Refugee

by Alan Gratz

  The shortest of the three men in fancy uniforms strode over to the group with a big smile on his face. Josef recognized him from the Shabbos service.

  “Welcome to the bridge, boys and girls,” he said. “I’m Captain Schroeder.”

  The captain shook each of their hands, even though none of them was older than thirteen. One of the parents on board the ship had arranged for a tour of the bridge and engine room for any children who wanted to attend, and eight of them had signed up. Ruthie and Evelyne hadn’t been interested, but Renata was there, along with a few of the other older kids.

  Captain Schroeder introduced them to his first officer and the other crew on the bridge, and showed them what some of the gauges and dials meant. Josef listened eagerly. “This is the engine control for the St. Louis,” Captain Schroeder explained. “When we want to change speed, we grip these handles, slide them all the way forward, and then pull them back to the new setting.” He smiled. “I’m not going to change the speed now, because we’ve got the engines set right where we want them.”

  Josef noticed both handles were set to AHEAD FULL.

  “Are we going full speed because we’re racing two other ships to Cuba?” Josef asked.

  The captain looked surprised, and then a little angry. “Where did you hear that we were racing other ships to Cuba?” he asked Josef.

  “Two stewards were talking about it the other day,” Josef said, feeling a little nervous. “They said if we don’t make it there first, they might not let us in.”

  The captain pursed his lips and glanced meaningfully at his first officer, who looked concerned.

  The captain turned on his smile again. “We’re not in any kind of race,” he said, looking from Josef to the other kids. “We’re just making best possible speed because we have calm seas and a following wind. You’ve nothing to worry about. Now perhaps Petty Officer Jockl will show you the engine room.”

  As high up as the bridge was on the ship, the engine room was just as far down. After stepping through a steel fire door that had CREW ONLY painted on it in big letters, Josef and the tour group went down staircase after staircase, and they still weren’t to the engine room yet.

  Below decks was very different from what Josef was used to above decks. Where everything on A-, B-, and C- decks was airy and comfortable, there were no portholes here, no spacious cabins. The air was damp, and smelled of cigarettes and cabbage and sweat. Peeking into the rooms, Josef could see that the crew quarters below decks had two beds to a room, and barely enough space to turn around. The hallways were narrow, and the ceilings were low. Petty Officer Jockl had to duck as they went through doorways. Josef had never been afraid of tight places before, but the close living conditions made him uneasy. He felt like he was visiting an alien world. The seven other kids must have felt the same way, because they were all silent. Even Renata.

  From down the hall came the sound of men singing, and Petty Officer Jockl slowed. As they got closer, Josef recognized the tune. It was “The Horst Wessel Song,” the anthem of the Nazi Party. Josef’s skin crawled, and he and the other kids looked at each other nervously. Josef had heard “The Horst Wessel Song” hundreds of times in the weeks following his father’s abduction. It had gone overnight from an obscure song the Nazis sang at rallies to the unofficial national anthem of Germany—and it was frightening. The last time Josef had heard the song was the day every one of his neighbors had lined the street to salute as Nazi soldiers marched by.

  Petty Officer Jockl tried to slip the children past the little common room where the crewmen were drinking and singing, but suddenly someone in the room called out, “Stop! Passengers aren’t allowed down here!”

  Jockl froze, and so did Josef.

  One of the men got up from the table, a scowl on his face. He was a thickset man, with a bulbous nose, bulldog cheeks, and dark, heavy eyebrows. Josef knew that face from somewhere. Had he been their steward at dinner? Set up their beds one night? No—Josef remembered. This was the man he had seen in the balcony the morning of the Shabbos service. The man who had been angry that the portrait of Hitler had been taken down and removed.

  The man staggered a little, bumping into things as he tried to move through the tight little room. Josef had seen drunk people leaving pubs in Berlin the same way.

  “The captain has given these children special permission to visit the engine room, Schiendick,” Petty Officer Jockl told him.

  “The captain,” Schiendick said, his voice dripping with disapproval. Even from where Josef stood, he could smell the alcohol on his breath.

