by Hamed Amiri
I felt my heart racing and I wondered if Hussein’s was too. I hoped not, for his sake. I watched as the door to his classroom opened, and I heard a voice from inside say his name.
The door closed behind him. So now it was my turn. By now I wasn’t just a bit nervous. I was in full fight-or-flight mode, heart pounding and battling the feeling of wanting to run away. But I couldn’t run – I was being ushered towards my classroom. My only option was to face the challenge just like Hussein had. A rush of adrenaline ran through my body. Even though I knew there wouldn’t be anything dangerous behind that door, it was like my body thought there would be.
As the door opened, my eyes darted around the room, looking for potential threats. I needed an escape plan. Even when the kind teacher seemed to be asking me how I was, I thought he must be going to do something bad. I just couldn’t wait to get out of there.
At lunchtime, when we all took a break, all I wanted to do was get back to Hussein. ‘Where’s my brother? Can you take me to my brother?’ I asked a volunteer. She seemed to know I was serious and took me to find Hussein. We had to go through a maze of rooms and doors and eventually we came to a little office area. Hussein was waiting for me, and I rushed up to him, the anger finally leaving my body.
‘What’s happened?’ he asked.
‘This place, bro! It gives me the creeps. Why are they so nice? What do they want?’ I realised I sounded like a lunatic.
Hussein seemed to understand. ‘Look, this is a chance for us to start over. They’re not like the people we’ve met, you’ve got to give them a chance.’ He took me over to the window and spoke in a whisper. ‘We promised to stick together right?’
‘I know,’ I hissed, ‘but you didn’t see the way they looked at me!’
Hussein laughed. ‘Look, they’ve been so kind to us,’ he said. ‘Don’t overthink it. Be thankful.’
Hussein smiled. He knew I was just spooked by everyone being so kind. Gradually his presence helped me to calm down. We’d been through such a lot together, he and I, and if I could trust anyone it was my big brother. He said we’d better go then, as it was time for our next class.
‘I’m not sure where we are,’ I said.
He shrugged. ‘Neither am I.’
When we eventually found our next classes and went our separate ways, something kept going through my mind. Hussein had said we had to be grateful. This had annoyed me – Mum and Dad had been through so much and tried so hard to get us here, it hadn’t been handed to us on a plate. But then I realised he didn’t mean that. He meant his illness. We should be grateful that we could go to school at all. Here was Hussein, in his uniform and starting his classes, but there was a possibility that he wouldn’t be able to stay until the end of term. I’d forgotten how delicate his health was right now, and that Mum and Dad were trying to get him to see a specialist. If they wanted to operate, he’d be too sick to stay in school. I decided to stay positive.
Finally the school day was over and I was reunited with Hussein and Hessam back in the minibus. ‘Homewards!’ shouted Hussein. I still hadn’t got used to the word ‘home’ – it felt weird to call it that after all this time.
When we got back to the apartment Mum and Dad were waiting for us. Mum hugged us and said she’d felt lost without us and I realised that we’d spent every minute of the day with each other for the past year. Maybe that was why I’d found school so hard too. Dad said it had been a nightmare to keep Mum’s mind off it.
I didn’t tell Mum and Dad how I really felt that day and Hussein didn’t either. We just told them all about our days – about the new equipment we’d never seen before, the teachers and the other kids. What happened at lunchtime would be just between me and Hussein.
I think there was a lot of pretending during those first few weeks. I pretended I was ok at school so as not to worry Mum and Dad, but really I was struggling. I wasn’t coping well with the language barrier, and found it really hard to communicate with anyone other than the volunteer translators. I could tell Mum and Dad were keeping something from us too. Every time we asked about Hussein’s treatment and when he’d be seeing a doctor, they said it was all in hand. But I could tell how stressed they were. The phone calls they were making were getting nowhere. Why couldn’t a specialist make time for Hussein? Mum and Dad said they’d be waiting for him at the hospital. I started to realise that when Mum and Dad had told us there were doctors here they hadn’t told the full truth. Did they do it to protect Hussein or because they wanted to believe it themselves?
Then one day, we got home from school and Mum was there waiting for us as usual outside the apartments. Just as we started to walk inside to the apartment, one of the volunteers waved Mum over. Hussein and Hessam and I kicked around for a bit while they chatted, and when Mum came back to us she looked excited. But she wouldn’t tell us what had happened. She said we needed to go upstairs and find Dad.
When we got to the apartment Mum rushed us all in. I could see she was shaking, and she wouldn’t even wait until we’d put our schoolbags down before she told us.
‘We’ve managed to get an appointment for Hussein at the hospital,’ she said. ‘With a heart specialist.’ She waited, beaming. Dad was speechless. I looked at Hussein. This was the news we’d all been waiting for. Finally, someone would help us to make him better. Dad said it made everything we’d been through to get to the UK worth it. I hoped so.
CHAPTER 19
The hospital waiting room
We had a few weeks to wait for the appointment. In the meantime, the main problem was that Hussein refused to tell anyone at school about his illness. He said he didn’t want to be any different from the other kids. He wanted to be seen as normal. But I knew that at some point people were going to find out something was wrong. It turned out we didn’t have long to wait.
