On 1 December we had seventeen days left to spend it.

On the same morning, we opened the front door to find six lads and two girls waiting on their bikes. As soon as Anthony looked out, they all started shouting, ‘Want a bike? Anthony, want a bike? Anthony? Anthony, have a bike!’ Anthony took a good look at each bike. ‘I think what we’d really like is a lift,’ he said. ‘Kaloo and Tricia.’ Kaloo McLoughlin and Tricia Springer had BMXs – the kind with the little pommels sticking out of the back axle for you to stand on. Anthony went on Kaloo’s bike and I went on Tricia’s. We cruised to school with all the other bikes trailing along after us like a motorcade. Everyone was looking at us. It was the best thing. At the gates, Anthony gave Kaloo and Tricia a tenner each. Tricia didn’t seem that happy about it. ‘It’s a kilometre. A tenner’s too much. I just want enough to buy a set of glitter pens.’ The truth is, we didn’t have anything smaller than a tenner. If you asked our Anthony now, he’d say this was where everything started to go wrong.

According to him, the problem with the money supply created an inflationary environment in the playground. We didn’t even know we had a problem then, though. We just thought we had over 229,000 pounds to spend. It seemed like it would be easy. At lunch, for instance, we had Hot Dinners instead of sandwiches and we didn’t have to queue. Peter Ahenacho queued for us and brought it over to the table, like a waiter. Tracey Edwards went and got our cutlery and drinks and cleared up after us. We gave them ten pounds each. Afterwards, we had extra helpings of pudding (chocolate flan) for ten pounds each. We were just finishing when Barry came and sat at our table. He had a set of walkietalkie watches. ‘They’ve got a 200-metre radius. New batteries. Matching designer fascias. What d’you think?’
‘Ten quid,’ said Anthony.
‘No way! You gave her ten quid for fetching a fork. Forty.’
‘Forty quid, then.’
So we’d spent 100 quid today already.

Out on the playground other people came up to us with stuff they’d brought in from home. There was a Gameboy; some goggles that helped you see at night, half a dozen micro-machines. We spent 100 pounds just walking from the monkey bars to the boys’ toilets. In the boys’ toilets, there was a boy from Year Five called Aamar. He had a big faded yellow box with footballers on the front. The corners of the box were all blunt. ‘Subbuteo, that’s what this is. You must’ve heard of it. It’s a legend.’ No, we hadn’t.
‘Football game, man. Classic, isn’t it? This is my dad’s from way back. Family heirloom.’
‘So it’s second-hand, then?’
‘Not second-hand, man, antique. Antique. Legend. Timeless. Look. These are the teams – Arsenal and Man City.’
He opened the lid. There were dozens of tiny players lying in rows like they were asleep. It had miniature floodlights, ambulances, referees, linesmen, managers’ dugouts, a TV van, advertising hoardings. Everything. It was a world, where you could be in charge. We had to have it.
‘Forty quid.’
‘Forty! You’re jesting, my friend. You’d give me ten quid if I sharpened your pencil, mate. I’m looking for a ton for this.’
‘A hundred quid! Now who’s jesting? I could buy a real team for a hundred quid. I could buy
Crewe Alexandra.’
‘Do it, then. It won’t have managers.’ He pulled a freezer bag from his pocket. Inside it were two tiny plastic men in sheepskin coats. One of them had a little hat on. The other had his collar up. We both gasped. ‘It will not disappoint you, my friend.’
I said, ‘How are we going to get all this stuff home?’
Anthony said, ‘A hundred quid for this but you deliver.’
Aamar spat on his hand and held it out for Anthony. Anthony looked at the hand and passed him a paper towel.
It was all a bit unenlightening.

Outside the gates after school, everyone who had a bike was waiting for us, shouting, ‘Want a lift? Give you a lift?’
We breezed past them out of the gates, where a big black saloon was waiting. Anthony had booked us a taxi. We climbed in and waved goodbye. I said, ‘That was a great day. If we go on like that, we’ll spend the money in no time.’
‘Keep your voice down,’ hissed Anthony. He nodded towards the cab driver, then whispered, ‘We’ve spent a bit yesterday and 350 quid today, which leaves us about 229,000 If we spent this much every day it would take us 655 days to get rid of the money.’
‘Oh.’
‘We’ve got sixteen days after today. Mind you, we haven’t paid for the taxi yet.’ The taxi was four quid all the way home, which is actually cheaper than second helpings of pudding when you think about it. Anthony gave the man a tenner and told him to keep the change. Which was a mistake really, as it would’ve been good to start getting some change.