It was a great afternoon, and although Yas was a bit shocked to see half the roof missing in our new home, she was happy to see how happy we all were. It was difficult keeping Anwar a secret from my sister; I’d never asked my children to keep his visits a secret, I hadn’t seen the need in that, we didn’t see anyone other than my sister, and if they did mention him to her then I would deal with that if it happened. I knew in different circumstances she would have given her right arm to see me happy, with the man I loved, but my life was complicated enough! I didn’t want her to know I’d made it much more complicated by falling in love!
Our children played and squabble as usual while we sat and chatted, and brought each other up to date on everything. She told me Dad was back in the village for now, but he would pass by her house on his trips to Sanaa, which was every week or few days to do his rounds to see if anyone had heard from me, or seen me.
She said he was still very angry, and according to him, he had many leads by now on our whereabouts. Yas felt this was just a tactic he would use to see if she would get worried and pass on information to us to see if we would hand ourselves over out of fear! She told me Nebat said he would tell her the same when he went to her house; he knew we were very close as sisters, he just didn’t realise how close.
There had been no word from either Ziad or his family, no word where Ziad was, or that he had any interest in finding his children, or if he even knew we were missing. This was good for us; if he wasn’t interested then we didn’t have to worry about him looking for us, and we had no clue to what his father was up to, he wouldn’t have taken my kidnapping his grandchildren lightly, even if he had disowned their father! This would have been looked upon as an act of defiance against the whole family name, his name!
Yas told us that even though Dad had put out word to all the family who worked in government to keep an eye out for us, she told us not to worry, because up until then neither Dad nor anyone else had knowledge of our whereabouts or intentions. She also said Nebat was going to pop around very soon for a visit so to expect her and to make sure I told the children so they didn’t panic again when she knocked the gate.
This time when Yas left she didn’t have to sneak me money, or wonder if we would be treated badly or abused as soon as she left the door. However we were now crippled by the knowledge that once our passports were available we were going to be separated once more, for what could be a lifetime. We were wary not to show our emotions as we said our goodbyes in front of our children. Me and my children stood by the gates and happily waved goodbye and shouted out that we loved them and would see each other soon.
Nebat came to visit a few weeks later; she only brought her oldest son Neshwan with her because she felt he was the only one she could trust at that time to keep a secret. Neshwan reminded me a lot of Tarek in his maturity and kindness towards his siblings.
He and Tarek stuck together like glue all afternoon, and it was so nice to finally see Tarek have some time to himself; whilst Izzy had my sister’s daughter to play with, and the other children had cousins around their age, Tarek was a little older, and wasn’t around children of his own age, especially because he wasn’t in school anymore.
Nebat was so happy to see we were OK, and was hitting herself at realising how close we lived to her; we were only around 15 minutes’ walk from her house! It was horrible to hear how ill Ahmed still was, and how Nebat was still struggling to cope with his care, Ahmed was still having angry outbursts since his accident, and even though she knew it wasn’t his fault, she was struggling to cope with him.
Even though Nebat was strong he was physically much bigger and stronger than she was, and she said it took all her strength to settle him down when he became hostile. She admitted she was starting to understand him a bit more recently and found ways to calm him down through talking to him instead of shouting at him, but his recovery was extremely slow, and drained her own health. She was also struggling financially even though she had managed to find someone to work in Ahmed’s workshop; luckily we had Yas, and just like she did for me, Yas helped Nebat and her family out with food and money whenever she could. It was lucky for us that Abdul was in charge of government food in the city where he worked, he would always help out families in need, and although we were not from his city at the time, we were very much in need!
I didn’t go into a lot of detail with her about what I was doing, because some of the details I found difficult to understand myself, so it would have been impossible to try and get my sister to understand. While I’d had a few years of education back in England, Nebat had never picked up a pen and paper, she had never been inside a school, she had no clue what a birth certificate was, or why we needed them. Nebat’s visits became regular, and of course she too had her own secret knock!
Yas visited as often as she could, which was around once every few weeks; sometimes she would drive to and from her house in Dhamar on the same day, therefore only staying for a few hours at a time, other times she would visit Abdul’s parents’ house and stay the night with them. They lived ten minutes’ walk from my house, which meant we would get to see her more than once, which was good for a change.
Over the coming months things were good, the children were happy because they felt safe and loved, and I felt safe and loved. Anwar was coming around a few evenings a week, he wouldn’t come until late afternoon because by then I’d be sure that neither Yas nor Nebat would turn up; women only went out to socialise early afternoon, or between certain times in the city.
The children would fight to get to the gate when they heard Anwar’s knock and would hang on to his every word; they never stopped smiling when he was around, neither did I. We both made sure that he was always gone by sunrise and that my children always woke up with me asleep beside them.
We had previously spoken about plans for him to apply for a British visa on his passport; his was Sudanese and for some reason he was refused a visa from Yemen to Britain on his passport. He thought that he would have a better chance if he applied for a Yemeni passport, and then apply for a British visa, that way he could follow us once we had left for England.