One evening Hussein was restless. Something was worrying him, so I asked him what was up. He took me into our bedroom and showed me his timetable for the next day. PE.
‘How am I supposed to do PE without having some kind of episode?’ he asked. ‘If I do, everyone will know there’s something wrong. They’ll think I’m a weirdo.’
‘You’ll be fine,’ I said, but even I didn’t believe myself. I remembered our football games back in the alleyway in Herat and how I would watch Hussein, always playing behind him so I could check he was okay. He was much weaker now.
The next day Hussein didn’t say anything at breakfast. The minibus picked us up and there were the usual jokes between the three of us. I still wasn’t enjoying school and Hussein was still looking after me. I think he quite liked it.
Because our timetables were the same for PE, I’d be doing the lesson with Hussein. It was football. I couldn’t wait – I loved football and, anyway, it would be a break from the intensive English classes we had to take. Trying to speak a different language all the time was tiring, and at least in PE no one had to talk much. Football was the same in any language.
As soon as I saw Hussein at the beginning of the class I could tell he was still worried. I also knew he was desperate to fit in with the other boys. We were already different to the others because of where we’d come from and how we spoke. He didn’t want to add a heart condition into that. The one thing that Hussein worried about was having to make a big deal of his illness. He’d always tried to play it down. He knew what it meant and what he couldn’t do, but he refused to make it who he was.
As we warmed up on the field I looked over at Hussein. He’d gone over to one of the teachers and was saying something to him. I was relieved – he must finally be explaining what was wrong. A volunteer who worked with us was with them too – he knew Hussein’s English wasn’t that great.
After a few minutes Hussein left the field and went into the changing rooms. The volunteer came over to me. ‘Hopefully everything makes sense now,’ I said. He smiled but looked puzzled.
‘Hussein’s just not feeling very well,’ he said. ‘What do you mean?’
‘Oh.’ My heart sank.. ‘Is that all he said?’
‘Yes,’ replied the volunteer. ‘He’s fine – he just wants to skip the lesson.’
I said okay and walked away. But I was mad. Hussein hadn’t told them the truth at all! When was he going to come clean? I wished I could tell the teachers myself, but I knew that if I did Hussein would kill me. I decided to talk to him on the way home.
On the bus, Hussein didn’t want to listen. I told him he needed to let the teachers know so they could watch out for him. I wasn’t in all his lessons and if anything happened no one would know what to do. He shrugged his shoulders.
‘I think my teacher knows there’s something up anyway,’ he said.
‘How?’ I asked.
‘He told me not to worry and whatever was the matter he was there for me.’
‘What does that mean?’ I questioned.
‘Don’t know. I guess it means he’s kind.’
‘You know you’re going to have to tell them at some point, bro,’ I said. ‘These guys care about you. They want to help you.’
‘Yeah, I know. I feel guilty about that. But I just want to be normal for a bit longer. There’s going to be a fight ahead for me, isn’t there? I can’t make my heart behave and there’s nothing I can do about this illness, but I can make sure I still have a good life. Anyway, I’m supposed to be looking after you.’
After that I changed the subject, chatting on and on about school, the English swear words I’d learnt and the nicknames I gave the teachers. Talking was my way of making Hussein feel that things were normal. But we both knew they weren’t.
Back at the apartment Mum was already cooking dinner. We teased each other and annoyed Hessam until Mum called us into the kitchen. She said she had some news.
‘The appointment’s tomorrow,’ she said. I turned to Hussein – he looked nervous. All these months of waiting and here we were – we’d finally get to find out what was wrong. Something told me that things would be different from now on, but I didn’t know whether they’d be good different or bad different. I realised that part of me didn’t want Hussein to go to the appointment at all. I just wanted things to stay the same. But I knew that couldn’t happen.
Hussein thought for a minute, then looked into Mum’s eyes. ‘Great. Let’s do this,’ he said.
Mum smiled. ‘That’s my boy.’
I knew Hussein well enough to know that he was putting on a brave face. But that was what Hussein did. No matter what the news or what he had to face, he was always calm. These days, it made him a good big brother to have.
The next morning I could tell that Hussein hadn’t slept much. He was already up when I got out of bed, and I started to put my ordinary clothes on. Mum came into the bedroom.
‘Hamed, Hessam, it’s time for school.’ She looked us up and down. ‘Why haven’t you got your uniforms on?’
‘You don’t think we’re going to school, do you?’ I said. ‘We’re the three musketeers. We stick together.’ The three of us bumped fists. Mum sighed. She said something about picking her battles and went back into the kitchen.
The hospital wasn’t too far from the apartment, but the journey felt like hours. One of the volunteers came with us to help translate, and I could tell that even he was nervous. The hospital was a big white building just like I’d seen in films, and I could see ambulances coming and going near the front entrance. We had to park a little way away and walk to reception, then follow a maze of corridors to find where we were supposed to be. I couldn’t believe how big the hospital was – how did the people working here remember their way around? As we approached the waiting room on the third floor I noticed Hessam had put his hand in Hussein’s. We really were going to stick together.