  “Yes,” Jockl said, straightening. “The captain.”

  On the wall of the common room, Josef saw a bulletin board with Nazi slogans and headlines from the rabidly anti-Jewish newspaper Der Stürmer pinned to it. He felt a shiver of fear.

  “Jewish rats,” Schiendick said, sneering at Josef and the other kids. Many of them looked at their shoes, and even Josef looked away, trying not to draw the big man’s attention. Josef clenched his fists, and his ears burned hot with frustration and embarrassment at his helplessness.

  After a few tense moments, Schiendick staggered back to his seat, the threat of the captain’s rank still worth something even so far away from the bridge.

  Petty Officer Jockl hurried the children along, and Schiendick and his friends broke into another Nazi song, even louder than before. Josef heard them sing, “When Jewish blood flows from the knife, things will go much better,” before Jockl ushered them down another flight of stairs. Josef’s legs felt weak, and he clung to the railing. He thought they had escaped all this on the St. Louis. But the hatred had followed them even here, to the middle of the ocean.

  With its huge diesel engines and generators and dials and pumps and switches, the engine room should have been fascinating, but Josef had a hard time getting excited about it. None of the other children were excited, either. Not after what had happened with Schiendick. The tour ended solemnly, and Petty Officer Jockl returned them to the surface, being careful to take them back by a different route.

  It was a different world below decks, Josef thought. A world outside the magic little bubble he and the other Jews lived in above decks on the MS St. Louis.

  Here, below decks, was the real world.

  Isabel watched as Papi, Señor Castillo, Luis, and Amara huddled over the boat engine, trying to figure out why it wouldn’t start. It had something to do with it overheating, Señor Castillo had said. Amara was pouring seawater over it, trying to cool it. Meanwhile, Iván and Isabel had been tasked with scooping the water back out of the bottom of the boat. The sock stuffed into the bullet hole was soaked through, and it drip-drip-dripped water onto Castro’s face at the bottom of the boat like a leaky faucet.

  They had been drifting north in the Gulf Stream with the motor silent for more than an hour now, and no one was singing or dancing or laughing anymore.

  Ahead of Isabel, her mother and Señora Castillo slept against each other on the narrow bench at the front of the boat, where the prow came to a point. Lito sat on the middle bench, right above Isabel and Iván.

  “You do have family in Miami,” Isabel’s grandfather told her as she and Iván worked. “When that news lady asked you if you had family in el norte, you said no. But you do,” Lito said. “My brother, Guillermo.”

  Isabel and Iván looked up at each other in surprise.

  “I didn’t know you had a brother,” Isabel said to her grandfather.

  “He left in the airlifts in the 1970s. The Freedom Flights, when the US airlifted political dissidents off the island,” Lito explained. “But Guillermo was no dissident. He just wanted to live in the US. I could have gone too. I was a police officer once, like Luis and Amara. Did you know that? Back before Castro, when Batista was president.”

  Isabel knew that—and that Lito had lost his job during the Revolution and been sent to cut cane in the fields instead.

  “I could have pulled strings,” Lito said. “Called in favors.
Gotten me and your grandmother off the island.”

  “Then you would have been born in el norte!” Iván told Isabel. She paused in her scooping, thinking how different her life might be right now. Born in the United States! It was almost inconceivable.

  “We stayed because Cuba was our home,” Lito said. “I didn’t leave when Castro took over in 1959, I didn’t leave when the US sent planes in the ’70s, and I didn’t leave in the ’80s when all those people sailed out of Mariel Harbor.”

  Lito shook his head at the tight cluster of people worrying over the engine at the back of the boat and thumped his fist against the side.

  “It was a mistake, leaving on this sinking coffin. I should have stayed put. All of us should have. How is Cuba worse now than it ever was? We’ve always been beholden to somebody else. First it was Spain, then it was the US, then it was Russia. First Batista, then Castro. We should have waited. Things change. They always change.”

  “But do they ever get better?” Iván asked.

