Refuge

by N G Osborne

  “Two of them.”

  “Which ones?”

  “The second and the third.”

  “The old man and the blind dude.”

  “He isn’t blind.”

  “In one eye he is.”

  “Which leaves the other.”

  “Which seems pretty fucked up as well.”

  “It’s not his fault he stepped on a mine.”

  “You telling me he’s only got one leg?”

  “No, he has two legs.”

  “Does he have two feet?”

  “Unfortunately not.”

  Outside the wails of first one then dozens of muezzins pierce the air.

  “Okay, we got to find some new guys.”

  “Mr. Matthews, if you are accusing me—”

  “Listen, I couldn’t give a shit about that.”

  “About what?”

  “Nepotism.”

  Wali gives Charlie a blank stare.

  “You know giving friends and relatives jobs—”

  Wali gets out his pad.

  “—but I’ve got to train these guys. Please, I beg you, make this easy for me. Find me a bunch of guys who can see, hear, speak English and run a mile in less than ten minutes.”

  “But this would mean I would have to replace all of them.”

  “I’m sorry but that’s the way it is.”

  Wali pouts as if he is on the verge of tears.

  “Now do you mind giving me the keys to the car?” Charlie says. “I mean that is my car you’ve driving, right?”

  “Where are you going?”

  “Home.”

  “If you could give me some time—”

  “It’s okay, I can drive.”

  “But you will get lost.”

  “Sometimes getting lost is the best way to get to know a city.”

  Wali looks at Charlie as if he’s now officially lost his mind.

  “The keys, Wali.”

  Wali reaches into his pocket and retrieves the keys.

  “This is not a good idea, Mr. Matthews.”

  “Send out a search party if I don’t turn up tomorrow,” Charlie grins.

  Charlie jumps in his Pajero and heads to Jamrud Road. He finds it no less mad than earlier that day. Buses, coming in the opposite direction, drift onto his side of the road and play chicken with him. Rickshaws dart in and out of traffic as if their very intent is to cause a pile up. Donkey drawn carts plod along as if it’s their God given right to hold everyone else up. Everyone honks, no one brakes unless they are truly forced to, while random animals and humans cross his path as though they’re playing Frogger and have more than one life to give.

  By the time he reaches the refugee camp, his nerves are frayed. He wasn’t thinking of going back to the American Club so soon, but now he’s desperate for a drink.

  He looks at the clock. Five-thirty.

  As long as you survive, you’ll be drinking a beer by six.

  He hears a wrenching sound and plumes of smoke start pouring from the hood. He pulls the car over and the engine takes a final gasp. Charlie gets out and goes to pop the hood. The latch scalds his fingers and he jumps back.

  “Fuck, fuck, fuck.”

  He stuffs his fingers into his mouth. An old man squatting nearby looks up at him with a vacant expression. It takes Charlie a moment to realize that the man’s pants are around his ankles, and he’s taking a shit.

  “Jesus,” Charlie says.

  Across the road he sees a group of refugees standing around. He knows there’s only one thing to do. He’s got to go back to Mine Aware and get some help. He waits for a gap in the traffic and joins them.

  “Evening,” he says.

  They all look his way.

  “Guessing there’s no triple A around here.”

  No one says a thing.

  “Guess not.”

  A packed bus pulls up. Four of the refugees try to get on. Only three make it. Five buses later, Charlie is the only person left at the side of the road. By now the sun has dropped below the Khyber Mountains, and the wind’s picked up. Charlie shields his eyes from the dust and sees a couple more buses approaching. Charlie waves his hands in the air but neither of them stop.

  “Ah, this is bullshit,” he shouts.

  Fifty yards out, he makes out the headlamps of another bus. He steps into its path. The driver leans on his horn. Charlie doesn’t budge. The bus’s brakes squeal, and at the last moment Charlie jumps out of the way. Charlie runs up to the door and grabs a hold of the handle.

  “Oh come on, let me in.”