Once we were in the right area of the hospital there was more waiting, but eventually it was Hussein’s turn. Mum said we had to stay in the waiting room while they went in with him, so Hessam and I settled down for some more waiting. I almost wished I’d gone to school.
When they finally came out it was just Mum and Dad. Dad said Hussein had gone for a test called an ECG and then he had to have a heart echo. Through the translator they’d managed to tell the cardiologist, Dr Masani, about Hussein’s birth, the complicated set of heart problems he’d been born with and the operations he’d had when he was little. The doctor explained that the racing heart rate was called arrhythmia, and this and the blackouts meant that Hussein’s growing body wasn’t coping with his heart’s problems, and he wanted to find out more about what was going on.
Dad said we’d have to wait a few weeks and then come back to talk about the results. A few weeks? Why couldn’t they fix Hussein now? I couldn’t work out why it had to take so long. Mum explained that at the moment the doctors had more questions than answers, and they would need to do a lot of tests on Hussein to find out what to do. Worse, because his heart was still growing they might have to wait before they could fix it.
The next two months were like living in a loop. Hussein would go to the hospital for tests, we’d wait a few weeks for the results, then he’d go back to talk to the doctor. Usually that meant going for more tests, with the same thing happening each time. Hussein was off school a lot with all the appointments, and eventually Mum said we needed to tell them.
‘No,’ protested Hussein. ‘They don’t need to know! Just tell them I’ve got a tummy bug again.’ But Mum wouldn’t listen.
‘They know something’s wrong, Hussein. They’ve seen your scars. And you’re missing too much school. It’s only fair to tell them.’
Hussein looked like he was going to cry with frustration. I was the only one who got it. He’d been hiding it well for months, playing in goal instead of running around the football pitch, choosing cricket teams so he could bowl instead of field. He didn’t want to be the boy who was always poorly. That wasn’t what he was about.
Eventually, the day came for Mum and Dad to go into school and speak to the teachers. It turned out Hussein hadn’t needed to worry. The teachers were brilliant, making sure he could do as much as possible and not treating him any differently. Even Hussein admitted he’d wished we’d come clean sooner.
I couldn’t believe the effort the school and hospital went to to give Hussein what he needed. And not just Hussein – all of us. We were treated like royalty, and I couldn’t believe we’d ever been ashamed to call ourselves refugees. Mum said we belonged here now.
While Hussein hated missing school, it was obvious to all of us that he was getting weaker. Dad said that as Hussein was getting older his heart was growing too. But one side of his heart was working harder than the other, it was getting bigger, like a muscle. That meant the two sides didn’t pump the same, and the doctors needed to work out what to do about it.
I didn’t understand exactly what was wrong, but I remember Hussein explaining it to Hessam one day. He held his hand flat like the doctor had done, and described what a valve was and why his wouldn’t close properly. ‘He’d make a good doctor,’ I thought.
At the latest visit to the hospital the doctors had given Hussein a drug that would calm his heart’s rhythm. But although it helped with reducing his blackouts, which had become more regular recently, the drug made Hussein sick. His skin went a funny blue colour and Mum said his liver wasn’t working well. His eyesight was also getting worse. When Hussein had one of his episodes, the doctors would pump this drug straight into his blood. That made him feel awful, but I guess it saved his life a few times.
As time went on, the drug Hussein took and the way his heart was pumping made it even harder for him to keep up with us. Hessam, always the little one who whinged and moaned, was becoming strong and sporty. It was Hussein who was getting left behind now.
He was now exempt from PE, but he still had to manage the stairs and the trip to school, and over time I realised that even this was a struggle for him. It was easy to forget how frail he was, because he never complained. But one thing was for sure: although his real heart wa
s failing, his other heart – the one that loved people and made him brave – seemed to be stronger than ever. He juggled his hospital appointments and school, catching up where he missed lessons. Whenever I asked him if he minded it all – the appointments, the waiting, the machines and the tests – he always said we were better off than some of the people we’d met on our journey to the UK. He said to think of the people who never made it here at all, the people who weren’t so lucky. He told me to imagine what it would be like if we were still in Afghanistan.
All the time Hussein was spending in the hospital seemed to be rubbing off on him. He always seemed to be looking for a way to help people. Then one night as we lay in bed, Hessam sleeping next to us, he said he wanted to tell me about something. ‘You’ll think I’m weird,’ he said, ‘but it’s changed my life.’
He had been sitting in the waiting room at the hospital, when an old lady came and sat next to him. He said he could tell she was kind by ‘the way she smelt’. I teased him forever about this, but secretly I knew what he meant. He said she had seemed anxious, as if it was her first time there, and she asked him if he was waiting for his parents. He realised that he was the youngest person in the room.
‘I wanted to help her, bro,’ he said.
‘I realised that, although I can’t run around and do the same things as other people any more, there’s still lots I can do. I can show people how to be positive.’
He was right. If Hussein had a skill, it was positivity. All those times on our journey when I’d felt like giving up, he was the one who kept me going. It used to help me to think that if he could do it, anyone can. Looking on the bright side was his greatest talent.
‘I told her about our journey here,’ he said. ‘She asked me how I did it – how I stayed happy when things were so tough. So I told her.’