Color Me Blue

by Ragnhild Yndestad

  I can feel the anxiety coming back as I curl up underneath the blanket, now that I do not have anything to distract myself with. It is dangerous, the woman said. It will be dangerous. And I am miles from home, from everything I know. Even my phone feels alienated in my hand, like something from another world, which I guess it kind of is. And then there is this truth, and the way both Arien and Madani speak, talk, a warmth in their voices, but there is also so much sadness there. It scares me. They are so real. Am I?

  I somehow manage to fall asleep, eventually, with my heart beating in my throat, and worried thoughts circling around in my mind like black ravens, plucking me from the inside. I have a nightmare, but when I wake up in the morning, I can not remember what it was.

  I put on my warmest clothes, fastening my hair in a bun behind my head, keeping my face free from any makeup. I look at myself in the mirror, and I look very pale. Invisible.

  Downstairs, inside the main house, the woman, Madani, has been so kind as to put out breakfast for me. Dark bread with cheese and salami, and fresh water. She is gone when I enter the kitchen, so I eat alone, concentrating on chewing the hard bread, trying not to think of what my day may hold, but ending up thinking about just that, and nothing else.

  Five minutes to eight, I step outside. The air is fresh, crisp as only morning air can be, and very cold. My breath comes out as smoke.

  I can hear the car coming from far away. The birds around me stop singing as the roaring engine approaches, sounding more like a machine gun than a car. I watch them as they fly away, the birds, thinking about mockingbirds.

  “So, what am I going to do today?” I ask, as I get into the passenger seat.

  “Good morning,” Arien says.

  “Good morning,” I blush.

  “So, the plan for today is that first of all, you need to meet your co-workers. We will go to the storage and sort out some clothing, and then we will go to HQ and discuss tomorrows distribution.”

  “HQ?”

  “Headquarters. It is a sort of meeting place in town, a building,” he explains.

  “So, we will not be going to The Camps today?”

  “No, never on the first day.”

  I feel relieved.

  Outside the window I notice that nature here, on the island, is really beautiful. It looks both exotic and at the same time a little northern. Vines, but the shades of green are cold, the colors pale.

  “How many workers are there?” I ask.

  “I think we are about 11 now, with you.”

  “Only 11?” I ask, shocked.

  He nods.

  “People in The West are getting better and better at following The Law,” he says bitterly.

  “And how many Easterns are there in The Camps?”

  “On this island I think it is a little over 7000.”

  I nod. I anticipated this from watching the news back home. It can be hard to give an exact number, because they vary so much. There are still coming in boats, and at the same time the winter cold makes many freeze to death. They do not have outdoor clothes like I do.

  We drive into town, and I stare. Where are the sky scrapes? The glass walls? The geometrical figures? This looks like one of those towns that used to be on postcards. Those small towns that have been preserved, for people to visit, and learn how folks there used to live, for fun. But this town is full of life. The small streets are crowded with people, and the air seems to vibrate from all the noise. Cars honking on each other, dogs barking, chattering, cursing, laughter. It is a bit like watching a circus. You hardly see anyone make any noise at all back home. People there walk silently beside each other on the streets, looking down into their phones, not noticing each other, not noticing anything. Here I see men, sitting outside restaurants, cafes, bars, drinking coffee or even beer, their roaring laugh booming all across the street.

  “Is there some kind of celebration?” I ask Arien.

  “No? Why would you think that?”

  I do not answer, I just keep staring, as if hypnotized by the endless life in front of me.

  I cling my hands around my seat as the car bumps up and down, making turns way too fast in the narrow streets, half-expecting to crash at any moment. But all the drivers here seem to be driving the same way, and none of them crashes, moving fast, elegant, through passages I would have thought impossible. No one seems to be following any traffic rules.

  Eventually, we stop outside a building that looks like a typical storage. Outside there is a poster on the door, saying ‘Ware House’, with a capital W and H.

  “Here we are.”

  I follow Arien inside. It is a small storage, and everywhere there are shelves from floor to ceiling. Boxes are pushed against the walls, filled with clothes, and the lights are dimmed, sparse.

  There are a handful of other people in here. To be honest, I was dreading to meet the other workers; the other criminals. In my head, I pictured them just as that, as criminals. Not the heaviest kind, of course; those go to prison. But thieves, rebels with skull tattoos on their arms, piercing in their noses, and calculating eyes. But the six folks, standing in a semi-circle by the boxes, look very normal. Like me. Kind, even.

  We shake each other’s hands, and I forget their names as soon as they say them. I have never been good with names. One of them, a girl with long, brown hair, seems to be my age.

  “So, what did you do?” a woman asks, grinning at me. Once again I am taken by surprise of the lack of shame, or fear, for breaking The Law.

  “I read a book. A flagged book,” I explain, shy.

  “That’s awesome! Where did you get it?”

  “I stole it from a museum.”

  “Really? Wow. Must have been a good book.”

  Her words make me feel a strange shade of brave, a little proud, even.

  “So, ehm, what did you do?” I ask, uncertain if the question may seem rude, even though she asked me first.

