by Rohan Wilson
Yes, and the organs begin to refreeze.
It’s a poor hiding place, but I tuck the glasses inside my mattress as far as I can reach and pin the seam with a bent paperclip. It looks innocent enough. I straighten the bedsheets and replace the blankets and when I look around Shadi is staring at me from his bunk on the opposite wall. I stop. He must have recently woken. He’s lying in his sheets, head on his pillow. For a time, he stares at me without saying a word and then he rolls over and faces the wall. I breathe out. Every glare from him, every word, carries danger these days. We’re not the brothers we used to be, that’s for certain.
What you need to understand about Shadi is that confusion has split him down the centre, like most conservatives, with his left half kept for heaven and his right half kept for Earth. Also, like most conservatives, he shared a strict relationship with his father. He used to be so good at reciting the Quran that his father sent him to a competition in Egypt. Trouble was, the judges only spoke Arabic and Shadi couldn’t follow their commands. He scored just seventeen out of one hundred. His voice was beautiful but his knowledge was rote knowledge, not true learning. The competition failure left his father so embittered that he gave up on Shadi’s education and let the boy do as he wished and it turned out that what he wished was to live without God in his life. No surprise, I suppose. Shadi found work as a fisherman, hooking skipjack on a pole from the stern of a trawler. He loved motorbikes and cigarettes and girls and weed and drinking and he left the Quran behind for some years, at least until his father developed a heart condition. That’s when things changed. He begged Shadi, his only son, to devote himself to the mosque and find a better life. In front of his family, in front of his dying father, how could Shadi refuse? From memory, Shadi sang a verse of the Surah Al-Isra that begs forgiveness of parents and it moved his father greatly. Shadi’s inner life rearranged in that moment as he turned one eye to eternity. He quit the trawler and joined Hulhumalé’s most famous imam, Dr Ibrahim Nazeem, in his mosque. The doctor was a great scholar of the Hadith and a member of the ruling party. Shadi grew his beard. He grew a love of righteous bullying—with me the target of his anger.
On the bunk below mine, Hassan Niyaz is beginning to stir and I wad up a pair of dirty underpants and throw them at his head.
‘Come on,’ I say. ‘Up.’
‘Up, brother,’ he says. ‘Up is heaven. We’re in hell.’
‘You make your own hell, just like you make your own heaven.’
‘Did I make this? Did you? No one chose this life.’
‘You choose every day. God knows that you choose and he keeps a scorecard. God knows if you tried or if you gave up.’
So it goes in this Eaglehawk. Two lonely men recite scenes from the great Bollywood movie Fifth Tuesday of June. We’d seen Fifth Tuesday of June eight times this month because the selection of movies available on the media headsets is very limited, being those few films the Department of National Integrity deams safe, yet we never tire of Fifth Tuesday. It’s Anand we admire. The hero, the reformer, the Muslim. We admire how he wins the affections of the beautiful Kanu through his devotion to the sick and poor of Mumbai.
‘It’s our day off,’ I say.
‘So, let me sleep.’
‘If you want to stay in here forever, then sleep. Me, I want to get out.’
‘That American girl has poisoned your mind,’ Hassan says. ‘Look at you. The fucking optimism. I can’t take it.’
‘It’s not optimism, my friend. It’s anger.’
‘I know anger when I see it.’ Hassan sits upright. He grinds the heels of his palms into his eyes. ‘You’re not angry.’
It’s true. Hassan knows much about anger. Before the disaster he’d been a member of the Association of Internally Displaced Peoples in Hulhumalé. As the islands of the north and northwest—Thoddoo, Rasdhoo, Eydhafushi—vanished beneath the sea, the families relocated to the capital, Malé. A hundred resort islands, whole atolls, whole histories, reduced to a handful of tired families. In the last years of the Maldives, Hassan joined many displays of outrage. They burned the flag and burned effigies of the president, and when the situation grew darker they burned the Range Rovers of politicians. For these acts he was sent to the prison on Maafushi island. In fact, he was in Maafushi prison, where they also kept my father, when the tsunami hit and only he of all the inmates escaped because the wall of his cell collapsed. For some, the disaster came at a good time.
