Rivers of London 02 - Moon Over Soho by Ben Aaronovitch

Author:Ben Aaronovitch [Aaronovitch, Ben]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 978-0-345-52460-7
Publisher: Random House Publishing Group
Published: 2011-03-01T00:00:00+00:00

JUST ABOUT every council estate I know has a set of communal rooms. There’s something about stacking people up in egg boxes that makes architects and town planners believe that having a set of communal rooms will compensate for not having a garden or, in some designs, enough room to swing a cat. Perhaps they fondly imagine that the denizens of the estate will spontaneously gather for colorful proletarian festivals and cat-swinging contests. In truth, the rooms generally get used for two things, children’s parties and tenant meetings, but that afternoon we were going to shake things up and have a jazz rehearsal instead.

Since James was the drummer he was the one with a van, a suitably decrepit transit that we could have left unlocked, with the keys in the ignition and a sign on the front windshield saying TAKE ME, I’M YOURS, and have no fears about it still being there when we came back out again. As I helped him carry his drum kit from the van to the rehearsal room he told me that it was totally deliberate.

“I’m from Glasgow,” he said. “So there’s bugger-all London’s got to teach me about personal safety.”

We had to do three more trips for the amps and the speakers and it being school-home time we soon collected an audience of wannabe street urchins. Presumably the street urchins in Glasgow are bigger and tougher than the ones in London, because James paid them no mind. But I could see Daniel and Max were uncomfortable. Nobody does hostile curiosity like a bunch of thirteen-year-olds who are putting off doing their homework. One skinny mixed-race girl cocked her head and asked whether we were in a band.

“What’s it look like?” I asked

“What kind of music do you play?” she asked. She had an entourage of little friends who giggled on cue. I’d gone to school with their elder brothers and sisters. They knew me but I was still fair game.

“Jazz,” I said. “You wouldn’t like it.”

“Yeah,” she said. “Swing, Latin, or fusion?”

The entourage duly laughed and pointed. I gave her the eye but she ignored me.

“We did jazz last term in music,” she said.

“I bet your mum’s looking for you,” I said.

“No,” she said. “Can we come and watch?”

“No,” I said.

“We’ll be quiet,” she said.

“No you won’t.”

“How do you know?”

“I can see into the future,” I said.

“No you can’t,” she said.

“Why not?”

“ ’Cause that would be a violation of causticity,” she said.

“I blame Doctor Who,” said James.

“Causality,” I said.

“Whatever,” she said. “Can we watch?”

So I let them watch and they lasted two minutes into “Airegin”—which was longer than I’d expected them to.

“That’s your dad, innit,” she said helpfully when my dad put in an appearance. “I didn’t know he could play.”

It was weird watching my dad sit down and play keyboard with a bunch of musicians. I’d never seen him play live but my memories are full of black-and-white photographs and in those he always had his trumpet in his hand. Trying to hold it in the same way as Miles Davis had, like a weapon, like a rifle at parade rest.

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