The Escape Read online

  Understanding was the only cure for Remel’s state of confusion. He made his way to his room and examined his bookshelf. His attention was caught by a small book at the top of the shelf. It was a book, and it was small and brown so it was extremely ironic that it intimidated Remel. There was a clear dichotomy between the boy who was ready to murder someone he barely knew because his friend told him to and the young man who stood there almost in tears in front of his bookshelf. He picked up the book. Another book dropped. Remel looked down at the floor and stared at a book titled: ‘Boys Don’t Cry’. He almost laughed at the irony as a teardrop fell on the cover. The book remained on the floor, because Remel didn’t feel as if he had time. The book in his hand demanded urgency. The title of this book was ‘The Holy Bible’. Remel could only stare at the book in awe as a surge of nostalgia rushed through him. He remembered the days he spent at church, not only in Sunday services but also during the week, taking part in youth clubs with all of his best friends. Then it hit him. One memory that he had worked so hard to repress escaped from the inner depths of his mind. Remel was seven when his father died from a fatal stabbing. His mother didn’t know that Remel could remember that day. In fact, his mother was nearly correct. He had worked so hard to imprison the feelings and memories.

  His heart was pounding as he remembered the adrenaline taking over his body when his dad lay on the floor dying. He remembered the sight of his father shouting at two young gang members to stop fighting. His father heroically tried to jump in the middle of the two before they could take each other’s lives. The single teardrop which fell on the book ‘Boys Don’t Cry’ was nothing compared to the Niagara Falls reconstruction Remel was now displaying on his face. The echo of the news headline after his father’s death still haunted him.

  “Man dies as a result of gang fight.”

  The woman presenting the news unsympathetically explained with an emotionless expression.

  They didn’t criminalise his father by twisting up the story, but they didn’t explain that he wasn’t part of the violence. They didn’t explain that Remel’s father was a hero. They didn’t explain that he was a church worship leader, an organ donor and a loving father. Remel soaked up the ocean on his face with his sleeve and averted his attention to his Bible. He went to the contents page and searched for Jeremiah. He opened up the page and looked for chapter 29. He then looked for the eleventh verse of the chapter. ‘For I know the plans that I have for you, says the Lord, plans for peace and not for evil, to give you a future and a hope’.

  When his father was alive, Remel was proud to wear the badge of being a Christian. Even though he was young, he knew all about his faith. He was a saint. When his father died, he was too small, so the obvious questions that were normally asked when a close one died like: ‘If there were a God why would he let this happen?’, ‘Why did it happen?’ or ‘Why couldn’t it be prevented?’ were too overwhelming for him to answer. He and his mother took bereavement counselling at the church that his dad went to. During the first and only session of counselling they went to, the preacher handed them a piece of paper with a bible verse printed on it. The verse was Jeremiah 29 verse 11. After reading it in their heads, Remel and his mother stayed silent. The minister looked in the eyes of Remel and his mother before letting the words ‘everything happens for a reason’ come out of his mouth. Remel’s mother stood up, left and Remel followed because he had to. One thing you can never do is tell a bereaved person that everything happens for a reason. That was the last time Remel went to church.

  Over time, Remel started to forget about God and the church. By the time he was 14, he labelled himself agnostic. He started living his life as he wished and stopped ignoring the devil on his shoulder. He also stopped avoiding bad company and trouble. If there was a God—he said—she or he had given him the ability and freewill to do what he liked so his behaviour was a sign of appreciation for the way he had been created. ‘YOLO’ and ‘Carpe Diem’ were his mottos, but he knew what he could and couldn’t do. His parents had raised him to be a good man regardless of what religion. At the age of 15, Remel discovered the term ‘nihilist’ and adopted the label without fully understanding what it meant. Now at the age of 18—almost 19—with a Bible in his hand, Remel wondered what he really was.

