Three Hours(74)
These moments are spread out, weeks between them sometimes, not all the time like they were six months ago, and they’re tiny things, but they matter because they’re signs that her son is still there; Jamie, who’d never hurt anyone, doesn’t hate anyone, and he wants this to stop.
She calls him again and it goes through to his message, the same message he’s had for over a year, and his voice sounds so young and friendly.
‘Hey, it’s Jamie, leave me a message.’
‘It’s Mum, please ring me, sweetheart, please.’
She hangs up and waits.
What did they do to you, Jamie?
*
1 IN 5 BRIT MUSLIMS’ SYMPATHY FOR JIHADIS – Sun
MUSLIMS TELL BRITISH: GO TO HELL!! – Daily Express
MUSLIMS ‘SILENT ON TERROR’ – The Times
JIHADIST KILLERS ON OUR STREETS – Daily Express
HUNDREDS MORE UK MUSLIMS CHOOSE JIHAD THAN ARMY – The Times
MUSLIM SCHOOLS BAN OUR CULTURE – Daily Express
NOW MUSLIMS GET THEIR OWN LAWS IN BRITAIN – Daily Express
PM: UK MUSLIMS HELPING JIHADIS – Daily Mail
BRITAIN GOES HALAL – Sunday Mail
GIVE US FULL SHARIA LAW – Daily Express
MUSLIMS TELL US HOW TO RUN OUR SCHOOLS – Daily Express
SNIFFER DOGS OFFEND MUSLIMS – Daily Express
RAMADAN A DING-DONG – Sun
FURY AT POLICE IN BURKAS – Daily Express
STRANGERS IN OUR OWN COUNTRY – Daily Express
BOMBERS ARE ALL SPONGING ASYLUM SEEKERS – Daily Express
MUSLIM THUGS AGED JUST 12 IN KNIFE ATTACK ON BRIT SCHOOLBOY – Daily Star
ASYLUM: YOU’RE RIGHT TO WORRY – Daily Mail
MUSLIM PLOT TO KILL POPE – Daily Express
THE SWARM ON OUR STREETS – Daily Mail
CHRISTMAS IS BANNED IT OFFENDS MUSLIMS – Daily Express
BBC PUT MUSLIMS BEFORE YOU! – Daily Star
MUSLIMS FORCE POOL COVER-UP – Daily Express
CALAIS CRISIS: SEND IN THE DOGS – Daily Mirror
THEY WANT US TO BE ISLAMISED. THEY DESPISE OUR COUNTRY AND OUR VALUES – Daily Mail
THOUSANDS OF ISIL FIGHTERS COULD USE MIGRANT CRISIS TO ‘FLOOD’ INTO EUROPE, NIGEL FARAGE WARNS – Daily Telegraph
CHRISTIANITY UNDER ATTACK – Daily Mail
JUST WAIT … ISLAMIC STATE REVEALS IT HAS SMUGGLED THOUSANDS OF EXTREMISTS INTO EUROPE – Daily Express
SHOCK REPORT: ISIS FIGHTERS HAVE ENTERED UK POSING AS MIGRANTS & WILL STRIKE NEXT – Daily Express
‘And so on and so on,’ Thandie says to Rose. ‘Victor was emailing Jamie pages of national newspapers in May.’
It would have been around him for years, Rose thinks, this soft hatred, this precursor to radicalization – Muslim bans in America, Trump all over the news, hate headlines in newspapers – but this boy is from a liberal family, attends a liberal school, doesn’t read those kind of papers, so Victor sent them to him.
‘Jamie started using the Aryan Knight identity the last week of June, didn’t he?’ Rose asks and Thandie nods.
‘The same week that his diary had “It’s over” about Antonella,’ Rose says. Not that anything had ever happened so presumably the day he realized this make-believe romance wouldn’t ever become real. Victor probably made that crystal clear to him. Rose wonders if Jamie was clinging on to his romantic fantasy as a bulwark against Victor, a bulwark flimsily made of flowers and hearts, two dimensional and beautifully coloured in, that came crashing down. Perhaps at the same time his friend Zac didn’t want him around and Jamie felt abandoned by both him and Antonella. And then Victor chose him. And yes, he did weird shit, had behaved badly, but could convince Jamie that he was his friend.
‘By August, he was spending time on far-right vlogger sites, Facebook groups and websites,’ Amaal says. ‘Britain First, the English Defence League, Breitbart, the Anti-Islam Alliance, Knights Templar International, Generation Identity, the list goes on; all viciously anti-Muslim and all legal or legal until recently. A few weeks later he joins 14 Words.’
*
In the theatre, they have stopped the rehearsal.
‘What does 14 Words even mean?’ Tim asks but Daphne can’t answer him.
‘I googled it,’ Joanna says, and she reads: ‘“We must secure the existence of our people and a future for White Children.” That’s fourteen words.’
‘Fuck’s sake, that’s the most stupid thing I’ve ever heard,’ Antonella says. ‘Cretinous fuckers.’
‘But Jamie barely knows Rafi, let alone hates him,’ Josh says. ‘They’ve always been in different tutor groups. They had, what, one PSME class together?’
‘And Victor wasn’t even in the same year as Rafi,’ Tracey says.
‘He was in the theatre with him, at the auditions and first read-through,’ Miranda says.
‘But they didn’t argue or anything. I don’t think they even spoke,’ Tim says.
They are trying to make sense of it, Daphne thinks, but there is no sense to be made of it.
‘Rafi still isn’t answering his phone,’ Benny says, looking terrified, all that teen-boy banter between him and Rafi covering a depth of love.
‘Probably to preserve the battery, being sensible,’ Daphne says.