‘You’re not angry,’ Hassan says. ‘You’re in love.’
‘Get dressed,’ I say. ‘Today they serve pancakes in the cafeteria.’
‘Aren’t you too angry to eat?’
I tug on a baseball cap. ‘Not even you, my friend, not even you can make me angry today.’
‘See. I knew it. You’re impossible.’
‘Impossible,’ I say, quoting from Anand once again. ‘We passed impossible a long while ago. That we met. That we fell in love. That we are together here and now. All these were impossible. We are not stopped by such a small thing as impossible.’
Hassan squirts air loudly through his lips.
We hear the whump of boots and Van Hooj appears in the doorway. Van Hooj, the ex-boxer. They always send Van Hooj when there’s a chance of trouble. He has his baton drawn and he pauses to look around the room before coming inside, his gear creaking every step. Behind him comes a white man, and no ordinary white man either. Hassan stands up. Others are sitting up in bed. We want a better look at this fellow.
The white man walks into the room and stops in the aisle between the bunks and we see now that his hands are zip-tied behind his back. He wears a full beard like a mullah and the hair on his head is matted in long Caribbean locks. He holds out his chin. He does not seem concerned.
‘Must be another refugee,’ Hassan says.
‘No,’ I say. ‘No, I don’t think he is.’
A second DEO comes through the door, the woman, Darby. She’s holding a plaser pointed at the man’s back. These plasers, they’re quite frightening. They give a burst of electricity that will make you think you’re burning alive. They must really be worried about this white man to bring plasers. Van Hooj fishes something from a utility pouch on his belt. A knife. There is silence in the room.
‘Kneel down.’
The prisoner dips slowly one leg and then the next. He’s a big man, big through the middle. It isn’t easy for him to kneel.
‘When this tie comes off,’ Van Hooj says. ‘I don’t want any fucking nonsense.’
The man says nothing.
‘Any nonsense and Darby there will fry you like a microwave.’
The zip-tie comes away and the prisoner rubs his wrists. His forearms are brightly tattooed and it makes his hands seem pale. He turns to meet our eyes. The great locks of hair snaking as his head rotates.
‘You’ll be right,’ Van Hooj says. ‘Some of them speak English. The smarter ones at least.’
‘The smarter ones,’ the prisoner says and he sounds very jovial. ‘The state gives you a uniform and now you can mock them. Is that how it works?’
‘Yeah it’s a uniform. You’re lucky I’m wearing it.’
‘Threats as well. Christ, you are the whole package.’
Van Hooj lets out a long breath. ‘I’ve worked twelve days straight, mate. Fourteen-hour shifts. Don’t make my life harder than it has to be.’
‘The poor, suffering, exploited militiaman? You’ve got to be shitting me.’
Van Hooj looks across at Darby. ‘You were right about this arsehole,’ he says.
‘Violence of thought, violence of action,’ the prisoner says. ‘That’s the role you play. You play it, mate, and you make this system possible.’
Van Hooj prods him with the ball of his baton. ‘There’s plenty of room in the Behavioural Adjustment Unit. I’m not too tired to chuck you in there.’
‘That’s precisely what I expect from you. Threats of violence.’
‘Whatever you say, mate.’
&
nbsp; ‘Look at this place. Look around. You make it this way. You and her and all the rest of you.’
‘Follow the fucking law and you wouldn’t be here.’
‘Law?’ the prisoner says and looks up at the ceiling. ‘Fair dinkum. You will not belittle them and you will not belittle me with talk of the law. We’re the higher power here. We’re the humanity. What are you? You’re an instrument. You’re an actor. You speak lines and take direction.’
‘And, like I said, lucky for you I do what I’m told.’
Van Hooj gives a signal with his hand and Darby backs out of the room bearing the plaser on her hip. Van Hooj starts to follow and then he stiffens in the doorway, like he’s had a thought, and comes about to face us.
‘Fourteen-hour days,’ he says. ‘Fourteen. I’ve got kids, you know. Do you think I ever see them? I’m not the one you want to be angry at, mate. I’m locked in here just like you are.’