We had also spoken of the possibility that things could turn out differently, and that we could be separated for life. We were both OK with that; although it was something neither of us wanted, we both understood enough to know it could happen. We spent almost every moment together awake, chatting, laughing, giggling, nodding off and then waking up, because we never wanted to waste a single second together.
Every time my pay cheque came in I made sure I took my children out to the night market and bought them something nice; it was a way of me showing them that things could be good, if you just put your mind to it and never give up. I was always cautious of our surroundings when we were out together in the night market; this wasn’t like the small side street daily market where we would buy our groceries, this was a big market, brightly lit street stalls in the busy main streets.
They had lots of beautiful things in the market, a lot of which we couldn’t afford! The gold stores sparkled with the most beautiful necklaces, bracelets, rings and earrings, and everything else women love to wear to show off their wealth, there was Yemeni clothes, even a few western clothes. I would buy them at least one piece of clothing each and I’d also bought myself a few treats; I had a few cassettes by now, Michael Jackson, Madonna and Lionel Richie. I loved listening to music, especially in the room that I’d spend time in during the day, it was also the room I’d spend my nights in with Anwar. That room had a little window in it that was slightly high up, and if I lay down and looked up through it I could see the sky, and I could also just about see the end branches of a large tree.
Some afternoons I would lie down with the cassette player on my belly and listen to English music whilst I looked up out the window at the sky and imagined I was back in England. I could hear the children playing outside and I’d imagine we were in a park back home, enjoying our freedom.
It w
as around this time that I started finding English stations on my radio, and English music! This was when I first heard Whitney Houston and her number one song ‘All The Man I Need’. I remember listening to the words of that song, and immediately thinking how it reminded me of Anwar.
Time went by and before I knew it around six months had passed. Karen visited me a few times over that period and told me she couldn’t get birth certificates for the children, but had decided to put the children on my British passport; however, they still needed to find the person who would be willing to sign it.
This was a huge risk for whoever signed it because just in case it got out that the Embassy had helped me, they would need to prove that someone had gone in and signed my passport saying he was my husband. Karen reassured me everything was going well, and asked me to have patience, she told me once again to wait for her to contact me, although anxious that Dad was still on our trail, and wary that time wasn’t in our favour, I knew we had no option but to wait.
Yas had informed me that Dad’s trips to Sanaa had increased and he was spending more and more time staying at Nebat’s house; this meant that Nebat’s visits were becoming fewer and fewer. Yas and her children weren’t able to visit us as much as they used to either, as Abdul had been promoted yet again, and they had been moved to another city further away.
We were becoming more and more isolated, but I was thankful that at least I was working and providing for my children; but my luck was about to run a little low. One day at work Louise informed me that the nursery was closing. Something had happened and most of the children were leaving and going back to their home countries with their parents, therefore she could no longer afford to keep me working. I was devastated! I had saved a little money; I knew it wouldn’t last us very long, I also knew the chance of me finding another well paid job, if any at all, was unlikely.
Karen tried her best to find me something else but failed, and before long, we found ourselves struggling once more. Anwar hadn’t been able to visit for weeks by then, he had had to have another operation on his hip because the wound had become severely infected, he wasn’t able to walk, and had been out of work because of this. Although I told Anwar I was out of work I didn’t tell him how badly we were struggling; there was no point, he was also struggling so couldn’t help us.
In the middle of all this Abdul’s cousin came home from his army job to stay in his house next door to us; he was a very quiet and kind man. Whilst home he bought some rabbits, six in all, and built them a cage outside his front door, he got on well with the children and encouraged them to feed the rabbits grass from the nearby fields and play with them, and then asked them to look after them once he was called back to the army.
Anwar came to see us as soon as he left; he was walking on crutches, and he had some good news. “I’ve found you work!” he told me, all excited. It was in a small private hospital. It wasn’t as well paid as my last job but it would get us by, it was as a receptionist. I had no clue what a receptionist was, or what I needed to do, but I knew I would do it!
This job was going to be much harder than the nursery; for a start I couldn’t take Nasser with me, and I knew this would be difficult for the children. It was also longer hours. The next day Anwar met me to show me where to go and who to speak to; he had worked with this lady a few years earlier in a school, and felt she was trustworthy. She was an older lady from Somalia called Sahara, and we immediately became friends; she spoke really good English and put me to work straight away, doing her best to explain what I needed to do, or not do, as a receptionist.
The hospital was a private hospital for foreigners, and our job was filing papers and typing etc. I couldn’t type at all, so my job was mainly filing and putting things in order. Although the change was a lot for the children to take in they didn’t complain; Nasser was the biggest change to the routine, he was difficult for them to manage, but they handled him well. We struggled with food in our first month before my pay cheque came in and, not wanting to turn to anyone again for help, I turned to more drastic measures: the rabbits!
