Batu and Golden

As Sasha took off on his favorite topic again, Batu nodded absentmindedly, but he was mostly thinking about his own sad situation. Scorpion was after him because he hadn’t been able to bring a payment to school again today; his mom had been in the hospital for a week, getting ready to have a baby, and his dad thought that giving kids pocket money spoiled them. In desperation, Batu had tried to wheedle some money out of his azhe, but Batu’s grandma respected her son’s rules, and she had said no to her grandson—for the first time ever. The whole thing had almost made his azhe cry, which made Batu feel terrible. Where was he going to get that stupid money? And the interest too! How much was there by now? What if his mom didn’t have enough? All these terrible thoughts were making him sweat. But it would be okay. Soon his mom would have the baby and come home, he’d ask her for more cash, and maybe he could pay the whole thing off. Suddenly, an image loomed in his imagination: Kaira’s enormous, dark, thick-knuckled fists. Kaira was strong—a real bruiser, like a bad guy’s sidekick in an action movie. But for some reason Batu was more afraid of Scorpion, with his nasty smirk and his evil-looking, bulging, swampy-green eyes. He had been afraid of Scorpion since kindergarten. Batu wasn’t sure how to explain that fear, not even to himself. Scorpion was a lot shorter than he was and just as skinny, probably not too strong. But who knew? They had never actually had a fight. Scorpion didn’t like to get his own hands dirty. Kaira did the fist work for him. Batu remembered the day the whole debt situation began. Kaira had walked up to him in school, looking worried, and asked him a question very sincerely. “Listen, Baboon, I really need some cash. Do you have any? We’re friends, right?” Batu remembered being glad to hear that. It was better to have Kaira as a friend than as an enemy. “I have two hundred tenge,” Batu had told him. “Not quite enough,” Kaira had said. “I need a thousand.” Batu’s face had fallen. “Where would I get a thousand? They never give me that much money at once.” Scorpion had popped up out of nowhere, eyes flashing, and handed Batu a thousand-tenge note. “Here, I can loan it to you!” he’d offered. Batu had stood there, frozen, his mouth open. Then he’d taken the money from Scorpion and handed it to Kaira. Without a word, Kaira had turned and walked away. Then Scorpion spoke. “Listen, you gave that money to him, but you owe it to me. Pay me back tomorrow, or there’ll be interest. Two hundred tenge per day.” Batu knew that you were supposed to repay your debts, and he knew there was nothing unusual about interest on a loan. But he still couldn’t quite figure out how it had all happened—and he didn’t know how to repay that debt when he had no income of his own. Today, during history class, Scorpion had cackled evilly and said, “Baboon! Since you didn’t bring me the cash, I have to teach you a lesson. When the teacher calls on you, don’t answer. Just sit there and roll your eyes, like this.” And Scorpion had rolled his disgusting eyes up toward his forehead so that all Batu could see was the whites of his eyeballs. “Got it?” Batu had no choice. He shuddered with hatred. That was why the teacher had decided to call his parents in for a meeting. “And she was determined to protect those poor gnomes, these little house elves who didn’t have any rights at all, and everyone was always mean to them and made them work for free, and the other wizards never even thought about them! Isn’t Hermione awesome? I mean, sure, someone had to do something about Voldemort, too, but . . .” On and on Sasha went. There was no stopping him. Batu would be happy to be able to talk like that, especially when he was called up to the blackboard in class. Although Sasha’s skills didn’t serve him that well in school either. He was super shy, always mumbling and stuttering, and he never got good grades for oral reports even though he was the smartest person Batu knew. Batu wondered for a second why it had to be him—Batu—whom Scorpion and Kaira always picked on. Why not Sasha, for instance? Or anyone else in their class? Sasha was totally a wimp! He didn’t even have to do phys ed because of his eyesight. But then Batu felt ashamed of himself for even thinking like that. Either that feeling of shame or the spring sunshine, which had finally come out in full force, was making him uncomfortably warm. He unbuttoned his jacket. Still chattering on, Sasha pushed his baseball cap farther back on his head, and his blond curls fell over his forehead. Batu couldn’t believe what he’d been thinking. Poor Sasha. Attention from Kaira and Scorpion was the last thing he needed. He didn’t even have a father, just a mom and a little brother, and he never bought school lunch because he was always saving up money for those books he loved so much. By now they had reached the yard outside the apartment building where they both lived. The yard was a big, quiet, square space. The adults in the building had once held a meeting and decided that nobody would ever park their cars or build garages in that courtyard. That meant that all the kids who lived there, including Batu and Sasha, had plenty of room for biking and skateboarding. Right now, though, it was empty. There wasn’t anyone