I suppose we expect the white man to do something, say something, but he doesn’t. Van Hooj collapses his baton on the heel of his palm. He shakes his head and leaves.
Clearly, the man is touching some nerves.
He stands in the aisle, taking in his new surroundings. Probably he’s feeling what we felt when we saw the dormitories the first time—dismay. The buildings had been printed by a Chinese-made contour crafter, a great machine like a shipping crane, crossing up and back, overlaying some dubious mixture of cement and construction waste. You can see in the walls the sedimentary bands where the print head had passed. Layer upon geologic layer. The walls are coated with primer and left unpainted and whenever you touch them you come away dusty. The prisoner is shaking his head as he takes all this in.
There’s one empty bunk on this level and Rasheed points him towards it, telling him in Dhivehi that he will be sleeping there. The prisoner isn’t paying attention though. He’s walking around, testing the floor with his boot. It is pitted and uneven like it was cast out of English porridge. He spreads his arms.
‘Anyone speak English?’
‘I speak it,’ I say.
‘What sort of place is this? Look.’ He kicks at a large crack in the cement. Ants are streaming through the crack. There’s no sealer on the floor and it doesn’t matter how much we mop and sweep, it stays dusty.
‘It’s not fit for habitation,’ the prisoner says.
‘It is better than Sri Lanka,’ I say.
The prisoner raises his eyes when I say this. ‘Where are you blokes from anyway?’
‘The Maldives.’
His lips tighten. ‘The Maldives,’ he says. ‘You the survivors then?’ A long silence follows. I can’t be sure if we’ve survived or not. I don’t know what to say. The prisoner is looking around at all of us. Most of the men, I think, are intimidated by him. He’s enormous. He seems to fill the room. They haven’t yet issued him with clothes from the commissary so he’s still wearing black jeans and a khaki shirt, as if he’s just stopped by for a visit. Beneath his beard his mouth is puckering and moving and he puts his hands on his hips and after a moment he does something strange. He spreads his arms and walks my way.
I stand motionless as he hugs me. It’s an honest embrace. Warm. Strong. My head about reaches to his chest and he presses it against the buttons of his shirt. He’s hot and smells in a musty way. He pats me on the back.
‘I’m sorry,’ he says.
I stand stiffly, unsure what to do. ‘Yes,’ is all I can say.
This is not the end. Next, he moves to Hassan and Hassan’s eyes are huge and full of embarrassment as the white man takes him in his arms.
‘I’m sorry,’ he says to Hassan.
Hassan smiles and frowns at the same time.
In fact, it is the beginning of something. The white man walks around the dormitory hugging each of us—Rasheed, Abdullah, Ibrahim, Ahmed—looking into our eyes, holding us by the shoulders, telling each of us he is sorry. The room is solemn and quiet. No one resists. Each man waits patiently for the prisoner to arrive and then waits patiently as they’re held. A line forms. All the men in the room. At first, I suppose they’re embarrassed and afraid and they fear offending the man, but as the process goes on, I grow less certain. Abdullah, who was a resort manager, a powerful man, holds on to the prisoner and tears stream down his cheeks. The white man gently rubs his back.
‘I’m sorry,’ he says. He looks into their eyes. He grasps their shoulders.
‘I’m sorry.’
‘Thank you.’
‘I’m sorry.’
‘Yes.’
Every man present has lost a wife, a daughter, a son, a father. We’ve lost a home. A country. We’ve lost everything it’s possible to lose. Fishermen and cleaners and builders and managers once, now made drones in a facility at the far end of the world. So we wait and we hug the white man and it’s not strange. What would ever be strange to us again? For most, the last person they’d held was that wife, that daughter, that son. We hold the white man but it’s the wife, the father, and son of whom we think.
All, save my cousin, Shadi Thoriq, who does not stir from his bed.
At the end of it the white man turns to address the room at large. I can feel the floor shake with his steps, so heavy is he.
‘Don’t resign yourselves to this,’ he says. He points his finger, not at anyone, but in a gesture that encompasses the whole facility. ‘They think we’re animals. They think we’re only good for carrying and dragging and building. The truth is different. We know it. The truth is we won’t lower ourselves. This place will bring out the best in us.’
