by Sara Alexi
“I know fire too, but not like you. When I was eight, I was given a chance to see if I was any good to get a job at the factory where my brother worked.” Aaman says, the picture still vivid in his mind’s eye.
"You give me four days work and we'll see if you are cut out for working here.” The man said, “If you are, I'll hire you and pay you. If you’re not, best go home and work in the fields.”
“You will see. You will hire me.” Aaman stood as tall as he could for eight years of age. His parents would be so proud of him when he came home with a job at the factory where his brother worked.
Four days, he worked at the back of the factory where paper and cotton was stored - rolls and rolls of them. His brother usually worked in the printing room but for these trial days he worked in the storage rooms with Aaman. On the fifth day, excitement ran through Aaman. This was the day he felt sure he would have a position with the factory, a proper job.
His brother was called to take some cotton pieces up to the laminating room. He pulled Aaman to one side. “You take the cotton pieces up, it will look good for you.”
The cotton was heavy and it took a long time. He walked slowly on his return journey, savouring his free run of the factory. It made him feel important. He smiled at the people he met, proud to work there. When he got back to the storage yard, he ambled up to the door of the storage room and everything looked normal. But as he neared the door, something felt amiss. He put his hand out to open the door, and a wave of adrenaline pumped through him. He swung the door open. At first it didn't make sense. There were orange tufts on the rolls on the top of the stacks. His brother was pulling these rolls off the stack and hitting them with his jacket. It was fire. Aaman’s body flexed rigid. His feet anchored to the spot. His jaw hung slackly. The smoke was filling the room. Aaman stared. His brother left the rolls, the orange tufts flicking towards the ceiling. He disappeared into the smoke. Aaman wanted to follow him but nothing would move. He stopped breathing. A shape came out of the smoke. His brother all but carried one of the old workers. A fleeting thought of how big and strong his brother was drew in a breath to expand his chest. Giaan carried the old man past Aaman and put him on the ground outside.
“Stay outside,” he barked as he passed Aaman. He went back in, and Aaman followed. He felt scared; he wanted to be by his brother. But no sooner had they entered the building than Giaan ran. He ran between the burning rolls, coughing and shouting to the men to get out. He came back with another old man whom he put outside. As he passed Aaman, he shouted “Get help!”
The blaze had really taken hold now, and the room grew dark and hot. Aaman hesitated before beginning to pivot on his heels when a stack of cotton rolls tumbled. They were very heavy. Clouds of dust mingled with smoke. A draft of singeing hot air hit Aaman in the face. He tried to clear the air with his hand. The rolls had landed where his brother had stood. As the dust settled, he could see his brother under the rolls trying to push them off. Aaman took a step towards him but the second step never came as he knew he was too small to lift the rolls. He stood there in horror. Giaan was waving at him, but Aaman’s ears would not open. He shouted again. “Get help! Run!” But Aaman’s legs would not move. All he could see was his brother’s eyes and his strength not helping him.
Then he was released and he ran screaming for aid. The old men were still coughing outside, and he ran manically calling everyone to come, to help. People began to stream out of their work units. First in curiosity and then in urgency. Aaman ran. Aaman shouted. The whole factory swarmed to the out buildings, the bigger men pushing to the front. Aaman ran and ran to every part of the factory he knew screaming for aid. Until finally there was nowhere else to run.
His legs could not move him fast enough to get back to his brother. His lungs cut like knives in their bid for oxygen. As he neared the store room, his legs began to wobble. He forced them forward, his feet twisting over onto his ankle. The door to the storeroom was open. Everything inside was fire. There was no life.
Juliet has stopped crying and finds that she is stroking Aaman’s arm. Aaman looks up from his lap where he has been staring in the telling of his tale. His eyes shine with tears, and the candle flutters between them. They sit in silence. Understood and understanding.
Juliet is the first to move, shifting her weight. They stand in unison, slowly. The village streets have hushed. Noise and laughter and light come in streaks from the shuttered houses. Aaman and Juliet walk in silence, snatches of conversation coming with each house they pass.