  Isabel thought that was a good question. All her life, things had only gotten worse. First the Soviet Union collapsing, then her parents fighting, then her father trying to leave. Then her grandmother dying. She waited for Lito to tell her different, to tell her that things would get better, but he looked out at the black water instead. Isabel and Iván shared a glance. Lito’s silence was answer enough.

  “Someone would have done something,” Lito said at last. “We should have waited.”

  “But they were going to arrest Papi,” said Isabel.

  “I know you love your father, Chabela, but he’s a fool.”

  Isabel’s cheeks burned hot with anger and embarrassment. She loved Lito, but she loved her papi too, and she hated to hear Lito say bad things about him. But even worse, he was saying these things in front of her best friend. She glanced quickly at Iván. He kept his eyes on his work, pretending not to have heard. But they were right at Lito’s feet. He could hear everything. And Lito wasn’t finished.

  “He’s risking his life for this—he’s risking your life, and your mother’s life and his unborn child’s life—and for what?” Lito asked. “He doesn’t even know. He can’t say. Ask him why he wants to go to the States and all he can say is ‘freedom.’ That’s not a plan. How is he going to put a roof over your head and food on your table any better than he did in Cuba?” Lito raised his eyebrows at Isabel. “He’s taking you away from who you are. What you are. How are you ever going to learn to count clave in Miami? The US has no soul. In Havana, you would have learned it without even trying. Clave is the hidden heartbeat of the people, beneath whatever song Batista or Castro is playing.”

  “Oh, hush, Papi,” Isabel’s mother said sleepily. She had been awake enough to hear them after all, at least the last part. “Miami is just North Cuba.”

  Mami shifted and went back to sleep, but Isabel worried that Lito was right. She had never been able to count clave, but she had always assumed it would come to her eventually. That the rhythm of her homeland would one day whisper its secrets to her soul. But would she ever hear it now? Like trading her trumpet, had she swapped the one thing that was really hers—her music—for the chance to keep her family together?

  “We should go back,” Lito said. He wobbled to his feet. “We’re not too far gone, and with Castro being so lenient right now, we won’t be punished for leaving.”

  “No, Lito,” Isabel said. No—as much as she feared the loss of her music, her soul, she wouldn’t trade that for her family. She grabbed Lito and held him back. “Don’t. We can’t go back. They’ll arrest Papi!”

  Panic rose like the distant rumble of thunder in Isabel’s ears. But then Iván and Lito both looked up, like they could hear it too.

  It wasn’t Isabel’s fear that shook her deep down to the pit of her stomach.

  It was the enormous tanker headed right for them.

  Mahmoud stood in a wet parking lot with his family, a light drizzle making everything slick and damp. Down past a pebbly brown beach, the Mediterranean Sea churned like a washing machine. A huge black-and-red cargo ship slid by on the horizon.

  “No. No boat today,” the Syrian man who was working for the Turkish smugglers told them. “Tomorrow.”

  “But I was told it would be today,” Mahmoud’s father said. “We hurried to get here today.”

  The smuggler raised a hand and shook his head. “No, no. You have money, yes? Tomorrow. You will get a text tomorrow.”

  “But where are we supposed to go?” Mahmoud’s mother asked the smuggler.

  Mahmoud couldn’t believe it. They had spent two long days in cars and buses, trying to get here on time for the boat Dad had hired to take them across the sea to Greece. And now there was no boat.

  “There’s a hotel on the next block,” the smuggler said. “They take Syrians.”

  “We’re trying to save money. We’re going all the way to Germany,” Dad told him.

  “There’s a park nearby,” the smuggler said.

  “A park? You mean sleep outside? But I have a baby … ” Mom said, gesturing to Hana in her arms.

  The smuggler shrugged as if it didn’t matter to him. His phone rang and he turned away to take it. “Tomorrow,” he told Mahmoud’s parents over his shoulder. “You will get a text tomorrow. Be ready.”

  Mahmoud’s father huffed but immediately turned to his family and put on a smile. “Well, we always talked about taking a Mediterranean vacation,” he said. “We’ve got an extra night in Izmir. Who wants to go out dancing?”

