Once in Bledley, the militiamen, unlike the president, didn’t confine themselves to the military base, but roamed the village. They took homes among the residents and came to the market, looking for merchandise to loot amidst the empty stalls. In groups of four or five, they smiled often and asked questions about how and why certain things were done, who owned what land, and how much would it cost to buy. They visited farmers sowing seeds and wanted to know what each was for. The villagers gave responses only to the specific questions, without offering anything more.
One week after the militia arrived, the cry of a girl interrupted the dark night. My ears caught the bone-chilling sound. “Did you hear that?” I asked Sidow.
Sidow sat up in bed. “Do you think the children can hear?”
We both approached the children in their cot in our room. Since the start of the war, we had Amina and Adam sleeping with us. Sidow had fashioned a thick tarp over four wooden legs and placed it against the west wall. Amina resisted the idea at first. She believed she was too old to sleep near her baby brother, or in the same room with her parents. But we insisted on it, and after a while she reluctantly agreed. I placed my hands around Amina’s ears, but she was awake and pushed them off, preferring to hide her head under her pillow. Adam continued to sleep under Sidow’s protective hands.
I leaned toward Sidow. “That sounds like Owlio, Idow’s fourteen-year-old.” Their house backed into the west end of our yard. Often Sidow’s mother and Idow’s wife stood on either side of the lemon trees that divided the property and chatted or passed borrowed items to each other. I knew it was Owlio, because she was their only daughter. The girl’s cry for help was loud and clear in the quietness of the lonely night. I could hear her, as if she were in the same room with us. Her father repeated verses from the Qur’an. Their fear filled me. I tasted their helplessness, and experienced their pain. The father begged the soldiers to take everything and leave his daughter alone. His wife prayed, but didn’t speak directly to the men. I jumped at the sound of the blood-chilling shriek that came from the girl when a single gunshot split the night. The bullet silenced her father, but her mother’s subdued wails and the Owlio’s quiet sobs continued.
*
Under the rule of the militia, life in Bledley became even more difficult for all. Killing Idow and taking his daughter was a green light for them. From then on, the rebels and their followers took more and without consent. Men approached families telling them they were taking their daughters for wives, often more than one at a time.
“I have to marry a man named Ahmed,” Hawa told me one day not long after the militia moved in.
Hawa’s first husband, Ilyaas, had died two years before and left her childless. She had returned to the house of her parents, and we occasionally saw each other in passing, sometimes at the market, sometimes at town gatherings. We never talked about how she’d helped me elope, but I was always grateful for the part she’d played and the risk she took for my happiness.
“Do you want to marry him?” I asked, knowing very well she didn’t from the way she said it.
“He is almost forty and I don’t know him. He just came to my father and said ‘I am marrying your daughter.’”
“What did your father say?”
“What could he say except to ask what day he wanted for the wedding.”
I almost advised Hawa to refuse, to tell her father she didn’t want a married man fifteen years her senior, a man she didn’t even know. But I knew that was impossible to do unless Hawa wanted her family to be murdered. And even then, the man would marry her all the same. “I am sorry,” I said.
Hawa was not alone. Although many of the rebels brought their wives with them, they were still taking girls much younger than Hawa and holding several weddings each day. Hawa and her family were not allowed to celebrate her marriage to Ahmed. “I am moving in with him and his first wife in a week,” Hawa told me the last time I saw her.
*
The news of Hawa’s death came only three months after she’d married Ahmed.
“Ahmed says she died from cholera,” Hawa’s mother told us when we went to offer our condolences. “He didn’t even tell us she was dead until after she was buried. We are right here in the village and we didn’t even see her body,” she sobbed.
“I am so sorry for your loss,” I said, feeling the loss was also my own.
“I know he killed her.”
“You don’t know that for sure.” One of the ladies said it to comfort her.
“He beat her more than he fed her because she wouldn’t follow his rules. She told me herself. Last week was the worst. He’d beat her after she visited me. And now my daughter is dead, and he wouldn’t even show me her body.” Hawa’s mother cried throughout the whole mourning week. Each time we saw her she repeated the same accusation, and all we could do was listen and sit beside her.
Losing Hawa in such a way brought the danger closer to us, but we had nowhere to go. The civil war continued to spread through the country as each tribe formed its own army and claimed authority over its own territory. And, as if punishing all of us for their wrongdoing, the sky above and the Allah who ruled it, sent rain begrudgingly in small sporadic droplets. For the two years that followed their arrival, one drought-ridden season led us to another. Finding drinking water and growing barely enough crops to feed our family became an accomplishment for us.
The militia leaders sent men to collect what they called crop yield tax. No farmer dared to resist or say anything aloud.
*
“Two of the milking cows are sick,” Sidow’s mother returned from the cowshed with the milking pail half full. “I couldn’t even get enough for us, let alone some to sell.”
The sickness started with the one or two cows on each farm. At first, farmers slaughtered the sick animals, sold some of the meat, or shared it with others in exchange for grain or milk. But quickly the problem grew beyond one or two head of cattle.
“What do we do? Now we are losing herds of sheep, goats, and cows,” someone shouted across the hall.