  The driver shakes his head. Charlie grabs a ten dollar bill from his wallet and sticks it against the glass. The doors hiss open. Charlie clambers on board and hands the money over. He looks up the bus. It’s crammed tighter than a cattle trailer. A wizened old man is picking himself up off the floor. He jabbers away at Charlie in Pashtu.

  “Sorry about that,” Charlie says.

  The man starts poking Charlie with his cane.

  “Hey, I said I was sorry.”

  The bus lurches forward, and Charlie and the old man end up on the floor. The man brings his cane up and catches Charlie in the balls. Charlie rolls over gasping. The man clambers to his feet and jabs him from above. Charlie scrambles down the aisle on his knees until he’s out of range.

  He raises his head and finds himself staring up at the most beautiful woman he’s ever seen in his life. The woman looks down at him with the hint of a smile and then drops her eyes to the books in her lap. He clambers to his feet and tries to catch her gaze again. Her head remains stubbornly bowed, her threadbare, red scarf hiding the top of her head.

  Charlie senses others staring at him. He looks around and finds that in fact every passenger is. He glances up at the ceiling; someone has painted a landscape on it dotted with burning tanks and Soviet soldiers dying in pools of blood.

  If that isn’t a warning, what is?

  Charlie lowers his gaze; most of the passengers have turned their eyes away. He glances at the girl; her head’s still down.

  Damn.

  The bus slows, and she gets up, her eyes fixed to the floor.

  “Excuse me,” she says.

  Charlie doesn’t budge.

  Please, just one last look.

  She raises her chin and stares at him. There’s not a hint of make-up on her face and he wouldn’t want there to be; nothing could improve her beauty.

  “Please,” she says.

  “My bad,” Charlie says.

  He pushes himself up against the refugee next to him, and she slides past. He scrambles into her seat and through the window watches her walk past the glowing cooking pits, and the ramshackle stalls at the side of the road. She crouches down, and Charlie thinks she must have dropped something. He squints into the darkness and discovers she’s stopped to give money to a legless young girl who’s propped against a stack of used tires.

  My God. She’s an angel.

  The bus drives forward. Charlie jumps up.

  “Stop,” he shouts.

  The bus lurches to a halt, and the old man goes sprawling. Charlie clambers over him and scrambles off the bus. He navigates his way through the throng and sees the young girl. He feels an obligation to give her something and hunts in his wallet. All he has are one hundred rupee bills.

  “Here,” he says shoving one of them into the girl’s outstretched hands.

  He hurries on and spies the red headscarf. The young woman is standing at a stall stacked high with mangoes. She picks up a couple and asks the price. When the owner gives it to her, she puts one back, hands him some coins and keeps on walking.

  Shit, what now?

  A young kid comes up to him. His nose is running and he keeps wiping away rivulets of goo with his sleeve.

  “You want Coke, mister?” the kid says.

  “You got a pen,” Charlie says.

  The boy gives him a blank stare. Charlie writes in the air.

  “Pen, pen,” Charlie says.

&
nbsp; The kid rushes off. Charlie catches a glimpse of the girl’s red headscarf just before she turns down an alley next to a bicycle repair shack. The kid returns with a chewed up ballpoint pen. Charlie hands him one of the hundred dollar bills

  “Here,” he says.

  The kid grins like he’s won the lottery. Charlie takes out another and starts scribbling on it

  ***

  NOOR HURRIES DOWN the claustrophobic alleys of the camp, her notebooks held tight to her chest. With each gust of wind ever more dust coats her face and her headscarf edges further back until her hair billows behind her like laundry on a line. Noor prays she can get to their hut without running into a fanatic. There have been more and more attacks on ‘loose women’ of late.

  My bad, my bad.

  She can’t get the expression out of her head. She’s never heard it before. She assumes it’s an American way of saying ‘I’m sorry’.

  What an odious man.

  The American had amused her at first, but the way he had stared at her, blocked her path…

  Noor hears someone running towards her. Her heart quickens. She turns just as they come around the bend. A man bowls in to her, and she tumbles to the ground. The man comes to a rest on top of her.