  After an hour of uncontrolled and emotional reflection on his life, Remel picked ‘Boys Don’t Cry’ off of the floor and placed it back on the bookshelf in return for a book called ‘Philosophical Terms for Beginners’ whilst he still held on to the Bible in his other hand. The book was immaculate and untouched. It was supposed to be used for revision, but it was unused due to the fact that he constantly had full marks in his in-class philosophy assessments as opposed to his friends who constantly failed. He flicked through the book and found the word ‘Pre-destination’ in bold print. The definition for the word said: ‘The belief that everything that happens in this world has already been planned and decided by God or any other deity. This is rejected by many theists based on the argument that God gave humans freewill’. Discontented with the book, Remel started to think about King Keys, the man with the black iron mask. All the memories that had rushed through him provided him with no answers. King Keys, The Perpetually Pensive Poet was hiding all of them, but he wasn’t present, and Remel was starting to think that King Keys’ presence was an illusion as a result of a strong punch to the head.

  “Remel! Come down! You’re always in your room, come and eat,” Remel’s mother shouted imperatively.

  Remel put his Bible and his philosophy book back in the shelf before running downstairs for dinner. It was only when he was in the kitchen, that he realised that it was night. He ate dinner with his mother at the table and spoke to her about his day. He told her he was with his friends, and they had a splendid time apart from a run-in with another group of boys, but a man came and stopped them before anything could happen. He didn’t go into any details but just the skeleton of the story made his mum pause. The topic of Remel’s dad lingered over the awkward silence in the room until he got up, cleared his plate, went to bath and brushed his teeth. He was like a robot. His mind was blank, and he tried to keep it that way so that the thought of King Keys couldn’t cloud his mind with questions. He was coming out of the bathroom when his mum bumped into him abruptly. She was fiddling with some letters in her hands.

  “I forgot to tell you… uh… if I could find it. Oh yes. Here it is. Your university sent in a letter. You’ve been chosen to take part in an event. Some sort of activism thing.”

  She fumbled her words just as she did with her hands. Eventually, she handed her son the letter.

  Remel analysed the letter without reading the words. The paper was plain, unembellished. A white folded piece of paper lay calmly in his hands addressed to the parent/carer of Remel Brathwaite. However, neither Remel nor his mother were fooled by the letter’s appearance. This letter, although they were unsure how, had great magnitude, and it would affect their lives in the near future.

  “Some opportunities come for a reason,” Ms Brathwaite whispered, and with that Remel went to his room.

  He closed the door shut, and he started to read the letter.

  ’Dear Parent/Carer of Remel Brathwaite,

  Upon appointment to the Cembling University, your child was told he was given the opportunity to do something special. It is in fact the phrase ‘Opportunity-giving and good life living’ which represents our university and drives us to do good in the world and the society around us. For this reason, it was definitely our pleasure to make a partnership with the ‘Change Maker Trust’ for their annual ‘Change Making Event’. The ‘Change Makers’ have simply done what their name says. They have been a charity for those in need, a shoulder to cry on for those who are alone and counsellors for the depressed.

  Every student starting this university next year was labelled as an option for this year’s student speaker. The information you gave this school upon admission was thoroughly inspected as we looked for
someone who we believed would not only represent our university but represent a symbol of change. Your child was chosen. We will not force your child to take up the offer, but we would highly appreciate it. The decision is yours.

  If you do decide to take us up on the offer, we would like you to arrive at the poet’s room on October 29th at 11:00am.

  Yours faithfully,

  William Dulman

  Principal of Cembling University’

  “Who is this man?” muttered Remel as he understood exactly the significance of the location: ‘the poet’s room’.

  This was somehow King Keys’ bidding (whoever King Keys was) so Remel knew without thinking hard that he would have had to take the university up on their offer if he wanted answers. When he did think deeply, he was able to find one answer. He knew exactly who King Keys was. King Keys was a white rabbit, and what ensued was a journey to a different world.

  Chapter 3

  Remel Brathwaite attends Cembling University. The university is failing and will possibly close before Remel’s three-year course finishes. He is studying computer science. The date is September 20th.

