Red Leaves

by Sita Brahmachari

  ‘Ah, there you are, Aisha!’ the grey-haired woman called out.

  A girl with a blue headscarf walked past him, the same girl he had found himself sketching at school, and just the thought of that made him feel even more self-conscious, as if he really had been spying on them. Once she was back among the other girls, Aisha glanced towards him and he caught the look of recognition in her eyes. Then she turned to the grey-haired woman and back to Zak as if to ask what he was doing here. Now he was this close he realized that his sketch had completely failed to capture her. Maybe it was that expression of determination he had been drawn to. Something about the way she held herself made Zak think that if a gust of wind was to blow through here right at this minute, she would be the one person not to be blown off course. If he told Shalini any of this, she would laugh at him and say he was ‘putting the girl on a pedestal’. Maybe he was; after all, he knew nothing about her.

  You’ve got to say something. Zak was desperately searching for a reason why he might be standing there looking so gormless, because the words were out of his mouth before he knew what he was saying.

  ‘The homeless woman . . .’ He looked towards Aisha, and she nodded. ‘She’s over there,’ Zak pointed towards where Elder had lain. ‘If you’ve got any food to spare for her, she looks quite weak.’ He kicked at the earth for a moment. ‘I just thought, if you’ve got any leftovers . . .’ Zak shrugged and then lowered his head and walked away. Behind him he heard one of the girls speak. He thought it might be Aisha’s voice.

  ‘Do you know him, Liliana?’

  ‘No, but he’s right, we should leave some of our feast for her.’

  Zak checked his phone. It was already five thirty. He texted Shalini to say that he would be back soon, then returned to his news feed scanning the stories and finding nothing relevant. Zak wondered about Aisha and the other girls picnicking in the wood. His mum had reported from Somalia during some of the civil-war fighting, and he remembered the bloody images of wounded people and starving children, their bellies swollen with emptiness, hungry eyes staring out at the camera. Perhaps at one time or another the families of the girls in the wood had left all that behind, or maybe they had been born here and knew little more about it than he did.

  Just as he was approaching the metal railings that led back to the road someone bumped against his shoulder and shoved past.

  ‘Sorry!’ Zak mumbled, even though she had collided with him.

  The girl had matted blonde dreadlocks and a faint smell, not as potent as Elder’s, but stale and damp all the same, wafting from her clothes. On her back she was carrying a guitar. Zak almost tripped as something flashed past his legs.

  ‘Here, Red! Come on, girl!’ she called to a dog with a rust-red coat. Her strong, bright accent was uncannily like his mum’s. Zak wondered where in Scotland the girl was from. She threw a stick in Zak’s direction and he felt as if she meant to hit him, but the dog caught it smartly in mid-air. Then it came nosing up, its tail wagging furiously and looked into him with enquiring eyes as if sensing something of the turmoil raging inside.

  ‘Big Issue?’ The girl called to Zak, hauling her rucksack off and taking out a magazine.

  ‘Sorry! I haven’t got any money on me.’

  The girl shrugged and, as she walked away, he heard her mutter, ‘Then spare us your pity! Come on, Red – no use sniffing around him. We’ll have to sing for our supper!’

  Zak paused to scan a sign that he’d walked straight past that morning:

  ‘Home Wood’ is named after the oaks that line the paths, some call them Home Oaks. It’s an ancient piece of woodland, dating back to the Domesday Book . . . originally part of the wild forest that covered Britain . . . one of the few remaining oak and hornbeam wild woods in the city . . . Plague victims were also buried here . . . It boasts a wide diversity of flora, fauna and bird life. Fungi include the rare ‘earthstar’ as well as the ‘death cap.’ . . . It was declared by the Duchess of Albany in 1868 as ‘belonging to all the people of the city forever’.

  Earthstar? Isn’t that what the old woman Elder had said in one of her chants?

  Zak looked back along the path and remembered something that his dad had once told him when they’d walked through the woods near their old house together:

  ‘If these old trees could talk they would have some stories to tell us, hey, Zak?’