  Her hands search for her assailant’s face. She scratches at his eyes, cheeks, nose, whatever she can dig her nails into. The man screams in pain. She shoves him off of her and clambers to her feet. She makes sure her weekly wage is still secure in her pocket.

  “Stop, please stop,” the man says in an American accent.

  The man raises his head, his face smeared with dirt and blood. He recognizes her.

  “I’m sorry,” he says. “I didn’t mean to scare you.”

  “You didn’t,” she says.

  She gathers up her fallen books. The man tries to help her.

  “Don’t,” she says.

  She gets up and sees him standing there with the mango in his hand.

  “I just had to find you,” he says. “You’re the most beautiful woman I’ve ever laid eyes on.”

  Noor gives him a withering glare and turns for home.

  “Wait, you forgot something,” he says.

  “Keep the mango,” she says.

  “No, something else.”

  Noor looks back. The American is holding out a piece of paper. Down the way she hears some men approaching. She edges over to him and snatches the piece of paper. She hurries away and doesn’t stop until she’s outside their hut. She stands there with her back against the wall and gathers herself. If it wasn’t for the paper in her hand she could be convinced that she’d just had an hallucinatory experience.

  She pushes open the corrugated metal door and steps inside. It’s hotter in the hut than it is outside. Her father sits on a stool reading by the light of a flickering lamp. Bushra squats nearby stirring daal in a blackened pot.

  “Evening my love,” her father says.

  Noor nods a greeting, and her father rises.

  “We’ll leave you to bathe. Come on Bushra”

  He opens the door and a gust of wind rushes in. Noor places the books on the floor and unfolds the crumpled piece of paper. It’s a hundred rupee bill. She turns it over and sees the man has written on it.

  ‘If you’re married or engaged—’

  Those words alone make her shiver.

  ‘Please throw this away.’

  It’s what I should’ve done. In fact I should’ve never taken it in the first place.

  ‘But if you aren’t, maybe we could meet tomorrow at 5PM in the lobby of the Pearl Continental.’

  Of course, the Pearl Continental; the greatest den of inequity in the whole of Peshawar.

  “Noor, you done yet?” Bushra shouts.

  “Nearly,” she shouts back.

  At the bottom he’s scrawled his name. Charlie Matthews.

  Noor stuffs the bill in her pocket with her wage. She glances at the circular metal tub in the corner, the soap scum on its surface evidence that Bushra and her father have already used it. Noor undresses and hangs her clothes on a nail on the wall. She steps into the tub and using a thin bar of soap scrubs her body as hard as she can.

  Was this Charlie Matthews trying to buy my services? Does he really think an Afghan girl’s honor can be bought so cheap?

  She shudders knowing that many are. She dries herself with a towel and puts on her nighttime shalwar kameez. She retrieves the bills and puts them in her pocket.

  “I’m done,” she shouts.

  Her father and sister waste little time in coming inside. They sit down on the floor mat, and Bushra doles out the daal. They each say a short prayer. Noor places a spoonful in her mouth and chews it over and over. She learned long ago that it makes the dish seem more substantial than it truly is.

  “Are you unwell my love?” her father says.

  Noor continues to stare at her food.

  “Noor.”

  She looks up. Her father is peering over his reading glasses at her.

  “You seem out of sorts, my dear.”

  “No. A little tired perhaps, but I’m otherwise fine.”

  Making sure not to hand over the bill the American gave her, she gives four hundred rupees to her father and one hundred to her sister.

  “Here,” she says.

  “You have given me too much,” her father says.

  “Your British Council library fee is due this week.”

  “Given our changed circumstances, I don’t need to—”

  “Baba, you know you’d be lost without your books.”

  He doesn’t argue. She returns to her daal.

  “I finished Midnight’s Children,” her father says.

  “That’s good,” Noor says.

  “I did not care for it much. This man Rushdie, his storytelling is too convoluted for my taste.”

  Noor doesn’t say anything.