on the soccer field, even though the ground was as dry now as it would be in summer—just somebody’s clean sheet flapping like a sail as it dried in the breeze off behind the transformer booth. Snow was still piled up in dirty drifts here and there in the shade, stinking of damp trash as it melted. Batu shivered but was too stubborn to fasten his coat. As they reached the door, Sasha was still hurrying to finish what he was trying to say. “So I’d rather read the book twice in a row than—” Suddenly, someone very rudely grabbed Batu by the shoulder. It was Kaira, naturally, and there was Scorpion next to him, grinning that revolting grin. “What’s up, Baboon?” Scorpion said with a jeer. Something went cold in Batu’s stomach. He started to babble nervously. “Hey, guys, what’s wrong? I’ll bring it tomorrow, I promise . . .” “Get away from him!” Sasha shouted, trying to intercede, but Kaira shoved him aside. Sasha stumbled back and landed on a dirty pile of snow, and his Harry Potter glasses, flashing in the sunlight, plopped onto the ground nearby. “You stay out of this, geek!” Scorpion barked at him, then turned to Batu. “You’ve been bad. You need to be punished. Kaira, give him a button!” Kaira walked up to Batu, and in one sharp move, he ripped a button off Batu’s school-uniform jacket and held it up right under Batu’s nose. “Here! It’s a present. Aren’t you going to say thank you?” Batu took the button. “Thank you,” he whispered. He could feel traitorous tears filling his eyes, and he didn’t know how to make them stop. “So here’s how it’s going to be, Baboon,” said Scorpion. “You need to pay your debt. This is serious business. If you’re too slow, we’re gonna teach you a lesson every day—first me, then Kaira, then me again, and so on.” Batu said nothing. The tears were running full speed down his cheeks. Scorpion sneered. He pulled something long and spotted out of his pocket and shoved it into Batu’s face. Batu screamed. It was a rubber snake, but it looked just like the real thing. “Give it a kiss!” Scorpion sang, taunting him. He and Kaira cracked up. But something strange was happening to Batu. He heard a ringing in his ears, and Kaira’s idiotic laughter sounded muted, like it was coming through a thick blanket. Kaira and Scorpion became dark silhouettes against a blinding-white background—and their figures were suddenly eclipsed by a huge snake head, rising up out of nowhere. The snake had eyes as green as Scorpion’s, with vertical black pupils, and those eyes looked as if they were calmly sizing Batu up. They were hypnotic. The snake hissed, a deafening sound, and it swayed over Batu. Its mouth opened. Its forked tongue emerged. Batu almost fainted in terror. He was trying desperately to remember even one word that Harry Potter used to talk to snakes. But that’s just a story! People can’t talk to snakes! Batu’s thoughts fleeted by in a panic. The serpent’s green eyes turned black and flashed in a way that looked perfectly human, and then the illusion disappeared. Batu, his face gone pale, barely managed to speak. He recognized those human eyes. “Dana?” The toy snake was now in his neighbor Dana’s hands. She had run up out of nowhere and grabbed it from Scorpion. “That was a big mistake, you rat!” shouted Dana. She took a swing at Scorpion and slapped him with the rubber snake’s long tail. Scorpion was furious. He grabbed for the toy, but the snake slithered out of his grasp and whipped him hard across the face. A loud howl rang out through the courtyard. “Now go and get your stupid toy!” Dana turned and flung the snake into the bushes. Scorpion dived in after it like a robot following orders, still pressing one hand to his cheek. Kaira didn’t know what to do. He didn’t think he should hit a girl, and he was positive he didn’t want her to hit him. Dana’s reputation told him that he had a very good chance of becoming a victim of her hard fists. Dana grabbed Batu’s arm and pulled hard. “Batu! Sasha! Come on, get inside!” Dana dragged Batu forward. Sasha hurried to limp after them. Dana dashed straight up two flights of stairs before she stopped to wait for her friends. Sasha and Batu were still climbing side by side, bumping into each other. Kaira and Scorpion were shouting something down below but didn’t seem to be in a big hurry to follow them inside. Soon, their voices went quiet, and the door at the bottom of the stairwell slammed shut. Dana turned to Batu. “Were you scared of that stupid toy? You should be ashamed of yourself!” “They tore off his button,” Sasha tried to explain. “And they say Batu owes them money.” “Hmm.” Dana frowned. “Those guys are getting out of hand. You should tell your father, Batu.” “But, Dana . . .” Batu took a deep breath, scowling at her. “You shouldn’t have butted in. I would have worked it out with them. Now everyone’s going to say I was hiding behind a girl! And I still haven’t paid off that debt.” “Oh, knock it off,” said Dana. “Don’t be such a coward! How much money did your mom pay for those karate lessons for you, and you’re still a wimp?” Batu blushed. “I’m not a coward! I . . . I just can’t, you know, hit a person. We’re, um, pashi . . . pacifists. You wouldn’t understand. Right, Sasha?” Sasha shrugged and looked away. “Right. ‘I’m not a coward, I’m just scared,’” Dana jeered. “Yeah, sure, pacifists!”