When they reach the lane, Aaman steps away. They stand opposite each other. The mutual understanding belied by the social distancing, the rigidity of conformity. There is a need for something to be said. But neither can find the words. The minutes of struggle themselves become the words that wished to be spoken, the understanding made explicit in the time taken trying to search for them. The tension releases. They both give a little, quiet laugh. Juliet turns to go.
“Goodnight, Juliet.”
“Monday?” Juliet asks.
Chapter 8
The sound awakes him. Some sounds have no call of alarm, some do. It is a deep, guttural, wet cough coming in spasms. Aaman opens his eyes. A clean shaft of light streams through the doorless opening onto the mud floor. The bunks topped with inactive dark lumps. Sunday, a day of no pay. A black shape on the floor pulses to the coughing rhythm. Aaman shifts his position, turning away, onto his back. The underside of the bunk above provides a canvas for the passing of endless seas of unused lives. Carved, burnt and scribed dates, names, loves, obscenities, anything to make an indelible mark, an anchor to existence.
Aaman turns another quarter turn to face the wall. Carefully, with little movement, he pulls out a loose piece of mud brick. With finger and thumb, he pinches the paper that peeps from behind. His rolled savings emerge. He replaces the piece of mud brick and, spitting on his fingers smoothes the surface, his night safe hidden. His money pocketed.
The coughing subsides. Aaman rolls from the bunk and stretches. Mahmout is still asleep. There are new men on the top bunks, lying on their stomachs, talking quietly, nervously, their smoke curling up in the stillness, around under the tiles, finding many easy exits. The air is stale and hot by day on the top bunk and cold and, if it rains, wet by night. It is never a bunk of choice for someone who has spent even one night here.
But the new men are always tricked. The farmer sells the top bunks for five cents more than the others. That gives the illusion of value. It makes him over five euros extra a week. He runs his Regen, a cross between a motorbike and a truck, on it. Better privacy he tells them, more head room, no one climbs over you, lets everyone else know you are a man of standing. The new men think it over and, with hope on a high, part with money that would be better spent on food. They never spend more than one night on the top if a lower bunk is free. Aaman never even spent the first night there. He did not con himself that he is here for comfort.
Through the doorway, in the brightness of the sun, the Nigerians are loading up for the day. One balances a carved elephant on one finger, another tries to retrieve it without a breakage. They laugh, the burden not so heavy for them, they have no wives, it is an adventure. They are tall, they are young, they are strong, and they help each other. Their trade is to make banter with the tourists and run fast from the police. Street sellers have no days off and no guarantee of pay.
Aaman steps past the bearded man curled on the floor whose sole-less shoes provide a pillow. The sunshine warms Aaman’s sleep-stiffened muscles. The Nigerians ignore him. There is a hierarchy even here. Aaman understands and walks past them into the orange grove to water a tree.
Oranges from the surrounding trees, his breakfast staple, are pocketed for the walk. The mud-brick barn drags all ambition from Aaman on a Sunday. The men talk of home, families they are not supporting, jobs they haven’t got. He can understand their talk even if the language is not his own. No, time passes too slowly on Sundays at the barn. He set
s out for the village.
No hope of work to rush for, no cold to keep at bay, the pace slow, steady, he throws his peel into the lush weeds and flowers by the roadside. Unseen tiny beasts make the high grass quiver as he makes his way by the edge of the road. A dog runs past, looking back, fearing reprimand, wishing for company. Aaman clicks his fingers, and the dog circles to approach from behind. His tail wagging and haunches lowered, he sniffs at Aaman’s sticky fingers. He licks his submission. They walk together, both happier for the company.
Juliet sprawls in her cotton-sheeted double bed. Sunday! A national habit of a lifetime frees her worries on this day. She stretches and yawns as noisily as she can before bounding out of bed. The cat resents the disturbance of the duvet, but pulls himself to standing. He greets Juliet by allowing her to stroke him before finding the warmest indentation in the bed she has left and, owning it, tucks all his extremities out of sight and closes his eyes.