  When you thought about it, it did feel kind of weird to be standing in a wood that had been here for so long. It’s like I’m a link in a chain that winds way, way back. Zak liked the idea of this wood belonging to ‘all the people of the city’, wherever in the world they came from and wherever they were going . . . even the homeless people seemed to feel that they belonged here. Just for a moment, lying in the warm sunshine, Zak had felt at peace too – until Elder’s appearance. But at least coming face to face with her and the others had taken him out of himself for a while and stopped him from drowning in his own misery.

  As Zak walked past the grocery shop that stood alone on the perimeter of the wood, he was surprised to see a full-sized image of a dog chalked on the pavement. A man wearing a turban was taking a photograph of it with his phone.

  ‘It would be such a shame if it rained before anyone sees this. I tell you, that girl has real talent, if only she realized. Keep buying those art materials for her, Mala,’ he called out to someone inside the shop. ‘You never know, she could be the next Banksy, and then we’ll be digging up the pavement to sell slabs!’ The man chuckled to himself as he inspected his photo.

  ‘I just wish she would sort herself out and take my advice! Problem is she has no faith in herself,’ a woman’s voice replied.

  Zak paused as a large woman wearing a bright orange salwar kameez and a flowery pink apron wandered out of the shop sipping a cup of tea.

  ‘She’s caught the expression in that dog’s eyes perfectly. Strange! She can feel so much for this animal, but she seems so nasty sometimes.’

  The woman moved aside for Zak to get past. He glanced down at the drawing. On the bottom was written a signature in large swirly letters: .

  ‘You know what she told me, when I suggested she must apply for art college?’

  ‘No, Mala, but I’m sure you’re going to tell me!’

  ‘Said I should mind my own business! So I told her straight, I am minding my business. You are the one sitting on my premises selling your magazine, so you are my business, isn’t it?’

  The man laughed heartily. Then Zak felt a hand patting him on the back. ‘Ho ho! What have you been up to, son? Rolling in the leaves? Your mother will be after you!’

  I don’t think so. Zak tried to raise a smile. This must be the Sikh couple Shalini had spoken of – the people who had made her feel welcome on her first day in the area. As he walked away Zak read the shop sign: ‘Kalsis Woodland Store.’

  ‘Better shake out that mop of hair too!’ Mr Kalsi called after him. ‘You’re like a leaf magnet!’

  Zak meandered aimlessly along the road. So the artist of the drawing is Iona the homeless girl. Her name really doesn’t suit her. Zak remembered with a sharp pang his favourite family holiday to Scotland. Perhaps he was idealizing it now, but it had seemed as if the sun had shone every day on the island of Iona. Zak felt like turning around and heading back to his old house where all his happy memories were stored. It had been explained to him a thousand times that after the divorce they would still keep in touch; that his dad would have him for holidays in the States, that he would visit often . . . that his mum’s assignments abroad would have long breaks between them and when she was home she’d be around for him all the time. Loads of people he knew had parents who were divorced or remarried, but it still felt to Zak as if he’d been dumped unceremoniously while both of his parents had fled, burying their sadness in their work. What’s a home if the people who are supposed to love you don’t live there?

  As Zak waited at the lights for the stream of traffic to stop, the phrase from the sign about the
wood ‘belonging to all the people of the city forever’ kept playing through his mind. A sense of ‘belonging’ – that’s what’s missing, he realized as he walked towards the house that he was supposed to now think of as home.

  You can’t put this off any longer. Liliana printed off some new photos ready to stick into Aisha’s book.

  Sixteen children she had fostered in these last twenty years, since her own kids had been old enough, and each foster child had taken a little piece of her with them when they’d left. Sometimes she wondered whether her heart had regenerative powers: the more times it broke, the stronger its capacity to love. But after every goodbye there had always been another foster child. Getting too attached was the reason why she’d said that she could take in no more babies. It should have been easier to keep her distance with an older child. But no matter how young or old they were, as soon as she saw them standing on her doorstep with nothing but a teddy or a doll to cling to, they had her heart. She’d learned to steel herself at that moment, swallowing back the tears, because she needed to reassure them that they would be safe with her, wherever and whatever they had come from. And they had been.