  “Me? Well, I let a stray come and stay in my house. It’s winter! He would have frozen to death if he kept sleeping on the street. And I had an extra room, so I figured, what the hell?”

  I’m out of words. A ‘stray’ is one of the animals living in the streets, in one of the bigger cities of The West. I don’t know how they get into the cities, but they come occasionally, sitting on the street corners begging for a few coins, or some food. Then one day, you walk that street again and they are gone. I don’t know where they disappear to, either. I guess The Government takes care of them in one way or the other.

  But a ‘stray’ is dangerous. That is, what is Public Opinion. They are lawless. They have already broken The Law coming in here, and what will keep them from breaking others? Whenever there is a rape or a robbery or a kill in cities with strays, it is always the strays who get the blame. They have nothing to lose, and they are wild, they do not have empathy. That is what they say, the public, the politics, at least.

  “But, weren’t you scared for your own safety? He could have killed you in your sleep! Or robbed your house.”

  She actually laughs.

  “Oh no, honey, I had known that guy for two years when I took him in, and I’ll tell you, he is one of the kindest people I have met. He wouldn’t hurt a bug.”

  I look away. I have heard of people like her. Sympathizers is the nice word used for them. But by Public Opinion, she is considered naïve. Insane. Or simply stupid. Many would even argue her naivety is dangerous, to herself and others. If it’s true, she let a stray into her house, I guess they were right.

  I follow her down one of the rows. We take clothes from the floor, fold them, and put them in the right boxes. Large, men, one says. Small, woman, another says. Teen girl, shoes. We sort the clothes in silence. I think she must have felt what I was thinking. I can feel her draw back, leaving the air between us a little colder. I try to smooth it over.

  “So, what happened to him? The stray,” I ask, while folding a pink t-shirt, fit for a child. There are many children in The Camps, or so I have
heard.

  “They sent him back east,” she says, motionless.

  We both know what it means to be sent back east. Starvation. War. Bombs.

  “He had a limp leg, from when a car ran over him in the street one day, while he was sleeping. He won’t survive The East with that leg. Probably, he’s already dead.”

  Her voice is bitter, but when I look at her, I see tears in her eyes.

  “Luckily, he’s just a stray. It could have been worse. It could have been a person,” I try to comfort her.

  She looks at me, opens her mouth as if to say something, but closes it again without a word. There is resentment in her eyes. We do not speak again that day.

  11

  The morning passes while we fold clothes. Sometimes it’s difficult to put them in the right box. Most of the clothes are old ones; they would be considered trash back home, and thrown. And this is where these thrown clothes end up, to be reused. But since they are so old, and worn, many of the labels have been cut out, so we have to guess the size. I am terrible at that. I can only guess my own size. The other workers are older than me, they have bigger families, children, and are therefore better with guessing sizes other than their own.

  I see that many of the boxes are empty. Especially, the clothes for young boys, teens, and small men. Also shoes. There are not many shoes. I don’t know why, but those empty boxes give me a weird sensation in the stomach, a sort of hardening. Conscience? I wonder. By holding these clothes it is difficult to think of them as animals. For example, when I hold up a purple sweater with butterflies on it, for a little girl, it’s hard to think of this as clothing for an animal, someone wild. I catch myself repeatedly holding the fabric strongly between my fingers, unable to let go of it, there is some kind of force that takes a hold of me, that seems to be coming from the clothes, or from the ghosts of those who will wear them, clinging to me.

  Around noon, Arien declares it is time for lunch. He disappears into his van, and ten minutes later he comes back with a couple of small boxes with food in. One holds salad, one rice, and one sauce. There is no meat. Meat is too expensive, he says. We all get a spoon, a white plastic spoon, and then we sit down on the floor of the storage, in a circle, and send the boxes around to eat. I feel uncomfortable when it’s my turn. I don’t know these people, except that they are criminals. What if they are sick? The last thing I want to be is sick while I am here. The fear and shame of being sent here are already more than enough to tire me out. But I’m hungry, and I do not want to come off as a snob, as a stereotypical, western girl. I can still clearly remember how Arien first thought my law-breaking consisted of stealing makeup and taking selfies. The way he said it, how his mouth shaped around the words, made it sound so stupid. Therefore, when it’s my turn, I eat, trying to look at ease, like this is normal to me. Already, surprises seem to be the normality here, and I am getting better at handling it.

  We eat in silence. I can feel the other workers eyeing me, somehow as if trying to figure out something. I get a weird feeling that it is me who causes the silence, that the others do not want to speak in my presence. But why?

  After the short meal we go back to work. Folding. This time Arien turns on music. I hadn’t noticed the small, black speaker in the corner. It looks like a radio. From the old times. I cannot believe it’s working. The music playing is old too. Rock songs, male musicians with husky voices, probably smoking during the recording. The mood changes abruptly. Arien starts to sing along, obviously familiar with the lyrics, and the woman who took in the stray, joins him. The girl who is my age begins to dance, while putting clothes into the boxes, her hips swinging from side to side for each step. I envy her elegance.

  A half-hour later, I notice a boy among us. Or a young man. I did not see him come in, but suddenly he stands next to me, folding a jacket. He sees me looking at him, and smiles, politely stretching out a hand.