The clean kitchen cupboard, which needs a coat of paint, Juliet muses, holds fresh, local organic eggs for breakfast, local olive oil bread, and a fantastic marmalade Juliet found online and paid through the nose to have delivered to Greece. But it was worth it. She flicks the kettle on and readies the coffee pot. There is just enough water from one kettle to boil the eggs and make coffee.
It is only when she lays the patio table that she realises she has no milk. She would like to be someone who could drink their coffee black, but, for Juliet, giving up milk in her coffee feels harder than giving up smoking did. She had achieved the one but not the other. She half enjoys her boiled eggs, but decides to go for milk before relishing toast and marmalade with her caffeine fix.
After covering the coffee pot with a tea towel and two cushions to keep it warm, Juliet slips into flip-flops. The door opens to the brilliance of the day. The village is alive with sound, the smell of roasting lamb coming from all corners. Music blares across the valley like a duel, whining, discordant, unfamiliar clarinet solos competing with hysterical bouzouki riffs. The music mixes with children laughing, dads shouting jovially, a background of clattering plates and women chattering excitedly.
The neighbours down the lane wave Juliet to join them. She motions “Later.” Greetings come from every doorstep and Juliet smiles from ear to ear. Her life is becoming complete, her dream realising.
Marina has left the shop open; she is in the back garden which spans the distance to her house behind. Between the two is an open fire pit with a lamb on a spit. Her family and friends spill from every corner and cover every chair, crowding in the kitchen beyond and creating a spellbinding cacophony of happiness.
“Come, join us!” Marina has rubber gloves on, holding a dyed red egg in each hand.
“Later. I need milk for now.”
“Take it, pay another time!” A child pulls Marina by her skirt into the kitchen. She’s gone.
Juliet walks back through the untended shop. Someone has been in and bought something, leaving the money on the counter. Juliet does the same.
Leaving, Juliet smiles at the sun, closes her eyes and focuses on the sounds of Greek Easter. The clarinets are still howling, the bouzoukia still manic. Someone has burnt something and the smell is acrid but drifts away. The milk feels freezing to her fingers. She thinks of her jug of coffee going cold and heads for home.
There is no one in the square. Everyone is with loved ones, everyone happy without a care in the world today. Juliet is happy for their joy. Content in herself, she turns onto the road. There is a man in the distance. She estimates they will cross at her lane end. She rehearses Easter day greetings and suitable responses in her head. She swaps hands with the milk. It is too cold. She walks and looks up.
“Aaman!”
“Hello.”
“Are you working somewhere today?”
“No, just walking.”
“Are you going somewhere?”
“No.”
Juliet feels prized like a winkle out of her Greek Easter fantasy. His loved ones are far away. No-one will invite him to eat with them, he does not own a house, and he does not contribute to village life. He takes and sends what he gets to his own village, his own life. He does not belong here. She knows that is how they see him.
“Do you ...” Juliet looks at the milk, starts to read one side of the carton, shifts her weight and gently shakes the milk before looking up. “Do you want to come to the house? I’m not roasting a lamb, but I was going to have toast and marmalade for now.”
“Marmalade?”
“Oranges in a sugar syrup.”
“Thank you, I have had oranges today. There are many oranges on all the trees and I have had so many. Every day I have many.” His expression tells her that he is sick of oranges.
“Toast and coffee then?”
“OK.”
They amble up the lane. Aaman silently offers to carry the milk. Juliet indicates this is not necessary. Juliet’s neighbours are all so busy they don’t see her pass. The noise of the chatter and laughter and music ebbs and flows as they make their way.
Juliet opens the door to find the cat is on the kitchen table again. Aaman lifts it off and looks at Juliet to see if his action is acceptable. She laughs gently and offers him a seat.
Aaman sits puzzling over the tent of cushions on the table covering a tea towel whilst Juliet cuts and toasts the bread. The butter from the fridge is hard and Juliet contemplates buying a microwave, just for these little jobs, she tells herself. She puts the butter on a plate and slips it under the grill tray to warm.