  Liliana surveyed the flat where she had lived all her adult life. The area had changed over the years and now most of the houses on Linden Road were large family houses, but Liliana felt that she had made her own kind of family home here in these modest rooms that held traces of every child she had looked after. Just this kitchen was crammed to bursting with memories. That little pottery giraffe had belonged to Lydia with her open trusting face, those origami owls were the work of ‘folded-hands-just-so Stephan’ with his neat, precise ways. Then there was Salma, her eyes like great dark pools, the most beautiful baby anyone could wish to hold. Liliana picked up the cushion that had been one of Salma’s comforters and stroked it against her cheek.

  ‘How come you’re so into doing all this story-booking now?’ Aisha asked as she came in and grabbed a biscuit from the tin on the dresser.

  Liliana sighed. Here was the question she’d been waiting for.

  ‘You know, Aisha, every story has different chapters in it . . .’

  ‘Obviously! Why are you speaking all weird? What do you need to talk to me about anyway?’ Aisha placed the biscuit on her plate and studied Liliana’s face. When her foster mother smiled gently back at her, the expression in Aisha’s eyes brightened and she sprang up from the table, holding her hand to her mouth in expectation.

  ‘My abo is alive?’ Aisha whispered.

  Liliana’s heart sank. No matter how many times she, the therapist or the social worker tried to explain to Aisha that there was no hope of her father being alive, somewhere deep inside the girl still believed that one day he would come for her.

  ‘Sit down, my love,’ Liliana said gently. ‘I need to talk to you.’

  Liliana patted the cushion on the chair next to her and began to tell Aisha her news in calm, even phrases that she’d rehearsed many times.

  ‘There’s a family been put forward to adopt you. Your social worker has asked us to go to the centre to meet them. It’s just to see how you might get on. They’re Somali with a daughter of sixteen . . .

  Aisha eyed her story book suspiciously and pushed it away as if it had somehow been contaminated.

  ‘Just meet the family and see what you think. Perhaps it would be good to be in your own culture. You keep telling me I don’t understand certain things, and that’s probably true. It’s such a rare opportunity – you should at least give them a chance,’ Liliana continued, struggling to maintain her even tone.

  Aisha stared at Liliana and said nothing at all.

  ‘And I’ve been thinking. I’m getting older, Aisha. I have my grandchildren . . .’

  Aisha’s jaw tightened. She shoved the plate away from her and it careered over the edge of the table and spun on the tile floor then shattered. Liliana studied her foster daughter. Aisha did not flinch, the muscles in her face remained completely motionless. Here once again was the silent child that had arrived on Liliana’s doorstep. This is my fault thought Liliana I’ve loved her too much, too deeply, and now we’re both going to suffer.

  Afterwards, as she swept up the broken pieces, Liliana allowed the tears to fall. She threw the debris in the bin then sat down again and read over the record of the journey that she and Aisha had made together. It had always felt odd to Liliana using her own name so placing herself in the third person in the story and she’d often had to stop herself from writing ‘Aisha and I’ . . . but she supposed it was a way of keeping a distance. Now it did seem possible that Aisha would one day read her story book and see ‘Liliana’ as just a stage, a small part in her journey. She scanned the hundreds of entries, resting randomly on a few that caught her eye.

  5 January

  Today Aisha smiled for the first time.

  14 March

  Aisha spoke directly to Liliana. These were her words: ‘I feel safe here.’

  1 June

  Aisha has been drawing pictures with her therapist. She has done a beautiful one of her old home before the fire and another of her father.

  5 September

  Aisha’s first day in Secondary School. She was reluctant to wear her uniform and did not want to speak about her experience at the end of the day.

  31 October

  Aisha’s 11th birthday

  A difficult day. Aisha sat and listened to the missing person’s register on BBC Somali radio. She said her best present in the world would be if her father was found on her birthday. Aisha hates all the commotion of Halloween. She wanted to stay in and turn the lights off so that no one would call at our door. When asked why she wouldn’t join in, she said, ‘I have had enough experience of being afraid in real life.’ I Liliana made her a cake and handled the ghouls who turned up on the doorstep!

  6 November

  Aisha is reading fables and poetry in English. She reads the same story or poem over to herself many times, as if she’s trying to memorize the words. Her writing in English is amazing, completely fluent, but she’s not yet talking much at school.

  10 January

  Aisha has decided to wear the hijab. Liliana discussed this decision and she said it made her feel closer to friends and family back home.