I knew the owner wouldn’t be back for months, and I could tell him one just ‘escaped’ and he would be no wiser, and anyway, we were very hungry! One afternoon I told Tarek and Izzy that I needed their help so that I could kill one of the rabbits, and because I didn’t want the younger ones to see me kill their ‘pets’, the plan was for Izzy to play with them inside, while Tarek helped me slaughter the rabbit around the back of the house. Things were going as planned; I’d been taught how to kill animals and had killed many animals before, in the Halal way. I thought a rabbit would be like a chicken, hold its arms and legs down, cut the throat, and drain the blood. Apparently not! As I cut its throat it let out a cry that sent shivers down my spine! Its cry was similar to the cry of a new born baby, and it made me let go of the rabbit, leaving it flapping about, all around the garden!
Tarek attempted to bring me back from my shock as I stood back covering my ears with my eyes closed, he grabbed my arm shoving me towards the dying rabbit. “Mum, it’s just a rabbit, you need to finish what you were doing!” he urged, but it was too late, the sound of the rabbit’s cry had brought the other children running out to see what was going on!
To try and spare them the scene of the rabbit in distress I hopped around after it, then listened to my children gasping in horror while I grabbed the rabbit and cut its head off; my hands were shaking as I held it upside down to drain the rest of the blood from its dripping neck, whilst I looked over at my children, who just stood there, their mouths wide open, staring up at me, waiting for an explanation!
I knew they were all hungry, they had spent the last few days eating stale bread and cups of tea, so with a very unsteady voice, and a fake smile, I shouted out, “Who wants rabbit soup?”
By the time my pay cheque came all six rabbits were gone; I hated killing them because of their cry, but it was something I needed to do to feed my children. We dug a hole next to the cage to pretend they had escaped, and when the owner came back and I told him his rabbits had escaped. He nodded and smiled, saying it was OK, and that he would buy the children some more before he left, I got the feeling he knew we had eaten them but didn’t mind. I felt guilty not telling him the truth about his rabbits after he had been so kind to us, and decided I was going to tell him the truth the next time I saw him, but I never saw him again; he was called back to work without notice.
Chapter Twenty Three
A Promise to Myself
Anwar continued to come over to the house a few times a week, and whilst there he taught the children how to read and write. Tarek was his main pupil as he had been to school before and already knew a little, while the others mainly drew pictures and played. He was still waiting to hear if he was entitled to a Yemeni passport or not and we had been in hiding for nearly nine months when we got a visit from Karen. When I opened the gate she had the biggest smile on her face.
“We did it. We did it!”
She grabbed me and hugged me as I repeatedly asked her, “Did what? What? What?”
“We found someone!” she said happily, as she led me inside the house. Karen told me that they had found someone willing to pretend to be my husband, someone who had agreed to sign for all my children to leave Yemen on my passport.
I couldn’t sit still with joy; I was asking question after question, why would he do this? What does he get in return? Who is he? Do I meet him? When can we go?
She revealed that she had misjudged my father in-law’s position in Sanaa, or how powerful he was! She told me that this man was a sworn enemy of his, and though he never had any intention of letting him know he had done so, found it fitting that he could hurt him by helping us escape. There were strong bad feelings between both families, but this man wouldn’t reveal what they were! She told me that this man wanted a British passport in return, and they had approved him one! She refused to tell me who he was, saying these were his terms, so I would not be meeting him.
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Everything had been done and approved; now all that was needed was to buy our tickets, which they would do on the day we would travel. We were all set to go, except now they had the task of getting us through security at the airport. Karen told me that they had checked out the names of security officials, soldiers etc. who worked at the airport, and found that a high number of them were my family members. It was impossible for us to leave right now. I’d always known that I had family who worked at the airport, but I never thought they would be the reason our plans would come to a halt! With a little encouragement from Karen, and a heart full of determination, I told myself all would be OK! Karen promised me that if they couldn’t find us a safe flight home soon, then they would find us another route out of Sanaa.
As soon as Karen left I headed for the phone box to call Yas. I told her the news and told her I needed to see her just in case they did find a way for us to leave. Karen had told me that if they found a window where they thought we could travel safely, they would just come for us without warning.
Yas arrived the next day, and however much she told me not to worry about her, that she would be fine. However much she promised that one day she would follow me, and we would be together again in England, I was worried! That’s when I started to question if what I was doing was right. I’d never questioned my wanting to run away before, never questioned whether or not I should leave the Yemen. I knew we needed to get away from Ziad, I knew we needed to get away from my father, but now I was about to leave my sister behind. I started to question if I needed to leave Yemen at all? I’d proven to myself that I could find work and survive, I could feed my children. However I also knew I still couldn’t keep them safe, we were constantly living in fear of being found and killed. I was torn. I was about to do the one thing I’d promised my sister I would never do, and that was leave her behind.
A Father's Betrayal Page 40