  “Hello, you must be new here. I am Hasin,” he says. I take his hand cautiously, and a little confused. He speaks the Common Tongue, but with a heavy accent, and he looks eastern.

  He has the most beautiful eyes I have ever seen on a man. They are a piercing green, in contrast to his olive skin, his lashes so long and dark he could make any girl jealous.

  “Louise,” I say, returning his smile.

  “Did you come today?” he asks.

  “No, last night.”

  “I see. And how long will you stay?”

  “Ten days.”

  He nods. He does not ask me why I was sent here.

  “And you?” I ask.

  He smiles sadly. “Forever, probably.”

  I look at him, taking what he says literally.

  “What on earth did you do?” I have never heard of anyone getting lifetime in The Camps. That is only for those who live there.

  “Don’t be frightened,” he speaks in a low, velvet voice, as if trying to get a scared kitty out from under a chair. “But I am from The East. I live in The Camps now.”

  First, I do not believe him. I look at him, waiting for the punch line, for him to laugh and say he was just joking. But he does not. The silence stretches out between us, until it reaches a breaking point, where I know I have to speak.

  “Oh,” is all I manage to say.

  I don’t want you to think of me as inhuman, or cold. You have to have patience with me. All my life I have learned to hate, resent, look down at, the people living in The Camps, from The East. It has been a doctrine. And Hasin didn’t look like I had thought. His face is clean, and kind, and very beautiful. He doesn’t look like an animal, he looks human. I feel so confused. He must be some kind of exception.

  “So, what do you do here?” I ask, eventually, trying to make sense.

  “I help out sometimes. It is nice to have something to do.”

  Back home, we have more than enough to do. Evaluations, homework, job, Social Media. It is endless. Stories of people collapsing because of stress are common. A part of everyday life. I cannot imagine having that amount of time in my hands as they must have in The Camps. They do not have school, or work. They do not have Social Media. They simply exist.

  “What are The Camps like? Do you have hobbies there? I mean, things to do?” What on earth am I talking about?

  “Our hobby is waiting. And The Camps are terrible.”

  I swallow.

  “What are you waiting for?” I ask.

  “Nothing.”

  He walks away.

  12

  We drive to what they call the headquarters. I’m excited to see the place. Arien seems to be the only one who has a car, or a license, so we all have to press ourselves into his van, sitting on top of each other. I feel grateful that I am very small, even for a girl. I do not mind sitting at the edge of my seat. The closeness to the others, though, is a little trickier. It is so strange. I can smell them. Perfume, sweat, deodorant. I can hear them breathing. I can feel their skin vibrate as their hearts beat, their rhythm almost synchronized. But not mine. My heart is still beating a little too fast, like a canary bird’s.

  The van stops outside another, dusty old street. All the streets here look the same. If Arien did not give me a ride, I would get lost so quickly. This town is like a maze.

  I follow the others in through a door. The headquarters house does not look any different from the other houses I have seen. Not the kind of fancy, cool building I had expected it to be, hearing the word ‘headquarters’.

  Inside the door we go up a long staircase, straight to the second floor and into a living room, with a glass door that leads out into a small balcony. I notice there are flowers near the window.

  We sit around a big, round table. It reminds of the history class back home, about King Arthur and his knights, in medieval England. They had a round table, did they not? I think so.

  Someone makes tea, and I hold tightly around my cup when it arrives, my hands are so cold. It’s the best tea I have ever tasted. Sweet and fruity, like warm wine. I drink it greedily.<
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  “So, tomorrow we will have to distribute blankets. Most of them don’t have any, and there’s a storm coming.”

  Everyone nods. I follow their example. Blend in with the others, make no ripples.

  “They need shoes as well,” says the woman with the stray.

  “I know, but we don’t have any more shoes.”

  “Can’t we get some?” she asks.

  “No, not right away. We’ll have to wait for the next shipment from the mainland.”

  “And how long is that?”

  “Depends on how quickly the western people throw their shoes.”

  We are silent. The woman blinks away angry tears. Many of the others look upset too, and I wiggle uncomfortably in my chair, feeling left out, like I am missing some important point. I suddenly remember that the woman is called Mary.

  “So, I suggest we meet in the warehouse in the morning, pack all the blankets we got, and go to The Camps. Does everyone agree?”

  Arien speaks to us like we are equal, like he is not the boss.

  We nod.

  Chatter fills the room, and Arien catches my eye and nods toward a door. When he leaves the room, I follow him.

  We stand in a small kitchen that smells strongly of tea. There are no chairs here, so we are left standing in the middle of the room, in semi-darkness.

  “How has your first day been?” he asks.

  “Good,” I say, with honesty. It has been much less eventful than I thought.

  “That’s good. But today has been an easy day. The other days will be much harder. I want you to be prepared for that.”

  “I am,” I say, unsure if it’s true. I feel stronger, safer now. The worst part was the travel, the not knowing what to expect, going into the unknown. But still, as Arien says, this has been an easy day.

  “Good. So, some rules. You are not allowed to go to The Camps alone. You understand?”

  I look at him, confused.

  “Of course I won’t. Why would I?”