No one speaks.
‘Keep heart,’ the white man says, ‘and be ready.’
I can see Shadi in his bed watching over the hump of his pillow. I wonder what he makes of all this. I wonder what Dr Nazeem will make of it.
‘Your chance will come,’ the white man says.
Chance. We live, every one of us, for the chance at a visa. It’s the only thing that matters. A visa, a new home, a new life. Perhaps the prisoner means that Australia will finally take us in. The thought of it gives me a knot in my throat.
You have to understand, the food in this Eaglehawk is a horror. From seven, the cafeteria serves breakfast and Hassan and I stand in the queue at the serving counter. The line inches along. Today is Monday, a day of rest for Hassan and me, and we’re impatient to finish breakfast so that we can play a game of cricket in the recreation yard. Hassan is a formidable batsman. He retired on eighty-seven last Monday and he’s anxious to start play. On reaching the front of the queue, you have to pause while a scanner registers your face and makes the correct deduction from your account. I stare at my name and image on the confirmation screen. The same tired man from the mirror, only this one has shaved his chin with hand soap and shaved down the stubble on his head. A tray releases from the slot below the screen. Thank you, Mr Umair, the scanner says.
We shuffle with the other men past the kitchen hands and have our plates filled from a series of stainless-steel vats kept heated on burners. I pass by the cereal dispensers. Multi-coloured fruit rings. Chocolate puffed rice. I watch Abdullah dose a bowl under the puffed rice and pour on some milk. Not food at all, only the imitation of food. Food reconstructed by a man who’d heard stories of what food should be.
‘Where are the pancakes?’ I say to the station attendant.
His mouth moves but I can’t understand him.
‘Sorry?’
‘I said flour. Ran out of flour.’
He’s an Adduan from the southernmost island of Gan. He speaks like he has a mouthful of water. They sound that way down in the Addu atoll. It’s another country, very nearly. The Adduans despise the people of Malé because Malé, as the capital and the seat of government, has always found methods of controlling them, and I stand looking at the attendant and thinking about the white sands of Gan and the sea fading from clear to blue to black as the water deepens offshore until I realise with a start that Gan is gone and Malé is gone and here we are,
Adduan and Maléan, on another island altogether, in another sea, shorn of that past like limpets prised off a rock.
‘Come tomorrow,’ the attendant says. ‘Plenty of flour tomorrow. They’ll make pancakes.’
Hassan puts down his tray. ‘Then I’m not hungry.’
‘Eat something,’ the attendant says. ‘You paid for it. Eat it.’
‘You should eat something,’ I say.
‘Mashuni, that’s what I want. And roshi. And rice.’
‘Have some eggs,’ the attendant says.
‘I’ve had eggs every day for two months.’
Abdullah picks up his bowl. The puffed rice sloshes.
‘Look at that,’ Hassan says. ‘It’s not even food.’
We’re all looking at Abdullah’s puffed rice. ‘Kanu, my angel,’ I say. ‘I can’t let them sleep on empty bellies.’
‘Their bellies might be empty, Anand. But their spirits are full.’
The attendant grins. He’d seen the movie.
Rows and rows of benches stretch across the hall. We choose a table by the wall and sit. Men, a hundred or more, hunch over their meals in a cold and sterile silence. Abdullah scoops rice puffs in his fingers and eats. We all eat with our fingers. One small way of remembering who we are. Guards walk the outer edges with their batons drawn and we watch them pass. Harkins. Morris. Van Hooj. Collard. Darby. By now I know every name. As I watch, my eye is drawn to the entrance way where the autodoors split apart and through comes Rasheed. His eyes are huge. He half walks, half skips to our table. He’s breathing hard.
‘There’s trouble,’ he says. ‘Outside.’
‘Tell Van Hooj.’
‘The morning prayer hasn’t finished.’
‘Why do they bother?’ Hassan says. It’s a favourite topic of his. ‘God is deaf.’
‘It’s the white man,’ Rasheed says.
I wipe my fingers on a napkin. ‘What about him?’