‘I want a word. What’s so funny about being black?’

Lara smirked, ‘I’m not black, I’m half-caste, actually.’

‘But you’re very mistaken, lovey. Ask me how I know?’

Lara tittered, shrugged, went to leave but Beatrice’s voice

charged past her, abrasive, abrupt, ‘STOP right there.’

Lara exhaled a bored, amplified sigh but sat down,

‘I dunno. How d’ya know, Mistress Beatrice?’

‘Experience, Lovey, that’s how and don’t be so cheeky.’

She stubbed out a cigarette, hunched forwards.

‘It’s time you woke up to the facts or the facts will wake

you up with a slap. The only half you are is half-asleep.

Come up to Toxteth, then you’ll know what time of day it is.

We stick together up there, not like you Southerners

with your wishy-washy ways. They don’t care whether

your mother’s white, green or orange with purple spots.

You’re a nigger to them, lovey, or a nigra as I like to say.

Now stick that in your empty shell. Lord knows there’s

enough room up there.’ Lara yawned, assumed a bland

uninterested expression, studied the wall, intensely.

‘YES, you can yawn all right, it suits you.’

Lara’s mocking gaze drifted wearily back to Beatrice.

‘Look, lovey, I know blacks who were beaten by marauding

whites in the race riots of the Twenties. Marauding, they were.

Do you think they stopped to ask if they were half-caste?

Oh, excuse me, Sir, just before I kick your head in,

is your mother white by any chance?

Those old Africans are dying off now. Mr Ogunsola

went last month, knew my father well, sailed the high seas

together, as chefs. Had a wake, of course, very emotional.

I was hung over for days. It’s up to us to carry the mantle,

Lara, don’t you see? You with your high-falutin’ education.

South Africa? Liverpool is the apartheid state of Great Britain.

Ask me how I know?’ / ‘How d’ya know, Mrs Mandela?’

‘Because I’ve lived it, that’s how. And the young ones

can’t get work so they loiter around Granby Street.

Some I’ve known since they were no more than a glimmer

of lust in their father’s eye. They won’t give good jobs

to our sort, whether we’re plain, milk or even white chocolate,

if you get my drift. Yet we built that great city with our

precious blood. The biggest slave port in England it was…’

Lara leapt up, waved her arms, ‘See! Caught you out.

There weren’t any slaves in England, Mama Kunta Kinte.’

‘Eeeh, you make me sick. Ignorant? Pig ignorant.’

‘IF YOUR UNCLE SAM was alive he’d have a story

or two to make your little Afro hair stand on end. Mind,

it’s standing on end already, needs a good dollop of grease

and a hot iron comb to straighten out the kinks, and look