  “I do not mean to denigrate his writing ability, his characters are marvelous; I just think he digresses too much.”

  “Fine, he’s not for you,” Noor says.

  Silence returns to their dinner.

  “That’s it,” her father says. “You told me you loved it.”

  “I did, you didn’t, what else is there to say?”

  “I don’t know how either of you can read that man’s books,” Bushra says. “He’s an enemy of Islam?”

  Noor can’t help but be drawn to Bushra’s plate. Bushra never fails to give herself the largest portion.

  “Why do you say that?” Noor says.

  “Mullah Razzaq says so,” Bushra says.

  “Mullah Razzaq is illiterate. He hasn’t read The Quran let alone The Satanic Verses?”

  “Have you?”

  “No. Hence why I have no way of knowing if Salman Rushdie is an apostate or not.”

  Noor picks up her plate and places it in the tub. She lays out her prayer mat and performs the Isha prayer. She feels her irritation seep away. By the time she finishes, Bushra is in the midst of her own set of rakkahs. Noor retrieves her mattress from against the wall and lies down. It’s so thin she often wonders why she doesn’t just sleep on the earthen floor. Noor looks at her father; he’s pretending to read, but she knows he’s watching her.

  “Night, Baba,” she says.

  “Night, my love.”

  He returns to his book. She turns her back on him and slips her hand into her pocket and pulls out the hundred-rupee bill. She stuffs it into a slit in her mattress. It can stay there with the other three hundred and twenty seven rupees in her emergency fund. She closes her eyes and tries her best to go to sleep, but soon images of the American infect her mind. She sits up and searches for her shoes.

  “I’m going for a walk.”

  “On tonight of all nights?” her father says.

  “It’s just wind, Baba, nothing more.”

  Noor shoves the door open and heads out into the graveyard. The eucalyptus trees’ leaves rustle in the wind, and the flags that mark the graves flap like sa
ils in a storm. Her eyes adjust to the dark, and she notices a pack of dogs coming her way. They alter their course and go around her. She prays they stay away from the rabbit. For her part, she has no worries about her own safety. Muslims may not believe in ghosts, but she hasn’t come across one yet who would willingly go into a graveyard at night.

  Except you, a voice in her head says.

  Yes, except me.

  She comes upon a crude headstone and kneels in front of it. Carved into its face in childish lettering is her mother’s name‌—‌Mariam Khan. Noor closes her eyes and searches for her mother’s face. Of late it’s become harder to recall, as if all memory of her mother is seeping away. Back in the camp a corrugated roof comes loose and clatters to the ground.

  “Mamaan, I think I’m starting to lose my mind. I feel the world encroaching upon me from every angle. There are times recently when I feel like I can’t breathe, worse yet I no longer know where to look, for fear of attracting trouble. I’ve lost all patience. I mean look how I lashed out at Bushra just now, at the administrator this morning.”

  The American’s face appears front and center in her brain, and she squeezes her eyes tight.

  “What’s going on, Mamaan? Please tell me. What did we do to bring this on ourselves? How much longer can I be expected to hang on?”

  There is no answer. She pushes herself back up and stares at the gravestone. She’s always wondered what happened to her mother’s body. She assumes she was dumped in an unmarked grave, perhaps into the same one they tossed Aunt Sabha and Uncle Aasif.

  “I love you, Mamaan,” she says.

  Noor stands and comes upon a worn path. The American’s image once again appears. She quickens her pace.

  Forget about him. He’s not worth it.

  She breathes in through her nose and lengthens her stride. Her arms swing back and forth, and the graves fly past her like ships in the night. The American recedes further from her consciousness until at last, to her relief, he’s forgotten altogether.

  SEVEN

  CHARLIE AND WALI stand inside the lobby and observe the new recruits. Charlie glances at his watch‌—‌four ten; still plenty of time before he has to head off to the Pearl Continental. He has a good feeling the girl will come.

  After all she didn’t say no.

  “Admit it,” he says to Wali, “this is a better bunch of guys.”