She joins Aaman and gives him toast. Aaman is still gazing at the centrepiece. Juliet laughs and throws the cushions back onto the sofa. Pulling the tea towel away, she says, “Tarah!”
Aaman smiles. The joke crosses cultures. They are both relieved.
“Are you OK from last night?” he asks.
“Yes, thanks. Are you? You were very brave last night,” she pauses, “and when you were a boy ...”
“No, I was not brave, I was terrified. I did not jump into action. Your baba was very brave to be in the fire for you.”
“I think for an eight-year-old boy you were very brave. My dad was a grown man.” Juliet pours the coffee and puts marmalade on her bread. Aaman picks up the jar and examines the contents.
“You say he is dead? You miss him?” He sniffs at the marmalade.
“So much. But I missed him more before he was dead.” She realises that to Aaman this will not make sense. “It’s a long story. Milk?”
Aaman nods before tipping his head on an angle like an attentive bird and then sits back, coffee mug in hand, as if he has all the time in the world to listen to her.
“My dad was the best.” Juliet laughs at the love of the memory. “He played with me all the time when he was at home. When I was very little, my mum worked and my dad stayed at home until I started school. Then they both worked. Mum came home before Dad but she …”
Juliet’s tone deepens and her face becomes firm.
“I don’t know, she always seemed cross and in a hurry, whatever we did. When Dad came home,” Juliet sighs and smiles, “it was as if all the hurry and all the crossness disappeared and we’d chase round the kitchen table and play hide and seek around the house. Mum would get snappy because the airing cupboard would get messed up, or her bed would be unmade by my dad pretending to hide under the covers. But he was great.”
“You were very younger when he died?”
“No. And that’s why it hurts. Their arguing slowly increased. It got to a point that they had no sense of timing. They would fight openly in front of me. I was at an age when I wanted to be with my friends all the time so I tried to go to other people’s houses after school. It felt good at their houses, normal.
“Then I would go back and Mum would be shouting at Dad. He’d see me and go quiet. She would carry on. Then he would leave the room and she would still be shouting. He would put his hand over my mouth and get me in an arm lock pretending to kidnap me and we would sneak o
ut and eat fish and chips at the corner shop and not go back until bedtime.” Juliet sucks on her lips to hold back the tears.
“Here I go again.” She smiles, but the corners of her mouth turn down.
Aaman rocks forward, puts down his coffee cup and rests his forearms crossed on the table, looks Juliet in the eye and waits.
“OK. Well, basically he left. I was thirteen. I became friends with Michelle that year. She really helped, we would stay out from school until late, be out all weekend. Mum didn’t care. She never asked where I had been. I would come home, full of our adventures and call her to see where she was. ‘Mum,’ I would call. ‘Yes, by some major error in my life!’ and my heart would sink. Even today, when I talk to Michelle, it always hurts. It brings back those times.” Juliet straightens her back and looks up at the ceiling. The cat rubs against her legs and she picks him up and absently puts him on her knee.
“I don’t think I am very nice to her. I mean I haven’t seen her for ...” She stops, closes her eyes, fingers counting. “Twenty-two years. That’s a long time, and I’m sorry to say I never call her. She just keeps on calling me.” Juliet looks at Aaman, fearing his judgement. None comes.
“Anyway, she was my rock that year when he left, and for many years after. I thought he had left without a word. I didn’t see him leave. He never phoned, he didn’t write—or so I thought.” Juliet exhales roughly through her nose, elbows on the table, her head sinking into her hands. The cat adjusts to avoid being squashed. Her voice becomes quiet and muffled into her palms. Aaman leans toward her to hear.
“When I was moving out of the house, I was eighteen and my escape route was college. They even paid us to go in those days, grants and so on.” Juliet unburies her face and leans her chin on clasped hands. She cannot meet Aaman’s gaze, so she looks at, but doesn’t see the painted wall.