  “I just want to find someplace dry where I can sleep,” said Mom.

  Dad led them in the direction of the hotel. All the shops were closing as they walked back through town, but Mahmoud marveled at how clean everything looked here in Turkey. There was no rubble, no twisted metal. The cobblestone streets were in perfect condition, and flowers grew in front of perfect little houses and shops. Shining cars and vans drove past on the road, and lights glowed in the windows of buildings.

  “Do you remember when it used to be like this in Syria?” Mahmoud asked his little brother.

  Waleed was gawking just as much as Mahmoud, but he didn’t say anything. Mahmoud took a deep, frustrated breath. He and Waleed had had their fights—they were brothers, after all—but ever since Mahmoud could remember, Waleed had been more like his best friend and constant companion. They played together, prayed together, shared a bedroom together. Waleed had been the hyper one, bouncing off walls and hopping on furniture and kicking soccer balls in the hall. As annoying as his brother had been sometimes, Mahmoud wished he would show a little of the old crazy again. Not even the Ninja Turtle that Mahmoud had bought for him in Kilis had cheered Waleed up.

  Later, in the hotel lobby, Mahmoud was still thinking about how he could get his brother back when he heard the desk clerk say they had no rooms left.

  “Maybe someone will share with us,” Mahmoud’s father suggested to the clerk.

  “You will forgive me,” said the desk clerk, “but the rooms already have three families apiece.”

  Mahmoud’s heart sank. Three families in each room! And the hotel was full. What were the chances they would find a room anywhere else?

  Dad searched on his phone and tried calling around, but it was the same story everywhere.

  “But how can they be so full?” Mahmoud’s mother said. “They can’t all be leaving tomorrow!”

  With nowhere else to go, they found the park the smuggler had told them about. But there was no room for them there, either. All the other refugees who had been turned away from the hotels were there, some sleeping on benches in the rain, others lucky enough to have tents—tents that looked like they had been there for more than a day or two. Mahmoud slumped in the rain. He was so wet. So tired. He just wanted somewhere warm and dry to sleep.

  “We should have stayed at the refugee camp!” Mom said.

  “No,” said his father. “No—we move forward. Always forward. And we don’t stop until we get to Germany.
We don’t want to end up stuck in this place. Let’s just see if we can find a dry spot for the night.”

  Mahmoud spied a thin Syrian boy about his age approaching each of the families in the park, offering them something. Mahmoud wandered closer to have a look. The boy saw his interest and came over to him.

  “Want to buy some tissues?” the boy asked. He offered Mahmoud a small unopened plastic pack of tissues. “Just ten Syrian pounds or ten Turkish kuruş.”

  “No, thank you,” Mahmoud said.

  “Do you need water? Life vests? A phone charger? I can get it for you, for a price.”

  “We need a place to stay,” Mahmoud said.

  The boy looked Mahmoud and his family over.

  “I know a place,” the boy said. “I will show you for two thousand Syrian pounds or twenty-five Turkish lira.”

  Two thousand Syrian pounds was almost ten American dollars—a lot of money when you had a whole continent to cross. But the rain was getting stronger, and there was no place dry left in the park. When Mahmoud told his father the boy’s offer, Dad was willing to pay.

  The boy led them away from the coast, to a neighborhood where weeds grew up through the cobblestones, and the houses had metal grates on the windows instead of flower boxes. One of the street lamps flickered, giving the street an ominous energy.

  The boy lifted a broken chain-link fence that led to a parking lot. “Here,” he said.

  Mahmoud’s father gave the rest of his family a dubious look and led them under the fence. They followed the boy to a large square building with boarded-up windows and graffiti-covered walls. One of the boards blocking the door from trespassers had been ripped off, and they pushed their way inside.

  It was a mall. Or it had been once. A large open courtyard with an empty fountain in the middle was ringed with storefronts that went up for four levels. A few of the shops were lit up with lamps connected to extension cords, and others burned kerosene lamps and candles. But most of the shops weren’t shops anymore—they were little apartments where people lived. Squatters in an abandoned shopping mall.