  It was Remel’s first day at university, and the sun was blazing hot. Every September was like this in London. The heat wave mimicked the temperature of the Caribbean. Sandals, crop tops and sunglasses came out of the closet for a month before the English weather took a drastic U-turn into arctic frost. Cembling University was uninspiring. The building was modern yet mundane. Remel stood in front of the office, analysing his future university. This was his fault. His expected grades were extremely high, but for him, they were tangible. He was the brightest in his year during his GCSEs and A-Levels, but he let bad company bring him down. Remel Brathwaite was the smartest and most dedicated student, but his intelligence could not be quantified by the ’F’s and ’U’s he got for his exams, so instead of going to the top universities in the world, he went to a failing university in London. He had been distracted his entire school life by his friends in gangs and used to leave school to smoke marijuana. He regretted it all. He walked in to the university office and filed in some quick administrative forms.

  Apart from welcoming speeches, lectures and introductions, Remel remembered nothing about his day. The only message he retained was that ‘Cembling University do things differently’. He told his mum about his tedious first day at university, and she laughed. It was a unique laugh that only parents like his did. It wasn’t a laugh in response to a joke. His mother was reprimanding him for his behaviour in the past years and the trouble he put her through but mocking him at the same time. Yes. It was possible to say all of this with a slight chuckle. Remel laughed as well, showing that he fully understood.

  By the beginning of October, Remel had settled into university fairly well. He had only made a few friends, but he concentrated during lectures, and he was dedicated to his work. He tried hard to avoid bad company. All of that went down the toilet when he met Jordan. Jordan Jones was a young man also in his first year of university who was studying cinematic and music production. His course was one made by the university. Jordan Jones smelt of pungent marijuana. He was bad news. On the first day of October, Jordan came into school just after smoking some skunk. After leaving the lecture hall, Remel bumped into Jordan accidentally and dropped his books.

  “Sorry bro,” said Jordan as he stood tall, looked down on Remel and didn’t help him pick up his books.

  Remel was about to walk past Jordan until Jordan put out a hand for Remel to shake. He shook Jordan’s hand firmly.

  “My parents are going to Italy in three weeks so I’m having a party. I don’t know you, but you seem calm G. Write down your contacts, and I’ll send you my address. Everyone’s going to be there,” Jordan explained out of the blue. His right hand was outstretched with his phone in hand. It was open to notes and several social media names and phone numbers were already written.

  Remel wrote in his social media details then spudded Jordan’s fist before walking away rapidly. He pondered whether he would actually go to the party or not.

  He did.

  It was the 27th of October, and Remel had a ton of assignments due on the 29th that he hadn’t touched. He was still fully aware of the importance of the date 29th October. The time was 6pm, and Remel was ready to leave to go to the party. Remel told his mum he was going to study at a friend’s house. She didn’t believe him, but she didn’t think her son could get into much trouble, in addition, at the age of 19, parents started to give their children more freedom no matter how strict they were. Before leaving the house, Remel looked in the mirror. His aesthetic was the epitome of cool. His hair was still perfectly styled after the low skin-fade haircut he had three days before. He wore a designer denim jacket with matching carrot-fit jeans, a black top and his favourite sneakers. To ornament the outfit, he wore a small gold chain. Remel checked his phone for the address of the party and made his way there.

  Wild bashment music was blasting out of the speakers in Jordan Jones’ house. The lights were off so people could barely distinguish each other in the cacophony of grinding bodies.

  “Yo bro!” shouted Jordan in Remel’s ear whilst greeting Remel, his honoured guest. Jordan shook Remel’s left hand whilst offering him a blunt.

  In Jordan’s right hand was a half-empty bottle of alcohol. Jordan jumped away, shouting in unison with the music. Remel tried hard to recognise the voice of the person who had just greeted him. He realised it was Jordan, the host of the party. Remel took the thick unlit blunt in his hand and smelt it. He instantly had a headache from the pungent smell of the drugs and threw it on the floor: his smoking days were over. The music stopped. The whole house moaned in annoyance. Jordan’s voice came through the speakers to announce a short break as if they were at a concert. During the break everyone in the house reverted back to the nomophobic people that made up the younger generation. The screens provided light for everyone to see.

