The People Next Door

Henry Adam

WHO    Nigel Brunswick, English of ‘mixed indeterminate race’, ‘the wrong side of twenty-five’.

TO WHOM    Phil, a corrupt police officer.

WHERE    Nigel’s flat.

WHEN    Not long after September 11th 2001.

WHAT HAS JUST HAPPENED    Nigel lives on his own in a small housing association flat. He has a history of mental health problems and likes to smoke Class A drugs. He is unexpectedly visited by a police officer, Phil, who is on the hunt for Karim, Nigel’s half-brother. Karim is an internationally wanted Muslim terrorist. He is on the run, and Phil believes it is just a matter of time before Karim will make contact with Nigel. As soon as Karim does so, Phil wants Nigel to tell him. Noticing that Nigel has been smoking Class A drugs in the flat, he threatens to arrest Nigel if he fails to cooperate. On this, their second meeting, Phil gives Nigel a stash of heroin in order to lure him further into helping with his undercover operation. He is physically rough with Nigel and tries to intimidate him. Nigel is insistent, however, that he has not seen Karim, but Phil keeps pressing him: ‘He’s your brother, though, isn’t he?’ The speech that follows is Nigel’s response.

WHAT TO CONSIDER

•	Nigel is lonely and vulnerable. He has had psychotic episodes. His mother has disowned him and he hates his father.
•	He is highly individual. You can be bold in your characterisation.
•	Nigel’s feelings about being mixed race. While he may have struggled with it as a boy, he comes to embrace it as an adult. He prefers to be called ‘black’ than ‘brown’, suggesting he sees race as a very political issue.
•	The political background and the paranoia that surfaced in the wake of 9/11. In certain spheres, all Asian men were considered with suspicion.

WHAT HE WANTS

•	For Phil to leave him alone.
•	To disassociate himself from Karim.
•	To portray Karim as a polite and well-behaved child. In his first meeting with Phil, Nigel is adamant that Karim is a good boy and an unlikely terrorist.
•	To give vent to his boyhood feelings of anger and confusion. Make a decision about whether Nigel has shared this story with anyone else before.

KEYWORDS  brother  Paki  striking  shadow  posh  related  Papa  baby-mothers  Mac  silence  tart  truth

Nigel

Yeah, he’s my brother, but we ain’t close. Ain’t like we grew up together or nothing. Ain’t like I’s going round his house every Christmas singing ‘Silent Night’. Shit, I didn’t even know the cunt existed till I was fourteen. I’m coming out of school one day, right, and I see this little Paki kid waiting there. He’s looking at me, see, but I don’t think nothing of it. People often look at me, you know? I got striking features or something. Anyway, after that, everywhere I go I see him, man. This Paki kid. He’s like my fucking shadow man. My little Paki shadow. I walk, he walk. I stop, he stop. Eventually I just stop and fucking stare at him see, like this, see – (NIGEL shows PHIL his best stern stare.) and I’m like ‘Okay Shorty, spill.’ He’s got this little posh voice man, and he’s like – ‘I know you, you’re Nigel aren’t you?’ And I’m like – ‘Hey, I know who the fuck I am. Who the fuck are you?’ And he goes – ‘My name is Karim. I think we might be related.’ And I go – ‘Yeah?’ An he go – ‘Yeah. I think you’re my brother, Nigel.’ And I’m like – ‘Go away, kid, I don’t have no brother,’ but he just stands there right, this sweet little kid, and he go – and listen to this – he go ‘Neither do I, but I think you might be him.’ (NIGEL raises an eyebrow to suggest this is the wisest, most profound sentence he has ever heard in his life.) Neither do I, but I think you might be him. (He waits for PHIL to see the wonder of this, but PHIL hasn’t been smoking smack.) He heard his uncles talking see. Laughing at his old man. Keep going on about ‘Papa’s little white boy’. That what they call him. Papa. Like he the big daddy or something – baby-mothers all over the shop. Like he some kind of Mac. (NIGEL makes contemptuous sound with his saliva.) […] He resourceful. He a smart kid. Anyway – I’m like fuck off kid, I ain’t your brother. I ain’t no Paki, am I? But then I tell my mother. And I know from her face, man. I know from her silence. I know from her little tart eyes man. That kid telling the truth. It’s like when I was little and I’d be going to school an people would be shouting– Paki, hey Paki – Paki, Paki, Paki, and I’m looking but I don’t see no Paki. And they’re shouting at me see, and I’m like – I’m fucking English man, I ain’t no Paki. But they was right man, they was right. They know me better than I know myself. Paki. Nigel the Paki. (Again the contemptuous sound.)