  25 January

  Aisha and a group of her new Somali friends sang a traditional song in the school choir today. One line in it was a solo by Aisha. Her voice is exquisite. Liliana told her she could be a singer one day. She says she doesn’t want to be a singer – she’s going to be a lawyer. That’s not hard to believe!

  6 May

  Aisha has won a poetry competition at school. She recited a beautiful poem she wrote about Somalia and memorized by heart.

  2 June

  Aisha has begun going along to the mosque with some of her Somali friends and their mothers.

  31 October

  Aisha’s 12th birthday

  She has been given a small decorated Quran and a prayer mat by her friend Muna.

  Aisha listened to the missing person’s register again. She hasn’t done it for months, but when she blew out her candles she told me Liliana that her wish was the same as last year – that her father will come to find her on her birthday.

  Aisha and her friends composed music to a poem by a famous Somali peace poet called Hadrawi. They performed it at the school concert. Aisha’s voice was bold and clear and not be messed with! Afterwards the girls all came back and had a ‘This is not a Halloween’ party.

  18 January

  Aisha was in detention for being ‘too loud’ in class and chatting to her friends! For Liliana a day of celebration! No more silence.

  April school report

  Aisha received the award for most improved in English Literature and Language in her year.

  15 September

  Picnic with Muna, Mariam, Somaya and other friends in Home Wood.

  Liliana let the book fall from her hands and sighed. She would have liked nothing more than to
run upstairs and fling her arms around Aisha and tell her that she would look after her till she was an adult and ready to leave, that she had made a mistake even mentioning the possibility of adoption. But she checked herself because maybe the best outcome for Aisha was to have Somali-speaking parents, to be among people who really understood her culture and religion. It was true that increasingly there had been things that Liliana had struggled with. She had argued with Aisha about wanting to fast for Ramadan. She had worried for her health, such a young girl, working so hard at school . . . Maybe she had been wrong to stop her. Then there’d been this whole thing about wearing the hijab. She could understand that Aisha wanted to identify with the other Somali and Muslim girls in her school, but Liliana couldn’t help it, she worried that wearing her hijab might mean that she’d be treated differently. Maybe Aisha would be better off with a family that made her feel more secure in all of these things.

  Liliana tapped restlessly on the table as she tried to convince herself that this was the least selfish thing she could offer Aisha. She will have a sister and a younger mother and father . . . security for much longer than I can offer her. I’m nearly sixty for goodness sake! She’ll have a whole new life ahead of her, and in time she’ll finally understand that her father’s gone. She can always keep in contact with me; she’s old enough to make her own decision about that . . . These were the logical arguments that Liliana laid out for herself as she opened the story book again and turned the pages until she reached the end of her own contribution. This evening, when she’d broken the news to Aisha, had felt like an ending. Liliana’s tears landed on a blank page. She wiped them away, but they continued to flow as she thumbed through the thick expanse of empty pages that lay ahead.

  Linden Road was the kind of endless tree-lined suburban street that Zak imagined hadn’t changed much since the houses were built. What were they – Edwardian or Victorian? He wasn’t quite sure. But as he walked past the patterned tiled porches and stained-glass windows, something felt different from the morning. Even at this distance he could see that the new house had become a building site. In just one day the scaffolding had gone up and a huge yellow skip had been parked on the road outside. It was ironic really that their new road shared the same name, if not spelling, as his brother but Lyndon had left home for university, and Zak couldn’t imagine that he would ever come to think of the new house as having much to do with him. He and Lyndon used to fight about anything and everything, from what programme to watch on TV to who was taking up more room on the sofa! Shalini always said they could find anything under the sun to argue about, but now that Lyndon was gone it felt like there was no sun. Zak had tried phoning him, but Lyndon never returned his calls. It was as if he’d disconnected from everything and everyone. Maybe this was his way of dealing with the break-up – to simply leave. Simply leave – why not? Why haven’t I thought of that before? That’s what everyone else has done, except Shalini, and no matter how kind she is, she’s paid to look after me. Even if Mum’s back in the country soon, it’ll only be a matter of time before she packs her bags and is off again to another war zone or some crisis. There was always something and the problem was that every time Zak said goodbye to her a part of him really believed that he would never see her again. The memory of her packing for this last trip was still too fresh in his mind.