Soon the animals were too sick for us to eat, and carcasses remained on the streets and alleyways for days, rotting and emitting putrid smells that made people sick. It didn’t take long for cholera to spread from infected ground water to humans. People died by the dozens, and Bledley earned the nickname the City of Death.
At first, we sold some of the crops to buy overpriced sugar, tea, and coffee, but even that came to an end. Two years after the start of the civil war, we were left without a single animal. Silos empty, all that remained were a few bushels of grain, maize, and sorghum.
“We have to leave. This is not home anymore. It’s our burial place,” Sidow said. “There are some international agencies helping refugees in the capital. If we can find a bus or cattle truck to take us there, we might get help. The roads are dangerous, but leaving can’t be worse than staying here.”
The following night we gathered what we could, some clothes, pieces of jewelry, a pair of shoes, and a pair of sandals for each of us.
Sidow’s mother stared at the house next morning as we prepared to go. “I never thought it would end like this.”
We allowed each other a moment to be alone with our thoughts and feelings about the place we called home. And then we left.
Chapter Nineteen
Tired and frightened, we arrived in Mogadishu two days and one night after we’d left Bledley. We had very little money and some cheese and dried meat. The large tents that we had heard had been set up at the Ceelgaab Market by relief agencies were nowhere to be found. There was nothing except desperate people in a desperate hurry, coming and going.
“Where is the help people told us about?” I asked. We walked through the market in a daze. The vendors had their merchandise on gray blankets spread upon the ground. Mounds of corn, beans, and potatoes covered the area as far as the ey
e could see. Swarms of flies descended upon people and merchandise alike, creating a deafening buzzing sound. Barefoot children as young as six or seven wearing nothing but underpants, rushed past us, pushing wheelbarrows and calling out their wares.
Sidow’s mother turned to him and said, “I know a friend of your father’s. He owns a business in this market.” She led us toward Idris’s Wheelbarrow Warehouse. “I haven’t seen him for more than ten years, but this is his shop.”
Idris, a tall muscular man, greeted us with a kind smile that felt out of place in this desolate setting. “I was devastated when I heard Moallim Ali died. I wanted to come, but couldn’t.” He encompassed us in his gaze. “I wasn’t as lucky as he was, didn’t have a son of my own, only girls, you see.” He extended his hand to shake Sidow’s. “Girls can’t be left alone, not in this city, so I had to miss the funeral.” He turned to my mother-in-law. “I am sorry for your loss,” he said and waited for a few seconds before he resumed speaking. “I heard Bledley has become a large graveyard for our people. You’ve come for my help, I gather. I don’t have much, but I’ll take care of you.” He turned around and picked up a small box from a desk behind him. He retrieved a little key and led us out of the office and to the back of the large warehouse that housed his wheelbarrows. “Come this way.” We followed him to a shed at the back of the building. “It isn’t big, but it’ll shelter you.” He handed my mother-in-law an American twenty-dollar bill. “Buy food for the children.”
My mother-in-law turned the bill over examining the foreign currency. Since the collapse of the government, Somali shillings lost value quickly and American dollars became the common currency. “Thank you, Idris,” she said.
The one-room shed was small and bare, but tucked behind the wheelbarrow warehouse and in the yard protected by Idris’s security guards, it was safer than anywhere else in the city. We ate a few pieces of stale bread, slices of homemade cheese, and the dried meat we’d brought with us. My mother-in-law and I shared two small prayer mats with the children, and Sidow and Hasan slept on the bare floor.
The next morning Idris brought us three straw mattresses. “Use these for now.” He leaned them against the door. “I have a job for your son. Work fitting a man. I loved your husband like a brother. He took care of me when I needed help.”
Idris waited, but my mother-in-law didn’t respond. She knew farmers relied on the land, not men, and she couldn’t ask her son to work for another. Heavy quietness descended upon us and the few seconds that followed dragged.
“I’ll take the job. It’s very kind of you to offer,” Sidow said.
He was up and out before dawn the next day.
“I counted wheelbarrows in the morning and counted them again at the end of the day when they were returned.” Sidow’s responsibility in Idris’s yard was demanding. “For the rest of the time I worked on mending broken wheels and handles, and filling holes in the metal drums with no time for lunch or tea,” he told us. “At least I am here close to you, and we are protected,” Sidow added.
Each night, I rubbed his body with oil to relieve the pain that was mostly inside. “I am sorry you have to work at a market like a boy and not on your own land.” My apology did nothing to reduce the sorrow that came home with him.
He moaned at the touch of my hand, but refused to admit he was hurting. The work here was nothing compared to hard farm labor. “I was on my feet the whole day is all.” He sat up and rested his weight on his elbows, as a forced smile crept to his face. “Your lovely touch has cured me now,” he said.
His words didn’t match the actions that followed. He kept a thin line between us on the mattress as if avoiding the touch that might propel us into something we didn’t have the privacy for. After a few nights of isolation, I had the courage to rest my arm on Sidow’s shoulder. It had been two weeks since the last time our bare skin touched. I waited for him to push me away, but he didn’t. He took a deep breath and I felt the rise and fall of his chest. After a while Sidow took my arm and wrapped it around his waist caressing it gently. He fell sleep after a few minutes.