  Remel looked around and recognised a few people from the university. There were around a 100 people in the house and more were upstairs in the bedrooms. Unsure of why he had come, Remel roamed around the living room forcing himself to make small talk with people he knew. After escaping unscathed from the unnecessary conversations, he walked past a table where his hand brushed the side of a bowl of pills labelled ‘X’. The bowl fell on the floor and caused a mess, but no one saw.

  Trap music started playing out of the speakers suddenly and energetically. A girl just shorter than Remel walked up to him. He didn’t recognise her. Even in the dark, her make-up managed to glimmer and showcase the most attractive elements of her face. Glitter sparkled on her eyelids just under her faultless eyebrows. She had beautiful chocolate skin and light hazel eyes. Remel fell into her gaze and smiled out of politeness. In return to his greeting, she placed her left hand on his stomach and rose it upwards towards his chest. He felt uneasy. She used her other hand to caress his face and then leant in to kiss him. He tried not to resist in order to not make a scene. Her acrylic nails crept up to the back of his head and tickled his neck. She released and smiled back at Remel seductively whilst biting her lips. Something sparkled in her hand. Remel stood there, unsure of whether he was excited or confused at what had just happened. A group of her friends, who had obviously instigated the kiss, sat gossiping and laughing in the corner of the room. He looked down, about two feet away from him, to where the bowl of pills had dropped. They were all crushed.

  A man who looked about two or three years older than Remel looked chemically exhilarated. The man looked down at the mess with a hammer in his hands, which had come from nowhere. A crowd insphered around him whilst the individual distinctive chatter of the crowd had an enormous crescendo. The noise then formed itself into the words ‘do it’ which were repeatedly shouted in unified approval. Remel joined the audience to see the man at the centre of the crowd dive on the floor and suck the powdered mess into his nostrils like two hoovers.

  “Woo-oo-oo!”

 
; The crowd cheered like dogs in approval.

  Remel stood in shock at what he had just seen. He was frozen until a camera light shone in his eyes. Remel had to leave. He left the house as quickly as possible. Once he had left the house, he was hit by the cool breeze in contrast to the stuffy environment which had just ensnared him. He took the first bus going to his house. Once he was four stops away, Remel decided to check the time. It was 23:30. He turned the screen of his phone off. When the screen was black, he looked at his reflection. He gasped in shock at the sight. He looked fine, but there was one thing missing: his gold chain. A knife was shoved straight into Remel’s mood, killing the sliver of happiness he had left.

  Remel got home, had a shower, brushed his teeth and then went to bed like a robot—void of emotion—following a simple routine programmed into him.

  Remel had woken up at 7am the next morning after the party to start working on his assignments. He had his laptop next to him, and he typed faster than light speed about computers. His mother came down the stairs. He recognised her footsteps. She was storming.

  “Mum, I made breakfast!” Remel shouted.

  The door to the living room flung open, and his laptop was yanked out of his grip so quickly it was almost simultaneous. Remel looked at his mother who still looked half asleep. Fury radiated dangerously under the bags under her eyes. With one hand she held Remel’s laptop and the other her hand was clenched tightly into a fist. The fist-clenched hand released to reach into her pyjama pockets. She took out her phone, unlocked it and turned it towards Remel. He was watching the video of a wild rave. The rave was taking place in a house where people crowded together to see a man, who looked chemically exhilarated, snort a heap of crushed pills. In the seconds that followed, the camera focussed on the crowd who cheered ecstatically. The camera then caught the glimpse of a boy who looked like he didn’t want to be there at all, and his eyes squinted as the flash of the camera shone directly in his face. Remel recognised himself and looked up to his mother with puppy eyes.