*
“My nephew has come from the west.” Idris visited us in our shack an hour after Sidow returned from work one evening. It had been six weeks since Sidow started working for him.
“He is a relation from the wife’s side.” Idris spoke haltingly. “My wife asked me to move him here, but I refused.” Idris wiped his face with the back of his hand. “This room is yours. I won’t take it from you, but I’m afraid I must give him your job. I tried to encourage him to get a delivery job, but my wife swore her nephew would not do boy’s work.”
We were grateful to Idris for keeping us in safety behind his business, but Sidow was losing both the income and the security of working in the yard, away from all the violence in the city.
“I understand,” Sidow said.
Idris stood by the door. “You could deliver and still earn some money. I’m sorry. I know this is not good news for you, but I have no choice.”
“I will take the delivery job,” Sidow said.
*
The mornings were difficult for Sidow. He’d pull me close to him an hour before he was due to leave for work as if begging me not to let him go. The first time he did that, I turned around and asked him what was the matter. He mumbled, “Nothing,” got up, and went to work early. I learned that he needed me to stay still while his tears wet the back of my neck. He knew I was awake, but neither of us acknowledged it. Quiet and alone together, we remained intertwined until he was ready to release me and go to work. “See you tonight,” he’d always say with a quick kiss to keep from lingering too long.
Sidow’s journey through Mogadishu pushing a wheelbarrow filled with goods was not only hard, but it was scary. Explosions ripped apart one area of the city or another every day. The fear of daily attacks loomed over us each morning as he prepared to leave.
“I am afraid for you,” I permitted myself to express the worry I kept contained the whole day. I washed and dressed his bruised hands, but it was to no avail. The wounds that started to heal overnight would open the next day under the wheelbarrow’s handle.
“I’ll be fine, Insha’Allah.” He kissed my hands.
I prayed he was right.
*
Sidow didn’t come home at his usual time that night. It was dark outside, well past Maghrib prayer, and Mogadishu was not a city in which to be about after nightfall. Except for a few quick, fearful glances, my mother-in-law, Hasan, and I didn’t acknowledge the dread that filled each of us. I boiled kibili fish and potatoes, fed the children, and put them to bed. The rest of the dinner sat untouched.
Hours after sunset, sitting by the dwindling fire across from Hasan and his mother, I heard a motor approach. Cars didn’t usually come at night, so it was out of place. By the time we stepped outside, the engine had died and the lights dimmed, but shouts between Idris’s security guards and the men in the car erupted.
“You must take him to his family,” one man yelled before their discussion was reduced to a low murmur.
As soon as the vehicle pulled away and the taillights faded in the distance, the guards came through the yard, dragging Sidow by the arms. “They said he was attacked. He would’ve died if they hadn’t come upon him and picked him up. That’s what they said, but they didn’t tell us anything else—not where he was or who hurt him.”
Hasan and I took hold of Sidow, and the two guards walked off whispering to one another about how weird the whole thing was, and how lucky Sidow was to be saved by strangers.
Sidow was awake and groaned in pain at my touch. One of his eyes was swollen shut, and there were cuts in his left arm going up to the shoulder where his shirt was torn. We asked him repeatedly what had happened, what he remembered, what had become of his wheelbarrow. Still, Sidow said nothing.
*
“I came as soon as I heard.
” Idris stood by our cooking fire early the next morning. “You should’ve called me immediately. How is he now?”
“Better than we feared last night,” my mother-in-law answered. “Thank you for checking.”
Idris walked back and forth, many questions written on his face. “Who brought him back?”
“Strangers. We never saw them, but your guards did.”
“Strangers,” he said and left. He returned several more times that day and the following evening, until he could speak to Sidow. “I am so glad you are safe,” Idris smiled and sat next to Sidow on the prayer mat. “What happened yesterday? Do you remember anything? The men who attacked you?”
“I don’t remember much.”
“Was it before you delivered or after?” Idris asked.
“I think it was before.” Sidow searched his mind. “I think it was when I knocked to deliver and someone opened the door and grabbed me by the shoulder.”
“Don’t think. You must know. I lost three hundred dollars’ worth of merchandise and the wheelbarrow.” He pressed his lips together. “The customers are angry.”
Sidow’s expression remained blank.
Idris looked to my mother-in-law. “Your husband was a good man. May Allah rest his soul.” He raised his palms up in a practiced and automatic gesture of prayer. “Even he wouldn’t suggest I lose my property.”
“We are not suggesting that either, Idris.”
Idris kept silent for a few seconds. “I’ll walk away from the cost of the wheelbarrow, but I must have the three hundred dollars.”
Sidow’s eyes widened and his jaws clenched. “I was robbed. You know I was! You know how dangerous that part of the city is. It isn’t like I lost the money or did anything intentionally.”
“I’ve done the best I can for you, but I can’t walk away from so much money. You must understand I need to make up for the loss.” Idris took his eyeglasses off his face and placed them on the top of his head. “I have receipts, ledgers outlining the inventory. I can show you everything.”
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